THE CLASSICAL DILEMMA OF DHARMA

The Classical Dilemma of Dharma

The word Dharma has always intrigued me. I call my dilemma classical, as I know I am not the only one battling to understand what it means. Not so much because of its esoteric import for the Anglo Saxon world, or the complexity of its etymology, but more because of the complete lack of a parallel in the English language.

Morality, duty, piety, truth, religion, legality, righteousness, conduct all seem to individually and severally signify in some measure the import of the word Dharma. But only in some measure, as the significance of the word is far beyond all the above can collectively connote.

Derived from the Sanskrit Dhātu Dhŗ which means to sustain, the word Dharma defies precise definition. The manifest meaning is too broad to even a very scholarly westerner to discern, decipher and define.

As a child, sitting on my maternal grandfather’s lap, I used to hear him deliver discourses on Dharma and basically in context of the most unsung hero of epic India – Bharat, the younger brother of Rama, the King of Ayodhya. “Ye dhryati, iti Dharmah” – “That which sustains is Dharma”. This to his mind was the actually the most precise definition of the word Dharma and to me the most intriguing also. How does the common mind translate this to daily life. No way!

What sustains? Of course the cosmic order.

How does that sustain? Of course because it must.

Why does it sustain? Because of the cycle of eternal perpetuity.

And of course, I needn’t say more on why I find this the most intriguing question.

Well the demagogue ( I am a Hindu, and if I can call Hinduism a religion, there is no well defined concept of blasphemy in my religion, so I can, unlike followers of any other faiths take the liberty of calling the famous charioteer a demagogue ), who preached Dharma / Karma and then in a teacher like exasperation Bhakti to Arjuna, much as the latter, in his bout of emotionalism, failed to imbibe the subtleties of either Dharma or Karma, thus being advised by his charioteer to abandon cerebration and adopt the path of Bhakti, as Bhakti needs no reason, it is unconditional surrender to the master; was perhaps the only one who understood the esoteric import of Dharma and its ever changing and so very situation and actor specific definition.

In the Mahabharata, Dhrtrashtra was forever, fondling with the idea of Dharma, and distorting its definitions to sponsor the designs of his son - a reflection of his own aspirations - leaves the naïve reader completed confused about the concept of Dharma with his convoluted argumentations to suit his son’s ambition.

Similarly, whereas Gangaputra Bhishma, who I would say was the most coherent of the epic cast after the slave son Vidur, also has in places shown an understanding of Dharma which is very confusing. How can a Kshatriya stay a silent spectator to pawning and then humiliation much less the disrobing of a women, and even more egregiously his own grand daughter in law, in the court that he was ordained to adorn, guide and protect, against all threats from within and without, and yet claim to being on the right side of Dharma?

How can a man of such immaculate erudition and seasoned judgement as Devvratta himself, a man whose senses would have been so refined by decades of abstinence and penance, err in his understanding of the profoundness of Dharma. If err he could never, how can Dharma ever allow Bhishma to stand witness to such guile, such deceit and such avarice and such rapaciousness. How come his bow was not strung of sheer indignation and anger on those masters of deceit.

The only character in the epic who shows complete moral and intellectual fidelity to his views and values and demonstrates unwavering coherence to what he believed was his Dharma was Vidur.

Help me guys in understanding the profoundness of Dharma.