Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa
Good-looking? Do not let it swell you - the same Light shines in every heart there is.
Rich? The riches were gifts, every coin. Strong and brave? Without the One's power in the arm, what would the arm do?
Loud about your charity? The Great Giver - who gave you what you gave - quietly marks that down as foolishness.
But the one whose ego-disease is cured by grace - that person is healthy forever.
Pride is like an illness, and grace is the cure.
Sukhmani has checked our reasons for pride before. Here it goes through them again. Good-looking? Parabh kee jot sagal ghat sohai — the One's Light shines in every heart. Your beauty was never only yours. It is like a window bragging about the sunshine. Rich? Everything was a gift. Strong and brave? Without the One's power, what could anyone do?
The sharpest line is about charity. Someone who brags about giving is handing out the One's own gifts and then asking for applause. That is why the Great Giver calls it foolish.
The new idea comes at the end. Ha-o rog means the disease of ego. Ego, or haumai, is the me-first feeling. The one cured of it by the Guru's grace is sadaa arog — healthy forever. This changes how a family can talk about ego. It is not a crime to punish. It is a sickness to heal. Nobody scolds you for having a fever. They look after you. Earlier in Sukhmani, ego was called a fever that bends how we see. Here the cure is promised.
When you feel proud of your looks, strength or generosity, who actually supplied each one?
Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa·How we use AI