[3] Swami Dayal lists Jagjivan Sahab as his predecessor[4] and writes: The sect has an official foundation date, which is April 21, 1657.
Many Hindus resented Aurungzeb’s strict Islamic policies-which included reviving the hated Islamic Jizya tax (poll tax on non-Muslim subjects), banning music and art, and destroying Hindu temples.
Though totally lacking in weaponry and money, the Satnamis inflicted several defeats on the Moghul forces.
The contemporary Moghul chronicler, Saqi Mustaid Khan, expressed amazement as to what came over this “destitute gang of goldsmiths, carpenters, sweepers and tanners and other… artisan castes that their conceited brains became so overclouded?
Rebellious pride having found a place in their brains, their heads became too heavy for their shoulders.” This also shows the thinking of Muslim intelligentsia who regard them as untouchables.
Amusingly, in contrast, Hindus have greatly respected the Satnamis throughout for their beliefs like prohibition of intoxicants and meat.
The resentment of the Satnamis against the Moghul persecution meant that they even enacted revenge by destroying mosques in the area.
[7][8][9] The sect was revived decades around 1714, when a community calling itself Satnami Sadh sprung up in Panchal Nagar (Farrukhabad), U.P.
The second revival was again decades later by Jagjivan Das, a Chandel Thakur, whose guru was Maharaja Vishveshwara Puri.
[15] The Satnamis have a sect mark of a straight line down the forehead drawn with ashes from an offering to Hanuman.