Without Good Deeds, Both Depart in Tears

TL;DR

Sri Guru Nanak Dev Ji travelled to Mecca during his Udasis. Sikh tradition tells us he engaged in a discourse there with the Qazis, and the verse he composed in Raag Tilang at Ang 723 of Sri Guru Granth Sahib Ji addresses Hajis directly: without good deeds, both — the Muslim and the Hindu, the pilgrim and the non-pilgrim, the religious and the worldly — depart this world in tears. The teaching is not that religions are equivalent. The teaching is that no affiliation, however sincere, can substitute for the life a person actually lived. Good deeds are what travel with us. Nothing else does.

ਬਾਬਾ ਆਖੇ ਹਾਜੀਆ ਸੁਭਿ ਅਮਲਾ ਬਾਝਹੁ ਦੋਨੋ ਰੋਈ ॥

Says Baba [Nanak] to the Hajis: without good deeds, both depart in tears.

— Sri Guru Nanak Dev Ji, Raag Tilang, Sri Guru Granth Sahib Ji, Ang 723

The story Sikh tradition has carried

Sikh tradition tells us¹ that during his Udasis — the long spiritual journeys Sri Guru Nanak Dev Ji undertook across Asia and the Middle East — the Guru visited Mecca. The story is one of the most beloved in Sikh memory, recounted in gurdwaras and family homes across the diaspora.

In the traditional account, the Guru arrived at Mecca and lay down to rest. The Qazis approached him in anger: your feet are pointing toward the Kaaba. Turn them away. The Guru replied: please move my feet wherever the house of God is not. Wherever they turned his feet, the Kaaba turned with them — because the Divine is not contained in any direction, any building, any single sacred geography.

A discourse followed. The Qazis pressed him with questions, including the question of which religion was greater — Islam or Hinduism. The Guru's answer was the verse we have in Sri Guru Granth Sahib Ji today.

He did not say one was greater than the other.

He said: without good deeds, both depart in tears.

What the verse actually says

The Gurmukhi line is precise:

ਬਾਬਾ ਆਖੇ ਹਾਜੀਆ ਸੁਭਿ ਅਮਲਾ ਬਾਝਹੁ ਦੋਨੋ ਰੋਈ ॥

Baba aakhe haajeeaa — Baba [Nanak] says to the Hajis. The verse explicitly addresses Muslim pilgrims. It is not a generic teaching — it is addressed to people who had just completed the most demanding religious obligation of their tradition, traveled across continents at great cost, observed every rite of the Hajj.

Shubh amlaa baajhahu — without good deeds.

Donoo roee — both will weep. Both will depart in tears.

The Guru is saying: the Hajj is real, the pilgrimage is real, the religious affiliation is real — and none of it substitutes for the life you actually lived. If your deeds along the way were unkind, the pilgrimage does not erase them. If your conduct toward your neighbors, your spouse, your servants, your enemies was without good — no amount of religious observance changes what you carry at the end.

This is not a critique of Hajj. It is a teaching about what actually makes the difference.

What the verse is not saying

This is important to be clear about, because the verse is sometimes presented in ways that diminish other faiths. Sri Guru Nanak Dev Ji is not doing that.

He is not saying Islam is empty. He is not saying Hinduism is empty. He is not saying Sikhism is better. He is not saying religions are equivalent in some flattening way.

He is saying: whatever your religion, the deeds of your life are what travel with you when the rest is gone.

A Muslim who lived with great kindness will depart in peace, with or without the Hajj. A Hindu who served selflessly will depart in peace, with or without the pilgrimages. A Sikh who recited Bani daily but treated his family harshly will depart in tears, despite the recitation. The recitation, the pilgrimage, the affiliation — all of these are good when accompanied by good deeds. None of them substitute for good deeds.

This is why the Guru's life was, in addition to teaching the Word, a life of practiced kindness. He sat with the poor carpenter rather than the rich landlord. He fed sadhus with his father's money. He cared for the sick and the marginalized. The Bani is the framework. The deeds are how the framework lives.

What "good deeds" actually means here

It is worth being precise about shubh amla, because the phrase can sound like vague moralism.

In Bani, shubh amla — auspicious deeds, good actions — has a specific shape:

Kirat karni — earning honestly. The deeds of your work, done without cheating, without exploitation, without taking what is not yours.

Naam japna — remembering the Divine. Not as a substitute for action, but as the orientation that informs action. The remembered Divine quietly shapes what you do.

Vand chakna — sharing with others. The food, the wealth, the time, the help. Not as charity from above, but as recognition that what you have is meant to be shared.

These three are the practical content of shubh amla. They are not religious in the sectarian sense. A Muslim, a Hindu, a Sikh, an atheist can do all three. A person who does them lives a life that, regardless of affiliation, departs at peace. A person who does not do them departs in tears, regardless of how much religious observance fills their days.

The diaspora question

For diaspora Sikhs, this verse carries a particular weight.

We live in religiously plural societies. Our colleagues are Muslim, Hindu, Christian, atheist. Our children's friends are from every background. The temptation to either flatten religions ("they're all the same") or rank them ("ours is better") is constant. Both are wrong. The Guru's verse offers a third path: religions are real, traditions are real, but what actually carries a person through life and beyond is the conduct of their days.

This means a few practical things:

A Sikh who works in an office full of non-Sikhs is not "above" them in spiritual standing because of affiliation. Their deeds matter as much as anyone else's. Spiritual rank is not by tradition; it is by life lived.

A Sikh whose Muslim neighbor lives with deep kindness should recognize this clearly: that neighbor's life is full of shubh amla. The Guru would honor it. So should the Sikh.

A Sikh whose own life is full of religious display — bigger turban, longer paths, more donations, louder recitation — but unkind toward family and harsh toward the vulnerable, is doing the thing the Guru warned the Hajis about. The display does not substitute for the deeds.

This is uncomfortable. It is also exactly what Sri Guru Nanak Dev Ji was teaching at Mecca.

What the verse asks of us

The verse asks one simple question, available to every reader regardless of tradition: at the end, when religious affiliation no longer protects you, when the recitations have stopped and the pilgrimages are over, what did you actually do?

Did you treat your spouse with care across the years? Did you raise your children with attention, not just provision? Did you treat your servants and employees with respect? Did you forgive when forgiveness was costly? Did you share when sharing was uncomfortable? Did you keep faith with friends when keeping faith required something of you? Did you live, in the small daily decisions, the values you claimed to hold?

The deeds of an ordinary Tuesday matter more to your departing than any pilgrimage. The kindness shown to your mother-in-law matters more than the verses recited at her funeral. The patience kept with your difficult colleague matters more than the dhan you gave at the gurdwara.

This is not because rituals are wrong. They are not. It is because rituals without deeds are weightless, and the Guru is asking us, gently and firmly, to weight our lives with what actually travels.

A final note

Sri Guru Nanak Dev Ji's discourse at Mecca was not the Guru of one religion telling the Qazis of another that they were wrong. It was the Guru of the Divine in all people telling everyone present — Muslim, Hindu, Sikh, witnessing — that the cosmos cares about what you did, not which tradition you did it under.

This is why the verse remains alive nearly five hundred years later. It survives across traditions because it is true across traditions.

Without good deeds, both depart in tears. With good deeds, the departure is something else entirely.

ਵਾਹਿਗੁਰੂ ਜੀ ਕਾ ਖਾਲਸਾ ॥ ਵਾਹਿਗੁਰੂ ਜੀ ਕੀ ਫਤਿਹ ॥