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Theology

The Sarbloh Granth: History, Attribution, and Manuscript Tradition

Professor: Sikhi University Source: SikhLibrary

The Sarbloh Granth (Iron Scripture) is a voluminous text of approximately 1,344 pages attributed in Nihang Sikh tradition to Guru Gobind Singh Ji. This course examines its manuscript history, the circumstances of its publication, the nature of scholarly debates surrounding its attribution, and its place within living Khalsa praxis.

Begin course12 lessons · 10-question test · 80% to pass
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Prerequisite recommended. This is a 200-level course. To get the most out of it, we recommend completing the 100-level courses first.

What you'll learn

  • Identify the principal manuscript traditions and published editions of the Sarbloh Granth
  • Summarize the arguments for and against Guru Gobind Singh Ji's authorship as presented by competing scholarly positions
  • Describe the role of Nihang Sikh traditions in preserving and transmitting the text
  • Analyze the structure and major sections of the Sarbloh Granth as a literary composition
  • Evaluate primary source evidence relating to the text's early history
  • Apply critical source analysis skills to contested scripture attribution questions

Key terms — ਸ਼ਬਦਾਵਲੀ

ਸਰਬਲੋਹ

All-Iron; the divine epithet meaning the One whose form is entirely iron/steel, used as a title for both Waheguru and the granth

ਗ੍ਰੰਥ

Scripture; a compiled written text, from Sanskrit grantha meaning book or treatise

ਨਿਹੰਗ

Nihang; a distinct order of Khalsa Sikhs known for preserving older martial and ceremonial traditions

ਬੁੱਢਾ ਦਲ

Buddha Dal; the elder army of the Nihang Sikhs, traditionally custodians of the Sarbloh Granth

ਮੰਗਲਾਚਰਣ

Manglacharan; the auspicious opening invocation or benedictory verse that begins a sacred text

ਬਾਣੀ

Bani; sacred utterance or scripture, specifically the compositions of the Gurus and Bhagats

ਪਾਠ

Path; the recitation or reading of sacred scripture

ਖ਼ਾਲਸਾ

Khalsa; the community of initiated Sikhs, from Arabic khalas meaning pure or liberated

ਦਸਮ ਗ੍ਰੰਥ

Dasam Granth; the scripture associated with the Tenth Guru, sharing some thematic overlap with the Sarbloh Granth

ਜਥੇਦਾਰ

Jathedar; the head or leader of a jatha (group), particularly the head of one of the five Takhts

Lessons

1. Introduction: What Is the Sarbloh Granth?

Full course contents
  1. Introduction: What Is the Sarbloh Granth?
  2. The Name Sarbloh: Iron as Theology
  3. Structure and Major Sections
  4. The Nihang Tradition as Custodian
  5. Publication History and Printed Editions
  6. Manuscript Evidence and Early Sources
  7. The Attribution Debate: Arguments for Guru Gobind Singh Ji's Authorship
  8. The Attribution Debate: Scholarly Concerns and Counter-Arguments
  9. Relationship to the Dasam Granth
  10. Language, Metre, and Literary Style
  11. The Sarbloh Granth in Living Sikh Practice
  12. Toward a Balanced Assessment: Faith, History, and Scholarship

Opening the Question

The ਸਰਬਲੋਹ ਗ੍ਰੰਥ presents a distinctive challenge to the student of Sikh literature: it is a text held sacred by a significant and ancient stream of the Khalsa — the Nihang Singhs — yet remains relatively unknown to the broader Sikh world and largely unstudied in Western academic Sikh studies. The published edition, prepared under the authority of Singh Sahib Baba Santa Singh Ji, Jathedar of the Panth Akali Buddha Dal at Sri Anandpur Sahib, bears the notation “Sri Mukh Vak” — words from the sacred mouth — indicating its attributed source in Guru Gobind Singh Ji (Baba Santa Singh 1973, title page). This attribution is the starting point of both devotion and debate.

