structural:summarization, quality:correction
Influences

Many Sikhs believe that Nanak's message was divinely revealed, as his own words in Guru Granth Sahib state that his teachings are as he has received them from the Creator Himself. The critical event of his life in Sultanpur, in which he returned after three days with enlightenment, also supports this belief.

Many modern historians give weight to his teachings' linkage with the pre-existing bhakti, sant, and wali of Hindu/Islamic tradition. Scholars state that in its origins, Nanak and Sikhism were influenced by the nirguni ('formless God') tradition of the Bhakti movement in medieval India. However, some historians do not see evidence of Sikhism as simply an extension of the Bhakti movement. Sikhism, for instance, disagreed with some views of Bhakti saints Kabir and Ravidas.

The roots of the Sikh tradition are perhaps in the sant -tradition of India whose ideology grew to become the Bhakti tradition. Fenech (2014) suggests that:

Indic mythology permeates the Sikh sacred canon, the Guru Granth Sahib and the secondary canon, the Dasam Granth and adds delicate nuance and substance to the sacred symbolic universe of the Sikhs of today and of their past ancestors.