The philosophical basis of Gandhi’s peaceful non-compliance.
Peaceful Warrior 2020.
(Preamble)
1. Who was Gandhi?
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, was born on 2 October 1869 and died tragically on the 30 January 1948 at the age of 78. He was first and foremost an Indian lawyer, an anti-colonial nationalist, and political ethicist, who employed nonviolent resistance to lead the successful campaign for India's independence from British Rule, and in turn inspire movements for civil rights and freedom across the world.
Mohandas Gandhi, hence forth for ease simply referred to as Gandhi was born and raised to a Hindu family in coastal Gujarat, western India. Gandhi was trained in law firstly at University College London and then at the Inner Temple, London, and called to the bar at the age of 22, in June 1891.
After two uncertain years in India, and unable to start a successful law practice, he moved to South Africa in 1893 initially to represent an Indian merchant in a lawsuit. He went on to stay for another 22 years. It was in South Africa that Gandhi raised his family, and first employed nonviolent resistance in a campaign for civil rights.
In 1915, aged 45, he returned to India and set about organising peasants, farmers, and urban labourers to protest against excessive land-tax and discrimination. Assuming leadership of the Indian National Congress in 1921, Gandhi led nationwide campaigns for easing poverty, expanding women's rights, building religious and ethnic amity, ending untouchability, and above all for achieving Swaraj or self-rule for India.
That same year Gandhi adopted the wearing of an Indian loincloth, or short dhoti and, in the winter, a shawl, both woven with yarn hand-spun on a traditional Indian spinning wheel, or charkha. For Gandhi this was a mark of identification with India's rural poor. Thereafter, he lived modestly in a self-sufficient residential community, ate simple vegetarian food, and undertook long fasts as a means of self-purification and political protest.
Bringing anti-colonial nationalism to the common Indians, Gandhi led them in challenging the British-imposed salt tax with the 250 mile Dandi Salt March in 1930, immediately to be followed up by the ‘Dharasana Satyagraha’ action, marching to the Dharasana salt works in Valsad, Gujarat. The British soldiers tried to beat the protestors with clubs to stop them gaining entry to the works, but were eventually overwhelmed by the challenge as tens of thousands of Indians came in peaceful support. Much later Gandhi succeeded in calling for the British to Quit India in a 1942 protest. He was imprisoned for a total of 6 1/2 years over his life upon many occasions, both in South Africa and India. His wife affectionately referred to as ‘Ba’ also imprisoned often with her husband, actually died in prison, at the detention centre (Aga Khan Palace in Pune) on 22 February 1944
Gandhi's vision of an independent India based on religious pluralism was challenged in the early 1940s by a new Muslim nationalism which was demanding a separate Muslim homeland carved out of India. In August 1947, Britain granted independence, but the British Indian Empire was partitioned into two dominions, a Hindu-majority India and Muslim-majority Pakistan. As many displaced Hindus, Muslims, and Sikhs made their way to their new lands with tensions running high, religious violence inevitably broke out, especially in the Punjab and Bengal.
Eschewing the official celebration of independence in Delhi, Gandhi visited the affected areas, attempting to provide solace. In the months following, he undertook several fasts unto death to stop religious violence. The last of these, undertaken on 12 January 1948 when he was 78, also had the indirect goal of pressuring India to pay out some cash assets owed to Pakistan. Some Indians thought Gandhi was too accommodating. Among them was Nathuram Godse, a Hindu nationalist, who assassinated Gandhi on 30 January 1948 by firing three bullets into his chest.
2. What is peaceful non-compliance?
GANDHI’S STATED PHILOSOPHY :-
WHAT:-
Peaceful resistance, non-compliance, is not pacifism because it involves fighting, just not with the use of harm or of physical force or violence
HOW:-
Refusing to obey orders deemed to be unjust. Employing calm, peaceful and non-violent non-compliance.
WHY:-
To assume a moral stance against causing harm or injury, and to be free to self-determination of an outcome.
