God's greatness, the child and the Mother
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
न कळे महिमा वेद मोनावले । जेथें पांगुळले मनपवन ॥1॥
चंद्र सूर्य ज्याचें तेज वागविती । तेथें माझी मती कोणीकडे ॥ध्रु.॥
काय म्यां वाणावें तुझ्या थोरपणा । सहस्रवदना वर्णवेना ॥2॥
तुका ह्मणे आह्मी बाळ तूं माउली । कृपेची साउली करीं देवा ॥3॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
His greatness cannot be known; the Vedas have fallen silent before it. The mind and breath falter and grow lame. The sun and moon carry His radiance; where then does my small intellect stand? How can I describe Your greatness when even the thousand-headed Shesha cannot express it? Says Tuka, I am a child and You are my Mother. Spread the shade of Your grace over me, O God.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
His greatness cannot be known; the Vedas fall silent before it, where mind and breath go lame. The sun and moon only carry his light; what is my small wit beside that? How can I describe your greatness, when even thousand-mouthed Shesha cannot tell it? Tuka says: we are children and you are the Mother. Spread the shade of your grace over me, O God.
What it means
Tukaram admits at the start that praise has a limit. He stacks up the greatest witnesses he knows, the Vedas, the mind and breath, the sun and moon, the thousand-mouthed serpent Shesha, and shows that all of them fall silent or come up short before God's greatness. The frame is the gap between an immeasurable God and a small human intellect that cannot hope to describe him. Rather than despair at that gap, the poem turns it into intimacy: if I cannot reach you with words, let me come as a child to a mother. The closing prayer changes the whole key, asking not for understanding but simply for the shade of grace, which a child receives without needing to comprehend it.
The Nature of God
Explorations of God's character, power, grace, and relationship to the world.
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