Dharma: the Hindu, Jain, Buddhist and Sikh traditions of India

Dharma is central to all the indigenous religious traditions of India, which cannot adequately be understood apart from it.

Often translated as 'ethics', 'religion' or 'religious law', dharma possesses elements of each of these but is not confined to any single category.

Neither is it the equivalent of what many in the West might usually consider to be 'a philosophy'.

This much needed analysis of the history and heritage of dharma shows that it is instead a multi-faceted religious force, or paradigm, that has defined and that continues to shape South Asian civilization in a whole multitude of forms.