Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa
The one Hukam moves through everything; the one duty rests on every head.
And He Himself has given the wandering — placing greed and corruption within.
The hymn's hardest verse, continuing the honesty of the aap-litany tradition: even the going-astray is inside the one Will — aap bhavaalee ditee-an, He Himself gave the wandering, the greed within included. Guru Amar Das will not carve out a second power to blame; there is one Hukam or there is not. Read fearfully, this is bleak; read whole — with verse 6 beside it — it is mercy: if the straying was within His doing, then no strayed soul is beyond His reach, and none of the lost are lost to a rival's territory. The dark is not another kingdom.
Does it comfort or trouble you that even the wandering has a purpose — and why?
Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa·How we use AI