Abhanga 2664
A precise honest-confession prayer for anyone whose outer-discipline has been excellent but whose inside has not been shaven so. The verse hands you the honest language: I hold the wish to see you, but conduct gives no place; I have been excellently disciplined outside but not shaven inside; if you do not carry the favor by your own authority, I have gone in vain. The petition is not for more outer-discipline; it is for the Lord to take-the-side of one who has not earned-the-seeing. This is bhakti's specific contribution: the asking can be honest about insufficiency without giving up the asking.
The verse
तुज पाहावें हे धरितों वासना । परि आचरणा नाहीं ठाव ॥१॥
करिसी कैवार आपुलिया सत्ता । तरि च देखता होइन पाय ॥ध्रु.॥
बाहिरल्या वेषें उत्तम दंडलें । भीतरी मुंडलें नाहीं तैसें ॥२॥
तुका म्हणे वांयां गेलों च मी आहे । जरि तुम्ही साहे न व्हा देवा ॥३॥
Literal translation
To see you — I hold this vāsanā (wish, desire); but to āchaṇā (conduct, practice) there is no place. If you carry the kaivāra (favor, partisan-help) by your own sattā (authority) — then I shall become a pāya-dēkhatā (feet-seer). By outer-vēṣa (garb), I have been excellently disciplined (daṇḍalē); inside, I have not been muṇḍalē (shaven, made-bald-as-an-ascetic) so. Tukā says: I have gone in vain (vāyām gēlōm) — if you do not become my sāhē (help), Deva.
What it means
A short, candid confession-prayer. Tuja pāhāvē hē dharitōm vāsanā — pari āchaṇām nāhī ṭhāva — I hold the wish to see you — but to conduct there is no place. The bhakta's wish (vāsanā) is real, but the āchaṇā (concrete-conduct that would qualify him for the seeing) has no place — no foothold, no actuality. The wish-and-conduct have come apart.
The dhrūpada: karisi kaivāra āpuliyā sattā — tari chi dekhatā hōīna pāya — if you carry the favor by your own authority — then I shall become a feet-seer. Kaivāra (siding-with, partisan-favor, advocacy) — the bhakta asks the Lord to take-his-side by the Lord's own authority, not on the basis of the bhakta's qualifications.
The second verse names the honest diagnosis: bāhiralyā vēṣē uttama daṇḍalē — bhītarī muṇḍalē nāhī taisē — by outer-garb, I have been excellently disciplined (daṇḍalē = struck/restrained-by-discipline); inside I have not been shaven (muṇḍalē = made-bald-as-an-ascetic) so. The image is from monastic-formation: the outer-discipline (the robe, the rules, the daṇḍa-of-rules) has been excellent; but the inner-discipline (muṇḍana = shaving-of-the-head, the symbolic letting-go-of-attachments) has not happened so (i.e., to the same degree). This is the honest confession of outer-religious-discipline-without-inner-renunciation.
The close: vāyām gēlōm chi mī āhē — jari tumhī sāhē na vhā Devā — I have gone in vain, I am — if you do not become my help, Deva. Without the Lord's sāhā (help, support), the outer-disciplined-but-inner-unshaven bhakta has gone vāyām (in vain). The bhakta does not pretend his outer-discipline is sufficient.
For someone today
A precise honest-confession prayer for anyone whose outer-discipline has been excellent but whose inside has not been shaven so. The verse hands you the honest language: I hold the wish to see you, but conduct gives no place; I have been excellently disciplined outside but not shaven inside; if you do not carry the favor by your own authority, I have gone in vain. The petition is not for more outer-discipline; it is for the Lord to take-the-side of one who has not earned-the-seeing. This is bhakti's specific contribution: the asking can be honest about insufficiency without giving up the asking.
Where this applies
- The honest confession of outer-discipline-without-inner-shaving
- Asking the Lord to take-one's-side by his own authority, not by qualifying-merit
- Recognizing the bāhirala vēṣa — uttama daṇḍalē — bhītarī muṇḍalē nāhī taisē pattern
- The petition that one has gone in vain without the protector's help