c. 1440-1518
Kabir
Weaver-poet of Benares whose short two-line sakhis mock empty ritual and point to the truth inside the seeker. Hindus and Muslims both claim him, and his verses are sung across North India and printed in the Sikh scripture.
Every line we carry
Each one links to its source, what it means, and the shirt in any of our looks.
- Nothing in me is mine. I hand back what is yours.
Kabir says that nothing he holds, not even himself, is really his own. Giving it back costs him nothing, because it was never his to lose. Hold your work, money and talent as things on loan, and generosity stops feeling like a loss.
Kabir Granthavali (Das 1928), Sakhi, Nihkarmi Pativrata ko Ang 3, our translation from the Hindi
- I went looking for comfort. Sorrow met me on the road.
Kabir set out after comfort and met hardship instead, and he tells comfort to go home: he and sorrow will manage. Chasing ease is often what brings the trouble. Some seasons are for getting along with difficulty rather than running from it.
Kabir Granthavali (Das 1928), Sakhi, Nihkarmi Pativrata ko Ang 6, our translation from the Hindi
- Beat your drum for ten days. You won't see these streets again.
Make your noise, Kabir says, but know it lasts about ten days. The town, the market and the lane you walk today will not be walked by you again. Play your part fully, without imagining the stage is yours forever.
Kabir Granthavali (Das 1928), Sakhi, Chitavani ko Ang 1, our translation from the Hindi
- Proud of your tall house? Tomorrow grass grows over you.
Kabir looks at a man admiring his high mansion and points to the ground. Before long that man will be lying in it with grass for a roof. Build what you like, but do not let the building do your thinking about what matters.
Kabir Granthavali (Das 1928), Sakhi, Chitavani ko Ang 10, our translation from the Hindi
- Fix the road you yourself have to walk.
Think about birth and death, Kabir says, drop the false work, and repair the path you will actually travel. Most people spend their effort smoothing roads they will never use. Put your care into your own habits, health and character, the road under your feet.
Kabir Granthavali (Das 1928), Sakhi, Chitavani ko Ang 14, our translation from the Hindi
- The fruit that falls never goes back to the branch.
A human life is rare and it does not come twice. Once the fruit drops, nobody ties it back on the tree. Treat this year, this season, this chance as the only one you get.
Kabir Granthavali (Das 1928), Sakhi, Chitavani ko Ang 34, our translation from the Hindi
- The light ones got across. The ones carrying loads drowned.
The boat is rotten and the boatmen are useless, yet the people who traveled light made it to the far bank. Those with bundles on their heads went down. Carry less: fewer grudges, fewer possessions, fewer things to prove.
Kabir Granthavali (Das 1928), Sakhi, Chitavani ko Ang 62, our translation from the Hindi
- The mirror is in your heart. Clear the doubt and see your face.
There is a mirror inside you, Kabir says, but you cannot see yourself in it while the mind is split two ways. Once the wavering stops, the face shows. Clarity about yourself comes from settling the inner argument, not from more looking.
Kabir Granthavali (Das 1928), Sakhi, Man ko Ang 8, our translation from the Hindi
- The horse is saddled, the whip in hand. Arrive before dark.
Kabir is mounted and ready, and he means to reach his Lord while there is still daylight, because night is coming. Everything is prepared; the only thing left is to ride. Whatever you are saddled up for, go now while the light holds.
Kabir Granthavali (Das 1928), Sakhi, Man ko Ang 13, our translation from the Hindi
- Plant thorn trees, and where will you eat mangoes?
You did it while you could, so why regret it now? Whoever plants the thorny acacia should not expect a mango harvest. Results grow from what you put in the ground, and no amount of wishing changes the tree.
Kabir Granthavali (Das 1928), Sakhi, Man ko Ang 27, our translation from the Hindi
- Save only the wealth that travels ahead. No one leaves with a bundle.
Kabir has never seen anyone leave this world with a bundle on his head. The only savings worth piling up are the ones that go with you: what you gave, how you lived, who you became. Spend your hoarding instinct there.
Kabir Granthavali (Das 1928), Sakhi, Maya ko Ang 13, our translation from the Hindi
- You gave up wealth. So what? Pride is harder to give up.
Renouncing money is the easy part, Kabir says; pride does not leave so quietly. It has swallowed great sages, and it swallows everyone in the end. Notice when your simplicity becomes something to be proud of.
Kabir Granthavali (Das 1928), Sakhi, Maya ko Ang 17, our translation from the Hindi
- The parrot learned to be clever and stayed in the cage.
A parrot can recite clever words and still sit behind bars, teaching others what it never understood. Learning that does not change you is just a longer song in the same cage. Measure your knowledge by the doors it opens in your own life.
