November 1, 2014 at 8:57am
Gandhi, " I do not want Britain to be defeated, nor do I want her to be victorious in a trial of brute strength, whether expressed through the muscle or the brain. Your muscular bravery is an established fact. Need you demonstrate that your brain is also as unrivalled in destructive power as your muscle? I hope you do not wish to enter into such an undignified competition with the Nazis. I venture to present you with a nobler and a braver way, worthy of the bravest soldier. I want you to fight Nazism without arms, or, if I am to retain the military terminology, with nonviolent arms. I would like you to lay down the arms you have as being useless for saving you or humanity. You will invite Herr Hitler and Signor Mussolini to take what they want of the countries you call your possessions. Let them take possession of your beautiful island, with your many beautiful buildings. You will give all these but neither your souls, nor your minds. If these gentlemen choose to occupy your homes, you will vacate them. If they do not give you free passage out, you will allow yourself man, woman and child, to be slaughtered, but you will refuse to owe allegiance to them.
This is no appeal made by a man who does not know his business. I have been practising with scientific precision non-violence and its possibilities for an unbroken period of over fifty years."
http://www.mkgandhi.org/mynonviolence/chap46.htm
Naveen Manikandan Periasamy Pardon me, but this is unadulterated non-sense and false interpretation of Ahimsa which is not based on Dharma, but on Leo Tolstoy's preaching of Orthodox Christianity to Gandhi. I recommend you to read this brain formatting letter that Tolstoy wrote to Gandhi and share your opinion on the same. Not everything that comes from the mouth of great souls is gold. http://www.brainpickings.org/.../leo-tolstoy-gandhi.../'
Kannan Thandapani I am familiar with this letter but it is brain-formatting only in a positive manner. Ahimsa, in its purest form, is not palatable to most. Only when it is presented as a workable strategy, people are willing to accept it. I think that was Gandhi's biggest regret as well - that people adopted ahimsa as a strategy and not The Truth.
Aparna Krishnan Gandhi stood by Ahimsa, and by the Dharma of the Bhagavad Geetha. Does that Dharma (as propounded by Krishna) demand that one 'fight' for right, and not surrender ? But Gandhi swore by both - the Geetha and Ahimsa.
Kannan Thandapani Gandhi saw in Tolstoy and Gita, or for that matter, even Ruskin, what he wanted to see. He departed from 'passive resistance' in making surrender a form of fight. The surrender was active and not passive.Kural suggests active surrender...Tolstoy cites from Kural as well : இன்னா செய்தாரை ஒறுத்தல் அவர்நாண நன்னயம் செய்து விடல். Gandhi's interpretation of Unto the Last also went beyond where Ruskin ventured. Btw, I find the implication that it is nonsense because it is based 'on Leo Tolstoy's preaching of Orthodox Christianity to Gandhi' very offensive. So what is wrong if it is based on orthodox Christianity? Gandhi himself said Sermon on the Mount went 'straight to my heart'.
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