Guru Ram Das - The Fourth Sikh Guru, Volume 2 English Graphic Novel | Sikh Comics Series

"Bathing in the nectar tank of Ram Das, all sins are erased. With this cleansing bath, one becomes immaculately pure."
— Sri Guru Granth Sahib

A holy city was rising from the ground. And the miracles had already begun.

Volume 2 opens in Amritsar, where Guru Ram Das has taken his seat as the Fourth Sikh Guru and the excavation of the two sacred tanks, Santokhsar and Amritsar, is well underway. But a city draws visitors. And the visitors who came to Guru Ram Das came with everything: old grudges, desperate prayers, unanswerable questions, and, in one extraordinary case, a faith so complete it transformed a leper into a healthy man.

Among the first to arrive was Baba Sri Chand, son of Guru Nanak himself, now eighty-five years old, who had remained estranged from the Sikh Gurus for decades since his father had passed the divine light to Bhai Lehna instead of him. Guru Ram Das received him at the outskirts of Amritsar, laid five hundred rupees at his feet, and welcomed him with complete reverence. Baba Sri Chand was moved, but he wanted to be certain. He looked at Guru Ram Das's long beard and asked, with deliberate sharpness, why he had grown it so long.

Guru Ram Das bowed and replied quietly: so that I may use it to wipe the feet of holy men like you.

Baba Sri Chand wept. He held the Guru in his arms. "I can see now why you are the Guru and I am not." He departed at peace, his decades of grievance dissolved in a single act of humility.

Volume 2 opens with one of the most moving moments in the Guru Ram Das story — and it only deepens from here.

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The visitors kept coming. The Siddhas arrived to debate whether yoga was superior to Naam. A Hindu holy man called Tappa argued that without pilgrimages, fasting, and austerities, the Sikhs would never reach heaven. Groups of so-called low-caste men and women came, untouchables, turned away from temples and holy books their entire lives,  and asked Guru Ram Das how they could possibly attain salvation. To each, the Guru gave the same answer, drawn from Gurbani: the Name of God is open to all. It requires no priest, no caste, no pilgrimage, no ritual. Ravidas the leatherworker, Namdev the fabric printer, Kabir the weaver, Dhana the farmer, Balmik the highway robber, all were saved. "Nanak's sanctuary is open to all, irrespective of their social status." So many so-called low-caste joined the new faith in this period and began calling themselves Ramdasias. Overtime they were simply called Sikhs.

Then came Bhai Adam and his wife, old, childless, and full of hope. They had tried every shrine and every fakir for years before a Sikh told them: go to Amritsar. For months, they served the sangat without asking for anything; fetching firewood, digging the sarovar, stocking the langar. One winter night, when unexpected rain left the entire congregation without dry wood, it was Bhai Adam's stored firewood that kept every fire burning and every pilgrim warm. Guru Ram Das noticed. He told Bhai Adam to ask for a boon. Bhai Adam, his Guru's teachings now embedded in his heart, said: "Sachay Patshah, I am already fulfilled. To behold your divinity and serve you is itself the reward." His wife had to return the next morning to ask for what they had come for all along. Guru Ram Das told them gently: a son was not written in their destiny, but he would pray. The son who came to them was named Bhagtu. Many believe he was one destined to be the Guru's own fourth son, gifted instead to this humble and devoted couple.

Then came the miracle of Bibi Rajni.

Rajni was the youngest daughter of Duni Chand, a wealthy and proud tax collector from Patti, near Amritsar. Her sisters praised their father for the fine clothes and comfortable house he provided. Rajni said: God provides for all of us. Our father is only the instrument. Duni Chand, who overheard, was furious. When Rajni refused to change her answer even at the moment of her marriage, he made good on his threat and married her to a leper, with no dowry and a cold farewell: now let us see how God fulfils your needs.

Rajni accepted it without complaint. She placed her husband in a basket, carried him from village to village, and begged for food to keep them both alive. She never once blamed God or her Guru.

One day, she heard a group of Sikhs walking and singing Gurbani. She followed them, and they led her to Amritsar.

She left her husband resting beneath a beri tree at the edge of a pool of water that Guru Ram Das's workers were excavating nearby. She went into the village to beg for food. While she was gone, her husband watched a black crow swoop down into the pool, and emerge from the water white as a swan. He watched it happen again. Then, trembling, he lowered himself into the water. One finger he kept above the surface. When he emerged, every trace of leprosy was gone, except that one finger.

