Baba

Baba (Persian: ‎, Urdu: , Pashto: : بابا; Sanskrit, Punjabi, Hindi and Marathi: बाबा; father; grandfather; wise old man; sir,^[1]) is a Persian honorific term used in several Middle Eastern and South Asian cultures. It is used as a mark of respect to refer to Sufi saints.
During the Muslim rule in South Asia it was also used for Hindu and Sikh ascetics (sannyasis) is also be used as a suffix or prefix to their names eg: Ramdev Baba, Baba Ramdevji, etc.^[1][2] Baba is also a title accorded to the head of certain order of Sufi saints: Baba Bulleh Shah and Rehman Baba.^[1] The Persian term was also adopted in Malaysia as an honorific of respect to address Chinese people born in British Straits Settlement.^[3][4] In Shona, a language spoken in Zimbabwe, and also in Yoruba, a language spoken by the Yoruba culture in the south western path of Nigeria, Baba is a honorific for father, a wise man, a fellow man. A term of respect used by wives, women, children and young people to an older man.

See also

• Baba (disambiguation)
• Indian honorifics

References

1. ^ ^{a b c} Platts, John T. (John Thompson). A dictionary of Urdu, classical Hindi, and English. London: W. H. Allen & Co., 1884.
2. ^ Hunter, William Wilson; James Sutherland Cotton, Richard Burn, William Stevenson Meyer, Great Britain India Office (1908). Imperial Gazetteer of India. 20. Clarendon Press. p. 295. 
3. ^ Ooi, Keat Gin (2004). Southeast Asia : A Historical Encyclopedia, From Angkor Wat to East Timor. Santa Barbara, Calif: ABC-CLIO. pp. 198. ISBN 1-57607-770-5. 
4. ^ Baba in Weiner, E. S. C.; Simpson, J. R. (1989). The Oxford English dictionary. Oxford: Clarendon Press. ISBN 0-19-861186-2. 

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