Understanding “kirat” and “work.”

In everyday language, work is usually understood as paid employment—activity done in exchange for money. In physics, however, work has a broader meaning: the expenditure of energy to accomplish a task (W = Fd). This wider sense helps clarify the meaning of kirat.

If Kirat is limited to paid labor alone, a contradiction arises. Tasks such as cooking, cleaning, or caring for elders are considered “work” and paid when done by someone outside the household, yet often dismissed as “not real work” when done by a family member. The activity itself is identical; only the flow of money changes.

A more consistent understanding resolves this tension:

Kirat includes any honest, constructive effort that uses time and energy to fulfill rightful responsibilities or serve others, whether or not it is paid.

Seen this way, household work—cooking, cleaning, childcare, and elder care—is clearly kirat. These tasks require sustained effort, carry responsibility, and directly support the well-being of others.

This understanding also makes clear that work done for oneself can be kirat. Earning a livelihood, studying sincerely, maintaining one’s health, or managing a household are all part of one’s rightful responsibilities. When carried out honestly and without harm, such work qualifies as kirat, even when the immediate benefit is personal or familial.

The same logic applies to sincere volunteer service. Even without financial compensation, voluntary seva involves purposeful effort aligned with dharma and can therefore be understood as kirat kamai.

Taken together, when “work” is understood as goal-directed activity involving the use of energy, kirat kamai naturally includes paid employment, unpaid domestic labor, self-supporting effort, and voluntary seva, provided the work is honest and responsibly undertaken.

Kirat and benefiting others

In Gurmat, kirat is not just any activity. It refers specifically to truthful, ethical effort within a dharmic way of life.

In the teaching “kirat karo, vand chhako, naam japo,” kirat karo means to live by honest work—free from exploitation, deception, or laziness. Such work ordinarily sustains one’s own life and family, providing food, shelter, education, and stability. Through this, it also contributes to the wider society.

Does Kirat require direct benefit to others?

If work is selfish in a harmful sense—through cheating, exploitation, or causing damage—it violates the spirit of kirat.

If the work is responsible and constructive—supporting oneself, raising children, running a household, studying sincerely, or performing one’s job ethically—it still qualifies as kirat, even when the immediate benefit is personal. Honest responsibility itself has moral value in Gurmat.

Direct service to others through seva, and sharing through vand chhakna, represent the fullest outward expression of kirat, especially when grounded in naam japo. These practices ensure that honest self-support does not become narrow self-interest.

In short, Kirat does not have to resemble charity at every moment. It must, however, be honest, responsible work—whether for oneself or others—that causes no harm and is ideally part of a life that also shares, serves, and remains rooted in the Naam.