Dharma Lakshanas

   Rta is the cosmic order – consisting of the laws that govern the functioning of the manifested universe.  Rita is the order through which the universal intelligence unfolds in action – whether it be creation, sustenance or destruction. 

   Dharma is connected to action whether through physical action or through the awareness of unacted thought vibrations.   And when this awareness or actions are in line with Rita, such actions form Dharma. 

   Atma gunas are primarily qualities of outflowing personal expression accompanied by the absence of relative intent.  Atma gunas make a human being realise and express his divine nature. 

    Dharma lakshanas however apply within the world of space and time, in the world of human beings – they are just characteristics of Dharma.  They enable the human being to function harmoniously in the social and natural surroundings to which he belongs.  Dharma is dynamic and has two facets.  The first facet primarily deals with awareness and is timeless seeking to take man closer to his divine nature.  The second facet is a characteristic of relational intent – seeking to guide the human being in his dealings with fellow human beings.  The application of this second aspect is dynamic and is influenced by the space and time in which it is utilised. And the objective is that it should not contradict the first and primary objective of taking man closer to his divine nature.  

   There are several human characteristics that are expounded as Dharma lakshanas including the 36 in the Bhagavad Gita which are more comprehensive.  But the 10 Dharma lakshanas indicated by Manu make a more handy number to remember.  Manu alternates between characteristics that primarily seek to shift you into your deeper inner awareness and characteristics that mainly moderate your relationship with society and nature.  Here is the Sanskrit verse:

    Dhrtih kshamaa damah asteyam shaucham indriya-nigrahah |

    Dheeh vidyaa satyam akrodhah dashakam dharma lakshanah ||

   Dhrtih – Dhrtih means to hold, to contain. It gives rise to the awareness that there is something that needs to be supported.  It is the fulcrum, the point of balance, the knife edge about which the law of balance hinges.  Every single law of the physical universe is just a law of balance.  It tells you what exists on either side of an equation.  Dhrutih is stationing our awareness on the equal sign in the equation.   It is knowing what has been put on one side of the balance and knowing that that it is now left to our choice to put something on the other side.  Dhrtih is knowing that in order to sustain the world of forms, choice must be executed with care in order to achieve a steadiness.  This sense of steadiness, of firmness which gives rise to an intrinsic flow of happiness and contentment is Dhrtih, a dharma lakshana that is facing inward.

    Kshamaa – forgiveness – It is not just forgiving an external act of violence against you, but also forgiving yourself for any violence that you may have perpetrated in your own personal field.  It is a way of getting out of the circle of violence.  It is a stepping back from the vicious cycle of violence, however small, whether in thought, word or deed.  It is a stepping back into the awareness of the futility of the cycles of violence and the negative fallout that hurts both the perpetrator and the victim.  Forgive therefore, if not to raise another, indeed to raise thine own self beyond the circles of violence.

   Damah – damah means to tame, to subdue – subdue something that arises within you, a negative and false force that seeks to take you over and run your life.  Tame the senses.  Subdue the appetite for more and more possessions.  Tame greed.  Subdue lust.  Tame the ego.  Sudue the penchant for catering to sense enjoyments.  Through damah, through taming and subduing, rise in self-command; act with self restraint; rise into Dharma.

    Asteyam – not taking that which is not rightfully yours.  It goes beyond stealing.  It applies even to a degree of personal wealth.  In Ancient Indian thought, one could earn any amount of wealth but there a limit as to how much he could keep and call it rightfully his.  Hoarding more than what is required is considered as stealing – the wise say that it was what was enough to survive for 3 days in Satya yuga; 3 years in Treta yuga, 3 decades in Dwapara yuga and 3 generations in Kali yuga.  If one hoards more than what is enough for 3 generations, he begins to fall from the human form and depending on what other qualities accompany this fall, he achieves a suitable non-human form.  This is illustrated in the Mahabharata story – Vyaasa and the Worm [see blog article - March].  Hoarding is depriving others of what could otherwise be shared, of depriving society of what could otherwise be spent in the cause of ‘Dharma’.   Therefore, if you have enough and more, make haste to give the excess away – but do it with discretion – ensure that it is spent in the cause of Dharma. 

   Shaucham – cleanliness. Not just physical cleanliness but also mental cleanliness.  A quality that arises in a person who just the way he regularly cleanses his physical body, also cleanses his subtle body, cleanses his mind field of all unnatural expressions and attachment to anything that is impermanent.  The natural world is supremely clean.  Without man, all lakes and rivers would be pristine.  May man reach that state again which will enable him to live a clean life in wonderful harmony with nature.

   Indriya nigraha – control of the five senses in your interactions with the external world – see not that which ought not to be seen; hear not that which ought not to be heard.  Control yourself, hold yourself from speaking that which ought not to be spoken.  Be thine own master; never touch that which is not yours.  Control your breath.  Breathe regularly.  Let not chaotic breathing make its home inside you.   Control your breathing and thereby your senses.

