In its coarsest sense, dharma can be crushed to fit the definition of “religion” — though that is unnatural and insensitive. Even in this coarse sense the verse opposes forced conversion: better to die within one's own path than to be driven into another's. This is controversial ground. Many — soldiers, kings, women, sages, ordinary citizens — have clung to this verse of reassurance under horrific pressure to convert, and drawn solace from it in terrible times. Yet terrorists and suicide-bombers may also misuse the saying to justify a wrong stance. The sequence of the verses must be noted. First one is to see everything rightly, without prejudice; then one identifies one's svabhāva; then one follows a path — any genuine religion or sādhanā — and this is one's Svadharma; anything against one's inner structure is Paradharma. Even a faltering practice within one's own Svadharma is better than an excellent practice that cuts against one's nature, for the latter breeds resistance and grief. Finally, one should mind one's own sādhanā; there is no point in converting others. But if my very life hangs on the edge under the pretext of Svadharma or Paradharma, I must reassure myself that I have been, and remain, in my own Svadharma — even under unimaginable cruelty or death. Easier said than done. Yet many heroic figures of India's unbiased history have become exemplars of just this view.