Gandhi – the Characterization

To understand Gandhi is a tricky exercise. He was unlike other political thinkers, philosophers and strategists not just because he lacked a definitive set of theory colluded with strange and vacillating principles but also because he held unusual objectives in his mind which often made his public-private life distinction seem to be obscure. Over the years following his assassination, hagiographic accounts created a larger than life image of Gandhi which associate the now popular and text-bookish ideas of Satya, Ahimsa, Non-Cooperation and Civil-Disobediences with him. These ideas, indisputably, were crucial part of the Gandhian way of life however it is a gross error to understand Gandhi as a person by analysing these Gandhian socio-political constructs. In my view, Gandhi’s humility is the crucial lynchpin between his simple yet complex character. I have tried, like many others, to empathize with Gandhi from a self-devised framework but have failed miserably in my attempts to cement together his inconsistencies. Reading Gandhi’s accounts and texts one wonders at the unfazed manner in which he wrote, seemingly detached yet anxious. His ideas continue to evolve with time. He appears as a man who is ever engaged into conversations, primarily with himself, to better understand what he really wants. His personality confounds me because of his eccentric behaviour that makes him difficult to comprehend. Why is he sometimes unusually cold - even with his closest kith and kin - and at other times, outrageously emotive so much that he forgets to take rest even for a second? The likes of M. Chatterjee and A. Sharma describe him as a spiritual seeker who is ever searching, in an odd mixture of passion and detachment, his way ahead in life. Evidently, at times reason can fail to make sense out of a selfless oriental seeker whose personality is largely driven by metaphysical concepts and interests, which lay beyond the conventional boundaries of rationality. A psychoanalytic point of view explains his adult personality as a sort of defence mechanism towards fighting and escaping his childhood guilt and fears.

Methods = Means?

The method of Non-Violent Passive Resistance or Satyagraha is interesting in many ways. Branded by many as anarchic, sometimes even as political blackmail, this was a tool newly invented which helped India to foster its Independence struggle. However, its importance must not stem out of the extent of its success in delivering the Indian freedom fighters with the objectives that they had aimed originally. Going by that logic it failed miserably, when applied 50 years later in 1971 during the Bangladesh war of liberation by East Pakistanis with Awami League leading the vanguard against West Pakistan - eventually leading to brutal crackdown of demonstrators by Pakistani Air-Force and Army. Clamped down with LMGs and artillery fire on major East Pakistan cities, it broke into a violent civil war between Pakistani Army and rebel guerrilla forces demanding emancipation and resulting in the death of around 3 lakh civilians. Satyagraha worked in one case but failed in other. The above small example is important to understand that for Gandhi this is precisely the point. He did not choose a method because it harboured possibility to work and succeed. He seems to be not concerned with the final result of his methods instead his prime focus was the methods themselves. For those who were of the opinion that - means were after all means – for them Gandhi had an answer – means were everything. These methods were not means employed to achieve specific goals, even if Congress and people by and large perceived them to be such. They were instead a way of personal life extended into the larger public domain. More on this later.

Gandhi, Ramana Maharishi and Advaita

Gandhi calls himself an Advaitin. One wonders by what parameters he qualifies as such. Advaita literally means non-dualism. There are texts available which command their authority over the philosophy of Advaita; Shankaracharya’s being the major ones. However to define Advaita or any such attempts goes fundamentally opposite to what Advaita stands for. At most, it can be felt or realized. Ramana maharishi stands as an exemplar personality who lived by the philosophy of Advaita as a Jivanmukt. However, Ramana’s life in many ways was diametrically opposite to Gandhi’s. While the Jivanmukt lived a strange disinterested life, Gandhi was a very active and emotional man. But if there is one commonality in both of them, then it’s their perplexing and unpredictable mind.

The perplexity of non-dual reality

Sound divorced from meaning or the other way round, will result in absurdity. It will not contain any information. For humans, information lies in language, which is a distinctive combination of sound and meaning. So information exists only in the presence of a combination of sound and meaning with a human to perceive it.

For an Advaitin there is no distinctness between himself and a bowl. Why so? The answer lies in knowing the origins of distinction. Separation, the word, the concept and its meaning only exists in the framework of language and thought. Outside it, it is hard to imagine its existence. An Advaitin will realize otherness only if he will come to think or speak of it, on employment of thought or language. To address the metaphysical concepts of Advaita with limited faculties of rationality will only create illusions and that is why an Advaitin will never employ dialectics to understand reality. For an Advaita, the non-dual reality can only be felt when the mind is free from the vice grip of reason and language. A mind detached from worldly affairs can best experience it.

Having no way to know what a real Advaitin would be, can we assume that Gandhi is sincere when he says that he is an Advaitin too? Yes, sincere he is, for he does not come out as a man who would give such a public statement just in jest. Everything he does, more than explaining the reason to do it to others, he seems to explain it to himself. So much so that often after deeply pondering he sometimes admits to have believed incorrectly originally and later corrected himself after having seen the light of the day. Such as his view that Truth is God. But is he really an Advaitin? For the sake of our understanding, keeping Ramana maharishi in mind, can we say that he is an Advaitin in making? An Advaitin like Ramana will harbour strikingly different outer and inner views, which unlike conventionally are strangely aligned with each other. Outer view is the same as or emerges out of the inner view. Outer view is the outlook and behaviour towards the external world. When a devotee asked him, does God exist, he replied in return, who is asking the question? This simple answer from the Advaitin explains that there is no separation unless we ask and create one. Who is asking the question, is a food for thought for the questioner to ponder deep within and ask him/herself that who am I and why do I ask and create the illusion of separateness? Inner view is the thought within one’s mind. Ramana would avoid, rather be disinterested in all such thoughts which would create the illusion of duality. There is a continuum from the inner to the outer. The absence of duality and a certain ignorance of language and thought. Internal mental setup is extended to the external behaviour. The private life is carried into the public domain. Or in other words, in consistency to the main philosophy, the distinction between private and public is a myth. They are one and the same.

