Bhai Mardana
1459–1534 · Companion and musician to Guru Nanak
The musician from a Muslim family who accompanied Guru Nanak on nearly all of his journeys, playing the rabab to the Guru's compositions until his death. His name heads three verses in the Guru Granth Sahib, though scholars differ on who wrote them.
Words to know
The rabab
Mardana was born at Talwandi, Nankana Sahib, about ten years before Guru Nanak, into a family of Muslim mirasis, hereditary musicians and genealogists. The two knew each other as boys in the same village.2
When Nanak began the journeys the tradition calls the udasis, Mardana went with him, and by the Encyclopaedia of Sikhism’s account he never again parted company with the Guru until his own death, across an itinerary that the janam-sakhis extend from Assam to Mecca. His instrument was the rabab, a plucked lute; Nanak composed, named the raga each composition belonged to, and Mardana played. The request the janam-sakhis keep repeating, Mardana, play the rabab, is the tradition’s own image of how the hymns came into the world: as music, before they were text.1,2,3,7
What this made
That partnership set the pattern for kirtan, the sung scripture that is still the central act of worship in a gurdwara. The Guru Granth Sahib is organised by musical measure rather than by author or theme, a structural fact that goes back to compositions made to be sung, with a musician present.
On Ang 553 of the Guru Granth Sahib, in Raag Bihagra, two headings carry Mardana’s name, and between them they head three shaloks, which were carried into the Adi Granth of 1604.5 Scholars differ on who wrote them. The Encyclopaedia of Sikhism reads one, the third, on the company of the holy, as Mardana’s own, and the other two as Guru Nanak’s, addressed to him.2 Prof. Sahib Singh’s commentary reads all three as Guru Nanak’s, addressed to Mardana, because Mardana would not have used the name “Nanak”, which the first two carry as their signature.4,5 Neither reading is settled.
The Encyclopaedia gives his dates as 1459 to 1534 and places his death at Kartarpur; other references give other dates and places.2
The point usually made about him
Nanak’s closest lifelong companion came from a Muslim family. Sources describe his own faith differently: the Encyclopaedia of Sikhism calls him the Guru’s “long-time Muslim companion”, while Bhai Gurdas lists him among the Guru’s Sikhs.2,6 Either way, for a faith whose founding utterance was there is no Hindu, there is no Musalman, the working partnership at the centre of it, lasting the rest of Mardana’s life, is not incidental detail.1,2,3
Before you go
Last updated:
- Born
- 1459, Talwandi (Nankana Sahib), Punjab, Pakistan
- Died
- 1534
- Category
- Figure
- See also
- Guru Nanak Dev Ji
Sources
Numbers in the text link to the work the claim rests on. Naming a work is not the same as checking every sentence against it; how entries are checked.
- W. H. McLeod. Guru Nanak and the Sikh Religion. Oxford University Press (1968). no page given yet
- Harbans Singh (ed.). The Encyclopaedia of Sikhism. Punjabi University, Patiala. Entry: Mardana, Bhai (1459-1534) 'One of his slokas appears in Guru Granth Sahib in Bihagare ki Var along with two others of Guru Nanak's addressed to Mardana'
- Eleanor Nesbitt. Sikhism: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford University Press (2005). no page given yet
- Sahib Singh. Sri Guru Granth Darpan. Commentary on page 553: all three shaloks are Mahalla 1, addressed to Mardana, since Bhai Mardana could not have used the word 'Nanak' in a composition of his own
- Sri Guru Granth Sahib, Ang 553 (Bihagre ki Var). Headings 'Salok Mardana 1' and 'Mardana 1' over three shaloks; the first two carry the signature 'Nanak', the third does not
- Bhai Gurdas. Varan Bhai Gurdas. Var 11, pauri 13: Mardana among the names of Guru Nanak's Sikhs
- W. H. McLeod (tr. and ed.). The B40 Janam-Sakhi. Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar (1980). compiled 1733; the request 'Mardana, play the rabab' recurs throughout