Listening to this beautiful bhajan today by Pt. Kumar Gandharva. I don't know if this is authentically by Gorakhnath, but it made me think about how Guru Nanak would have heard from the Nath yogis in addition to sharing his shabads with them. Here are a couple of translations of this bhajan followed by some notes.
Śūnya Gaḍh Shahar — Gorakhnāth (bhajan)
शून्य गढ़ शहर, शहर घर बस्ती; कौन सूता, कौन जागे है।
In the citadel of Emptiness stands a city; within the city, neighborhoods.
Who sleeps here—and who is awake?
लाल हमरे, हम लालन के; तन सोता, ब्रह्म जागे है।
The Beloved is mine, and I belong to the Beloved;
the body dozes, but Brahman keeps watch.
जल बिच कमल, कमल बिच कलियाँ; भँवर बास न लेता है।
Lotuses in the water, and tight buds among the lotuses—
yet the bee will not make its home there.
इस नगरी के दस दरवाज़े; जोगी फेरी नित देता है।
This body-city has ten gates;
the yogi keeps his rounds, guarding them day and night.
तन की कुंडी, मन का सोता; ज्ञान की रगड़ लगाता है।
The body is the mortar, the mind the pestle;
with patient rubbing he makes a paste of knowledge.
पाँच पचीस बसे घट भीतर; उनको घोट पिलाता है।
Within this clay-pot body live the Five and the Twenty-Five;
he grinds the dose and lets them drink.
अग्नि-कुंड में तपसी तापे; तपसी तपसा करता है।
In the pit of fire the ascetic heats himself—
austere among austerities.
पाँचों चेले फिरे अकेला; ‘अलख, अलख’ कर जपता है।
The five disciples roam—each alone;
and he chants “Alakh, Alakh,” the Unseen, the Unseeable.
एक अप्सरा सामने उभी, दूजी सुरमा हो सारे है;
One apsarā appears before him; another arrives, eyes darkened with kohl;
तीसरी रम्भा सेज बिछावे; परनिया नहीं कुँवारी है।
a third—Rambhā—spreads the bed: a “bride” who is somehow still a virgin.
परनिया पहिले पुत्र जाया; मात-पिता मन भाया है।
Before the wedding, a son is born—
and the parents are overjoyed.
‘शरण मच्छिन्दर’, गोरख बोले; ‘एक अखण्डी ध्याया है।’
“Refuge in Matsyendra,” says Gorakh;
“Meditate on the One, indivisible.”
What the bhajan is doing (and how its images work)
A fortress that is empty, yet crowded.
Gorakh’s opening paradox—an “empty fort” that contains a whole city—pushes us past surface reality. The “city” is the body-mind world we inhabit; its “emptiness” is the ground of being that cannot be grasped, only realized. When he asks, “Who sleeps? Who wakes?”, he isn’t asking about eyelids; he’s distinguishing a life absorbed in appearances from a life attuned to Consciousness which “keeps watch.” The tradition behind this metaphor speaks of the body as a city of nine, ten, or even eleven “gates,” ways the inner awareness meets the world (Gītā 5.13 speaks of nine; Kathopaniṣad 2.2.1 of eleven). In Gorakh’s verse the yogi becomes a night-watchman, circling the “ten doors,” holding vigilance over what enters and exits.
Non-dwelling and the honey-bee.
The bumblebee that will not “make a home” among even the most fragrant lotuses is a compact image for non-attachment. Beauty exists; temptation exists; the practice is not denial but non-dwelling—not letting attention crystallize into possession.
Grinding insight: a slow, interior alchemy.
“Body the mortar, mind the pestle”—Gorakh’s yogi doesn’t chase visions; he works them, like an apothecary, into a usable paste. What is he medicating? “The Five and the Twenty-Five” inside the pot of the body: the Five are the great elements (earth, water, fire, air, space); the Twenty-Five are the tattvas—the enumerated principles of experience in Sāṃkhya (mind, senses, subtle elements, etc.). In other words: the whole kit of embodiment is brought under the taste of wisdom.
Fire-ritual and “Alakh” (the Unseen).
The “fire-pit” points to rigorous austerity—one strand evokes the famous pañcāgni discipline, the “five fires,” both an outward penance and an inner meditation taught in the Upaniṣads. Yet Gorakh immediately steers the focus to recitation: “Alakh, Alakh”—the Nath invocation of the unseeable, stainless Absolute (Alakh Niranjan)—so that the heat of practice is oriented to the formless, and not merely to endurance.
The three apsarās and the comic-serious paradox.
Then the poem seems to swerve: three celestial temptresses arrive; Rambhā lays out the bed; a “bride” who is somehow still a virgin gives birth before the wedding; everyone is delighted. It reads like riddle and satire at once. Gorakh is dramatizing Māyā’s power to produce consequences without true union: before any real consent, you’re already entangled; the world will even celebrate your entanglement. The only safeguard is the refrain of refuge—“Śaraṇ Machhindra”—and a return to non-dual attention: “Meditate on the One, indivisible.”
Why the refrain matters.
Invoking Matsyendranāth (Machhindra), the guru of Gorakh, is not sectarian loyalty alone; it’s a way of saying that only Guru-oriented awareness can keep practice from getting co-opted—by senses (“the five disciples”), by metaphysics (“the twenty-five”), or by spectacle (“the apsarās”). The chant “Alakh” keeps the compass set to the Unseen, while “One, indivisible” keeps the heart’s gaze gathered.
A few guideposts for readers
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Ten/Elev(en) gates: Classical texts liken the body to a “gated city”—nine in the Gītā; eleven in the Katha Upaniṣad (adding the navel and the crown). Gorakh’s “ten” keeps the image fluid but the point is steady: guard the thresholds of attention. (Holy Bhagavad Gita, Wisdom Library)
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“Five and Twenty-Five”: The Five are the elements; the Twenty-Five refer to Sāṃkhya’s tattva-map of experience. Gorakh’s yogi “doses” them with insight so they serve, rather than rule. (Wikipedia)
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“Alakh, Alakh”: A Nath salutation to the attributeless, unseeable Reality—Alakh Niranjan—used to re-center practice in the formless. (Wikipedia)
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Fire practice: The pañcāgni motif (five fires) is both an external tapas and an Upaniṣadic meditation; Gorakh uses it as shorthand for intensity placed in the right orientation. (Swami Krishnananda)
Further listening/reading:
A reliable lyric/transliteration reference and short note on the “ten doorways” image is available via Ajab Shahar’s page on Shoonya Gadhh Shahar. For background on “Alakh Niranjan,” see a concise overview of the phrase in the Nath tradition; for the “gated city,” see Gītā 5.13 and Katha Upaniṣad 2.2.1. (Ajab Shahar, Wikipedia, Holy Bhagavad Gita, Wisdom Library)
Singing oneness!
