jab lagu ghaṭ mahi dūjī ān.
taü laü mahali na lābhai jān.
ramat rām siu lāgo raṅgu.
kahi kabīr tab nirmal aṅg.8.1.
-Guru Granth Sahib 345
This composition is based on the seven days of the week. The days of the week are often associated with the notions of good and bad. However, Bhagat Kabir Ji encourages us to focus on connecting with the Nam of IkOankar (the Divine) rather than believing in such notions. He imparts a distinct teaching for each day of the week. The message through Sunday is to practice devotion. Through Monday is to partake Nam from the Wisdom (Guru). Through Tuesday is to understand the true nature of the vices. Through Wednesday is to develop intellect within. Through Thursday is to rid our minds of the overpowering influence of Maya. Through Friday is to remain unaffected by the pride and prestige gained through good deeds. Finally, the message through Saturday is to keep one’s wandering mind steady and stable.
Commentary
Literal Translation
Interpretive Transcreation
Poetical Dimension
Calligraphy
If one sings the virtues of the 1-Light again and again, having approached the Wisdom (Guru), that being finds the secret of the 1-Light. In the eighth stanza, Bhagat Kabir says that as long as within the seeker’s heart there is another hope, as long as we have anything other than IkOankar (One Creative and Pervasive Force, 1Force the One) in our minds, as long as we desire anything other than connection with the Divine or have even the slightest expectation of something else, then our work is not done. We are reminded that it is only IkOankar’s support and perspective that we need and that if we are still in duality, we will not be able to discover the One fully. We physically understand this! We know that the One lives everywhere, colors everything, and is one with everything, but internalizing this is hard work—it takes effort, habit, commitment, devotion, and a relationship with the Wisdom.
If we want to become filth-free, if we want to enter IkOankar’s abode, to experience IkOankar as present and all-pervading, we ought to work to eliminate that duality within ourselves, and we do this by cultivating the virtues of the One within, through praise and remembrance and Identification. When we do this, we also become free from rituals, omens, and entanglements, from fear of karmic systems and fixations on physical cleansing. This is how all parts of the body, every limb, become filth-free and beautiful—through a relationship with the beautiful One! We become filth-free when all our love and devotion are attached to that beautiful and all-pervasive One, when we are in remembrance when we are continuously singing, when we are permeated with that love and remembrance when our bodies are so permeated with the One that we too are pervading that One. Will we eliminate the duality within ourselves? Will we experience the One pervading everywhere? Will every limb become filth-free?
SUMMARY
In this composition, Bhagat Kabir alludes to various conceptualities, lifestyles, schools of thought, philosophies, complexes, and systems that all claim to be developing some kind of devotion. He uses the calendar week, moving through different days to show us how we can taste and experience devotion to the One and experience the presence of the One. He subverts and reframes popular ideas of purity and auspiciousness, simplifying them directly for his audience. He challenges ideas about asceticism, strict and untenable disciplines, complicated systems, fear-based karmic understandings, and the idea that the body we have been given is somehow full of filth, that the lives we live as humans only bring negativity and that to free ourselves from it, we must leave what the Divine has provided for us. How do we work with these lives, in this world, with these bodies, and make sure we are not being looted from within? Like the lotus, how do we exist in the water, mud, and filth and still bloom? Through a relationship with the Wisdom (Guru), through singing the virtues of the one constantly, through devotion, praise, and Identification. These are the marks of what it means to become filth-free truly. Filth comes! It is a natural process of being human beings in this world. But cleansing ourselves continuously through devotion is part of this process, too. This is daily work, and it requires us to do it again and again, week after week. If we want to demystify the mystery of the One for ourselves and experience the One’s presence, it can only happen through the Wisdom (Guru) and this devoted commitment. Will our day-to-day life become about praise? Will we cultivate more and more devotion with each passing week? Will we make these bodies filth-free?
If we want to become filth-free, if we want to enter IkOankar’s abode, to experience IkOankar as present and all-pervading, we ought to work to eliminate that duality within ourselves, and we do this by cultivating the virtues of the One within, through praise and remembrance and Identification. When we do this, we also become free from rituals, omens, and entanglements, from fear of karmic systems and fixations on physical cleansing. This is how all parts of the body, every limb, become filth-free and beautiful—through a relationship with the beautiful One! We become filth-free when all our love and devotion are attached to that beautiful and all-pervasive One, when we are in remembrance when we are continuously singing, when we are permeated with that love and remembrance when our bodies are so permeated with the One that we too are pervading that One. Will we eliminate the duality within ourselves? Will we experience the One pervading everywhere? Will every limb become filth-free?
SUMMARY
In this composition, Bhagat Kabir alludes to various conceptualities, lifestyles, schools of thought, philosophies, complexes, and systems that all claim to be developing some kind of devotion. He uses the calendar week, moving through different days to show us how we can taste and experience devotion to the One and experience the presence of the One. He subverts and reframes popular ideas of purity and auspiciousness, simplifying them directly for his audience. He challenges ideas about asceticism, strict and untenable disciplines, complicated systems, fear-based karmic understandings, and the idea that the body we have been given is somehow full of filth, that the lives we live as humans only bring negativity and that to free ourselves from it, we must leave what the Divine has provided for us. How do we work with these lives, in this world, with these bodies, and make sure we are not being looted from within? Like the lotus, how do we exist in the water, mud, and filth and still bloom? Through a relationship with the Wisdom (Guru), through singing the virtues of the one constantly, through devotion, praise, and Identification. These are the marks of what it means to become filth-free truly. Filth comes! It is a natural process of being human beings in this world. But cleansing ourselves continuously through devotion is part of this process, too. This is daily work, and it requires us to do it again and again, week after week. If we want to demystify the mystery of the One for ourselves and experience the One’s presence, it can only happen through the Wisdom (Guru) and this devoted commitment. Will our day-to-day life become about praise? Will we cultivate more and more devotion with each passing week? Will we make these bodies filth-free?
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