Gandhi’s BELIEF:-
All life is sacred. Therefore no acts or intentions to kill or harm another is justified.
He also believed that the strength of civil resistance is; with personal control of oneself at all times despite aggression being received. And also that the aim is to make injustice visible, expose the action and never fail to point out the injustice of the oppressor.
To this end Gandhi has become the foremost example of the way of Satyagraha. To him it was holding firmly on to truth. Described as ‘truth force’, ‘soul force’ or equally ‘love force’. For Gandhi it meant more than simply passive resistance, it required strength, to follow non-violent methods. The pursuit of truth did not allow for any use of violence or aggression, even as a defence against the enemy or attacker. He genuinely believed that an enemy could be ‘weened off’ the use of violence if ‘he’, refused to be controlled or follow an unjust direction given by the oppressor.
In this he was saying that when, for example (in the Bible scriptures) Jesus said that a true follower must turn the other cheek when abused, that this was an evidence that resistance to be affected by the violence use against them, gave the victim (follower) the moral superiority.
In Hindu teachings, Satyagraha is a term that effectively embodies the philosophy that Gandhi wished to adopt. ‘Passive resistance’ or ‘Truth force/soul force’. A firm adherence to the restraint from any form of violent action. He was committed to pacifism in that there should be no violence, however he made it perfectly clear that he was not really a pacifist, but a warrior fighting for peace, which couldn’t really be described as pacifistic.
He actually had three concepts he followed in his life, working for the independence of India from the rule of the British Empire: Satyagraha, Ahimsa and Swaraj.
1. Definition of 'satyagraha'
Satyagraha
in British English
NOUN
1. the policy of nonviolent resistance adopted by Mahatma Gandhi from about 1919 to oppose British rule in India
2. any movement of nonviolent resistance
Collins English Dictionary. Copyright © HarperCollins Publishers
Word origin
via Hindi from Sanskrit, literally: insistence on truth, from satya truth + agraha fervour
2. Definition of 'ahimsa'
Ahimsa
in British English
NOUN
(in Hindu, Buddhist, and Jainist philosophy) the law of reverence for, and nonviolence to, every form of life
Collins English Dictionary. Copyright © HarperCollins Publishers
Word origin
Sanskrit, from a-1 + himsā injury
3. Definition of 'swaraj'
Swaraj
in British English
NOUN
(in British India) self-government; independence
Collins English Dictionary. Copyright © HarperCollins Publishers
Derived forms
swarajism (swaˈrajism) NOUN
swarajist (swaˈrajist) NOUN, ADJECTIVE
Word origin
C20: from Sanskrit svarāj, from sva self + rājya rule
3. Gandhi in more detail:-
Born in the western city of Porbandar, in the Gujarat region of India on the 2nd October 1869. Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was the fourth child and youngest son from Karamchand Uttamchand Gandhi (father) and Putlibai (mother). Born into the Hindu faith in a Modh Baniya family, Gandhi was brought up in a poor but educated ‘lower-middle class’ occupational family. Baniya were effectively traders or merchants and bankers (money lenders), dealers in grain, spices and commerce, and in the modern world pretty well any and all commodities.
Gandhi struggled at school and only achieved average grades on the whole, and was a relatively shy and awkward boy, who didn’t enjoy games or sports and found more solace in books as companions, than other people. He was not at that point a confident and proficient orator, speaking only when he felt compelled.
Mavji Dave Joshiji, a Brahmin priest and family friend, advised the young (18) Gandhi and his family that he should consider law studies in London. Gandhi fascinated at an early age with propriety, the beginnings of his interest in social justice (or rather social injustices) and was sent to London England with the permission of his mother Putlibai, to study law at the University College London (UCL) where he studied law and jurisprudence and later at Inner Temple with the specific interest of becoming a barrister.
Mavji Dave Joshiji, a Brahmin priest and family friend, advised the young (18) Gandhi and his family that he should consider law studies in London. Gandhi fascinated at an early age with propriety, the beginnings of his interest in social justice (or rather social injustices) and was sent to London England with the permission of his mother Putlibai, to study law at the University College London (UCL) where he studied law and jurisprudence and later at Inner Temple with the specific interest of becoming a barrister.
