Ang-51 — Chapter 37
Following the Guru's Teachings, I cannot be touched by the Messenger of Death. I am absorbed in the True Name.
The Creator Himself is All-pervading everywhere; He links those with whom He is pleased to His Name.
Servant Nanak chants the Naam, and so he lives. Without the Name, he would die in an instant. ||2||
Pauree:
One who is accepted at the Court of the Lord shall be accepted in courts everywhere.
Wherever he goes, he is recognized as honorable. Seeing his face, all sinners are saved.
Within him is the Treasure of the Naam, the Name of the Lord. Through the Naam, he is exalted.
He worships the Name, and believes in the Name; the Name erases all his sinful mistakes.
Those who meditate on the Name, with one-pointed mind and focused consciousness, remain forever stable in the world. ||11||
Salok, Third Mehl:
Worship the Divine, Supreme Soul, with the intuitive peace and poise of the Guru.
If the individual soul has faith in the Supreme Soul, then it shall obtain realization within its own home.
The soul becomes steady, and does not waver, by the natural inclination of the Guru's Loving Will.
Without the Guru, intuitive wisdom does not come, and the filth of greed does not depart from within.
If the Lord's Name abides within the mind, for a moment, even for an instant, it is like bathing at all the sixty-eight sacred shrines of pilgrimage.
Filth does not stick to those who are true, but filth attaches itself to those who love duality.
This filth cannot be washed off, even by bathing at the sixty-eight sacred shrines of pilgrimage.
The self-willed manmukh does deeds in egotism; he earns only pain and more pain.
O Nanak, the filthy ones become clean only when they meet and surrender to the True Guru. ||1||
Third Mehl:
The self-willed manmukhs may be taught, but how can they really be taught?
The manmukhs do not fit in at all. Because of their past actions, they are condemned to the cycle of reincarnation.
Loving attention to the Lord and attachment to Maya are the two separate ways; all act according to the Hukam of the Lord's Command.
The Gurmukh has conquered his own mind, by applying the Touchstone of the Shabad.
He fights with his mind, he settles with his mind, and he is at peace with his mind.
All obtain the desires of their minds, through the Love of the True Word of the Shabad.
They drink in the Ambrosial Nectar of the Naam forever; this is how the Gurmukhs act.
Those who struggle with something other than their own mind, shall depart having wasted their lives.
The self-willed manmukhs, through stubborn-mindedness and the practice of falsehood, lose the game of life.
Those who conquer their own mind, by Guru's Grace, lovingly focus their attention on the Lord.
O Nanak, the Gurmukhs practice Truth, while the self-willed manmukhs continue coming and going in reincarnation. ||2||
Pauree:
O Saints of the Lord, O Siblings of Destiny, listen, and hear the Lord's Teachings, through the True Guru.
Those who have good destiny pre-ordained and inscribed on their foreheads, grasp it and keep it enshrined in the heart.
Through the Guru's Teachings, they intuitively taste the sublime, exquisite and ambrosial sermon of the Lord.
The Divine Light shines in their hearts, and like the sun which removes the darkness of night, it dispels the darkness of ignorance.
As Gurmukh, they behold with their eyes the Unseen, Imperceptible, Unknowable, Immaculate Lord. ||12||
Salok, Third Mehl:
✦ Connected Across Traditions
The Golden Rule
Matthew 7:12
“Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”
Hadith (An-Nawawi 13)
“None of you truly believes until he wishes for his brother what he wishes for himself.”
Leviticus 19:18
“Love your neighbor as yourself.”
Mahabharata 5.1517
“One should never do to another what one regards as injurious to oneself.”
Impermanence & Letting Go
Dhammapada 20:277
“All conditioned things are impermanent. When one sees this with wisdom, one turns away from suffering.”
Tao Te Ching 76
“A man is born gentle and weak. At his death he is hard and stiff. The soft and yielding is the disciple of life.”
Ecclesiastes 3:1-2
“To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven.”
Bhagavad Gita 2:22
“As a person puts on new garments, giving up old ones, the soul similarly accepts new material bodies, giving up the old and useless ones.”
The Path to Wisdom
Proverbs 4:7
“Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom. And in all your getting, get understanding.”
Dhammapada 20:282
“Wisdom springs from meditation; without meditation wisdom wanes.”
Analects 2:11
“If you study the past and use it to understand the present, you are worthy of being a teacher.”
Tao Te Ching 33
“Knowing others is intelligence; knowing yourself is true wisdom.”
Humility & Surrender
Bhagavad Gita 18:66
“Abandon all varieties of dharma and simply surrender unto Me. I shall deliver you from all sinful reactions; do not fear.”
Matthew 5:5
“Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.”
Tao Te Ching 22
“If you want to become whole, let yourself be partial. If you want to become full, let yourself be empty.”
Quran 2:45
“Seek help through patience and prayer. It is indeed exacting, but not for those who are humble.”
Good vs Evil / Light vs Darkness
Yasna 30:3
“Now the two primal Spirits, who reveal themselves as Twins, are the Better and the Bad, in thought and word and action.”
John 1:5
“The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”
Dhammapada 1:1-2
“Mind is the forerunner of all actions. If one speaks or acts with a pure mind, happiness follows like a shadow.”
Genesis 1:3
“And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.”