The word "Sikh" is derived from the Sanskrit word shishya or disciple. It is a young, indigenous, and monotheistic philosophy. Guru Nanak (1469-1539), who was trying to unite Hinduism and Islam, founded the Sikh religious order. Sikh philosophy is a set of ideas developed by ten gurus or teachers and passed on to their shishyas or disciples. To the Sikhs, God is nirakara or formless and one. Sikhism has no idols or superstitions and recognises all human beings as equal. However, it retains certain Hindu ideas, such as those of the immortality of the soul, transmigration, and karma. The sacred book of the Sikhs is the Adi Granth or Granth Sahib (completed in 1604), of which the Japji section was written by Guru Nanak.

The ten Sikh gurus are Nanak, Angad, Amar Das, Ram Das, Arjan, Har Gobind, Har Rai, Har Kishan, Teg Bahadur , and Gobind Singh. The tenth and last guru, Gobind Singh, ended the guru system and organised the Sikhs into a military theocracy named Khalsa , meaning pure. He started the system of pahul or baptism with water stirred by a dagger, after which one would be entitled to use the honorific `Singh (lion) after his name and carry the five "kakkas" or `K's - kesh (hair tied in a topknot), kanga (comb), kara (steel bangle), kacha (undergarment), and kirpan (dagger). After Guru Gobind Singh's death, the Sikhs got divided into 12 groups. Collective decisions are taken by the leaders of the groups and taken as coming from God. Gurvani or "the Guru's word" is the literary expression of Sikh philosophy.

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