  

   Dheeh – intelligence, understanding – shift your awareness from the world of mind-driven ideas to the higher realm of pure intelligence which is a reflected quality of the universal organising principle at work.  Dwell in this intelligence, dwell in this higher understanding.  Act not, react not, just because it seems right to your mind.  The mind is just a storehouse of impressions and patterns, of memories and broken paths.  Consider it within your intelligent understanding of how the world operates……….and then act in dheeh.

   Vidyaa – gather information about how the world operates, obtain this knowledge, obtain also the art which is the secret of expression of this knowledge by subduing the mind and utilising one’s faculties.  This is vidyaa – true education.  Know that in its seed form, the world is one.  Know the duality that pervades all of nature.  Know of the three gunas – Sattva, rajas and tamas that interweave their magic in the manifested world.  Know of the four purusharthas – the fourfold goals of life – dharma, artha, kaama and moksha.  Know of the 5 senses, their roles and their play.  Know of the 6 gates to downfall – lust, anger, greed, arrogance, infatuation and jealousy.  Know of the seven steps to liberation, the eight fold path of yoga, the nature of the body with nine gates.  Know the ten Dharma lakshanas and be thou truly educated. 

   Satyam – truth - Satya or Truth applies to the spoken word.  It can also be said to be Dharma in the realm of the spoken word.  Satya is connected to verbal expression whether through the spoken word or through unspoken thoughts.  Ponder therefore before you utter.  Make no haste.  Only that speech which is both true and pleasant is the truth.  That which is unpleasant can be a fact but never the truth.  Seek therefore that which is pleasant as well as true.  Resort to silence if you are in doubt.  And time will reveal satya, that which is true.   

   Akrodhah – absence of anger – anger is one of the great pitfalls of human character.  In anger grave sins are committed, words that ought never to have been uttered are uttered.  Curses and damnations pollute the world of human speech.  Eschew anger.  Withdraw yourself into that deep layer within yourself, into region of a deep and timeless calm.  Know that anger is external and temporary.  Stay a witness to the situation until anger subsides.  Anger can not be sustained.  It will eventually evaporate.  Rise and dwell beyond the reach of anger. 

  The important thing to remember is just as daylight cannot exist with darkness, Dharma cannot exist with adharma.  If you say that we will have a little bit of loss of control of the senses, i.e., we are suffering a loss in the area of indriya nigrahah, then adharma will rush to fill this space and Dharma will vacate it.  Thus co-existence cannot be encouraged in the name of tolerance.  Adharma must be eroded, removed or rooted out.  What is needed is tact - an approach which seeks to enable the preservation of the potentials of the vehicle which is to exhibit Dharma, i.e., the body-mind complex.  We must slowly remove that which is Adharma through various strategies from occupying any part of the body-mind complex since we are convinced that Dharma alone shall eventually fully shine through our physical mental frame.  After all it is Dharma that has given birth to this human form.  Dharma is not just a bundle of rules but essentially refers to the constitutive laws of the manifest world through which every form comes into being.  And it is a natural debt of gratitude that we owe to nature and a privilege of gratification that we fully occupy and establish our presence in this being that we inhabit.  Thus Dharma helps us in establishing our presence and eliminates absence.  Presence of being leads to consciousness and absence of being to unconsciousness.  Thus each of the 10 Dharma Lakshanas helps us in establishing and maintaining our conscious presence in the body-mind field. 

   Use the 10 Dharma lakshanas to shift to the layer of awareness deep within yourself where you are aware of that which can be sustained, that which ought to be upheld, that which must be supported, that which we must seek to protect, that which is Dharma.   

   And it is not that man is needed for Dharma that governs all of the manifested world.  It is the other way around.  If man wishes to continue to explore and live, he must live in Dharma. It is not either that the universal laws are powerless.  Nature can very well take care of itself.


  Man is incidental.  Dharma is eternal.  One who ignores this truth is only inviting destruction........as the saying goes:

Dharma eva hato hanti

Dharmo rakshati rakshitah

Tasmaat dharmo na hantavyah

Maano dharmo hatah avadheet [hatOvadheet]

[The great fabric of] dharma destroys those that seek to destroy it

Dharma protects those that protect it

Therefore do not attempt to destroy Dharma

Respect Dharma, do not invite destruction

Affirmation or Prayer?

A prayer or an affirmation is a method that is resorted to acquire or strengthen a certain attainable human potential.  Thus one can only pray for something that one is eligible to receive.  And this something cannot be a material object even though more often than not people pray for material things.  In order to achieve a material objective, a material effort must be made - a mental effort cannot do it.  A mental effort can only strengthen the mental capacity of a person, strengthen only a certain inner faculty of his/her personality.  If this faculty is entirely absent in a person, no amount of prayer can yield such a faculty in the same birth - for example, a blind man by birth cannot pray and be cured of his blindness.  

