Raag Sorath
Commentary

Raag Sorath, Chau-Padas, Mehl 5 (Guru Arjan)

You are Giver and receiver both; I am a small, held thing beside You -- and I live just by beholding You.

The Arc

Pauri 0: remembrance, repeated, turns sorrow into bliss, and tangled tasks fall into harmony. Rahau (Pauri 1): Your Name is the life of the world; holding You in mind carries me across the stormy sea, for You are the One who decides, listens, and does it all -- Giver and Enjoyer both. Pauri 2: which of Your countless goodnesses could I name? I stay alive just by beholding You, full of wonder. Pauri 3: with pure grace You kept my honor whole and made my mind clear, and I long only to sit humbly among the good-hearted.

Key Vocabulary

  • simar simar... bha-ay anandaa: remembering, remembering, bliss arises
  • jagjeevan naam: the Name, the Life of the world
  • aapay daataa aapay bhugtaa: Giver and Enjoyer both
  • paykh paykh jeevai: one lives by beholding
  • baachha-o santaa dhooree: longing for the dust of the good

Themes and Cross-Connections

Aapay daataa aapay bhugtaa -- the One as both Giver and receiver -- points to the non-dual vision at the project's core: there is no second. The human response is not helplessness but achraj, wonder, and living by beholding.

For Raag Sorath

Sorath's contemplative warmth suits a shabad that makes wonder itself a way of staying alive.

Translation Notes

Ki-aa ih jant vichaaraa ('what can this poor creature do') is rendered as being 'a small, held thing' -- empty-handedness and wonder rather than self-diminishment. Bha-ojal ('terrifying world-ocean') is softened to 'the wide, stormy sea'.

Read this shabad →
← Back to Raag Sorath