ABSTRACT
Vyasa's early Samkhya views on the five senses matched up with their objects: the five material elements also remain at the foundation of his "theory of meaning of life". Vyasa often switches to a beast's-eye view of human life which, though full of suffering and ruptures of relationships, remains worth living. Like Hannah Arendt in The Human Condition, Vyasa teaches us that the paradigm example of human action is speaking to each other. Conversation, thus, is central to the two-sided moral thinking of the Mahabharata. Another pervasive feature of the Mahabharata is the use of taxonomies and enumerated typologies to interpret nature, people and people's actions. The normative meaning of life is dharma. In different situations, the meaning of life is dharma, the inexorable passage of time, the impetus of desire, and normative liberation through complete detachment and transcendence of desire remaining the regulative ideal. The Bhagavadgita is known for its recommendation of desireless performance of duty for duty's sake.
