Servant's love, no equality with God
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
तुह्मां आह्मां सरी । येथें कईच्या या परी ॥1॥
स्वामिसेवा अळंकार । नाहीं आवडिये थार ॥ध्रु.॥
तुका ह्मणे कोडें । आह्मी नाचों तुज पुढें ॥3॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
How can we ever be on equal footing, O Lord? The ornament of serving the Master has no place for personal preference in this bond. Says Tuka, we delight in dancing before You as a loving spectacle.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
How could we ever be equals, You and I? Serving the Master is the ornament; in this love there is no room for my own preference. Tuka says: gladly we dance before You, for the joy of it.
What it means
Tukaram refuses any thought of standing level with God. He treats the gap not as a wound but as the whole beauty of the bond: service to the Master is itself the ornament he wears, and personal preference has no place inside that love. To want things on his own terms would spoil it. So he keeps only the one thing a servant can offer freely, the delight of dancing before the Lord for the sheer joy of being seen.
Devotion to Vitthal
Poems of praise, invocation, and intimate address to Lord Vitthal at Pandharpur.
More in this theme →