Exhortation, death rides with birth
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
किती या काळाचा सोसावा वळसा । लागला सरिसा पाठोवाठीं ॥1॥
लक्ष चौयाशीची करा सोडवण । रिघा या शरण पांडुरंगा ॥ध्रु.॥
उपजल्या पिंडा मरण सांगातें । मरतें उपजतें सवें चि तें ॥2॥
तुका ह्मणे माळ गुंतली राहाटीं । गाडग्याची सुटी फुटलिया ॥3॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
How long will you endure the circling grip of Time, which follows you relentlessly? Free yourselves from the eighty-four lakh births; take refuge in Panduranga. The moment the body is born, death is its companion; the dying and the being born are joined together. Says Tuka, like pots strung on a waterwheel, the chain is broken only when the pot shatters.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
How long will you bear the circling grip of Time, which keeps right at your heels? Free yourselves from the eighty-four lakh births; take refuge in Panduranga. The moment a body is born, death is its companion; the dying and the being born go together. Tuka says: like pots strung on a waterwheel, the chain breaks only when a pot shatters.
What it means
Tukaram is pressing the listener about how long they will keep enduring the wheel of time and rebirth. He sets the stakes plainly: birth and death are bound together, so every new body is already carrying its own death. The waterwheel image shows lives strung like pots, rising and falling endlessly, the cycle unbroken until a pot finally shatters and leaves the chain. Against this he offers one exit, taking refuge in Panduranga, as the way out of the eighty-four lakh births.
Appeals and Exhortations
Direct calls to action: wake up, seek God, do not waste this human birth.
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