Guru Granth Sahib: The Sikh Scripture and Eternal Living Guru

The Guru Granth Sahib is the scripture of Sikhism and, for Sikhs, their eternal and living Guru. First compiled by Guru Arjan in 1604 as the Ādi Granth, "the first book", and completed by Guru Gobind Singh, who in 1708 declared it his successor, it contains some six thousand hymns by six of the Sikh Gurus and by Hindu and Muslim saints, arranged by musical mode (rāga) across 1,430 pages in the standard edition. It is treated with the reverence due to a living Guru and is at the centre of every gurdwara.

Compiling the Adi Granth: Guru Arjan and the Kartarpur Pothi§

The hymns of Guru Nanak and his successors were sung in the community from the beginning and were written down in manuscript collections. Under the third Guru, Amar Das, a set of volumes known as the Goindval pothīs was prepared. In the early seventeenth century Guru Arjan, the fifth Guru, undertook a definitive compilation. Sikh tradition relates that he gathered the existing collections, selected and arranged the hymns, and dictated the text to the scholar Bhai Gurdas beside a pool at Amritsar. The volume was completed in 1604 and installed in the newly built Harmandir Sahib, with the elder Sikh Baba Buddha as its first custodian (granthī).

A manuscript preserved by a branch of the Gurus' descendants at Kartarpur in the Jalandhar district is held by many Sikhs to be this original volume. Its relation to other early manuscripts has been the subject of detailed scholarly study and some controversy, and access to it has been restricted. Guru Arjan's purpose, as Sikh tradition understands it, was to establish an authoritative text against rival compositions circulating under the Gurus' names.

From Adi Granth to Eternal Guru§

Around 1706, at Damdama Sahib (Talwandi Sabo), Guru Gobind Singh prepared a final recension, adding the hymns of his father, Guru Tegh Bahadur, but none of his own. Before his death at Nanded in 1708 he declared that after him the Guru would be the scripture, and from then it has been known as the Guru Granth Sahib, "the honoured Guru in book form". Sikhs do not regard it as a book about the Guru but as the Guru itself, the embodiment of the divine Word (shabad) and the light that passed through the ten human Gurus. Authority over the community's collective decisions rests with the Guru Panth, the assembled Khalsa, guided by the scripture. The lives of the Gurus are told in Guru Nanak and the Ten Sikh Gurus.

Authors of the Guru Granth Sahib: Gurus and Bhagats§

The Gurus wrote under the name "Nanak", identifying their voice with the founder's; each hymn is identified by a heading, Mahalā 1, Mahalā 2 and so on, which tells the reader whether it is by the first, second or later Guru. Guru Arjan contributed the largest number of hymns, followed by Guru Nanak. Among the best-known compositions are Guru Nanak's Japjī, Guru Amar Das's Anand ("Bliss") and Guru Arjan's Sukhmanī ("Pearl of Peace").

The scripture also includes the compositions of fifteen bhagats, devotees from different castes and religions whose teaching the Gurus judged to be in harmony with their own. The largest number are by Kabir, the weaver-poet of Benares; others are by Namdev, a calico-printer from Maharashtra, Ravidas, a leatherworker considered "untouchable" by caste society, the Brahmin Ramanand, the Vaishnava poet Jaidev, and Shaikh Farid, the Chishti Sufi saint of Pakpattan (d. 1266), whose Punjabi couplets are among the earliest literature in the language. Hymns by court bards (bhaṭṭs) and by a few Sikhs, including the minstrels Satta and Balvand, complete the collection. The inclusion of low-caste and Muslim authors is often cited as a sign of the scripture's message of equality, discussed in Sikh Beliefs.

Structure, Ragas and Language§

The standard printed edition, whose page numbering has been fixed since the early twentieth century, runs to 1,430 pages (aṅg, "limbs"). It falls into three parts:

• Opening prayers: the Japjī of Guru Nanak, which begins with the Mūl Mantar and is not set to a raga, followed by short collections recited in the evening (So Dar, So Purakh) and at night (Sohilā).
• The raga section, the main body, in which hymns are grouped into thirty-one principal ragas, from Srī Rāg to Jaijāvantī. Within each raga the hymns are arranged by form and length, then by Guru in order, with the bhagats' hymns at the end.
• A concluding section of couplets (salok) and other compositions, ending with Guru Arjan's seal (Mundāvaṇī) and a list of ragas called the Rāgmālā, whose authorship and place in the scripture have been debated.

