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The Golden
Temple is the ultimate Sikh pilgrimage. The Harmandir Sahib,
as it is traditionally known, actually means the temple of
Hari or the Supreme God. Also known as the Darbar Sahib, the
stupendous, architectural phenomena is located at the city of
Amritsar. The temple's exterior is gold-plated and the
structure stands in the middle of a square tank. There is a
causeway across the Pool of Nectar to reach the Temple. The
shrine is symbolical of the doctrines of Sikhism. It also
represents the magnificent strength of all the Sikhs. The
amazing thing about Harmandir Sahib is that it has doorways on
all four sides, meant to be open for the people of the all
four castes. All over the, the Sikhs always look forward to
visit to the magnificent temple and offer prayers at the
Harmandir Sahib.
 Guru
Arjan Dev, the fifth. master, who came to the spiritual throne
in 1581, felt from the growing popularity of the shrine as a
pilgrim center the need to have the tank paved on the four
sides and the steps of Hari Mandir bricked. The devotees
joined to construct the temple, which would be lived in during
the everyday life, where the infinite mystery would be
revealed to those who may want to see. Already, however, the
demand to create a paradise on earth became urgent, from the
vision of Arjan Dev, of many simple hearts coming, with dipped
eyes over joined hands, to pray and touch the holy water on
their foreheads. So this Guru had the structure of the Hari
Mandir planned in such a way that the outsight, might afford
the insight. The present causeway leading to the Hari Mandir
was then designed, with the rectangular shape of the
circumambulatory walk ending at the gateway, from which the
path to Reality began. And to combine, symbolically, the
noblest truth of Islam about One God with the faith in the
Hindu God Hari and his many incarnations, the Muslim divine,
Mian Mir of Lahore, is said to have been invited by Guru Arjan
Dev to lay the foundation stone of the temple in A.D. 1588.
The structure of the shrine also mixed the rectangular form of
the Hindu temple with the dome and minarets of the Muslims
Amritsar is an institution by itself. And the Golden Temple is
the cradle of Amritsar with the city growing around it
nurtured by its divine sanctity. The Golden Temple stands
there in simple majesty, the gilded splendor of its paneling,
dome and minarets shining in the morning light, silhouetted
softly in the water and etched gently across the city escape.
For the Sikh community the Harmandir Sahib Gurdwara Golden
Temple is the final spiritual "vision," journey's end or
beginning and, for every other community too, it is a shrine
to be visited.
 JALLIANVALA
BAGH MASSACRE, involved the killing of hundreds of unarmed,
defenceless Indians by a senior British militry officer, took
place on 13 April 1919 in the heart of Amritsar, the holiest
city of the Sikhs, on a day sacred to them as the birth
anniversary of the Khalsa. Jallianvala Bagh,. a garden
belonging to the Jalla, derives name from that of the owners
of this piece of land in Sikh times. It was then the property
the family of Sardar Himmat Singh (d.1829), a noble in the
court of Maharaja Ranjit Singh (1780-1839), who originally
came from the village of Jalla, now in Fatehgarh Sahib
district of the Punjab. The family were collectively known as
Jallhevale or simply Jallhe or Jalle, although their principal
seat later became Alavarpur in Jalandhar district. The site,
once a garden or garden house, was in 1919 an uneven and
unoccupied space, an irregular quadrangle, indifferently
walled, approximately 225 x 180 metres which was used more as
a dumping ground. |
