Saka Sis Ganj: Meta-Historical Reading — Naad Pargaas USA
Re-Reading Guru Lādho Re: A Meta-Historical Perspective
01 / Record
Ankita interrogates the tendency to read Sakhi merely as hagiography or historical biography — a reduction that re-inscribes onto-theological assumptions of fixed origins and doctrinal closure. She proposes a fourfold hermeneutic for reading the Sakhi of Guru Lādho Re (the discovery of Guru Tegh Bahadur as the ninth Sikh Guru by Bhai Makhan Shah Lubana). The framework moves through history, episteme, ontology, and Hukam — arguing that Sakhi is not a closed event but a semantically open, cosmologically driven phenomenon where Shabad, Nam, and Hukam form a triadic movement of activation.
02 / Themes
The Fourfold Hermeneutic
- 01Sakhi as history — the event situated within time and space, while exposing the limits of one-dimensional historicism
- 02Sakhi as episteme — symbolic and semantic layers of truth disclosure, including the convergence of prayer and material offering
- 03Sakhi as ontology — the Guru's personal relatability and the transformation enacted within the devotee
- 04Sakhi as Hukam — the unfolding of divine rhythm in which time, space, and consciousness cohere
- 05Critique of colonial and reformist reductions of Janam Sakhi literature (Trumpp, Macauliffe, McLeod)
- 06The meta-event: how consciousness transforms narration into realization
03 / Programme
Full Programme
- Naad Pargaas USA
- Organised by
- Dr. Harpreet Singh
- Harvard University
- Inaugural remarks
- Jaswinder Singh
- Jamia Millia Islamia
- Paper presentations
- Dr. Ankita Sethi
- GTBIT, New Delhi
- Paper presentations
- Amandeep Singh
- Naad Pargaas USA
- Paper presentations
- Komal Kaur Dang
- Great-granddaughter of Bhai Vir Singh
- Special guest
- Rabbi Shergill
- Punjabi artist
- Guest of honour
- Prof. Jagdish Singh
- Naad Pargaas, Sri Amritsar
- Closing remarks
- Dr. Sukhwinder Singh
- Panjab University, Chandigarh
- Vote of thanks
- Harjot Kaur
- Naad Pargaas USA
- Moderator
04 / Extracts
From the Paper
“The Sakhi's surplus of meaning — its ability to signify beyond factual narration — is compromised when approached solely as a historical or sociological artifact, abstracted from its wider cosmology.”
“Prayer functions as the purest form of transcendental gesture — an orientation of consciousness towards the divine that signifies interior alignment rather than outward claim.”
“The gold mohar represents the purified domain of materiality — not wealth as possession, but matter rendered meaningful through intention, responsibility, and ethical participation in the world.”
“Shabad performs this transformative work — it carves raw experience into revelation, enabling realization. In the Sakhi, transcendental meaning enters the immanent world, demanding disclosure.”
“Hukam is not understood here as a command imposed from the outside, but an immanent principle that structures reality through rhythm, relationality, and openness.”
“The cry of Guru Ladhore marks this ontological shift. The event becomes a meta-event — a disclosure that journeys through cosmology and opens into ontological resonance.”