KABĪR (fifteenth century CE) was one of the most famous saints and mystics in the Indian tradition. Kabīr is unique in that he is revered by Hindus and Muslims alike, yet his personality and his biography remain shrouded in mystery. The...

(uncertain dates, possibly 1440–1518) a wandering saint of Hindu background with a theistic attitude of type and with Sūfī sympathies. He was also influenced by the early form of South Indian Christianity (traditionally believed to have...

Al-Kabir "the Great" is also one of the 99 names of God in Islam. For a complete disambiguation page, see Kabir (disambiguation) A painting of Kabir Kabīr (also Kabīra) (Hindi: कबीर, Gurmukhī: ਕਬੀਰ, Urdu: کبير‎)...

David Lorenzen has rescued from obscurity the collection of legends about Kabir which Ananta-das wrote towards the end of the sixteenth century. This short hagiographic work is the earliest known collection of stories concerning Kabir and for that reason alone it commands a...

Byline: MIKE DICKSON EVEN before a tornado blew through on Thursday, seismic events had already shaken the Small Heath area of Birmingham this week. The police cordons on Heybarnes Road showed you exactly where - the house raided the previous day...

Two police officers were convicted Monday of torturing a bus driver in an abuse case that came to light when a cell phone video of the man being beaten and sodomized appeared on Egyptian blogs and YouTube.They were sentenced to three years in prison.The bus...

The footage is shocking: A man lies screaming on the floor of a police station as officers sodomize him with a wooden pole.Compounding the shock, it turns out that it was the police who made the film, and that they then transmitted it to the...

In the following essay, Saraswati explores Kabīr's poetry and describes the poet as a non-literate genius who criticized institutional religion and religious and intellectual elitism, while making spirituality accessible to common people. The critic goes on to point out the irony of the attempt by scholars and some of Kabīr's followers to make his ideas acceptable and in line with orthodox philosophy and religion.

In the following excerpt, Scott explores the pathway to salvation that is set forth in the poetry of Kabir.

In the following essay, Vaudeville explores the complex subject of the language of Kabīr's poems, discussing the languages in which the verses were written, his own spoken language, the language of the literate versus the non-literate people of his day, and the poet's spontaneous style.