Model of Politics

At this juncture, we seem to identify the similarities in Gandhi and Ramana. Let’s say, Gandhi holds on to a private life which is disciplined, rigorous in habits and checked by vows. But, he seems to be training himself, for a larger aim and his training extends into the public domain as well. Coming of age leadership experiences in South Africa shaped him into a confident, curious and mature person from a much afraid, reticent and diffident youth. Steady spiritual realizations offered him to think about the wider transcendental mysteries of the world around him. This larger aim seems to be his quest to take control of himself and live a rediscovered righteous life. Satya and Ahimsa are much deeper feelings and recognitions that his humane heart learns to harbour for the whole world around him. His Satya, the feeling of identifying what was just in a situation and then being true to follow one’s inner voice was a universal principle applied in an absolute manner to everything without any exemption. Ahimsa was his belief in universal empathy and love. Satya and Ahimsa go deep as universal Justice and Love, which Gandhi seems to accept as fundamental to universal service. It is hard to see where Advaita fits in this. However, one explanation is Gandhi’s unquestioning dedication to empathize with everything around, with his failure to identify any difference between man and man coupled with nearly obstinate will to challenge and destroy all thoughts that make one believe in distinctions. Never hate the man, hate the intention. This intention is the illusion which divides man from man.

Gandhi’s ways are as much private as they are public. It is hard to find Gandhi ever retreating into an unknown private domain hidden from people around. His engagements with politics are more of a symptom than the cause themselves. The main cause is his lifestyle, curious to ask and question, to care and provide, and to live righteously and maintaining this tempo unaffected by external factors in a detached manner. He is a self-trained man serious about his practices, which are beyond the language of private and public. He holds to his intention of taking full control of his life with sheer fortitude and discipline. This is coupled by what A. Sharma recalls as his quality of putting praxis before theory that makes him the ideal karmayogi of Indian scriptures. The beauty and perhaps curse of Gandhi’s personality is the sheer sincerity and depth of his beliefs yet uncertain character of its ability to bring change.  

Gandhi's religious thought (review part-3)

Truth

Chatterjee mentions how truth has always had a role to play in various Indian systems of thoughts like Hinduism, Jainism and Buddhism. It was used as a blanket cover for several spiritual pursuits, yogic practices and meditative techniques. In such a backdrop, Gandhi’s experiments with truths become interesting because he has his own ways of ascesis. She mentions how at a later stage in his life he discovers that God is Truth. He is not substituting Truth for God but is in fact trying to elucidate what God means for him. Gandhi has very peculiar views on religion. As Chatterjee mentions, he believes in idolatry and is also an iconoclast, which means his God does not have a perceptible image but at the same time he is reflected in the faces of starving millions. Gandhi mentions verses from the holy Koran, reads passages from the Sermon on the Mount and this also not for nothing. Several times he has received criticism for such ventures and so many times he was taken to task by his fellow Hindus. How can we forget that a fellow radical Hindu took his life? But the point nevertheless remains that he borrowed and absorbed from wherever he could look. He educated himself into developing a religio-ethical creed. A theory which is humanistic and practical first and anything else later. Gandhi was also close to atheists and Chatterjee recounts the incident when he attended the funeral of Charles Bradlaugh whom he admired very much. Gandhi saw in atheists, a will to enquire and search for truth. They rejected sentimental and metaphysical arguments on rational grounds and he saw a thrust for truth in them.

Another reason, on similar lines, why Gandhi preferred to see his God in the absolute truth is because time had proved that in every religion, the mere word God appeared as the biggest stumbling block. The word itself weaves debates around it and very often the essence of religion is lost in these debates. Gandhi didn’t want to engage in this God-talk and was rather impatient with those who were only interested into talking religion and not acting. Truth solved such problems.

This calls for understanding the meaning of Truth. Gandhi’s understanding finds its resonance in the Upanishads. The TaittirIya Upanishad says that ‘Brahman is truth eternal.’ For Gandhi, truth is the absolute Brahman. In the Sabarmati Ashram evening prayers would include the BhajanAvalI and one of the hymns said: ‘Early in the morning I call to mind that Being which is felt in the heart, which is sat (the eternal), chit (the knowledge) and ananda (the joy). Truth was sat existing beyond and unconditioned by space and time. Gandhi once quoted from Mahabharata: ‘There is no dharma other than Truth.’ Satyam eva jayate nanRtam means Truth is victory not falsehood. For Gandhi Truth was not the path to salvation, it was salvation. He saw the whole Hindu tradition was a relentless pursuit after truth.

