[1] Considered by scholars as semi-legendary biographies, they were based on a Sikh oral tradition of historical fact, homily, and legend,[2] with the first janamsakhi were composed between 50 and 80 years after his death.

[4][5] The janamsakhis present accounts of the life of Guru Nanak and his early companions, with varying degrees of supernatural elements among them, typical for hagiographic biographies; more important was his message of equality before God, regardless of social classifications, also emphasizing friendships with those of other religions and the welfare of women.

The earliest layer of what was to become the written tradition later was, according to McLeod, "authentic memories concerning actual incidents from the life of Nanak," in conjunction with the verses left by him in what would become the Adi Granth.

[2] The first janamsakhis were oral in nature and began spreading across the Punjab when news on Guru Nanak's exploits and fame started being passed around.

[9] They have been recited at religious gatherings, shared as reverential fables with the young generation, and embedded in the cultural folklore over the centuries.

Guru Nanak is deeply revered by the devout Sikhs, the stories in the janamsakhi are a part of their understanding of his divine nature and the many wonders he is believed to have performed.

[2] The earliest janamsakhi collections were structured to lucidly expound on Guru Nanak's teachings to the audience, relating accounts to the specific hymns of the Adi Granth.

[2] The early oral tradition reached remote areas away further from Kartarpur, presenting his life and teachings to those who had never met the Guru, and for following generations.

[2] The dominant motif of the janamsakhi is not chronological or geographical accuracy, as history was not their concern, but the depiction of various themes of "the divine dispensation of Nanak, his concern for kindness, social cohesiveness, and his stress on divine unity and the consequent unity of humanity," revealing the beliefs, attitudes, and needs valued by the Sikh community of the age.

[14] In order to convey Guru Nanak's teachings, the janamsakhis make extensive use of allegory, often with mythic elements to imbue meaning.

A parable also relays Guru Nanak's body vanishing after his death and left behind fragrant flowers, which Hindus and Muslims then divided, one to cremate and other to bury.

In the year 1883 a copy of a janamsakhi was dispatched by the India Office Library in London for the use of Dr. Trumpp and the Sikh scholars assisting him.

His father Kalu was a khatri of the Bedi sub-cast and lived in a village Rai Bhoi di Talwandi; his mother's name is not given.

After only one day he gave up reading and when the pundit asked him why Guru Ji lapsed into silence and instructed him at length on the vanity of worldly learning and the contrasting value of the Divine Name of God.

[18] The oldest accepted manuscript of the Bala janamsakhi was written by Gorakh Das in 1658, but the actual date is believed to be earlier.

Santhok Singh wrote Nanak Parkash based on the Bala janamsakhi with the goal of removing parts he believed were edited and added by the Hindals.

[21] In the first journey or udasi, Guru Nanak left Sultanpur towards eastern India and included, in the following sequence: Hakimpura →Lahore → Gobindwal → Fatehbad → Ram Tirath → Jahman → Chahal → Ghavindi → Khalra → Kanganwal → Manak Deke → Alpa → Manga → Eminabad → Sialkot → Sahowal → Ugoke → Pasrur → Deoka → Mitha Kotla → Chhanga Manga → Chuhnian → Hissar → Rohtak → Sirsa → Pehows → Thanesar → Kurushetra → Karnal → Panipat (Sheikh Sharaf) → Delhi (Sultan Ibrahim Lodi) → Hardwar → Allahabad → Banaras → Nanakmata → Kauru, Kamrup in Assam (Nur Shah) → Nagapattinam Port → Sri Lanka → Patna → Chittagong →Dibrugarh → Talvandi (twelve years after leaving Sultanpur) → Pak Pattan (Sheikh Ibrahim) → Goindval → Lahore → Kartarpur.

Prithi Chand's behaviour was evidently unsatisfactory as he was passed over in favour of his younger brother, (Guru) Arjan Dev, when his father chose a successor.

Climbing the mountain, the Guru found all nine Siddhas seated there – Gorakhnath, Mechhendranath, Isarnath, Charapatnath, Barangnath, Ghoracholi, Balgundai, Bharathari, and Gopichand.

[2] The last major, and evidently the latest, tradition of janamsakhi is the Gyan-Ratanavali (also known as Bhagat Ratnavali[23]) attributed to Bhai Mani Singh, who wrote it with the express intention of correcting heretical accounts of Guru Nanak when requested to do so by the Sikh congregation.

[15] Older manuscript of the Mani Singh janamsakhi have different dates for the death and birth of Guru Nanak compared to popular renditions.

[28] Many important figures in the literary traditions, such as Rai Bhullar or Jai Ram (Nanaki's husband), barely make a mention in the women's oral janamsakhis.

[28] Max Arthur Macauliffe, a British civil servant, published his six volume translation of Sikh scripture and religious history in 1909.

[9]: 101  He considered the Miharban and earlier manuscripts of the Bala collections, belonging to the schismatic, now-extinct Mina and Hindali sects respectively, to have particularly dubious origins.

[9]: 103 His approach "proved to be highly controversial,"[34][22] as it "angered many Sikhs" who saw him as "removing the vibrant life and message of their Guru from these texts," using incompatible Christian heuristic methodologies comparable to the Higher Criticism of the Gospels,[9] through which Trilochan Singh contends that he would have set out to prove that that Guru Nanak himself had never existed, though failing to do so.

[22] Throughout the early seventeenth and eighteenth century Janamsakhis, Nanak is consistently likened and considered tantamount to the Divine itself, though this has been downplayed among recent Sikh scholars.

[36] The janamsakhi literature produced was often elaborately illustrated with paintings on the folios of the handwritten manuscripts, each depicting a life story of the first Guru.