Far away in Punjab there is a town called Anandpur, and in that town there was a house called Anand Bhawan. Guru Tegh Bahadur Ji lived in that house.
One day Guru Tegh Bahadur Ji set out on a long journey towards the east. Wherever he stopped along the road he told people the same simple thing. Remember the Lord in every moment and in every breath. Do good. Do not tell lies. The Lord is not hiding somewhere far away behind a curtain. The Lord is here, and there, and everywhere, close to you, closer than you think.
He came at last to Patna. The sangat there loved him and begged him to stay, and out of love for them he stayed. Later, when he travelled on to Assam, he left his family safe in Patna.
And so, in Patna, in the fortunate month of December, in the house of Guru Tegh Bahadur Ji and Mata Gujri Ji, Guru Gobind Singh Ji was born.
Now do not think that somebody new had arrived. It was the same one who came the first time as Guru Nanak Dev Ji, come down for the tenth time. Bhai Sahib says it as plainly as anything: whoever is sitting on that throne, it is Guru Nanak Dev Ji sitting there, and only the body has been changed.
Nobody had to carry the news to Saint Bheekan Shah Ji. He was a holy man who lived far from Patna, and he simply knew it, the way you know the sun is up before anybody opens the curtains. He got to his feet and began walking towards Patna.
When he reached Guru Ji's house he asked, very humbly, whether he might be allowed to look at the Prince-Guru Ji. In that house holy people were always welcome. A maid carried Guru Gobind Singh Ji out into the courtyard in her lap, and Saint Bheekan Shah Ji bent low and touched his forehead to Guru Gobind Singh Ji's feet.
Then something happened that even holy people are not free from. A small doubt crept into Saint Bheekan Shah Ji's mind. He wanted to know one thing. Has this Guru come for the Hindus, or has he come for the Muslims?
He had brought two bowls with him. Into one he poured milk. Into the other he poured water. He set them both down on the ground, and in his heart he made a bargain with himself. Whichever bowl is pushed away, he thought, that will be my answer.
He waited.
And Guru Gobind Singh Ji reached out a foot and pushed both bowls over at once.
The milk ran out. The water ran out. They ran together across the ground and mixed, and once they had mixed, no one in the world could have told you which was which. They were one thing now.
Saint Bheekan Shah Ji sat back on his heels and understood.
Think about milk and water, and how they love each other. If you put milk on the fire to boil, it is the water in it that dries away first, and it goes quietly, so that the milk will not burn. And when the milk sees its friend suffering like that, the milk swells up and rises and spills right over the side onto the fire, and puts the fire out. And if you pour a little water back in, the milk settles down again, happy.
That, thought Saint Bheekan Shah Ji, is what has come into the world. Not a Guru for one kind of person and not for another kind. A Guru of love, who would teach proud people to bow their heads a little, so that Hindus and Muslims could care for one another the way the milk and the water do.
He was quiet for a while. His heart had grown very big.
Then he bowed once more, and went away satisfied.
Saint Bheekan Shah Ji did not live long enough to see what came afterwards. He never saw the caste walls come down, or the day the gate was opened so that anybody at all could walk through. He never met Pir Budhu Shah Ji, a Muslim who loved Guru Gobind Singh Ji so much that he gave his own sons for the sake of other people.
But he had seen the two bowls tipped over, and the milk and the water running together on the ground.
And for Saint Bheekan Shah Ji, that was enough.