Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa
The human body is a vast fortress, with busy shops and streets running through it.
The one who faces the Guru comes to trade there and gathers the true goods: the One's Name.
Deal in that treasure of the Name — the true jewels, the true diamonds — held right inside you.
Those who go searching for this wealth somewhere outside the body are looking in the wrong place entirely.
They wander lost in doubt, like a deer running through the bushes hunting for a scent that comes from within its own body.
The treasure you are looking for is already inside you, like the musk-deer's scent.
The verse uses a famous picture: the kasturi mrig, the musk-deer. It races through the forest chasing a lovely smell it can never find. Why? Because the smell comes from its own body the whole time.
We do the same. We search outside, in places, in things, in far-off trips, for a treasure that is andar, "inside." Think of hunting all over the house for your glasses while they sit on top of your head.
The body is not something to escape. It is a kot, a fortress, with busy shops and streets inside. The trading that matters happens right here, within you. The gurmukh, the person turned toward the teaching, trades in the Name, the real jewels and diamonds.
The verse calls the outward searchers foolish. The point is a gentle correction, not scorn: the searching was aimed outward, while the jewel was at home all along.
What is something people often chase "out there" that might already be inside them?
Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa·How we use AI