Hello friends. I'm Latta Baraiya and today in this blog I'm going to discuss one famous poem "Dino Daan" by Rabindranath Tagore. Before beginning the discussion I would like to throw some light on the poet.
Rabindranath Tagore was a Bengali polymath – poet, writer, playwright, composer, philosopher, social reformer and painter. He was a fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society. He reshaped Bengali literature and music as well as Indian art with Contextual Modernism in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Before jumping on the questions and answers let's have look at the poem :-
Said the royal attendant, “Despite entreaties, king,
The finest hermit, best among men, refuses shelter
In your temple of gold, he is singing to god
Beneath a tree by the road. The devout surround him
In numbers large, their overflowing tears of joy
Rinse the dust off the earth. The temple, though,
Is all but deserted; just as bees abandon
The gilded honeypot when maddened by the fragrance
Of the flower to swiftly spread their wings
And fly to the petals unfurling in the bush
To quench their eager thirst, so too are people,
Sparing not a glance for the palace of gold,
Thronging to where a flower in a devout heart
Spreads heaven’s incense. On the bejewelled platform
The god sits alone in the empty temple.”
At this,
The fretful king dismounted from his throne to go
Where the hermit sat beneath the tree. Bowing, he said,
“My lord, why have you forsaken god’s mighty abode,
The royal construction of gold that pierces the sky,
To sing paeans to the divine here on the streets?’
“There is no god in that temple,” said the hermit.
Furious,
The king said, “No god! You speak like a godless man,
Hermit. A bejewelled idol on a bejewelled throne,
You say it’s empty?”
“Not empty, it holds royal arrogance,
You have consecrated yourself, not the god of the world.”
Frowning, said the king, “You say the temple I made
With twenty lakh gold coins, reaching to the sky,
That I dedicated to the deity after due rituals,
This impeccable edifice – it has no room for god!”
Said the tranquil hermit, “The year when the fires
Raged and rendered twenty thousand subjects
Homeless, destitute; when they came to your door
With futile pleas for help, and sheltered in the woods,
In caves, in the shade of trees, in dilapidated temples,
When you constructed your gold-encrusted building
With twenty lakh gold coins for a deity, god said,
‘My eternal home is lit with countless lamps
In the blue, infinite sky; its everlasting foundations
Are truth, peace, compassion, love. This feeble miser
Who could not give homes to his homeless subjects
Expects to give me one!’ At that moment god left
To join the poor in their shelter beneath the trees.
As hollow as the froth and foam in the deep wide ocean
Is your temple, just as bereft beneath the universe,
A bubble of gold and pride.”
Flaring up in rage
The king said, “You false deceiver, leave my kingdom
This instant.”
Serenely the hermit said to him,
“You have exiled the one who loves the devout.
Now send the devout into the same exile, king.”
1) The poem is written before 120 years (approx.). Can you find any resemblance between the poem and the pandemic time?
Yes, I find that the poem is relevant to pandemic time also. In the corona pandemic thousands of people died and there was no space in hospitals. Countries like India have lakhs of people who believe in God except rather than humanity. During the corona pandemic we see that everything was closed. People have to stay at home. Even temples were also closed ! People talked a lot about this topic. When the money came people built a temple rather than a hospital, so now temples are closed so where will they go ? Same thing is happening in this time also that there are people like this king who are using money only to become famous and popular. There is no humanity in their hearts. People face a lot of problems during the corona pandemic. But the thing is that God is not in temples but in you ! And that can be reflected through your behavior, your way of treating others !
2) Why do you think the King is angry on the Sage?
King is angry with the sage because the sage doesn't accept the proposal of the king. King offered him a beautiful temple for living there and for worship. But the sage denied his offer by saying that God is not there in the temple, God has gone away with the poor people. There is no need for this beautiful temple if you can't help poor people who are your (King's) responsibility. The sage speaks truth and all we know that,
"Truth is always bitter !"
So that's why the king thought that the sage was insulting my decision. The sage hurts the ego of the king. This is why the king is angry with him.
3) Why do you think the Sage denies to enter in the temple?
The sage denied to enter in the temple because he believes that God is not living in the gold temples. He thinks that God is living with the pure and kind people. What should we do with this gold, if the gold came from poor people's hard work. If they don't have enough food for survival, this gold temple is useless ! Instead of living there God will choose to live under the trees because the poor people take rest under that tree.
4) Can there be any connection between the text of the poem and the verdict of Ayoydhya Ram Mandir?
Yes ! There is a connection between the text of the poem and the verdict of Ayodhya Ram Mandir. When our prime minister bricks the first stone in Ram Mandir Ayodhya that time this poem came out on social media and became viral. It's deep connection with this poem and Ayodhya temple. As we know, people around us are very religious. They spend crores of rupees to build temples. See the position of poor people in India, there are millions of people who are not able to get food at one time and on the other side people are wasting money to build statues and temples. Even our government is spending money on building these stuff rather than building hospitals and schools ! If you develop your country you should make your health and education system strong. And I think temples are not going to help you in building a developed country.
Thank you.
