THE JEWEL OF HAPPINESS
The Sukhmani of Guru Arjan
a commentary by
AJAIB SINGH
Chapter 16
THE GIVERS OF NAAM
God has no form, outline or color. He is different
than the three gunas.
He makes those with whom He is pleased realize Him,
says Nanak.
Guru Arjan Dev Ji Maharaj describes God by saying, "God has no
color, has no form, has no outline. He has no mark or sign by which
one can recognize that He is God." He is different than the three
gunas - rajogun, satogun and tamogun. He is above them, and He is
formless and colorless. Can we meet such a God, with our efforts? Just
by ourselves, can we realize Him? He says, No. We can realize Him
only if He showers grace on us. When He showers grace on us, He
makes us meet the Perfect Master, and when the Perfect Master tells
us in which form God is residing within us, and by doing what practice
we can realize God - until he tells us all these things, we cannot
realize Him.
Keep the immortal God in your mind:
Give up the attachment with men.
Giving up the love and attachment for the world, we have to love and
be attached to God, Who will never come to an end and Who is
Indestructible.
There is no one beyond Him.
He exists continuously in all living beings.
"There is no one above God," means there is no one greater than God.
God resides everywhere. He resides in man, He resides in the demons,
He resides in the animals, in the birds, everywhere. He is the Giver
of everyone and He is King of everybody. Whether one is man or demon,
whether one is bird or animal, God is the only One Who sustains
everybody.
He himself is sensible and wise;
He is deep, profound and most serious.
God Himself is the Owner of all Creation, and He does everything by
Himself. He doesn't have any counsellor - whatever he wants to do,
He does that by Himself because He is All-in-all.
He is Parbrahm, the Supreme Lord, and Gobind,
The Treasure of Mercy, the Kind Forgiver.
The Almighty God is Gracious and Merciful, and He is continually
showering grace and having pity on the souls.
May I get the feet of your Sadh! -
Nanak says, this is the desire of my mind.
Guru Arjan Dev Ji Maharaj says now, "I have always the desire in my
heart that I may remain forever at the feet of Your Sadh." Because
whenever God showers grace and mercy on the souls and whenever He
gives His Knowledge to the souls, He gives that through the Sadh and
He puts His Power in that Sadh and He brings the souls back through
that Sadh. That is why he says here, "I always have the desire to
remain at the feet of Your Sadh." As Kabir Sahib also says, "God speaks
through the body of a Sadh. How can God even speak without the body?"
Guru Nanak says, "God Himself has taken up the form of Sadh."
Tulsi Sahib also says, "God says that if you want to feed me, feed Me
through the mouths of Saints. If you will feed them, I will be fed."
God is the fulfiller of desires and is able
to help others;
What He has written, that must happen.
He saves the honor of all those who take refuge in Him, and He
continually showers grace on those who take refuge in Him. Master also
used to say that it is the law of Nature that "Nature provides food for
the hungry, and water for the thirsty;" in the same way, those who take
refuge in the Saints, their honor is saved by them and Saints shower
grace on them.
In the twinkling of an eye He can destroy or create;
No one except Him knows His inner secret.
In the twinkling of an eye He can destroy the Creation and in the
twinkling of an eye He can create it. For Him, it is nothing to destroy
the Creation in one moment, and in the same way it is not hard for Him
to create it in just one moment. And no one can know His inner secret.
Only the Saints, only the Sadhs within whom His Power is working,
only they know the inner secret of God, and only they know how one
can realize God. And if God wants to shower His Grace on the souls,
He puts His Power, His strength, in the Saints, and He puts His
understanding, His Knowledge, in the Saints, which is given to the people.
In His palace are present happiness and joy.
It is heard that all things are present in His home.
In the Home of that God there are the treasures of happiness, and in
the Home of God sweet and melodious Sounds are always going on.
All the riches and happiness of this world are in His Home. There is
nothing lacking in the Home of God.
Among the kings He is the King, among the yogis He is
the Yogi.
