Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa
Your steps are unsteady and your eyes are blind; you do not keep your mind on the Word, O brother.
The Shaastras and the Vedas, the old holy books, keep a person tied to the three pulls of Maya, the busy, shiny world, and so they go about their work blindly.
You can walk through life with unsteady steps and eyes that do not see, missing the Word right beside you.
The Shabad, the Guru's Word, is close, and still it is missed. The verse then names the Shaastras and Vedas, the old holy books of the Hindu tradition. The verse says they can keep a person tied to the trai gun, the three pulls of Maya. Maya means the busy, shiny world that keeps us wanting more.
This is not a put-down of those books. The tradition honors them. It is about how anyone reads anything holy. Think of a student who memorizes every answer for a test but never understands one. The words stay in the head. They never reach the heart, and they only feed more wanting.
Learning that reaches the heart changes how you see and how you love.
When has something you learned finally moved from your head to your heart?
Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa·How we use AI