The world as rope and snake
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
रज्जुसर्पाकार । भासयेलें जगडंबर ॥1॥
ह्मणोनि आठवती पाय । घेतों आलाय बलाय ॥ध्रु.॥
द्रुश द्रुमाकार लाणी। केलों सर्व सासी धणी ॥2॥
तुकीं तुकला तुका । विश्वीं भरोनि उरला लोकां ॥3॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
Just as a rope is mistaken for a serpent, so this whole elaborate world is a superimposition. Therefore I remember your feet and take refuge in you completely. Like a tree seen in a dream, you made me master of the whole appearance. Says Tuka, Tuka is dissolved in Tuka; what fills the universe and still remains is that alone.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
Just as a rope looks like a snake, this whole spread of the world is laid over the truth. So I remember your feet and take refuge in you completely. Like a tree seen in a dream, you made me the master of the whole appearance. Tuka says: Tuka is dissolved in Tuka; what fills the world and still remains is that alone.
What it means
Tukaram reaches for the old Vedanta image of the rope mistaken for a snake: the snake was never there, only a misreading of the rope, and in the same way the elaborate world is an appearance laid over what truly is. He compares it again to a tree seen in a dream, real only while the dream lasts. Rather than make this an abstract lesson, he turns it into refuge: since the world is appearance, he holds the one thing that is not, the feet of God. The last line collapses the distance entirely. Tuka has dissolved into Tuka, and what fills the universe and yet remains over it is recognized as that same one reality.
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