dle of the eighteenth century onwards the
Sikhs were masters of the Panjab and their great chief Ranjit Singh
(1797-1839) succeeded in converting the confederacy into a despotic
monarchy. Their power did not last long after his death and the Panjab
was conquered by the British in the two wars of 1846 and 1849.

With the loss of political independence, the differences between the
Sikhs and other Hindus tended to decrease. This was natural, for
nearly all their strictly religious tenets can be paralleled in
Hinduism. Guru Govind waged no war against polytheism but wished to
found a religious commonwealth equally independent of Hindu castes and
Mohammedan sultans. For some time his ordinances were successful in
creating a tribe, almost a nation. With the collapse of the Sikh
state, the old hatred of Mohammedanism remained, but the Sikhs
differed from normal Hindus hardly more than such sects as the
Lingayats, and, as happened with decadent Buddhism, the unobtrusive
pressure of Hindu beliefs and observances tended to obliterate those
differences. The Census of India,[678] 1901, enumerated three degrees
of Sikhism. The first comprises a few zealots called Akalis who
observe all the precepts of Govind. The second class are the Guru
Govind Sikhs, who observe the Guru's main commands, especially the
prohibition to smoke and cut the hair. Lastly, there are a
considerable number who profess a respect for the Guru but follow
Hindu beliefs and usages wholly or in part. Sikhism indeed reproduces
on a small scale the changeableness and complexity of Hinduism, and
includes associations called Sabha, whose members aim at restoring or
maintaining what they consider to be the true faith. In 1901 there was
a tendency for Sikhs to give up their peculiarities and describe
themselves as ordinary Hindus, but in the next decade a change of
sentiment among these waverers caused the Sikh community as registered
to increase by thirty-seven per cent. and a period of religious zeal
is reported.[679]

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 651: It is exemplified by the curious word an-had
_limitless_, being the Indian negative prefix added to the arabic word
_had_ used in the Sikh Granth and by Caran Das as a name of God.]

[Footnote 652: See especially G.H. Westcott, _Kabir and the Kabir
Panth_, and Macauliffe, _Sikh Religion_, vol. vi. pp. 122-316. Also
Wilson, _Essays on the religion of the Hindus_, vol. I. pp. 68-98.
Garcin de Tassy, _Histoire de la Litte