Logic of Nonviolence

 

Brainstorming:

What is Non violence?

Is 100% non violence possible ?

Non = Negation i.e. Negation to violence is nonviolence. Everyone wants to preserve life: Hurting, injuring , hampering any life is violence. This violence can be physical , verbal , emotional , institutional , structural. Retaliation is not a solution every time.

Attitude , behavior matters while acting as a non violent. Primary quality of God is Love and Primary quality of supreme is compassion. We are custodian of our own life first.

Natural cycle of living is also a fact. Non-violence in daily life is towards myself and the living beings around. Positively self talk

Be more accepting and flowing with life.  Keep my body healthy. Be more compassionate

Be more observing than judging.  communicating without violence

 

Notes from the Presentation

अहिंसा परमो धर्मःahimsa paramodharma’

(Nonviolence is the supreme religion)

‘Truth is the supreme principle. Gandhi says, ‘Truth is God’. And nonviolence or ahimsa is paramodharma’ (supreme religion).According to Gandhi, ‘Truth is the ultimate purpose (goal) and nonviolence is the way to achieve it.’  That is why he wrote in his Autobiography “Ahimsa is the basis of the search for truth". 

For Gandhi, nonviolence is ‘love’.He said, it is ‘largest love and greatest charity’; It is a pro-life attitude

 

I.     Meaning of Nonviolence:

a.      Nonviolence means: ‘not killing’, ‘not hurting’, ‘not injuring’ any. 

b.      For Gandhi, nonviolence is positive ‘love’.

   He said, it is the ‘largest love and greatest charity’; pro-life attitude

 

 

               Individually : abstaining from wrongdoing; not hurting any life; and

                  adhering to righteousness;  to upholding positive values

            Interpersonally / Socially : Opposing wrong : Protest against wrong (satyagraha); and                                                                        renovate systems and improve    life prospect for all, especially                                                                                 the poor (constructive  renovating systems and improve life prospect for all,                                                            especially the poor (constructive interventions)

 

II.                Levels of Nonviolence: passive non-violence and active nonviolence.

 

a.       Passive non-violence: It means abstaining from acts of violence; avoidance of violence of all kinds.

                     i.      not to hurt, injure, impede  anyone: 1.  in thought, word and deed

a.        knowingly or unknowingly

b.      directly or indirectly

c.       actively or passively

d.      Structurally

 

Structural violence. Society operates through the structures and the systems it is made of. For example, markets, banks, railways, schools, colleges, hospitals are structures and their function is streamlined by a well stipulated system. Bank has a building, infrastructure and it has an operating system (procedures to deposit and withdraw money, get loan and repay it... that is the system. School is a structure (building) as well as an educational (curriculum, syllabus, pedagogy…) system. Culture is an operating system by which society functions.   These structures and systems are essentially meant to support the people.   By its own arrangement, if these structures stand against the interest of its people by any way, then such conduct is called structural violence. Cumbersome (too complicated) procedures at the bank, hospitals keep the poor away from getting services; market arrangement resulting in the exploitation of poor producers; religion and culture permitting discrimination against fellow humans (gender discrimination for instance) as examples of structural violence.  Gandhi in his seminal Hind Swaraj reflected on the violence associated with modern industrial civilization. While modern science and technology has made human life sophisticated, it has also created an unbridgeable gap between poor and rich, humans and the rest of the ecosystem in the biosphere, making life perilously unsustainable.

 

Then there is unconscious / mindless violence. What is mindless violence? The violence that we commit carelessly to others is of this kind. Pollution (especially greenhouse gases, plastic and toxic waste)  unrestrained consumption, rash driving ... are examples of mindless violence. Being conscious of our actions and their implications or in other words, mindfulness is an aspect of nonviolence, or its absence an aspect of violence.

 

All these forms of violence hamper, imperil life of fellow beings, hence life calls for the avoidance of these violence.   Absence of violence is generally termed as peace.  However, in hindsight it is stated as a ‘peace of the graveyard.’   Absence of violence may at best lead to no suffering, but by itself will not guarantee life.  Life requires positive values.

That is the reason ‘absence of  violence’ is called ‘passive non-violence.’

