Social criticism, the wasted life
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
धिग जीणें तो बाइले आधीन । परलोक मान नाही दोन्ही ॥१॥
धिग जीणें ज्याचें लोभावरी मन । अतीतपूजन घडे चि ना ॥ध्रु.॥
धिग जीणें आळस निद्रा जया फार । अमित आहार अघोरिया ॥२॥
धिग जीणें नाहीं विवेक वैराग्य । झुरे मानालागीं साधुपणा ॥३॥
तुका म्हणे धिग ऐसे जाले लोक । निंदक वादक नरका जाती ॥४॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
Shame on the life of one enslaved to his wife; he loses both the next world and his honor. Shame on the life of one whose mind is set on greed; honoring a guest never comes to pass. Shame on the life of one given to sloth and excess sleep; boundless appetite, a wretched glutton. Shame on the life without discernment or renunciation; he pines for the mere reputation of saintliness. Says Tuka, shame on such people as these: slanderers and quarrelers, they go to hell.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
Shame on the life of a man ruled by his wife. He loses both the next world and his honor. Shame on the life of a man whose mind is fixed on greed. He never once honors a guest. Shame on the life of a man full of laziness and too much sleep, eating without limit, a foul glutton. Shame on the life with no discernment and no renunciation, that pines only for the name of holiness. Tuka says: shame on people who have become like this. Slanderers and quarrelers, they go to hell.
What it means
Tukaram lays out a list of lives he calls disgraceful, and the thread running through them is appetite mistaken for living. The man who is ruled by craving, by greed, by sleep and food, by the wish to look holy without doing the work, has handed his life to the body and lost both worlds. The sharpest line is the fourth: someone with no discernment and no detachment who still hungers for the reputation of a saint, holiness as a costume. He closes by naming where slander and quarrel lead. The poem is meant to be held up as a mirror to the listener's own patterns, not used to despise any particular person.
Worldly Life
The perplexities of action, karma, and navigating life in the world.
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