The Golden Temple (also known as the Harimandir Sahib (lit. 'House of God', in Punjabi language) is a gurdwara located in the city of Amritsar, Punjab, India. It is the pre-eminent spiritual site of Sikhism.
Sikhism is an Indian religion, and is a philosophy, that originated in the Punjab region of India, around the end of the 15th century CE. It is one of the most recently founded major religious groups and stands at fifth-largest worldwide, with about 25-30 million adherents (known as Sikhs).
Sikhism developed from the spiritual teachings of Guru Nanak (1469-1539), the faith's first guru, and the nine Sikh gurus who succeeded him. The tenth guru, Gobind Singh (1666-1708), named the Sikh scripture Guru Granth Sahib as his successor, bringing to a close the line of human gurus and establishing the scripture as the 11th and last eternally living guru, a religious spiritual/life guide for Sikhs. Guru Nanak taught that living an "active, creative, and practical life" of "truthfulness, fidelity, self-control and purity" is above metaphysical truth, and that the ideal man "establishes union with God, knows His Will, and carries out that Will". Guru Hargobind, the sixth Sikh Guru (1606-1644), established the concept of mutual co-existence of the miri ('political'/'temporal') and piri ('spiritual') realms.
The religion developed and evolved in times of religious persecution, gaining converts from both Hinduism and Islam. Mughal rulers of India tortured and executed two of the Sikh gurus-Guru Arjan (1563-1605) and Guru Tegh Bahadur (1621-1675)-after they refused to convert to Islam.