Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa
Someone who keeps a running scorecard with the Guru — always measuring, always calculating — loses the very peace they were counting.
Chasing after wealth again and again, they find even what they had slips away.
What can they gain or enjoy, when inside there is only restlessness and ache?
Carrying ill-will toward those who hold no ill-will only piles a heavy weight on your own shoulders.
Bitterness in the heart leaves a bitter taste in the mouth, and no shelter anywhere.
Even gold turns to dust in such hands — nothing brings satisfaction while the heart is at war.
But if that same person comes back to the shelter of the Guru, all the old missteps are simply set aside and forgiven.
Nanak holds the Name in mind day and night; remembering the One, the weight of every wrong lifts away.
A Shalok of the Fourth Mehl about the corrosion of a calculating, grievance-keeping heart — one that treats even the Guru as a transaction to be tallied. The images of grinding teeth and foaming rage become "restlessness and ache," and the emphasis falls here: the harm of ill-will is not a punishment sent from outside but the natural cost of carrying it — nirvairai naal je vair rachaa-ay — hating those who hold no hatred is simply a weight on your own back. Crucially, the verse does not end in judgment: jay gur kee sarnee fir oh aavai — "if he comes back to the shelter," all is forgiven. The door is always open. That open door is the whole point.
Why do you think keeping score of every slight makes a person less happy, not more? And what does it feel like to finally let a grudge go?
Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa·How we use AI