These types of living beings can enlighten humanity with knowledge of dharma, or knowledge of truth.

An avatara will therefore also restore the balance of dharma. Too much evil is compensated for with goodness. Krishna is a prime example of this. At crucial moments, he plays a role in the victory of the dharmic Pāṇḍavas over the adharmic Kauravas.

That Krishna is not an ordinary human being, but an avatara of Viṣṇu/īśvara is evident from the 11th chapter of the Bhagavad Gītā, where he reveals himself to Arjuna as viśvarūpa, all forms of the universe. Here, the difference is revealed between the jīva as small knowledge, small power, and īśvara as all knowledge/all power. In Purana literature, avatars often fall somewhere in between, as they utilize a specific aspect of īśvara.

Kṛṣṇa is also the bringer of self-knowledge by being Arjuna’s teacher: dharma- and jñāna-avatar in one.

In principle, an avatar has no karma, or rather, there appears to be only prārabdha-karma (karma that has begun to work itself out and must be minimally worked out in the current life). An avatar will not generate new karma (āgāmi-karma) because they are an ethical manifestation. Furthermore, because the avatar usually knows that they are the self, they know that there is no karma, so they have no karma at all. The avatara is thus free from karma, performs his prārabdha task, and dies.

Literally, ava means “lower.” Tara comes from the Sanskrit root tṛ, which means crossing over, to the beyond. It is the crossing from the true to the untrue realm, to help the ignorant. In the deepest sense, it means: crossing over different orders of reality, which is not a crossing over but a cognitive shift through the swamps of mental ignorance through knowledge.

The avatara knows that she or he, as consciousness, is never truly manifested. The manifestation is an expression or appearance of and in consciousness, brahman, that I am. We can therefore view Viṣṇu as brahman/īśvara. Ten principal avataras of Viṣṇu (Daśāvatāra):

1. Matsya – The fish (salvation from the flood), awakening from chaos.
2. Kūrma – The tortoise (support for the mountain during the churning of the ocean), stability of knowledge.
3. Varāha – The boar (saves the earth from the cosmic ocean), emergence of self-knowledge.
4. Nṛsiṁha – Half-man, half-lion (protects devotee Prahlāda), victory over ego.
5. Vāmana – The dwarf (restores cosmic order through modesty), humility as the key to freedom.
6. Paraśurāma – The warrior brahmin (punishes arrogant kṣatriyas).
7. Rāma – The ideal king. 8. Krishna – The divine shepherd and preceptor (Bhagavad Gita), love, righteousness, and surrender.
9. Buddha – As a compassionate guide.
10. Kalki – The future rider who destroys adharma.