THE
ETHICAL AND RELIGIOUS IDEAS
OF
MAHATMA
GANDHI
K. THIAGARAJAN
Among
the contemporary thinkers and constructive meta-physicians of our age, of
Gandhiji
does not formulate any theoretical philosophy of life, but his life and
activities embody a living sermon. He sets out to solve the problems of life as
they confront him in the course of his rich and varied career. “I have not the
qualifications for teaching my philosophy of life. I have barely qualifications
for practising the philosophy I believe.” (Harijan, 12th July, 1942) He conveys his message and
teachings through actions and utterances that have a bearing on concrete
situations. He does not merely proclaim ideals of conduct, but follows them up
in his own personal life to their logical conclusion and thus puts them to test
through experimental verification.
Gandhiji
is essentially a man of religion, and morality according to him is synonymous
with religion. “Morality is the basis of things and truth is the substance of
all morality.” (My Experiments with
Truth) The fundamentals of religion are focused in his
personality and he expresses them in his manifold activities in diverse spheres
of life. His life is a ceaseless endeavour to solve
problems by methods derived from his innermost convictions regarding the nature
of God and man. All claims and interests, both individual and corporate,
receive devoted attention and service at his hands and he deals with them in accordance
with a basic religious insight.
Religion
does not consist merely in a set of beliefs or a code of rituals, it grips one’s
whole personality and expresses itself in the way in which one lives. “The
whole gamut of man’s activities today constitutes an indivisible whole. You
cannot divide social, economic, political and purely religious work into
watertight compartments. I do not know religion apart from human activity. It
provides a moral basis to all activities which they would otherwise lack,
reducing life to a maze of sound and fury signifying nothing.” (Harijan,
24th December, 1938) He reconciles the spiritual and temporal
interests of life into a harmonious system on the basis of religion. “The soul
of religion is one, but it is encased in a multitude of forms.” (Young India 25th September,
1925) One’s religion grows and develops in the course of one’s life, and
contact with those who follow other religions should deepen and enrich one’s own
rather than supplant it.
Gandhiji’s
approach to every problem is from the standpoint of the human spirit. His
unremitting efforts to promote Hindu-Muslim unity and the eradication of
untouchability which he characterizes as “a hideous untruth” are not prompted
by motives of political expediency, but are matters of religious significance: “Service
of Harijans is for me, as it must be for you, a
question of repentance and reparation for the wrong we have done to our
fellow-men.” (Young India, 13th
November, 1924)
Gandhiji
judges customs, habits, laws and institutions in the light of ethical values.
Nothing that has any retarding effect upon the development of the divine spirit
in man should be permitted. His advocacy of cottage industries, Khadi, his conception of village Swaraj,
his exaltation of the dignity of manual labour and
his dread of totalitarianism–all these become intelligible when we grasp the
basis on which his whole philosophy of life rests–sanctity of human personality
and the integrity of the individual will.
Gandhiji’s
passion for simplicity and opposition to the use of machinery have been
misunderstood and he has been charged as seeking to put back the clock of human
progress. But when viewed in the context of the present circumstances and the
operating motives behind the industrial life of today, it will be clear that it
is not opposition to machinery as such, but his love of the common man that has
determined his attitude.
Gandhiji
listed the evils of our age and held that truth and non-violence alone could
set them right. He enumerated
seven evils and strove hard to set them right with some success though not with
complete success. The seven evils according to him are: (1) Politics without
principles; (2) Wealth without work; (3) Pleasure without conscience; (4)
Knowledge without character; (5) Commerce without morality; (6) Science without
humanity; and (7) Worship without sacrifice. The evils, when analysed to their roots, are different forms of
exploitation and use of violence.
Gandhiji
places before the world to-day an alternative for capitalism and communism
based on enlightened individualism which is psychologically individualistic but
ethically universalistic. He pleads for a democratic way of life in economic, social and
political spheres. His opposition to the Russian economic order is on account of compulsion and restraint on the
individual that it involves. “If it were not based on force I would dote on it.
But to-day since it is based on force, I do not know
how far and where it will take us.” He hates privilege and monopoly of every kind. Whatever cannot be
shared by all is taboo to him. His loin cloth and abstemious life are more due
to his desire to identify himself with the starving and naked masses than to
any spirit of self-immolation
for its own sake.
Gandhiji
stands for integrated life, both for the individual and society in consonance
with Truth, i.e., God. He lives his principles and his life in his message to
humanity. There may be differences of opinion on some of the views expressed by
him and difficulties in the practical application of his principles. He is
himself aware of these. He asks
every one to think for himself and follow the inner
light. One may be incapable of attaining
the ideal, but on that account we should not lower the ideal. “We may never be
strong enough to be entirely non-violent in thought, word and deed. But we must
keep non-violence as our goal and make steady progress towards it. The
attainment of freedom, whether for a
man, nation or the world must be in exact proportion to the attainment of non-violence
by each.” (Young
India, 20th May, 1926)
Gandhiji
is more concerned with effort than achievement. Means must be as pure as the
end itself and ultimately the means and the end are identical. This identity
gives the clue to appraise life. The real aim is not the attainment of any
concrete result, but the preservation of the spirit underlying the effort. The goal
may not be reached, but that does not mean the method has failed. For the
adoption of the method in its purity is itself a triumph of the spirit. He
seeks to draw out the best in human nature and true heroism is not in the
success achieved but in the noble endeavour. In the
very failure lies the seed of future success for only Truth will ultimately
prevail. His influence on others is in the words of the late Rabindranath
Tagore, “ineffable like beauty, like music,” and its claim upon others is “great
because of its revelation of a spontaneous self-giving.”
Gandhiji
seeks to establish the