In the caste systems that were, and are often still practiced in India, Gandhi was committed to be married to a young girl Kasturbai Makhanji Kapadia. In May 1883 the 13 year old Gandhi was married to his 14 year old bride following the arranged marriage tradition. Though they didn’t really begin living together, remaining at the respective family homes, a few years later Kasturbai (Ba) became pregnant but lost the child within the first few days. Gandhi’s father also died at around the same time and the two deaths profoundly affected the 16 year old. His wife did in fact become pregnant again and gave birth to a son, however Gandhi still decided to travel to London and left his wife and child behind whilst he gained his legal education.
On 10th of August 1888 Gandhi set out for Mumbai and then on to England after a short stay with other Members of his Modh Baniya community, where he managed to get himself excommunicated from his caste. They felt he would be corrupted if he went to England and ignored the support of his mother.
During his life in London he joined the Vegetarian Society to support the ideals of a healthy diet. He also came into contact with the Theosophical Society, members of which encouraged him to seek truths from many religious writings including the Bible, the Bhagavad Gita, and Buddhism. He also joined a speaking practice group, and this is possibly where the young Gandhi eventually lost his inhibitions with articulate public speaking.
He was called to the bar at the age of 22 in June of 1891 and he promptly returned home to India with the aim of practicing law in his homeland. He tried unsuccessfully to open a practice in Mumbai, (modern day Bombay) and spent a considerable amount of his time working after returning to Rajkot to make a modest living drafting petitions for litigants.
He was called to the bar at the age of 22 in June of 1891 and he promptly returned home to India with the aim of practicing law in his homeland. He tried unsuccessfully to open a practice in Mumbai, (modern day Bombay) and spent a considerable amount of his time working after returning to Rajkot to make a modest living drafting petitions for litigants.
Finding work and setting up a law practice became much harder than he’d expected, and in 1893 a Muslim merchant in Kathiawar named Dada Abdullah contacted Gandhi with an offer of a credible and immediate employment. Abdullah owned a large successful shipping business in South Africa. His distant cousin in Johannesburg needed a lawyer, and they preferred someone with Kathiawari heritage. Gandhi inquired about his pay for the work. They offered a total salary of £105 plus travel expenses. (I’ve estimated this to be about £17,000 in 2020 money) He accepted it, knowing that it would be at least a one-year commitment in the Colony of Natal, South Africa, which was also a part of the British Empire.
(Gandhi in Africa 1893-1915 (23 yrs of age - 45 yrs))
Shortly after arriving in South Africa leaving Durban bound for Pretoria Gandhi refused when asked, to remove himself from the first class seat he had purchased a ticket for. The train conductor under instruction from several complaining white South African people, threw Gandhi unceremoniously from the train and his bags after him. In those days it was not allowed for non-white people to use this class of travel. The train incident which gave the rather naive lawyer his first taste of direct racial abuse meant he was thrown out at Pietermaritzburg, less than a third of the way to his destination. He sat in the train station, shivering all night and pondering if he should return to India or protest for his rights. He chose to protest and was allowed to board the train the next day and sat in coach with the other passengers. During this journey along came a Dutchman from first class and demanded that Gandhi give up his seat whilst the man smoked his pipe, and was told to sit at his feet on the floor.
Later Gandhi reported that ‘it had been one of the most creative experiences of my life thus far.’
Later Gandhi reported that ‘it had been one of the most creative experiences of my life thus far.’
Gandhi was in Transvaal because he had been asked to work on a case between Dada Abdullah & sons and another company from the Gujarat region of India. Other than a few isolated case of snobbery thus far, the young Gandhi had not yet realised the levels of racism than were occurring in South Africa towards both asian and black people, something he’d not seen in either London or his homeland India. Following his journeys across the African continent beginning on 24th May 1893 he became all too aware of the differences that white people or Europeans enjoyed. Terms such as ‘Coolie’ which meant Indian labourer and ‘Samis’, a derogatory Afrikaans term aimed at those perceived as educated Indians, were regularly used against both he and his fellow workers and anyone the whites considered undesirable. On another occasion he was kicked into a gutter for daring to walk near a house, as Indians were not allowed to walk on public footpaths in South Africa and Gandhi was brutally kicked by a police officer off of the footpath onto the street without warning.
