Piara Singh Padam
Courses
A Survey of Sikh Literature
This course offers a guided academic survey of the Sikh literary tradition from its origins to the present day. Students learn to read, situate, and analyze the major works as literature and as cultural record rather than reproducing the sacred and classical texts themselves. The sweep runs from the poetic…
Understanding Teekas: How Gurbani Has Been Explained
This overview course introduces the tradition of the teeka (commentary or exegesis) and shows how commentaries have helped Sikhs read and understand Gurbani for more than a century. It explains what a teeka is and why a learner often needs help with older vocabulary, grammar, and context. It surveys the main…
The Historical Rehatnamas: Codes of Sikh Conduct
A scholarly survey of the historical ਰਹਿਤਨਾਮੇ — the early codes of Sikh conduct attributed to the Khalsa era. This course examines the ਚੌਪਾ ਸਿੰਘ, ਦੇਸਾ ਸਿੰਘ, ਪ੍ਰਹਿਲਾਦ ਰਾਇ, ਨੰਦ ਲਾਲ, ਦਯਾ ਸਿੰਘ and related ਰਹਿਤਨਾਮੇ, their disputed dates, the textual and authenticity debates surrounding them, what they reveal about eighteenth-century Sikh practice, the contradictions among them, and the central methodological problem of distinguishing genuine Guru-era injunctions from later sectarian and Brahmanical additions — culminating in how these texts were sifted to produce the modern ਸਿੱਖ ਰਹਿਤ ਮਰਯਾਦਾ.
The Early Rehatnamas: Reading the Puratan Codes of Khalsa Conduct
This course is about the early Sikh codes of conduct known as the puratan rehatnamas, and about how scholars study them. It does not reproduce the texts themselves. Instead it explains what a rehatnama is, surveys the major early codes commonly attributed to figures such as Bhai Nand Lal, Bhai Desa Singh, Bhai…
Gurbilas Patshahi 10: Guru Gobind Singh Ji's Court
An advanced study of the ਗੁਰਬਿਲਾਸ ਪਾਤਸ਼ਾਹੀ ੧੦, Koer Singh's mid-eighteenth-century poetic biography of ਸ੍ਰੀ ਗੁਰੂ ਗੋਬਿੰਦ ਸਿੰਘ ਜੀ. The course examines the text as a foundational work of early Sikh historiography: its genre and ਕਵਿ conventions, the courtly world of ਪਾਉਂਟਾ ਸਾਹਿਬ and its ਬੱਤੀ ਕਵੀ (fifty-two poets), the founding of the ਖ਼ਾਲਸਾ, the ਅਨੰਦਪੁਰ period and its battles, the place of the ਦਸਮ ਗ੍ਰੰਥ, and the great ਸਾਖੀਆਂ of ਭਾਈ ਦਯਾ ਸਿੰਘ and ਭਾਈ ਮਨੀ ਸਿੰਘ. Students learn to read a ਗੁਰਬਿਲਾਸ critically — weighing its devotional aims, its ਪੁਰਾਤਨ sources, and its contested reliability — guided throughout by the scholarship of Piara Singh Padam, who edited and annotated the standard modern edition.
Gurbilas Patshahi 6: Guru Hargobind Ji and Miri-Piri
An advanced study of the Gurbilas Patshahi 6, the early Sikh verse-chronicle (ਗੁਰਬਿਲਾਸ) celebrating the reign of Guru Hargobind Ji, the sixth Nanak. The course examines the text as a literary and historical source for the doctrine of ਮੀਰੀ-ਪੀਰੀ — the union of temporal and spiritual sovereignty — the founding of the ਅਕਾਲ ਤਖ਼ਤ, the militarisation of the Panth, the four battles against Mughal forces, the Guru's imprisonment in Gwalior, his relations with Emperor Jahangir, and the development of Amritsar and the Kartarpur period. Students engage critically with questions of authorship, dating, and the place of ਗੁਰਬਿਲਾਸ literature within the wider corpus of Sikh historiography.
