Guru Gobind Singh Educational Society, Jabalpur

Guru Gobind Singh

Following the death of Guru Tegh Bahadur, Guru Gobind Singh (1666–1708), the most important of all the Gurus with the exception of Guru Nanak, assumed leadership of the Sikhs. Gobind Rai, whose name was altered to Gobind Singh possibly at the time of the creation of the Khalsa, was born in Patna, the only child of Guru Tegh Bahadur. At the age of five he was brought to Anandpur and educated in Sanskrit and Persian and in the arts of poetry and warfare.

Nine-year-old son Gobind Rai became the Tenth Guru and his call to arms was heard throughout India. After several stunning victories against the Hindu Hill Rajas and the Mughal Empire, the Tenth Guru created the Khalsa, on Baisakhi Day, 1699. Infusing his own essence into the Khalsa, he made the Khalsa the Guru, and then bowed down to the Khalsa. He thus became Guru Gobind Singh. He established the Rehit, the code of conduct, for a Sikh to follow. Guru Gobind Singh declared that the Guruship would no longer be passed to a human being, but to the Shabad Guru, embodied in the Siri Guru Granth Sahib. Upon his passing beyond, the Light of the Guru which had been incarnate for some two hundred years, was again diffused into the Word of God. His Sikhs were then directed to look only to the Siri Guru Granth Sahib as their Guru, for all time to come.