Social criticism, piety on the outside
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
परद्रव्य परनारी । अभिळासूनि नाक धरी ॥1॥
जळो तयाचा आचार । व्यर्थ भार वाहे खर ॥ध्रु.॥
सोहोळ्याची िस्थती । क्रोधें विटाळला चित्तीं ॥2॥
तुका ह्मणे सोंग । दावी बाहेरील रंग ॥3॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
One who covets another's wealth and another's wife, yet makes a show of piety by holding his nose in pious disdain: let such conduct burn. Like a donkey carrying a useless load, his observances are vain. He sits in pretended composure, yet is polluted within by anger. Says Tuka, he merely puts on an outward display of color.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
He covets another man's wealth and another man's wife, then holds his nose in pious disgust. Let such conduct burn. He carries a useless load, like a donkey. He sits as if calm, but inside his mind is fouled with anger. Tuka says: it is a costume. He shows only the color on the outside.
What it means
Tukaram sets the inner reality against the outward show and lets the gap condemn the man. Someone greedy for money and lusting after another's wife performs disgust at impurity, as if he were the clean one. Tukaram calls his observances a dead weight, like a donkey hauling a load that benefits no one, because rituals without an inner change accomplish nothing. The pretended composure hides a heart polluted by anger; the holiness is only paint on the surface. The poem turns us toward our own divided life, where the face we present and the mind we carry do not match.
Social Criticism
Rebuke of hypocrisy, caste pride, false teachers, greed, and religious pretence.
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