His methods of this pursuit are interesting. There’s a distinct element of Advaita in it. He understands the whole species of humans, animals and nature as one. Moreover as Chatterjee observes later that this is actually one and the only inconsistency that we can observe in Gandhi- he is a believer in one world one people and at the same time he’s a nationalist fighting for independence and sovereignty. He believes that men should rationalize their needs so that everyone receives his due share. The needs have to be decreased when so many people sleep at night without even one morsel of bread in their stomachs. He calls for vegetarianism because eating non-veg is an act of ahimsa towards animals. Similarly water must be saved because at some places women have to walk miles to get just one bucket of not very clean water. His self-discipline is actually an inculcation of God-ward proclivities. This is a certain kind of ethical behaviour true to the atman inside.

In Gandhi’s mArg of truth, the tapasya, a series of disciplines is necessary. This mArg overlaps very considerably with the Jain list of vratas or resolutions. These are Ahimsa (non-violence), Nidarta (fearlessness, truth), Brahmacharya (chastity), Asteya (non-stealing) and Aparigraha (non-possession). He also pays a lot of attention to means rather than ends and often quoted a famous adage ‘as you sow so shall you reap.’ Gandhi advocates a strict steadfastness in their enforcement upon the people he led. He borrowed the scrupulous discipline present in nature like the sequence of day and night, cycle of seasons and saw them not as mechanical but as a model for human activity. He was of the view that before being send on campaigns, the satyagrahis had to be trained in the above mentioned resolution with the same steadfastness as shown by nature. Gandhi believed that discipline was utmost important and that the vows were important not so much to control the tempest raging within us but more so as they were a sign of strength. It was not a formalistic framework to keep oneself on rails but a way of entering more deeply into the truth.

Lastly Chatterjee mentions what words Gandhi used to represent the untruth. Gandhi says the nApAk (unholy), Satanism, evil, adharma, irreligion and deadly sins were untruth and that a Satyagrahi, a genuine seeker of truth must have a heart as hard as granite to fight against them.

SUFFERING

  

Suffering plays a very important role in Gandhi’s scheme of things. Before proceeding to Gandhi’s views, Chatterjee has explained the traditional Indian outlook attached to the idea of suffering – dukkha. In the Indian metaphysics as well as religions, dukkha has always been considered as a chief practical problem. Hinduism holds the concept of rebirth where the endless cycle of birth and death with ceaseless dukkha appears as a horrifying prospect. However, Gandhi held an innovative view on suffering, which he considered to be the richest treasure of life. He did not see dukkha from a Hindu cosmic point of view but from a very human and practical point of view. He saw suffering in the form of the injustices inflicted upon the weak and the wickedness present in the human heart such as the emotions of anger, greed, lust etc. However, he was not talking about this form of suffering only. More importantly he was concerned about the suffering which was self-inflicted- known as tapasya. Tapasya was the marg for tackling the above-mentioned miseries.

Gandhi focused on two things. First, tapasya should not be a method which only the spiritually strong sannyasins can adopt but it should also be achievable by all. Second, while it would enable the common man to build up a good life it must also be an effective weapon against the prevalent suffering. Gandhi looked for a method through which the constructive energies of all men could be released. He believed non-violence to be that method, the tapasya. The moral equivalent of warfare. Gandhi believed that the reality must be changed but non-violently otherwise the total burden of suffering in the world would increase. Non-violence was voluntary adoption of suffering by an individual and a group as a self-purificatory act to set up an example for others and convert the heart of the oppressor. He puts self-sacrifice in the place of ancient YagNas. This sacrifice was not the individual suffering undertaken through austerities in quest for self-perfection. Instead, this was the combined heroism of groups of satyagrahis.

Regardless of all, Gandhi repeatedly said that this method was new and yet to be tested. He believed that the suffering undertaken through the path of non-violence was not just to rectify the injustices inflicted upon common people or only making the authority concede to righteous demands but also to win the heart of the opponent and establish with him a new human relationship.

In matters of training Satyagrahis Gandhi paid utmost importance to discipline. To those, he led, he commanded with the wisdom of a spiritual dictator. Non-violence was not just to be observed in physical terms but also in terms of thought. Gandhi knew that the teachings of self-suffering can be put to use only after necessary preliminary training and he had the knack for sensing the readiness of Satyagrahis for embarking on a particular campaign.

Gandhi also said that each should find his salvation within his own community. This view might appear contradictory since Gandhi exhorted groups of satyagrahis rather than individual suffering. The contradiction is solved when we understand that Gandhi was asking everyone, all members of the group, to first clean their own houses. As an example, he meant that while untouchables must non-violently defy Brahmin edicts like, not using a certain road expecting reprimand in return-suffering- they must also improve their own lives by observing cleanliness, spinning etc.

Chatterjee goes on to argue that independent observers might not find Gandhi’s strategy of using suffering that effective a tool. It might simply appear as a kind of political blackmail. However, she clarifies this doubt by invoking the images of violent struggles of history which include assassinations, hostages, guerrilla strategies, isolated acts of terrorism and innocent people getting killed. Gandhi’s strategy of non-violent suffering was not political blackmail because he made sure that proper preliminary training of self-purification was given to the satyagrahis before they would be embarked on a campaign. The self-suffering was eventually supposed to move the heart of the oppressor, hridaya-parivartana. If it could not be done then it was better to get killed than kill, apparently to fail than to submit to tyranny. Such a method were satyagrahis were ready to lay their lives for the truth was not political blackmail.

