Exhortation, keep good company
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
ऐका जी संतजन । सादर मन करूनि ॥1॥
सकळांचें सार एक । कंटक ते तजावे ॥ध्रु.॥
विशेषता कांद्याहूनि । सेवित्या घाणी आगळी ॥2॥
तुका ह्मणे ज्याची जोडी । ते परवडी बैसीजे॥3॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
Listen, O holy ones, with attentive minds. The essence for all is one: avoid those who are like thorns. Worse than an onion is the stench of one who consumes it. Says Tuka, sit in the company of those whose companionship is profitable.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
Listen, holy ones, with attentive minds. The essence of it all is one: keep away from those who are like thorns. A man who eats an onion stinks worse than the onion itself. Tuka says: sit in the company of those whose company pays.
What it means
Tukaram addresses the assembly of devotees and reduces the whole teaching to a single rule about company. He tells them to avoid harmful people the way you avoid thorns, since their nearness wounds. The onion image sharpens the warning: the one who feeds on something foul carries its stench further than the thing itself, so the harm of bad company spreads through the one who keeps it. He closes by pointing the choice the other way, toward the company of the good, which alone is profitable. The point is not to despise people but to watch which company you let shape you.
Appeals and Exhortations
Direct calls to action: wake up, seek God, do not waste this human birth.
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