Kabir Granthavali (Das 1928), Sakhi, Chanak ko Ang 14, our translation from the Hindi
- Talk without deeds is a sand fort. It falls while you watch.
Kabir asks what your fine speech is worth if no action stands behind it. It is a fort made of mud and sand, collapsing in front of everyone. Say less, do the thing, and let the doing speak.
Kabir Granthavali (Das 1928), Sakhi, Karni bina Kathni ko Ang 1, our translation from the Hindi
- The world died reading books. Read one word of love.
Generations read book after book and none of them became wise. Kabir says the one who reads a single letter of the Beloved is the real scholar. Study has its place, but love practiced teaches what libraries cannot.
Kabir Granthavali (Das 1928), Sakhi, Kathni bina Karni ko Ang 4 (Sakhi 377), our translation from the Hindi
- What I went out to find, I found right here.
Kabir traveled to find something and found it where he stood, and the one he had called 'other' turned out to be himself. The search outward often ends with a look inward. Before the next journey, check what you are carrying already.
Kabir Granthavali (Das 1928), Sakhi, Gyan Virah ko Ang 37, our translation from the Hindi
- Why sleep, Kabir? One day you will sleep with your legs stretched out.
Kabir scolds himself for dozing when he could be awake and remembering God. There will be a long sleep soon enough, the one where you lie stretched out for good. Rest when you need to, but do not sleep through your life.
Kabir Granthavali (Das 1928), Sakhi, Sumiran ko Ang 12, our translation from the Hindi
- The river and its waves are one surf.
Kabir asks where the river ends and the wave begins, and answers that they are the same water. A wave is just the river standing up for a moment. Whatever you are, you are not separate from the ocean you ride.
Songs of Kabir (Tagore 1915) XIV; Sen II.56, Rabindranath Tagore, 1915
- When the wave rises it is water. When it falls, the same water again.
A wave builds, breaks and settles, and at every stage it is only water. Kabir uses it to say that rising and falling do not change what you are. Good days and bad days are the same sea taking different shapes.
Songs of Kabir (Tagore 1915) XIV; Sen II.56, Rabindranath Tagore, 1915
- I laugh when I hear that the fish in the water is thirsty.
A fish complaining of thirst is funny, and Kabir says that is us: surrounded by what we seek and wandering off to find it. The real thing is already at home. Look closer before you look farther.
Songs of Kabir (Tagore 1915) XLIII; Sen I.82, Rabindranath Tagore, 1915
- The musk is in the deer, but it seeks it in the grass.
The musk deer chases its own scent through the forest, never guessing it comes from itself. Kabir's point is that what we hunt for outside is often what we already carry. Stop chasing the smell and notice where it starts.
Songs of Kabir (Tagore 1915) VI; Sen I.83, Rabindranath Tagore, 1915
- Be strong, and enter your own body. There your foothold is firm.
After describing a far shore with no ground and no ford, Kabir sends the seeker back into his own body. That is the one place where the footing holds. When everything feels unstable, come back to breath, feet and the present.
Songs of Kabir (Tagore 1915) XX; Sen II.22, Rabindranath Tagore, 1915
- Put all imaginations away, and stand fast in that which you are.
Kabir tells the restless heart to stop building pictures of somewhere else. Stand in what you actually are. Most anxiety lives in imagined futures; footing lives in the real one.
Songs of Kabir (Tagore 1915) XX; Sen II.22, Rabindranath Tagore, 1915
- He who is brave never forsakes the battle.
Kabir's battlefield is the self, where the enemies are passion, anger, pride and greed. The brave one keeps fighting there, and the one who runs is no fighter at all. Stay in the hard inner fight even when nobody sees it.
Songs of Kabir (Tagore 1915) XXXVII; Sen I.36, Rabindranath Tagore, 1915
- The truth-seeker's battle goes on day and night.
A soldier fights for a few hours; Kabir says the person seeking truth fights every day for life. There is no final victory over your own habits, only daily practice. Accept that and the long fight gets lighter.
Songs of Kabir (Tagore 1915) XXXVII; Sen I.36, Rabindranath Tagore, 1915
- If your bonds are not broken while living, what hope in death?
Kabir refuses to postpone freedom to an afterlife. If you do not get free now, death will not do it for you. Whatever you mean to change, the only time it can happen is while you are alive.
Songs of Kabir (Tagore 1915) III; Sen I.57, Rabindranath Tagore, 1915
- When you reach the ocean of happiness, don't go back thirsty.
Kabir pictures someone standing at the edge of a great sea of joy and walking away still thirsty. Pure water is right there; drink it with every breath. When the good thing is in front of you, take it.
Songs of Kabir (Tagore 1915) LXI; Sen I.48, Rabindranath Tagore, 1915