No, I just don't want argue for the sake of it without any sign of productive benefit at the end.
Thats probably a good idea if you've been arguing for the sake of it. In any case you havent done much arguing anyway. You've failed to respond to my objections to neo-sikhism.
I notice that you did not use a single piece of contemporary or even near contemporary evidence to support any of your "points"
It simply isnt my place to prove a negative. I cannot prove that there are no WMD's if they arent any, just as I cannot prove conclusively that the sikh Gurus werent liberals. I can give reasons why they were probably not but i cannot prove completely that they werent, just as I cannot prove that the Gurus werent, for example, originally from Mars. My claim all along has been the sikh Gurus were not driven by ideology similar to modern day liberalism. They were not egalitarians. They were not socialists: determined to remove inequality from society altogether. They were not against inequality of property, of wealth, of sex or of morality.
If you disagree with me, which you must if you agree with the neo-sikh version that says sikhism shares much with modern liberalism in respect to the above mentioned qualities, then the burden is on you to demonstrate it. It is up to you, the neo-sikh, to prove that the sikh gurus believed in egalitarianism, that they were, for example feminist and socialist. It is my job to critique your arguments and evaluate their merits - because i am skeptical of such claims.
I cannot prove that the Sikh gurus were conservatives - because by definition if they were, then there isnt much to distinguish them for being so. Well apart from being rational and calm, for recognising and dealing in realism instead of utopianianism. For opposing evil as saintly men often do, and which the Sikh gurus definitely did do. These facts of mine do not need proof - they do not require any "single piece of contemporary or even near contemporary evidence" - for all men at all familiar with Sikhi are aware of these facts.
I make no extra claims apart from these: That the sikh gurus opposed the evils of female infantacide, of tyranical mughal rule, the burning suicide of female widows, of preventing lower castes and classes from participating in religious discourse and community, and so on. These examples do need any proof beyond what is usually accepted by everyone.
This is all i claim about the Sikh Gurus. It the neo-sikhs who claim more than this. They claim that the sikh gurus did these things not only because they were evil - BUT - also because these were obstacles to sikhi's desire to create a equal society. That they were only the start of what was supposed to be a wider goal of making society towards liberal ideals. That what the sikh gurus started, we must finish.
Further if you hold that the Sikh gurus believed in equality, you have to deal directly with my objections. My objections are that the gurus did not implement equality in a) choice of guruship, b) selection of bani for Adi Granth, c) choice of panj pyare, and, d) sikh sangat. If they believed in equality they would have made sure their successors were taken from as diverse and wide groupings as possible. This would mean having gurus of different races, cultures and gender.
For b), Gurus would have ensured that they selected at least some bani, even if it was a single line, from the hand of a Woman. But they did no such thing. Yet it is often implicitly held that the sikh gurus selected the contents of the Granth with positive intention of diversity in contributors. So why no female contribution? Were the gurus unaware of gender inequality? Ofcourse not, for one it's a undeniable fact of life that there is inequality between the genders, and furthermore Guru Nanak had already spoken of injustice against women by saying, 'Kings are born of woman, and women of women', so the gurus were aware of both the inequality and the injustice.
For c), the panj pyare case is particularly interesting for we know that the original members were volunteers. So at least in this case we can speak sensibly about merit or 'the best man for the job', those who stood up and put their hand up for the Guru. Interestingly no woman volunteered. But suppose the gurus had wanted equality - and if that were the case, they could have made clear that they wanted at least one woman by announcing so. They did not however any such thing. Nor they did they see any problem with the fact that the volunteers, all of them, had been men. That is in a strict sense an inequality and a complete inequality for that matter, but Guruji had no problem with it at all. Or if they did, that hasnt been recorded by history. Supposing though a woman had volunteered, then if the Guru had accepted her, that would not mean he was for equality. It would simply mean that he was against descriminating against women. Such a woman would only be unaccepted to the Guru if the Guru were against woman-kind, but this is not a view held by anyone. Equality though does not only demand non-descrimination, which is a negative desiderata - equality requires something else too. It requires positive intent to remove inequality. This then, would have been the Guru making a provision for holding at least one place for a woman in the panj Pyare, the sovereign leaders for his Panth. He did no such thing ofcourse.
In d) we see that the Sikh community while it practised and preached respectfulness, it did not actually represent an equal society for it had in place many inequalities. There is the obvious inequality between the Sikh and Guru. Sikh and guru are never equal. There were, too, sikh leaders who served in ranks of authority, over other sikhs, and indeed even non-sikhs who's authority was to be respected. For example Guru Arjan Dev said of Bhai Gurdas, the latter was the key to the Sikh Granth. Women if equal to man in a sikh society never realized such a proportion in battle. It was almost entirely only men who served in such capacities. In Sikh society there were men and women of different castes, and they would have known that they belonged to particular castes, but it wasnt a problem that they did. The problem if any such problem existed was the unfair treatment of lower castes by higher ones. The problem wasnt the caste system itself, for any such system is recreated and reproduced in multiplicty in all human affairs. Nature itself creates inequality of abilities, and human societies are distinguished by inequality of wealth, of intellect, of physical prowess, and any number of different qualities. These systems are part of all societies and they cannot sensibly be removed. Thus I've given good counter-explanations on why its not true that the Gurus wanted the same thing as neo-sikhs. Read my posts and see how easily I dispel the usual myths.
Guru Hargobind was unconventional according to Bhai Gurdas - but he wasnt this way because he was enpassioned with idealism towards the ends of neo-sikh liberalism. It was because circustances demanded it from him. Sikh gurus had waited patiently for a long time before Guru Hargobind moved to enact those changes of rejecting the authority of the unjust rulers. They are arguments for conservatism - because conservatives are careful and thoughful before changing something. They know that while its possible to make society better, it is more likely though that you will make things worser by changing it. Conservative saints like the Guru were against evil - they have to be - most saints are. But just because an evil exists does not mean it must be opposed, and just because an evil can be opposed does not mean doing so is a good idea - for maybe fighting that evil will not decrease evil, but increase it. An example for this is the War in Iraq - while it was rightful and just to remove Saddam - doing so has proven to be a much greater evil since then. These are complicated issues and they require great thought and consideration.
But liberals have a simpler thought model to follow. They say anything that causes evil must be opposed - they see that because inequality of society has been cause for great suffering and injustice that this means that inequality itself must be removed. They wish for greater autonomy of individuals and this means removing restrictions on conduct. But the sikh places himself at the complete authority of his Guru - and this is in conflict with liberalism which denies living under the authority of others. The liberals infact often oppose religion itself for this very reason. Yet many 'sikh-intellectuals', see no problem with this and continue to forge fond and sympathetic ties with them.
I've demonstrated though, or I could demonstrate what others already have, and that is, that the desire to create the equality of society is a destructive ideal. But this is logically independent from the discussion at hand, which is, were the early sikhs sympathetic and agreeable and active on liberal ideals of society? This is for you, or the countless men and women who write on Sikhism, to show.
