Concept Of Dharma

Dharma is ubiquitous in Indian Vedic/lndic/ Hindu philosophy. Dharma is law or moral law or law and morality or natural law by acceptance jusreceptum which is believed to have been ordained by Divine Author; it is not a law as we understand it today. We have so far believed the truth in the lie that the Western legal thought the only faviour for Indian legal perception forgetting that those Western scholars have had conceived their legal concepts as per their own systems requirement. Our Vedic/lndic/ Sastric ideas are hidden treasures of legal knowledge and provide deep as well as ample insights in a perfectly clear manner to unfold it and develop Indian Legal Theory on the legal cosmology for the futurology of legal concept conscientiously, obediently as a duty and an obligation.

"The fundamental importance of the concept of dharma for the Hindu tradition and any account of it is matched by the resistance of this concept to comprehensive definition and comprehensive monographic treatment.1 The term dharma has the widest scope of application covering all areas of human life. It is the concept the Hindus have used for centuries to articulate what is right, both true and proper, in every sphere to which they turned their minds - religious, philosophical, social, legal - the list is as endless as the propensity of the human mind to conceptualisation. Through the particular meaning it has in any given context dharma highlights the uniqueness of every moment of life, whereas through its operation across contexts it emphasizes the interconnectedness of life's particulars. The context sensitivity of dharma makes it necessary to contextualise any study of it. My treatment of it is not and cannot be comprehensive: the aim of the present work is to study the concept of dharma in its religio-philosophical dimension, tracing its development from the Vedas to the didactic passages of the Mahàbhàrata. I believe that studying dharma from the religio-philosophical perspective is a useful starting point: due to the pervasiveness of religious thought in the Hindu tradition the meanings dharma has in this sphere inform its use in other spheres. A competent examination of dharma in its religio-philosophical aspect can therefore chart the domain of dharma in broad outlines which can be subsequently filled in with more specific studies. In the religio-philosophical, as in any other of its semantic fields, the concept of dharma cannot be studied in isolation. As a master key to a large network of concepts and ideas, dharma opens a wide field of investigation. To account for the developments in the ideology of dharma one must look at all the significant religio-philosophical developments in the period under consideration. " - from the Introduction

The answer to philosophical questions will often depend on the position one takes regarding the fact-value problem. It is, therefore, not surprising that, in the tradition of western philosophy, the past 200 years or so record an animated discussion of it. In the present collection the debate is continued by representatives of various "schools" in contemporary western thought. A number of philosophers from non-western cultures, too, enter into it. The contributions do not all reflect on the same theme, nor do they use the same approach. Essays written by philosophers sympathetic to the analytical tradition are followed by reflections on the part of those inspired by phe nomenology. A third group of contributions is by non-western thinkers, who are more likely to approach the problem in terms of culture. Their engage ment with the issue clearly shows, among other things, that it is almost exclusively in the western tradition that the fact-value distinction is often understood as an outright dichotomy. The occasion for the publication of this collection is Dr. Cornelis Anthonie van Peursen's retirement as Professor of Philosophy. This year he leaves the Free University, Amsterdam; until 1982 he was professor at the University of Leyden as well. In the Netherlands and beyond he has become known for his concern with constructive comparison of diverging philosophical trends and the cross-cultural fertilization of thought. Characteristic of his career are his efforts to render the results of academic philosophizing understand able to a broader audience.

This short treatise explains in detail the principle of Radical Pluralism which asserts that the elements alone are realities while every combination of them is a mere name covering a plurality of separate elements. The principle has been elucidated by its contrast with Arambhavada which maintains the reality of the whole as well as of the elements and with Parinama-vada which ascribes absolute reality to the whole. The work is divided into sixteen sections dealing with Skandhas, Ayatanas, Dhatus, Elements of mind, Pratityasamutpada, Karma, Impermanence in Sankhya-Yoga, Theory of Cognition, Pre-Buddhaic Buddhism etc. It has two appendices dealing with the views of Vasubandhu on the fundamental principles of Sarvastivada and the classification of all elements of existence according to the Sarvastivadins. The two indices appended to the work record proper names and Sanskrit terms occurring in the work.

This is the first scholarly book devoted to the study of the term dharma with in the broad scope of Indian cultural and religious history. Most generalizations about Indian culture and religion upon close scrutiny turn out to be inaccurate. An exception undoubtedly is the term dharma. This term and the notions underlying it clearly constitute the most central feature of Indian civilization down the centuries, irrespective of linguistic, sectarian, or regional differences. The nineteen papers included in this collection deal with many significant historical manifestations of the term dharma. These studies by some of the leading scholars in the respective fields will both present a more nuanced picture of the semantic history of dharma by putting contours onto the flat landscape we have inherited and spur further studies of this concept so central for understanding the cultural history of the Indian subcontinent.

Master's Thesis from the year 2017 in the subject Law - Comparative Legal Systems, Comparative Law, , language: English, abstract: This study intends to be a comparative analysis between two legal tradition which grew up in two different civilizations. The concept of Dharma in Medieval Hindu legal philosophy and Thomas Aquinas’ Natural Law theory have been taken into the comparison in this research as two great legal traditions which grew in the same period of middle age. This research has examined the salient features of natural law ascribed by concept of Dharma in medieval Hindu jurisprudence and how natural law was perceived by Aquinas in his legal philosophy which was aptly described in his master work “ Summa Theologiae”. Apart from mere analyzing facts this study further examines the affinities that existed between concept of Dharma and Aquinas’ theory of Natural Law.