संत साहित्य · Tukārām · Abhanga 17 of 4582

Abhanga 17

English: This abhang is for the moment when something you've been working toward, waiting for, or growing into has actually happened — and you have to learn to recognize what that recognition feels like. Tukaram's claim is unusual: it does not feel like victory or arrival in the dramatic sense. It feels like no separation, and time stopping running. The categories that used to organize your relationship to the thing — moments-of-progress, durations-of-effort, anniversaries-of-beginning — no longer apply. You stop tracking. Not from forgetting, but from the categories no longer fitting.

When you've been in a long love (a person, a practice, a place) and you suddenly notice you can no longer locate where you end and they begin

When you stop tracking time or anniversaries with someone — not from forgetting but from the categories no longer applying

When you've been waiting for a 'sign' that something has worked — and you have to learn to recognize the cessation of the question as the sign

The verse

एका जिवें आतां जिणें जालें दोहीं । वेगळीक कांहीं नव्हे आतां ॥१॥ नारायणा आम्हां नाहीं वेगळीक । पुरविली हे भाक सांभाळिली ॥२॥ तुका म्हणे जालें सायासाचें फळ । सरली ते वेळ काळ दोन्ही ॥३॥

(Source: transliteral.org Sant Tukaram Gatha, abhang 17. Eleventh in 0007-0020+ gopī-arc.)

Literal translation

English: Two lives have now become a living-by-one-soul; there is no separation any longer. Between Narayana and us there is no separation; the promise has been kept and honoured. Tuka says: the fruit of long effort has come — both moment and duration have ended.

मराठी (आधुनिक): आता दोघांचं जगणं एकाच जिवाने होतं; आता कुठलंही वेगळेपण नाही. नारायण आणि आमच्यात वेगळेपण नाही; ती भाक पुरवली गेली, सांभाळली गेली. तुकाराम म्हणतात — सायासाचं फळ आलं; वेळ आणि काळ — दोन्ही सरले.

Word-by-word gloss

Marathi	Meaning
एका जिवें आतां जिणें जालें दोहीं	"two lives have now become a living-by-one-soul" (एका जिवें = by one soul/life; जिणें = the act of living; दोहीं = of the two)
वेगळीक कांहीं नव्हे आतां	"there is no separation now at all"
नारायणा आम्हां नाहीं वेगळीक	"between Narayana and us there is no separation"
पुरविली हे भाक सांभाळिली	"the promise has been fulfilled and protected" (भाक = promise, vow; सांभाळिली = was kept-safe / honoured)
जालें सायासाचें फळ	"the fruit of (long) effort has come" (सायास = effort, struggle, perseverance)
सरली ते वेळ काळ दोन्ही	"both vela and kala have ended" (वेळ = time as occasion / particular moment; काळ = time as duration / chronological flow — the two together name 'time-and-occasion')

What it means

This abhang is the non-dualist crescendo of the gopī-arc. The previous abhangs in the sequence have been variously about defiance, departure, arrival, deafness, identity-loss, borrowed-strength, rest, and companioned-solitude. 0017 names the philosophical destination: वेगळीक नव्हे — no separation. The gopī-relational frame and the Vedantic non-dualist frame fuse here. The bhakta and Narayana are no longer two locations between which love flows; they are one location. [T]

The line "सरली ते वेळ काळ दोन्ही" — both vela and kala have ended — is one of Tukaram's most precise phrases. वेळ and काळ are subtly different: वेळ is the specific moment (the time of an event, a particular occasion); काळ is time-as-flow (chronological duration, time-as-such). The end of both means: there is no longer a particular-moment-this-is-happening and there is no longer a flow-of-time-in-which-things-progress. The bhakta has stepped out of temporal location. [T]

The middle verse — "पुरविली हे भाक सांभाळिली" — the promise has been kept and honoured — is structurally important. The non-duality is not described as something attained; it is described as a promise kept. Narayana has been honoring a promise. The bhakta's experience is of being-faithful-to-by the divine. The non-duality is offered, not extracted. [T]

For someone today

English: This abhang is for the moment when something you've been working toward, waiting for, or growing into has actually happened — and you have to learn to recognize what that recognition feels like. Tukaram's claim is unusual: it does not feel like victory or arrival in the dramatic sense. It feels like no separation, and time stopping running. The categories that used to organize your relationship to the thing — moments-of-progress, durations-of-effort, anniversaries-of-beginning — no longer apply. You stop tracking. Not from forgetting, but from the categories no longer fitting.

This applies in long love (a marriage that has become unlocatable as two-people-meeting); in long practice (a meditation or art form that has stopped feeling like me-doing-X); in long faith (a relationship to the divine that has stopped feeling like me-praying-to). The diagnostic is not happiness; happiness comes and goes. The diagnostic is the cessation of separation as a category. If you can no longer locate the boundary between yourself and the thing you have been with, you may be in this abhang's territory.

The teaching about promise is also worth holding: this is not something you achieved by effort. The middle verse explicitly says the promise was kept by Narayana — by the divine, by the other party. Effort got you here, but what arrived is a gift, not a prize. Hold it that way.

मराठी: ही ओवी त्या क्षणासाठी आहे जेव्हा तुम्ही ज्याकडे काम करत होतात, ज्याची वाट बघत होतात, किंवा ज्यात वाढत होतात ते खरंच घडलं — आणि तुम्हाला ती जाणीव कशी असते हे ओळखायला शिकायचं आहे. तुकारामांचा दावा वेगळा आहे: ते नाटकीय अर्थाने विजय किंवा आगमन वाटत नाही. ते वाटतं — वेगळेपण नाही, आणि काळ धावायचं थांबला. ज्या वर्ग-गटांनी तुमचं त्या गोष्टीशी असलेलं नातं रचलं होतं — प्रगतीचे क्षण, श्रमाची durations, सुरुवातीच्या वर्धापन-दिवस — ते आता लागू पडत नाहीत. तुम्ही ट्रॅक करायचं थांबता. विसरण्यामुळे नाही — categories न-बसण्यामुळे.

हे लागू होतं दीर्घ प्रेमात (असं लग्न जे आता दोन माणसं भेटतायत असं स्थित करता येत नाही); दीर्घ साधनेत (असं ध्यान किंवा कला जी आता मी-X-करत-आहे वाटत नाही); दीर्घ श्रद्धेत (देवाशी असलेलं असं नातं जे आता मी-प्रार्थना-करतो वाटत नाही). निदान आनंद नाही; आनंद येतो-जातो. निदान आहे वेगळेपण ही category बंद होणं. तुम्ही स्वतःमध्ये आणि तुमच्या-सोबत-च्या-गोष्टीमध्ये सीमा शोधू शकत नसाल, तर तुम्ही या ओवीच्या territory मध्ये असू शकता.

भाक-बद्दलची शिकवणही धरून ठेवण्यासारखी आहे: हे तुम्ही श्रमाने मिळवलं नाही. मधली ओवी स्पष्ट सांगते — भाक नारायणाने पुरवली — देवाने, दुसऱ्या बाजूने. श्रम तुम्हाला इथे आणला, पण जे आलं ती भेट आहे, बक्षीस नाही. तसंच धरून ठेवा.

Where this applies

When you've been in a long love and you suddenly notice you can no longer locate where you end and they begin. Trust the un-locatability. It is the abhang's territory.
When you stop tracking time or anniversaries with someone — not from forgetting but from the categories no longer applying. सरली ते वेळ काळ दोन्ही. The categories have ended.
When you've been waiting for a 'sign' that something has worked. The sign Tukaram names is the cessation of the question. If you have stopped wondering whether it has worked, it may have.