Sikhs of the Khalsa: A History of the Khalsa Rahit

W. H. McLeod was a historian of Sikhism, and this Oxford University Press book is his scholarly history of the Khalsa Rahit, the Sikh code of conduct, tracing its development from the founding of the Khalsa through its various modern codifications. Its strength is that McLeod applies rigorous historical-critical method to trace how the Rahit actually changed and was codified over time rather than presenting it as a fixed, unchanging text. Its limit is genuinely contested: McLeod's historical-critical approach to Sikh sources has been disputed by some within the Sikh community itself, so a claim about a foundational Sikh event drawn from McLeod's account may benefit from checking a source written from within the tradition alongside it.