The set of discourses titled “The Path of Love” are on Kabir’s songs that were translated by Rabindranath Tagore. Osho ofcourse gives the right meaning for each of the songs. The following excerpt is from discourse number 7. If you wish to read the full transcript its here – A Harmony of Love and Renunciation.
The song referred to here is the following –
chalat mansā achal kīnhī man huā rañgī
tatv meñ nīh-tattva darsā sañg meñ sañgī
bañdhte nirbañdh kīnhā toī sab tañgī
kahae 'kabīr' aagam gam kiyā prem rañg rañgī
In Hindi
चलत मनसा अचल कीन्ही मन हुआ रंगी
तत्व में नि:तत्व दरसा संग में संगी
बंधते निरबँध कीन्हा तोई सब तंगी
कहै 'कबीर' अगम गम किया प्रेम रंग रंगी
Note : I have excerpted certain portions of the discourse to bring home my point that so much is lost in translation :). My suggestion for anyone on the path of spiritual discovery is to read or to listen to Osho’s discourse and get your own meaning out of it…
Lost in Translation
“…..IT WAS A BEAUTIFUL MORNING, and the sun was just rising on the horizon, and the first rays of the sun were playing with the almond leaves, and I saw an owl settling on the almond tree. He said, “Getting dark; is this a good place to rest until dawn?” Only one rabbit was listening to him. The rabbit said, “Sir, it is dawn! The sun is rising. You have it the wrong way round.”
The understanding of an owl is totally different: the night is day for him, and the day is night; and in the morning he settles for the night. Evening is his dawn. And this much gap exists between the mystic and the non-mystic. What is dawn for a mystic is a dark night for you, and what is a dark night for the mystic is all that your life consists of. Hence, the misunderstanding.
Mystics have always been misunderstood. They say something – we understand something totally different. Misunderstanding is so natural between a mystic and a non-mystic that understanding seems almost a miracle…. “
“……When Ravi Shankar is playing, you don’t bother about whether he is right or wrong. What do you mean by “right” or “wrong”? Music is music – good or bad, but not right or wrong. You don’t bother; you simply listen. and because the music has no language, you cannot translate it. You are simply in the presence of the music, surrounded by it, overwhelmed by it, taken off your feet to a faraway journey by it. But you are not deciding whether it is right or wrong, whether it appeals to your logic or not. You listen from the heart.
The mystic has to be listened to as if you are listening to music. and yes, I say to you: It is a music, far deeper than any musician can create. Once you start translating it, things become difficult.
Even these beautiful translations of Rabindranath Tagore are not true – cannot be. Kabir’s sayings are in Hindi; then they were translated into Bengalese; then from Bengali, Rabindranath translated them into English. They are faraway echoes, and much is lost. For example: I have stilled my restless mind, and my heart is radiant: for in Thatness I have seen beyond Thatness, in company I have seen the Comrade Himself.’
‘I have stilled my restless mind’… CALAT MANSA ACAL KINHI: now the original has a totally different taste to it. If I have to translate, it will say, “My Lord, so you have done it? You have made my moving mind unmoving?” That is the meaning of it: CALAT MANSA ACAL KINHI? “The mind that was always moving, always moving… my Lord, so you have done it? You have made it unmoving?” That would be truer to Kabir. CALAT MANSA ACAL KINHI? Kabir is amazed! Kabir says, “My God, what have you done? I have been trying and trying and trying, and I could not still it, and you have stilled it?
And it was so difficult, not even conceivable. Even a single thought was so difficult to drop, and now it is dropped completely, now it is nowhere! I cannot find it. All those vibrations of the mind, all those waves, continuous waves, all those thoughts, thought-processions – all have disappeared. So you have done it? CALAT MANSA ACAL KINHI? Rabindranath translates it: I HAVE STILLED MY RESTLESS MIND. Now he has missed the whole thing. He says, I HAVE STILLED MY RESTLESS MIND. No; Kabir is not saying that. The sentence can be translated this way too. So I am not saying that the translation is linguistically incorrect; it is mystically incorrect…..”
I will reiterate my earlier statement.. Whatever excerpts I post in my blogposts from Osho’s discourses are just those that support a certain point of mine and my interpretation. Your interpretation and understanding will be totally different. So please do listen to Osho or read his books. He is the Master. 🙏🏿
I loved this whole discourse because it brought home a fundamental truth – we do not listen fully and everything that we do grasp is tainted by our context and our experiences. Hence the loss in translation. For folks like us, one small change that we can make is to “listen” attentively. Listen to understand, not to reply. Catch yourself as you are forming the reply and start listening.
Thank You Master 🙏🏿
p.s the reference to the owl settling in the morning for the night is Osho’s private joke and has no resemblance to anyone living or dead …. but I have a sneaky suspicion, that Osho did mean the person you and I are thinking of, who said “this morning, I got up at night”.