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The Master's Sword

For Guru Gobind Singh Ji, the Sword was a symbol of God's Power, Justice and Saving grace, through which He protects the virtuous and punishes the wicked :
"Sword that smiteth in a flash,
That scatters the armies of the wicked,
In the great battlefield;
Thou symbol of the brave
Thine arm is irresistible thy brightness shineth forth,
The blaze of Thy splendour dazzling like the sun.
Sword, Thou art protector of the saints,
Thou art the scourage of the wicked;
Scatterer of sinners I take refuge in Thee.
Victory to Thee, Sword: Saviour and Sustainer.
Victory to Thee: Sword Supreme."
- Bachiter Natak
Guru Gobind Singh also writes about the "Sword of Wisdom": Giane-ki-badhani which dispels all darkness, and sweeps away all cowardice. In the Dasm Granth, he says :
"Blessed is he in this world, who always has the Name of God on his lips, and in his heart is ever enshrined the spirit of true warriors. Knowing this body to be transient, he sails on the boat of glorifying God and crosses the stormy ocean of existence. He makes his body a mansion of patience, and within it he lights the blazing lamp of divine Wisdom. Holding the Sword of divine knowledge in his hands, he sweeps away all cowardice out of his inner life."

- Epilogue to Krishan Avtaar
Professor Puran Singh correctly writes: "Every Sikh is to wear His Sword. Not his own. Kirpan is a gift from the Guru. It is not an instrument of offence or defence; it is mind made intense by the love of the Guru. The Sikh is to have a sword-like mind. It is the visible sign of an intensely sensitive soul. It is but the symbol of the myriad personality of the Guru's Sikh, that knows no defeat, no disappointment, the personality that is unconquerable in its hope, in its spiritual radiance.
Guru Gobind Singh says :
'I will make one Sikh dominate over a million.'
This dominion is of the illumined mind. The highly intensified and developed intellect naturally becomes over-powering, so much so that it becomes facinating and attractive in a physical sense. It gathers its own moths like the intense flame of a night lamp. The presence of a great spiritual man overpowers millions. What is mind if it has not the flash of the lightning and the sword. All conquests in the fields of life are mental and moral; physical conquests are no conquests. I think he who wears the Guru's Sword is a spontaneous man fully grown in His Spirit."

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