Chatterjee explains that the method of self-suffering would not always be useful and effective unless the parallel constructive works are also run. Gandhi was extraordinarily sensitive to timings of campaigns because he believed that the voluntary assumption of suffering cannot be justified in the absence of supporting constructive work.

Chatterjee also suggests that using ahimsa and dukkha together, Gandhi has created a certain kind of enlightened anarchism. One wonders that if non-violent suffering is used as a tool against authority of the day then who will justify its enlightenment. Gandhi was both a spiritual dictator and an epitome of self-sacrifice which gave his enlightenment the required legitimacy. However, ordinary men are not like Gandhi and if today the method is used then how will it qualify as enlightened? We must realize that devoid of enlightened the method is just another form of anarchism.

SECULARISM

As Chatterjee talks about religion, inner voice and Gandhi’s spiritual pursuits to train satyagrahis, she does not miss the important problem of religion getting mixed with public life and the response that Gandhi’s critics give to it. For Gandhi, secularism was never a problem neither was the presence of more than one religion. He saw similar ethical and human concerns in all religions. Pluralism was never an intellectual problem for Gandhi. Moreover, anyone with a Jain background and training in Syadvad would take this plurality for granted.

To understand more deeply why Gandhi had inter-religious beliefs is to understand the kind of pursuit on which Gandhi was moving. As mentioned earlier by Chatterjee, his was a relentless pursuit of truth. He was not a pioneer labouring on theological frontiers because the frontier mentality was alien to him whether on fronts of religion or geography. He also had a knack to relate and find his own convictions reflected in whatever he was reading. Chatterjee points to the fact that Gandhi had some deep rooted convictions and things that he read only made them much stronger. Ideas such as civil disobedience by H.D.Thoreau and life of labour by John Ruskin were some examples. Wherever he found these ideas, he wholeheartedly accepted them regardless if they crossed religious boundaries. In his thoughts, commitment to common ethical values was in no way incompatible with the diversity of religious belief.

As mentioned earlier, one and perhaps only contradiction in his scheme of things was to believe in one world one government and at the same time in nationalism. Unity of mankind and nationalist aspirations didn’t go hand in hand. However, he explained that the unity was based on our common imperfections which all men have. A microcosm form of this unity and coexistence was mentioned by him in his speeches like this: all men must acquire the wisdom of a Brahmin the fighting spirit of a Kshatriya the business acumen of a Bania and the spirit of service of a Sudra.

We can see his application of these cross religion beliefs in so many forms. One of the examples is his disapproval of materialism. He was against rapacious acquisitiveness mainly for two reasons, one emerges out of Swami Vivekananda’s Advaita view that this acquisition of wealth and material is unequal which would lead to some people being discriminated vis a vis to others. The other reason stemmed out from Ruskin’s notion of life of labour. If machines would dominate the market then labour will be displaced which would be disastrous in a country where God resides in the faces of so many labouring men and women.

In India, public and social lives have been different. There was never an Indian parallel to the proletarian pop culture in the west that accompanied along with it secularization. In India, Chatterjee mentions, there was a continuity between beliefs and religious practices in India’s villages for hundreds of years. Politics for Gandhi was a mission, not any art, business or a game as Tilak one put it and Gandhi would use all his religious knowledge no matter where it came from to purge out the dirt. He also believed that Gita has shown that there are multiple paths to attain the highest truth of all. Politics was also a human activity which is built into man’s community and there was nothing wrong to walk on it and purifying it by infusing a non-violent spirit into it. Gandhi thought that activism of religion, when it is purged of obscurantism, superstition and doctrinal barriers, was to bring about conflict resolution as it had in itself the seed of sensitivity to social injustice. This quality made religion an integral part of politics.

Chatterjee also mentions about Gandhi’s dislike for any kind of compartmentalization. To divide religion on the basis of doctrines and sacraments was another form of fragmentation which Gandhi could not accept. His Advaita beliefs prevented him from engaging in any form of partitions. He believed in the whole, unity of one.

Although Secularism was not a serious issue for Gandhi, and he involved cross religion thoughts freely in the field of politics, he also received a lot of flak for it. Occasionally he read passages from the holy Koran as in 1947 which brought a shower of criticism on his head. He was called a slave of Jinnah-Saheb and a fifth columnist. He was also taken to task by students of Gujarat National College when he read some passages from the New Testament. These incidents show that although Secularism had entered Indian public discussion or perhaps it was infused from west but Gandhi did not pay much importance to it ever. His thoughts and beliefs worked on a different plane situated much higher. He paid the price to Godse. 

Gandhi's Religious Thought - (review part-2)

INNER VOICE

Chatterjee has dedicated one complete chapter to talk about Gandhi’s view of spirituality. From Indian perspective, it is hard to talk about religion and spirituality in rigid terms like what it means to the west. These terms have no exact counterpart in either Hinduism or Indian languages which would mean and express the same sentiments that these terms express. Hinduism is centred on the concept of Dharma where questions of God’s existence become ancillary. For Gandhi, God is Truth and his spiritual and physical endeavours are directed towards the search of the latter. Chatterjee mentions how Gandhi has digressed from traditional Hindu practices of YajnA and PUjA and has replaced them with soul-force and prayer respectively. This is where Chatterjee embarks upon understanding an important concept in Gandhi’s scheme of things, the inner voice. She says that the link between the soul-force and prayer is the inner voice. It is the power which is released through self-sacrificing acts especially when embarked upon collectively.

