Renunciation, done with the body
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
वोखटा तरी मी विटलों देहासी । पुरे आतां जैसी जोडी पुन्हां ॥1॥
किती मरमर सोसावी पुढती । राहिलों संगती विठोबाचे ॥ध्रु.॥
आतां कोण याचा करील आदर । जावो किळवर विटंबोनि ॥2॥
तुका ह्मणे आतां सांडि तें चि सांडि । कोण फिरे लंडी यासी मागें ॥3॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
I have grown disgusted with this wretched body. Enough of forging such bonds again and again. How many more deaths must I endure? I have remained in the company of Vithoba. Now who will honor this body? Let it go, discarded and disgraced. Says Tuka, cast it off, just cast it off. Who would follow this worthless thing?.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
Bad as it is, I am sick of this body. Enough now of forging this bond again. How much dying must I keep enduring? I have stayed in Vithoba's company. Now who will give this body any honor? Let it go, mocked and cast off. Tuka says: throw it away, just throw it away. Who would chase after this worthless thing?
What it means
Tukaram turns on the body with disgust, weary of being bound to it birth after birth. He counts the deaths he has had to suffer and says enough; he has found his footing in Vithoba's company instead. With that, the body loses all its claim to honor in his eyes, and he is content to let it be discarded and disgraced. The repeated command to cast it off is not self-hatred so much as a refusal to keep serving the body as if it were the self. The poem points the disgust at the attachment to the perishable, not at life itself; what is worthless is the clinging.
Renunciation
The case for letting go of worldly attachments and turning wholly to God.
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