THE JEWEL OF HAPPINESS
The Sukhmani of Guru Arjan
a commentary by
AJAIB SINGH
Chapter 21
THE PERFORMER OF HIS PLAY
God Himself is Sargun (one who has all qualities),
Nirgun (one who is not affected by the gunas),
The Formless One, and is in deep Samadhi,
He has created all the creation Himself
and He Himself remembers Himself.
One disciple came to Guru Arjan Dev Ji Maharaj and asked Him this
question: "Who creates this creation? And how is creation created? And
when this creation is dissolved who does that? And when creation is
dissolved where do the souls living in the creation at that time go?
And what does God do when there is no soul living in the creation?
When everything is dissolved then what happens to the souls and what
happens to God? And how is the creation created once again after
being dissolved?"
So in the first six paragraphs of this section, Guru Arjan Dev is
telling him how the creation is dissolved, and in the last two paragraphs
of the section he will tell the disciple how the creation is created after
the dissolution. He says that God Himself is the creator of this creation
and He is the only One who dissolves the creation. His work is done by Him
and not by anyone else but Him. He is the Doer, He creates the creation,
and whenever He wants He dissolves the creation.
Guru Arjan Dev Ji Maharaj says that when this creation is dissolved,
at that time, the earth is dissolved in the water and the water is dried
up by the fire and the fire is carried away by the air, and then the air
is absorbed by the sky and sky is absorbed by the Maya, and then Maya
goes and absorbs in Brahm. God goes into His meditation and in this
world nothing remains in existence except void. That formless Lord is
full of all the qualities, He does not have any bad qualities, He is the
formless One. Nanak says, "He is the only One who creates and dissolves
the Creation."
When the world did not have any form,
Then how could sins and good deeds be found?
When this world did not have any form, at that time, there was not
anything like sins and virtuous deeds, and nobody had this awareness or
knowledge of good and bad deeds. Because at the time of dissolution all
the souls go back Home, they all become one with God. So where are the
sins and virtuous deeds going to exist?
When He went into deep samadhi,
Then with whom could anyone be unfriendly
or have enmity?
When God goes into His deep samadhi when He dissolves the Creation, no one
is left in this world who has enmity to others, no one remains in this
world who has ill thoughts for others.
When there was no color or sign of His creation
Then who could have pains and happiness?
When this creation does not have any form, any sign, then how can we want
to be happy or sad in this Creation?
When the Supreme Being alone was there,
Then where was the attachment and illusion?
When the Almighty Lord exists by Himself, and when He Himself dissolves
this creation, then who is going to have the illusion? Who is going to have
doubts about Him? Who is going to have attachments?
God Himself has created His play.
Nanak says, There is no other Doer.
In replying to the questions of the disciples, Guru Arjan Dev Ji Maharaj
is saying, "Look here, O brother, God Himself is the Creator, He is the
only one who dissolves this creation. There is nobody else who can do this
job, because nobody else can do this job except God Himself. And sitting
within all the creatures which He has created He performs this play, and
whenever He wants, He stops performing this play. This play can be
performed only by Him and nobody else has the right to do that. God does
not have any friends, He does not have any equal, He does not have any
community, He does not have any religion. He exists everywhere by His own
power, and whenever He wants He can withdraw from it."
When only God Himself was the Owner,
Who could be called free or entangled?
When God alone is the owner of the whole creation then nobody has any
liberation, nobody has any imprisonment.
When there was only One God, Inaccessible and Limitless,
Who was making hells and heavens?
Almighty Lord is limitless; no one can reach Him and when He exists and
everything exists by Him, then no other incarnation comes, nobody else
makes the heavens and hells. Whatever is done is done by Himself.
When the Nirgun God was in the state of Samaj,
Where was the place of Shiva and Shakti?
When God, Who is not involved in any gunas, exists in this creation there
is no other power equal to Him. Not even Shiva, or any other powers that
exist, are equal to Him. When the creation is dissolved, all these lower
realms like Indra Puri or Brahm Puri or Shiv Puri, all these lower regions,
even the heavens and hells, are dissolved because they are not stable.
When He Himself holds His own Light,
Who could be called either fearless or afraid?
When God mixes His Light with His own Light, then nobody has any fear and
no one is fearless.
God Himself is the performer of His own plays:
Nanak says, The Lord is Inaccessible and Limitless.
God Himself is doing all these plays and happenings which are happening in
this world. Nobody can comprehend Him because He is limitless, He is
unfathomable.
