Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa
You get soaked up in passing pleasures, O mind -- but hold instead the One whose color never washes out.
The color of that love never fades. Serve the teaching, keep the Word close, and it stays with you bright and true.
Rang means both "color" and "love/joy," and Guru Ram Das plays on it: worldly rang (dyed pleasure) fades, but har rang kaday na utrai -- the divine color "never comes off." This is the dyer's-vat idea that recurs across Gurbani: a cheap dye rinses away, but when the One is the dyer the color is permanent. Sabad samaal -- hold the Word -- is how the color is kept fast.
What is something you love that lasts, compared to a fun that is gone by tomorrow?
Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa·How we use AI