Varnashrama Dharma (वर्णाश्रमधर्मः)

परिचयः ॥ Introduction

The principles of varna and ashrama are founded upon the principles of Purushartha viz. dharma, artha, kama, moksha that are the foundation of India’s culture. These Purusharthas together with varna and ashrama sum up the entire principles of Indian culture. Through the fulfilment of these, life became complete socially, physically, psychologically, intellectually, and spiritually.

Indian Outlook of Life

The perfect outlook of life considers four aspects which form inseparable ingredients of the very notion of perfection viz.

• society
• the individual
• the universe
• God

These four principles sum up the central objectives of what may be called the human perspective.

No man in this world is complete, and no man can be complete.The human personality is an admixture of various levels or, we can say, forces. The wisdom of the ancients was such that they contemplated a system of introducing some sort of perfection into the social order by bringing together the various partial endowments of personalities into an ordered system, which gave the shape of perfection. This vision of perfection took into consideration four objectives of human existence known as the Purusharthas and is worked out through the administration and organisation of society, and the discipline of the individual. The organisation of society took the form of the varna system, and the discipline of the individual took the form of the ashrama system. These are the famous varna and ashrama orders of the regulation of life as a whole.