Kabir
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Who was Kabir?
Pranav Khullar, June 28, 2018: The Times of India
Kabir enthralled people and inspired them with his devotional poems and songs of love and humanism. He wrote in vernacular Hindi, which was a mixture of Bhojpuri, Awadhi and Braj. His idiom was simple and colloquial. He borrowed freely from Sanskrit and Persian vocabulary but his speech was direct and forthright. It came straight from the heart and appealed to everyone with its simple but insightful messages.
In the worlds of Rabindranath Tagore who has translated many of Kabir’s poems, “Kabir stood as one of the most appealing and inspiring symbols of India’s religious heritage.”
..... ‘Mo ko kahan dhoondo re bande
Mein to tere pas mein
Na mein debal na mein masjid
Na Kaabe na Kailash mein’
... ‘O servant of God, where dost thou seek me?
I am beside thee.
I am neither in temple nor in mosque
Neither in Kaaba nor in Kailash’. ......
Kabir lived all his life among tanners, butchers, hewers of wood and drawers of water. Their lives often saddened him. In one of his popular couplets he says:
..... ‘Kabir teri jhompri
Gal katiyan ke pas
Jo karan ge so bharan ge
Tu kyon bhayo udas’
... ‘O Kabir, you live in the
neighbourhood of butchers
why worry about them?
They will reap as they shall sow’. .....
At the time of his death, both Hindus and Muslims claimed Kabir’s body. But when the shroud was lifted there was nothing except a spray of beautiful flowers. That was the creedless master whose songs are sung in millions of homes every day. In a larger historical framework, the Buddha and Kabir can be knit in a single thread, both of whom brought a new vision and promoted a casteless and classless society.
See also
Kabir
