Abhanga 4001
Preaching spiritual wisdom without lived experience, while secretly greedy and contemptuous of ordinary people, is hollow hypocrisy that deserves harsh condemnation.
The verse
मुखें सांगे ब्रम्हज्ञान । जन लोकाची कापितो मान ॥१॥
ज्ञान सांगतो जनासी । नाहीं अनुभव आपणासी ॥ध्रु.॥
कथा करितो देवाची । अंतरीं आशा बहु लोभाची ॥२॥
तुका म्हणे तो चि वेडा । त्याचें हाणूनि थोबाड फोडा ॥३॥
Literal translation
Mouth-brahma-jñāna — kills-jana's-māna. Tells-jñāna-no-anubhava. Deva-kathā — antara-lōbha-āśā. Tukā: he-is-mad — break-his-thōbāḍa.
What it means
A 3-verse anti-hypocrite-jñānī polemic. He says brahma-jñāna by mouth, but cuts the honor of the common people. He tells jñāna to others — but has no experience himself. He does Deva's kathā — but inwardly is full of greed. He is mad — strike and break his face. The harshness — break-his-face — is Tukārām's strongest physical-polemic against false-jñānīs. Pair with 3800 (anti-śabda-jñānī jaḷō), 3873 (anti-mercenary-kathākāra).
For someone today
Tukaram has no patience for people who preach spiritual wisdom while quietly humiliating the ordinary people around them. He points out someone who talks about ultimate truth to others but has never actually experienced it himself, who performs devotional storytelling about the divine while secretly hungry for gain. Tukaram calls this person simply mad, and his anger is blunt and physical, strike him and break his face, because he sees this kind of hollow, self-serving preaching as a real betrayal of what spiritual teaching is supposed to be.
मराठी: जो माणूस अध्यात्मिक ज्ञान सांगतो पण त्याचवेळी सामान्य लोकांचा अपमान करतो, त्याला तुकाराम अजिबात सहन करत नाहीत. ते अशा माणसाकडे बोट दाखवतात जो इतरांना परब्रह्माबद्दल बोलतो पण स्वतःला त्याचा प्रत्यक्ष अनुभव नाही, जो देवाची कथा करतो पण मनात लोभाची आशा बाळगतो. तुकाराम याला सरळ वेडा म्हणतात, आणि त्यांचा राग थेट, शारीरिक शब्दांत व्यक्त होतो, त्याला मारा आणि त्याचे तोंड फोडा, कारण अशा पोकळ, स्वार्थी उपदेशाला ते खऱ्या अध्यात्मिक शिकवणीचा विश्वासघात मानतात.
Where this applies
- Tukārām's anti-hypocrite-jñānī polemic
- Pair with 3800 (anti-śabda-jñānī), 3873 (anti-mercenary-kathākāra)