Confession, the babbling tongue
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
वटवट केली । न विचारितां मना आली ॥1॥
मज कराल तें क्षमा । कैसें नेणों पुरुषोत्तमा ॥ध्रु.॥
उचित न कळे । जिव्हा भलतें चि बरळे ॥2॥
तुका ह्मणे कांहीं । लौकिकाची चाड नाहीं ॥3॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
I have blurted out whatever came to mind without thinking. Forgive me for all of it, O Purushottama; I know no better. I do not know what is proper; my tongue babbles whatever it likes. Says Tuka, I have no concern for public decorum.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
I have chattered on, saying whatever came to mind without thinking. Forgive me all of it, O Purushottama; I know no better. I do not know what is proper; my tongue blurts whatever it likes. Tuka says: I have no care for what people think is decent.
What it means
Tukaram owns the looseness of his own speech and asks pardon for it. He admits he says whatever rises in him, with no measuring of what is fitting, and calls himself simply ignorant of the right way to speak before God. Then he names the deeper freedom underneath the confession: he no longer cares about public decorum, the social judgment of what is proper. The apology turns into a kind of release, the babbling of a child who trusts that the one he speaks to will forgive rather than judge.
Confession and Sin
Raw, unflinching accounts of personal failure, weakness, and the weight of sin.
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