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Updated: June 5, 2025
Almost all these teachers, whether orthodox or heterodox, had a singular facility for composing hymns, often of high literary merit, and it is in these emotional utterances, rather than in dogmatic treatises, that they addressed themselves to the peoples of northern India. The earliest of these mixed sects is that founded by Kabir.
Their doctrine is a combination of Hinduism and Islam, tending towards Krishnaism. The Kartâbhajas mentioned at the end of the last chapter show a mixture of Hinduism and Mohammedanism, and the mixture is found in other sects some of which are of considerable importance. A group of these sects, including the Sikhs and followers of Kabir, arose in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.
But when they raised the cloth which covered the corpse, they found underneath it only a heap of flowers. So the Hindus took part and burnt them at Benares and the Moslims buried the rest at Maghar. His grave there is still in Moslim keeping. In teaching Kabir stands midway between the two religions, but leaning to the side of Hinduism.
Whilst he sat with us, Kabir Khalil, one of the principal Ulema, and one Haji Abdullah, a Shaykh of distinguished fame who had been dreaming dreams in our favour, sent their salams. This is one of the many occasions in which, during a long residence in the East, I have had reason to be grateful to the learned, whose influence over the people when unbiassed by bigotry is decidedly for good.
Kabir came to the market to sell cloths from his loom; when the woman grasped his hand, blaming him for being faithless, and followed him to his house, saying she would not be forsaken, Kabir said to himself, "God answers prayers in his own way." Soon the woman felt a shiver of fear and fell on her knees and cried, "Save me from my sin!" To which he said, "Open your life to God's light!"
"Kabir is a child of Ram and Allah," he says, "and accepteth all Gurus and Pirs." "O God, whether Allah or Ram, I live by thy name." "Make thy mind thy Kaaba, thy body its enclosing temple, Conscience its prime teacher. Then, O priest, call men to pray to that mosque Which hath five gates. The Hindus and Mussulmans have the same Lord." But the formalities of both creeds are impartially condemned.
Eagerly the Malaki set out on his journey, with his kabir on his back, and his betel-nut and buyo-leaf in the kabir. He had not travelled far, before he came to a steep ascent of rock-terraces, the Terraces of the Wind, that had eight million steps.
I refer to caste, the denial of the brotherhood of mankind, the artificial barricading of class from class, the sacrifice of the individual to his class condemned by native reformers like Ramananda, Kabir, Nanak, and Chaitanya long before the advent of European ideas. Whatever the origin or original advantages of the caste system, it has long operated to repress individuality.
This identification of Kabir with the deity is interesting as being a modern example of what probably happened in the case of Kṛishṇa. Only in this way can Paramâtmâ be found. The Âtmâ without Śabda is blind and cannot find the path. He who sees Âtmâ-Râm is present everywhere. All he sees is like himself. There is nought except Brahmâ. I am he, I am the true Kabir."
He has stated that he gave yoga initiation to Shankara, ancient founder of the Swami Order, and to Kabir, famous medieval saint. His chief nineteenth-century disciple was, as we know, Lahiri Mahasaya, revivalist of the lost KRIYA art.
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