Scale and Scope

At approximately 1,344 pages in its printed form, the Sarbloh Granth is a large and varied composition. It opens with a ਮੰਗਲਾਚਰਣ (Manglacharan), moves through a version of a Japji Sahib attributed to its text, and then unfolds into extensive mythological narratives, hymns, and philosophical poetry. Scholars who have examined the text note that it contains multiple poetic metres, invocations to various forms of the divine, and substantial sections dealing with heroic narrative in the tradition of martial Puranic literature (Fenech and McLeod 2014, 287). The text is not part of the standard Sikh Nitnem (daily liturgy) practiced by the majority of Sikhs, but certain sections — particularly the Manglacharan and the Sarbloh Japji — form part of the extended Nitnem observed in Nihang Singh jathas.

Why This Course Matters

Engaging seriously with the Sarbloh Granth is an act of intellectual and spiritual responsibility. For those committed to Khalsa praxis in the Nihang tradition, the text is sacred ਬਾਣੀ. For historians, it raises important questions about textual transmission in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. For all students of Sikhi, it offers an opportunity to practice the skills of careful reading, honest scholarship, and respectful engagement with tradition. This course does not resolve the attribution debate — that remains an open scholarly question — but it equips students to engage with both the text and the debate intelligently.

2. The Name Sarbloh: Iron as Theology

Etymology and Divine Epithet

The word ਸਰਬਲੋਹ combines sarab (all, entire, from Sanskrit sarva) with loh (iron, from Sanskrit loha). As a divine name, it means "the One whose entire form is Iron" or "the All-Iron Lord." Within the text itself and within Nihang theological understanding, Sarbloh is an epithet for Waheguru — the Eternal, Sovereign, indestructible divine reality. Iron in this framework is not merely a metal; it becomes a theological symbol of incorruptibility, divine strength, and the sovereignty that cannot be bent or broken (Singh and Mann 2015, 12). The granth bearing this name is thus a scripture of the Iron Lord, a text whose very title encodes a theology.

Iron in Khalsa Practice

The significance of iron in Sikh tradition extends well beyond the Sarbloh Granth. The ਕੜਾ (iron bracelet worn by initiated Sikhs) and the ਕਿਰਪਾਨ (steel blade) are among the Panj Kakars — the five articles of Khalsa identity. Nihang Singhs extend the principle of Sarbloh into their cooking and eating practices: food prepared and consumed in iron utensils is called ਸਰਬਲੋਹ ਦੇਗ, and eating from iron vessels is considered spiritually significant. This practice finds its theological justification partly in the Sarbloh Granth, which frames iron as the substance of divine manifestation (Oberoi 1994, 90). The granth thus stands not merely as text but as a living theology of iron embedded in daily practice.

Sarbloh and Sovereignty

The theological concept of Sarbloh is also connected to sovereignty — ਰਾਜ — in the Nihang understanding. The invincible, iron nature of the divine corresponds to the ideal of the Khalsa as an unconquerable sovereignty. In this sense, the Sarbloh Granth participates in the broader cultural project of the late Guru period: the construction of a Khalsa identity that is warrior, sovereign, and spiritually pure. Understanding the name is thus the first key to understanding the text's theological program.

3. Structure and Major Sections

Opening Sections

The Sarbloh Granth opens with a ਮੰਗਲਾਚਰਣ — an auspicious invocation — followed by the composition known as the Sarbloh Japji Sahib. The published edition (Baba Santa Singh 1973) notes "Sri Mukh Vak Page: 10" at the opening, indicating that the Bani of the Guru begins at page 10 of that edition. The Manglacharan itself contains invocations to various forms of the divine, including Maja Lakshmi, Bhavani, and other manifestations described in terms that draw on both Puranic and Gurmat frameworks. The opening verse, as rendered in the published translation, begins: "One Universal Creator God. Victory to Sri Waheguru" — establishing the Sikh theological foundation before proceeding into the more expansive mythological invocations that follow.