Among the renunciates He is the Renunciate and among
householders He is the Householder.
God becomes King and enjoys kingship, living among kings. In the same
way He becomes a householder and enjoys household life, living among
householders. Living among renunciates He is enjoying the life of
renunciation. Still He is unaffected by it all - He is enjoying
everything, He is doing everything, but He is not affected by the
surroundings.
The devotees have obtained happiness by
remembering Him.
Nanak says, No one has known the limits of such a Being.
His beloveds and His dear ones have achieved peace and happiness by
doing His Simran, The other people in the world have not understood
His secret, and they have not realized Him. Kabir Sahib says, "No one
can know the glory of the Creator." Even though He has created the
whole Creation, still nobody is able to understand His Glory. He
Himself knows His Glory; and the one who is made to walk on His Path
by Him, knows His Glory.
There is no limit to His plays.
All the gods have become tired searching for it.
Now he asks, "Who can value His Glory and who can value His Creation?"
Even the gods and goddesses have tried to comprehend His Glory, the
Glory of His Creation, but still they have not been successful in doing
that.
How can a son know about the birth of his father?
God has strung all of His own string.
The son cannot know about when his father was born - he doesn't have
any knowledge about the birth of his father. But the father knows about
when the son was born -on which day, on which date and in which
year he was born. In the same way, since God has created this Creation
and He is our Father, we cannot know how He was born, how He was created.
He knows how we were created, because He has created us. We are all His
children and He is our Real Father, He is our True Father. So how can
we know about the birth, about the creation, of our Father? Only those
on whom He is gracious, and only those who do His devotion can know about
when God was created and what is the Will of God. Otherwise, not everybody
can know the secret of God.
Whom God gives the wisdom, knowledge and meditation
Only such servants can meditate on Naam.
Only they can do the devotion of God and achieve Naam on whom God showers
His grace and mercy and to whom God gives the right understanding.
Those whom God deludes in three gunas
Are born and then die and come again and again.
Now Guru Sahib says that those on whom God doesn't shower his grace
and mercy, they are involved in all three gunas - in raja-, tama-,
satagun, and they are continually involved in taking birth and dying.
High and low status are His creation
Nanak says, He whom He makes to understand,
can understand this.
Even in the animals He is present, and in man, and at other places also
He is present. This means that all places are His and everywhere He
is present. There is no place where He is not present. But this
understanding can come only to those on whom He is gracious, and only
He knows to whom He has to give this understanding, and up to what
extent. And, because of that, only a few souls can understand this
secret. He knows who He still has to keep in birth and death, and who
He has to liberate.
Kabir Sahib says that there are some souls who come into this world
prepared from the Home of God and they have the knowledge of God
from the very beginning. And there are some souls who go in the company
of such high souls, such developed souls, and after going in their
company, gradually they also get the same status, they also become like
them. But there is another type of souls, those who come in this world
that don't want to go in the company of the high souls, the developed
souls, and no matter how much you teach them, how much you please them,
still they will not get any effect of it, they will not understand
anything. Their condition is just like putting water on a stone: that
stone will not absorb that water. No matter how much you put on it, all
that water will run away and the stone will not be affected. In the same
way, there are some souls who come in this world and don't get affected
by the company of the Saints.
He has different colors and different forms.
He assumes different guises and yet is unique.
Even after creating different kinds of creations, He is still the unique
One.
In many ways He has expanded the creation;
God is immortal and is One.
He has made different kinds of creations. If He wants, He can liberate
the old man, and if He wants, He can liberate even the young man - it
is all in His hands. Souls get birth in the world and they die, they come
and go. But God is the only thing Which never takes birth and Which
never dies - He is always present.
In a moment He performs many plays;
The perfect One has filled up all the places.
He has created the creation in many ways;
He alone knows His own worth.
