INSIDE THE GURU'S GATE - Anpere

ple in the ordinary social structure and the acts they perform inside the gurdwara, the
more humble will the individual person be evaluated.
While acknowledging the shared subordination of all disciples dwelling in the
presence of Guru Granth Sahib, the Sikh communitas is also lauding collective norms
that generate new social differentiations within the community. Based on the principle
of equality Sikhs will often state their religion is without priesthood, as compared
with other traditions, and at the same time extol Khalsa norms that are stipulated in
the Sikh code of conduct (Sikh Rahit Maryada) and acted by Sikhs who have undergone
the khande di pahul ceremony and comply with a stricter religious discipline.
BECOMING A “COMPLETE” SIKH
The adoption of a Khalsa identity should ideally eliminate previous social categories
and ranks for a shared identity as loyal disciples to the Guru. In the Sikh community
the Khalsa identity remains the normative ideal in relation to which other Sikh identities
and different grades of religiosity are measured. The well-known emic categories
of Keshdhari – those who keep unshorn hair (kesh) and observe some of the Khalsa
rules but have not gone through the initiation ‒ and Sahajdhari – literally “slowadopters”
or Sikhs who do not observe the code of conduct (rahit) but believe only in
Guru Granth Sahib ‒ are evaluated relative to the ideal of an Amritdhari identity. 351 In
Sikh ceremonies the term amrit commonly designates sweetened water that has been
consecrated by recitations of hymns from the Guru Granth Sahib. More explicitly, it
refers to the blessed nectar-water distributed in the Khalsa ceremony Khande di pahul,
or “the initiation of the double-edged sword”, also called Amrit sanskar, or “the ceremony
of [taking] nectar”. A person who has undergone this ceremony and partaken
of the nectar (amrit chhakna) is consequently called Amritdhari, literally a “bearer” or
“holder” of amrit.
Local Sikhs may ascribe several significations and meanings to the adoptions of
Amritdhari identity and personal motives that have induced them to undergo the
ceremony. Half of the thirty-five community members who participated in my semistructured
interviews stated that they had “taken amrit” and assumed an identity as
351
The category of Sahajdhari Sikhs has been interpreted by Sikh reformists as those who are not
yet prepared for the Khande di pahul ceremony but are moving on the path to becoming Amritdhari
Sikhs in the future (see Lal 1999). The present Sikh code of conduct (Sikh Rahit Maryada)
issued by the SGPC in 1950 is a Khalsa Rahit binding Amritdhari Sikhs worldwide. The manual
does not reduce the definition of a “Sikh” to merely adopters of an Amritdhari identity but defines
a Sikh as the human being who faithfully believes in One God, the ten human Gurus, the
Guru Granth Sahib, the utterance and teaching of the Gurus (gurbani), and the initiation ceremony
promulgated by Guru Gobind Singh. The definition may include all the emic categories of
a Sikh since one only needs to have faith in the Khande di pahul ceremony even if one does not
undergo it.
179
Published on www.anpere.net in May 2008