Social criticism, the fruitless act
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
सिंदळीसी नाहीं पोराची पैं आस । सांटविल्याबीजास काय करी ॥1॥
अथवा सेतीं बीज पेरिलें भाजोन । सारा देइल कोण काका त्याचा ॥2॥
तुका ह्मणे नाहीं खायाची ते चाड । तरि कां लिगाड करुनी घेतोस ॥3॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
A faithless woman has no care for the child she bears. What use is a seed once it has been stored away? Or if a roasted seed is sown in a field, who will pay the rent on such a crop? Says Tuka, if you have no desire to eat the fruit, then why do you take on the entanglement at all?
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
A faithless woman has no care for the child she bears. What use is a seed once it is locked away? Or if you roast a seed and sow it in a field, who will pay the rent on that crop? Tuka says: if you have no wish to eat the fruit, then why do you take on the entanglement at all?
What it means
Tukaram piles up images of effort that can bear no fruit: a stored seed that never reaches the ground, a roasted seed that cannot sprout yet still owes rent. The point is that some labor is doomed from the start because the living power in it has been killed. He turns it back as a question to the doer: if you do not even want the fruit, why take on the burden and the tangle of the act? Read against pretended devotion, it asks why a person keeps up the outward motions when the inner intent that would make them fruitful is dead.
Social Criticism
Rebuke of hypocrisy, caste pride, false teachers, greed, and religious pretence.
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