Her efforts are to understand this inner voice and Gandhi’s experience of prayer. She starts by understanding Gandhi’s attitude towards rituals and sacraments. It is important over here to mention his views on this topic. He said that works done without faith and prayers were like artificial flowers without fragrance. Nevertheless, Gandhi was sensitive to the presence of symbolism in religious life. He thought symbolism was instrumental to give shape to what was invisible to the human eye but clearly visible to the eye of human imagination.

Indian religious life was full of symbolism whether in food, dress, dances, Kirtan so on and so forth. Gandhi accepted them gladly but was also critical of the accompanying cruelty, unhygienic conditions, rudimentary practices like untouchability etc. He himself introduced new symbols like wearing Khadi - a symbol of self-sufficiency and doing one’s own things that would reduce dependencies. Chatterjee is trying to show that for Gandhi, the insistence on prayer and devotion was also somehow linked to the expression of symbols like those mentioned above.

Chatterjee pays special attention to digging deep in Gandhi’s inner voice. For Gandhi, the inner voice could mean a message from either God or Devil since both wrestle in the human breast. Act determine the nature of voice. This is his attempt at ultimately making the man responsible for his acts done out of responding to the inner voice. The purity of the final act would determine if it was the God or the Devil who spoke initially. This is similar to saying that everything is pre-defined however we can still shape our destiny. Whatever shape we give to it, it was pre-destined to receive that shape.

Gandhi clarifies his position on inner voice, for those to whom it sounded obstructionist in current form, as it simply being the dictates of reason. He said that these dictates contained both authority and power but revealed themselves only to those men who had undergone purificatory discipline of a Satyagrahi and have faith in God. Gandhi held the view that if one listened to his inner voice then he would come in tune with the universe which will gives the power to stand alone in the harshest of the harsh conditions. He was very fond of a song that Tagore wrote during independence movement. ‘Ekla Cholo’- the song motivates the lone worker to struggle for freedom even when no one responds to the call in dark.

Chatterjee mentions that Gandhi never really liked the titles that were given to him. Neither Karmaveer nor Mahatma. He considered himself a humble seeker after truth and a devotee of God. Gandhi found it hard to accept anything that made him stand apart from his fellow brothers and sisters. His belief in Advaita stood in front of him as a roadblock. In one of the paragraphs that Chatterjee mentions, his belief in Advaita is clearly stated by him. He said God and his laws were one. Anything attributed to God was not a mere attribute. God was the attribute. God was the truth, love, law and a million things that human ingenuity could name. That if one individual gained spiritually, all gained around him. If he fell the whole world would fall.

As the chapter closes, Chatterjee explores that important conduit through which the inner voice is approached- prayer. For Gandhi, prayer was a means of self-purification. It arose from the hunger of the soul. When he prayed for an ailing friend, we also see his rational outlook towards prayer. He said that he didn’t know if prayer would add even a single second to the life for which he prayed. But it definitely comforted those who were prayed for and elevated those who prayed. Gandhi paid special attention to congregational prayers. These were accompanied not by a sermon or homily but a public address which dealt with very practical day to day matters of the ashram, the political events of the day and social challenges needed to be met. These mass prayer sessions were also a lesson in self-discipline. Even when no idols and images were used in his prayer gatherings, even when they were held under open skies, hundreds of thousands flocked. Gandhi was training them to listen to their inner voice. 

Gandhi's Religious Thought by Margaret Chatterjee - Review (P-1)

I recently wrote an in-depth review of Margaret Chatterjee's book Gandhi's Religious Thought.

Here is the review in piecewise format.

Margaret Chatterjee has divided the book into broad theme-based chapters. These themes are ideas and concepts which Gandhi believed in. I have tried to divide the review into these themes and also separate them under different headings for convenience. These are Dharma, Inner Voice, Truth, Suffering and Secularism. Her research covers Gandhi’s correspondence with several peers, his written works and his dialogues with interviewers, his public speeches, Indian National Congress’ addresses so on and so forth. The tract written, by and large to understand Gandhi from a religious perspective is a multidimensional endeavour. It is rich with anecdotes from Gandhi’s life which stem out several sub-themes and often lead the discussion in unrequited directions. Chatterjee confesses herself that to put Gandhi into a religious perspective inside some limited calculated pages is not a very good idea. To give an example to this would be to mention chapter 4 where Chatterjee discusses Gandhi’s experimentation with truth. She starts with talking about the ontological presence of truth in the Indian school of thought, goes on to talk about truth from the perspective of dharma as present in Mahabharata. However, after that she talks about the way Gandhi looks at the relationship between man and nature which digresses the discussion on truth for some pages. She is indeed trying to drive home some points from these little offline discussions, but I find them confusing at times.

There is a lot of content that Chatterjee wants to talk about. She has also included commentaries and responses of Gandhi’s peers and critics to give a multi-sided view of several issues. This is not to say that she is neutral in her approach towards Gandhi. After reading the chapters, one realizes that Chatterjee has endeavoured to understand Gandhi from a religious perspective rather point out fallacies in his complex and often misunderstood scheme of things.