Very cleverly God has created this Creation. You know how beautifully
He has made animals, human beings, birds, and all those things, and how
on the exact time the sun comes out, the moon comes out, the days and
nights happen. Births and deaths also take place at the exact time. So,
very cleverly He has created, and made all the arrangements of this
world. And that is why nobody can say how valuable God is. No scholars,
no mathematicians, can calculate the value of God - only God knows His
value - or the one who has lost himself on the Way of God, the one who
is doing His devotion -he can know how precious God is.
All hearts are His and all places belong to Him;
Nanak lives by repeating His Naam.
Now Guru Sahib says, "God is present in all bodies, God is present in all
places, and all places are His. I am living by repeating His Naam, because
the support of my life is in His Naam."
All creatures are sustained by the Naam;
The world and regions are supported by the Naam.
In this section Guru Sahib is describing the Glory of Naam, the importance
of Naam. He says that the worlds, and the divisions of the world, are
existing only because of the support of Naam, and all the creatures are
moving here and there only because of the support of Naam.
The Simritis, the Vedas, the Puranas are supported
by Naam.
The hearing of Divine Knowledge too is supported by
Naam.
He says that even the Vedas and Shastras are having the support of
Naam and those who are reading the scriptures and hearing the scriptures,
they also have the support of Naam. Guru Sahib is saying throughout this
section that, everywhere, Naam is present, and whatever we see moving,
whatever creation we are seeing, exists only because of Naam.
The sky and the world below are supported by Naam;
All the bodies are supported by Naam.
The three worlds are supported by Naam.
By hearing the Naam with ears one can get liberated.
All these worlds of the Lords - the world of Lord Indra, the world of
Lord Krishna, the world of Lord Shiva - all these are existing because
of the support of Naam. And we can get liberation only by hearing
that Naam.
Graciously, those whom He attaches with His Naam
Get liberation in the fourth plane, says Nanak.
God makes him do the devotion of Naam on whom He showers His grace. And
only he rises above the tamogun, satogun and rajogun and goes to the
fourth plane, and after getting the four stages, he becomes One with Him.
Once there was a sadhu who had performed many austerities, and
he made the announcement that those who had his darshan would go
to heaven. When people heard that they would go to heaven just by
having the darshan of a sadhu, they all came to have his darshan. But
there was one intoxicated devotee - a meditator of Shabd Naam - He
didn't go to have the darshan of that sadhu. When the followers of
that sadhu were carrying him, he turned his back towards him. When
he was asked why he was doing that, he replied, "By having his darshan
I will go to heaven, but I don't want to go to heaven, as I have to go
to Sach Khand."
Saints do not tempt their disciples by saying, "You will get to
heaven," and then never even frighten them by saying that they will go
to hell. They condemn both hell and heaven. Kabir Sahib says, "Saints
condemn both hell and heaven, because, by the grace of my Master, we
will go to our Real Home."
The form of God is True. His place is True
He is the True Being, and He alone is Supreme.
His form is True Form and His Form is never destroyed, and in His
Kingdom, He is the head; nobody makes Him the head, He is head
by Himself. God can never be established, nor can He be formed because
He is Self-made.
His acts are true and His words are true.
The worlds of the True Being pervade everywhere.
He says that His deeds are true and His bani is also true, and His bani
is never destroyed. He is the True Person, He is a Perfect Person, and
He resides everywhere, He is present everywhere.
His deeds are true. His creation is true;
The root is true, and true is what springs from it.
His doings are purest of all
He whom He makes understand is True.
Now he says, His Creation is True, and His deeds are true. And showering
His grace, to whomever God gives the understanding of His Creation, that
personality is also true.
The True Naam of the Lord is the giver of happiness;
Nanak says, this true Faith is obtained from the Giver.
In this section Guru Sahib describes His Creation, he describes the
Naam. He says Naam is the Peace-Giver and only by Naam can we have the
real happiness and real peace. Now the thing is, can we achieve that
Naam by ourself? He says, No. We cannot get that Naam by ourself because
Naam is not words. We can get that Naam only if God is gracious on us.
