Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa
I found the secret: love. Love so genuine and complete that it became a kind of intoxicating drug — and with it, I won over the Lord Himself. His heart was moved by it.
Through the grace of the Saints, I found myself held in the Lord's embrace — the embrace of the One who is too deep for any mind to fully reach. And held there, I became beautiful. Every pain that had been following me: gone.
The devotees' genuine love is so powerful that it draws the Lord to them. He comes to where love calls Him.
O my companions — sing! The desires that drove me all this time have been fulfilled. Maya — the illusion of all the things that trap and tangle — can no longer reach me. God has taken my hand. When He holds your hand, the ocean cannot swallow you.
"The intoxicating drug of love"
Paraym thaug-urī pā'e rījhā'e gobind man mohi'ā — "administering the intoxicating drug of love, I have won over the Lord of the Universe; I have fascinated His Mind." The word thaug-urī is a potent one: it means a narcotic, an intoxicating substance, something given to render someone unconscious or senseless. The devotee has, through genuine love, "intoxicated" the Lord Himself — rendered Him helpless before the love that is offered.
This is the audacity of the bhakti tradition at its most radical. The devotee does not only approach God with supplication. Love itself is a power that acts on the divine. The devotee wins over (rījhāe — to please, to charm, to win the heart of) the Lord through love — not through wealth, merit, sacrifice, or argument.
"By the devotees' loving worship, the Lord has come under their power"
Bhagat lakhyaṇ kar vas bha'e — "through the marks/nature of devotion, the Lord has come under the devotees' power." This line is remarkable and deliberate. It is not that the devotees have become more powerful than God. Bhakti readers often take it as a picture of God's own responsiveness to love — the divine leaning toward the love that is offered, and genuine love reaching it.
"God has taken hold of my hand"
Kar geh leenay naanak prabh pi'āray — "taking hold of my hand, O Nanak, my Beloved God will not let me be swallowed by the world-ocean." The hand-holding image recurs in the closing Chhant (Pauri9) as well — it is the central metaphor of this entire composition. The child held by the hand in a crowd does not need to know the way. They go where the hand leads. They do not need to fight the crowd. They only need to not let go.
*What is the difference between loving God out of fear, out of duty, and out of genuine delight? Have you ever felt the third kind?*
Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa·How we use AI