nānak runnā bābā jāṇīai je rovai lāi piāro.
vāleve kāraṇi bābā roīai rovaṇu sagal bikāro.
rovaṇu sagal bikāro gāphalu sansāro māiā kāraṇi rovai.
caṅgā mandā kichu sūjhai nāhī ihu tanu evai khovai.
aithai āiā sabhu ko jāsī kūṛi karahu ahaṅkāro.
nānak runnā bābā jāṇīai je rovai lāi piāro.4.1.
-Guru Granth Sahib 579
This composition is based on the Panjabi folk poetic form Alahania related to death. In the first stanza, the message of worldly destructibility is conveyed while glorifying IkOankar, the Creator. In the second stanza, the being is advised to give up pride and remember IkOankar. In the third stanza, the life of those beings is considered fruitful, who single-mindedly remember the eternal IkOankar. Everything happens according to the will of IkOankar; human effort is only a means to that end. In the last stanza it is conveyed that crying for worldly things is useless. Crying in longing and love of IkOankar is meaningful.
Commentary
Literal Translation
Interpretive Transcreation
Poetical Dimension
Calligraphy
In the fourth stanza, Guru Nanak says, O Baba! One may be considered to have truly cried if one cries with love. Here, Baba refers to those who manifest, express, and embody the Wisdom. It refers to all of us and the wisdom within us—the potential we have to embody the Wisdom. The only crying that is meaningful is that which is done out of love for IkOankar (One Creative and Pervasive Force, 1Force, the One). All other crying that is done for temporary things and temporary relationships is useless. The Guru continues: all crying is useless; the world is not mindful and cries for the sake of Maya (allure of material things and relationships). Because we are not mindful, because we are forgetful and ignorant, and because we do not understand anything, including the difference between “good” and “bad,” we lose these bodies. We waste their potential. We do not spend our time here fruitfully. Every being that comes into this world must eventually leave it, but even knowing this, we continue to take pride in temporary things. The Guru ends by again appealing to the wisdom within us: O Baba! One may be considered to have truly cried if one cries with love.
The Guru is gently guiding us to a mindset that we ought to spend some time developing. The Guru acknowledges the kinds of crying in the world but urges us to reframe how we think about and mourn loss. In the world, we lose things, and we cry. We lose wealth, we lose objects, we lose power, we lose influence, we lose fame. We constantly orient ourselves around keeping or gaining more of what we have. This fixation engulfs us, making the moments of loss much harder to bear. We are ignorant; we are moving through the world without thought or understanding, and it is because of this lack of awareness we cry for the sake of attachment to temporary material things and even for the sake of temporary relationships. We equate the loss of the ones we love with the loss of objects! We trivialize our relationships as being bound by time and the body. We cry, and it is not fruitful because that crying entrenches us further into the illusion of this temporary world. But if we were to cry with love for the One and practice a devotion so intense that we felt the pains of separation, that is the kind of crying that will take us toward the love of IkOankar. It is through this that we can find a way to feel the presence of the One, to practice remembrance, and to steady ourselves amongst the comings and goings of this world.
The Guru acknowledges our pain and asks us to cry in love. We are asked to reframe our understanding, to let the wisdom within us engage in an effort to understand. We are shown that our current relationship with the world is one of ignorance and illusion. We do not understand anything, and we waste these bodies. Will we fulfill our potential to be wise ones? Will we cry in love? Will our pain of material and relationship loss disappear and make room for the pain of separation, the pangs of longing in love that we are being urged toward? Will we experience the intimacy with the One and the love it brings?
SUMMARY
In the first Alahani, Guru Nanak explores the play of the One in this world, which has gotten us all busy doing different things and engaging in various tasks, affairs, and paths. We all come here for an allotted time to do those tasks and engage in those things, and we all must go when our allotted time is over. In Stanzas 1 and 2, the Guru urges us not to get caught up in the temporary or the false. In Stanza 3 and 4, the Guru emphasizes that whatever happens is what pleases the Command of the One. This is the power and the potency of the Command—no one can interfere with it. We are urged to be wise, not waste our time in the customs and rituals of this crying, and to understand that in our culture and paradigms, our crying is about attachment to the temporary. We are shown that this kind of grieving will not take us outside of the material, outside of the temporary. But if we are to cry in love, in a way that is not for display, in a way that is intimate and personal and internal, we can begin to find a remedy for the sorrows of this life, for the songs of sorrow that further our pain and pick at our wounds. We can find a balm for this pain. We can be soothed. We can begin to experience the presence of the One.
The Guru is gently guiding us to a mindset that we ought to spend some time developing. The Guru acknowledges the kinds of crying in the world but urges us to reframe how we think about and mourn loss. In the world, we lose things, and we cry. We lose wealth, we lose objects, we lose power, we lose influence, we lose fame. We constantly orient ourselves around keeping or gaining more of what we have. This fixation engulfs us, making the moments of loss much harder to bear. We are ignorant; we are moving through the world without thought or understanding, and it is because of this lack of awareness we cry for the sake of attachment to temporary material things and even for the sake of temporary relationships. We equate the loss of the ones we love with the loss of objects! We trivialize our relationships as being bound by time and the body. We cry, and it is not fruitful because that crying entrenches us further into the illusion of this temporary world. But if we were to cry with love for the One and practice a devotion so intense that we felt the pains of separation, that is the kind of crying that will take us toward the love of IkOankar. It is through this that we can find a way to feel the presence of the One, to practice remembrance, and to steady ourselves amongst the comings and goings of this world.
The Guru acknowledges our pain and asks us to cry in love. We are asked to reframe our understanding, to let the wisdom within us engage in an effort to understand. We are shown that our current relationship with the world is one of ignorance and illusion. We do not understand anything, and we waste these bodies. Will we fulfill our potential to be wise ones? Will we cry in love? Will our pain of material and relationship loss disappear and make room for the pain of separation, the pangs of longing in love that we are being urged toward? Will we experience the intimacy with the One and the love it brings?
SUMMARY
In the first Alahani, Guru Nanak explores the play of the One in this world, which has gotten us all busy doing different things and engaging in various tasks, affairs, and paths. We all come here for an allotted time to do those tasks and engage in those things, and we all must go when our allotted time is over. In Stanzas 1 and 2, the Guru urges us not to get caught up in the temporary or the false. In Stanza 3 and 4, the Guru emphasizes that whatever happens is what pleases the Command of the One. This is the power and the potency of the Command—no one can interfere with it. We are urged to be wise, not waste our time in the customs and rituals of this crying, and to understand that in our culture and paradigms, our crying is about attachment to the temporary. We are shown that this kind of grieving will not take us outside of the material, outside of the temporary. But if we are to cry in love, in a way that is not for display, in a way that is intimate and personal and internal, we can begin to find a remedy for the sorrows of this life, for the songs of sorrow that further our pain and pick at our wounds. We can find a balm for this pain. We can be soothed. We can begin to experience the presence of the One.
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