Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa
The One is the king — and also all the people the king rules. It is the one who needs nothing at all — and also the one enjoying every delight. It sits on the throne as the truest, fairest judge there is. And once you see this, all your worried crying and complaining simply stops, because you understand it is all held safely by the One.
Once the seeker has seen the One at home (P1), the eyes open to see that One everywhere and as everything — and this pauri is a dazzling list of opposites all held within the single reality. Aape raajan aape logaa — "the One is the king, and the One is the people." Aap nirbaanee aape bhogaa — "the One is utterly detached (in nirbaan, needing nothing), and the One is the enjoyer of all pleasures." The divine is not on one side of any divide; it is both sides, the ruler and the ruled, the renunciate and the reveler.
This is Ik Onkar pushed to its full radical conclusion: if there is truly only oneness, then every role in the great play is the One playing it. The poor and the king, the one who fasts and the one who feasts — all are the single presence wearing different costumes. There is no "other" anywhere, because there is no second thing. This dissolves the deepest dualisms the mind clings to.
The last line shows the effect of this vision: aape takhat bahai sach niaaee, sabh chookee kook pukaariaa — "the One sits on the throne as the true (sach) judge, and all the crying-out, all the desperate clamor, stops." When you truly see that the One both governs everything and is everything — sitting as the just, real ground of it all — the anxious noise of complaint falls silent. There is no one to protest to and no one outside the One to be wronged by. The kook pukaar (the wailing, the petitioning) ends not because problems vanish but because the frame of separation that made them feel unbearable has dissolved.
A lot of worry comes from feeling something is "against" us. How might it feel different to trust that everything, even the hard parts, is held by one fair and loving reality?
Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa·How we use AI