Sikh and Non-Religious Views of Creation

A Creator without a creation story

Sikhs believe that Waheguru, God, created the universe. This does not mean that Sikh scripture contains a creation story setting out a sequence of events, such as what God made on particular days. The Guru Granth Sahib teaches about God as Creator without providing that kind of narrative.

The Mool Mantar, the opening statement of the Guru Granth Sahib, describes God’s nature. In Guru Granth Sahib 1, it teaches that there is one God and describes God as “the creator”. This is an important source of authority for Sikh belief: the universe depends on God for its existence rather than being independent of God.

Sikhs understand creation through Hukam, meaning God’s will or divine order. Before the universe existed, there was only God; creation came into existence through God’s will. God is self-existent and beyond birth and death, so Sikhs do not understand God as another object within the universe that must itself have been created.

God also sustains creation. For Sikhs, the universe is therefore not simply the result of an event in the distant past: its continuing existence depends on God. This belief encourages a sense of reverence towards the world as God’s creation.

What the Big Bang explains

The Big Bang theory is the most widely accepted scientific explanation of the universe’s early development. It describes the universe expanding from an extremely hot, dense early state. As it expanded, it cooled; matter eventually formed atoms, and later stars and planets developed. The universe is still expanding.

This is not an explosion of a ready-made planet into empty space. It concerns the expansion of the universe itself. Evidence includes background radiation, understood as leftover radiation from the early universe.

A scientific explanation relies on observations and evidence rather than the authority of scripture. Many non-religious people accept the Big Bang as a natural explanation of the universe’s development without adding a divine Creator. Humanists emphasise reason and evidence, while atheists do not believe in God. These positions can overlap, but the terms do not mean exactly the same thing.

Brian Cox: science, understanding and wonder

Professor Brian Cox, a physicist and supporter of the British Humanist Association, presents scientific investigation as a way of understanding the universe after the Big Bang. In his 2010 Voltaire Lecture, he explained that the universe’s complexity arises from a few basic building blocks.

Cox also challenged the idea that science cannot satisfy people’s sense of wonder or search for meaning. He argued that gaps in scientific knowledge do not need to be filled with imagined supernatural explanations. He concluded: “Science is clearly economically valuable and clearly spiritually valuable. I don’t see why you would need anything else.”

Here, “spiritually valuable” refers to science’s ability to inspire wonder and enrich human experience, not to belief in a divine spirit. His argument offers a non-religious alternative to finding meaning through belief in God as Creator.

Where Sikh and non-religious views can agree

Many Sikhs accept scientific accounts of the universe’s development. Without a detailed creation narrative prescribing a particular sequence or timescale, they need not reject the Big Bang to remain faithful to Sikh teaching.

A Sikh could understand the Big Bang as the process through which God’s creative will operated. On this view, science explains the physical development of the universe, while Sikh belief identifies its ultimate Creator. Accepting a natural process does not necessarily mean denying God.

For example, a Sikh and an atheist could both accept the evidence for an expanding universe. Their agreement about the physical process would not require agreement about whether that process depends on God.

How far do the views conflict?

The strongest disagreement concerns whether a divine Creator is needed, rather than necessarily how the universe developed. Sikhs affirm that God created and sustains the universe. An atheist rejects that belief, and Cox argues that science can provide understanding and wonder without a religious explanation.

A Sikh might respond that describing the universe’s development does not answer every question about why it exists or whether it has a divine purpose. A non-religious person might reply that an unanswered question is not evidence for God and that explanations should be supported by evidence.

A justified conclusion therefore distinguishes the scientific theory from interpretations of it. Sikh belief and the Big Bang can be compatible because they need not offer competing descriptions of the same physical process. Sikh belief and atheism nevertheless conflict over God’s existence and role. Scientific agreement can coexist with a significant religious disagreement.

Sikh belief

• Waheguru creates and sustains the universe through Hukam, God’s will or divine order.
• No detailed creation story does not mean no belief in creation.
• Guru Granth Sahib 1: the Mool Mantar describes the one God as “the creator”.

Big Bang and non-religious views

• The universe expanded from a hot, dense early state and cooled; atoms, stars and planets developed.
• Background radiation supports the theory.
• Humanists emphasise reason and evidence; atheists do not believe in God.
• Brian Cox: science explains the universe and provides wonder and meaning without needing supernatural explanations.

Extent of conflict

• Compatibility: many Sikhs accept the Big Bang as the process through which God created.
• Disagreement: Sikhs affirm a divine Creator; atheists reject this belief.
• Judgement: the Big Bang need not conflict with Sikhism, but an atheist interpretation conflicts over God’s existence and role.