SADHNAA, one of the fifteen saints and süfis whose hymns are incorporated in the Guru Granth Sâhib, was a qasãi or butcher by profession who, by his piety and devotion, had gained spiritual eminence. He is believed to have been born at the village of Sehvãn, in Sindh. He was cremated at Sirhind, in the Punjab, where even today a tomb stands in his memory. He is considered to be a contemporary of Nãm Dev, another medieval saint. Sadhnaã lived by selling meat, though, as it is asserted, he never butchered the animals himself. His only sabda (hymn) in the measure Bilãval, in the Guru Granth Sãhib, indicates his belief that all evil deeds of a man could be washed away by devoted meditation on the Name— and so the deeds of a butcher:

 What merit have you, Enlightener of the world, if our ill deeds are not effaced? 

What avails it to enter the asylum of the lion, if a mere jackal will be allowed to devour one?