#tukaram

[darkskytenjiku]

[hinducosmos]

Sant Tukaram Maharaj Artist: J. B. Dikshit (via Tukaram Maharaj Quotes)

[santmat]

Spiritual Passages from Hazur Baba Sawan Singh, Sant Tukaram, Shams of Tabriz, Rumi, Niloba, George Arnsby Jones, and Sant Kirpal Singh

"The sum total of these observations is that there is one power and one only — the Sound Current — which leads us from the eye center to our Spiritual Home. All other powers (without exception) keep us confined to the material and mental planes, giving us forms according to our actions. If, during lifetime, entry has been made into the eye center and the Sound Current (Bell sound) has been grasped, life has been usefully spent. If this has not been done, even though all else has been done — and most successfully — then life has been wasted. This done, all is done; this not done, all else done is as if nothing is done. Such is the finding of Sant Mat and it is a fact. It is not an arbitrary mandate." (Hazur Baba Sawan Singh)

Not Necessarily Saints

"They’re not mystics because they write poetry,

not saints because they’re related to a saint.

Their names and costumes don’t matter;

only those who face the enemy in battle are brave.

They’re not mystics just because they play instruments

and drape an ascetic’s blanket over their shoulders,

or sing and recite scriptures.

Reading the Vedas and performing rituals

does not make them saints.

Penances, pilgrimages and living in forests

make no one a mystic.

Beads, caste marks and smeared ashes —

these don’t make a saint.

If they don’t forget the body, says Tuka,

they’re just people of the world."

— Sant Tukarama, Many Voices, One Song, The Poet Mystics of Maharashtra

"Do not be satisfied only with your sheikh’s 

[spiritual teacher’s] nice words,

nice actions, nice character, and beautiful face,

for there is something beyond all these. Seek THAT."

-- Shams of Tabriz the Sufi

The Fault is Not Our Stars

"The mystic adepts inform us that 

the exploration of the 

inner realms

is the heritage of each soul,

and if we do not go within 

and traverse these regions 

the fault is ours."

— George Arnsby Jones, 

The Inner Journey of the Soul 

back to its Origin

"The soul is a conscious entity, 

a drop of the Ocean of 

All Consciousness...

Since it is environed 

by mind and matter, 

it has lost its heritage 

and forgotten its origin...

The Masters come to our help,

to awaken us from 

this long slumber of ignorance." 

(Kirpal Singh)

This Light

Astonishing, this Light, so different —

even with eyes closed you see it.

It was never lit, nor does it ever go out —

the luminous soul makes it shine eternally.

No color yet all colors,

this Light is illumined by life itself.

Nila says, Today God in his grace

used my offering of the lamp of devotion

simply as an excuse

to let me experience this Light.

— Niloba, Many Voices, One Song, The Poet Mystics of Maharashtra

“When I am silent, 

I fall into the place 

where everything is music.”

— Rumi

[discoursets]

Utopias are projected visions, sometimes imagined in the past, sometimes located in a different world, sometimes inscribed in the future possibility. But they all lay a claim to some kind of reality, the reality of being possible, and in so doing provide the motivation for efforts at social transformation. The ‘heavenly city’ or the glorious life projected in religious traditions is brought down to earth, and posed as inspiration for living and possible action before oppressed human beings. They represent a combination of ecstasy and reason – the two pervading themes of this study – because they envision a society of abundance and enjoyment, and at the same time project through the understanding of history and its forces the way to achieve such a society through reason-guided action. It is a striking fact that in India we can see the emergence of utopias at almost the same time as in Europe. But these are found at a lower level of society (as contrasted with the high intellectual Thomas More, writing in Latin). Utopias were not available in Sanskrit. Rather they are found in the visions of dalit-bahujan intellectuals of the radical bhakti movement of the fifteenth to seventeenth centuries. These are not so elaborated as in Europe, but that is in part due to the lack of documentation of mass activities and the fact that there were very few among the more literate elites who could move beyond the sanskritized and brahmanic perspectives that militated against visions of equality.

— An excerpt from Seeking Begumpura, 2008.

[finita--la--commedia]

I have no Personal skill. It is The Cosmic One Making me speak.

Tukaram (died 1650), as quoted in “The Longman anthology of world literature. Volume C.”, general editor David Damroch

[minoracts]

Tukaram, in Arun Kolatkar's translation

[pyotra]

--Tukaram, #99 (tr. from Marathi by Rajeev S. Patke)

[kailasanath]

I speak and yet I am silent. I have died but am alive. I live among people but in truth do not. I appear to enjoy but in fact have renounced. I am in the world, yet out of it. I have broken free of all bonds. I am not what I appear to be, says Tukā. You want to know? Ask Viṭṭhala what I really am.

Sant Tukārām