Nondual union, gold and ornament
Original Marathi from the Tukaram Gatha · About Sant Tukaram
मराठी मूळ
गोडीपणें जैसा गुळ । तैसा देव जाला सकळ ॥१॥
आतां भजों कवणे परी । देव सबाह्य अंतरीं ॥ध्रु.॥
उदका वेगळा । नव्हे तरंग निराळा ॥२॥
हेम अळंकारा नामीं । तुका म्हणे तैसे आम्ही ॥३॥
Tukaram Gatha (Marathi Wikisource)
English Translation
Just as jaggery is nothing but sweetness through and through, so God has become all that exists. How then shall I worship, when God pervades everything, inside and out? A wave cannot be separated from the water. Says Tuka, as gold takes the name of the ornament it becomes, so are we one with him.
We ask forgiveness for any inaccuracies in rendering Tukaram ji’s original Marathi.
In Plain Words
As jaggery is sweet through and through, so God has become all of this. Then how shall I worship him, when he is everywhere, outside and within? A wave cannot stand apart from the water. Tuka says: as gold goes by the name of the ornament made from it, so are we one with him.
What it means
Tukaram pushes worship to the point where it questions itself. If God is sweet all the way through like jaggery, and fills everything inside and out, then there is no separate place to stand and offer worship from. His images all collapse the seeming difference: a wave is only water shaped for a moment, and gold called a bangle or a ring is still gold under the name. So we too are not other than God; we are God under a passing name and form. The poem does not deny worship so much as locate it inside a oneness that was always already the case.
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