Ahimsa Isn’t Surrender in Disguise

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We have been seeing about Ahimsa — non-violence — a very important quality that we should inculcate in children. This is typically an Indian value. It has gone elsewhere in the world from here only.

We also saw that as Ahimsa is beneficial for the society, how it is also equally beneficial for oneself. Yoga Shastra says peace will establish itself around the person who practices Ahimsa naturally.
Who doesn’t want peace in life?

Don’t think Ahimsa is submissiveness. Mahatma Gandhi wrote a book called Non-Violence in Peace and War — how to observe non-violence during war also. That means non-violence is not just avoiding conflicts.

Mahatma Gandhi says, if it is a choice between cowardice and violence — if these are the only two options available, there is absolutely no third option — then you should go for violence.

He was badly assaulted and wounded in Africa in 1908. His son asked him,
'What should I have done? Should I have run away? Should I have watched as a mute spectator? Or should I have protected you using physical force or violence?'

Gandhiji said — 'It is your duty as a son to protect me. Even if it involves violence.'

He has said, India should rather take up arms than suffer dishonour — if that is her only option.
Ahimsa is not a policy you adopt when you feel helpless, when your enemy is too powerful. That is not Ahimsa — that is cowardice. Understand this clearly.

Ahimsa is far more powerful than Himsa.
Forgiveness is far more powerful than punishment — forgiveness when you have the power to punish.
This adds to your inner strength.

Don’t confuse Ahimsa with meekness.
You have power to punish — but you forgive. Do this consciously. This adds to your inner strength.
This adds to your inner spiritual strength.
This helps you to evolve spiritually.

A mouse forgiving a cat which is ready to pounce upon it and tear it to pieces is not non-violence.
That is helplessness. Not forgiveness. Not non-violence.

Understand this clearly.

What Gandhiji thought was — India was not helpless, even then.
Strength is not physical strength or weapon strength.
If you are relying on physical strength — learning martial arts or building muscles — then you are wrong.
That strength is only till someone more powerful than you comes, or someone with a more lethal weapon comes.

Strength is in the heart.

These days we teach our children martial arts. Do it — no problem. It is good for the body and mind.
But don’t do it for the wrong reason.
Don’t say it is for self-defence — that it will protect you from molesters, eve-teasers, bad people on the road.
The strength is in the heart, not in the body.

You must have heard or read — Octogenarian couple fights away robbers.
Is it physical strength? No — it is in the heart.

Young children getting bravery awards — ten- or twelve-year-old children — for saving lives.
Where does that strength come from? It is in the heart, not in the body.

Gandhiji says — when he was in Africa, the physical strength of an average African boy was much more than an English boy.
But the African boy would run away if he saw an English boy.

Why?
Because he doesn’t realize strength.

During our freedom struggle, our population was nearly 30 crores. And the oppressors were hardly a lakh of them.
How were they able to oppress us? Because we didn’t realize our strength.

Inner strength — not physical strength.

We didn’t realize the tremendous power that we had to punish.
If we had realized it then, the story would have been different.

This inner strength — which comes out of realization of one’s own power to punish, but still refraining from it — was what Gandhiji was trying to wake up across the entire nation.
A nation full of people with the strongest willpower.

Have you thought about this?

If we were facing the British merely on physical strength, we would have had victories, and we would have lost also at times — depends on the situation.
But if it was only on physical power, army power, and we managed to push them out —
Nobody likes defeat. Nobody wants to be called a loser.
They would have come back — with better strength, with allies to help them.

This fight would have continued even today.

We are seeing it across the world — in the Middle East, fights between tribes or groups in Africa.
Do these fights ever end?
No. They go on, and on, and on.
There is a lull for some time. Then they start again.

Nations who don’t attack their neighbours — who don’t have expansionist ambitions — they are the ones who are most peaceful, where happiness is the highest.
They also have defence forces — but that is for self-defence.
They are the ones who are growing.

The path of the sword has a definite end — that is — the end.
Those who take up this path — they perish.

Look at Osama bin Laden. Look at Baghdadi.
It is only till you meet your opponent who is more powerful than you.

Why go as far? Our own neighbour — harbouring terrorists.
One surgical strike — hundreds of them finished.

What about all those resources? Even that is a country — it is people’s hard-earned money. It is taxpayers’ money. Gone.

Here in this case, you only needed an opponent with a strong will. Finished.

So, don’t confuse Ahimsa with meekness.

We will continue to explore the concept of Ahimsa in great detail.

Ramaswamy Sastry and Vighnesh Ghanapaathi