Khotwal, Punjab (modern Pakistan)·c. 1173 – 1266
بابا فرید
Baba Farid
Ganj-i-Shakar, The Treasury of Sweetness
He hung upside down in a well for forty days, and what poured out was honey.
“Farid, do not turn around and strike those who strike you. Kiss their feet and return home.”
Life
Sheikh Farid-ud-Din Mas'ud Ganj-i-Shakar was born around 1173 in Khotwal, near Multan in Punjab. His father, Jamal-ud-Din Sulaiman, was a scholar descended from the second Caliph, Umar. Even as a child, Farid showed an extraordinary inclination toward prayer and fasting. His mother, to encourage him, would place sugar under his prayer mat; when he found it, she told him it was God's reward. The name 'Ganj-i-Shakar' (Treasury of Sugar/Sweetness) is said to derive from this childhood story.
He became a disciple of Qutbuddin Bakhtiar Kaki, the great Chishti saint of Delhi, who was himself a successor of Moinuddin Chishti of Ajmer. Under his master's guidance, Farid undertook severe austerities, the most famous being the chilla-e-makoos, in which he suspended himself upside down in a well for forty days of continuous prayer and fasting. This extreme devotion earned him his master's mantle.
He settled in Pakpattan (then called Ajodhan) in Punjab, where he established his khanqah (hospice). For decades, seekers of all backgrounds came to him. He lived in voluntary poverty, often going hungry himself while feeding others. His disciple Nizamuddin Auliya would carry his light to Delhi and become one of the most beloved saints of the subcontinent.
Baba Farid composed his verses in the Punjabi and Hindavi of the common people, not in Persian or Arabic, the languages of the court and the mosque. Over a hundred of his shaloks (couplets) were later included in the Guru Granth Sahib by Guru Arjan Dev, making them sacred scripture for Sikhs as well. He died in 1266 in Pakpattan, where his shrine remains one of the most visited in South Asia.
One Heart
“Farida, if you have any sense, do not write evil of others. Look within your own self; is there no evil there?”
Teachings
Ishq: The Agony and Ecstasy of Divine Love
For Baba Farid, the path to God is through the total burning of the heart. Love is not comfort but a consuming fire that leaves nothing of the ego behind. His verses throb with the pain of separation (birha), the beloved's absence that is itself the proof of love's reality.
Humility and Radical Non-Retaliation
Farid teaches a surrender so complete that even when struck, the devotee does not retaliate but kisses the feet of the aggressor. This is not weakness but the highest strength; the ego has been so thoroughly dissolved that there is nothing left to defend.
The Body as a Reminder of Death
Many of Farid's most powerful verses concern the inevitability of death and the urgency of turning to God now. The body will be consumed by the earth; the hair will turn white; the companions of youth will depart one by one. Only the Name endures.
Works & Publications
Shaloks in the Guru Granth Sahib
134 shaloks (couplets) preserved in the Sikh scripture, the earliest recorded Punjabi poetry and among the most profound expressions of longing in any language.
Oral Teachings and Malfuzat
His sayings and discourses were recorded by disciples in the Chishti tradition, preserving his guidance on prayer, poverty, love, and surrender.
Qasidas and Ghazals
Devotional poems in Persian and Punjabi attributed to Farid, many preserved through the oral tradition of the Chishti order.
An Inspiration
Baba Farid's raw, unadorned verses of surrender and longing, composed not in the language of scholars but in the tongue of the people, echo Ananta's own directness. His insistence on humility so total that it transcends even the instinct for self-protection points to the same egoless space that Ananta's satsang invites.