When Rajni returned and found a healthy stranger waiting where she had left her husband, she refused to believe him. The matter was brought before Guru Ram Das, who was supervising the excavation nearby. The Guru asked the man to dip the remaining afflicted finger into the water. It was cured on the spot. Then he turned to Rajni: "You left your home with firm faith in Waheguru, the Guru and Gurbani. All who come to the Guru with such faith will receive their heart's desire."

When Duni Chand heard what had happened, he came to Amritsar at once and fell at the Guru's feet. The spot where the leper was healed is known to this day as Dukh Bhanjani - the Destroyer of Sorrow.

The final act of Volume 2 belongs to the succession. When Guru Ram Das's cousin invited him to a wedding in Lahore, the Guru asked his eldest son Prithi Chand to go in his place. Prithi Chand refused; afraid that in his absence his father might appoint one of his brothers as the next Guru. The second son Mahadev refused too. The youngest, Arjan Dev, replied at once: "I am blessed that you considered me worthy of this task." He went to Lahore and stayed for months; growing homesick, writing three letters of love and longing to his father. Prithi Chand intercepted two of them. The third reached the Guru. When Guru Ram Das discovered what Prithi had done, he sent Bhai Budha to bring Arjan back to Amritsar.
The succession was declared. Five copper coins and a coconut were placed at Arjan Dev's feet. The tilak was applied. Prithi Chand protested bitterly. Guru Ram Das composed a hymn addressed directly to his own son: "Son, why do you quarrel with your father?" And when Prithi still would not relent, the Guru condemned him publicly and departed for Goindwal. On September 1, 1581, forty-seven years old, having led the Sikhs for six years, eleven months, and seventeen days, Guru Ram Das's journey on earth came to an end. He left behind a holy city, two sacred tanks, 638 hymns enshrined in what would become Sri Guru Granth Sahib, a Sikh marriage ceremony rooted entirely in Gurbani, and a faith that now knew exactly who it was.

What's Inside:

• Baba Sri Chand: The eighty-five-year-old son of Guru Nanak arrives in Amritsar after decades of estrangement, and the one reply that dissolves a lifetime of grievance
• The Open Door: Guru Ram Das's response to the so-called low-caste who came asking how they could find salvation — and the Gurbani that invited every untouchable into the Sikh fold
• The Siddhas and Tappa: Two encounters with Hindu holy men who came to debate yoga, rituals, and austerities, and left convinced that Naam and Gurbani are the supreme path
• Bhai Adam: A childless couple from Malwa, months of quiet seva, a night of unexpected rain, and the boon the Guru gave to two people who had stopped asking for it
• Bibi Rajni: The daughter who refused to deny God as the true provider, married to a leper as punishment, yet carried by faith all the way to Amritsar, where the waters of the unfinished sarovar cured her husband of every trace of disease
• Dukh Bhanjani: The crow that emerged as a swan, the finger held above the water, and how Guru Ram Das revealed the sacred nature of what would become the holy tank at Harmandir Sahib
• The Letters: Arjan Dev in Lahore, three hymns of longing, and the eldest son who intercepted two of them, only for the truth to come out anyway
  The Succession: The appointment of Guru Arjan Dev as the Fifth Sikh Guru, the copper coins and the tilak, and Guru Ram Das's public condemnation of Prithi Chand
• The Gurbani: Guru Ram Das's 638 hymns in Sri Guru Granth Sahib, on the Guru-Sikh relationship, the Laavan marriage ceremony, selfless service, and the daily Sikh way of life

Perfect For:

• Children aged 7 and up (and the adults reading alongside them)
• Gurdwara Sunday school programs and Sikh Studies classes
• Parents and grandparents wanting to share the lives of the Ten Sikh Gurus with the next generation
• Anyone who needs to be reminded that faith carried all the way — through poverty, through suffering, through the darkest detour — always finds its miracle.

Book Details:
32 Pages · Paperback · English · Published 2016 · ISBN 9789382887522 · Publisher: Sikh Comics

Volume 2 of 2 — covering Guru Ram Das's Guruship in Amritsar through the succession of Guru Arjan Dev. Begin the story with Volume 1.

An illustrated Sikh children's book bringing the life and teachings of the Fourth Sikh Guru to vivid life, one sakhi at a time.

Also Available in Punjabi