TRIBAL EGO

By Chaudhry Rajinder Nijjhar, M.Sc.

Many people feel proud of their being belonging to an influential tribe and they would look down upon the others as mean and low. This is the characteristic of a FOOL, who is dominated by HAUMAE BIRTI. Unless a person subdues his HAUMAE or ego, he cannot have "sense", spirit or SURTI to perceive God. In other words, HAUMAE is the enemy of SURTI and it must be subdued to uplift one's soul. In the Bible, a person of the HAUMAE BIRTI is called a Once-born person or AAKEEJA and he is dominated by the natural instincts. The man of spirit is called Twice-born or DAWEEJA and he is capable of logical thinking to understand "Logo" or the Word of God.

Now, when a person is born into a family, then he or she does not make her own choice but by the Will of God to Whom belongs our souls. So, our birth is a gift of God and not of our own making. This Gift of life being of God, we should thank God by displaying His qualities of Love and Service to others.

God does not like HAUMAE in which people start to do their own wills but SURTI so that they do the Will of God understandably. For the person of HAUMAE, it is said,

"SOCHIAN SOCH NA HOWIYAE; JAE SOCHEE LAKH WAAR"

So under such circumstances, a man of HAUMAE will do his own will. There is another proverb:-

MOORAKH NOON APNI AKAL TAE PARAYIA DHANN WADA LAGDA HAE

It is the MOORAKH who uphold expensive marriages and dowries so that public could boast of his riches. For such purposes, he needs money, which he rarely possess. So, he borrows or sells his property. In short,

MOORAKH DI SHAH BENA PATT NAHI; GURU BENA GATT NAHI

Thus, a man of spirit or SURTI will be rather thankful to God for the human birth for it is a rare and the BEST gift. For this reason, it said to be DULABH and it is in the human form that one could best work for God. So, the twice-born people of SURTI have no HAUMAE of his family background but the sons of Satan still do not leave them in peace.

So, tribes or tribal identities of people are for their recognition/identification only and a person is to be valued for his qualities, which could be of the Satan or of God.

But the sons of Satan being the cheats who want to snatch the rights of others like a thief, they normally conceal their tribal identities so that they can go Scot free.

Now, in Sikhism the tribal identity is to be kept "implicit" whilst the identity of person on the basis of his qualities in God becomes "explicit". In other words,

HINDU DI JAAT TANN OR JANUM NAAL; SIKH DI JAAT KARMA NAAL

SAE JAAT SAE PAAT; JAEHO JAEHA KARM KUMAWAN DAE

Secular world being TANN or body related, the tribal identity and the tribal customs are to be upheld as all the Satgurus and Sachae Paatshahs of the Khatri tribe did and those who are speaking against this system are the sons of Satan looking for mischiefs as the three prominent "Lalas" (Lala Tara Singh Malhotra, Lala Mohd. Ali Jinnah, a Babla Bhatia and Lala Gandhi, a Bania) did during the 1947 partition of India in which the people of the same tribes were made to fight against each other. Now, they want to create riots in the name of Hindu/Sikh when we the Jatts of the Pakistan, Panjab and Haryana are of the same "root stock".

Finally, Satguru Angad Dev Ji asked people to kill even the self-acquired HAUMAE through building strong physical bodies. For this reason, He promoted wrestling among the disciples to support the Saying of Bhagat Kabir Ji:-

"JANI JANAE TAN BHAGAT (SEWADAR) JANAE KEH DAAT (MERCIFUL) KEH SOOR (SOORMA);

NAHI JANI BANJH RAHAE (SHOULD NOT BE BORN) KAAHAE GOWAWAE ALLAH DA NOOR" .

So, do not conceal your tribal identity to become a son of Satan but perform deeds to glorify God for giving you a human birth. For this reason, no Bhagat concealed his tribal identity. In fact, tribal identity plays an important role in keeping the "honour" of such people intact as it happened to us when during the 1947 Partition of India the invading tribal people of Arian tribe were turned away from "FOES" to our best "FRIENDS" to the fulfillment of the Saying:-

BEEO BEEJ PATT LAE GAE; ABB KEUN UGHWAE DAAL