Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa
When you meet the Perfect Guru, you find the greatest jewel — the wisdom of deep reflection.
When you give your whole mind to the Guru, you receive something even greater: love for all of creation.
Liberation is found. Every flaw and failing is erased.
Satgur pooraa jay milai — "if one meets the Perfect True Guru." The conditional (jay — if) is significant: meeting the Guru is not guaranteed by intention alone. It is a gift, a grace — and when it happens, what is found is the ratan beechaar (jewel of meditative reflection).
Ratan (jewel, gem, ruby) — the most prized thing in any treasury. In a world that assigns value to gold, land, and offspring, Guru Nanak consistently reassigns value to the inner: the jewel of wisdom, the gem of the Name. The Guru's treasury contains all of these; the world's treasury contains none.
Man deejai — surrendering the mind. The price of admission to the Guru's treasury is not money, caste, or learning: it is the mind. Give the mind fully to the Guru — orient it completely toward the teaching — and what you receive in return is sarab pi-aar: universal love, love that does not exclude anything or anyone. The mind given to the Guru returns enlarged.
Avgan maytanhaar — the eraser of demerits. Guru Nanak is not saying that past actions have no weight. He is saying that the Guru erases what the ego has accumulated — not through magic but through the transformation that genuine contact with the Guru produces. The same soul that arrived burdened departs lightened.
What would you be willing to give — fully, completely — if you were certain of what you would receive in return?
Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa·How we use AI