Mythological Narratives

The bulk of the Sarbloh Granth consists of extended mythological narratives, many drawn from or inspired by the Puranas and the Devi Mahatmya tradition. Stories of divine combat — the slaying of Sumbhasura, Mahishasura, Chand, Munda, and Raktabeej — appear in the opening sections. These narratives are not straightforward retellings; they are transformed through the Gurmat lens into celebrations of divine sovereignty over ego and evil. According to scholars who have examined the text, the mythological material serves the theological argument that the one divine reality manifests in forms of power to protect the righteous (Fenech and McLeod 2014, 288). The warrior goddess imagery is consistently subordinated to the monotheistic framework established in the Manglacharan.

Hymns and Philosophical Poetry

Interspersed throughout the text are sections of devotional poetry, philosophical reflection, and hymns in classical musical metres. The text employs metres including Dohra, Chaupai, Bisnupad, Chhapay, and Soratha — the same classical metres found in the Dasam Granth. This metrical consistency has been cited both as evidence of a common authorship with the Dasam Granth and as evidence that the text draws on the same literary tradition and therefore could be a later composition in the same style (Singh and Mann 2015, 43). The question of metre alone cannot resolve the attribution debate, but it situates the text within a specific literary tradition.

4. The Nihang Tradition as Custodian

Who Are the Nihang Singhs?

The ਨਿਹੰਗ Singhs are a distinct and ancient stream of the Khalsa. Their origin is traced by tradition to the time of Guru Gobind Singh Ji and the early Khalsa, and they are known for preserving older forms of dress, weaponry, dietary practice, and ceremonial observance. The word nihang is sometimes rendered as "crocodile" or "fearless," signifying the martial and spiritually fearless character of this order. The ਬੁੱਢਾ ਦਲ (Buddha Dal, the elder army) and the Taruna Dal (younger army) represent the two main divisions of the historical Khalsa military orders, with the Buddha Dal traditionally assigned the care of historical sites and sacred texts (Harbans Singh 1992, vol. 3, 45).

Transmission of the Sarbloh Granth

The Sarbloh Granth as a complete published text emerged through the Buddha Dal under Baba Santa Singh Ji in the twentieth century. Prior to this publication, knowledge of the text was maintained within Nihang jathas through manuscript copies, oral recitation, and the practice of ਪਾਠ (scripture reading) within their ceremonial life. The fact that the text existed primarily within this living tradition — rather than in broad public distribution — is significant for its manuscript history. It means the transmission is traceable through a specific lineage, which both supports the authenticity of that lineage's claim and raises questions about why the text was not more widely known in the eighteenth century (Oberoi 1994, 91).

Living Praxis as Evidence

For the student of religion, living praxis — how a text is used, recited, and understood by its community — is an important form of evidence. The Nihang Singhs' integration of the Sarbloh Granth into their ceremonial life, their Amrit Sanchar (initiation) ceremonies, and their daily observance represents centuries of continuous practice. This continuity is not proof of the text's composition by Guru Gobind Singh Ji, but it is evidence of a real and sustained religious tradition that students of Sikhi must take seriously rather than dismiss. The course will return to this balance between historical criticism and respectful engagement with living tradition throughout.

5. Publication History and Printed Editions

The Buddha Dal Edition

The most widely referenced printed edition of the Sarbloh Granth was published under the authority of Singh Sahib Baba Santa Singh Ji, ਜਥੇਦਾਰ of the Panth Akali Buddha Dal, from Guru Ka Bagh, Sri Anandpur Sahib. The title page of this edition reads: "Published by the order of Singh Sahib Baba Santa Singh Ji, Jathedar of Chiyanve Karori. Office: Panth Akali Budha Dal, Fifth Takht (Chakravarti) Hindustan (Punjab)" (Baba Santa Singh 1973). The designation "Fifth Takht" reflects the Nihang claim that the Sarbloh Granth holds a status in their tradition parallel to that of the Sri Guru Granth Sahib Ji in the broader Panth. This is a significant theological claim and one that distinguishes Nihang practice from that of most other Sikhs, who recognize only the Akal Takht as the supreme temporal authority alongside the Guru Granth Sahib Ji as the eternal Guru.