When the Imperishable One was seated on His own
Throne of happiness,
Where were birth, death and destruction?
He says that God is not subjected to destruction. God is never destroyed,
God is immortal and He lives in the Anami place which also is never
destroyed. In that place there is nobody else who sets up his throne and
sits beside God. God is the only One who resides there.
When there was only One God, the perfect creator,
Who could be afraid of Yama's tortures?
When Almighty Lord Himself is taking care of all creation, then at that
place nobody has to be afraid of the Angel of Death.
When there was only the Invisible and
Incomprehensible God,
Then from whom could the Lord of Judgment
ask the accounts?
When God Himself knows about everything and when God Who is unseen but
sees everything, is the owner of the whole creation, then how can the
Lord of Judgment keep account of the souls when creation is destroyed?
When there was only the Lord, Who is not affected
by Maya and is unseen, and unfathomable,
Who was free or bound in fetters?
When the Lord, who is limitless and unseen, and Lord of all the orphans,
is present, who can bind anyone, who can attach anyone? He is the only
One who can do all these things.
God Himself is wonderful and strange.
Nanak says, He Himself has created His own form.
At that place all the glory is of Almighty God.
When there was the Only the Pure Being, Who was
Himself the Lord of all Beings,
Who else could wash the impurities?
God is pure, sinless, holy. Who is there to remove the sins or the
impurity of God?
When there was only the Niranjan (unaffected by Maya),
Formless, and Undisturbed One,
Who was there to honor or disgrace?
When the Lord who is not affected by Maya is the Almighty Owner of the
Creation, then who is there to honor Him or disgrace Him?
When there existed only the Lord of the world,
Who could be deceived or swindled?
When the glory of God exists everywhere, then there is nobody who can
deceive anyone and nobody is deceived.
When the Form of Light absorbs Himself in the Light,
Who could feel hunger or satisfaction?
When the Light becomes one with the Light and God is sitting in His deep
meditation then at that place and time, who can satisfy hunger by eating
and who wants to eat food there?
The Creator Himself is the Doer of everything
and makes others do.
Nanak says, No one can estimate God's Glory.
Now Guru Arjan Dev Ji Maharaj says that God Himself is the Doer of all
these things and everywhere there is the glory of God and nobody can
reach Him. When He is limitless no one can know His limits, no one can
describe His glory. Kabir Sahib says, "No one can know the glory of the
Creator of this Creation. If anyone speaks, he will say, `He has showered
a lot of Grace on me and He is Great.' Nobody can sing the glory of God
in its full sense."
When God Himself glorified His own Self,
Who was then mother, father, son or brother?
God has made His own importance and His own glory by Himself. He does not
have any mother, he does not have any father, he does not have any brother
or sister. He does not live in any community, there is no one there who
can make the glory of God. Whatever is done is done by God Himself.
When He is competent with all skills,
Where were the Vedas or Katebs (Muslim scriptures) read?
God has all knowledge and all skills; so at that place nobody listens
to or reads the Vedas, Shastras or other Holy Scriptures. Kabir Sahib
says that at the place where God resides neither day or night exist,
not even the Vedas and Shastras have any importance there. Kabir says,
"O mad man, why are you wandering here and there? Why don't you remember
that Formless One?"
When He Himself was containing His own qualities,
Who was there to think of good or bad omens?
Now He says that when God Himself is present, nobody thinks about
auspicious or unauspicious things.
When He Himself was high and close to Himself,
Who was the Lord and who was the disciple?
Only God is present there; He is the only one who can be called as the
highest human. There is no disciple there, there is no Master. There
is no deity there, and no worshiper there, since God is the only one
present.
He Himself is astonished and surprised.
Nanak says, You alone know your limits.
God is pleased with Himself within His own Self, and He is the only One
Who knows about His Glory.
When the Undeceivable, Impenetrable and Inscrutable
One was absorbed in Himself,
Who could be influenced by Maya?
Nobody can deceive God; nobody can make a fool of God. Where God resides,
Maya cannot have any effect because Maya cannot reach there.
When He ordered Himself,
Then these three gunas could not enter.
He Himself commands His own Self and there is nobody else who can give Him
orders. He is the only one who can do that. And at that place, the three
gunas - rajogun, tamogun and satogun - cannot find any entrance.
When One God alone existed,
Who was there worrying or free from worries?
When God is the only one present there, who can have any worries and who
can become worryless?
