Facts about Guru Nanak's Japji Sahib Bani

Japji Sahib is the keystone of the compilation of the most sacred Banis (hymns) of the Sikh Gurus. 

If Hindus have Bhagavad Gita, Islam has Quran, Christians have Bible, Buddhist have Dhammapada, Jains have Uttaradhyayan & Aacharang Sutra then Sikhs have Japji Sahib to trace the entire path of knowing the Divine within through the grace of Divine.

• Japji Sahib is often uneven in its meter and rhythm because Bhai Lehna (the second Guru, named as Guru Angad Dev, in the lineage of 10 Sikh Gurus) left the original beauty and purity laid by Guru Nanak Dev untouched.
• Japji Sahib is the first composition to appear in the Sikh holy book, The Guru Granth Sahib. It is known that Japji Sahib’s mool mantra ‘Ik Onkar Satnaam’ was the first ever chant by Guru Nanak Dev after His immersing in Divine for 3 days in the year 1499 A.D.
• Japji Sahib consists of 1 mool mantra in the beginning followed by 38 Pauris (Stanzas) and then 1 shlok at the end. This small yet precise writing from Guru Nanak Dev is complete in itself to let the seeker immerse in love with God and awaken the state of purity within.
  

The Mool Mantra written by the Seventh Guru, showing the Ik Onkar at top.

• Guru Granth Sahib can be stated as one of the most secular scriptures that includes writings from 6 Sikh Gurus, 13 Hindu saints and 2 Muslim saints. In total it has 5,894 Shabads (line compositions) written in 60 Ragas (rhythm & poetic meters). The Granth has 1,430 pages out of which pages 1-8 are Japji Sahib.
• The mool mantra of Japji Sahib encapsulates the entire Sikh theology and thus Guru Granth Sahib is essentially an amplification of this mool mantra. The mool mantra appears 33 times in the entire Guru Granth Sahib that is symbolic to several meta-physical facts.