By
Paul Sinclair (One World One People) 11/9/06and revised on 2/3/22
‘In one village a notoriously fierce communal agitator
came up to Gandhi in front of hundreds of paralyzed onlookers,
put his hands around Gandhi's slender throat, and began choking
the life out of him. Such is the height to which Gandhi had
grown that there was not even a flicker of hostility in his
eyes, not a word of protest. He yielded himself completely
to the flood of love within him, and the man broke down like
a little child and fell sobbing at his feet. For those who
watched, it seemed a miracle. For Gandhi, who had got used
to the "miracles" of love, it only proved for the
hundredth time in his own life the depth of the words …
"Hatred does not cease by hatred at any time; hatred
ceases by love. This is an unalterable law." ’
– Eknath Easwaran, Gandhi the Man: The Story of
His Transformation. 1
Mahatma
Gandhi
Mahatma Gandhi began his life long struggle
in South Africa to demonstrate that non-violence is the greatest
force at the disposal of humankind. The movement he was instrumental
in forming was named ‘Satyagraha.’
Throughout
his lifetime, Gandhi successfully applied the practice of non-violence
and continually overcame what appeared to be impossible odds stacked
against him. He defeated and overturned unjust laws that oppressed
Indians in South Africa; he liberated India from British Rule; and
he peacefully ended numerous violent uprisings during the partition
of India. These are but a few of his extraordinary achievements.
He claimed, ‘I have been practising with scientific precision
non-violence and its possibilities for an unbroken period of over
fifty years. I have applied it in every walk of life — domestic,
institutional, economic and political. I know of no single case
in which it has failed.’
His
statements would seem vindicated as ‘the science of
non-violence’ as Gandhi often called it, was later used
by Martin Luther King Jr to win civil rights for African Americans
in the United States. Nelson Mandela also used it to peacefully
end apartheid in South Africa. So let’s revisit the
past to look at the science of non-violence and using the
great Mahatma Gandhi's own words as much as possible, let’s
try to see what makes it tick, so to speak. Let us also attempt
to ascertain why non-violence has been so successful in the
past and why Gandhi claimed it to be the vital rule of conduct
for the world’s people if we are to live consistently
with human dignity and attain world peace.
So
let’s revisit the past to look at the science of non-violence
and using the great man’s own words as much as possible, let’s
try to see what makes it tick, so to speak. Let us also attempt
to ascertain why non-violence has been so successful in the past
and why Gandhi claimed it to be the vital rule of conduct for the
world’s people if we are to live consistently with human dignity
and attain world peace.
At the very core of Gandhi’s Satyagraha
movement was the belief that the Universe has been created, is ordered
and under the control of a supreme intelligence. That governing
intelligence he saw as benevolent and has as one of its manifest
attributes, equal love for all humanity. Gandhi was constantly striving
throughout his life to meet his Maker by realising his true nature
as a soul: The soul being imperishable, changeless and eternal with
infinite life.
‘He
who seeks refuge in God ought to have a glimpse of the Atma
(soul) that transcends the body; and the moment one has a
glimpse of the imperishable Atma one sheds the love
of the perishable body… Violence is needed for the protection
of things external; non-violence is needed for the protection
of the Atma…”
This
quest to realise the ‘truth’ of his own soul became
his guiding light and was responsible for the birth of the satyagraha
movement. Satyagraha is, ‘Truth (Satya) implies love,
and firmness (graha) engenders and therefore serves as
a synonym for force; the force which is born of truth and love or
non-violence.’
The real power of Satyagraha is what he called soul-force as opposed
to body-force. Soul-force was produced when people adhered to certain
natural laws and ways of living. The practice of non-violence was
for Gandhi a core condition: ‘Man as animal is violent, but
as Spirit is non-violent. The moment he awakes to the Spirit within,
he cannot remain violent.’
‘In the application of Satyagraha, I discovered in the earliest
stages that pursuit of truth did not admit of violence being inflicted
on one’s opponent but he must be weaned from error by patience
and sympathy. For, what appears to be truth to the one may appear
to be error to another. And patience means self-suffering. So the
doctrine came to mean vindication of truth, not by infliction of
suffering on the opponent, but on one’s self.’
In the following he gives a practical example: ‘For instance,
the government of the day has passed a law which is applicable to
me. I do not like it. If by using violence I force the government
to repeal the law, I am employing what might be termed body-force.
If I do not obey the law and accept the penalty for its breach,
I use soul-force. It involves sacrifice of self.’
We’ll now let Gandhi’s own words more fully explain
the incomparable use of soul force.
‘Everybody
admits that sacrifice of self is infinitely superior to sacrifice
of others. Moreover, if this kind of force is used in a cause
that is unjust, only the person using it suffers. He does
not make others suffer for his mistakes.’
‘Non-violence in its dynamic condition means conscious
suffering. It does not mean meek submission to the will of
the evil-doer, but it means putting of one’s whole soul
against the will of the tyrant. Working under this law of
our being, it is possible for a single individual to defy
the whole might of an unjust empire to save his honour, his
religion, his soul, and lay the foundation for that empire’s
fall or its regeneration.’
‘The hardest heart and the grossest ignorance must
disappear before the rising sun of suffering without anger
and without malice.’
‘And history is replete with instances of men who by
dying with courage and compassion on their lips, converted
the hearts of their violent opponents.’
‘It
(non-violence) is meant for the common people as well. Non-violence
is the law of our species as violence is the law of the brute. The
spirit lies dormant in the brute, and he knows no law but that of
physical might. The dignity of man requires obedience to a higher
law, to the strength of the spirit.'
‘I have ventured to place before India the ancient law of
self-sacrifice. For Satyagraha and its offshoots, non-cooperation
and civil resistance, are nothing but new names for the law of suffering.’
‘Suffering is the law of human beings; war is the law of the
jungle. But suffering is infinitely more powerful than the law of
the jungle for converting the opponent and opening his ears, which
are otherwise shut, to the voice of reason.’
‘…if you want something really important to be done
you must not merely satisfy the reason, you must move the heart
also. The appeal of reason is more to the head but the penetration
of the heart comes from suffering. It opens up the inner understanding
in man.’
‘I seek entirely to blunt the edge of the tyrant’s sword,
not by putting up against it a sharper-edged weapon, but by disappointing
his expectation that I would be offering physical resistance. The
resistance of the soul that I should offer would elude him. It would
at first dazzle him and at last compel recognition from him, which
recognition would not humiliate but would uplift him.’
‘It
is the acid test of non-violence that in a non-violent conflict
there is no rancour left behind, and in the end the enemies
are converted into friends.’
According to Gandhi, non-violence in its purest form is a
soul-force and has behind it the power of the Universe’s
Creator. Next, in part two we must ask what principles and
laws need to be adhered to in order to produce soul-force
and who is qualified to use it?
