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KarmaVaani

Beginner · 7 lessons · about 64 min

Hinduism: first steps

For the curious, and for anyone returning

Seven short lessons on the ideas, texts, practices and places at the heart of Sanatana Dharma, each one opening into the part of the site that goes deeper.

7 lessons
Illustration: A North Indian Nagara-style stone temple with a tall curvilinear shikhara tower and an amalaka crown, a saffron flag, a courtyard with a few steps
Start: Dharma, karma and moksha

  1. Dharma, karma and moksha

    5 min

    Three words that frame almost everything else: right living, the law of action, and freedom.

    Open

  2. One truth, many forms

    8 min

    How Brahman, Ishvara and the many deities fit together, and why a Hindu home may honour several.

    Open

  3. The texts: Vedas to the epics

    6 min

    Shruti and smriti: the Vedas and Upanishads, then the Ramayana and Mahabharata that carry their teaching in story.

    Open

  4. The Gita’s second chapter

    20 min

    Krishna begins his teaching: the self that is not born and does not die, and how to act without being bound by results.

    Open

  5. Puja and darshan

    5 min

    What worship at home and in a temple involves, and what it means to see and be seen by the deity.

    Open

  6. The sacred year

    10 min

    How the lunar calendar fixes festivals and fasts, and what each one is kept for.

    Open

  7. Sacred places

    10 min

    Tirthas, the great temples and pilgrimage circuits, on a map of 3,474 temples.

    Open