Ecstasy, becoming what he beholds
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
डोिळयांचें दैव आजि उभें ठेलें । निधान देखिलें पंढरीये ॥1॥
काय ते वानावें वाचेचे पालवें । वेदा न बोलवे रूप ज्याचें ॥ध्रु.॥
आनंदाच्या रसें ओंतीव चांगलें । देखतां रंगलें चित्त माझें ॥2॥
तुका ह्मणे मी तों सगळाच विरालों । विठ्ठल चि जालों दर्शनानें ॥3॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
The fortune of my eyes has today stood before me. I have beheld the treasure of Pandhari. How can the tongue describe it, when even the Vedas cannot speak of that form? Cast in the mold of bliss, that beautiful form captured my chitta the moment I saw it. Says Tuka, I have been utterly dissolved. Through that darshan, I myself have become Vitthal.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
Today the fortune of my eyes has stood before me. I have seen the treasure at Pandhari. How can the tongue praise it, when even the Vedas cannot speak of that form? It is poured out of the very juice of bliss, so beautiful; seeing it, my mind was steeped in its color. Tuka says: I have wholly melted away. By that darshan I have myself become Vitthal.
What it means
Tukaram describes the moment of sight at Pandharpur as good fortune made visible, the treasure his eyes were always meant to see. The form is past speech, beyond even the Vedas, because it is cast from bliss itself, and his mind is soaked through with it like cloth in dye. Then comes the boldest claim: he does not merely admire Vitthal, he dissolves. In true darshan the seer is consumed into the seen, so that he can say he has himself become Vitthal. It is the language of nondual union spoken from inside love, not theory.
Ecstasy and Joy
Triumphant happiness: poems written from the far side of the struggle.
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