He says that when our past karmas bear good fruit, only then are we made
to come in the company of the Saint. And when we come in the company of
a Saint, he makes us devote ourselves to the service and the Path of the
Surat Shabd. When we come in the company of a Saint because of our past
good karmas, the Master makes us do the devotion of Shabd Naam, which is
the means of liberation.
The teachings of the Sadhu are true words;
They in whose hearts these enter are also true.
Now Guru Sahib talks about the Sadhu of God. He says that as God
is Truth and whatever God does is all true, and whatever God speaks
is all true, in the same way, the Sadhu of God doesn't speak any false
words. Whatever he speaks, that always comes true. The divisions of
this world may be overturned but the word of the Sadhu will always
prove true - it will never be overturned. Guru Nanak Sahib says, "Give
up the false, and have that Truth in your within." Make the habit of
speaking truth and you will see God in your within, because God is
not far from you, He is in your within. He is in the Truth.
Once there was a mahatma who went on a pilgrimage. While on
pilgrimage he went to one householder's home who prepared treats of
chapattis for him on the way for his journey. And when he left that
place, one greedy man accompanied him, thinking that the mahatma
would have some wealth, and by accompanying him he would get something
from him. So when both of them were walking and after some time the
mahatma had to go to attend the call of nature, while he was gone that
greedy man searched through the belongings of the mahatma to see if
there was any money or wealth there, but he couldn't get anything. He
found only three stuffed chapattis, of which he ate one. And then he
repacked all his things, as if he had not touched the belongings of the
mahatma.
When the mahatma came back, he noticed nothing, and they both
started walking again. And after some time when they stopped to have
their food and their food was opened, the mahatma was surprised to
see that there were only two stuffed chapattis there. Because he had
started with three chapattis and now there were only two. So he asked
the man, "Have you eaten one of the chapattis?" The man answered,
"No Mahatma Ji, I have not even touched your bags. Either those people
made only two chapattis for you, or else you might have eaten it. I
don't know because I have not eaten it." The mahatma thought, It's a
very bad thing that he is in my company. But still, he is lying and that
is not a good thing, so I should make him speak the truth. So the
mahatma said, "Well, it's all right." They finished their eating and
started on the way again.
Along the way they were caught up in one trouble, because when
they were crossing a dangerous river that man thought that he was going
to drown, so he cried, "Mahatma Ji, do something so that we may be
saved!" The Mahatma said, "Remember God, Who has given birth to you,
and I'm sure that if you will remember Him with your true heart, He will
help you." So when the man remembered God, God saved him and they
crossed that river easily, without having any problem. So the mahatma
said then, "Oh man, you know how much grace God has showered on you!
He has given birth to you and now He has saved you. You should swear
by that God whether you ate that chapatti or not." The man said, "No,
Mahatma Ji, I swear by Him -I didn't eat that chapatti." Again the
mahatma felt very bad because it was not good for someone to be in
his company and still speak a lie. He thought, Now I am determined to
make him speak the truth, no matter what happens. So he said to the
man, "Okay, come along with me."
Again when they were proceeding, at one place they had to pass
through one forest, but when they entered it, they saw that the forest
was on fire and they were caught in the middle of the fire and there
was no way out. So that man cried, "Mahatma Ji, before we were saved
because it was only water, but now I am sure we will be burned in this
forest because there is no way out!" The mahatma said, "Don't worry
about it. Remember God Who has given birth to you and Who saved
you. If you will remember Him, He will save you." So when the man
remembered God with full faith in Him, they were saved. And when
they passed out of that forest the mahatma said, "Well, now you should
be very grateful to God because He has saved you two times, so you
should swear by Him and tell me the truth, whether you ate that chapatti
or not." The man answered, "No, Mahatma Ji, I didn't eat that chapatti.
I don't even know about it. How can I eat it when I don't even know
about it? I swear by Him that I have not even touched that chapatti."
So the mahatma again felt very bad. He thought, Something should
be done to teach him a lesson, and something done so that he may speak
the truth. Because when mahatmas come in this world, they always want
that their disciples, their followers, should always speak the truth,
because truth is above all.
