Abhanga 3820
No method of knowing, whether study, meditation, vision, or scripture, can fully grasp the divine, so at some point you must let go of trying to think it through.
The verse
न कळसी ज्ञाना न कळसी ध्याना । न कळेसी दर्शना धुंडाळितां ॥१॥
न कळेसी आगमा न कळेसी निगमा । न बोलवे सीमा वेदां पार ॥२॥
तुका म्हणे तुझा नाहीं अंतपार । म्हणोनि विचार पडिला मज ॥३॥
Literal translation
Not-known-by-jñāna — not-by-dhyāna — not-by-darśana-searching. Not-by-āgama — not-by-nigama — vedas-can't-speak-the-sīmā-pāra. Tukā: no-anta-pāra-to-you — vichāra-fell-upon-me.
What it means
A canonical 3-verse 6-fold na-kaḷē (not-known-by) formless-confession. You are not known by jñāna, by dhyāna, by darśana even after extensive searching. You are not known by āgama, by nigama; the Vedas cannot speak the limit-or-beyond. Therefore — there is no end-or-far-shore to you — and the whole exercise of vichāra (mental-investigation) has fallen upon me. The 6 means of knowing (jñāna, dhyāna, darśana, āgama, nigama, veda) are each named and each negated — the most systematic Tukārām articulation of the Viṭṭhal-beyond-all-paths-of-knowing. Pair with 2925 (formless-Viṭṭhal-no-rūpa-no-nāma), 2949 (maithuna-analogy-anubhava-vs-śābdika).
For someone today
Tukaram admits that none of the usual paths to knowing God actually get you there: not study, not meditation, not vision, not scripture. Every method he tries, he names and then sets aside as insufficient. In the end he simply stops trying to think his way to the divine, because it has no boundary or far shore that thought can reach. That surrender of striving is itself the point of the verse.
मराठी: तुकाराम सांगतात की देवाला जाणण्याचे नेहमीचे मार्ग खरे तर पुरेसे पडत नाहीत: ज्ञान नाही, ध्यान नाही, दर्शन नाही, शास्त्रही नाही. प्रत्येक मार्ग ते नाव घेऊन सांगतात आणि मग तो अपुरा ठरवतात. शेवटी विचार करून देवाला गाठण्याचा प्रयत्न ते सोडून देतात, कारण त्याला अंतच नाही, पैलतीरच नाही. हा प्रयत्न सोडणे हाच या अभंगाचा गाभा आहे.
Where this applies
- Tukārām's THE 6-fold not-known-by-anything canonical formless-confession
- no-anta-pāra — vichāra abandoned
- Pair with 2925 (formless-Viṭṭhal), 2949 (maithuna-analogy)