Sri Guru Gobind Singh Ji

The Encyclopaedia, drawing on Sikh tradition, says Bhai Jaita walked from Delhi to Anandpur carrying the head of Sri Guru Tegh Bahadur Ji, after every other Sikh in the city had kept away for fear of reprisals. He belonged to a caste others looked down upon. Sri Guru Gobind Singh Ji, still a boy of nine, received him and declared that the Ranghreta was Guru Ji's own son. Bhai Jaita stayed on, became the drummer of the Ranjit Nagara, and took the name Jiwan Singh when the Khalsa was created.

The Encyclopaedia tells it this way. Pir Buddhu Shah of Sadhaura, whose real name was Badr ud-Din, called on Guru Ji at Paonta in 1685 and recommended five hundred Pathan soldiers under four leaders. When the hill chiefs came in 1688, all the Pathans left except Kale Khan and his men, and went over to the attackers.

Guru Ji sent word to the Pir. He arrived at Bhangani with seven hundred followers, along with his brother and four sons. Many fell, including two of his sons and the brother.

After the battle Guru Ji offered rich gifts, which the Pir turned down. As the tradition has it, he asked instead for the comb from Guru Ji's hair and the turban Guru Ji was about to tie on. These, with a small kirpan, stayed with his family for generations. He paid a price in the end: a local official, on orders from Sirhind, seized and executed him in 1704.

The story most Sikhs know comes from Kuir Singh's Gurbilas Patshahi 10 of 1751, followed by Sukkha Singh and Santokh Singh. On Vaisakhi morning, after the service, Sri Guru Gobind Singh Ji stood before the great gathering at Kesgarh with a drawn sword and asked for a Sikh who would give his head. The people fell silent. At the third call Daya Ram, a Khatri of Lahore, got up and followed Guru Ji into a tent.

Guru Ji came back with the sword dripping blood and asked again. Next to rise was Dharam Das, a Jat of Hastinapur, then Mohkam Chand of Dwarka, Himmat of Jagannath, and the barber Sahib Chand of Bidar. Macauliffe adds that people ran to complain to Guru Ji's mother that Guru Ji had lost his reason, and he says a goat was killed each time, a detail not in the Encyclopaedia's telling.

Then all five walked out alive, dressed alike in saffron robes, with swords at their sides. Guru Ji stirred water in an iron bowl with a double-edged sword while reciting scripture. Mata Jito added sugar crystals, and each man drank five palmfuls. These were the Panj Piare, the five beloved. Guru Ji then asked them to initiate Guru Ji in the same way, and took the name Singh.

Sainapati, who was close to Guru Ji, tells it far more simply. People gathered at Vaisakhi on the bank of the Sutlej. Guru Ji made the Khalsa known, and many joined while others grew anxious. He says nothing about heads or a tent, and gives his attention to what the Khalsa was to be.

Macauliffe, citing a Persian historian he calls Ghulam Muhai ul Din, says a Mughal newswriter forwarded Guru Ji's address to the emperor. It told people to take up one creed and end religious differences. The four castes were to drop their separate rules and be brothers, eating from one dish without disgust.

The newswriter added his own note. Some Brahmins and Khatris said they would accept the teaching, while others refused to be told by a boy to give up the faith of their ancestors. Still, he says, some twenty thousand men rose and pledged obedience.

Kuir Singh's Gurbilas Patshahi 10 tells that the hill chiefs, unable to break into Anandpur, made an elephant drunk and sent it to batter down the gate of Lohgarh. Sri Guru Gobind Singh Ji chose Bhai Bachitra Singh, one of five brothers given to Guru Ji's service by their father, to meet it.

He rode out and thrust his spear through the armour plate on the animal's forehead. The wounded beast turned and ran back through the attackers' own ranks, causing chaos. Bhai Bachitra Singh would later fall in the retreat of 1705.

Sources tell the battle this way. Sri Guru Gobind Singh Ji reached Chamkaur late on 6 December 1705. The elder landowner refused entry for fear of the rulers, but his brother Rup Chand let Guru Ji in. Eight Sikhs were posted on each side, with two more at the gate, and Guru Ji went to the upper floor with the two sons.

The Mughal force, grown with reinforcements, surrounded the house at dawn. The defenders had little ammunition, and when it ran out they went out in small parties to fight hand to hand. Sahibzada Ajit Singh led one group and fell. Sahibzada Jujhar Singh, then fourteen, led another and fell near the same spot. The Encyclopaedia quotes the Zafarnamah as describing forty set against a million.

By nightfall only five Sikhs remained in the house with Guru Ji. They urged Guru Ji to go and rally the Sikhs again, and tradition makes this a command from the five acting as the Khalsa. Guru Ji handed over the clothes being worn to Bhai Sangat Singh, who looked somewhat similar, and left in the dark.

Three others also got out, Bhai Dharam Singh, Bhai Man Singh and Bhai Daya Singh, each going in a different direction by an arrangement to meet by the stars. Then, the gurdwara tradition says, Guru Ji did not want to steal away unannounced. On a low mound Guru Ji clapped and shouted that the Pir of Hind was leaving, and the three others called out from their positions, confusing the tired besiegers. In the morning Bhai Sangat Singh and Bhai Sant Singh fought to the last.

