Experience, ready to leave with God
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
मज अंगाच्या अनुभवें । काई वाईट बरें ठावें ॥1॥
जालों दोहींचा देखणा । नये मागें पुढें ही मना ॥ध्रु.॥
वोस वसती ठावी । परि हे चाली दुःख पावी ॥2॥
तुका ह्मणे घेऊं देवा । सवें करूनि बोळावा ॥3॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
By direct experience of my own being, I have come to know what is good and what is bad. I have seen both sides, and the mind no longer turns back or forward. I know the abandoned settlements, yet this habitual path brings only suffering. Says Tuka, let us take God as our companion and bid farewell to all of this.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
By the direct experience of my own being, I now know what is bad and what is good. I have seen both sides, and my mind no longer turns back or forward. I know the deserted settlements well, yet this same old path brings only suffering. Tuka says: let us take God as our companion and bid farewell to all of this.
What it means
Tukaram speaks from firsthand experience, not hearsay: he has tasted both good and bad and now sees them clearly, so his mind no longer swings backward in regret or forward in craving. The image of abandoned settlements names how he knows where the familiar worldly road leads, places already emptied out, and that this same path yields only suffering. Having weighed it all, he makes his choice: take God as the one companion for the journey and say goodbye to everything else.
The Necessity of Experience
Why direct experience of God, not mere learning, is the only path.
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