Pipa: The body is God
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Photo: Three Sikh Guardians of the Temple, Amritsar. Photographer Hannah P. Adams, ca. January 24, 1906. Photographed by an American tourist visiting Darbar Sahib this important photograph reveals one of the very early appearances of the modern khanda emblem. It is worn as a turban ornament by the Nihang on the right hand side.
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The body is God,
the body is the temple,
the body is the worshiper,
the body is the sacred shrine.
The body is the incense,
the lamp, the sacred offerings;
it is the body I worship
with broken petals.
After searching
all the world,
it was in the body
I found all the treasure
of the world.
Nothing is born,
nothing dies --
such is Ram's light.
What is contained
in the universe
is also contained
in the body:
whatever you seek,
you shall find.
Pipa says, He is Primal Matter;
the true guru will show this.
(Pipa)
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Source and Recommended Reading:
'Songs of Saints from Adi Granth'
By Nirmal Dass (Introduction)
Purchase Book:
Amazon.com
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Description:
This complete and accessible translation of the songs of the saints from the Sikh holy book, the Adi Granth, provides access to the hymns written by Hindu and Muslim devotional writers of north India, who flourished from the twelfth to the eighteenth centuries. The songs of the saints hold a unique position in Sikhism in that they provide the faith with a prehistory that reaches back to the dawn of north Indian Bhakti and Sant traditions. These works provided a ground upon which Sikh gurus laid the foundations of their faith. The songs also mark the earliest beginnings of Hindi literature. Although the literary output of these saints comes down to us in various stages of corruption, the works which appeared in the Adi Granth are unchanged since their inclusion in that work in the early 1600s.
This book is important for many fields: It is not only vital for understanding Sikhism, but also crucial for the study of the saints (sants). It is thus significant for understanding the early development of Hindi literature, which began with the sants, and the study of north Indian religion, in which the sants figure prominently.
(Daniel Gold, Cornell University)
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