AS the New Year unfolded with its familiar mix of uncertainty and hope, I found myself returning repeatedly to Guru Gobind Singh. What occupied my mind on his recent birth anniversary was not the magnificence of his courage, but a question that is surprisingly rarely asked: What might have been passing through his mind in the final moments of his life when he took the momentous decision that there would be no human Guru after him?
This decision, perhaps one of the most radical ones in the history of religious traditions, is today absorbed into a seamless reverence. We accept it and bow before it. Yet we seldom pause to think of it as an intellectual, ethical, and existential act, taken in the shadow of loss, betrayal and relentless struggle. What does it mean for a spiritual leader, having witnessed immense suffering, to relinquish personal authority altogether and vest it instead in the Word and the collective?
What strikes me most is not the absence of answers, but the absence of the question itself. In my conversations, I have found that few have reflected on this moment as deeply human and fraught with doubt and resolve. At a time when authority everywhere seeks perpetuation and dynastic continuity, Guru Gobind Singh’s refusal of succession invites deep reflection.
What led him to conclude that henceforth, the Guru would reside eternally in Guru Granth Sahib? What historical pressures, ethical reflections and spiritual insights converged to produce a decision so radical that it altered the very structure of religious authority in Sikhism?
Sikhism’s unrelenting history of martyrdom is matched by its remarkable resistance to violence, an approach embodying a profound moral stance. This ethos is encapsulated in Guru Granth Sahib’s pronouncement: “Fear none, and frighten none.” The termination of the human Guru lineage with Guru Gobind Singh thus poses a profound question: why, after two centuries of succession, did the tenth Guru take this decision?
The answer lies at the intersection of spiritual authority, historical contingency and the imperatives of survival, exceeding purely theological explanations.
By the late seventeenth century, Mughal rule under Aurangzeb had ossified into a regime of unyielding religious authoritarianism, wherein Sikh Gurus personified a palpable moral rebuke to imperial Islamisation, a visibility that exacted a lethal toll. From its earliest decades, the faith unfolds as a spiritual tradition forged through a sustained moral confrontation with power.
Guru Arjan Dev, the fifth Guru, was tortured and executed under Emperor Jahangir in 1606. Guru Tegh Bahadur, the ninth Guru, was publicly beheaded in Delhi in 1675 under Aurangzeb for refusing to convert to Islam and for defending the religious freedom of Kashmiri Pandits.
Guru Gobind Singh, the tenth Guru, witnessed the martyrdom of all four of his sons, the elder two dying in battle, the younger two, Zorawar Singh and Fateh Singh, bricked alive at Sirhind, while their grandmother, Mata Gujri, died in captivity shortly thereafter.
Guru Gobind Singh grasped with unnerving rationality that as long as Sikh authority remained vested in a singular, identifiable human figure, it remained vulnerable to annihilation. The appointment of another Guru would, in all likelihood, have given rise to yet another martyrdom.
To perpetuate the lineage of human Gurus under these circumstances would have risked reducing sacrifice to a ritualised script, thereby invalidating its transformative potential.
Instead, Guru Gobind Singh opted for the radical alternative of vesting Guruship in Guru Granth Sahib, thereby transmuting Sikh authority into an enduring, indisputable entity. Whereas a human figure is susceptible to corporeal destruction, a text that is internalised, recited and collectively venerated retains a profound resilience to annihilation.
Aurangzeb’s power was capable of extinguishing the physical body, but the realm of thought, once embedded in shared memory, lay irretrievably beyond his power.
Guru Granth Sahib facilitated this paradigmatic shift. Compiled initially by Guru Arjan Dev as Adi Granth in 1604 and subsequently finalised by Guru Gobind Singh, the text constitutes a monumental archive of spiritual and ethical praxis. Encompassing the writings of Sikh Gurus alongside those of Hindu and Muslim saints, such as Kabir, Namdev, Ravidas and Sheikh Farid, it epitomises an expansive and inclusive vision of truth, privileging justice, remembrance and ethical conduct. As the Granth aphoristically asserts, “Truth is high, but higher still is truthful living”, thereby underscoring the primacy of lived ethics over abstract principle.
The foundational priority of lived truth reveals the Word’s assumption of Guruship, effecting a classic shift that reflects Sikh philosophy’s profound privileging of the Shabad as the fulcrum of spiritual existence. The act of listening to the Shabad itself becomes a path to liberation, underscoring the Guru’s role as a mere conduit of truth, rather than an object of worship. Viewed through this lens, Guru Gobind Singh’s declaration emerges as a culmination of Sikh metaphysics triggered by the pressures of extreme historical violence.
By ending the lineage of human Gurus, Guru Gobind Singh effectively decentralised Sikh authority, ensuring the tradition’s perpetuation through a collective, ethically-informed consciousness. The Khalsa and Guru Granth Sahib emerged as complementary institutions, with the former embodying militant discipline and the latter, enduring wisdom. This dual framework enabled Sikhism to withstand persecution without succumbing to despair or fetishising martyrdom. Furthermore, Guru Gobind Singh’s decision constituted a defiant refusal to acquiesce to the empire’s script of domination, specifically its ploy of leveraging the public execution of a Guru as a means of terrorising the community. By vesting authority in Guru Granth Sahib, Sikhism effectively dismantled the Mughal state’s most potent instrument of control, rendering its authority no longer contingent upon the bodily vulnerability of a single individual.
In this sense, Guru Granth Sahib as the eternal Guru represents a profound symbiosis of spiritual and political significance, affirming that ideas and values can be more powerful than force. When violence seeks to rout leadership, the most resilient response is to relocate authority within the interstices of shared memory and living truth. The termination of the Guru lineage does not signify Sikhism’s withdrawal from history but a deliberate choice to preserve Sikhism’s essence by redefining where its authority lies