Dasam Granthਦਸਮ ਗ੍ਰੰਥ

The Dasam Granth is a large collection of poetic compositions attributed to Guru Gobind Singh Ji, the tenth Sikh Guru, and to the poets of his court. Compiled into one volume after the Guru's lifetime, it holds hymns, heroic tales, retellings of older stories and letters, and its best known prayers are read by Sikhs every day.

What is the Dasam Granth?

The Dasam Granth is the collection of compositions linked with the court of Guru Gobind Singh Ji, and its name states that claim plainly: as the Encyclopaedia of Sikhism explains, dasam means tenth and granth means book, so the title means the Book of the Tenth Master, set apart from the earlier Adi Granth, now honoured as Guru Granth Sahib Ji. It has also been known as Dasven Padshah Ka Granth, the Book of the Tenth King. It is a separate volume from Guru Granth Sahib Ji, which all Sikhs hold to be the eternal Guru.

Kamalroop Singh and Gurinder Singh Mann, as summarised by Wikipedia, describe the Dasam Granth as carrying bir ras, the heroic strain of verse about warfare, weapons and courage, beside the shanti ras, the strain of peace, that marks Guru Granth Sahib Ji. The standard print edition, first published in 1902, contains 1,428 pages with 17,293 verses in 18 sections, on the figures given by Robin Rinehart. The compositions are mostly in Braj, with parts in Avadhi, Punjabi, Hindi and Persian, written mainly in Gurmukhi script.

What does the Dasam Granth contain?

The volume opens with its most prayed compositions. First comes Jaap Sahib, 199 verses praising the formless and timeless God. Then comes Akal Ustat, the praise of the Timeless One, which the Encyclopaedia of Sikhism counts at 271 verses in Braj in Gurmukhi script: the ten Tav-Prasad Savaiye of daily prayer are taken from this hymn. The third great section is the Bachittar Natak, the wondrous drama, partly an autobiography: its Apni Katha portion tells the Guru's story up to 1696 and his early battles, and the Encyclopaedia dates its completion to before the founding of the Khalsa in 1699.

The middle of the book turns to Chandi, the goddess as warrior, in three works retelling the Devi Mahatamya story from the Markandeya Purana: Chandi Charitar I and II in Braj, and Chandi di Var, the same story as a ballad in Punjabi. After them come Gian Prabodh, the awakening of knowledge, on God, the soul and the duties of rulers, and the avatar cycles: Chaubis Avtar, the twenty four incarnations of Vishnu, with the Brahma Avtar and Rudra Avtar beside it.

The later sections vary more. The 33 Savaiye praise the one God beyond every scripture, Khalsa Mahima praises the Khalsa, and Shastar Nam Mala, the garland of weapon names, lists arms as symbols of divine power in over 1,300 verses. The largest single part is the Charitropakhyan, a cycle of 405 tales which the Encyclopaedia of Sikhism says forms over one third of the book and was completed in 1696 on the bank of the Sutlej, probably at Anandpur Sahib: its final tale holds the Benti Chaupai, recited daily as Chaupai Sahib. The book closes with the Zafarnama, the letter of victory in Persian verse to the emperor Aurangzeb, and the Hikayats, Persian tales placed after it.

Who wrote the Dasam Granth?

Authorship is the question on which honest sources openly disagree, and this page reports the positions without settling them. Wikipedia, following W. H. McLeod, sets out three views: the entire work was composed by Guru Gobind Singh Ji himself, the entire collection was composed by the poets of his court, or part was composed by the Guru and part by the other poets. The first is the traditional view, and it is the position of the Sodhak Committee, the scholars who studied 32 manuscripts at Amritsar from 1897 and produced the standard edition: they held the Dasam Granth to be entirely the Guru's work, and a 1931 review under the Darbar Sahib Committee of the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee vindicated that conclusion, as SikhiWiki records. Traditional scholars also cite a letter attributed to Bhai Mani Singh Ji, though Robin Rinehart records that scholars who examined that letter found it unreliable.

