Social criticism, counsel wasted on the proud
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
लटिकें तें रुचे । साच कोणां ही न पचे ॥1॥
ऐसा माजल्याचा गुण । भोगें कळों येइल सीण ॥ध्रु.॥
वाढवी ममता । नाहीं वरपडला तो दूतां ॥2॥
कांहीं न मनी माकड । तुका उपदेश हेकड ॥3॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
Falsehood is relished easily, but truth is hard for anyone to digest. Such is the character of the arrogant; they will learn its futility through suffering. He who feeds his attachments and has not yet been caught by Death's messengers lives in false security. Says Tuka, a monkey heeds nothing. Counsel to the unyielding is wasted.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
Falsehood is relished easily; truth is hard for anyone to digest. Such is the nature of the arrogant; they will learn its emptiness only through suffering. He who keeps feeding his attachments, not yet seized by Death's messengers, lives in false safety. Tuka says: a monkey heeds nothing. Counsel given to the stubborn is wasted.
What it means
Tukaram observes how readily people swallow flattery and falsehood while truth goes down hard. The arrogant person, he warns, will only discover the hollowness of his way through the suffering it brings, not through advice. He points at the pattern of feeding one's attachments while imagining oneself safe, simply because Death's reckoning has not yet arrived. The closing line names the trap of stubbornness itself: counsel slides off a mind that will not receive it, the way it would off a restless monkey, so the warning is finally a call to examine whether you are that closed.
The Moral Ideal
Purity, sincerity, truthfulness, humility, peacefulness, and service.
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