Self-examination, the eye that misses its own faults
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
संसार करिती मोठएा महत्वानें । दिसे लोका उणें न कळे त्या ॥1॥
पवित्रपण आपुलें घरच्यासी च दिसे । बाहेर उदास निंदिताती ॥ध्रु.॥
आपणा कळेना आपले अवगुण । पुढिलाचे दोषगुण वाखाणिती ॥2॥
विषयाचे ध्यासें जग बांधियेलें । ह्मणोनि लागले जन्ममृत्यु ॥3॥
तुका ह्मणे माझें संचित चि असें । देवाजीचें पिसे सहजगुण ॥4॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
Those who conduct worldly life with great self-importance appear deficient to others, yet cannot see it themselves. Their own purity is visible only to their household; outsiders see only their flaws and speak ill of them. They cannot see their own faults, yet they readily enumerate the virtues and vices of others. The world is bound by the chains of sensory obsession, and therefore birth and death persist. Says Tuka, such is my own accumulated destiny: a natural madness for God.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
Those who run their worldly life with great self-importance look deficient to others, and cannot see it in themselves. Their purity is visible only to their own household; outside, people are cold and speak ill of them. They cannot see their own faults, but they freely list the virtues and faults of others. The world is bound by its craving for sense-objects, and so birth and death keep coming. Tuka says: this is simply what I have stored up, a natural madness for God.
What it means
The abhanga sets a blind spot against a clear one. People who carry themselves with self-importance in worldly affairs cannot see how poorly they appear to others; their own family may call them pure, but outsiders see only the flaws. The sharper point is the double standard: they are expert at cataloguing everyone else's virtues and vices while staying blind to their own. Tuka names the engine underneath, the craving for sense-objects, as the very thing that keeps the round of birth and death turning. He closes by pointing at himself instead of at them: whatever he has been given to store up is just one thing, a natural madness for God, and the contrast is meant to turn the listener's eye back onto his own faults rather than his neighbour's.
Social Criticism
Rebuke of hypocrisy, caste pride, false teachers, greed, and religious pretence.
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