Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa
It was destiny that brought the body and the soul-bird together — and the same One who joined them will one day gently part them again. The foolish chase pleasures, and then have to swallow the pains that come trailing right behind.
Because from grabbing pleasures come sickness and wrongdoing, and from those come sorrow, separation, and the whole circle of coming and going. People try to argue their way out of the consequences of what they've done — but it's no use. The real reckoning rests with the True Teacher, who quietly brings the argument to an end. Whatever the One sets in motion comes to pass; no amount of struggling against it changes it.
This Pauree returns the soul's gaze to the Creator and to the deep logic of how a life actually works. It opens with the body and the soul-swan — hans — brought together by destiny and, in time, separated by the same hand: He who created them, also separates them. Birth and death are not two opposed events but two motions of a single One, the joining and the parting both held in the same care. There is steadiness in this: the One who brought you together with your body will be just as present when it lets you go.
Then the Pauree traces a precise and sobering chain — the true cost of a life ruled by craving. The fools enjoy their pleasures; they must also endure all their pains. And the mechanism: from pleasures arise diseases and the commission of sins; from sinful pleasures come sorrow, separation, birth and death. Grasping pleasure is not free; it has a tail. The hunger for sensation leads to excess, excess to harm and illness, harm to sorrow and separation, and the whole thing spins the wheel of coming and going. This is not a moralistic scolding; it is a clear-eyed map of cause and effect — as you plant, so you harvest, traced through one full turn.
And the Pauree ends with two truths about reckoning and surrender. First: the fools try to account for their misdeeds, and argue uselessly. The ego, caught out, argues — it explains, justifies, negotiates, pleads its case. But before the truth, the argument is pointless. The judgement is in the Hands of the True Guru, who puts an end to the argument. The Guru is the one who finally silences the ego's endless self-defense — not by condemning it, but by ending the whole futile court case. And second, the deep ground of peace beneath it all: Whatever the Creator does, comes to pass. It cannot be changed by anyone's efforts. This is not fatalism but rest. Once you stop arguing with what is, stop straining to control what was never yours to control, you can finally let the One's Will be the Will — and find, in that surrender, the peace the whole arguing self could never win.
When you're caught out, do you tend to argue and justify — and what would it feel like to simply let that court case end?
Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa·How we use AI