A straight double-edged sword. It is used to stir the sweetened water, the amrit, prepared for Sikh initiation, and it gives its name to the composite emblem of two curved swords, a circle and a central straight blade that appears on the Nishan Sahib flying over every gurdwara.
The two curved swords in the emblem are miri and piri, temporal and spiritual authority, and the pairing is the point: Sikh tradition does not divide the two, and the emblem is an argument about that. The straight khanda in the centre is the sword itself; the circle, the chakkar, has no beginning or end.
The emblem is also held in the atlas as a sign; this entry is the object.
Facts
Use
Who May Handle It ConsecrationNot consecrated; an instrument, not a consecrated object 1 Learn More
The Sword That Stirs the Water of Initiation
The khanda is a straight double-edged sword, and though it is a weapon in form its central religious use is not martial but sacramental: it is the implement that prepares the water of Sikh initiation.
Stirring the amrit
At the Amrit Sanchar, the Sikh rite of initiation into the Khalsa, sweetened water is stirred with a khanda while the scriptures are recited, and this stirred water, the amrit, is then given to the initiates to drink and is sprinkled on them. The double-edged sword is thus the instrument by which the initiation is effected, and its use in this way gives the object a significance far beyond that of a weapon. The same word names the composite emblem of Sikhism, in which a central double-edged sword is flanked by two curved swords and encircled by a ring.
Sovereignty and the two swords
The double-edged sword in the emblem stands for divine knowledge that cuts through illusion, the ring for the oneness and eternity of God, and the two flanking swords for the twin authority, spiritual and temporal, that the tradition holds together, so the khanda gathers the central ideas of Sikhism into a single sign. As a weapon it belongs to the martial dimension the tradition took on under the later Gurus, but its defining religious act is the stirring of the amrit, which places a sword at the very centre of the rite that makes a Sikh a member of the Khalsa.
Who Is Permitted to Hold It During the Rite
The khanda used in initiation is a genuine double edged steel sword, forged rather than cast, kept distinct in most gurdwaras from the emblem of the same name that combines a sword shape with a circular chakkar and two crossed kirpans on flags and insignia.
Forging and upkeep
Blacksmiths producing a ceremonial khanda work to the same double edged, straight bladed pattern regardless of size, a form with no curve and no single cutting edge, distinct from the kirpan's more knife-like blade. A gurdwara typically owns and maintains its own khanda rather than sourcing one freshly for each ceremony, and it is cleaned and stored with the same care given to other consecrated implements kept near the Guru Granth Sahib.
Who is permitted to use it
During Amrit Sanchar, the Sikh initiation rite, the khanda is used exclusively by the Panj Pyare, five baptized Sikhs formally authorized to administer the ceremony, who stir the sweetened water, amrit, with the blade while reciting scripture. This is a genuine restriction on handling, an unauthorized person does not perform this role regardless of their standing in the community, since the ceremony's validity depends on it being carried out by initiators who have themselves undergone it.
Cross-Tradition Connections
Belongs to Tradition
Element Of
The double edged sword between two curved swords and a circle, used at the initiation and standing on the flag.
Part Of
The khanda gives its name to the composite emblem of two curved swords, a circle and a central straight blade that appears on the Nishan Sahib flying over every gurdwara.
Related To
The khanda sword is used to stir the amrit prepared during Amrit Sanchar, Sikh initiation.
Sources
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