Social criticism, the hollow holy man
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
काय धोविलें कातडें । काळकुट भीतरि कुडें ॥1॥
उगा राहें लोकभांडा । चाळविल्या पोरें रांडा ॥ध्रु.॥
घेसी बुंथी पानवथां । उगा च हालविसी माथा ॥2॥
लावूनि बैसे टाळी । मन इंिद्रयें मोकळीं ॥3॥
हालवीत बैस माळा । विषयजप वेळोवेळां॥4॥
तुका ह्मणे हा व्यापार । नाम विठोबाचें सार ॥5॥ ॥2॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
Why do you wash only the outer skin when inside you are crooked and dark? Be quiet, you fraud of the world, you who deceive women and children. You sit at bathing ghats and nod your head solemnly for no reason. You sit with cymbals, while your mind and senses roam free. You move the prayer beads while your real chanting is of sense pleasures, moment after moment. Says Tuka, all of this is mere show; the Name of Vitthal alone is the true substance.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
What have you washed but the outer skin, when inside you are crooked and dark as poison? Be quiet, you fraud of the world; you have fooled women and children. You wrap a shawl at the bathing ghats and nod your head for show. You sit with your cymbals while your mind and senses run loose. You finger the prayer beads, but your real chanting is of sense pleasures, over and over. Tuka says: all this is just business; the Name of Vithoba alone is the substance.
What it means
Tukaram skewers the performing holy man who scrubs the outside while staying crooked and dark within. The shawl at the ghat, the solemn nodding, the cymbals, the moving beads are all props; underneath, the mind and senses wander and the real, ceaseless chant is for sense pleasures. He calls the whole act a trade, religion run as a business of impressing onlookers. The point lands not as contempt for one man but as a warning about a pattern any of us can slip into: outer display standing in for inner change. The only genuine substance, he says, is the Name of Vithoba itself.
Social Criticism
Rebuke of hypocrisy, caste pride, false teachers, greed, and religious pretence.
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