Who was Guru Nanak Dev Ji and why is he considered the founder of Sikhi?

Guru Nanak Dev Ji was born in 1469 in Talwandi, now known as Nankana Sahib in present-day Pakistan. He is revered as the first of the ten human Gurus and the founder of the Sikh faith, though he himself would not have used the word "founder" in the way we understand it today. He understood himself as a messenger of the one God, Waheguru, sent to remind humanity of what it had forgotten.

From a young age, Guru Nanak showed a deep disinterest in material life and a profound absorption in spiritual questions. The defining moment in his life came when he disappeared into a river at Sultanpur Lodhi for three days. When he emerged, he spoke the words that would become the opening of the Guru Granth Sahib: "There is no Hindu, there is no Muslim." He had received a calling to spread the message of Ik Onkar, the oneness of God, and the equality of all human beings.

What made Guru Nanak's message revolutionary was its directness. He rejected the caste system, the idea that priests held special access to God, and the notion that rituals and pilgrimages could substitute for genuine devotion. He taught that God was within every person, accessible through Naam Simran (remembrance of the Name), honest work (Kirat Karni), and sharing with others (Vand Chakna). These three principles remain the practical foundation of Sikh life.

Guru Nanak travelled extensively, undertaking four major journeys called Udasis, covering much of the Indian subcontinent, the Middle East, and Central Asia. He engaged with Hindu pandits, Muslim qazis, yogis, and rulers, always with the same message: that external religious identity meant nothing without an inner relationship with God.

He established the first Gurdwara at Kartarpur, where he lived out his final years farming the land alongside his followers, demonstrating that spiritual life and ordinary working life were not in conflict.