Accessibility and Translation

For much of its history, the Sarbloh Granth was accessible primarily to those with command of classical Braj Bhasha and Punjabi. The text is composed in multiple literary languages, and its dense mythological allusions require considerable scholarly preparation to navigate. Modern efforts to translate and annotate the text remain in early stages. The digital preservation of the Buddha Dal edition through institutions like the Internet Archive (Namdhari eLibrary) represents an important step toward broader scholarly access, though full critical edition work — examining multiple manuscript witnesses — remains to be accomplished.

The Question of a Critical Edition

A critical edition of any scripture involves collating manuscript witnesses, identifying variant readings, and establishing the most reliable text. For the Sarbloh Granth, no published critical edition exists that systematically compares manuscript sources. This is partly a resource question and partly a theological one: for devotees, the text as received through the Nihang tradition is sacred ਬਾਣੀ, and textual criticism can feel like an inappropriate application of secular methodology to the sacred. Yet without such work, key questions about the text's composition history cannot be answered with scholarly confidence. This gap represents both an opportunity and a responsibility for future scholarship.

6. Manuscript Evidence and Early Sources

The Problem of Early References

One of the central concerns raised by scholars skeptical of the traditional attribution of the Sarbloh Granth to Guru Gobind Singh Ji is the apparent absence of independent references to the text as a standalone granth in eighteenth-century sources. The major biographical works on Guru Gobind Singh Ji from the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries — including the Suraj Prakash of Kavi Santokh Singh — do not clearly enumerate the Sarbloh Granth among the compositions of the Tenth Guru in the way that other works are referenced (Fenech and McLeod 2014, 288). This argument from silence is not conclusive, but it is a significant evidential consideration that any serious student must engage.

Manuscript Tradition within the Nihang Orders

The counter-evidence lies in the Nihang manuscript tradition itself. Defenders of the text's authenticity point out that texts transmitted within specific martial orders may not appear in general biographical literature precisely because they were held as specialized knowledge within a distinct lineage. The Nihang Singhs were not a literate clergy producing commentaries and bibliographies; they were a martial order preserving praxis. The absence of a text from a biography does not prove the text does not exist; it may reflect the organizational structure of early Khalsa society, in which different jathas held different portions of the scriptural heritage (Singh and Mann 2015, 67).

What Manuscript Study Can and Cannot Tell Us

For students approaching this question honestly, the key insight is this: manuscript evidence can establish when a text was written down, but writing down is not the same as composition. A text composed orally and transmitted within a living tradition for decades before being committed to manuscript would not have early manuscript witnesses. Furthermore, undated manuscripts cannot easily distinguish between a text composed in 1699 and one composed in 1799. The honest scholarly position is that the manuscript evidence is currently insufficient to definitively resolve the question of composition date, and that significant archival and paleographic work remains to be done.

7. The Attribution Debate: Arguments for Guru Gobind Singh Ji's Authorship

The Living Tradition Argument

The most powerful argument for the authenticity of the Sarbloh Granth's attribution is the continuous living tradition of the Nihang Singhs. This is not simply an argument from authority but an argument from social reality: a community of Khalsa Sikhs whose lineage traces directly to the early eighteenth century has consistently maintained that this text is ਬਾਣੀ of Guru Gobind Singh Ji. For this community, the text is not controversial — it is as sacred and as certain as any other composition of the Tenth Guru. This tradition of recognition has practical and ceremonial weight that cannot be simply dismissed by appeal to the absence of external documentation (Harbans Singh 1992, vol. 4, 112).

Literary and Theological Consistency

Proponents of the traditional attribution also point to the literary and theological consistency between the Sarbloh Granth and acknowledged compositions of Guru Gobind Singh Ji in the Dasam Granth. The same poetic metres appear in both texts. The same theological concerns — divine sovereignty, the warrior manifestation of the divine, the protection of the righteous, the destruction of tyranny — animate both. The mythology drawn upon in the Sarbloh Granth parallels that of the Chandi di Var and the Chandi Charitra in the Dasam Granth, suggesting either a common author or a close disciple working in a master's tradition (Singh and Mann 2015, 55). While literary consistency is not proof of authorship, it establishes plausibility.

