अथ धर्मानुशासनम्

 Question प्रश्न 101.

What is the Discipline of Dharma?

किं धर्मानुशासनम्? 

विवेक-सम्मत धर्म क्या है और धर्म-सम्मत विवेक क्या है?

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This Question of Dharma!

For whatever reasons;

With the interaction between different cultures and societies, so many  Sanskrit / PrAkrit words entered the collective social consciousness, that has resulted in much confusion about what might be the essential and the salient features of :

 Dharma.

Those who came here in India from the far different and diverse cultures tried to study and because of political interests and influences of those, who sponsored them, interpreted and manipulated this and so many other words of  Sanskrit and PrAkrit - not to speak of all other vernacular languages too.

So let us have a fresh look into how the Sanskrit texts from the very beginning looked at and had a view of :

The Sense and meaning of  Dharma.   

To address this issue we need to see how this word has been used in the Sanskrit  texts throughout the history since the very beginning, when these texts were first written down.

Those who wrote down these texts were the disciples of the RSHi who first of all narrated these texts to them.

These texts especially the Veda were recited and learnt through listening to them which is called श्रुति / श्रवणम् .

Historically though there were many a ways to record this through in the local dialects, and accordingly the influences crept into the written texts.

The only two forms that originated were The देवनागरी / नागरी and the  ग्रन्थ लिपि  and both these forms strictly adhered to the vocal pronunciation of the language in which the Veda-texts  had to be recited, taught and learnt.

Except the தமிழ், the oldest, prevailing and still current till date, all languages maintained this status and structure of those Sanskrit texts, however  தமிழ்  created and adopted a kind of script to preserve this style in the form of  - 

ग्रन्थ लिपि.

The traditional learning of Veda  also ran in a parallel way by applying the diacritical marks so as to preserve and maintain the accuracy of pronouncing the word(s).

This was so precisely accurate that even the  साम / sAma too strictly complied with this. From sAma साम, further evolved the sAmaveda and the  सङ्गीत / samgita - the "muse" /  छन्द . Even the "Muse" was  thus an offshoot of Veda.

Let us now come upon the Dharma.

Essentially, Dharma is synonymous with Sanatana. So fundamentally and basically, there is nothing like : 

सनातन धर्म / sanAtana Dharma.

For Dharma itself is what sanAtana is, and sanAtana is, what Dharma is.

Obviously, neither Dharma and nor the  sanAtana could be restricted to religion. Because religion though be according to and supported by Dharma, it's still kind of a practice which may be according to OR opposite and may be against  विवेक / Conscience.

However, the word conscience could be derived from Sanskrit in the two ways :

शंस्  - शंसयति, to commend, recommend, 

संश् - संशयति, to doubt, to suspect.

The word Science is an example to see how it too could be derived from these above two verb-roots. And still the sense and meaning persists!

So there is :

विवेक-सम्मत धर्म,

And 

धर्म-सम्मत विवेक .

Therefore the word "Dharma" could be what is Just according to Justice; that to according to the :

प्राकृतिक न्याय  / Natural Justice.

Maybe, just for the reference we can see how the word  "Just" itself too could be derived from the Sanskrit verb-root : युक्तं . I'm not going to go in details!! 

Accordingly there is : 

वर्ण-धर्म  / varNa-dharma,

and the : 

The  आश्रम-धर्म / Ashrama-dharma,

and again the  वर्णाश्रम धर्म .

So there is:

ब्रह्मचर्य धर्म, ब्रह्मचर्य आश्रम, गृहस्थ धर्म, गृहस्थ आश्रम, वानप्रस्थ धर्म, वानप्रस्थ आश्रम, संन्यास धर्म and the संन्यास आश्रम.

This whole structure and pattern of the sanAtana has the support /  foundation of the Natural Justice. Nature is Dharma as well as the sanAtana too.

This may help us in understanding what is :

विवेक-सम्मत धर्म  and the धर्म-सम्मत विवेक.

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