When God Himself was absorbed in His own self,
Then who was there to speak and who was there
to listen?
He is the only one present there, so who can be there to read to Him and who
may listen to what is being read?
God is completely Endless and is Highest of all.
Nanak says, He Himself alone can reach Himself.
God is limitless, He is the highest of all. He is higher than the highest
gods and goddesses. He is the complete owner of this Creation and since He
is limitless He is the only One who knows His limit. Guru Arjan Dev Ji
Maharaj in these six paragraphs replied to the question of his disciple:
that in the home of the Lord there is no enmity, there is no one who can
be an enemy toward others, and there is no enemy, there is no sadness,
there are no days or nights, nothing is auspicious or unauspicious, there
are no Vedas or Shastras, there is no one who worries about anything, and
there is nobody who can be called worryless; because God is the only One
present there.
In the next two paragraphs, Guru Arjan Dev Ji is telling His disciples
about the Creation, how the Creation was created and when God creates the
creation. Again He is the only one who does it.
When God created this world in its form,
He spread the three gunas in it.
Now He says that when He wanted to create the creation, at that time He
expanded these three gunas: raja, tama and sata gun.
Then the talks of sins and virtues started.
Some suffered hell and some desired the heaven.
When the Creation was created, the same Power, God, sent the rishis and
munis in this world to tell people about good and bad deeds. Rishis and
munis told people, "If you will do good deeds, they will be counted as
your virtue and you will be rewarded for them and if you will do bad
deeds they will be counted as your sins and you will be punished for them.
If you will do good deeds you will get heaven and if you do bad deeds you
will go to hell. So rishis and munis came in this world and they wrote all
these stories and everything in the Vedas and Shastras, the holy books.
And they came in this world to give the knowledge of good and bad to
people, to all those souls who were sent in this plane. The soul was an
ignorant one, she did not have any knowledge because when she was born
into this world, she was just a piece of clay and she did not have any
awareness of who is father, mother, brother or sister. So those rishis
and munis, those holy people, gave the knowledge to the souls: who was
who to them and how they had to deal with them. And in that way when the
people grew old they got the knowledge of all the surroundings and all
the things. And after that this practice was going on, the souls knew
about their relation and they were involved in it.
Snares and Traps of Maya came into existence.
Egoism, Attachment, Illusions, Fear and Duality.
When the soul came in this world Maya had so many traps. Somewhere
there was the trap of brother, somewhere there was the trap of sister,
and the soul was attached to that. Somewhere there was the trap of
society, the community. And in that way the soul did not find any
escape out of the traps which were made by Maya.
Pain, happiness, honor and disgrace
And talk of different kinds stalked.
In this world pain and happiness, honor and dishonor, have been spread
everywhere. In the snares of all these things the souls are trapped. The
souls are wandering here and there because they want happiness and they
are fed up of pain. And because they don't want dishonor they are searching
for honor and they are trying their best. So in that way they are spending
their energy, they are making all efforts and in the end they always remain
here.
God Himself performs His play and sees it.
And when He withdraws His power, alone He remains,
says Nanak.
God creates this play and He wants to play this play. And whenever He plays
this play He becomes very happy. And whenever He wants to finish this play,
whenever He withdraws everything and brings everything together to an end,
then only He, one God, remains.
Guru Gobind Singh Ji says that first He is many, and then He remains
only One.
Whereas God is Invisible, He Himself is manifested
in His Devotees.
God creates the creation for the glory of Saints.
Now He says that it is a very surprising thing that God also lives on this
plane among His devotees. Wherever His devotees are living God also comes
down and He lives with them. Why did He make all this Creation? Only
because He wanted to glorify His devotees. God made two types of people:
gurumukh and manmukh. Gurumukhs are those who are devoted to Lord and do
His devotion. Manmukhs are those who do not believe in the existence of
God. They say, "We are the only ones existing and there is no one called
God in this world." And you know that from the very beginning the
gurumukhs and manmukhs never get along with each other. They are like two
sons of the same father: one is good and the other is bad. Their paths are
like the path of water and the path of oil: they cannot get mixed up with
each other. One son of the Father becomes successful in the examination
while the other one fails.
God Himself is the owner of both the parties.
Their glory is known to themselves only.
Ever since the creation was created, God has been the owner of both
parties: He is the owner of manmukh as well as gurumukh, because He is
sitting in both of them. The manmukhs have not stopped doing their job
of shouting and saying that God does not exist, nor have the Saints
stopped doing their work saying "God exists and will come to us and we
will make you see Him."