 

 

b.      Active Nonviolence:

                      i.      Not allowing anyone to hurt any

1.  in thought, word and deed

a.       knowingly or unknowingly

b.      directly or indirectly

c.       actively or passively

 

                        ii.      Not being a mute witness to acts of hurting by any against any

1.  Not being a mute witness to occasions of suffering of neighbours (Acting against occasions of suffering) of fellow beings.

2.  Resisting any thought or conduct that is against life

3.  Negating anything that is not in keeping with ‘protecting, promoting or preserving life.’

 

 

 

 

“Ahimsa is not the crude thing it has been made to appear. Not to hurt any living thing is, no doubt, a part of ahimsa. But it is its least expression. The principle of ahimsa is hurt by every evil thought, undue haste, by lying, by hatred, by wishing ill to anybody. It is also violated by our holding on to what the world needs. (M K Gandhi, ‘From Yeravda Mandir’, p. 7).

 

Gandhi says,  “Ahimsa is not merely a negative state of harmlessness, but it is a positive state of love, of doing good even to the evil-doer.”(Young India, August 25, 1920, p.2)

Ahimsa means “love” in the Pauline sense, and yet something more than the “love” defined by Paul...Ahimsa includes the whole creation, and not only humans. Besides, “Love” in the English language has other connotations too, and so I was compelled to use the negative word. But it does not, as I told you, express a negative force, but a force superior to all the forces put together.  (Harijan, March 14, 1936, p. 39)

He termed “Nonviolence is soul force or the power of the Godhead within us. We become Godlike to the extent we realize nonviolence.” (Harijan, 12-11-1938, p.326).

“it is mightier than the mightiest weapon of destruction devised by the ingenuity of man”

 

Society needs pro-life values, pro-life practices.  The presence and practice of such values in the society is called dynamic nonviolence.

I.              Basis of Nonviolence:

 

a.      Three pragmatic reasons for not to hurt anyone:

  i.      Every individual is primary (has the right to live as much as ‘I’ do).  “You are an ‘I’ to me”

    ii.      Being an image of God, every individual deserves a chance to live a complete life.  ‘Individual is essentially good’.

  iii.      Our life is indispensably dependent on the life of others (ecosystem / community).  Hurting others amounts to hurting our own support system.  ‘Hurting others is self-infliction’.  ‘Any killing is suicidal’

 

b.      Three philosophical reasons for not to hurt any

    i.      The purpose of life is to live in all its fullness

     ii.      Life is a team game. Team requires a norm to pursue (to live)

  iii.      And the norm has to be cohesive, inclusive, mutually enriching, and never discriminatory and debilitating.

 

c.       Creational reason for not to hurt

   i.      Who am I to judge: God / Creation alone is absolute, humans are relative, finite. We cannot be offensive (punitively) violent towards anyone whom we do not understand fully / sufficiently

 

d.      Gandhi’s nonviolence emanates from his understanding of the foundational belief that

        i.      Truth is God, and

          ii.      Nonviolence is the means to realize that Truth.

I.              The logic of nonviolence

 

“Non-violence is not a mere philosophical principle. It is the rule and the breath of my life.” (YI, 13-9-1928, p. 308)

  Though there is repulsion enough in Nature, she lives by attraction.  Mutual love enables Nature to persist.  Man does not live by destruction.  Self-love compels regard for others..  – MK Gandhi, Young India, 02-03-1922, p.130

1.      If life is the central principle, then what ever we do must be prolife.

2.      If we do anything that is a departure from life, away from life or against life, then such act is called violation. 

3.      Violation is anti-life, and it hurts one and all.                         

  4.Violation is what is called as violence, for, it hurts the prospects of life

I can see that in the midst of death life persists, in the midst of untruth truth persists, in the midst of darkness light persists.  – MK Gandhi, Young India, 11-10-1928

Violence, which is divisive and destructive can never be the law of life. (If violence were the law, humanity would have come to an extinction long ago – M K Gandhi)

There is no other way than nonviolence for life (to live)

5.      The purpose of life is to live a complete (holistic) life.

6     Humans are social beings; life is a team game; ought to live / play together.

7     Togetherness is possible only if we follow a norm that is intrinsically cohesive, unifying and mutually sustaining.

8     In other words the norm has to be one of nonviolative in nature

 9.      Every life is primary, every individual is primary because every life is an image of God / manifestation of the Truth.

