The Guru Nánac, according to the belief of his followers, was in former times the rája called Janak, and united the dignity of a king with that of a saint. He called mankind to God. The author of this work heard from distinguished Sikhs that, when Bába Nánac appeared in the Sat-jog, a great number of Sikhs assembled around him. He sent a cow into the kitchen. When prepared, it was brought into the assembly; some ate of it, others were afraid to do so. The Guru prayed to God that the cow might rise again, and all those who had been afraid, beholding this miracle, approached him praying: “Now we shall eat whatever you order.” Nánac answered: “Not now be it so: mine and your engagement prevails in the Trèta-Jog.” Afterwards, at the revolution of the Trèta-jog, the Guru appeared. The disciples assembled; then a slaughtered horse was brought into the assembly in the manner before said. Some ate of it; others abstained from it. The Guru prayed, and the horse was brought to life. Those who had been afraid prayed as before. He replied again: “Your word and mine are engaged for the Dwápar-jog.” In this age they brought a slaughtered elephant into the assembly of his followers. The same happened as I said before, and he appointed them for the Kali-jog. In this age, they say, a man was brought into the assembly; whoever ate, became free; who abstained from it, remained subject to durance, and some of the Sikhs call Nánac the slave of God.
It is also related that, when Nânac died, in the Sat-jog, two roads opened before his soul: the one led to heaven, the other to hell. Nânac chose the latter, and having descended below, he brought all the inhabitants out of hell. The Lord God said to him: “These sinners cannot enter heaven; you must return into the world and liberate them.” On that account Nânac came to this world, and his followers are the former inhabitants of hell; the Guru comes and goes, until that multitude shall have found their salvation.
Except the zealots among the Sikhs, no man else believes Bábá Nânac a god. As to the rest, Nânac’s followers condemn idolatry, and believe that all their Gurus are Nânacs, as was said before. They do not recite the mantras of the Hindus, they do not venerate their temples, nor do they esteem their Avatárs. The Sanscrit language, which according to the Hindus is the language of the gods, is not held in such great estimation by the Sikhs. Whatever it be, the number of these sectaries increased every where, so that, in the time of the Guru Arjunmal it became very considerable, and at last there was no place in any country where Sikhs were not to be found. They make no difference between Brahmans and Kshatriyas, for Nânac was a Kshatriya, and none of their Gurus was a Brahman, as stated above. Thus they subjected the Kshatriyas to the tribe of Jats,[467] who are an inferior caste of Baisas (Viśas). The deputies of the Gurus are besides frequently Jats. They honour equally Brahmans and Kshatriyas. The Guru is chosen at the discretion of his followers. It should be known that, in the time of the Afghan sultans, the Umras were called successors or deputies of Ali; finally, for the sake of brevity, the name of deputy (masnad) alone was used by the Hindus. The Sikhs call masnad, and also Rámadas, the Guru whom they esteem as a king of the true faith.
Before the fifth period no tribute was exacted from the Sikhs, but presents were given by them according to their own discretion, to their Gurus. Arjunmal sent in his time a person to the Sikhs of each town in order to collect a tribute; in that manner, the Sikhs accustomed themselves to the government of a masnad, or deputy. Their principal deputies, of whom there was a great number, elected on their part deputies, so that such substitutes were to be found in every place. The Sikhs created their Gurus, and established that an audasi,[468] or one that has abandoned the world, is not to be esteemed higher than any other man. On that account, some of their Gurus are inclined to agriculture, others to commerce, and to various trades and occupations. Each of them brings every year something, according to his means, to his Guru; the deputy receives a present without exacting it; others collect what is destined every year to the deputy, and deliver it to the chief man of the Guru, who disposes of it for his own maintenance and for other contingencies; no body incurs blame on account of presents (or contributions): being raised from all quarters, they are forwarded to the Guru.
In the month of February, when the sun is in the sign of the Bull, the subordinate Gurus come to their chief with those of their followers who choose to accompany them. At the time of taking leave, each receives a turban as a present from the deputy.
