Saints, shun the company that turns from them
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
संतांपायीं विन्मुख जाला । तो जरि संगति मागों आला ॥1॥
तरि त्याहुनि दुरी जावें । सुखें एकांतीं बैसावें ॥ध्रु.॥
आत्मचर्चा नाहीं जेथें । अगी लावुनि द्यावी तेथें ॥2॥
तुका ह्मणे नाहीं । चित्ता समाधान कांहीं ॥3॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
If one who turned his back on the saints comes seeking your company, move further away from him. Sit happily in solitude instead. Where there is no discussion of the Self, set fire to that place and leave. Says Tuka, there is no peace of mind to be found there.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
If one who has turned his back on the saints comes asking for your company, then move further away from him. Sit happily alone instead. Where there is no talk of the Self, set fire to that place and go. Tuka says: there is no peace of mind to be had there.
What it means
Tukaram counsels how to guard your own spiritual life by choosing company. A person who has rejected the saints may still come seeking your fellowship, and the advice is to step back from him rather than be drawn along, choosing solitude over harmful closeness. He makes the test sharp: any gathering with no talk of the Self is worth burning down and leaving, an image aimed at the emptiness of the place, not at any person in it. The reason given is simple and practical: such company leaves the mind no peace, so it is no loss to walk away.
The Saints
The character and service of true saints: softer than butter, harder than diamond.
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