Dharma: The Path of Righteousness and Duty

Dharma is the moral compass that guides individuals to live in harmony with their divine essence and the cosmic order. It is the soul’s duty to align its actions with dharma, embodying righteousness and fulfilling its purpose. This adherence to dharma not only facilitates the soul’s progression but also contributes to the unravelling of the physical ‘cocoon,’ preparing the soul for its eventual release and ascent into a more expansive spiritual existence.

The word comes from Hinduism, where dharma is the order that holds the world together and the conduct that upholds it. Its best-known scripture teaches that it is better to follow one’s own dharma imperfectly than another’s well, and in that scripture the duty is bound to the class a person is born into. UPL takes the first teaching and not the second: each person has a path of right action that is their own, found by conscience and not assigned by birth. In Buddhism the same word, as Dhamma, means the Buddha’s teaching and the truth it points to.