Longing, naming the obstacle
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
ऐसें कोण पाप बळी । जें जवळी येऊं नेदी ॥1॥
तुह्मां तंव होइल ठावें । नेदावें कां कळों हें ॥ध्रु.॥
कोण जाला अंतराय । कां ते पाय अंतरले ॥2॥
तुका ह्मणे निमित्याचा । आला सुच अनुभव ॥3॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
What sin is so powerful that it will not let me come near You? Surely You must know the reason; why will You not let me understand it? What obstacle has arisen? Why have Your feet grown distant? Says Tuka, the hint of the cause has come to me through experience.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
What sin is so strong that it will not let me come near you? Surely you know the reason; why will you not let me understand it? What obstacle has come between us? Why have your feet grown so distant? Tuka says: through what I have lived, the hint of the cause has come to me.
What it means
Tukaram searches for the hidden thing keeping him from God and assumes some powerful sin is the barrier. He presses the Lord, who must already know the cause, to disclose it so he can see what stands between them. The distance he feels is real to him: the feet he longs for seem to have withdrawn. Yet he ends not in pure confusion but with a clue, saying that his own experience has begun to show him where the obstacle lies, turning the complaint into the start of self-examination.
Longing and Separation
Cries from the dark night of the soul: remonstrances, complaints, and desperate yearning.
More in this theme →