Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa
In the beginning the One was spreading through everything; in the middle it is; at the end it will be. It is beyond and within all.
The saints hold the all-pervading One in mind; Nanak, it is the destroyer of every wrong, the One of the whole universe.
The Vaar opens on the theme it will circle back to at the very end: the One that pervades beginning, middle, and end — before time, through time, and beyond it (echoing Japji's "true before time began... true even now"). This is a Vaar (a heroic ballad-form, here turned to praise) built of alternating Shaloks (short couplets) and Paurees (the stanzas that climb like steps). It begins by planting its feet on the one unshakable ground: whatever changes, the One is the constant, holding all of it. The saints simply keep this in mind, and that remembrance dissolves what weighs on them.
What has stayed the same through all the changes in your life? Is there something steady underneath it all?
Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa·How we use AI