Gandhi: A Very Short Introduction by Bhikhu Parekh

Author:Bhikhu Parekh
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Publisher: OUP Oxford
Published: 2011-09-15T00:00:00+00:00

A non-violent revolution is not a programme of seizure of power. It is a programme of transformation of relationships, ending in a peaceful transfer of power.

Soul-force

Gandhi concluded that, since the two methods of fighting against injustice were inadequate or deeply flawed, we needed a new method. It should activate the soul, mobilize the individual’s latent moral energies, appeal to both the head and the heart, and create a climate conducive to peaceful resolution of conflict conducted in a spirit of mutual goodwill. Gandhi thought that his method of satyāgraha met this requirement. He first discovered and tried it out during his campaigns against racial discrimination in South Africa, and kept perfecting it in the course of his struggles against British rule in India and the unjust practices of his own society.

For Gandhi satyāgraha, meaning civil insistence on or tenacity in the pursuit of truth, aimed to penetrate the barriers of prejudice, ill-will, dogmatism, self-righteousness, and selfishness, and to reach out to and activate the soul of the opponent. However degenerate or dogmatic a human being might be, he had a soul, and hence the capacity to feel for other human beings and acknowledge their common humanity. Even a Hitler or Mussolini was not beyond redemption. They too loved their parents, wives, children, friends, and pet animals, thereby displaying the basic human capacity for fellow-feeling. Their problem was not that they lacked that capacity but rather that it was limited to a few, and our task was to find ways of expanding it. Satyāgraha was a ‘surgery of the soul’, a way of activating ‘soul-force’. For Gandhi ‘suffering love’ was the best way to do this, and formed the inspiring principle of his new method. As he put it:

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