On one occasion Gandhi was asked by the Magistrate of the court to remove his Turban whilst in court. Gandhi promptly refused and began to feel the petty, deeply racist indignities that the British Empire constantly adopted towards people who weren’t white skinned. This was almost certainly the catalyst for more activism and radical insurrection from the young educated Gandhi. He was no fan of injustice as he firmly believed that under the empire all subjects should be considered equal.
When Gandhi had arrived in South Africa, according to the historian Arthur L. Herman, he thought of himself as "a Briton first, and an Indian second". However, the prejudice against him and his fellow Indians from British people that Gandhi experienced and observed, deeply bothered him. He found it humiliating, struggling to understand how some people can feel honour or superiority or pleasure in such inhumane practices. It was here that Gandhi began to question his people's standing within the British Empire. It did not create a feeling of social justice or equality or parity. It seemed to Gandhi that the empire was actually lacking in empathy and compassion towards other human beings and the cracks began to appear in the veneer that had once given him the chance to rise above the class he felt he had inherited at birth. What it did in fact was reveal to him that the world he knew was not at all the one he wished to see. He soon set about doing things differently.
In a triumph for his first legal case, Gandhi won the argument and subsequently decided to stay on in South Africa for the foreseeable future, to further support the Indian workers and other oppressed people.
He organised marches and demonstrations to defy the orders given by local government officials, most notably the issue of Indians having to carry identity cards. He argued that as a subject of the Empire they all had the same rights. The police however were ordered to suppress the rising defiance, but Gandhi succeeded in making the point and eventually the decree was abandoned, despite great physical hardships and beatings by the police as instruments of the state/empire.
During the next few years several laws were passed that effectively restricted any rights that Indian migrants had in South Africa. In 1894 a franchise amendment order designed to limit the amount of Indians eligible to vote was passed. In 1895 a law was brought in that specified the terms of Indentured workers, would be limited to 2 further years (after the initial 5) or they could pay a 3 pound tax. (Equivalent to six months of wages) Both of which incensed the notion of moral injustice within Gandhi.
Also during those first years Gandhi became instrumental in setting up the Natal Indian Congress (NIC), a political organisation working for Indian rights in South Africa. At first it was deemed by many of his countrymen to be somewhat ‘elitist’, Gandhi had many wealthy and influential friends, many of the Indian middle classes and he eventually set up a new law practice, moving to Johannesburg the capital.
In 1906 the Boer government introduced ‘Asiatic law amendment ordinance’. This basically required all non-whites over the age of 8 to register full details with the authorities, give fingerprints and carry I.D. cards at all times.
Years later at one public meeting called, he chaired the proceedings with the government authorities and police present, and succeeded in encouraging the entire assembly of Indian migrants not to comply with the decree that said that a police officer could enter the home of an Indian without permission, or even the courtesy to ask for such. This decree would also not recognise the legitimacy of Indian marriage. Many people said that they would rather die than have their wives/homes insulted/disrespected in this way, but again Gandhi managed to advise them how another response would potentially yield a more suitable and lasting outcome. And herein was born for Gandhi the Satyagraha, a way to struggle and win the moral argument.
Formulating his convictions he said simply,
‘They can torture my body, they can break my bones, they can even kill me. Then they will have my dead body. But they will not have my obedience, UNLESS I give it to them.’
(Gandhi In India 1915 - 1948 (45yrs of age - 78yrs))
Some years later upon this simple act of defiance he set the stage for the greatest rebellion ever to have been seen at that time. And wonderfully it involved almost total support for no aggression or violence against any of the oppressors. They would not he said; be able to control with any kind of force anyone who refused to comply and were prepared to offer the ultimate sacrifice, death. He asked them all to consider how 350,000,000 Indians would be ‘made’ to do the Empires bidding by only 100,000 British soldiers.
