The Difficulty of Being Good: On the Subtle Art of Dharma

by Gurcharan Das

Dharma, the word at the heart of the epic, is in fact untranslatable. Duty, goodness, justice, law and custom all have something to do with it, but they all fall short. Dharma refers to ‘balance’—both moral balance and cosmic balance. It is the order and balance within each human being which is also reflected in the order of the cosmos. Dharma derives from the Sanskrit root dhr, meaning to ‘sustain’.12 It is the moral law that sustains society, the individual and the world.

In this cauldron fashioned from delusion, with the sun as fire and day and night as kindling wood, the months and seasons as the ladle for stirring, Time (or Death) cooks all beings: this is the simple truth.

If greed is the sin of capitalism, envy is the vice of socialism

Envy is felt more strongly between near equals than those widely separated in fortune. It does not make sense to envy the Queen of England.

a patriarchal culture divides women into two types: angels and whores.

‘We may not admit it, but the truth is that we all seek to be loved by the world.

one’s ego is a ‘leaky balloon’ that needs constantly to be refilled through the praise and attention of others.

One should never do to another what one regards as injurious to oneself. This, in brief, is the law of dharma. —Mahabharata XVIII.113.8