WHAT IS DUTY? - 1

WHAT IS DUTY?

It is necessary in the study of Karma-Yoga to know what duty is. If I have to do
something I must first know that it is my duty, and then I can do it. The idea of
duty again is different in different nations. The Mohammedan says what is
written in his book, the Koran, is his duty; the Hindu says what is in the Vedas
is his duty; and the Christian says what is in the Bible is his duty. We find that
there are varied ideas of duty, differing according to different states in life,
different historical periods and different nations. The term "duty", like every
other universal abstract term, is impossible clearly to define; we can only get an
idea of it by knowing its practical operations and results. When certain things
occur before us, we have all a natural or trained impulse to act in a certain
manner towards them; when this impulse comes, the mind begins to think
about the situation. Sometimes it thinks that it is good to act in a particular
manner under the given conditions; at other times it thinks that it is wrong to
act in the same manner even in the very same circumstances. The ordinary idea
of duty everywhere is that every good man follows the dictates of his
conscience. But what is it that makes an act a duty? If a Christian finds a piece
of beef before him and does not eat it to save his own life, or will not give it to
save the life of another man, he is sure to feel that he has not done his duty. But
if a Hindu dares to eat that piece of beef or to give it to another Hindu, he is
equally sure to feel that he too has not done his duty; the Hindu's training and
education make him feel that way. In the last century there were notorious
bands of robbers in India called thugs; they thought it their duty to kill any man
they could and take away his money; the larger the number of men they killed,
the better they thought they were. Ordinarily if a man goes out into the street
and shoots down another man, he is apt to feel sorry for it, thinking that he has
done wrong. But if the very same man, as a soldier in his regiment, kills not
one but twenty, he is certain to feel glad and think that he has done his duty
remarkably well. Therefore we see that it is not the thing done that defines a
duty. To give an objective definition of duty is thus entirely impossible. Yet
there is duty from the subjective side. Any action that makes us go Godward is
a good action, and is our duty; any action that makes us go downward is evil,
and is not our duty. From the subjective standpoint we may see that certain acts
have a tendency to exalt and ennoble us, while certain other acts have a
tendency to degrade and to brutalise us. But it is not possible to make out with
certainty which acts have which kind of tendency in relation to all persons, of
all sorts and conditions. There is, however, only one idea of duty which has
been universally accepted by all mankind, of all ages and sects and countries,
and that has been summed up in a Sanskrit aphorism thus: “Do not injure any
being; not injuring any being is virtue, injuring any being is sin.”