Equality: Caste and Gender
The Gurus taught that all people share one divine light, and rejected caste as a measure of worth. Sikh institutions were built to put this into practice, although the sources show that caste has not disappeared among Sikhs.[EoS][Src][EoS][EoS]
Caste in the teachings
In the Punjabi usage the Encyclopaedia of Sikhism describes, caste can mean simply a family or occupational group. The Gurus' objection was to a fixed ranking by birth, backed by religious authority. Sri Guru Nanak Dev Ji says on ang 83 that caste names are empty and the same shelter covers all, and on ang 349 that one should see the light in a person and not ask about caste.
Practical steps followed. In sangat all worship together, and in pangat all eat together in rows. In the amrit ceremony, initiates are told to give up ties of caste and former occupation. The Sikh Rehat Maryada forbids discrimination by caste in the sangat, when serving kara prashad and in langar. It also tells Sikhs to marry without regard to caste. The contributors to Sri Guru Granth Sahib Ji included Bhagats of many trades and two faiths.[EoS][Src][EoS]
Women in the teachings
The best known passage is in Asa ki Var, where Sri Guru Nanak Dev Ji asks why anyone should call woman inferior when kings are born of her. On ang 472 he also rejects the belief that childbirth makes a woman impure.
Tradition, reported in the Mahima Prakash, says Sri Guru Amar Das Ji discouraged the veil and placed women in charge of communities of disciples. He also spoke against sati, the burning of widows, on ang 787. The Rehat Maryada forbids the veil and female infanticide, and allows widows to remarry. It lets women attend the scripture, officiate at weddings and serve among the five who give amrit. Women have voted in elections to the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee.[EoS][Src]
Where sources disagree
- Teaching and social practice
The Encyclopaedia's entry on caste rejects any religious basis for it among Sikhs and treats what remains as a fading exception. The same entry records that some Khatri and Arora groups marry within the group, that Jat Sikhs generally marry within their class, and that discrimination has continued against Mazhabi and Ramdasia Sikhs, whose families were historically assigned sanitation and leather work. It also notes that in 1920 officiants at Harmandir Sahib at first refused offerings from Sikhs of these backgrounds. The gap between teaching and practice is therefore recorded in the sources themselves.[EoS][EoS]
- Who writes these accounts
The Encyclopaedia's entries on caste and on women are written from within the Sikh tradition and argue a case. Both describe an ideal more fully than they measure how far it has been reached. The women's entry says Sikh women have shared equally in religious life, but gives no figures for women in leading roles.[EoS][EoS]
Cite this page
"Equality: Caste and Gender". Sikh History: lives of the Gurus. https://sikh-history.co.uk/beliefs/equality/