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Glimpses of World Religions
and Muslims, convened a meeting and having got from them the teaching and opinions of all the religious sects and whatever teachings that were in tune with, in conformity with the Sikh principles, and which were saturated with the personal experiences of visualising God, which were, moreover, full of life, which were beyond the blind fanaticism of religion, - those were condensed and in this way this great book was written.
In this book or scripture, there are writings of six Gurus, fifteen devotees, about 15 Bhāts and of 4 other musicians. No writings are available of sixth to eighth Gurus. And it was Guru Govindsinh who had introduced or familiarised the writings of the ninth Guru. Not a single creation or writing of Guru Govindsinh himself, is included or given a place in it.
All the Gurus wrote in the name of 'Nanak' only and so, Guru Arjuna, with the intension of making it intelligible as to which Guru has written it, accepted the tradition or mentioning the serial number of Mahala against each 'work' (writing) e.g. Mahala no. 1 means Guru Nanak's writing, Mahala Dooja or second means Guru Angad's writing. Mahala, actually means house i.e. the form. The underlying idea is that Guru Nanak is only one, his light or lustre went on assuming new forms. The other meaning of Mahala is the newly married wife of God Almighty. Each and every Guru used to consider himself as a spouse or newly married wife; such a meaning has been accepted. The original script of Guru Granth Saheb (Beed) is now in Kartarpur of Jalandhar district. So it is known as Beed of Kartarpur. The reason behind the inclusion of the teachings by Brahmanas, Kshatriya, Shudra and Muslim saints and devotees is that the spiritual generocity of India was to be included in it. In Sikh religion, there is no place for illusion, blind faith, distinctions of higher or lower caste and religious fanaticism. In it, one would, rather, find writings like Mantras, such as "Allah and Parbrahma are the same."
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