DHARMA

Chatterjee believes that Dharma is the central religious concept of Hinduism.  Its understanding is very important in order to understand various other concepts that stem out of it. However before moving in that direction, Chatterjee want us to understand the basis of Gandhi’s religion. Gandhi believed it was pity, daya. He also mentioned that is was necessary to revive Hinduism of its pity and compassion. Gandhi linked pity for his fellow beings in the same way as Hanuman held devotion for Lord Rama. For Gandhi finds the reflection of his God in people, he showed the same dedication to them as Hanuman showed it to his God. He said that Hanuman tore his heart to show that there was nothing inside but Ramnama and that although he did not have same power but if someone would feel the need to do so, he would only find love for Ram whom he saw in the faces of the starving millions of India.

She proceeds to explain the meaning of Dharma. It is an ethico-religious concept which is perhaps also closer to the Judaic idea of righteousness. Etymologically, it stood to hold an ideal society where each person would do his designated work and it in turn had to be held by the society. Another related term called Swadharma stems out from Dharma, which mean self-Dharma. This idea means doing what is one’s proper business to do and setting up limits to ambitions enabling a man to develop his potentialities. Gandhi believed in the notion of hereditary occupation for which he gave dual reasoning. One, an ideal one that if everyone did their designated jobs communities will become self-sufficient and second, that industrialisation would erode traditional hereditary occupations leading to unemployment. For these reasons, he supported the Varna-ashram dharmas or the caste duties. He however was completely against the abhorrent activity of untouchability or throwing people out of the system of four castes, the outcastes.

Gandhi’s understanding of Dharma lies on a categorical path. This is to say that there is a near-Kantian element in his belief that man must know how to differentiate between dharma and its anti-thesis.

Gandhi, Chatterjee says, was never guilty of academic verbiage. He was a man of people and not a professional philosopher of theologian. If he would speak in a formal language which the people would not understand, his motive would fail. His understanding of dharma was something like complete categorical dedication to the God with a humble heart. This has to be done with a sense of duty, nishkam-karma, with a certain sense of detachment and without the expectation of fruits. The humility stems from Anasakti – selfless action and bhakti of the God.

Chatterjee talks more about concepts of God in chapters to come.

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi- the saint of action

Gandhi emerged as an exceptional political strategist with an unconventional personality. He took an active interest in the lives of people and community at large which made him a man of politics albeit a very peculiar one. This is because he didn’t work within the traditional paradigm of politics. He was not systematic at all. He did not follow the traditional rules of politics. People defy political orders and histories of every country are a living testimony to it. People resist with all strength and anger. But Gandhi’s lesson of defiance was different. He said, ‘one can disobey only if there’s scope to obey, but in our case there’s no question to obey anything.’ His disobedience had an element of detachment. This is the important juncture where he juxtaposed the spiritual with the practical. The detachment stemmed out of the spiritual and the spiritual out of religion. This shall be my aim- to understand how Gandhi reconciles religion with politics.

First look at his qualities will present a plethora of contradictions. Such as Religion and Politics; a combination that every modern nation wants to shy away from. Secularism is the motto of the day. But Gandhi enforced that politics must be reformed through religion. In my opinion, he even believed that politics is an outgrowth of religion. More contradictions- he was ideal and romantic but also realistic and shrewd. Believed in universal equality but still accepted the castes and Varnashrama Dharma. However after reading more and understanding him better I realized that Gandhi understood these ideas from a standpoint where they were not contradictions at all. Gandhi justified how idealism will go hand in hand with realism, how equality and freedom will go hand in hand with caste duties and how politics was a subset of religion. He also admitted that his views may become inconsistent with the time, but that was also justified in his system of things.

To understand this extraordinary personality and how he cultivated himself, we must understand his scheme of things, his influences and his objectives- immediate and long term.

Let us for a moment not look at Gandhi as the Mahatma or a politician who fought for our independence but instead as a middle class boy born and brought up in a traditional religious Gujarati family belonging to the Bania (Merchant) caste. If we read his autobiography we will find the early sources of his religious leanings. Ladha Maharaj, a friend of his father would often visit his home to read Tulsidas’ Ramayana and young Gandhi often listened with rapt attention. He was exposed to Jain beliefs through his mother’s contacts. Very soon, he came in contact with Raychandbhai, a Jain philosopher, who later became his spiritual guide during his years in South Africa. He was very impressed by the teachings of Bhagavad Gita and went so far to translate them. His western influences were John Ruskin’s ‘Unto this last’ which mainly discussed the Sermon on the Mount and Tolstoy’s ‘Kingdom of God is within you.’ ‘Offer the other cheek also if someone slaps you,’ repeated Gandhi very often from the Sermon. He was also influenced by folk traditions, stories, and hymns, especially that of Narsinh Mehta’s. The Bhagavad Gita and the philosophy of Advaita Vedanta had the most significant influence on him. The retelling of these influences is very important because they had been instrumental in shaping Gandhi’s thoughts.

From a psychological point of view, I am trying to understand the way in which Advaita Vedanta of Gita and Upanishads, the Jain, folk and epic literary texts had shaped his mind and thoughts. His own individual endeavours to train himself with vows and forced discipline were equally instrumental. But I see that even his self-training was an outcome of religion. He was training himself to be a seeker. What was he seeking? Later. Once we understand his thoughts, we would see why he was unlike ordinary men and women and did not qualify as any traditional politician. We will also see how he observed the world around him and will get justifications of his actions in his private spheres like relations with his wife, sons and extended family friends and in public life which were mostly political and social in nature.

What was Gandhi interested in? Were these interests political in nature? Did he have any self-interests?

