Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa
No one else can save you. Don't look for anyone else.
I have searched in all four directions. I have come to find His Sanctuary.
O Nanak — the True King has pulled me out and saved me from drowning.
The closing pauri completes the shabad's movement: from "you cherish your body but it will be abandoned" (Pauri 0) through the various failures of worldly investment to the single resolution: the Sanctuary of the True King.
Chaar kunt khojiaa — I have searched in all four directions. This is the exhausted seeker who has tried everything else. The True King (Saachaa Raajaa) pulls him out (kaadhh leeaa) from drowning — active rescue, not passive permission.
The drowning and rescue imagery connects to the world-ocean of poison (Shabad 64, Shabad 70). The same ocean, the same rescue — available to those who call from within it.
Have you ever exhausted all your own options and finally, with nothing left, turned to something larger? What happened?
Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa·How we use AI