The
saloks of Sheikh Farid
Ji guide the seeker towards life’s true purpose, the devotion to the one absolute Divine, IkOankar. In these saloks, he reminds us that our time in this world is finite; therefore, one must turn to IkOankar without delay. Yet, attachment to transient possessions and relationships causes many to forget this truth, becoming entangled in vices that lead to restlessness and inner turmoil. In contrast, those who cultivate virtues such as love, humility, patience, contentment, selfless service, and righteousness experience the bliss of connection with IkOankar even while living a householder’s life. Their life becomes serene and suffused with inner joy.
sāḍhe trai maṇ dehurī calai pāṇī anni.
āio bandā dunī vici vatiāsūṇī bann̖i.
malkalmaüt jāṁ āvasī sabh darvāje bhanni.
tin̖ā piāriā bhāīāṁ agai ditā bann̖i.
vekhahu bandā caliā cahu jaṇiā dai kann̖i.
pharīdā amal ji kīte dunī vici dargah āe kammi.100.
-Guru Granth Sahib 1383
Commentary
Literal Translation
Interpretive Transcreation
Poetical Dimension
Calligraphy
In the one hundredth stanza, Sheikh Farid says, the human body of three and a half maunds runs on food and water. The being came into the world and wandered, having tied their hopes to carry along with them. Sheikh Farid emphasizes the physicality of our existence—we come into this world in a body that weighs an approximate amount. We subsist on food and water. Then he emphasizes the internal—we come into this world with hopes and desires that we carry along with us. In pursuit of those desires, we do all kinds of things. We accumulate wealth, we cheat people, we worry about what we have and what we might lose, and we spend our time trying to feed our desires only to find a constant lack of satiation. While we are engaged in this rat race, we lose sight of our temporariness. It does not even come to mind.
Sheikh Farid continues, When the angel of death arrives, having broken all doors, those dearest siblings, having tied, have sent them forward. We can have all these expectations and hopes and desires, and we can pursue them! But when death comes, it breaks all the doors. We cannot be protected from it. When the time comes, it is as if our relatives hand us over to death, and we are sent forward into the hereafter. We go alone, our bodies departing on the shoulders of four people to the cremation or burial site. No one can keep us here. And what do we face after we go? The only thing that helps us is the deeds we did in the world. No one will vouch for us after our time is up. Sheikh Farid encourages us to ask ourselves: how did we spend our time? Did we pursue good and virtuous deeds while we were live? Did we indulge in negativity in pursuit of worldly desires? We are asked to reflect through colloquialisms about the heft of the body and the size of the grave, the bare necessities of food and water that then feed into internal aspirations and desires. This is playing with the colloquialisms that create aspirations. Will we maintain the body in the world, fulfilling our basic needs, without the pursuit of comfort spiraling into a forgetfulness that engulfs us? Will we practice remembrance before it is too late?
