The Interfaith Peace Project is pleased to offer you prayer reflections for each day of Interfaith Harmony Week, February 1-7.
Sikh Tradition
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Sikh Reflection on Love, Compassion and Peace
Guru Nanak’s Message of Compassion
The central message of Guru Nanak, the founding prophet of the Sikh faith, is that everyone should respect all regions. For him love and respect – not just tolerance for those of other faiths – is the cornerstone of a democratic society. Nanak’s whole life and his teachings symbolized interfaith harmony.
Nanak’s mission was to help transform people’s attitudes by freeing them of hatred and mistrust, bias and prejudice on grounds of religion. He was appalled by communal strife, disharmony and ruthless persecution and oppression witnessed in the wake of the Mughal invasion. He wanted people to build up relationships on trust. He wanted them to live happily in love, peace, and harmony, no matter what faith they followed.
Those who went to listen to Nanak were moved by his passionate appeal for understanding among people and mutual trust. His message of amity and goodwill spread far and wide, and Nanak forged a bond of love and respect among people of diverse faiths. He had been so successful in getting people to change their minds because he was motivated by his deep mystical communion with God. His telling observation was: Nai Koi Hindu, Na Mussalman”-There is no Hindu or Mussalman. They are human beings created by God and despite distinctive religions and beliefs, they are equal before the Creator, who equally abides in everyone.
We are all God’s children and equal before Him. One who realizes this is a true man (person) of religion, Nanak said. When asked, who is greater of the two, Hindu or Muslim? Nanak replied, “Without good deeds both will come to grief. Loving God, God’s creation and doing good deeds is the true religion”, he emphasized. “Respect for each other is high but higher still is respect for each other’s views.”
A revolutionary spiritual reformer, Nanak did not believe in the caste system, idol worship, ritualism, and asceticism.
Onkar Singh Updated article Nov 24, 2007
http://timesindia.indiatimes.com/Guru Nanak-Message -Of-Compassion
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Love is the ultimate state of human behavior
where compassion prevails and kindness rules
Yogi Bhajan
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It is the touch of the hand, a spoken word and the contact of
the eyes which open the heart of a human being, not the knowledge
of all libraries in the world. Turn your passions into compassion by
feeling others are you and you are others. Remove the barriers of
the egocentric self and feel the self in all. All is one and one is all.
Yogi Bhajan
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Give us the wisdom and compassion, give us the love, give us the peace.
That’s our prayer from our heart.
Give us the power to help, to serve, to be humble
to those who need us at any time at any space.
May Thy grace guide us all to joy. Sat Nam.
Yogi Bhajan
Sikh Dharma International
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