Abhanga 4347
Devotion can turn a sacred place and the divine itself into your own family, a home and birthright rather than something distant or foreign.
The verse
आमुचि मिरास पंढरी । आमुचें घर भीमातिरीं ॥१॥
पांडुरंग आमुचा पिता । रकुमाबाईं आमुचि माता ॥ध्रु.॥
भाव पुंडलीक मुनि । चंद्रभागा आमुची बहिणी ॥२॥
तुका जुन्हाट मिराशी । ठाव दिला पायांपाशीं ॥३॥
Literal translation
Āmuchi mirāsa Paṇḍharī — āmuche ghara Bhīmā-tirīm: our mirāsa is Paṇḍharī — our home on Bhīmā-banks. Pāṇḍuranga āmuchā pitā — Rakumābāīm āmuchi mātā: Pāṇḍuranga our father — Rakumābāī our mother. Bhāva Puṇḍalīka muni — Chandrabhāgā āmuchi bahiṇī: the bhāva (kinsman) Puṇḍalīka muni — Chandrabhāgā our sister. Tukā junhāṭa mirāśī — ṭhāva dilā pāyāmpāśīm: Tukā is the old-time mirāśī — given place near (his) feet.
What it means
A canonical 4-verse Vārkarī family-of-Paṇḍharī text using Maharashtra's mirāsa (ancestral-inheritance-right) idiom. Paṇḍharī is our mirāsa-right; Pāṇḍuranga-pitā, Rakumābāī-mātā, Puṇḍalīka-bhāva, Chandrabhāgā-bahiṇī. Tukārām claims himself a junhāṭa (old-time, hereditary) mirāśī.
For someone today
Tukārām claims: Paṇḍharī is my ancestral-birthright; the divine family is mine — father, mother, brother, sister; I am an old-mirāśī given a place at the feet.
Where this applies
- When you long to feel you truly belong somewhere instead of just visiting
- When you want to relate to the divine with the closeness of family rather than formal distance
- When you feel like an outsider in your spiritual community and want reassurance of your place there
- When you want to claim a spiritual home as your birthright rather than something you must earn from scratch