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Tukaram was only
seventeen when his father and spiritual mentor, Bolhoba, passed away. It was the
loss of a veritable protective shield and Tukaram was crestfallen on account of
that.
No sooner had he
managed to overcome this grief than his mother, Kanakai, departed from the world
the very next year. Tukaram was thrown into a bottomless pit of bereavement.
Soon thereafter,
when Tukaram was still eighteen, the wife of his elder brother, Savji, passed
away. As it was, Savji had shown little interest in matters temporal. He left
home for pilgrimage after his wife’s death and never came back. That meant that
the family was suddenly bereft of four of its important members. His life, which
was replete with everything desirable, was suddenly robbed of its mainstay.
Nevertheless, Tukaram summoned all the reserves of fortitude at his disposal and
began, at the age of twenty, re-building his life afresh. Alas, it was not to
be.
Tukaram was just
twenty-one when the whole region found itself in the grip of an unprecedented
famine. There was belated rainfall in 1629 and ultimately, crops were lost due
to a surfeit of rain. However, people still held on to their hopes. The next
year, 1630, was one of drought. Now people became desperate. The prices of
essential commodities went up sky-high. Cattle perished by the hundred in the
absence of feed and many people died of sheer starvation. Even well-to-do
families became impoverished. The cup of people’s woes began overflowing, the
next year (1631), which marked the culmination of natural calamity. It was a
year of tremendously excessive rainfall, because of which all crops were washed
away. Life everywhere was thrown into disarray.
The family of
Tukaram suffered very much in this time of great adversity. He lost all his
cattle. The money-lending business was lost. Tukaram’s first wife, Rakhumabai,
and his beloved, only son, Santoba, fell prey to the famine.
It is common
knowledge that the people to take the greatest undue advantage of a famine are
merchants and money-lenders. Even today we see such people, who achieve their
nefarious objects by creating a situation of artificial scarcity.
However, Tukaram
was not a heartless businessman to insist on repayment when people were
suffering untold misery. On the contrary, keeping aside his personal grief, he
came forward to help the famine-hit population generously. ‘Much had been spent.
There was some left, which was given away to Brahmins and alms-seekers,’ he says
in a couplet. This, however, should not be construed to mean (as is generally
done) that Tukaram allowed himself to become bankrupt. ‘I put a zero in the name
of the family, but did this charitable work,’ he says. It was renunciation by
choice.
It was with great
courage and resilience that Tukaram faced the bereavement of his near and dear
ones and the blows dealt by natural calamities and the family’s dwindling
fortunes. He faced them all, did not run away from them. He never was an
escapist. He was desirous of conquest in the work-a-day life and also wanted to
cull the elixir of it all. All these disasters had made him evaluate money, the
human situation and human relationships. The futility of it all had amply been
borne in upon him. His quest now was directed towards the permanent values. He
began thinking in terms of sailing through all these to reach the shore yonder.
He set out for the Bhamnath Mountain in search of truth. No coming back till he
found the immortal truth. That was his determination. Wild animals attacked him
and reptiles troubled him, but Tukaram remained undeterred. His perseverance
reached fruition on the fifteenth day when he encountered Eternal Truth.
‘I lived on the
Bhamgiri Mountain and concentrated all my faculties on Him
Snakes, scorpions
and tigers attacked me, there was trouble everywhere,
It was on the
fifteenth day that Revelation came, when I met Vithoba.’
It was an encounter void
of form or figure (niraakaar). The Lord God gave his benediction to the disciple
and gave him much courage.
Kanhoba, the
younger brother of Tukaram, had set out in search of his elder brother ever
since Tukaram left home. He had scoured all the hills, valleys and jungles in
the vicinity of Dehu. His search eventually led him to the cave on the Bhamnath
Mountain and was taken aback by the spectacle that he saw there. The whole body
of Tukaram was covered with ants, scorpions and snakes and the Lord God had
appeared before him! Kanhoba was spellbound! It was the most memorable day of
his life. Both the brothers embraced each other. Kanhoba then arranged a few
stones at the place, to mark the spot where his elder brother had the divine
visitation and both then returned to the confluence of the Rivers
Sudha-Indrayani and bathed there. Tukaram then broke his fifteen day long fast.