Kabir Sahib has said, "When the Lord sent me in this world, I came
to give this message, but the pity is that I had to weep while giving the
message, and the happiness which I find in my real Home, I do not find
here." Kabir was the first Saint to come on this plane, and He never went
below the human body. In this age Kabir came in the time when Emperor
Sikunder Lodi was ruling, and he tried his best to kill Kabir Sahib. Once
he tied his hands and feet with iron chains and threw him in the water of
the River Ganges; once his hands and feet were tied and he was thrown in
front of an intoxicated elephant. He tried to kill Kabir Sahib, but He
was never killed. He was tortured, He was given a very hard time, but
still Kabir Sahib never stopped giving His message of truth.
People used to call Guru Nanak "the one who misleads from the Path."
And people used to say, "Do not go to him because he will not give you
good teachings." He was opposed so much that once when he went to do
Satsang in one village, the villagers would not allow him to enter the
village and He had to spend the night in the hut of a leper.
In the same way, Guru Arjan Dev Ji Maharaj, whose bani we are reading,
was tortured very much by Emperor Jahangir, the Mogul Emperor. He was made
to sit on hot coals and burning sand was thrown at his head. He was made
to stand in the boiling water up to the neck, meaning he was also given a
lot of torture; and they tried their best to kill him but he resisted it.
No matter how much manmukhs work against the Masters, no matter how
much they torture Them, they can never decrease the glory of the Masters.
The Mogul Emperor Aurangzeb invited Guru Teg Bahadur, to Delhi, and
then he killed Him. Now what is their condition? Nobody goes to pay any
homage to the tomb of Aurangzeb, and the pigeons make that place dirty.
Nobody takes care of that tomb. But the place where Guru Teg Bahadur was
killed - nobody knows for sure whether that was the place where he was
killed or whether it was ten feet away from the place where they are
worshiping now - but they have made a temple there and all day long they
go on watching that place and they lay parshad there and they always sing
the glory of that great Master who was killed at that place. Even though
the Mogul Emperor tried his best and killed that great Saint, even after
three hundred years people are remembering Him and in no way can you say
that His glory was decreased.
Guru Nanak says that as the critics go on criticizing the Saints, the
glory of the Saints goes on increasing. And the critics lose a lot by
criticizing the Saints whereas the Saints gain a lot when they are
criticized.
He Himself performs plays and amusements.
He Himself enjoys the pleasures, yet remains
unattached by them.
God Himself does His own miracles. Sitting within everyone He Himself is
enjoying. Guru Sahib says, "Within everyone my Lord is present; there is
no one who is without Him. I sacrifice myself on that person within whom
the Gurumukh gets manifested."
He attaches to His Naam, whomsoever He wishes.
He makes whomsoever He desires play the worldly plays.
And now Guru Sahib says that is a very surprising play of God, that if
God is pleased with anyone, He makes him do the meditation of Shabd Naam.
But if He is not pleased with someone, He does not make him do the
meditation of Shabd Naam and He lets him go and play in the worldly plays
and remain there.
O, Incalculable, Unfathomable, Unaccountable,
Immeasurable Lord.
As you make your servant Nanak speak, so he speaks.
That God is limitless, nobody can reach His limits. God is bottomless;
God cannot be measured. There is no balance in this world which can
measure the glory, the power, of Lord. Here Guru Sahib says that however
God wants him to say the devotee speaks in that way.
Guru Arjan Dev Ji Maharaj sings the glory of God. He says, "O Lord,
I did not understand what you did for me, but you united me with God. I
do not have any good qualities, it was Your Grace, that you felt mercy
and you had pity on me. When you had mercy on me you made me come in the
company of the friend of my Satguru, and now Nanak says that I will
survive only when I get the Naam. When I get the Naam my body and mind
will become alive again."
The things of the Mahatmas are not from their hearsay. Whatever
they say they say from their own experience and from what they have
seen with their own eyes. Mahatmas say, "O man, you are talking from
what you have read in the books, but we are talking from what we have
seen."
Mahatmas have seen God and after seeing Him they have told people,
"There is only one Power; there is one Plane where there is all
happiness and all peace. And if you try and reach that Place, you can
also have that. God showered a lot of Grace on us that He made us do the
meditation of Shabd Naam, and He chose us for His devotion. So now it is
our duty to be grateful to Him, to be thankful to Him, and to do Bhajan
and Simran daily."
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