KARNI NAMAH, address on the importance of good conduct, is an apocryphal composition in verse attributed to Guru Nanak. In this work Guru Nanak is said to have predicted to one Qaxi Rukan Dm the advent of the rule of the Khalsa which will usher in the millennium.

MIHARBAN JANAM SAKHI takes its name from Sodhi Miharban, nephew of Guru Arjan and leader of the schismatic Mma sect. Miharban`s father, Prithi Chand, was the eldest son of Guru Ram Das and as such had greatly resented being passed over as his father`s successor in favour of a

ADI SAKHIAN (adi = first; sakhian, plural of sakhi = anecdotes, stories, discourses, parables) is one of the early compilations but not the first of the extant janam sakhi traditions to evolve. The manuscript, dated 1758 Bk/ AD 1701, and copied by Shambhu Nath Brahman was first located by Dr

NASIHAT NAMAH, lit. epistle of admonishment, is an apocryphal composition in verse attributed to Guru Nanak and is said to have been addressed by the Guru to king Croesus (Karun in Sikh chronicles). The King is advised to do good deeds when God has bestowed riches upon him. Money

ARDAS, supplication and recollection, is the ritual prayer which Sikhs, individually or in congregation, recite morning and evening and in fact whenever they perform a religious service and at the beginning and conclusion of family, public or religious functions. The word ardas seems to have been derived from Persian

POTHI, popular Punjabi form of the Sanskrit pustaka (book), derived from the root pust (to bind) via the Pali potlhaka and Prakrit puttha. Besides Punjabi, the word poihi meaning a book is current in Maithili, Bhojpuri and Marathi languages as well. Among the Sikhs, however, polhi signifies a sacred book,

APOCRYPHAL COMPOSITIONS, known in Sikh vocabulary as kachchi bani (unripe, rejected texts) or vadhu bani (superfluous texts) are those writings, mostly in verse but prose not excluded,which have been attributed to the Gurus, but which were not incorporated in the Guru Granth Sahib at the time of its compilation in

POTHI SACH KHAND, by Sodhi Miharban (also written as Miharvan), is the first of the six pothis or volumes which are said to have comprised the first detailed janam sdkhi or biography of Guru Nanak. Sodhi Miharban (1581-1640) was the son of BabaPrithi Chand and grandson of Guru Ram

BALA JANAM SAKHI. The Janam Sakhis of the Bala tradition owe both their name and their reputation to Bhai Bala, a SandhuJa^ from Guru Nanak`s village of Talvandi. According to the tradition`s own claims, Bala was a near contemporary of Guru Nanak who accompanied him during his period in

POTHIAN, BABA MOHAN VALIAN, manuscript copies {pothidn, lit. books), in Gurmukhi script, containing some of the compositions of the first three Gurus and eight medieval saints, which, according to Sikh tradition. Guru Arjan (1563-1606) obtained from Baba Mohan, the elder son of the Third Guru, Amar Das, and which

BEDAVA, lit. disclaimer (be=without + dava = claim). The term came to be used by Sikh chroniclers in reference to an episode Kelating to the last days of Guru Gobind Singh *s battle at Anandpur during the winter of 1705. As, in consequence of the protracted siege of Anandpur,

PREM AMBODH POTHI, lit. book of knowledge about loving devotion, attributed to Guru Gobind Singh, but not included in the Dasam Granth, comprises of the life stories in verse of some of the famous bhaktas or devotees. Written in AD 1693, the book has, besides the introductory chapter, sixteen sections,