Having recorded truly something of the Sikhs in general, I will now give an account of the chiefs of this tribe whom I have known myself. In the sixth period lived Sri Guru Har-govind, the son of the Guru Arjun mal. The Padshah Nur-ed-din Jehangir,[469] now an inhabitant of heaven, called to his court Arjun-mal, on account of his having offered prayers for the king’s son Khusro, who had rebelled against his father. Khusro having been taken, the king ordered the imprisonment of Arjun-mal, and wanted to extort a large sum of money from him. The Guru was helpless; they kept him a prisoner in the sandy country of Lahore, until he died of the heat of the sun and of ill treatment. This happened in the year 1015 of the Hejira (A. D. 1606).[470] In like manner the king banished from Hindostan the Shaikh Nezam Thánasír, because he had been connected with, and had prayed for, his son Khusro.
After Arjunmal followed his brother Baratha,[471] whom his followers called “the benevolent Guru.” Now, in the year 1055 of the Hejira (A. D. 1645), the Guru Harjayi occupies his place. They both professed the adoration of one God. The disciples of the Guru Har-govind, son of Arjunmal, called these Gurus Mainá (مينا)[472] which among them is an مينا oprobrious name. After the decease of Arjunmal, his son, Har-govind, also made pretensions to the khalifat (deputyship), and obtained the place of his father.[473] Hargovind was always attached to the stirrup of the victorious Jehangir. He became involved in many difficulties; one of them was, that he appropriated to himself the pay due to the soldiers in advance; he carried also the sword against his father; he kept besides many servants, and was addicted to hunting. Jehangir, on account of the money due to the army, and of the mulet imposed upon Arjunmal (as was said before), sent Har-govind to the fort of Gwalior,[474] where he remained imprisoned twelve years. He was not permitted to eat a good meal. During that time the deputies and other Sikhs used to come and bow before the walls of the fort. At last, moved by pity, the king granted him liberty. After Jehangir’s death, Har-govind entered the service of his majesty Amír-ul Múnenîn Abu-ul-muzafer shaháb ed-din Muhammed saheb Keran sani shah Jehan, the victorious king. When the Guru returned to Batnesh, which is a district of the Penjab, he attached himself to Yar Khan, the eunuch, who held the office of a Foujdar[475] in the Nawabí of the Penjab, and whom he assisted in the administration. Har-govind returned to Rámadaspúr, where the Gurus Rámadas and Arjun-mal had built great edifices and dug tanks. There he sustained an attack of the army which Shah jehan, the shadow of God, sent against him, and the Guru’s property was then plundered. From thence he fled to Kartarpúr; there too war reached him, and on this occasion Mír Badherah, and Páindah Khan, the son of Fattah Khan Ganáida, found their death. Before and after this, he encountered great dangers of war, but with the aid of God he escaped unhurt, although he lost his property. It is related by one, Sadah by name, that in this war a man aimed a blow at the Guru, who parried it, and struck him with his blade, saying: “Not in that manner, but so the sword is used;” and with one blow he made an end of his foe. One of the companions of the Guru asked the author of this work: “What was the purport of the words by which the Guru accompanied his blow?” I said: “It was to give instruction, as it belongs to a Guru to teach also how to strike a blow with a sword; for a Guru is called a teacher: he did not strike out of anger, which would have been blameable.” At last he retired from the war of Kartarpúr to Bhagwárah, and because there, in the vicinity of Lahore, he met with difficulties, he betook himself from thence in haste to Gerait púr, which lies in the mountainous district of the Penjab, and was then dependent upon the rája Tárachand, who had never paid homage to the pádsháh Shah Jehan. The inhabitants of this country adore idols. Upon the summit of a fortified mountain, they raised an image of the Déva, named Nâina (Naráyana). Rájas and other eminent persons made pilgrimages to this place. At the time when the Guru came there, one of the Sikhs, called Bhairo, who accompanied him, entered the temple and struck off the nose of the idol. The rájas, having been informed of it, came to the Guru to complain of the act, and named the man who did it. The Guru called Bhairo before him. The Sikh denied the deed. The servants of the rájas declared: “We know the man.” He replied: “O rájas, ask you the god: if he tells you my name, kill me.” The rájas said: “You blockhead! how shall the god speak?” Bhairo laughed and answered: “Now it is clear who is the blockhead: if the god cannot defend his head, nor point out the man who struck him, what benefit do you expect from him, and why do you venerate his strength?” The rájas remained silent and confounded. From this time, the disciples of the Guru increased considerably, and in this mountainous country, as far as the frontiers of Thibet and Khota, the name of Muselman was not heard.
