Skip to main content

DHARMA - The goal and means of Human Life!


Hindu religion-Sanatana Dharma has always spoken about Purusharthas,purusha translates to man and artha translates to goal.

The purushathas or goals worthy of human pursuit i.e. artha ,kama ,moksha with dharma as the means and basis of achieving them.

It has always been clear that it is dharma that precedes and supercedes everything else, it is the foundational principle of life and it is dharma that is Eternal,hence the name Sanatana Dharma.
Though in the last few centuries with the increasing popularity and accessibility of yoga it seems that Hindu religion had taken a form where it shifted itself from being dharma centric to becoming more karma centric. 

Karma was given higher priority than dharma and in the process moksha , liberation and escaping from the human cycle of birth and death became central and the most important goal of human life.

Therein arose the increased tendency of Hindus for the ascetic withdrawal from life to achieve moksha , in the process giving birth to new forms and religions like Buddhism, Jainism etc

What most people don't realise is that it is a deviation from the original the vedic way of life and the purushathas. 
When you place moksha above everything else it does not render itself to the foundational principle of dharma but rather an escape from responsibility and focuses more on personal ambition of escaping from cycle of birth and death.

It would be wrong to assume that yoga , liberation or enlightenment is not important in Hindu Religion or Sanatana Dharma , it is a necessary but not a sufficient condition and  hence moksha in itself cannot be the end and final goal of life.

The goal of human life is not escaping from cycles of birth and death, it is not attaining moksha or nirvana,nor  is it attaining heaven ,neither is it the ascetic withdrawal from societal life but 
Establishment of Dharma and the Divinisation of Life

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Miss you Maa!

My grandmother's life revolved around her family, whether it was shopping for her grandchildren, planning for their weddings, doing evening Bhajans with them. The family was her central locus of operation, from keeping tally of house expenses, daily pooja, visiting temples, traveling. 5 years ago she had a paralytic attack which left her left leg paralyzed, she was able to recover from it with her strong will power but it was never the same, a couple of months later she started showing symptoms of dementia and Parkinsons, her dinacharya and responsibilities took a toll though she never gave up doing Hanuman Chalisa and Sunder Kand every day. We still managed to go out at least once a month for a temple visit along with eating her favourite food Paani Puri outside. In 2019 we went for a small pilgrimage to Kanchipuram along with her and some of my relatives for darshan of Athi Varadaraja Swamy when he was raised from Amritha Saras which happens once in 40 years, unlike us she couldn...

Sabarimala,Women and Menstruation!

All right, so this issue of women of menstruating age, aren't allowed to enter the Sabiramala Temple, and the recent judgement which comes as a relief to the previous blunder of defying the practice. When movies like Padman, Toilet are released worldwide, it gives us an idea of what the general mentality of people is, with respect to hygiene and menstruation , in modern day India. Though it is sad to look at , what's even more depressing is the take on the situation prevelant, trying to potray it as a culture which considers menstruation as something impure, women a class lower to men. It is indeed disappointing to see all the cultural failures, when people fail to recognise that the Kamkhya Temple,Assam where the devi here is worshipped in the form a Yoni. They celebrate the Ambubachi Mela, a festival marking thedevi going through her annual mensuration cycle. A culture where menarche is celebrated in many places across India as Ritu Kala Samskara, whe...

Where is this thing called peace?!

Namaste everyone,this being my first post on my blog,I would like to share something on peace. Everyone in this world are  looking directly or indirectly for peace,not ultimately but yes.Everyone in this world deserves to be peaceful,yet it is not so?Have we ever thought why?Let me be clear that when we talk about peace it is not siting quietly in meditation, it is the state of being stress free,whether while working or eating or whatever work it is! So let us get back to the question,what is stopping us from being peaceful?  From not finding car keys, to exams, to day to day work, to rocket science,there is something which is not letting us be peaceful? So what is this  something, it is our own attitude towards Peace! NO Peace and KNOW Peace, both sound the same,both may look to be different,but are they really different? Just knowing about Peace is the same as NOT knowing about peace, only if we are able to live by so, only then KNOWING and NOT KNOWING about Peace ...

Sexuality and The Divine!

It is the sad reality of modern India, that we have become subservient to Western/ Victorian Morality, we are slowly turning into such sick hypocrites that it is difficult to even start a conversation, in these lines. So, if a thirteen-year-old boy/girl who has just hit puberty, getting into their teens and they go to watch a movie with an intimate sex scene playing right out there, what to do you expect? You expect the boy/girl not go get aroused, not to think in those terms, just watch it like it is a passing scene, act like they are 40-year-old grown-ups? It is not very simple as it sounds, what is it that is the repercussion, consequence of it? Either you accept the western way, accept that intimacy in teenage is quite common, and it's all right to choose that path, or are you looking at it from a point of view that it's not the right age, and maybe hence not morally just, to choose it. But herein lies the problem, you don't have the guts to debate either of th...

Free of Cost?!

I was at my office and a lady walked in,  started her story of how she came to Bangalore with her children and husband and, how she is staying at the railway station, and needed some money. She trying to play the emotional victim, threw at me a list of people who have given her 100,200 rs each. I just asked her one question, what have you done in the last 4 days to find a place/job to work? She tried to reinstate her community card and I was adamant at the question. All the drama stopped, she took her piece of paper and walked out with sense of anger. I continued to do my work. You drive to a signal and there's a man dressed in a saree trying to molest you and take some money. Alright in Sanskrit I learnt Puling (male), striling (female) and napunsakling, it is very clear that our ancestors knew that its alright, there was no need to negate or promote it. But now, for what it seems(at least 80% of the cases) is that, it's a very easy way to earn money and moreover on what ba...