Soil Soul Society: A New Trinity For Our Time by Satish Kumar

Author:Satish Kumar [Kumar, Satish]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: The Ivy Press
Published: 2013-09-29T22:00:00+00:00

THE ‘SEVEN BLUNDERS’

Wealth without work

Pleasure without conscience

Knowledge without character

Commerce without morality

Science without humanity

Worship without sacrifice

Politics without principles

MAHATMA GANDHI

4 TRUTHS FROM TAGORE

Rabindranath Tagore was a contemporary of Gandhi. If Gandhi pursued poetry through politics, Tagore pursued politics through poetry. I was introduced to the writings of Tagore when I lived in a Gandhian community in Varanasi (Benares). There, my bedroom was opposite to that of my Bengali colleague and friend Shishir, who was a fan, follower and devotee of Tagore’s poetry and music.

Shishir was always quoting Tagore, translating him for me into Hindi and putting Tagore’s music on the gramophone. This captured my imagination and so I went to a bookshop and bought three books: one of poetry, Gitanjali (Song Offerings), for which Tagore had been awarded the Nobel Prize; one a novel, Gora (The Fair-skinned Boy); and a play, Dakghar (The Post Office) in Hindi translation.

Until then I had only heard of Tagore and had read a poem here or a song there, although I already knew the song Okla Cholo Re (‘Walk alone, even if nobody follows you or listens to you, don’t give up, keep going, keep moving, keep flowing’). We used to sing it every morning and evening at our prayer meeting because the song resonated with the sentiments of Gandhi, who often said that even if you are in a minority of one, truth is truth, and you should stand up for your convictions. Of course, everyone in India, including myself, knew our national anthem by heart – a song composed by Tagore in praise of the diverse and delightful landscapes of the Indian subcontinent.

Thus I was familiar with the stature and importance of Tagore but only superficially, because Tagore wrote in Bengali, a language I did not know, and therefore I had no easy access to him in the original. So it was thanks to Shishir that I was compelled to pay proper attention to Tagore.

Once I had done so, I discovered was that Tagore was a poet of the spirit as much as a poet mesmerized by the mystery and beauty of nature, in the tradition of the mystic poets Rumi and Kabir. However, he did not only dwell in the divinity of flowers, rivers and seasons. He was as much an activist poet as a nature poet.

I saw him as an Earth activist, a spiritual activist and a social activist. His poetry and plays, his songs and stories, his talks and teachings, his imagination and creativity were all underpinned by a vision to serve the Earth, lift the spirit and transform society. Tagore celebrated the beauty, integrity and generosity of life on Earth manifested in myriad forms.

The song in praise of his native land of Bengal later became the national anthem of Bangladesh.

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