The choice of musical modes reflects the Gurus' view that the divine Word is to be sung. Ragas carry moods and associations with seasons and times of day, and trained musicians (rāgīs) perform the hymns in kīrtan. The text is written in the Gurmukhi script, standardised in the community's early decades. Its language is mostly an old Punjabi mixed with the "language of the saints" (sant bhāṣā) used across North India, with words from Braj, Sanskrit, Persian and Arabic, which makes careful study necessary even for modern Punjabi speakers.

Honouring the Guru: Prakash, Hukamnama and Akhand Path§

In a gurdwara the Guru Granth Sahib is placed on a raised throne under a canopy, wrapped in cloths (rumāle), and an attendant waves a whisk (chaur) over it, a gesture of respect once shown to royalty. Each morning it is ceremonially opened in the rite of prakāsh, "illumination"; at night it is closed and carried, often on the head, to a resting room in the rite of sukhāsan. Worshippers bow before it, remove their shoes and cover their heads in its presence, and never turn their backs on it carelessly.

After the morning opening the scripture is opened at random and the first hymn on the left-hand page is read aloud as the hukamnāmā, the Guru's "order" or guidance for the day. The hukamnāmā from the Harmandir Sahib is published daily. The same method is used to choose the initial of a child's name. A complete, unbroken reading by a relay of readers over about forty-eight hours, the akhaṇḍ pāṭh, marks weddings, deaths, anniversaries and festivals, while a slower reading over a longer period is called sahaj pāṭh. These rites are explained further in Gurdwara, Langar and Sikh Practice.

Translation, Printing and the Dasam Granth§

Printed editions in a standardised form spread from the late nineteenth century, and today printing of the scripture is regulated by the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee. The first full English translation, by the German missionary-scholar Ernest Trumpp in 1877, was resented by Sikhs for its disparaging introduction; Max Arthur Macauliffe's translations of 1909, made with Sikh scholars, were better received. Later complete English translations include those of Gopal Singh, Manmohan Singh and Gurbachan Singh Talib. Sikhs regard all translations as aids to understanding rather than substitutes for the original.

A separate collection, the Dasam Granth, "the Book of the Tenth", contains compositions attributed to Guru Gobind Singh, among them the Jāp Sāhib used in daily prayer, as well as mythological narratives whose authorship is debated. It is not installed as Guru. The ballads (vārs) of Bhai Gurdas are traditionally called the "key" to the Guru Granth Sahib.

Frequently asked questions§

How many pages does the Guru Granth Sahib have?§

The standard printed edition has 1,430 pages, called aṅg. Because the pagination is standardised, Sikhs everywhere can cite passages by page number.

Who wrote the Guru Granth Sahib?§

It contains hymns by six Sikh Gurus, Guru Nanak, Guru Angad, Guru Amar Das, Guru Ram Das, Guru Arjan and Guru Tegh Bahadur, together with fifteen bhagats such as Kabir, Ravidas, Namdev and Shaikh Farid, and a number of bards and Sikh devotees. Guru Arjan compiled it in 1604.

Why is the Guru Granth Sahib called a living Guru?§

Guru Gobind Singh declared before his death in 1708 that the scripture would be the Guru after him. Sikhs believe that the divine Word it contains is the same light that guided the ten human Gurus, so they treat it with the respect due to a living teacher.

Sources and further reading§

• The Guru Granth Sahib: Canon, Meaning and Authority — Pashaura Singh, 2000
• Sri Guru Granth Sahib — Gurbachan Singh Talib (trans.), 1984
• The Sikh Religion: Its Gurus, Sacred Writings and Authors — Max Arthur Macauliffe, 1909
• Textual Sources for the Study of Sikhism — W. H. McLeod, 1984
• The Feminine Principle in the Sikh Vision of the Transcendent — Nikky-Guninder Kaur Singh, 1993