Joti Jot Purab of Sri Guru Har Rai Sahib Ji: the gentle Guru of Kiratpur

The Joti Jot Purab of Sri Guru Har Rai Sahib Ji remembers the day in 1661 when the seventh Sikh Guru completed his life on earth at Kiratpur Sahib, aged about thirty-one, after entrusting the Guruship to his younger son, Sri Guru Harkrishan Sahib Ji.

The gentlest of the Gurus

Sri Guru Har Rai Sahib Ji was the grandson of Sri Guru Hargobind Sahib Ji and is remembered for his tenderness towards every living thing. He kept gardens and a small zoo at Kiratpur Sahib, and a dispensary of herbal medicines open to anyone in need. Sikh tradition tells that when Dara Shikoh, the eldest son of the emperor Shah Jahan, fell gravely ill and the court physicians could do nothing, the Guru sent the herbs that healed him, saying that a tree gives shade even to the one who cuts it.

A Guruship of preaching

He kept a body of about two thousand mounted Sikhs, as his grandfather had wished, but his years as Guru were largely peaceful. He travelled through the Malwa and the Doaba, and sent preachers further afield; among those he blessed was Phul, from whom the ruling families of Patiala, Nabha and Jind later descended.

The succession

Summoned to the court of the emperor Aurangzeb, the Guru sent his elder son Ram Rai instead. When Ram Rai altered a line of the Guru's bani to please the court, the Guru disowned him and chose his younger son, Harkrishan Ji, then five, as the eighth Guru.

How the day is observed

Sikhs remember him with kirtan and Ardas at Kiratpur Sahib and in gurdwaras everywhere, and katha often turns to his compassion and his care for nature.