Gandhi was a religious man and he believed that he was only a humble servant of the Lord of the universe. The Bhagavad Gita had taught him the theory of Nishkan-karma which meant to be simultaneously in a state of action and detachment both. In Gita, Krishna told Arjun that he was a Karmayogi therefore he must follow his Dharma. Gandhi also took himself to be a karmayogi - the humble servant of the Lord- who had to pursue his dharma. But before proceeding we must understand the meaning of these terms and the central concept of Advaita around which all of them are woven.

Gandhi thought in a certain way that subscribed to the school of non-dualism. He was aware of the Atman present in each and every person, animal and objects of nature. He was also aware of the universal Brahman that existed independently. ‘Brahma is the imperishable supreme aspect of God and Adhyatama is the individual soul living in the body of all beings as the doer and the enjoyer,’ [1]he said. He asserted the Advaita when he said ‘the supreme state of Brahma is reached by sages who have freed themselves from the likes and dislikes by observing Brahmacharya.’[2] Gandhi was of the view that humans were perfectible and that the Atman could reach the universal Brahman. Bhagavad Gita gave ample evidence of this perfectibility by presenting Krishna as the mortal who carried the Supreme God within him. In Bhagavad Gita, Krishna said, ‘the man of vision (who loves me, does my bhakti) and I are one. His whole soul is one in me and I am his supreme path.’[3] Gandhi’s views on human perfectibility were also corroborated by his belief in the Jain ideal of Syadvad. These views were formed mostly by staying in touch with Raychandbhai. Syadvad means the presence of multiplicity of individual truths. Everyone holds fast their own truths and they are false only if they are considered to be exclusive. Syadvad believes that the universal truth is the collective whole of all the individual truths. This is similar to saying that the Atman is the truth within and the universal Brahman is the ultimate truth. One must hold fast to his individual truth and seek towards the ultimate truth. Gandhi believed that the journey from Atman to Brahman can take place only when the ego within is extinguished and we served ourselves humbly to the universal lord. The seeker must pursue the absolute.

Back to the first question. Why did he seek at all? What were his interests? Does this absolute truth also mean Moksha?

At this important point we must understand that Gandhi was not seeking the absolute truth out of any interests. He was seeking it as a duty. Why? Because in the affairs of mortal life a karmayogi must follow his dharma, which in the Upanishadic sense means right conduct or righteous duty. Just as Arjun finally decided to fight for righteousness when Krishna exhorted him to follow his dharma, Gandhi decided to follow his dharma which was his duty to pursue the absolute truth or the universal God. He did not questions this and performed it with a sense of detachment, the nishkam-karm. Moksha comes later. We must first understand the nature of this universal God, in Gandhi’s scheme of things.

Gandhi gave his own interpretation to the God of Gita. He called him the Daridranarayan or the God of the weak. Borrowing from Advaita, he saw the absolute Brahman as a collective of individual Atmans of all people. This was similar to Vivekananda’s interpretation and explained the etymology of the word Harijan. ‘God lives in the starving millions,’ he said many a times. The 3 supreme ideas mentioned in Bhagavad Gita are of Gyan (Light), Bhakti (Love) and Karma (Life). As mentioned above, Krishna said in Gita that the supreme Lord could be attained only by doing his bhakti. Since Gandhi’s God resided in people he did the bhakti of the masses by dedicating his karma towards them.

So far we have understood that Gandhi as a seeker was pursuing the absolute truth (ultimate Brahman) because a karmayogi must follow his dharma. Dharma dictates righteous duty, which in turn means complete dedication to the Lord Almighty- ultimate Brahman. The Lord resided in the weak so dharma dictated complete devotion to the service of the destitute. We should also look at his ways to serve God, the starving millions.

Gandhi was a Hindu but he accepted the religion in a selective manner. He did not blindly followed all sacraments and tenets. He went so far to say that those Vedas which asked for sacrifices and indicated towards subjugation of the weak must be ignored. He paid immense importance to the Jain ideals of Brahmacharya, Aparigraha, Satya, Asteya and Ahimsa and very craftily added them into his scheme of things which was originally inspired from the wisdom of Gita and stories from the epic literatures of India namely Ramayana and Mahabharata. For him these ideals were instrumental in serving the poor. He invoked the element of pity, daya from Bhagvad Gita as crucial for this service. His favourite hymn ‘Vaishnav jan to tene kahiye je, peed paraayi jaane re’ originally written by Narsinh Mehta means Vaishnava (devotees of Lord Vishnu) people are those who feel the pain of others. He was a staunch believer of reincarnation, which is a central tenet of classic Hinduism but was of the opinion that he wanted to be born again and again to serve the weak endlessly. This was his definition of serving and dedicating himself forever to the lord almighty. We can see that these ideas emerge out of Bhagvad Gita but Gandhi shaped them in a certain way that suited his understanding of dharma- duty to the Lord. This makes me remark on the beauty of the Bhagavad Gita and its ability to be interpreted by the seeker for what he or she is looking for.

Moksha for Gandhi was complete liberation from any impure thoughts. Any deviance from the route of serving others was an impediment to Moksha. To immerse oneself into dharma, the right conduct, one’s own truth of serving the almighty lord with Anasakti- selfless action, would lead to Moksha. Gandhi wanted to be born again and again so that he can serve the people endlessly and this was Moksha for him. Jain influences made him see life in all beings. Gandhi saw in each being a small part of the Brahman. For him all was sacred so he enforced Ahimsa with all his might. ‘Love your neighbour as your God’. This was his idea of Loksangraha, a collective effort for universal brotherhood. He taught Ahimsa not just in physical aspect but also in spirit. Even a thought of ill-will would broke the principle and was an aberration from Moksha.

