The Mahabharata holds a central place in Hinduism and ancient Indian philosophy, reflecting the interplay between religious, ethical, and philosophical ideas that have shaped Indian thought. Composed over several centuries of oral tradition, this epic encompasses a wide range of nested stories covering themes including dharma (duty/righteousness), karma (action and its consequences), moksha (liberation), and bhakti (devotion), all of which are integral to South Asian religious philosophy. It is a sprawling, symbolic, and cosmological treatise rooted in the belief systems of ancient India, where the human, divine, and cosmic realms are interconnected.

The Mahabharata examines the intricacies of dharma, or moral duty, particularly when such duty conflicts with personal desires, familial loyalties, or societal expectations. Themes of karma, the law of cause and effect, are also omnipresent, suggesting that every action has consequences spanning lifetimes. The epic continually emphasizes that present circumstances—characters’ rises to power or tragic downfalls—are shaped by past actions, reflecting the cyclical nature of samsara, or the cycle of life, death, and rebirth. The Kurukshetra War, for instance, is not merely a human conflict but a cosmic battle between righteousness (dharma) and unrighteousness (adharma) playing out in the universe.

The Mahabharata’s religious framework is embedded in Hindu cosmology, which encompasses the four yugas, or cosmic ages, that represent the gradual decline of moral and spiritual order.