Book contents
- Guru Nanak’s Transcendent Aesthetics
- Reviews
- Guru Nanak’s Transcendent Aesthetics
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Preface
- Note
- Introduction
- Chapter 1 Aesthetic Stairway
- Chapter 2 Aesthetic Repertoire and Literary Appetizers
- Chapter 3 Aesthetic Designs in the Language of Love
- Chapter 4 Aesthetic Agents
- Chapter 5 Aesthetic Revealer
- Conclusion
- Bibliography
- Index
Chapter 1 - Aesthetic Stairway
The Japujī
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 November 2024
- Guru Nanak’s Transcendent Aesthetics
- Reviews
- Guru Nanak’s Transcendent Aesthetics
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Preface
- Note
- Introduction
- Chapter 1 Aesthetic Stairway
- Chapter 2 Aesthetic Repertoire and Literary Appetizers
- Chapter 3 Aesthetic Designs in the Language of Love
- Chapter 4 Aesthetic Agents
- Chapter 5 Aesthetic Revealer
- Conclusion
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
The Japujī is Guru Nanak’s foundational hymn. Its thirty-eight stanzas are symmetrically set within a prologue and an epilogue. Seven vital aspects of Guru Nanak’s transcendent aesthetics emerge in this inaugural Guru Granth Sahib hymn: (1) aesthetic agents (panc) who invite audiences to join them on a spiritual excursion; (2) aesthetic keynote, the transcendent Nanakian material (mūlmantra); (3) the aesthetic thirty-eight stairsteps (pauṛis) leading to ever new vistas; (4) the aesthetic realm (saram khanḍ) where epistemic faculties are honed; (5) aesthetic disclosures of the ontological design (hukam) in the writing of this multiverse (lekhā) by the look of love (nadar); (6) aesthetic productions of truth (sat), beauty (suhāṇu), and enduring joy (sadā mani cāo) which reproduce an ethics of joy – singing (gāviai), listening (suniai), embracing (maniai), and loving (manu rakhiai bhāo); (7) an aesthetic epilogue, a scene capturing everyday aesthetics – the whole world playing together with night and day as the midwives and caretakers. Guru Nanak’s consummate composition fulfills Luce Irigaray’s desire that transcendence is a bodily realization here and now.
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- Guru Nanak's Transcendent Aesthetics , pp. 28 - 70Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2024