ARATI, from Sanskrit aratrik, meaning the light or the vessel containing it which is waved before an idol, generally in the clockwise direction, accompanied by the chanting of mantras. This is also the name given the ceremony which for the Hindus is a mode of ritual worship to propitiate

BABAR, ZAHIR UD-DIN MUHAMMAD (1483-1530), soldier of fortune, founder of the Mughal dynasty in India, diarist and poet, descending in the fifth generation from Timur, was born on 14 February 1483. In June 1494, he succeeded his father, \'Umar Shaikh\', as ruler of Farghana, whose revenues supported no more than

BHAGVANA. BHAI, along with Bhai Latkan Ghura, Bhai Gurditta and Bhai Katara, the jeweller, once came to see Guru Arjan and asked for a mantra, or sacred formula. The Guru, as says Bhai Mani Singh, Sikhan di Bhagat Mala, told them that any name for God would save, but

CHARPAT NATH, one of the yogis whom, according to the Miharban Janam Sakhi, Guru Nanak met on Mount Sumer, was a Gorakhpanthi recluse. Guru Nanak himself mentions his name twice in his compositions in the Guru Granth Sahib in his Si`dh Gosti and in another hymn in Raga Ramkali.

DHUNI, from Skt. dhvani meaning sound, echo, noise, voice, tone, tune, thunder, stands in Punjabi generally for sound and tune. In the Guru Granth Sahib, the term appears in the sense of tune at the head of 9 of the 22 vars (odes) under different ragas or musical measures. Directions

GOSTI BABA NANAK, lit. the discourses of Baba [Guru] Nanak dictated by Hariji, son of Sodhi Miharban, is an unpublished and incomplete work (MS. No. 2306) preserved in the Sikh History Research Department at the Khalsa College at Amritsar, comprising 235 folios and 23 complete and two, one in the

HUKAM, Arabic hukm for command, order, decree, law, has acquired in Sikh usage a metaphysical shade connoting the Divine Law or Order, regulating the entire universe. Its importance in Sikh theology is indicated by its occurrence at the very beginning of the Adi Granth (Guru Granth Sahib, the Sikh

LALU, BABA (1444-1542), paternal uncle of Guru Nanak and the son of Shiv Ram and Mata Banarasi, was born at Talvandi Rai Bhoi. He was the younger brother of Mahita Kalu, father of Guru Nanak.

MIRIPIRI, compound of two words, both of Perso Arabic origin, adapted into the Sikh tradition to connote the close relationship within it between the temporal and the spiritual. The term represents for the Sikhs a basic principle which has influenced their religious and political thought and governed their societal structure

NANAKPANTHI, lit. the follower of the panth or way of Guru Nanak. The term Ndnakpantht was perhaps used for the first time for Sikhs in Mobid Zulfiqar Ardistani`s Dabistdni Mazdhib, a seventeenth century work on comparative religion, which has a chapter entitled Nanak Panthidn describing the Sikhs, their Gurus

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

ROHTAS (30° 55`N, 73° 48`E), town in Jehlum district of Pakistan had a historical Sikh shrine, Gurdwara Choha Sahib, commemorating the visit of Guru Nanak (1469-1539) during his western uddsi or preaching tour. Later in 1542, Sher Shah Suri raised around the habitation a strong fort which he named Rohtas