संत साहित्य · Tukārām · Abhanga 2336 of 4582

Abhanga 2336

When your devotion is genuine and full, you no longer need harsh austerities or even the craving for liberation, because loving surrender already carries all the strength you need.

When you feel obligated to perform strict fasting or austerity to seem devout

When anxiety and craving crowd your mind and you need to simply release them

When you catch yourself chasing liberation or a spiritual goal instead of simply loving and trusting

The verse

उपास कराडी । तिहीं करावीं बापुडीं ॥१॥ आम्ही विठोबाचे दास । चिंता झुगारावी आस ॥ध्रु.॥ भक्तीच्या उत्कषॉ । नाहीं मुक्तीचें तें पिसें ॥२॥ तुका म्हणे बळ । अंगीं आमुच्या सकळ ॥३॥

Literal translation

Upāsa-fasts and karāḍī — let the wretched do them. We are Viṭhobā's dāsas — fling away chinta-and-āśā. By bhakti's-excess — there is no mukti-fascination. Tuka says: all the strength is in our body.

What it means

THE BHAKTI-OVER-MUKTI DECLARATION ABHANG.

THE CELEBRATED LINE: bhaktīchyā utkaṛṣē — nāhīm muktīchē tē pisē — by bhakti's-excess — there is no mukti-fascination. Utkaṛṣa = excess, abundance. Pisē = madness, fascination. By the excess-of-bhakti, there's-no-mukti-fascination (the bhakti-saturated-bhakta has-no-room-for-mukti-craze). Echoes 2293's we-kick-mokṣa-pada and 2299's na lagē mukti.

[T]

For someone today

For today: upāsa-fasts and karāḍī — let the wretched do; we are Viṭhobā's dāsas — fling away chinta-āśā; by bhakti's-excess — no mukti-fascination; Tuka says — all strength in our body.

Where this applies

When you feel pressured to prove your faith through fasting or extreme self-denial
When worry and craving keep pulling at you and you need to simply let them go
When you find yourself chasing the idea of enlightenment or liberation instead of resting in love itself
When you doubt your own inner strength and forget it was there all along