 10 I would like to live, so does my neighbor like to live 

11.      My life is dependent on my neighbor. In the same way,

12 My neighbour’s life is dependent on me.  Human life is bound by mutual dependence.

13 .    I can take his/her serviceto realize my life only by helping him/her to realize his/her life

14 This attitude of reciprocity is called nonviolence (seeing the other in the same way one sees oneself).

15.  Consciousness of ‘the other too being primary’ gives rise to sense of ‘Equality’;

16.  And ‘not to hurt anyone’ leads to a sense of ‘Justice’;

 

17  Social life is governed by a set of norms

                                                              i.      We call it ‘culture’ ; and politically

                                                            ii.      we call it ‘law and order’

18.  Non-violation of all these  norms of life is called nonviolence.

 

I.              Ahimsa / Nonviolence is a social Principle:

a.      Nonviolence according to Gandhi, means,  positive love (compassionate action)

  i.      Recognizing the primacy of every individual, especially of those we are in contact with

 ii.      Recognizing every individual in our neighbourhood as a partner (stakeholder

  iii.      Justice, Equality and Freedom, opportunity, dignity… of all are essential positive values. They are together called positive love or ahimsa.

 

b.      Nonviolence is acting in a manner of protecting, promoting and preserving life.

 i.      Recognizing the prevalence of social, economic and political impediments and 

ii.      Striving to remove them

 iii.      Functioning in a manner of upholding the social principles of Justice, Equality and Freedom of all

c.       Nonviolence is resistance against wrong (satyagraha) to uphold life

 i.      Part of nonviolence is protesting against wrong systems (of the society) that deny individuals or a section of the society the opportunity to life a complete life.

d.      Nonviolence is constructing a social order that upholds life of one and all (Sarvodaya)

                             i.      Part of the nonviolence is, renovating social structures and systems in a manner that                                                 facilitates everyone to realize one’s life in fullness

                            ii.      Building structures and systems for people to realize the new facets of life.

 

II.           Way of life

Nonviolence is to understand the way of  is life and its conduct (it is called pursuit of Truth of life), and

a.       Endeavoring to live upto it and never against it;

b.      Reducing the gap between understanding and action. 

c.       Harmonizing all our actions with life. Eightfold noble path (Astangamarg) of Lord Buddha talks about such harmonizing:

                                                              i.      Right understanding

                                                            ii.      right thought

                                                          iii.      Right speech

                                                          iv.      Right action

                                                            v.      Right livelihood

                                                          vi.      Right effort

                                                          vii.      Right mindfulness

                                                      viii.      Right concentration

              

III.        Utility of Violence?

 

Does violence too help in life?

 

While nonviolence is the law of life, it is generally believed that, violence is unavoidable in some situations such as: when we are attacked by others. There is a scriptural saying in Indian religions:

अहिंसा परमो धर्मःahimsa isparamodharma’

(Nonviolence is the supreme religion)

And

धर्म हिंसा तथैव च

‘Violence’ too serves in upholding Dharma / life

 

Fighting in defense of one’s life, or the honor of one’s people, the community, the nation, is an essential way of social living.   That is not called violence, but aggression.

 

Gandhi says, ‘life lives upon life’.  

Tiger eats deer.  It is created to live that way.  Tiger cannot have compassion over deer and stop eating.  That will be suicidal for tiger.

 

Tiger becomes aggressive when hungry and hunts its prey (deer).  They are nonviolative (of the law of nature) therefore they are not violence.  Hunting is called aggressive action.

 

Army is trained to be an aggressive force.  Their purpose is to ‘protect’ ‘defend’ the nation.  ‘Killing’ would never be their objective.   However in their fight to defend the nation, the opponent happens to die (collateral damage).  Such an act is called  non-violative aggression.

 

Violence is essentially a human phenomenon.   Any act of intentional killing hurting or damaging others / others’ livelihood is essentially violence.

 

Tiger does not intend to kill a deer.  It only intends to sustain its life, and deer happens to be its designated food.   That is why, tiger do not kill any animal when it is not hungry.

 

Nonviolence is the law of life

Violence is anti-life.

There is no place for violence in life.

Aggressive action is inevitable in life threatening situations.

 

Compiled by D John Chelladurai, Prof. and Head, Dept of Gandhian Studies, Mahatma Gandhi Mission University, Aurangabad, MS, India – 431003