Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa
If clinging attachment is an "impurity," then every form and every creature is tangled in it. That is how living feels when we forget the One.
And so we keep circling, coming and going, over and over.
If being "unclean" lived in things, then everything would be unclean.
Guru Amar Das follows the old sootak rules all the way to the end, to show they cannot work. Sabho sootak jaytaa moh aakaar — every form is caught in uncleanness through moh, clinging attachment. Aakaar means form, anything with a shape. So if uncleanness lived in things and touch, no one could ever be clean. That is exactly why the whole outward idea falls apart.
Mar mar jammai vaaro vaar — dying and being born, over and over. This is read gently. It is the restless circling of a life run by clinging, not a threat. Think of a hamster wheel: lots of running, but no arriving. The real answer will be inside us, not a rule about what to avoid.
Why do you think rules about what you can touch or eat cannot really make a heart good?
Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa·How we use AI