The author of this work heard what follows from the tongue of Guru Har-govind: “A mighty rája exists in the north or this mountainous country. One day he sent me an ambassador who asked information, saying: ‘I have heard that there is a town named Delhi; what is the name of its rája, and whose son is he?’ I was astonished to hear that he did not know even the name of Amír ul Múmenín saheb Karan sáni (Jehangír).” The Guru had eight hundred horses in his stable, three hundred troopers on horseback, and sixty men with fire-arms were always in his service. Among these some carried on commerce, and other trades and occupations. Whoever was a fugitive from his home took refuge with him.
The Guru believed but one God. A person desired from him some account of the creation and the constitution of this world. The Guru said: “The universe is an appearance without reality, and an unsubstantial manifestation of God, the highest being; and all bodies, as well as gods, are an idle illusion. I will tell thee, said he, a story of old times: There was a king who went to hunt the hátah jori, which in the Turkish language is called kamer ghah, and in Persian barah shikar, ‘a fawn of the chace.’ A deer came into the circle of the hunting party. The king said: ‘On whose side the deer will come forth, let him not return before me until he has taken it with his hand.’ By fate, the animal came out on the side of the king. Khusro run after it until he was far from the army, and reached a place where, on account of thick wood, he could not find a path. The king was glad to think the deer would now return towards him; but when he came near it, there was a small opening through which the game escaped. The king sharply pushed on his horse, which, contracting itself, passed through the thicket; but the pádsháh was taken by two branches, and his arms and feet fastened so as if it had been purposely brought about. He remained two days in such a state, until two persons, a man and a woman, who were gathering wood, arrived near him. The woman said to her husband: ‘Look! the king has hanged a thief.’ The man replied: ‘This is not a place for hanging; we must examine it nearer.’ When they had approached, they saw and recognised the king, and said to each other: ‘If we release him, it will be of use to us.’ The woman observed: ‘He is the king; once made free, what advantage will he grant us for it? If he promises to marry our daughter, we will release him.’ They said so to the king, who promied what they desired. After that, they liberated him, brought him to their house, and gave him their daughter. He remained there some time, and then joined his army. When he wanted to enter his palace, the door-keeper struck him with his stick; the king was seized with a trembling and awoke. He saw the high throne and the servants before him waiting for his orders. By this dream he was aroused from the emptiness of his illusion; he knew that the world is but an appearance without reality; and that, whatever we experience, being awake, is likewise nothing more than a dream. He found that the diversity of forms and of distinct bodies is but an image of existence, and that in truth there is but one real being, one praiseworthy, and raised above all others by superlative excellence.”
One of the Brahmans was called Déva, and counted himself among the wise. He visited the Guru, and seated himself one day upon the bed of Bába Jév, who was the son of a Guru. The people said: “Do not sit there.” He asked: “Why not?” They answered: “This is the place of the Guru.” He said: “Is perhaps the figure of a Guru not that of a man, or have I not a rational soul manifest in me? or can I not enjoy what another eats or drinks?” This speech came to the ears of the Guru Hargovind. He called that man before him, and said: “O Déva! it is not the whole world but one being?” He replied: “It is.” The Guru pointed to an ass, and asked: “Do you know what this is?” Déva replied: “You are one with God, therefore you are also this.” The Guru laughed, and was not at all angry. Déva wished to marry his own sister; the people said: “This is forbidden.” He answered: “If it were forbidden, the junction of the sexual parts would be impossible. Thus, because it is not God’s will that we should rise up in the air, he withheld from us the faculty of flying.”