Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa
Underneath the appearances, nothing real is ever born, and nothing real ever dies.
The One stages His own drama: comings, goings, the seen, the unseen - all of it moving in His Will.
He is all, in Himself: setting up worlds, taking them down, in ways past counting. What He is cannot perish - nothing of Him can break. His support runs under the whole universe.
His glory has no floor to reach and no map to hold it. As He inspires our remembering - exactly so, we remember.
You are more like the ocean than a single wave.
Nah kichh janmai nah kichh marai — nothing is born, and nothing dies. This line can make your head spin. It does not mean bodies. Bodies clearly arrive and leave. It means what everything really is: the One, wearing many forms. Births and deaths are costume changes in aapan chalit, His own drama. The Actor never leaves the stage. Ashtapadee 11 spoke of this theater too. Here it is seen by an audience that has woken up.
The wave picture helps a child hold it. Waves rise and fall all day long. The ocean does not begin or end with any of them.
Abhinaasee naahee kichh khand — He cannot perish, and nothing of Him can break. This is the deepest safety in the universe. At the root of everything is something that cannot break, and everything real is made of it.
The last line hands over even our remembering. Aap japaa-ay ta naanak jaap — as He moves us to remember, so we remember. Our remembering is His breath moving through us. This is the last teaching of Ashtapadee 6, now told about the whole universe.
If the realest part of you cannot be broken or die, what is there, finally, to be afraid of?
Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa·How we use AI