ARTICLES - ENGLISH/PUNJABI

The Fallen Leaf on Page 546 SGGS

The Pitfalls of Translating Gurbani……..An example of How Translators add their own mindset to translations and twist them in the directions never intended !!

 Dr. Karminder Singh Dhillon explains:

For a start, the English translation uses the words “the soul wanders”.

This gives the impression that the verse is about death and the situation of the soul in a after life after death.

There is no mention of “the soul” in the verse. No mention OF death either. Neither is the word “wondering”used.

The word FIRET is traveling. Not wondering.

The shabad is actually about SEPARATION. The word for separation is VICHUNEY.

The shabad is about separation from our Creator and the journey of spirituality here and now.

The first verse talks of this journey. VAAT DUHEYLEE RAAM- meaning the journey (VAAT) of spiritual realization is a difficult (DUHEYLEE) one .

The CAUSE of the separation while being in the journey is in verse two. PAAP KAMAVADEYA….Meaning I am suffering separation as a consequence of me committing sins.

The ILLUSTRATION of this separation is in the verse in the pic posted above.

The illustration / example of spiritual separation is of a leaf dropping of a high branch and the illustration / example of the resulting spiritual journey is the lonely downward spiral of the separated leaf.

Illustrations / examples are just that. We cannot stretch the example beyond how it is used by the author (Guru Arjun).

For example I cannot ADD to the example and say “a goat came and ate up the fallen leaf”. And use this ADDED part to suggest that the after life demons will eat up my soul after death !!!