Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa
The One placed the soul inside the cave of the body and breathed the breath of life into it, the way a musician breathes into a flute.
The One breathed life into the body's flute and opened nine doors — eyes, ears, nostrils, mouth and the rest — but kept the tenth door hidden.
At the Guru's door, some are given loving faith, and the tenth door is shown to them.
The One has countless forms, and the Naam holds nine treasures. No one can find where the One ends.
Nanak says: the One placed the soul inside the cave of the body and breathed the breath of life into its flute.
Har jee-o gufaa andar rakh kai vaajaa pavan vajaa-i-aa — "the Lord placed the soul in the cave, and played the instrument of the breath." Two great images fuse. The gufaa — the cave — is the yogic term for the body's inmost recess (the guhaa of the Upanishads, where the Self hides); the vaajaa pavan — the wind-instrument of the breath — makes every inhalation the One's own music-making. Life is not merely given; it is PLAYED. The body of verse 6 (the poor instrument without love) is revealed as an instrument that was never silent: the Musician has been breathing through it from the first cry.
Then the doors: na-o du-aaray pargat kee-ay dasvaa gupat rakhaa-i-aa — nine gates made manifest, the Tenth kept hidden. The nau darvaajay are the body's nine openings, the outward-facing commerce of the senses; the dasam duaar — the Tenth Gate — is the tradition's name for the hidden inward opening at the crown, where the individual meets the Infinite. The economy of revelation is exact: gurdu-aarai laa-ay bhaavnee — through the Guru's door, loving faith is attached — iknaa dasvaa du-aar dikhaa-i-aa — and to some the Tenth is SHOWN. One door (the Guru's) opens the other (the hidden one): gurdwara as the key to dasam duaar.
Behind it, no small chamber: anayk roop naa-o nav niDh — endless forms, the nine treasures of the Name — tis daa ant na jaa-ee paa-i-aa — and no limit findable (verse 12's edgelessness, now located WITHIN the body-house). The verse closes by repeating its first line whole, as the bani loves to do — the cave, the breath, the music: your anatomy, correctly read, is scripture.
Nine doors of you face the world — what do you think it feels like when the hidden one opens inward?
Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa·How we use AI