So the mahatma asked him, "Tell me, oh man, why did you leave
your home?" The man answered, "Mahatma Ji, because I am very poor.
I don't have any money in my family and I have left my home, and
my family, in search of money so that I can go back and give it to them."
The mahatma said, "Well, I have done a lot of devotion to God and
I am sure that God will help you in some way through me. Collect some
pebbles and some stones, and I will remember God and touch those
pebbles and stones with my hand. And I am sure that they will turn
into gold and you can have that wealth." So he collected some stones,
and the~ mahatma put a piece of cloth over them, and remembering God,
he touched them and they were turned into gold. Then the mahatma
made three piles of them, and he said to the man, "You see, one pile
is for you and another is for me, and the third one is for the one who
ate the chapatti. So now it is time - tell me who ate the chapatti.
"Then the man said, "Mahatma Ji, whether you kill me or forgive me, but
now let me tell you the truth - I am the one who ate that chapatti."
So very cleverly, the mahatma made him speak the truth. Whenever
mahatmas and Masters come in this world, they always work hard in
this direction. They always say you should give up lies and speak
the truth, because lying pollutes our soul. It brings a black covering
on our soul and we cannot realize God, since God is Truth. If we are
always grateful and always sincere, only then can we achieve God.
Anyone who comes to know the true vision
gets the liberation by meditating on Naam.
If there is any liberation, it is in the Naam, and we get that Naam from
any Mahatma.
God is True and all His creation is True;
He Himself knows His own limits.
He, whose creation is this, also is the maker of it.
Don't think of anybody else to be the sustenance
of the creation.
God Himself knows about Himself. He Himself knows His value and
He Himself recognizes Himself by sending one of His devotees into
this world who recognizes Him(self). And, since God has created this
world He is the only one Who is taking care of this Creation, He is
the only One Who resides everywhere. And residing within all of the
creatures, He is taking care of them and He is keeping the accounts
of their good and bad deeds.
One created by God cannot know of His greatness.
Nanak says, whatever pleases Him must happen.
Whoever has understood the greatness of God
has become wonderstruck.
He who has realized God has got wondrous bliss.
Those who did the devotion of Shabd Naam, giving up the worldly pleasures,
and those who have manifested that True God within themselves, only they
have received true happiness and true intoxication.
They remain dyed in the color of God;
They obtain everything through Master's words.
Such souls always remain dyed in the color of God whether pain comes
or happiness. They always remain happy in that and they always abide
in the words of the Master.
They are Givers and are competent to destroy misery;
In their association the entire world gets liberation.
God has sent the Masters into this world as the Givers. As God gives
and gives and He removes the pains of everybody, in the same way,
the Masters also remove the pains of everybody by making them meditate
on Naam. What medicine do they have to remove the pains and the
sufferings of man? They have the medicine of Naam with them, and by
making the people mediate on Naam, they remove their pains and
sufferings. Naam is the medicine for all disease and Naam is the
only thing which re-makes what is spoiled.
Fortunate are the souls who serve the servants of God.
In their company one develops devotion with Him.
Fortunate are the souls who become disciples of the Masters who have
been sent in this world by God as the Givers; only such disciples are
in tune with God, and only they remember God.
The servant of God always sings the praises of God;
Nanak says, He gets the reward with the grace of the
Master.
They do the meditation of Naam by meeting the Mahatmas, and Mahatmas
also become receptive to the grace of God by meeting their Masters.
In this chapter Guru Arjan Dev Ji Maharaj sang the glory of Naam,
he sang the glory of the Mahatma. And he said that very fortunate are
the souls who become the disciples of such Mahatmas. As a piece of
stone cannot cross the river by itself unless it goes in the company of
the boat and then it easily crosses the river, in the same way, no matter
how many bad deeds we have done which prevent us from crossing the
Ocean of the World by ourself, if we go in the company of the Saints
and the Mahatmas we can easily swim across this Ocean of the World.
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