Abhanga 3167
Chasing and storing up sensory pleasures over a lifetime only ties a knot that becomes harder to undo, while the body itself is destined for death.
The verse
देह मृत्याचें भातुकें । कळों आलें कवतुकें ॥१॥
काय मानियेलें सार । हें चि वाटतें आश्चर्य ॥ध्रु.॥
नानाभोगांची संचितें । करूनि ठेविलें आइतें ॥२॥
तुका म्हणे कोडीं । उगवून न सकती बापुडीं ॥३॥
Literal translation
Deha mrtyāñce bhātuke — deha (is) Death's snack; kaḷōm āle kavatuke — came-to-knowing as delight. Kāya māniyele sāra — what taken as sāra; he chi vāṭatē āścharya — this feels (as) astonishment. Nānā-bhōgāñcī samchite — varied-bhōga accumulations; karūnī ṭhevile āite — stored and readied. Tukā mhaṇe kōḍī — Tukā says: the knot; ugavūn na sakatī bāpuḍī — the helpless can't untie.
What it means
Tukārām's mortality-meditation: the-body-is-Death's-snack; we-(stupidly)-stored-up-bhōga-samchita; the-bhōga-knot-cannot-be-untied-by-the-helpless.
For someone today
Tukaram meditates on death with startling honesty: the body itself is nothing more than a snack for death, and realizing this comes almost as a strange delight. He wonders in astonishment what he ever thought was truly essential in life. People spend their years gathering all kinds of pleasures and storing them up as if for later use, but that very accumulation becomes a knot that the helpless cannot untie on their own. It is a warning that chasing and hoarding sensory enjoyment only tightens a bond that grows harder to release the longer it is fed.
मराठी: तुकाराम मृत्यूवर विलक्षण प्रामाणिकपणे चिंतन करतात: शरीर हे मृत्यूसाठी केवळ एक खाद्यपदार्थ आहे, आणि हे उमगणे जणू विचित्र आनंदासारखे वाटते. आपण आयुष्यात खरोखर काय सार मानले होते, याचे त्यांना आश्चर्य वाटते. लोक आयुष्यभर नाना प्रकारचे भोग गोळा करतात आणि जणू पुढच्या वापरासाठी साठवून ठेवतात, पण हेच साठवलेले भोग एक गाठ बनतात, जी असहाय्य माणसाला स्वतःहून सोडवता येत नाही. भोगांच्या मागे धावणे आणि ते साठवणे यामुळे एक बंधन घट्ट होत जाते, जे जितके जास्त पोसले जाते तितके सोडवणे कठीण होत जाते, हा याचा इशारा आहे.
Where this applies
- Tukārām's body-is-Death's-snack mortality-meditation