Summarise the impact of the Bhakti movement with regard to:

(a) Equality of all human beings.

(b) Fostering unity and harmony between different communities.

(c) Promoting regional languages and devotional literature.

(a) Equality of all human beings — Bhakti saints preached universal brotherhood and emphasised equality of all men. The teachings of Kabir, Guru Nanak, Ravidas helped reform Indian society. They tried to evolve a new social order by following the principle of equality and by denouncing caste distinctions. By exposing the futility of empty rituals, they did away with the domination of priests. Thus, the Bhakti movement brought in social changes.

(b) Fostering unity and harmony between different communities —The Bhakti movement played an important role in fostering Indo-Islamic culture. The Bhakti movement emphasised the essential unity of Islam and Hinduism, and laid stress on a religion based on love and devotion rather than one based on rituals. Thus, they created an atmosphere in Which liberal sentiments and views could grow and religious narrowness was shunned. They preached that the God is one and only the ways of worshipping him are different. The God must be worshipped with love and devotion.

(c) Promoting regional languages and devotional literature — The Bhakti movement played an important role in promoting regional languages and devotional literature. The Bhakti saints preached in the language of people. Languages like Hindi, Bhojpuri, Maithili and Oriya became popular. Among important literary works of this period were Ramcharit Manas by Tulsidas, Gurmukhi literature of the Sikh Gurus and the Vaishnava literature in Bengal. The local languages became even more popular by Bhakti saints like Mira Bai and Sant Janeshwar.