Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa
Inside this body there are countless treasures — more than you could ever count. When you turn toward the light and meet what's real, then you finally get to see them. Past the nine ordinary openings of the body, there's a tenth door, and through it comes freedom — and a music that no one plays, sounding all on its own.
Guru Amar Das returns to the body as a treasury: "is kaaia andar vasat asankha" — inside this body are countless treasures. This continues the previous verse's pointing inward, but goes further. Your body isn't just a vehicle to drag around; it's a storehouse of riches you haven't opened. But there's a condition: "gurmukh saach milai ta vaykha" — only when you turn toward the light (gurmukh) and meet the real do you actually see them. The treasures are there whether or not you see them — like stars hidden behind daylight. The turning-toward-the-light is what makes them visible.
Then a beautiful piece of old imagery: "na-o darvaaje dasvai mukta." The body has nine "gates" — the nine openings (eyes, ears, nostrils, mouth, and the two lower openings). These are how we usually engage the world — looking, listening, tasting, consuming. But Guru Amar Das points to a tenth gate, "dasvai" — not a physical opening at all, but an inner doorway. Through the nine gates, awareness flows outward, chasing the world. Through the tenth gate, awareness turns inward and upward, and there — "mukta" — is freedom. The tenth gate is a symbol: the inner opening that appears when the mind finally turns from the outer chase to the inner depth.
And what's found there? "Anhad sabad vajaavania" — the unstruck shabad, sounding. Anhad means "unstruck" — a sound not made by any instrument, because it's the hum of reality itself, the vibration of the One in everything. You can only hear it when the nine outer gates quiet down and the tenth opens. It's always sounding; we just can't hear it over the noise of our outward-rushing senses. This is Guru Amar Das's vision of the awakened state: not floating off to some other realm, but discovering that the treasure, the freedom, and the music were all here, inside, behind a door we never thought to open — and the shabad is the key that opens it.
Most of our attention flows outward, chasing things to see, hear, and have. What might you notice if, even briefly, you turned that attention inward instead?
Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa·How we use AI