He was a karmayogi who wanted to follow his dharma to serve others with detachment and bhakti for endless time. He believed in teaching through setting example. He never forced anyone, but exemplified the life of a karmayogi with tenacious will and determination. He believed that if everyone lived their lives as karmayogis then the human civilisation would set up the Kingdom of God right here on earth. The Advaita reinforced itself again and again as reflected in this thought. Earth and Heaven were same. This was his concept of Ram-Rajya.

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[1] Discourses on the Gita- Mahatma Gandhi Chapter 8.

[2] Discourses on the Gita- Mahatma Gandhi Chapter 8.

[3] Bhagvad Gita- Chapter 7 Verse 18.

Je Suis Charlie

Before even going into the what-a-bad-act-of-violence sentimental outpour I want to focus first on the meaning of Secularism as interpreted and enshrined by the Constitutional Council of France. The idea of this article is not to analyse whether it was a bad and horrific action or a good and justified reaction. Certainly there are causes responsible for an action. In fact Mr. Devdutt Patnaik goes so far, although not very impressively, to give a philosophical bend to the recent attacks by talking about maya: we live in our constructed realities smothered by the maya which makes us the killer and the killed both. One can always throw in more constructed jargons like Justice by arguing that 12 people lampooning prophet get killed in cold blood in France by two isolated militants and 3.7 million people come out in their support but 2000 plus innocent people including children and pregnant women are captured in their own homes in Nigeria and butchered for committing no crime by an army of organised militants and still only a handful of news agencies talk about the incident. Call it the ridiculousness or mishandling to deal with global terror outfits or the absurdity of modern day realpolitik one cannot but be compelled to frown at these incidents. These are matters of grave concern which make us rethink our basis concepts of justice, freedom, peace, tolerance, security and allegiance to basic humanism and simply commenting that it was good or bad would be gross oversimplification.

The text-book definition of Indian secularism is that the government shall remain neutral to all religion by not meddling itself into the affairs of any single one of them. Free practice, profession, propagation (of) your religion (conversion although is not a right as said by SC in one verdict and de facto conversion by force is infringement of freedom of conscience), freedom from taxation (on religious institutions), freedom to give religious instructions (to autonomous private education institutions), freedom to manage language and culture (religious minority) are some provisions mentioned under part-3 of Indian Constitution also called as ‘Fundamental Rights’. Pretty impressive isn’t it? In theory, yes. But this is not the case in France.

In France, Secularism simply means concerning with the affairs of natural and not the supernatural. The French state does not recognize religion and recent past incidents would also show that there’s a certain element of hostility against religion in their secularism. The French accepted the concept of Laïcité – the separation of church and state way back in 1905. However the more severe version of secularism was defined by the French courts recently in 2004. Increasing amount of immigration in the past decade gave way to the emergence of multiple identities. To prevent the practice of appeasement politics, which destroys social fabric – India being a fantastic example, the decision was taken to identify secularism as a strict non-recognition of any religion. This essentially means that the people of France have the right to offend religion just as they can other sensitive matters like public figures. In 2011 they passed a law for mandatory revelation of face at places of work, officially banning Hijabs and Naqabs. This came into implementation since 2014.

Charlie Hebdo was practicing this legal and political facility to express its disagreement of institutionalised religion, specifically Islam as per the context. Certainly the fact that they didn’t express why they disagreed with Islam but straight away lampooned it as a joke is questionable. Charlie’s belief is that rather than pouring in over the top militarised troops into the middle-east, they should instead create such an atmosphere of liberal thought that Islam like Christianity is reduced to a banality. Despite several threats and some previous attacks, Charlie did not succumb. Theirs was a provocative, thoughtful, funny, obscene and an anarchist method.

Most important now is to understand the socio-political implications of these attacks on Charlie Hebdo. Anti-immigration sentiments are high in European nations. Whether they are anti-Islam marches in Germany or the rising Islamophobia in France, one must clearly understand the backlash that Charlie Hebdo will create.

Clearly there were reported attacks on Mosques and other Islamic centres which only corroborate the rising fear of Islam in European countries. These are not isolated incidents. The growing immigration compounded by an anti-Islam sentiment has been further responsible for alienating the Muslim communities in European countries. This has caused ghettoization and marginalisation. I even heard Mr. Bobby Jindal recently talked about certain no-non Muslim zones in England where a more severe form of Islam is strictly followed. The idea is that if one reads the profile of majority of Muslim people living in these areas, one would find that these are 2^nd and 3^rd generation immigrants from marginalized working classes living in grim high rise suburbs at the outskirts of large cities where unemployment, drug exploitation and other crimes plague day in and day out. Such marginalisation and unemployment brings along dejection and stigma with it, which if can be solved by joining a radical Islam then the latter is considered a viable option. Such reasons which provide a meaning to these despondent men and women then become an explanation to incidents of young people flocking in groups to join radical forces in Middle-East like IS.

Charlie Hebdo and its aftermath must be treated very sensitively. The government and law enforcement agencies must work hard to keep all the sections of people in confidence and ensure their ideal of secularism in practice.