Nanak naam jahaaj hai. Charhe so uttare paar.
(O Nanak, the name of Waheguru is like a ship which will take you to your salvation)
This saying by Guru Nanak Dev Ji, the founder of Sikhism, is what so many souls around the world turn to during difficult times. His life was full of events that contained so much wisdom. He jotted down his experiences from these events and shared his learnings with the world in the form of Guru Granth Sahib.
Guru Nanak (15 April 1469 – 22 September 1539), also referred to as Baba Nanak (‘father Nanak’), was the first of the ten Sikh Gurus. His birth is celebrated worldwide as Guru Nanak Gurpurab on Kartik Pooranmashi, the full-moon day in the month of Katak, October–November.
Nanak travelled far and wide teaching people the message of one God who dwells in every one of His creations and constitutes the eternal Truth. He set up a unique spiritual, social, and political platform based on equality, fraternal love, goodness, and virtue.
Nanak’s words are registered in the form of 974 poetic hymns in the holy text of Sikhism, the Guru Granth Sahib, with some of the major prayers being the Japji Sahib, the Asa di Var and the Sidh-Gosht. It is part of Sikh religious belief that the spirit of Nanak’s sanctity, divinity and religious authority descended upon each of the nine subsequent Gurus when the Guruship was devolved on to them.
Here are some of the gems from the book that’ll help you navigate the rough tides of life.
“He who has no faith in himself can never have faith in God.”
“Burn worldly love, rub the ashes and make ink of it, make the heart the pen, the intellect the writer, write that which has no end or limit.”
Even Kings and emperors with heaps of wealth and vast dominion cannot compare with an ant filled with the love of God.
“Death would not be called bad, O people, if one knew how to truely die.”
“There are worlds and more worlds below them, and there are a hundred thousand skies over them. No one has been able to find the limits and boundaries of God. If there be any account of God, then alone the mortal can write the same; but God’s account does not finish, and the mortal himself dies while still writing.”
“Dwell in peace in the home of your own being, and the messenger of Death won’t be able to touch you.”
“The world is a drama, staged in a dream.”
“Speak only that which will bring you honor.”
“Those who have loved are those who have found God.”
“He who regards all men as equals is religious.”
“There is but One God. His name is Truth; He is the Creator. He fears none; he is without hate. He never dies; He is beyond the cycle of births and death. He is self-illuminated. He is realized by the kindness of the True Guru. He was True in the beginning; He was True when the ages commenced and has ever been True. He is also True now.”