The Theological Program of Sarbloh

The theological concept of ਸਰਬਲੋਹ as an attribute of Waheguru is coherent with the theological program of Guru Gobind Singh Ji's time — a period in which the Guru was constructing a Khalsa identity that combined spiritual depth with physical sovereignty. The granth's sustained meditation on iron as a metaphor for divine incorruptibility and human courage fits the historical moment of the founding of the Khalsa in 1699 with a coherence that makes the attribution historically plausible, even if it cannot be proven by external documentation alone.

8. The Attribution Debate: Scholarly Concerns and Counter-Arguments

The Argument from Silence

As noted in the lesson on manuscript evidence, the absence of the Sarbloh Granth from early eighteenth-century biographical accounts is significant for some scholars. W. H. McLeod and scholars following his methodology argue that texts attributed to the Gurus must be tested against the historical evidence available, and that attribution cannot rest solely on the authority of a specific tradition (Fenech and McLeod 2014, 21). By this standard, the Sarbloh Granth presents a weaker evidential case than the Guru Granth Sahib Ji, whose composition and compilation history are well documented, or even than much of the Dasam Granth, which has eighteenth-century references. Students should understand this concern without dismissing it as anti-Sikh bias — it is a question of historical methodology.

The Complexity of Mythological Content

Some scholars and Sikh theologians have expressed discomfort with the extensive invocations of Hindu deities and goddesses in the Sarbloh Granth, arguing that this content is difficult to reconcile with the strictly monotheistic and iconoclastic thrust of mainstream Sikh theology as expressed in the ਗੁਰੂ ਗ੍ਰੰਥ ਸਾਹਿਬ. Defenders of the text respond that Guru Gobind Singh Ji consistently employed mythological imagery in the Dasam Granth as metaphor and literary device, not as theological endorsement of polytheism — and that the same framework applies to the Sarbloh Granth (Singh and Mann 2015, 88). This is a genuine theological debate, not simply a historical one.

The Scholarly Responsibility

The responsible position for a Sikh academic course is to acknowledge that this debate is not resolved, that both traditional attribution and scholarly skepticism have legitimate grounds, and that students have a responsibility to engage with primary sources themselves rather than simply accepting either the devotional claim or the skeptical conclusion. What is clear is that the Sarbloh Granth is a text of profound religious significance for a substantial and ancient Khalsa community, and it deserves careful, respectful, and rigorous study regardless of how the authorship question is ultimately resolved.

9. Relationship to the Dasam Granth

Structural Parallels

The ਦਸਮ ਗ੍ਰੰਥ and the Sarbloh Granth share a number of structural and thematic features. Both open with invocations that acknowledge Waheguru before proceeding into mythological material. Both employ the classical Braj Bhasha literary tradition alongside Punjabi. Both contain extended narratives drawn from the Puranas, transformed through a monotheistic lens. Both include compositions in diverse metres — Dohra, Chaupai, Bisnupad, Chhapay, Soratha — that are characteristic of the literary culture of the court of Guru Gobind Singh Ji (Singh and Mann 2015, 43). These parallels have led some scholars to propose a close compositional relationship between the two texts, while others suggest that the Sarbloh Granth is a later composition deliberately modeled on the Dasam Granth.

Theological Overlaps

The theology of divine sovereignty and martial manifestation that animates the Chandi di Var and the Chandi Charitra in the Dasam Granth is closely related to the theology of Sarbloh in the Sarbloh Granth. Both frame divine power as essentially creative and protective, manifesting in forms of strength and sovereignty to protect the righteous from oppression. This shared theological vision is coherent and internally consistent, and it provides the devotee with a unified understanding of the Guru's theological project across both texts.