Following this momentous argument, the Empire was eventually pressured to withdraw from India and a cry of freedom rang out. Swaraj (home rule) had been won. Sadly however, because of how Gandhi saw the future of India, the separation of India from Pakistan broke his heart. And the subsequent relocation of ethnic groups to new areas brought with it much suffering for the people and families of all sides. Hundreds died in retaliations when religious hatred spread and for a time it seemed that there would never be peace. Gandhi often put himself in harms way, going to prison and being attacked from all sides for this non compliant approach and even went on hunger strike until the fighting factions, Muslim and Hindu alike stopped their squabbles.
Following this momentous argument, the Empire was eventually pressured to withdraw from India and a cry of freedom rang out. Swaraj (home rule) had been won. Sadly however, because of how Gandhi saw the future of India, the separation of India from Pakistan broke his heart. And the subsequent relocation of ethnic groups to new areas brought with it much suffering for the people and families of all sides. Hundreds died in retaliations when religious hatred spread and for a time it seemed that there would never be peace. Gandhi often put himself in harms way, going to prison and being attacked from all sides for this non compliant approach and even went on hunger strike until the fighting factions, Muslim and Hindu alike stopped their squabbles.
4. Who inspired Gandhi?
Gandhi was inspired in his beliefs and practices by a number of writers and philosophers, some were also his contemporaries. The Missionary (Charlie) who became his best friend, Charles Freer Andrews, who he met in South Africa. Affectionately referred to as ‘Christs Finest Apostle’ (C.F.A)
One of those inspirations was Henry David Thoreau. Thoreau’s book ‘Civil Disobedience’, an 1849 essay was one of those that caught Gandhi’s attention. He said of Thoreau (H.D.T) ‘that he taught nothing he wasn’t prepared to practice himself.’ In this he said Thoreau had been ‘sanctified by suffering’, and that he was also one of the most moral people to hail from America.
Henry David Thoreau:- 12 July1817 - 6 May 1862. Was an essayist, poet and philosopher and also a transcendentalist. He wrote several key books that influenced Gandhi, but particularly Walden and Civil Disobedience.
Another key person to influence Gandhi’s philosophy was the writer Leo Tolstoy. Tolstoy wrote ‘Letter to a Hindoo’ in 1908. One of the major points that he read within that writing was:- “stay steadfast to the traditions of non-violence rather than ‘adopting’ the irreligious and profoundly immoral social arrangements under which the English and other Pseudo-Christian nations live today.’ Gandhi was so impressed in fact that he wrote to Tolstoy on the 1st October 1909 asking for permission to reprint this article and in Gandhi’s native language, Gujarati. Tolstoy quickly replied in the affirmative and they began a regular correspondence with each other until Tolstoy’s death in November of 1910.
Soon after this Gandhi wrote an obituary in his magazine and published it.
“The late lamented ‘Tolstoy the Great’ : in Indian we would have described him as a Maharishi (great seer) or Fakir. He renounced his wealth, gave up a life of comfort to embrace that of a simple peasant and he himself put into practice what he preached.”
Much earlier whilst studying in London, Gandhi was introduced by Friends of the Vegetarian Society to a writer by the name of John Ruskin. The book titled ‘Unto the last’, had a most profound effect upon Gandhi helping him to move away from his former elitisms and into the ‘determination to change my life’.
Of course many things influenced the lawyer from Porbandar, and throughout his life there have been many examples of the effects of the writings and actions by other activists. Perhaps non more obvious than the humble declaration by Gandhi when he said of his life that it was ‘an experiment with truth’. And later, ‘be the change that you wish to see in the world’. He did seem to have taken great inspiration by the thoughts and philosophies of those writers as he constantly fought with his own attempts to behave in keeping with Satyagraha.
