The power of one

Guru Granth mentions the following formula of six: There are six schools of philosophy/six teachers/and six sets of teachings.

The six schools of philosophy are Yoga, Sankhya, Vedanta, Vaisheshika, Nyaya, and Mimasa. These schools of thought represent various methods of self-inquiry, and they are also inter-dependent. The six systems give rise to six kinds of teachers, and further six kinds of teachings. However, despite this: The Teacher of Teachers is just one/he only comes in different forms.

This is further explained by pointing out: Seconds, minutes and hours, days, weeks and months/all originate from Time/and the various seasons originate from the one sun/o Nanak, in just the same way, the many forms originate from the Creator.

The young Guru Nanak Dev goes for a bath in a nearby river, takes a dive, and does not resurface thereafter. Search parties go out to retrieve his body, but fail to find him or his body, and he was presumed drowned. After many days, Guru Nanak Dev surprises everybody, and returns to town, and sits in the cremation ground. He says he has met God, and brings His message of oneness. He continuously repeats that there is no separate existence of any religion, and that God is one. Saint Kabeer captures this emotion thus: First, He created the Light/then, by His Creative Power, He made all mortal beings/from the One Light, the entire universe welled up/so who is good, and who is bad?

Saint Kabeer then delivers a hard-hitting blow to all the hate mongers by owning all prophets and all religions: You fashioned all these men and women/ Lord all these are Your Forms/kabeer is the child of God, Allah, Ram/all the Gurus and prophets are mine!

In a world splitting along many fault lines, we need to remind ourselves of these simple but profound messages from Nanak and Kabeer.