Social criticism, the indiscriminate one
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
नेणे सुनें चोर पाहुणा मागता । देखून भलता भुंकतसे ॥1॥
शिकविलें कांहीं न चले तया । बोलियेले वांयां बोल जाती ॥ध्रु.॥
क्षीर ओकुनियां खाय अमंगळ । आपुली ते ढाळ जाऊं नेदी ॥2॥
वंदूं निंदूं काय दुराचार । खळाचा विचार तुका ह्मणे ॥3॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
A dog cannot tell a thief from a guest or a supplicant. Seeing anyone at all, it barks. No training takes hold in such a creature; all words spoken to it are wasted. It vomits up milk and eats filth, never departing from its own ways. Says Tuka, what is the use of praising or blaming such misconduct? This is the nature of the wicked.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
A dog cannot tell a thief from a guest or a beggar. It sees anyone at all and barks. No training takes hold in such a creature. All words spoken to it are wasted. It throws up milk and eats filth, and never leaves its own ways. Tuka says: what use is praising or blaming such misconduct? This is the nature of the wicked.
What it means
Tukaram draws the wicked person as a dog with no discernment: it barks at saint and thief alike, because it cannot tell them apart. Training does not stick; good words spoken to it fall away unused. Worse, it spits up the milk it is given and goes back to filth, never departing from its own habits. He ends by refusing the whole effort: praise or blame change nothing in such a one, because this is simply its nature. The mirror to hold up is the part of us that cannot distinguish what is holy from what is harmful, and keeps returning to what fouls it.
Social Criticism
Rebuke of hypocrisy, caste pride, false teachers, greed, and religious pretence.
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