The Encyclopaedia says Ghani Khan and Nabi Khan were Pathans of Machhiwara who had sold horses at Anandpur and admired Guru Ji. Hearing that Guru Ji had come alone to Machhiwara after Chamkaur, they dressed Guru Ji in blue and carried Guru Ji in a palanquin, telling anyone who asked that this was the holy man of Uchch.

They escorted Guru Ji as far as Hehran, near Raikot, where Sikhs took over. Guru Ji sent them home with a letter of commendation, which their descendants preserved. Rai Kalha, a Muslim chief of Raikot, then sheltered Guru Ji, and it was his messenger who, the Encyclopaedia says, brought the terrible news from Sirhind.

According to the Encyclopaedia's account, drawn from Sikh chronicles, Mata Gujri and the two boys became separated at the Sarsa. Their cook Gangu took them to his village of Kheri near Morinda. Seeing money in the saddlebag, he stole it in the night and betrayed them to the local officials, who sent them on to Sirhind. They were held in the Cold Tower of the fort.

On 9 December the boys were brought before Wazir Khan. He offered riches and honours if they accepted Islam, then threatened death, and they refused. When Sher Muhammad Khan of Malerkotla pleaded for the children, they were given more time. They spent two more winter days in the tower with their grandmother, who urged them to stand firm.

An order came on 11 December to seal them alive in a wall. Tradition says the masonry fell away when it reached their chests. The next day, as this account has it, they refused again and were put to death. Mata Gujri, nearby, passed away when she heard the news. Macauliffe has the merchant Todar Mal bring it to her, and the Encyclopaedia says he cremated all three the following day.

In the Zafarnamah, Guru Ji wrote of the four children as gone but said that the coiled cobra still held up its head.

According to the tradition, some forty Sikhs from the Majha left Anandpur during the siege and signed a paper disowning Guru Ji. At home their women shamed them, and a woman named Mai Bhago of Jhabal rallied them to go back and ask forgiveness.

They reached the pool of Khidrana in the Malwa just as Wazir Khan's army was closing on Guru Ji, and took up positions in front of the attackers. The Encyclopaedia's entry on Muktsar says they fixed cloths over the shrubs to look like tents. They fought hard enough that the Mughal force, short of water in that dry country, turned back.

Guru Ji came down to the field afterwards and found that all but one had attained martyrdom, and Mahan Singh lay near his end. Macauliffe says Guru Ji offered him any boon and he asked only that the paper be cancelled. Guru Ji took it out and destroyed it, and he passed away content.

Guru Ji blessed them as the forty muktas and cremated them there. The place took the name Muktsar, the pool of liberation. Mai Bhago, wounded, stayed with Guru Ji afterward as a bodyguard in men's dress, the Encyclopaedia says, and later settled near Bidar.

The Encyclopaedia and Macauliffe tell a similar story. Lachhman Dev of Rajauri had once killed a doe while hunting and, moved by remorse, had left home at fifteen to become an ascetic named Madho Das. He had settled by the Godavari at Nanded and was known for his powers.

Sri Guru Gobind Singh Ji came to his hermitage on 3 September 1708. By the end of their encounter he fell at Guru Ji's feet and called himself Guru Ji's banda, or slave. Guru Ji took him to the camp and gave him the rites of the Khalsa.

Guru Ji gave him five arrows from the quiver, a drum and a banner, with five Sikhs to go with him, and sent him north against the faujdar of Sirhind, who had martyred the younger sons. He reached the Punjab and took Samana on 26 November 1709.

Sainapati and the sources that follow him say two Pathans came to Nanded and sat in the evening gathering for several days, so no one suspected them. One evening, after the Rahras prayer, they found Guru Ji alone. One of them struck Guru Ji in the left side below the heart.

Before he could strike again Guru Ji struck him down with a sabre, and his companion fell to Sikhs who rushed in. The emperor sent surgeons, including an Englishman named Cole. The wound was stitched and seemed to mend. But when Guru Ji pulled a stiff bow some days later, it opened again and bled badly, and Guru Ji did not recover.

The Bhatt Vahi Talauda, as quoted in the Encyclopaedia, tells it in a few lines. On Wednesday, 6 October 1708, at Nanded, Sri Guru Gobind Singh Ji asked Bhai Daya Singh to bring the Sri Granth Sahib. Guru Ji placed five paise and a coconut before it, bowed, and told the gathered Sikhs that it was a command: they were to treat the Granth as standing in Guru Ji's place.

Sainapati remembers a different moment. A day before the end, he says, Sikhs came asking what form the Lord would now take. Guru Ji's reply was that the Khalsa was Guru Ji's own form, and that Guru Ji would dwell in the Khalsa from beginning to end.

Guru Ji passed away on the night of Kattak sudi 5, 1765 Bikrami, which the Encyclopaedia gives as 7 October 1708. There were to be no more personal Gurus. From this point authority lay with Sri Guru Granth Sahib Ji and with the Khalsa.