My favourite punjabi poet
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| Bulleh shah |
1) Introduction: My favourite Punjabi Poet - Bulleh Shah.
2) Early life and background.
3) Career.
4) Poetry.
5) A beacon of peace.
6) The Humanist.
7) Conclusion - a perfect faqir and a true lover.
Of course, there are many top class Punjabi poets in the classic and modem times. But I like most Syed Abdullah Shah Qadri (1680—1757) popularly known as Bulleh Shah, who was a Mughal-era Punjabi Muslim Sufi poet, a humanist and philosopher. His first spiritual teacher was Shah Inayat Qadiri, a Sufi murshid of Lahore. Bulleh Shah gathered spiritual treasures under the guidance of his murshid and was known for the karamat (miraculous powers) he had.
Bulleh Shah is believed to have been bom in 1680, in the small village of Uch, Bahawalpur, Punjab, now in Pakistan. His ancestors had migrated from Bukhara in modern Uzbekistan. When he was six months old, his parents relocated to Malakwal. There his father, Shah Muhammad Darwaish, was a preacher in the village mosque and a teacher. His father later got a job in Pandoke, about 50 miles southeast of Kasur.
Bulleh Shah received his early schooling in Pandoke, and moved to Kasur for higher education. He also received education from Maulana Mohiyuddin. His spiritual teacher was the eminent Sufi saint, Shah Inayat Qadiri.
A large amount of what -is known about Bulleh Shah comes through legends, and is subjective; to the point that there isn’t even agreement among historians concerning his precise date and place of birth. Some “facts” about his life have been pieced together from his own writings. Other “facts” seem to have been passed down through oral traditions. Bulleh Shah practiced the Sufi tradition of Punjabi poetry established by poets like Shah Hussain, Sultan Bahu, and
Shah Sharaf. Bufleh Shah lived in the same period as the famous Sindhi Sufi poet, Shah Abdul Latif Bhatai. His life-span also overlapped with the legendary Punjabi poet Wans Shah, of Heer Ranjha fame, and the famous Sindhi Sufi poet Abdul Wahad. better known by his pen-name, Sachal Sarmast (“truth-seeking leader of the intoxicated ones’).
The verse form Bulleh Shah primarily employed is the Kafi, popular in Punjabi (SaraikiJ and Sindhi poetry. Bulleh Shah's writings represent him as a humanist, someone providing solutions to the sociological problems of the world around him as he lives through it describing the turbulence his motherland of Punjab is passing through, while concurrently searching for God.
The simplicity with which Bulleh Shah has been able to address the complex fundamental issues of life and humanity is a large part of his appeal. The verse form Bulleh Shah primarily employed is called the Kafi, a style of Punjabi, Sindhi and Siraiki poetry used not only by the Sufis of Sindh and Punjab, but also by Sikh gurus. Bulleh Shah's poetry and philosophy strongly criticizes Islamic religious orthodoxy of his day.
Bulleh Shah’s time was marked with communal strife between Muslims and Sikhs. But in that age. Baba Bulleh Shah was a beacon of hope and peace for the citizens of Punjab. While Bulleh Shah was in Pandoke, Muslims killed a young Sikh man who was riding through their village in retaliation for murder of some Muslims by Sikhs.
Baba Bulleh Shah denounced the murder of an innocent Sikh and was censured by the Mullas and Muftis of Pandoke. Bulleh Shah maintained that violence which was not the answer to violence. Bulleh Shah also hailed Guru Tegh Bahadur as a ghazi (Islamic term for a religious warrior) and incurred the wrath of the fanatic Muslims at the time.
Banda Singh Bairagi was a contemporary of Bulleh Shah. In retaliation for the murder of Guru Gobind Singh’s two sons by Aurangzeb, he sought revenge by killing common Muslims. Baba Bulleh Shah tried to convince Banda Singh Bairagi to renounce his campaign of revenge. Bulleh Shah told him that the same
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