Points of Distinction

Despite the parallels, the Sarbloh Granth has features that distinguish it from the Dasam Granth. The concept of iron as an attribute of the divine is more extensively developed in the Sarbloh Granth. The text also seems to have a more specifically Khalsa-centric theology, connecting the divine epithet Sarbloh to the Khalsa identity through the wearing of iron and the preparation and consumption of food in iron vessels. Whether this distinctive development represents the composition of Guru Gobind Singh Ji himself or a close disciple developing his master's thought within his tradition is one of the open questions the course invites students to consider.

10. Language, Metre, and Literary Style

Languages of the Text

The Sarbloh Granth is composed primarily in Braj Bhasha — the literary Hindi dialect that served as the principal vehicle for devotional and martial poetry in north India from the medieval period through the eighteenth century. This is the same literary language used extensively in the Dasam Granth. Sections also appear in classical Sanskrit diction, and the text shows familiarity with Persian-Arabic vocabulary in some passages, reflecting the cosmopolitan literary culture of the Punjabi courts of the period (Fenech and McLeod 2014, 67). The ਗੁਰਮੁਖੀ script in which the text is written represents a localization of this multilingual literary tradition into the specifically Sikh scriptural context.

Poetic Metres

The primary metres employed in the Sarbloh Granth include the Dohra (a couplet form common in didactic and narrative poetry), the Chaupai (a four-line form favored for devotional and narrative verse), the Bisnupad (a longer stanzaic form used for panegyric), the Chhapay (a complex six-line form with variable last two lines), and the Soratha (an inverted Dohra). These are the metres of classical Braj Bhasha poetry, and their use reflects compositional training in the literary tradition of the Vaishnava and Shakta devotional poets. The metrical facility demonstrated in the text is consistent with what scholars have identified in the Dasam Granth compositions attributed directly to Guru Gobind Singh Ji.

Stylistic Features

The style of the Sarbloh Granth is marked by extensive use of epithets and divine names — a feature particularly visible in the opening Manglacharan, which strings together hundreds of divine names and attributes across multiple poetic metres. This technique of divine name-enumeration (nāmāvalī) is a classical Sanskrit and Hindi devotional form, and its appearance in the Sarbloh Granth connects the text to both Vaishnava and Shakta literary traditions while framing the divine names within the monotheistic Gurmat framework. The devotee is not worshipping multiple gods; the multiple names are understood as facets of the one Waheguru.

11. The Sarbloh Granth in Living Sikh Practice

Liturgical Role

Within Nihang Singh jathas, the Sarbloh Granth holds a place in extended Nitnem and ceremonial observance that goes beyond what is standard in mainstream Sikh practice. Sections of the text — particularly the Manglacharan and the Sarbloh Japji Sahib — are recited as part of the extended daily liturgy observed by committed Nihang Singhs. The text is also central to certain forms of Amrit Sanchar (Khalsa initiation) practiced within the Nihang tradition, where its recitation forms part of the ceremonial context (Harbans Singh 1992, vol. 4, 113). This liturgical integration means that for practicing Nihang Singhs, the Sarbloh Granth is not an abstract historical text but a living spiritual resource encountered daily.

Sarbloh Langar and Material Practice

One of the most distinctive expressions of the Sarbloh Granth's influence in Nihang practice is the tradition of ਸਰਬਲੋਹ ਦੇਗ — food prepared and consumed exclusively in iron utensils. The theological basis for this practice is found in the Sarbloh Granth's identification of iron with the divine. Eating from iron vessels thus becomes an act of communion with the divine nature symbolized by ਸਰਬਲੋਹ. This material practice embeds the theology of the text in the body and in daily life in a way that is distinctive to this stream of the Khalsa tradition.

The Text as Living Teaching

Perhaps the most important thing to understand about the Sarbloh Granth's place in practice is that it is not experienced by its practitioners as a subject of academic debate but as a living spiritual teacher. The ਪਾਠ of the text — its recitation in a spirit of devotion — is understood to confer blessings, to strengthen the Khalsa spirit, and to connect the practitioner with the sovereign divine reality of Sarbloh. This experiential dimension of the text cannot be reduced to historical analysis, and a complete education about the Sarbloh Granth must make space for this dimension of living religious experience alongside critical scholarship.

