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The Concept of Dharma : A Reappraisal : 105
that is usually accepted as the point of recognition for philosophy. Religion being founded on faith and philosophy being based on reason and logic are thus viewed to be poles asunder. However, there has been recent attempts to explore the rational basis of religious faith and, in this context, the role and contribution of philosophy of religion is, obviously remarkable. But again it is to be noted here that such philosophical enterprise of analyzing the religious concepts and theories is not set to defend or offend any such theoretical positions but only to understand the discourse of religion purely from the point of view of conceptual analysis. It is not a religious but distinctly a meta-religious enquiry. Dharma, as hinted before, is not same as theology. Its primary concern is morality. Even if theistic frame is given prominence in certain circle, it is not at the cost of moral significance. Iśvara is too bound by the moral law which is viewed as fully autonomous.
When dharma is interchanged with the practice of certain rites and rituals with the supposition that such practices would give rise to the attainment of supra-empirical status in the realm of divinity, that sense of dharma is set aside by the Advaita Vedāntins like Sankara who unequivocally holds that Advaita darśana is for jñānamimārsā. For his dārśanic program, Sankara never propounds a theological doctrine. His Advaitavāda is a typical philosophical position having a deep-rooted metaphysical and epistemological significance. In the classical Indian philosophical perspective, there are well known schools of darśana and those are never set to found any religious sect or cult. However, in the tradition, one comes across the different formulations like Śaiva, Sākta, Saurya, Gāņapatya, Vaisnava and so on. But those are, it should be noted, not distinct dārśanic positions based upon philosophical reasoning, rather those are different theistic positions based on diverse forms of faith/belief. This point of view at times is found to have been traced in certain quarters as some form of philosophy and thereby attempts have been made to expose their
