What is an Avatar? (Hinduism)

The avatar, central to Hinduism, refers to an earthly form, mostly human or animal, taken by a deity in order to aid human beings. According to the Bhagavad Gita, a sacred Hindu text, the god Krishna says to Arjuna: “Whenever there is a decline of righteousness and rise of unrighteousness then I send forth Myself”.

The goal of the avatar is to restore the dharma, namely the maintenance of both the cosmic and the social order. It is the primary concern of the Brahmanical dharma literature, which outline the responsibilities of the priestly caste (brahmin) to produce universal order in the sacrifice. The Dharma-sutras, explicate the ritual, moral, and social question of how people should conduct themselves in relation to varna and asrama (‘stage of life’).

The Bhagavad Gita shows this in its story about the Battle of Kurukshetra. The major character is Arjuna, a member of the Kshatriya class (the warrior or ruling elite in the varna) who fronts up against another branch of his family over a dispute on who should rule the kingdom. However, he despairs over the prospect of killing his relatives and those he respects on the other side. Advice comes from his charioteer, who is actually an avatar of Krishna. Through the charioteer, Krishna says to Arjuna that it is his duty to fight and that he has the “right to perform your prescribed duties.”

The god Vishnu, the preserver of the order of the universe, takes on earthly form in various guises in his attempt to restore cosmic order.

In the Shatapatha Brahmana, Vishnu took the form of a great-horned fish who saved Manu, the first human and progenitor of humanity, from the deluge that occurred at the beginning of this world by allowing Manu to tie his boat to its horn for protection against the rising water.
In the Tortoise, Vishnu is the cosmic foundation on which rests the churning stick used by the gods and demons in their act of creation in the ocean of milk.
The great horned boar who saved the goddess Prithivi (“Earth”) from the demon Hiranyaksha and raised her from the primeval waters.
In the form of the man-lion, Vishnu was able to defeat the demon Hiranyakashipu, brother of Hiranyaksha, who was invulnerable to humans and animals but not to a combination of the two.
The axe-wielding Parashurama who defeated the Kshatriya (warrior) class persecuting the priestly brahman class, thus establishing the theological and social dominance of the brahmins.
Krishna, the eighth and most important avatar of Vishnu, is described in the Mahabharata, particularly in the section called the Bhagavadgita, as the ideal warrior king. He miraculously saves the Pandava wife, Draupadi, from shame during the attempt on the part of the Kauravas to disrobe her. As described above, he lectures the Arjuna to perform his duty as a member of the Kshatriya class and fight his enemies, even after he witnesses relatives in their ranks.
According to Hindu texts, the Buddha, the founder of Buddhism, is an avatar of Vishnu who came to preach gentleness and non-violence. He was particularly concerned with animal killing.
The tenth and last of Vishnu’s avatars is Kalki. Often depicted with a horse’s head and a man’s body, Kalki is expected to come in the future. In the Puranas, he is described as a warrior who will arise to punish evil-doers at the end of the Kalyuga and thus usher in a new Krita Yuga, the fourth world age.