Ṛta
[3] Vedic ṛtá and its Avestan equivalent aṣ̌a both derive from Proto-Indo-Iranian *Hr̥tás "truth",[4] which in turn continues Proto-Indo-European *h2r-tós "properly joined, right, true", from a presumed root *h2er-, making it a distant cognate of Latin ordo and thus English order.
Although this meaning is not actually cited by authoritative Sanskrit dictionaries it is a regular derivation from the verbal root ṛ, "to move" with ta, the suffix which forms the past participle, so it can be regarded as the putative origin of the word.
[7] The proper Sanskrit pronunciation of the word is ṛta, the ṛ being a vocalic r, like that in pert or dirt, when pronounced with a rhotic r, e.g. as in American, followed by a short a.
[9] In contrast Hermann Oldenberg (1894) surmised that the concept of Ṛta originally arose in the Indo-Aryan period from a consideration of the natural order of the world and of the occurrences taking place within it as doing so with a kind of causal necessity.
[11] In the context of Vedic religion, those features of nature which either remain constant or which occur on a regular basis were seen to be a manifestation of the power of Ṛta in the physical cosmos.
[13] The notion of a universal principle of natural order is by no means unique to the Vedas, and Ṛta has been compared to similar ideas in other cultures, such as Ma'at in Ancient Egyptian religion, Moira and the Logos in Greek paganism, and the Dao.
Instead, the gods, like all created beings, remain subject to Ṛta, and their divinity largely resides in their serving it in the role of executors, agents or instruments of its manifestation.
[20] While the concept of Ṛta as an abstract, universal principle generally remained resistant to the anthropomorphic tendencies of the Vedic period, it became increasingly associated with the actions of individual deities, in particular with those of the god Varuna as the omniscient, all-encompassing sky.
"action") refers to the works one performs, which can occur either in congruence with or in opposition to Dharma – and thus, to Ṛta – and which are posited to stand in a causal relationship to the pains and pleasures one experiences in life.
Given the inherent goodness of Ṛta and its absolute power over the operation of the universe, the presence of gross inequality and injustice in the world represented a serious religious, philosophical and ethical dilemma.
The notion of Karma helped to overcome this problem as it was conceived as a "law of moral causation" which effectively excused the gods and Ṛta from the appearance of evil in the world, placing the responsibility for the same squarely upon the individual.
[33] As Day (1982) notes, "acts are causally determinative in accordance with their good or evil nature, and their out-workings are inexorable; there is no intrusive or arbitrary factor which might overcome their potentiality for causing retributional effects, or otherwise interfering with the strictly mechanical efficiency of Karma.
