________________
NONVIOLENCE IN THE UNITED STATES
By Arun Gandhi Founder/Director, M. K. Gandhi Institute for Nonviolence Memphis, TN 38104 - www.gandhiinstitute.org
In 1935 when Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, leader of the Harijan community in India, threatened to walk out of the Hindu fold with all his followers if Hindus did not reform, scores of Christian priests and Muslim religious leaders descended on India in the hope of converting almost 60 million Harijan. They stood on street corners denouncing Hinduism and offering equality and respect if the Harijan converted to
Christianity. After many weeks they discovered that not many Harijan accepted
their offer. One Christian missionary known to Gandhiji asked him why the Harijan were not accepting the Christian offer.
Gandhiji said: "The day you stop talking about how good Christianity is and start living it everyone will join you." The profound truth contained in these words is relevant for all religions today. In the modern age instead of humanity becoming inclusive we have made spiritual pursuit a competitive commodity. In our eagerness to convince the world that our way is the best each religion has caused more conflict than understanding.
Gandhiji said: No religion has the whole Truth. Each has a small kernel of Truth and the only way to understand the philosophy is to make a "friendly" study of each.
Ahimsa, fortunately is not an exclusive Jain concept, and has a much broader meaning than just nonviolence. In one form or the other nonviolence is a part of every belief system, each understanding it differently.
Jain Education International 2010_03
JAINA
ᅲᅲ
ग
2005
For Private & Personal Use Only
Gandhiji said:
No religion has
the whole Truth. Each has a small
kernel of Truth and the only
Any concept that is defined in the absolute sense becomes a dogma and becomes "friendly" study
of each
difficult to understand. The truth in life is that there is much violence in nonviolence and nonviolence in violence. In reality nonviolence is not simply non-killing. Whether we kill something ourselves or get it killed by someone else the sin attaches to both the desire and the action. We cannot live with life-threatening bugs nor can it be said that a vegetarian is necessarily a nonviolent person. We must understand that human beings commit violence in many forms physical and passiveboth consciously and unconsciously, Violence, in fact, has become so much a part of human culture that we accept it as human nature. Yet, it isn't human culture. Much of our violence comes from our abuse of anger. It is exacerbated by our greed, jealousies, prejudices and so many negative attitudes that have become an integral part of human nature.
Gandhiji translated ahimsa to mean love and not nonviolence. If we love all of
way to understand the
philosophy is to make a
Extending Jain Heritage in Western Environment
97 www.janelibrary.org
