Dharma is the practical experience of God. When a dumb man tastes candy, he experiences its sweetness, but he is incapable of describing it. Similarly, someone who has the divine experience forgets himself totally and is silent – this state of silence is ‘dharma’. So, dharma is the experience of the Self which is within each one of us. Swami Vivekananda said, “Religion means realisation”. When people preserve this experience in their lives, it is dharma. In other words, dharma is not book-knowledge but the practical experience of the Self and this experience is called atma-gyan or self-realisation. Real dharma is self-realisation.