5. What was said about Gandhi at his funeral.
During the State Funeral Procession of Mahatma Gandhi, the American news recorder spoke on air saying, “He died as he’d always lived. A private man without wealth, without estates, titles or office. He could not boast any scientific achievement, or artistic talent. He was not a commander of armies, nor a ruler of vast lands yet today leaders and dignitaries from all over the world join hands in paying homage to ‘the little brown man in a loin cloth’, who lead his country to freedom.”
General George C. Marshall the U.S. secretary of state was quoted as saying:-
“Mahatma Gandhi has become the spokesman for the conscience of all mankind. He was a man who made humility and simple truth more powerful than empires.”
And Albert Einstein the famous scientist and mathematician said of him:-
“Generations to come will scarce believe that such a one as this ever in flesh and blood, walked upon this earth.”
6. What has been said about Gandhi in recent years?
A QUOTE BY RICHARD ATTENBOROUGH:- On making the 1982 film GANDHI staring Ben Kingsley.
“No man’s life can be encompassed in one telling. There is no way to give each year its allotted weight to include each event, each person who helped to shape a lifetime. What can be done is to be faithful in spirit to the record and try to find ones way to the heart of the man!”
A Quote by John Lennon:- (somewhat tongue in cheek)
“Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King are great examples of fantastic non-violents who died violently. I can never work that out. We're pacifists, but I'm not sure what it means when you're such a pacifist that you get shot. I can never understand that.”
(I dare say that if John had known his own demise would ironically fulfil this statement he might have thought better of saying it.)
A Quote by Martin Luther King Jr.:-
“While the Montgomery boycott was going on, India's Gandhi was the guiding light of our technique of nonviolent social change.” “Nonviolence” is a more than simply agreeing that you won't physically attack your enemy.”
7. What tributes to Gandhi continue to this day?
Gandhi's birthday, 2 October, is commemorated in India as Gandhi Jayanti, a national holiday. And worldwide as the International Day of Nonviolence. Gandhi is commonly, though not formally considered the Father of the Nation in India,[14][15] and was commonly called Bapu[16] (Gujarati: endearment for father,[17] papa[17][18]).
Talat Ahmed, in her book :-
‘Mohandas Gandhi; experiments in civil disobedience.’ Wrote of Gandhi;
“Gandhi is not just simply the most famous ‘founding farther’ of India; to use the language of Hegel, he is a ‘world historical individual’ whose impact on the twentieth century might be compared to Vladimir Lenin or Mao Zedong.”
“There are few people from history that have garnered such ongoing attention when it comes to the subject of peace, love and civil resistance. Songs have been made, that quote him and honour Gandhi in so many ways. He has exemplified the way that a person can attempt to live whilst considering all other creatures he came into contact with. He has continued to inspire millions of people to greater acts of humility, peace and love and for that he shall never be forgotten.”
(Peaceful Warrior)
8. Quotes made by Gandhi that still resonate today.
Ive selected a sample below of those that still hold true today and can help us all in our attempts to fight for peace.
‘’An eye for an eye will make the whole world blind.
‘’An eye for an eye will make the whole world blind.
“You must be the change that you wish to see.”
“Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.”
“Freedom is not worth having if it does not include the freedom to make mistakes.”
“Earth provides enough to satisfy every mans need, but not every mans greed.”
This presentation was prepared following a desire to keep the message Gandhi shared, alive and kicking in the 21st century….
Based on reading :-
Mohandas Gandhi, ‘experiments in civil disobedience.’
Talat Ahmed (SWP)
And watching the 1982 Oscar winning film Gandhi :-
Richard Attenborough with Ben Kingsley.
Song references to Gandhi:-
See Youtube :-
The ‘Gandhi Rap.’
And ‘Courage to be daring.’
General PHILOSOPHY;-
- Is the study or creation of theories about basic things, such as the nature of existence, knowledge and thought, or about how we should live.
- A particular set of ideas a person has.
- A particular theory about how to live or deal with a particular situation.
@Collins Online Dictionary.
