From time to time the hukam comes through Maharaj for us to recite many Jaap Sahibs together out loud.  Such a hukam came at 8:15 this morning, so Bhagat Ji rounded up some of us in the havan and at 8:30 we started. There being no one else to do the women’s part (we alternated male and female voices), I started it, but only after stopping to ask Bhagat Ji to give me the note. I know that Bibi Jaswant Kaur, our great ragi, always sets the note lower than Bhagat Ji’s rendering of the introductory passage (Chakar chehan ar barn jaat…), and then he follows her. But he gave me the same high note he had started with, so I continued with that. Jaap Sahib recitation gets higher as it progresses, so by verse 170 I was way above my voice range, but Jaap Sahib continued nonetheless. Each time we re-started from the first verse I searched for a lower note, but it never worked. Thus we did 12 Jaap Sahibs up to 11:45 a.m., at a very high pitch. The only way for me to do it was to ask Maharaj to sing, which He did, from deep inside, with great joy and vigor. A few days ago Bibiji told me that when Maharaj used to sing, His voice was so strong that He could be heard all over Delhi. The voice that came from my mouth today was rather like that. People were quite surprised—but I knew Who was singing. It wasn’t me. I have no voice. One sure sign that it was Maharaj: The energy and sound got stronger and stronger the more Jaap Sahibs we did, whereas the human voice declines as it is strained. I felt that Jaap Sahib was coming from the very stones of this holy place.

It is Maharaj who has written Jaap Sahib; it was He who was singing; it was He who was listening; and what He was hearing was His own praises.