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G.S. Mann: Guru Nanak’s Life and Legacy 7
listeners/readers as the followers of the path paved by him, and in the
process preserve his remembrance. 17
Rather than trying to overturn these accounts along the lines McLeod
established, I believe that scholars need to study early Sikh sources such
as the Janam Sakhis by developing a clearer understanding of their dates
of origin and the context of their production. 18 The field is fortunate to
have sufficient manuscript data and related historical evidence to address
these issues, and the critical editions of these texts are slowly becoming
available. 19 This seems to be the only way to flesh out significant
information available there.
Let me explain what I mean with some details. On the basis of my
work with the Janam Sakhi manuscripts, the evidence seems to point to
the rise of the Janam Sakhis in the following sequence: Puratan (pre-
1600), Miharban (pre-1620), and Bala (1648–1658). 20 The dates of the
Puratan are suggestive of an early period in the history of the community,
when the people who had met the Guru and had the opportunity to hear
his message from himself may still have been around (Guru Nanaku jin
sunhia pekhia se phiri garbhasi na parai re, M5, GG, 612). The evidence
indicates that this text was created by someone who was part of the group
that later emerged as the mainstream Sikh community. The possibility
that the author of this text and some of his listeners knew Guru Nanak as
a real person—who bathed, ate food, worked in the fields, rested at night,
and had to deal with sons who were not always obedient—makes this
text an invaluable source of information on the Guru’s life.
Unlike the Puratan, the importance of the Miharban and Bala Janam
Sakhis falls in a different arena. Elaborating on the Puratan narrative,
these two Janam Sakhis expand the scope of the Guru’s travels and
introduce a circle of people who would have made up the third and fourth
generation of his followers. 21 Whereas the farthest limit of travels to the
east in Puratan is Banaras, Miharban extends the travels to Assam and
Puri. Also as sectarian documents, they both reflect the points of view of
the groups that created them and mirror the divisions within the
community and the polemics involved in presenting the founder in the
middle decades of the seventeenth century. 22 Given the variations in time
of their origin and context of production, it is essential to study each of
these texts separately to see what they have to offer on the Guru’s life
and the early Sikh community.
Let me present some details available in the Puratan Janam Sakhi to
support its relevance for understanding the Guru’s life, his primary
concerns, and the contours of the early Sikh community. With regard to
the founding of Kartarpur, the Puratan narrates that it was established
after the first long journey (udasi) of the Guru, and not after the
completion of his travels, as it is commonly presented in current
scholarship. 23 As for the daily routine at Kartarpur, we are told that the
Sikhs gathered at the Guru’s house (dargah), recited his compositions as