In many ancient Indian texts, we find that the path of affirmation is resorted to, as opposed to the usual path of prayer.  The path of prayer is far more popular and common whether one is praying for physical well being or for material prosperity.  The path of affirmation is less known and seldom used but still is very much part of the spiritual seeking process in Ancient Indian thought.  Both are valid paths and one may choose one or the other based on what he is comfortable with.  

When you make a prayer, you are making a request.  If you are praying to a granting deity, you are doing it so that the deity may be pleased with your prayer and may grant your wish as prasadam [benign fruit] - a deity is nothing but the pure unbiased intelligence and complete potential of a particular faculty.  For example if a child has made a mistake and has been given a time-out by its mother, then the child can pray to the mother to free it from its predicament.  Here the mother is the pure and unbiased intelligence having the complete potential to grant freedom to the child.  When you make a prayer therefore, the granting force is seen to be outside - external to you.   And it makes for a degree of comfort when you see the deity as external and as an office to which you can apply.  When you make an affirmation  however, you are acknowledging that the deity and the prasadam are both within you.  

The request or prayer puts us into a dialogue and the moment you enter a dialogue, the mind and ego enter the picture.  The mind tells you of other options and other desires.  The ego tells you either that you should not be asking for something or creates an expectation.  When the mind is involved, it tends to stick to something more than the other.  It might say that this desire is preferable to the other.  It depends on the maturity of the person.  


A mature person can ask and obtain in a manner that doesn't hurt him.  But this is not the case with everyone.  If we are granted what we ask with our limited knowledge, then it may be counter productive to our own well being in the long term.   If you are not mature in your understanding and in your relationship with the divine, any request carries the danger of feeding your false self or the Ego. In fact an unbridled ego can never be comfortable with a mature request and will likely create a reaction.  Therefore when one is praying, one should be knowledgeable and aware and must seek in wisdom. 

When you are affirming using an established mantra [a formula set in a language and tone that communicates  the intent of the words through both meaning as well as vibration] you are using the mind only as an instrument to state an affirmation and are not seeking its involvement.  The advantage is that there is no requirement of maturity of a person.  Any person howsoever immature can just chant it and await the vibratory strength of the mantra to do its work.   Only he must know the mantra properly and must have the faith in its power.  

Whether it is a prayer or an affirmation, the intent is to endow you with the attribute that is asked for in the prayer or stated in the affirmation.  It is important for one to know what to ask.  One can ask for atma gunas or for dharma lakshanas.  For this one must know what truly constitutes a divine characteristic [atma guna] or a sustainable human characteristic [dharma lakshana].

Those who wish to remain in the worldly sphere of work and human association, prefer the dharma kshetra - the field of dharma.  This is based on the recognition of the attributes of the dharma kshetra which are reflected in our body-mind complex and in the natural external world.  Seeing them as attributes of a naturally existing field also enables us to be comfortable with these attributes without attaching our ego to it.  It is not an external gain resulting in the setting up of a rna [imbalance] but a seeking in your effort to express your natural potential.  Knowing dharma, we seek to become the dharmajna [knower of the field of manifestation - dharma kshetra].

Those who wish to go beyond the dimensions of space and time, seek to express divine qualities called atma gunas.  They are in fact the natural attributes of our divine self.  Expressing these, we seek to become the atmajna - the knower of the pure divinity within us - the atman.   

Whenever we think of asking for something, we find that it is difficult to ask for something specific.  This is why the scriptural verses such as the chamakam [a portion of Vedic Hymns to Lord Rudra/Shiva - the deity of knowing] explicitly specify what can be asked or affirmed.  Truly, any desire that arises in our individual mind only takes us away from the Lord.  

A prayer takes the external route while an affirmation takes the internal route.  It is like Lord Subramanya  [first son of Lord Shiva and Goddess Parvati] going around the world while Lord Ganesha [second son of Lord Shiva and Goddess Parvati] simply goes around his parents.  While Subramanya is the commander of the devas, he recognises the kshetra as the external manifested kshetra.  Ganesha who realises that what is projected out is only an image of what is inside, just circum-ambulates his parents.  Once you turn your eye inward, the inward becomes closer and easier to access.  An affirmation readily communicates to your subtle body because the sookshma sharira [subtle body] understands only the binary language like a computer.  The subtle body is also vibratory in nature and affirmations change its frequency of vibration more directly than a prayer.

Whether you take the external route of prayer or the internal route of affirmation, it eventually amounts to the same thing.  The prayer may be more suitable for asking for a potential that is more helpful in the external field of work and an affirmation may be more suitable for asking for a potential that is more helpful in our inward seeking.  What is important is that we know what we want.  This is where the ancient texts authored by seers are a wonderful source of knowledge.

It is best that our prayers and affirmations are guided by the experience of sages and seers rather than being chosen by us with our limited knowledge and understanding.  We bow down in gratitude to those knowers of the divine, the knowers of the Lord.  We pray to Him who is the source and substratum of the universe to grant us the ability to affirm without doubt, to declare without hesitation that our true dwelling is within the soft glow of the gentle awareness of His glorious presence.   

bhagavadarpanam