How mystic poets Baba Farid, Namdeo, Kabir, and Rahim fostered secular sentiments in their poetry

Humans have always had a remarkable diversity of religious experiences. Across time and cultures, spiritual practices – whether animistic, mystical, ritualistic, or ascetic – owe much to a common human desire to connect with something greater than oneself. These practices include prayer, fasting, sacrifice, self-mortification, festivals, pilgrimage, meditation, art, music, and dance. Whatever the form, such quests for meaning, transcendence, and connection reflect a universal human impulse.

Among these diverse expressions of spirituality, mysticism is prominent in many world religions, particularly in Hinduism (Bhakti), Islam (Sufism), Judaism (Kabbalah), and Eastern Christianity. It has especially thrived in regions from the Middle East to the Indian subcontinent. Scholar and philosopher Majid Fakhry describes mysticism as rooted “in the original matrix of religious experience” – born from an intense awareness of God and the realisation of one’s insignificance without God. This leads the mystic towards a central goal: the dissolution of the ego (fana) and total surrender to God. By shedding their egoistic self and discovering the divine presence within, mystics strive for greater self-realisation. In this transformation, writes Fakhry, “man becomes dead unto himself and alive unto God.”

Scholars trace the origins of both Sufism and Bhakti to the latter half of the first millennium AD. Both...

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