Many academic scholars hold the middle position. The Guru's court at Paonta and Anandpur Sahib kept 52 poets who composed and translated in Braj, and Wendy Doniger's summary, quoted by Wikipedia, describes many Sikhs and scholars as holding that the text was authored and compiled partly by the Guru and partly by his court poets. Hardip Singh Syan adds that pre-colonial Sikh society accepted the Dasam Granth wholeheartedly as the Guru's work, even though the authorship issue has not, in his words, been satisfactorily resolved. The Encyclopaedia of Sikhism itself notes a school of opinion holding that the Charitropakhyan is by court poets rather than the Guru. This page follows the careful sources: compositions are described as attributed to Guru Gobind Singh Ji, each position is named with its holders, and no verdict is given in our own voice.

How was the Dasam Granth compiled and preserved?

The compositions began as separate works, gathered as booklets and small granths across the Guru's life. When Anandpur Sahib was evacuated and the camp crossed the flooded Sarsa river, much of the court's writing was lost, as both Wikipedia and the Encyclopaedia tradition describe: what survived did so because copyists and devotees had kept copies in many hands. After the Guru's passing in 1708, tradition holds that Bhai Mani Singh Ji collected the writings and compiled them into one volume. SikhiWiki adds that he worked on the direct instruction of Mata Sundari Ji and spent nine years gathering copies, while the Encyclopaedia, following Kesar Singh Chibber's Bansavalinama of 1769, dates it to about 26 years after the Guru's death. The resulting birs do not all agree in order or contents.

Early manuscripts anchor the history. Wikipedia reports that the oldest is likely the Anandpuri Hazuri Bir, dated 1698, with a few later folios. Another view reported there takes the earliest surviving complete manuscript to be the combined Adi and Dasam volume attributed to Bhai Mani Singh Ji and dated 1713. The Patna birs and the illuminated Patna Missal of 1765 are also named among the important early copies, and the version in wide circulation follows the edition ascribed to Bhai Mani Singh Ji. In the eighteenth century the whole text was carried and recited by the soldiers of the Dal Khalsa.

Which banis from the Dasam Granth are read every day?

Three compositions stand inside Nitnem, the daily Sikh prayer, and no side of the authorship debate disputes this. Jaap Sahib is read in the morning, Tav-Prasad Savaiye follows it as part of Akal Ustat, and Benti Chaupai, read as Chaupai Sahib, is recited in the morning and again in the evening. The same three banis are read by the Panj Pyare while preparing amrit in the Amrit Sanchar, the Khalsa initiation ceremony. Beyond Nitnem, the first stanza of the daily Ardas comes from Chandi di Var, and the Sikh Rehat Maryada also places a stanza of the Chaubis Avtar inside the evening Rehras. For most Sikhs the Dasam Granth is therefore known first through prayer: its verses open the day, frame the community's petition and welcome new members into the Khalsa Panth.

Wider reading sits beside the daily core. In the Nihang tradition the Dasam Granth is given equal scriptural standing beside the Adi Granth, while Wikipedia notes full recitation of the text among Nirmala Sikhs in the contemporary era. Robin Rinehart observes that few Sikhs have read the complete book. Both things are true at once: the book is prayed from daily by millions, and read whole by few.

The Dasam Granth in Sikh life today

SikhiWiki records that today the Dasam Granth is kept open with reverence at Takht Patna Sahib and at Takht Sachkhand Hazur Sahib at Nanded, and in gurdwaras maintained by the Nihang Singhs, where its meanings are explained and a hukamnama is also taken from it. Wikipedia adds the other half of the picture: after the early twentieth century the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee stopped holding regular parkash of the volume in the gurdwaras it manages, apart from special occasions. This page reports the practice as the sources describe it and takes no side in the discussion about it.

For a first time reader, the sources suggest a steady way in: begin with the banis already woven into Sikh daily life and with the Bachittar Natak's account of the Guru's mission, and read the heroic sections as court poetry of courage, which is how Kamalroop Singh and Gurinder Singh Mann describe its purpose. Hold the authorship question as the best sources hold it, as a real and open discussion. What no Sikh source questions is the place of Gurbani in daily life, and the standing of Guru Granth Sahib Ji as the eternal Guru.