The mixture of Hindūism and Muḥammadanism is evident in this tradition. It is obviously intended to summarize the life of Nānak and the object of his teaching. He is not represented as an outcaste and a failure; on the other hand, his purposes are held to have been fully accomplished. The great triumph was the establishment of a common basis of religious truth for both Muḥammadan and Hindū; and this he is shown to have accomplished with such dexterity that at his death no one could say whether he was more inclined to Hindūism or to Muḥammadanism. His friends stood around him at the last moment quite uncertain as to whether they should dispose of his remains as those of a Muḥammadan, or as those of a Hindū. And Nānak is represented as taking care that the matter should ever remain a moot point. The final miraculous disappearance of the corpse is obviously intended to convey the idea that Nānak belonged specially neither to one party nor to the other; while the green and flourishing appearance of the flowers of both parties conveys the lesson that it was his wish that both should live together in harmony and union. The narrator of the life clearly wishes his history to substantiate the prophetic statement recorded at the commencement of his book (I. O. MS. 1728, fol. 7) that, at Nānak’s birth, “The Hindūs said, ‘The manifestation of some God (Devatā) has been produced’; and the Musalmāns said, ‘Some holy man (ṣādiq) of God (K͟hudā) has been born.’ ”
The most potent cause of the uncertainty as to Nānak’s true position in the religious world, arises from the initial fact that he was born a Hindū, and necessarily brought up in that form of belief. He was a perfectly uneducated man, there being no reason to suppose that he could either read or write, or perform any other literary feat, beyond the composition of extemporaneous verses in his mother tongue. Guru Arjun, the fourth successor of Nānak, appears to have been the first chieftain of the fraternity who could read and write. The necessary result of Nānak’s early associations was that all his ideas throughout life were substantially Hindū, his mode of thought and expression was Hindū, his illustrations were taken from Hindū sources, and his system was based on Hindū models. It must be borne in mind that Nānak never openly seceded from the pale of Hindūism, or ever contemplated doing so. Thus in the Sākhī of Miyān Mithā it is related that towards the end of Nānak’s life a Muḥammadan named Shāh ʿAbdu ʾr-Raḥmān acknowledged the great advantages he had derived from the teaching of Nānak, and sent his friend Miyān Mithā to the Guru so that he might derive similar benefit. “Then Miyān Mithā said, ‘What is his name? Is he a Hindū, or is he a Musalmān?’ Shāh ʿAbdu ʾr-Raḥmān replied, ‘He is a Hindū; and his name is Nānak.’”—(Sikhān de Rāj dī Vithiˏā, p. 258.) He struck a heavy blow at Hindūism by his rejection of caste distinctions; and on this point there can be no doubt, for his very words, preserved in the Ādi Granth, are: “Thou (O Lord) acknowledgest the Light (the ray of the Divine in man), and dost not ask after caste. In the other world there is no caste.”—(Translation of the Ādi Granth, p. 494.) In consequence of this opinion Nānak admitted to his fraternity men of all castes; his constant companions being spoken of as Saiyids and Sikhs, that is, Muḥammadan and Hindū pupils. Sikhs have ever before them the intermediate character of their religion by the stanza (21) of the Jap-Jī, which says, “Pandits do not know that time, though written in a Purāna; Qāẓīs do not know that time, though written in the Qurʾān.” Hindū scholars are told in the Ādi Granth that they miss the true meaning of their religion through delusion. “Reading and reading the Pandit explains the Veda, (but) the infatuation of Māyā (delusion personified) lulls him to sleep. By reason of dual affection the name of Hari (i.e. God) is forgotten.” (Translation, p. 117.) In the same way Nānak turns to the Musalmān and says,—
“Thou must die, O Mullā! thou must die! remain in the fear of the Creator!
Then thou art a Mullā, then thou art a Qāẓī, if thou knowest the name of God (K͟hudā).
None, though he be very learned, will remain, he hurries onwards.
He is a Qāẓī by whom his own self is abandoned, and the One Name is made his support.
He is, and will be, He will not be destroyed, true is the Creator.
Five times he prays (niwāj gujarhi), he reads the book of the Qurʾān.”
(Translation, p. 37.)
Nānak does not seem to have been fastidious as to the name under which he recognized the Deity; he was more concerned with impressing on his companions a correct understanding of what Deity was. The names Hari, Rām, Govind, Brahma, Parameśwar, K͟hudā, Allāh, &c., are used with perfect freedom, and are even mixed up in the same poem. The most common name for God in the Ādi Granth is certainly Hari; but that does not seem to have shocked the Muslim friends of Nānak. Thus, in a poem addressed to Hari as “the invisible, inaccessible, and infinite,” we are told that, “Pīrs, prophets, sāliks, ṣādiqs, martyrs, shaik͟hs, mullās, and darveshes; a great blessing has come upon them, who continually recite his salvation.”—(Translation, p. 75.)