Raag Gauree
Commentary

Raag Gauree Poorbee, Chau-Pada, Mehl 5 (Guru Arjan)

Never let the Oneness fall out of mind; it is cool water on a burning heart, the protection that held you before you could ask, and the Giver even to those with nothing to give back.

The Arc

Pauri0 (Pause) opens Gauree Poorbee with one total instruction — never forget the Oneness — naming it the Giver of all peace and Cherisher of all hearts. Pauri1 images the Name as cool water quieting a burning mind. Pauri2 (handled with the project's wellbeing care) turns stark old imagery of birth-perils and death-dread into the reassurance underneath it: you were protected before you could ask, and you are carried safely across. Pauri3 warns, gently, against gambling one's life away on the unreal. Pauri4 ends in honest self-portrait — the mind tangled in craving and anger — met by grace given precisely to the empty-handed.

Key Vocabulary

  • har har: doubled Name; the rhythm of remembrance (simran) itself
  • seetal, saaNt, sookh: cool, calm, at ease — the sensory register of the Name's relief
  • bhavjal: the world-ocean the soul is carried across (frightening imagery set aside per project rules)
  • joo-ay janam na haaray: "not losing your life in the gamble" — spending it on the real
  • nirgun kay daataaray: "Giver to the one with nothing to give back" — grace, unearned

Themes and Cross-Connections

The healing register — the Name as seetal coolness on a burning fire — recurs across Gauree Mehl 5 (see B00C459, B00C460's quenched thirst). The close, nirgun kay daataaray, is a crisp statement of the project's grace-lens: the gift goes to the empty-handed, never to the deserving-first. The "don't gamble your life away" image links to the Gauree keynote that the unreal washes off while the real endures (sach vs jhooth).

For Raag Gauree

Poorbee is a sub-raag of Gauree with a slightly more plaintive, yearning color; here it carries a shabad that moves from urgent remembrance to deep comfort, fitting Gauree's reflective mood while leaning warm.

Translation Notes

Sant Singh Khalsa renders Pauri2 with "the hellish pit of the womb" and "the fear of death," and Pauri4 with "sexual desire." The Gurmukhi supports the perils-of-birth and death-fear imagery, but per the project's wellbeing rules the frightening pictures are set aside and their underlying comfort (early protection, safe crossing, fear dissolved) is foregrounded; kaam is rendered as "wanting" rather than the adult-specific gloss.


Last updated: 2026

Read this shabad →
← Back to Raag Gauree