He now asked
Kanhoba to bring over all the documents pledged to them by their borrowers.
These were the promissory notes taken from the borrowers. Tukaram divided these
into two. Half of them he gave back to Kanhoba and consigned the remaining half
to the waters of the Indrayani. This was an act of supreme sacrifice on the part
of this money-lender, who, by destroying the promissory notes, absolved his
borrowers of their bounden responsibility at a time when his own monetary
affairs were in great disarray! He showed the world that he had renounced the
business of money-lending. It was true socialism!
Instead of
attending to his worldly affairs, Tukaram decided to renovate the temple that
had suffered the ravages of famine, thus proclaiming to the world that he had
now definitely taken the metaphysical path. The small temple in their
residential wada (house) proved insufficient to cope with the rising number of
pilgrims during the time of his father, Bolhoba. He had, therefore, built a new
temple on the beautiful bank of the Indrayani and shifted the idols there. That
temple was now in need of renovation and Tukaram undertook the task himself.
‘The temple was in
bad disrepair, which inspired me towards renovation,
So that religious
the programme could be held there for the benefit of one and all.’
Thus, his principal
motive in renovating the temple was purely altruistic. He wanted to offer the
people a place where religious programmes such as keertan, Harijagaran could be
held for all the people, thus paving the way for their salvation.
‘I then memorised
the (spiritual) answers given by the saints of yore,
Having first placed
my implicit faith in them.’
Tukaram re-built
the temple to do keertan and began going up the Bhandara Mountain to prepare for
these discourses in an atmosphere of complete solitude. He would get up early in
the morning, offer prayers to Vithoba- Rakhumai, the family deity, and set out
for Bhandara.
‘In order to master
the art of doing keertan, Tuka undertook the study,
Tuka would study in
such a manner as the ocean would welcome the river,
Whatever was heard
was committed to memory and books were also read.’
He perused in right
earnest the Jnanadevi and Amrutanubhav of Jnanadev, Eknath’s criticism of the
Bhagawat, Bhavartha Ramayan, Swatmanubhav and the religious compositions of
Namdev and Kabir. He memorised the sayings of all these great saints.
Tukaram partook of
this saintly offering, which had given a figure and form to the Eternal
Principle essentially devoid of both. He also had recourse to the ancient
Puranas and ancient sciences.
Tukaram was very
fond of this atmosphere of solitude, for it offered him a whole new range of
near and dear ones in the form of trees, creepers and birds. Hence his famous
abhang: Vrikshavalli amha soyare vanachare.
Tukaram’s wife,
Jijabai, would take his lunch to the Bhandara after finishing all her domestic
chores in the morning. She would have her own lunch there after Tukaram had his.
Jijabai looked after Tukaram with great solicitude during this period of his
spiritual quest and therefore, she had an important share in that as well. It
was while Tukaram was completely immersed in this spiritual pursuit that Lord
Vithoba appeared in his dream along with Namdev and exhorted Tukaram to
undertake versification, so that people could be edified. The message was clear:
Tukaram had attained salvation himself, now it was time to disseminate this
divine benediction among one and all. He was inspired towards versification.
‘I was then
inspired to versify and in my mind, I put my hands around Lord Vithoba’s feet.’
Verses (abhang)
began gushing forth from his mouth and the fortunate among the people began
listening to him. His abhangs encapsulated the essence of ancient shrutis and
shastras in a very lucid manner. Tukaram used to do keertan at the gate of
Jnanadev’s abode at Alandi. The great scholar Rameshwar Bhat happened to listen
to those sweet compositions. He was surprised to find the essence of the
Bhagawad-geeta and the Bhagawat in the Prakrit language and with such lucidity!
He was scandalised and denounced this novel happening. He said, ‘You are a
shudra. Your abhangs elucidate the essence of the Vedas, which is not your
right. It is sacrilegious to listen to it from your mouth. Who incited you to
undertake such an enterprise?’ Tukaram said, ‘It is not my own speech, it is God
speaking through me.’
