Abhanga 579

Divinity may live in everyone, but real flaws still make people genuinely different, the way sugarcane and onion grown in the same soil taste nothing alike.

The verse

Literal translation

What it means

A all-deva-but-avaguṇa-makes-difference abhang. Discrimination-within-deva-immanence register. The bhakti-cosmology recognizes deva-immanence in all, but also recognizes that avaguṇa (defects) make some unequal. Three claims:

1. अवघे देव साध — परी या अवगुणांचा बाध — म्हणउनी नव्हे सरी — राहे एका एक दुरी — all — deva — sādhu — but — avaguṇa bādha — thus — no sarī — stays — one-from-other — at distance. The opening-claim: all are deva,sādhu(good); but thebādha(harm, hindrance) ofavaguṇa(defects); thus there is nosarī(equality); one stays at-distance from the other. Deva-immanence-in-all but avaguṇa-creates-hierarchy.

2. ऊंस कांदा एक आळां — स्वाद गोडीचा निराळा — ūsa — kāmdā — same āḷa — svāda gōḍī — different. The agricultural-image: ūsa (sugarcane) and kāmdā (onion)— in the sameāḷa(plot, irrigation-bed); but thesvāda(taste) ofgōḍī(sweetness) differs.Same-plot-of-earth-and-water but different-yield.Same-deva-immanence but different-quality-by-jāti.

3. तुका म्हणे नव्हे सरी — विष अमृताची परी — Tuka says: not equal — viṣa-amṛta — parī. The closing-poison-nectar-claim: Tuka says: not equal; theparī(way) ofviṣa(poison) andamṛta(nectar) is different. Poison-and-nectar-not-equal. Final-discrimination. (Both come-from-the-same-cosmic-source but their effects-differ-radically.)

[T]

For someone today

Tukaram says something that sounds like a paradox but is really honesty: divinity is present in everyone, yet people are not all the same, because real flaws and shortcomings make a genuine difference. He points to sugarcane and onion growing in the very same irrigated plot, drawing from the same soil and the same water, yet producing utterly different tastes. In the same way, two people can share the same source of life and still turn out very differently, because poison and nectar, though they may seem to come from the same place, do not act the same way at all. This is permission to see the good in everyone without pretending every choice, character, or outcome is equally good.

मराठी: तुकाराम असं काहीतरी सांगतात जे विरोधाभासासारखं वाटतं पण खरं तर प्रामाणिक आहे: प्रत्येकात देवत्व आहे, तरीही सगळी माणसं सारखी नसतात, कारण खरे दोष आणि उणिवा खरा फरक घडवतात. ते ऊस आणि कांदा याचं उदाहरण देतात, जे एकाच वाफ्यात, एकाच माती आणि पाण्यातून वाढतात, तरीही त्यांची चव पूर्ण वेगळी असते. त्याचप्रमाणे दोन माणसं एकाच जीवनस्रोतातून येऊनही खूप वेगळी घडू शकतात, कारण विष आणि अमृत, दोन्ही एकाच ठिकाणाहून आलेले वाटले तरी त्यांचा परिणाम सारखा नसतो. यातून हे शिकायला मिळतं की प्रत्येकातलं चांगुलपण ओळखावं, पण प्रत्येकाची निवड, स्वभाव किंवा परिणाम सारखाच चांगला आहे असं ढोंग करू नये.

Where this applies

• All deva, sādhu. Immanence.
• But avaguṇa — bādha. Discrimination.
• Sugarcane-onion same plot. Same-source-different-result.
• Poison and nectar. Final-difference.

Related verses

• Abhanga 2467 — What looks like your whole world, like a fig to the insect living inside it, is only a tin
• Abhanga 4481 — Tukaram promises that sincerely calling on the Lord's name, knowingly or unknowingly, with
• Abhanga 4482 — Tukaram teaches that no ritual equals sincerely speaking the Lord's name, that self-center
• Abhanga 4497 — Tukaram describes a life so soaked in devotion that Krishna's presence fills every ordinar