Wonder, the infinite at the threshold
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
अनंत ब्रह्मांडें । एके रोमीं ऐसें धेंडें ॥1॥
तो या गौिळयांचे घरीं । उंबरा चढतां टेंका धरी ॥ध्रु.॥
मारी दैत्य गाडे । ज्यांचे पुराणीं पवाडे ॥2॥
तुका ह्मणे कळा । अंगीं जयाच्या सकळा ॥3॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
Infinite universes rest on a single hair of His body, like a tiny ball. Yet this same Lord, in the home of cowherd folk, clings to the threshold as He tries to climb over it. He slays mighty demons whose great deeds fill the Puranas. Says Tuka, all powers reside within His being.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
Infinite universes rest on a single hair of His body, like a tiny ball. Yet this same Lord, in the house of the cowherds, clings to the threshold as He tries to climb over it. He slays mighty demons whose great deeds fill the Puranas. Tuka says: all powers live within His being.
What it means
Tukaram sets the vast against the small in one short stroke. The Lord who carries infinite universes on a single hair, as if they were a little ball, is the same child in the cowherds' home who has to grip the doorsill to climb over it. He is the one who kills the great demons the Puranas sing about, and yet he toddles at a threshold. The poem is not solving the paradox but holding it up to wonder: every power rests in this one being, and the same God is both the unfathomable and the small child of Gokul.
The Nature of God
Explorations of God's character, power, grace, and relationship to the world.
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