Asa Ki War | Internet Sacred Text Archive

Sikhism

ASA KI WAR[1]

THERE is but one God whose name is true, the Creator, devoid of fear and enmity, immortal, unborn, self-existent, great and beneficent.

GURU HAR GOBIND

This War includes sloks. The sloks also were written by the first Guru, and should be sung to the air of 'Tunda As Raja'.[2]

SLOK

Guru Nanak

I am a sacrifice to my Guru a hundred times a day,

Who without any delay made demigods out of men.

Guru Angad

Were a hundred moons to rise, and a thousand suns to mount the sky;

Even with such light there would be appalling darkness without the Guru.

Guru Nanak

Nanak, they who very clever in their own estimation think not of the Guru,

Shall be left like spurious sesames in a reaped field.

[1. The word Wâr originally meant a dirge for the brave slain in battle, then it meant any song of praise, and in this collection it means God's praises generally. Wârs were composed in stanzas called pauris, literally ladders, which were sung or chanted by professional minstrels.

The Âsa ki Wâr is repeated by religious Sikhs after the Japji as a morning divine service.

2 As, son of Chitrbîr, was a holy prince against whom a false charge had been preferred by his lascivious stepmother, which led to his hands and feet being cut off as punishment. One of the many Oriental versions of the story of Potiphar's wife.]

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They shall be left in the field, saith Nanak, without an owner:

The wretches may even bear fruit and flower, but they shall be as ashes within their bodies.

PAURI I[1]

God Himself created the world and Himself gave names to things.

He made Maya[2] by His power: seated He beheld His work with delight.

O Creator, Thou art the Giver; being pleased Thou bestowest and practisest kindness.

Thou knowest all things; Thou givest and takest life with a word.[3]

Seated Thou didst behold Thy work with delight.

SLOK II

Guru Nanak

True are Thy regions and true Thy universes,

True Thy worlds and true Thy creation

True Thine acts and all Thy thoughts;

True Thine order and true Thy court;

True Thy command and true Thy behest

True Thy favour and true Thy signs.

Hundreds of thousands and millions declare Thee true

True is all Thy power, true all Thy strength

True Thy praises, true Thy eulogies

True Thy might, O true King.

Nanak, true are they who meditate on the True One.

They who are born and die are the falsest of the false.[4]

[1. The pauris in this collection are all by Guru Nanak, so in the original his name is omitted at their head.