INSIDE THE GURU'S GATE - Anpere

them. Just as the space of a gurdwara building is permeated with sacred words, so
should the inner temple of humans be filled with the Guru’s words and teaching. 323
Among local Sikhs the significance of attending a gurdwara is firmly embedded
in the emic notion of seeking darshan, the “sight” of Guru Granth Sahib and the devotional
congregation of Sikhs. The majority of my interlocutors stated that darshan of
the Guru enshrined in the scripture is a primary reason for visiting a gurdwara and
one of the more important acts to conduct in their daily worship. An elderly Sikh
woman, for example, explained her personal motives for attendance in the following
way:
All the ten Gurus and Guru Granth Sahib ji are in the gurdwara. The
Gurus want their children to come to them. If the children are coming
with wishes they will fulfil these wishes. The Gurus want them to get
rid of this cycle of birth and death…to get moksh. Many people go there
to express wishes, like if someone wants to have a baby. I am not going
there for these reasons… I only go to take darshan of the ten Gurus.
In devotional contexts of the Indian religious traditions of Hindus, Buddhists
and Jains the notion of darshan generally implies the auspicious exchange of sight
between a devotee and a deity or human attributed supramundane qualities. At
home or in the temple a devotee will approach the consecrated image of a god or
goddesses to actively see and “take” auspicious sight emanating from the superior
being, who returns the gaze to the worshipper. The mutual gazing is a basic devotional
act, believed to establish human-divine interactions. 324 It is not merely a visual
registration of a superior’s presence, but a transactional act through which sight is
exchanged and the inferior viewer is imparted blessings and shares of the properties
of the object seen.
Local Sikhs frequently recur to this pan-Indian understanding of darshan when
describing their daily worship of making obeisance to the scripture enthroned in the
323
Similar verbal expositions can often be traced back to textual references in the figurative
language of the Sikh scripture itself. In compositions of the Gurus the term gurdwara does not
refer to a specific place of worship but is a puzzling metaphor for the spiritual transition or
threshold of the Guru’s teaching as a way to obtain the divine name (Nam) and knowledge in
order to open up the door of liberation (see e.g. GGS: 153, 616, 730, 930, 1015). Guru Nanak
frequently utilizes the image of a door in different contexts, such as “the door of liberation”
(mukh duar), and “the tenth door” (das duar), for the abode of God and the ultimate stage in the
spiritual development of humans. When the “tenth door” is opened the guru–oriented person
will attain liberation (see e.g. GGS: 159, 1033, 1040, 1331). The term gurdwara, on the other hand,
more often signifies the means by which humans reach this final destination, i.e., the Guru as the
divine words and name.
324
For an overview of darshan in the Hindu worship, consult Eck 1981. In an anthropological
analysis on darshan, Gell discusses consecration rituals of applying “eyes” to icons and apotheosised
humans in the Hindu and Buddhist traditions (Gell 1998). For a detailed analysis of how
Buddhists in Thailand imbue images of the Buddha with the knowledge of the dhamma teaching
and actual empowerment of the images, see Swearer 2004.
158
Published on www.anpere.net in May 2008