‘You might think
these are my verses; but no, this is not my own language,
Nor is it my own
skill; it is God, who makes me talk.’
‘It was Namdev and Lord
Vithoba Himself, who ordered me to versify,’ he said.
However, Rameshwar
Bhat was far from mollified. He ordered Tukaram to sink his verses in the river.
If indeed these were the outcome of a divine order, God would save them from
perishing, he said. He also appraised the village head (Patil) of this
‘misdemeanour’ of Tukaram. The Patil became angry. The people at large also took
umbrage.
‘Angry is the Patil
and angry the villagers, where should I go now and where live?’
Tukaram collected all his
abhang books, tied a heavy stone to the bundle and consigned it to the
Indrayani, in much the same manner as he had sunk his borrowers’ promissory
notes earlier. That was a matter temporal, this time it was matter spiritual.
Tukaram was now
woebegone. People began heaping derision on him, saying there was no divine
order or benediction in the first place. It was all a sham! Tukaram then
launched a protest in front of the temple with great determination. The
do-or-die spirit in him had been fully aroused. Thirteen days passed and yet
nothing happened.
In the meantime,
Rameshwar Bhat, who had started from Alandi, having denounced Tukaram, came to
the source of the Nagzari (stream) and entered its waters for a bath. While he
was bathing, a fakir came there to fetch water. Encountering a stranger in
Rameshwar Bhat, he asked the latter who he was and whence he had come. However,
Rameshwar Bhat, unwilling to hear the Yavan’s (Muslim) language, put his fingers
into his ears and took a deep dip into the water. The fakir was enraged by this.
The result was that as soon as Rameshwar Bhat emerged from the water-body, his
whole body began smarting with heat. He then draped himself in wet clothes and
returned to Alandi to seek expiation from the fakir’s curse.
Here at Dehu the
Lord God paid a visit to Tukaram in a child’s garb on the thirteenth night and
told him that He had safeguarded Tukaram’s abhang books underwater for thirteen
days and that these would re-surface the very next day. Some of the devout at
Dehu also received similar divine messages and accordingly, went to the bank of
the Indrayani the next day. Lo and behold, all the books of Tukaram’s verses
were seen floating on the water surface! The good swimmers among them
immediately plunged into the river and brought all the books ashore. The
surprising fact was that all the books were completely untouched by water!
Tukaram felt that
the Lord God was put too much trouble on his account and expressed his regret in
an abhang.
At Alandi, Jnanadev
said to Rameshwar Bhat, ‘Your suffering is all due to your denunciation of
Tukaram. There is only one way to atone for it. Go to Dehu and meet him.’
Accordingly, Rameshwar Bhat set out for Dehu. When Tukaram came to know of this,
he wrote an abhang especially for the scholar and sent it to him with one of his
disciples. All his suffering ceased as soon as Rameshwar Bhat read that.
‘Even foes become
friends if the mind is clean, even wild animals and serpents cannot do anything
to such a soul, it is from grief that happiness ensues, even flames become
soothing balm.’
Rameshwar Bhat then
came to Dehu to meet Tukaram and stayed on there to listen to the latter’s
keertan.
Angadshah came to
know of how Rameshwar Bhat had been rid of his trouble by Tukaram. He was
dismayed. He came to Dehu with the intention of harassing Tukaram. He went to
Tukaram’s house and asked for alms. Tukaram’s daughter put only a pinch of flour
into his bowl, but it enlarged itself within the bowl, which soon overflowed. He
realised the spiritual power of Tukaram and called on Tukaram with a sense of
devotion. He then stayed on at Dehu to listen to Tukaram’s discourses and
keertan.
Thus it was that
knowledge and scholarship bowed their heads before devotion. The news of
Tukaram’s books being retrieved unscathed from the river soon spread everywhere.
Public disgrace was averted for Tukaram. True to their original meaning, the
abhangs proved to be indestructible. The Lord God was seen in his visible form.
Tukaram was now free to continue with his discourses and keertan.
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