You Don't Seize the Treasure; He Calls You Home

Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa

This last verse says the treasure isn't grabbed. The One gives it and calls you home.

After all the talk of trading and money and searching, the final word is aapay dayvai — He Himself gives. The shabad, the Word, isn't won by being clever. It is a gift. And sabad bulaa-ay — He calls us in, like the palace earlier in the song where He invites people inside. The gift and the invitation both come from the One. The trader worked and the searcher searched, but in the end the Beloved opens the door. This is gurprasad, grace, a gift you didn't earn. It leaves no room for the trader to feel proud of his own success.

The reward is named clearly: sahj sukh, the peace of sahaj, a calm that comes easily and naturally. It isn't the jumpy, grabbing, "I won!" kind of happiness. It's balance, like a bike rider who has stopped wobbling and just glides. The soul settles into its true self, at home in mahlee mahal, the palace inside. After the manmukh's restless sleepwalking in the last verse, this is the deep rest of someone who stopped searching outside and came home inside.

The last picture closes the circle: sun sun Dhi-aavani-aa — hearing the Naam, the Name, again and again and holding it close. The song began with the Word making and ending whole worlds. It ends with that same Word being heard quietly inside one human heart. The huge and the tiny turn out to be one thing. To really listen to the Word inside is to join the same song that makes worlds. And the vadi-aa-ee, the greatness, that comes isn't the ego getting bigger. It is the quiet wideness of a small soul that has melted back into the One it never truly left.