Holkar into the Punjab. The Sikh Army was
known as Dal Khalsa, or the Army of God, _khalsa_ being an Arabic word
meaning one's own. [396] At the height of the Sikh power the followers
of this religion only numbered a small fraction of the population of
the Punjab, and its strength is now declining. In 1911 the Sikhs were
only three millions in the Punjab population of twenty-four millions.

Smarta Sect

_Smarta Sect_.--This is an orthodox Hindu sect, the members of which
are largely Brahmans. The name is derived from Smriti or tradition,
a name given to the Hindu sacred writings, with the exception of the
Vedas, which last are regarded as a divine revelation. Members of
the sect worship the five deities, Siva, Vishnu, Suraj or the sun,
Ganpati and Sakti, the divine principle of female energy corresponding
to Siva. They say that their sect was founded by Shankar Acharya, the
great Sivite reformer and opponent of Buddhism, but this appears to
be incorrect. Shankar Acharya himself is said to have believed in one
unseen God, who was the first cause and sole ruler of the universe;
but he countenanced for the sake of the weaker brethren the worship
of orthodox Hindu deities and of their idols.

Swami-Narayan Sect

1. The founder.

_Swami-Narayan Sect._ [397]--This, one of the most modern Vaishnava
sects, was founded by Sahajanand Swami, a Sarwaria Brahman, born
near Ajodhia in the United Provinces in A.D. 1780. At an early age he
became a religious mendicant, and wandered all over India, visiting
the principal shrines. When twenty years old he was made a Sadhu of
the Ramanandi order, and soon nominated as his successor by the head
of the order. He preached with great success in Gujarat, and though
his tenets do not seem to have differed much from the Ramanandi creed,
his personal influence was such that his followers founded a new sect
and called it after him. He proclaimed the worship of one sole deity,
Krishna or Narayana, whom he identified with the sun, and apparently
his followers held, and he inclined to believe himself, that he was a
fresh incarnation of Vishnu. It is said that he displayed miraculous
powers before his disciples, entrancing whomsoever he cast his eyes
upon, and causing them in this mesmeric state (Samadhi) to imagine
they saw Sahajanand as Krishna with yellow robes, weapons of war,
and other characteristics of the God, and to behold him seated as
chief in an assembly of di