Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa
So many voices praise the One - and still no one has found an edge.
Nanak says: the One made this creation with its countless ways and countless kinds of beings.
Countless people praise the One, and still no one finds an edge.
It opens the tenth part of Sukhmani, Guru Arjan's long song of peace. Sukhmani is built in ashtapadees, sections of eight verses each. Each one opens with a short verse called a salok, like this one. This section is a cousin of Japji's "countless" pauris, 17 to 19, and of its pauris about how vast the One is, 22 and 24.
For eight verses, Guru Arjan will repeat one phrase: ka-ee kot, "many millions." He swings it like a flashlight across everything that exists: good people and thieves, stones and stars, heavens and hells. The point is not to count. It is to fix our sense of size. Nine sections have been about the human heart. Now the tenth steps outside and shows the heart how big the house is.
When you look up at the stars, do you feel smaller or larger? Can you feel both at once?
Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa·How we use AI