Devotion, an unbreakable vow
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
जैसा तैसा आतां । मज प्रमाण अनंता ॥1॥
पायां पडणें न संडीं । पोटीं तें च वर तोंडीं ॥ध्रु.॥
एका भावें चाड । आहे तैसें अंतीं गोड ॥2॥
तुका ह्मणे आह्मां । टळणें चि नाहीं नेमा ॥3॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
However You may be, O Ananta, You are my authority. I will not cease falling at Your feet; what is within me is the same as what is on my lips. With single-minded devotion, whatever comes at the end is sweet. Says Tuka, for us there is no straying from our vow.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
However You may be, You are my authority now, Ananta. I will never stop falling at Your feet; what is in my heart is the same as what is on my lips. With single devotion is my longing, and so the end is sweet. Tuka says: for us there is no straying from the vow.
What it means
Tukaram declares a loyalty that does not depend on how God appears or behaves. Whatever face Ananta, the Endless One, shows him, that is the authority he bows to. He vows to keep falling at the feet, and insists his inner state and his spoken words are one, that his devotion holds no pretense. Because his longing is fixed on a single object, he trusts the outcome will be sweet. The poem closes on the firmness of the vow itself: come what may, he and his fellow devotees will not stray from it.
Devotion to Vitthal
Poems of praise, invocation, and intimate address to Lord Vitthal at Pandharpur.
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