Ask everyone what the One is like, and the truest answer is a happy "I cannot say" — and then the One comes home to you.
The Arc
This chhant opens with a seeing — the Giver of fearlessness in every heart, filling all yet untouched, the world risen from it like waves from water; drinking that sight like a fish that has found its water. Then: what praise could ever be big enough? The One wins every heart; wealth and things travel on with no one, so hold the One close now, in good company. A seeker goes to the wise and asks what the Beloved is like, offering the heart for any news — and the answer overflows into a glad "I cannot say." It closes at home: in pure kindness the One comes to its own, darkness lifts, light and overflow fill the heart, pain leaves, peace moves in, and a deep, natural ease settles over everything.
Key Vocabulary
anbhai kaa daataa — the Giver of fearlessness.
jal tarang — waves and water; creation rising from the One and never ceasing to be it.
daras... jal meenaa — drinking the sight like a fish in its water.
manmohan / mohan — the One who wins and enchants every heart.
sant sang / saadhsang — the company of the holy, where the One is recognized.
sukh ghar meh voothaa — peace moving into the house of the heart.
sehjaa-i-aa — settled in sahaj, natural ease.
Themes and Cross-Connections
The fish-and-water image (daras leenaa ji-o jal meenaa) is Gurbani's classic picture of the soul that cannot live apart from the One, and it answers Saarang's longing head-on — the longing is a fish out of water, and the vision is the water returned. jal tarang (waves and water) sounds the wave-and-ocean non-separation that runs all through the tradition. The glad "I cannot say what the One is like" turns the limit of praise into wonder rather than defeat.
For Raag Saarang
The raag of longing reaches its homecoming here — the seeker who asked everyone what the Beloved is like ends not with a definition but with the Beloved arriving: pain gone, peace moved in.
Translation Notes
This chhant is Mehl 5 (Guru Arjan). Though a chhant, its imagery is seeker-and-Beloved rather than an overt soul-bride, so it is rendered as the soul's belonging and homecoming, not a gendered marriage. In Pauri 1, jab khinchai tab chhaa-ee (when He withdraws, the mortal turns to dust) is bent gently — when the breath of life is drawn back, the body returns quietly to the earth — with the hope-forward turn that only the One stays. ghari muhtak belaa aa-ee (your time shall come any instant) is carried as an invitation to hold the One close now, without the fear of a looming deadline. Mohan / manmohan (the Enticer) is rendered as the One who wins every heart.
Ask everyone what the One is like, and the truest answer is a happy "I cannot say" — and then the One comes home to you.
The Arc
This chhant opens with a seeing — the Giver of fearlessness in every heart, filling all yet untouched, the world risen from it like waves from water; drinking that sight like a fish that has found its water. Then: what praise could ever be big enough? The One wins every heart; wealth and things travel on with no one, so hold the One close now, in good company. A seeker goes to the wise and asks what the Beloved is like, offering the heart for any news — and the answer overflows into a glad "I cannot say." It closes at home: in pure kindness the One comes to its own, darkness lifts, light and overflow fill the heart, pain leaves, peace moves in, and a deep, natural ease settles over everything.
Key Vocabulary
Themes and Cross-Connections
The fish-and-water image (daras leenaa ji-o jal meenaa) is Gurbani's classic picture of the soul that cannot live apart from the One, and it answers Saarang's longing head-on — the longing is a fish out of water, and the vision is the water returned. jal tarang (waves and water) sounds the wave-and-ocean non-separation that runs all through the tradition. The glad "I cannot say what the One is like" turns the limit of praise into wonder rather than defeat.
For Raag Saarang
The raag of longing reaches its homecoming here — the seeker who asked everyone what the Beloved is like ends not with a definition but with the Beloved arriving: pain gone, peace moved in.
Translation Notes
This chhant is Mehl 5 (Guru Arjan). Though a chhant, its imagery is seeker-and-Beloved rather than an overt soul-bride, so it is rendered as the soul's belonging and homecoming, not a gendered marriage. In Pauri 1, jab khinchai tab chhaa-ee (when He withdraws, the mortal turns to dust) is bent gently — when the breath of life is drawn back, the body returns quietly to the earth — with the hope-forward turn that only the One stays. ghari muhtak belaa aa-ee (your time shall come any instant) is carried as an invitation to hold the One close now, without the fear of a looming deadline. Mohan / manmohan (the Enticer) is rendered as the One who wins every heart.