12. Toward a Balanced Assessment: Faith, History, and Scholarship

The Limits of Historical Method

This course has presented historical methodology as a tool for engaging with the Sarbloh Granth, not as the final arbiter of its sacred status. Historical method can establish what external evidence exists for a text's composition date; it cannot determine whether a text is sacred, spiritually true, or worthy of devotion. These are theological and existential questions that historical method is not equipped to answer. A student who completes this course should understand both the value and the limits of historical-critical method when applied to sacred scripture (Pashaura Singh 2000, 17).

Scholarly Integrity and Devotional Respect

At the same time, intellectual integrity requires that students not simply set aside historical questions because they are devotionally inconvenient. The honest acknowledgment that the attribution of the Sarbloh Granth is historically debated is not a betrayal of the Nihang tradition; it is a mark of academic seriousness that actually honors the tradition by taking it seriously enough to examine it carefully. A tradition that cannot withstand honest examination is fragile; a tradition that emerges from honest examination as coherent and meaningful demonstrates real depth.

An Open Invitation

The Sarbloh Granth invites the student into a world of iron sovereignty, warrior devotion, and cosmological mythology refracted through the Gurmat lens. Whether one reads it as the direct composition of Guru Gobind Singh Ji or as a later text in the spirit of the Guru's tradition, it is a remarkable literary and spiritual achievement that rewards careful study. This course has aimed to equip students with the tools to continue that study — with honesty, respect, and a genuine openness to what this ancient text has to teach about the ਖ਼ਾਲਸਾ vision of divine sovereignty and human dignity.

From the Granth — ਸ੍ਰੀ ਸਰਬਲੋਹ ਗ੍ਰੰਥ (ਪੂਰਾ)

ਸ੍ਰੀ ਸਰਬਲੋਹ ਗ੍ਰੰਥ (ਪੂਰਾ) · Ang 1–1040, rendered verbatim from the reader corpus. Tap any line for its published translation and ਅਰਥ.Read with Santhya audio →

References & further reading

  1. Fenech, Louis E., and W. H. McLeod. Historical Dictionary of Sikhism. 3rd ed. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2014.
  2. Singh, Kamalroop, and Gurinder Singh Mann. The Granth of the Tenth King. Amritsar: Singh Brothers, 2015.
  3. Loehlin, C. H. The Sikhs and Their Scriptures. Lucknow: Lucknow Publishing House, 1958.
  4. Singh, Harbans. The Encyclopedia of Sikhism. 4 vols. Patiala: Punjabi University, 1992–1998.
  5. Baba Santa Singh, ed. Sampooran Sri Sarbloh Granth Sahib Ji. Sri Anandpur Sahib: Panth Akali Buddha Dal, 1973.
  6. Oberoi, Harjot. The Construction of Religious Boundaries: Culture, Identity, and Diversity in the Sikh Tradition. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994.
  7. Singh, Pashaura. The Guru Granth Sahib: Canon, Meaning and Authority. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2000.

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Course test

Pass with 80% or higher to complete the course and unlock the next one.

1. What does the title 'Sarbloh Granth' mean?
2. Which Sikh community is the primary custodian of the Sarbloh Granth?
3. Who published the widely referenced printed edition of the Sarbloh Granth?
4. What is the main scholarly concern about the Sarbloh Granth's attribution?
5. Which poetic metres are shared between the Sarbloh Granth and the Dasam Granth?
6. What is 'Sarbloh Degh' in Nihang practice?
7. In what primary literary language is the Sarbloh Granth composed?
8. What is the 'Manglacharan' that opens the Sarbloh Granth?
9. How does the course recommend students approach the attribution debate?
10. What is the significance of 'iron' as a theological concept in the Sarbloh Granth?

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