Obsessed by his over zealous reverence for Vedas, Swami Daya Nand had been critical of every religion of the world. Almost all the religions professed by Hindu Society those days--Jainism, Buddhism, Shivaites etc.--were the target of his onslaught. His contemptuous remarks against Mussulmans, Sikhs and Christians were the cause of great upheaval and the British Government had to concede to force the publishers to expunge some parts from his book, Satyarth Prakashm, especially in respect of Islam.

At this juncture I would like to deal only with his disdainful remarks perpetrated against Guru Nanak. In the Satyarth Prakash published in 1908 he says, "St. Nanak's motive was righteous but he had no scholastic knowledge at all. However, he certainly knew the language of the country, which prevails in villages. He did not at all know Vedas and other scriptures and Sanskrit. Had he known the Sanskrit language, how could he write the word nirbhaya as nirbho.... However he might have passed as a Sanskrit scholar by making those Sanskrit verses among the villagers who had never heard a word of Sanskrit before.... calumniation and praise of Vedas are found here and there in his book; for had he not done so, some one would have asked the meaning of the Vedas, and had he not been able to tell it, he would have lost his respect.... Since ignorant men are called saints, they can not know the worth of Vedas.... There were not many followers of Nanak in his time... ignorant make their teacher saint after his death.... St. Nanak was not a rich or noble man but his disciples describe him to be a great saint and a very opulent man...."

How far Swamy Daya Nand had read and comprehended the teachings of Guru Nanak? It is portrayed in the manner he had quoted one verse from Guru Granth Sahib. In Satyarth Prakash he says again, ".... in some places he (St. Nanak) spoke in favour of the Vedas in his book.... Thus:- ...Sukhmani, Porhi7, Chowk8....It means that Brahma died though versed in Vedas, all the four Vedas are tales. O Nanak, the Veda does not know the greatness of a saint. The knower of the Brahma is himself the Great God." What a pity the exponent of Vedas and critique of all the contemporary knowledge did not know the verse he was referring to was not written by St. Nanak but by Fifth Master, Guru Arjan.

Regarding the use of word nirbho instead of nirbhay, it does not need an explanation that a dialect changes its character and pronunciation after every hundred or so miles. Three other versions of the same word are available in Punjabi Encyclopaedic Dictionary; nirbhau, nirbho, and nirbhey. Above all, (Guru) Nanak's work... assumed the form of an agrarian movement. His teachings were purely in Punjabi language mostly spoken by cultivators. They appealed to the downtrodden and oppressed peasants and petty traders as they were ground down between the two milestones of government's tyranny and the Muslim brutality.' (History of the Sikhs by H.R.Gupta).

Obviously Swamy Daya Nand's knowledge of Sikh Scripture was very limited and he knew little about the life and history of Sikh Religion.

In the light of Swamy Daya Nand's remarks, "...all his (Nanak's) chatterings... are myth themselves," let us consider what were the views of a few European-writers, who were near contemporary of Swamy Daya Nand, on the philosophy, thought, and poetry of Guru Nanak.

Earnest Temple has been most critical of the Sikh Scriptures. Even he could not ignore the scholarship of Guru Granth Sahib, "...in a linguistic point of view, of the greatest interest to us, as it is real treasury of the old Hindui dialects, specimens of which have been preserved therein which are not to be found anywhere else. The Granth contains sufficient materials, which will enable us to investigate those old and now obsolete dialects, from which modern idioms have their origin, so that the gap, which hitherto existed between the older Prakrit dialects and modern languages of the Arian stock, may, by a careful comparative study of the same, be fairly filled up."

J.D.Cunningham writes in History of Sikhs, "Nanak combined the excellence of preceding reformers, and avoided the more grave error into which they had fallen.... He loftily invokes the Lord as the one, the sole, the timeless being; the creator, the self-existent, the incomprehensible, and the everlasting.... He addressed equally the Mulla and Pandit...that the only knowledge which availeth is the knowledge of God.... Nanak adopted the philosophical system of his countrymen.... He makes the same uses of the current language or notions of the time on subjects and thus says, he who remains bright amid darkness, unmoved amid deceit, that is, perfect amid temptation, should attain happiness...."

Among all the foreign writers, M.A.Macauliffe's contribution towards the elaboration of Sikh Religion is indisputably supreme. On the origin and progress of religion, until it received its monotheistic consummation accepted by Guru Nanak, Mr. Macauliffe writes, "In India a belief in an infinite, illimitable, and supreme power was...evolved...ages before the emigration of the Aryans to Europe. Prajapati...father of the gods, and lord of all living creatures...received exceptional human homage. There was also Aditi, as in one passage of Rig Veda, identified with all the deities, with men, with all has been and shall be born...he was one though the poets called Him by many names.... Before there was anything...there was that One.... Then was darkness, everything in the beginning was hidden in gloom, all was like the ocean, without a light. Then that germ which was covered by the husk, the One, was produced (Rig-Veda, X. 129).... Guru Nanak...gave expansion to this conception of the one God."

Consequently we infer that the Europeans, with their language and cultural limitations, understood the writings and the philosophy of Guru Nanak much more dynamically than Swamy Daya Nand Sarswati, the founder of the Arya Samaj.