Dharamshala: Coinciding with the 550th birth anniversary of Guru Nanak Dev, the library of Tibetan works archives (LTWA) here has published a book celebrating the parallels between two of the world’s most widespread and influential faiths – Buddhism and Sikhism.

The book ‘Two Gurus One Message – The Buddha and Guru Nanak: Legacy of Liberation, Egalitarianism and Social Justice’, written by Savinder Kaur Gill and Sonam Wangmo, was published in e-format this month.

Rosemery, the senior editor at the LTWA, told TOI that this is the first-of-its-kind initiative. The book explains sacred verses of the Guru Granth Sahib (the Sikh holy scripture) in great philosophical depth, backed by strong Buddhist philosophical understanding based on the Nalanda tradition, she added.

Savinder Kaur Gill, the first author of the book, hails from a Sikh family and first studied Buddhism in the Theravada tradition in Ajahn Buddhadasa Bhikkhu’s hermitage in Suan Mokkh, Thailand. She is trained as a civil engineer and holds a PhD in environment and resource studies from Mahidol University, Thailand. She also holds an MA in Buddhist studies from the International Buddhist College, focusing her thesis on comparative religion.

The other author, Sonam Wangmo, spent 13 years at Jamyang Choling Institute for Buddhist Dialectics in Gharoh, Dharamshala, Himachal Pradesh, studying Buddhist philosophy, Tibetan language and literature. She also holds MA degrees in Buddhist studies from Delhi University, India, and more recently, from the International Buddhist College, Thailand.

