Talk:The Purpose of Dharm
By Śrī Candraśekharendra Sarasvatī Svāmī
Religion is the means of realizing dharm, artha, kāma and mokṣa, Dharm does not equal to religion. These four are called puruṣārthas.
In Tamil, dharm is called “aram”; artha is known as “poruḷ”; and kāma and mokṣa are called “inbam” and viṭu respectively. Artha occurs in the term puruṣārthas, but it is itself one of the puruṣārthas? What a man wants for himself in his life are the aims of a man’s life, the puruṣārthas. What does a man want to have? He wants to live happily without lacking for anything. There are two types of happiness: the first is ephemeral; and the second is everlasting and not subject to diminution. Kāma or inbam is ephemeral happiness and denotes worldly pleasure, worldly desires. Mokṣa or viṭu is everlasting happiness, not transient pleasure. It is because people are ignorant about such happiness, how elevated and enduring it is, that they hanker after the trivial and momentary joys of kāma.
Our true quest must be for the fourth artha that is viṭu or mokṣa. The majority of people today yearn for the third artha that is kāma. When you eat, you are happy. When you are appointed a judge of the High Court, you feel elated. You are delighted when presented with a welcome address by some institution, aren’t you? Such types of happiness are not enduring. The means by which such happiness is earned is poruḷ. Poruḷ may be corn, money, or a house. It is this poruḷ that is the way to happiness. But the pleasure gained from material possessions is momentary, and you keep constantly hungering for more.
Mokṣa is the state of supreme bliss, and there is no quest beyond it. We keep going from place to place and suffer hardships of all kinds. Our destination is our home. A prisoner goes to his viṭu or his home after he is released. But the word viṭu also means release or liberation. Since we are now imprisoned in our body, we commit the grave mistake of believing that we are the body. The body is in fact our goal. Our real home is the bliss called mokṣa. We must find release from the goal that is our body and dwell in our true home. God has sentenced us to the goal (that is, he has imprisoned us in our body) for our sins. If we practice virtue he will condone our sins and release us from the prison of our body before the expiry of the sentence. We must desist from committing sinful acts so that our term of imprisonment is not extended and endeavor to free ourselves and arrive in our true home, our true home that is the Lord. This home is bliss that passeth understanding, bliss that is not bound by the limitations of time, space and matter.
Lastly, we have the first puruṣārtha, dharm. Dharm denotes beneficent action, good or virtuous deeds. The word has come to mean giving, charity. “Give me dharmam. Do dharmam, mother,” cries the beggar. We speak of “dāna-dharm” [as a portmanteau word]. The commandments relating to charity are called “āra-kaṭṭalai” in Tamil. Looked at in this way, giving away our artha or poruḷ will be seen to be dharm. But how do we, in the first place, acquire the goods to be given away in charity? The charity practiced in our former birth by giving away our artha it is what brings us rewards in this birth. The very purpose of owning material goods is the practice of dharm. Just as material possessions are a means of pleasure, so is dharm a means of material possessions. It is not charity alone that yields rewards in the form of material goods; all dharmas will bring their own material rewards.
If we practice dharm without expecting any reward in the belief that Īśvara gives us what he wills and in a spirit of dedication, the impurities tainting our being will be removed and we will obtain the exalted bliss. The pursuit of dharm that brings in its wake material rewards will itself become the means of attaining the Paramporuḷ. Thus we see that dharm, while being an instrument for making material gain and through it of pleasure, becomes the means of liberation also if it is practiced unselfishly. Through it we acquire material goods and are helped to keep up the practice of dharm. This means that artha itself becomes a basis of dharm. It is kāma or desire alone that neither fulfils itself nor becomes an instrument of fulfilling some other purpose. It is like the water poured on burning sands. Worse, it is an instrument that destroys everything—dhārmic thoughts, material possessions, liberation itself.
All the same, it is difficult, to start with, to be without any desire altogether. Religion serves to rein in desire little by little and take a man, step by step, from petty ephemeral pleasure to the ultimate bliss. First we are taught the meaning and implications of dharm, and how to practice it, then we are instructed in the right manner in which material goods are to be acquired to practice this dharm; and, thirdly, we are taught the proper manner in which desires may be satisfied. It is a process of gaining maturity and wisdom to forsake petty pleasure for the ultimate bliss of mokṣa.
Mokṣa is release from all attachments. It is a state in which the Ātman remains ever in untrammeled freedom and blessedness. The chief purpose of religion is to teach us how this supreme state may be attained.
We know for certain that ordinary people do not achieve eternal happiness. The purpose of any religion is to lead them towards such happiness. Everlasting blessedness is obtained only by forsaking the quest for petty pleasures. The dictates of dharm help us to abandon the pursuit of sensual enjoyments and endeavor for eternal bliss. They are also essential to create a social order that has the same high purpose: the liberation of all. Religion, with its goal of liberation, lays down the tenets of dharm. That is why the great understand the word dharm itself to mean religion.