---
type: Concept
title: "Dharma"
description: "The cosmic ordering principle, ethical duty, and inherent nature of reality — the most untranslatable word in Sanskrit."
reception_note: "Present dharma as its own category, not through the colonial-era box 'religion' or its shadow renderings 'duty'/'law'; that boxing is a documented 19th-century construction (census categories; Monier-Williams 1899) addressed in the not: field and Error Genealogy."
tags:
  - ethics
  - metaphysics
  - social-order
  - Vedanta
  - non-translatable
darshana:
  - Pan-dharmic
not:
  - term: "Religion"
    why: "Implies a belief system with founder, book, and creed; Dharma has no founder, predates any text, and is discovered, not converted to."
    instead: "Keep Dharma untranslated; gloss per context (cosmic order, svadharma, inherent nature)."
  - term: "Duty"
    why: "Strips the cosmic and metaphysical dimensions, reducing Dharma to social obligation; duty is imposed, Dharma is inherent."
  - term: "Righteousness"
    why: "Imports Christian moral absolutes; Dharma is context-sensitive, shifting with role, circumstance, and consequence."
  - term: "Law"
    why: "Suggests external legislation; Dharma (ṛta) is the inherent ordering principle of reality, not a rule imposed from outside."
  - term: "Morality"
    why: "Reduces Dharma to ethics; it also denotes the inherent nature of a thing (the dharma of fire is to burn)."
related:
  - /concepts/karma.md
  - /concepts/moksha.md
  - /concepts/viveka.md
  - /concepts/yoga.md
  - /concepts/vairagya.md
timestamp: "2026-06-18"
okf_version: "0.2"
---

# Dharma

**Not:** Religion, Duty, Righteousness, Law, Morality

## What It Actually Means

Dharma operates at multiple simultaneous levels — cosmic, social, and individual — which is precisely why no single English word can capture it.

At the **cosmic level**, Dharma is *ṛta* — the fundamental ordering principle that holds the universe together. It is not a rule imposed from outside; it is the inherent nature of how reality functions.

At the **social level**, Dharma is the ethical and behavioral framework appropriate to one's stage of life (*āśrama*), role (*varṇa*), and circumstances. It is context-dependent, not categorical — what is dharmic in one situation may be adharmic in another.

At the **individual level**, Dharma is *svadharma* — one's own nature, calling, and unique path. The Bhagavad Gītā (3.35): "Better is one's own dharma, though imperfectly performed, than the dharma of another well performed."

Dharma also means the inherent property of a thing — the dharma of fire is to burn, the dharma of water is to flow. In this sense, it precedes ethics entirely and describes the nature of reality itself.

## Why the Substitutes Fail

**"Religion"** implies a belief system with a founder, a book, and a creed. Dharma has no founder, predates any single text, and is discovered (not revealed). You cannot "convert" to Dharma — you can only recognize it.

**"Duty"** strips the cosmic and metaphysical dimensions entirely, reducing Dharma to a social obligation. Duty is imposed; Dharma is inherent.

**"Righteousness"** imports Christian moral absolutes. Dharma is context-sensitive — the Mahābhārata's genius is showing how Dharma shifts depending on circumstance, role, and consequence.

## Audience Metaphor

Dharma is like gravity — it's the fundamental force that keeps everything in its orbit. You don't choose to follow gravity; you can only align with it or fight it. Fighting it doesn't break the law — it breaks you.

## Citations

1. [Bhagavad Gītā](/references/bhagavad-gita.md) (especially chapters 2–3, 18)
2. Mahābhārata — Śānti Parva
3. Manusmṛti (with Dharmic interpretive tradition)
4. Rajiv Malhotra, *Being Different* (2011)

## Error Genealogy

- Dharma boxed into the Western category "religion" (and its shadow renderings duty and law) was constructed by colonial administration and census categories (19th c.) and fixed by missionary/colonial lexicography (Monier-Williams, 1899). See [G6 — Dharma = religion](../../../GENEALOGIES.md) in the repository root for the full chain and sources.
