Raag Basant
Commentary

Raag Basant, Vaar, Mehl 5 (Guru Arjan)

Har kaa naam dhi-aa-ay kai hohu hari-aa bhaa-ee — remember the Name, and your whole life turns green.

The Arc

Three pauris, no sloks and no rahau. Pauri 1: remember the Name and become green — the soul springtime, the three worlds in bloom, the nectar-fruit, peace welling up in holy company. Pauri 2: the five mighty forces calmed, the Beloved standing in our midst, sorrow and sickness gone, ever-fresh — and the great homecoming, from the One and back into the One. Pauri 3: the biggest questions (where from, where now, where to), answered by belonging to the One, with deep listening and remembrance making the devotee beautiful, and the Guru Truth passed on to all.

Key Vocabulary

vaar (a ballad-form composition); hari-aa (green, alive); rut (season); amrit fal (nectar-fruit); saadhoo (holy company); chhaa-ee (shadow); simran (remembrance); panj (the five forces); niro-aa (ever-well, whole); agam agochar (beyond reach and grasp); sach (Truth).

Themes and Cross-Connections

The Name as spring and green life; the five forces calmed; homecoming as a drop returning to the ocean; the three great questions of existence; deep listening making the heart beautiful.

For Raag Basant

This is the Basant Kee Vaar — the only Vaar in all of Raag Basant, and its purest statement. The entire teaching of the raag is compressed into three short pauris: remember the Name, and turn green, alive, and at home. Its very first line — become green — is the seed of the whole raag.

Translation Notes

Basant Kee Vaar, Mehl 5 confirmed from the header (basant kee vaar mahal 5). This is the only Vaar in Raag Basant and unusually short (three pauris, and in this rendering no sloks). Because a Vaar has no rahau, For Your Children aligns straight to each pauri in order. Wellbeing: womb of reincarnation and never again die softened to never wandering lost again and a restful, boundless belonging (a drop returning to its ocean).

Last updated: 2026-07-10

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