Surrender, hide me within Yourself
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
त्यागें भोग माझ्या येतील अंतरा । मग मी दातारा काय करूं ॥1॥
आतां असो तुझे पायीं हें मोटळें । इंिद्रयें सकळें काया मन ॥ध्रु.॥
सांडीमांडी विधिनिषेधाचा ठाव । न कळतां भाव जाइल वांयां ॥2॥
तुका ह्मणे आतां नको उजगरा । लपवीं दातारा अंगीं मज ॥3॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
If pleasures and enjoyments come to fill my being through renunciation, then what shall I do, O generous Lord? Let this bundle of body, senses, and mind now rest at Your feet. The business of dos and don'ts, the ground of ritual injunctions, if devotion slips away without being understood, all is lost. Says Tuka, now let there be no more sleepless anxiety; hide me within Yourself, O Lord.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
If pleasures and enjoyments come back to fill me through my renunciation, then what shall I do, O generous Lord? So let this bundle, my senses, my body, my mind, now rest at Your feet. The whole business of dos and don'ts, the ground of ritual rules: if devotion slips away without my noticing, all of it is lost. Tuka says: now let there be no more sleepless dread; hide me within Yourself, O Lord.
What it means
Tukaram names a subtle trap of the spiritual life. Even renunciation can backfire, since giving things up can quietly bring back a new kind of enjoyment and self-regard, and he asks God what he is to do about that. His answer is to stop managing himself: he lays the whole bundle of body, senses, and mind at God's feet. He fears that while he is busy with the bookkeeping of ritual rights and wrongs, the living devotion at the heart of it could slip away unnoticed, and then everything would be wasted. So he asks for the deepest shelter: no more anxious wakefulness, only to be hidden inside God.
Surrender and Acceptance
The conditions of spiritual receptivity and the letting go of the separate self.
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