Dr. SARVEPALLI RADHAKRISHNAN
A.
RANGANATHAN
“It
is an honour to philosophy” observed Lord Russell in 1962, “that Dr.
Radhakrishnan should be President of India.” Lord Russell regarded it as a
fulfilment of the Platonic dream that philosophers must be kings. However,
unlike Plato who did not admit poets in his Republic, Dr. Radhakrishnan began
his distinguished career as an interpreter of the poetry of Rabindranath
Tagore. In his interpretative work, ‘The Philosophy of Rabindranath Tagore’,
Dr. Radhakrishnan not only viewed this famous poet as a historic link in the
long chain of India’s cultural evolution, but also as the prophet of modern
India’s cultural renaissance. Indeed Dr. Radhakrishnan’s Republic (in the
geographical and cultural sense of the term) is different from Plato’s
Republic.
Sarvepalli
Radhakrishnan was born on September 5, 1888 at Tiruttani, in South India. After
a distinguished career at the Madras Christian College, Radhakrishnan joined
the Madras Presidency College as a lecturer in philosophy. Finally, at the
close of a long and distinguished career of teaching at several Indian
universities, Dr. Radhakrishnan was appointed Spalding Professor of Eastern
Religions and Ethics at Oxford. As Spalding Professor and a Fellow of All Souls
College, Oxford, Dr. Radhakrishnan was the most outstanding representative of
India’s intellectuals in Britain.
Although
Dr. Radhakrishnan is justly renowned as a philosopher, he is essentially a
creative artist. It is perhaps significant that the Goethe Plaquette was
awarded to him, since he symbolised Goethe’s ideal of the creative artist who
becomes a different being in the successive stages of his career. For he has
achieved distinction in four different fields of intellectual and political
endeavour–Indian philosophy in its wider perspectives, diplomacy, social
thought and comparative religion.
Dr.
Radhakrishnan has recorded in his charming autobiographical essay entitled
“Fragments of a Confession” that historical writing, which is different from
historical research, is a creative activity. He has argued that just as our
political problem is to bring East and West together in a common brotherhood
which transcends differences, so in the world of philosophy, we have to bring
about a cross-fertilization of ideas in the history of modern thought. And
addressing the International Congress of Orientalists in New Delhi on January
4, 1964, Dr. Radhakrishnan referred to Alexander’s role in reconciling
different sections of mankind during the ancient age. Let me quote his words: “
Alexander abandoned the view that the non-Greek world was barbarian and that
its people were fit only to be slaves. All men possessing wisdom and virtue are
of one family. Plutarch says that Alexander brought together into one body all
men everywhere, uniting and mixing in one great loving cup, as it were, men’s
lives, their characters, their marriages, their very habits of life. He looked
upon the whole inhabited world as his fatherland. All good men are of one
family; the only foreigners are the wicked. Alexander felt that it was his
sacred mission to reconcile mankind. In Egypt, in Iran, in North-West
India, he felt the impact of the great civilizations of the East and looked
upon them as worthy partners of the Hellenic civilization. Shortly before his
death, Alexander held a banquet to celebrate the end of a great war, and he
invited to it 9000 people–Hellenes and non-Hellenes. At the end of it he prayed
for peace, for the partnership of all peoples of the world to live in unity and
concord: Homa-noia, of one mind; the world should be based on a
communion of minds and hearts.
In
the concluding chapter of the second volume of ‘Indian Philosophy’, Dr.
Radhakrishnan has correctly stressed that the republic of Indian thought “never
developed a Monroe Doctrine in matters of culture.” He has not only revealed
this liberal frame of mind in his exploration of the spiritual depths and
metaphysical flights of Hindu philosophy, but has also added a new dimension of
sympathetic insight in his interpretation of Buddhist philosophy. As an
interpreter of the Hindu religious classics, Dr. Radhakrishnan has followed the
hallowed tradition of the great exponents like Sankara, Ramanuja and Madhva.
For he has written commentaries on the Gita, the Upanishads and the
Brahma-sutras. He had already written on the ethical idealism of the Buddha and
given a celebrated lecture, ‘Gautama the Buddha’ (which was hailed as “a
masterpiece on a master-mind by a master-mind”) and won for him the coveted
Fellowship of the British Academy. And he has also commented on the classic
texts of Buddhism like the Dhammapada. It is this
catholicity of outlook which has led him to investigate the bearings of Indian
philosophy on politics and literature, and the deeper implications of religion
and ethics, in his perceptive essays on poets like Kalidasa and Tagore,
religious and political figures like Buddha and Gandhi, singers and saints like
Tyagaraja and Ramana Maharshi.
Seldom
in history has there been a philosopher so representative of his age, one who
so completely articulates the aspirations of his contemporaries in trying to
usher in a new era of understanding between nations. Dr. Radhakrishnan has
presided over sessions of the UNESCO, and has served for a period of nine years
on the International Committee of Intellectual Co-operation set up by the
League of Nations, which included among its members such great scientists and
scholars as the late Madame Curie, Albert Einstein and Gilbert Murray.
The
similarity between Gilbert Murray and Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan
is truly striking. Like Murray, who perceived the values of Greek poetry as
constituting a source of creative insights in his understanding of
international relations, Dr. Radhakrishnan has drawn upon the ancient fountain-head
of Indian philosophy in his assessments of the contemporary international
scene. In all his writings on social and political themes, Dr. Radhakrishnan
has emphasized the dignity of the individual as an end in himself, in order to
visualize a new social order based on religion and ethics which is essentially
a state of mind derived from an idealist view of life and an understanding of
the varieties and depths of religious experience reflecting the permanent
values of civilization.
Dr. Radhakrishnan’s philosophy of tolerance has the following features: The ideal of an integrated personality that recognizes no cold war between the sciences and the humanities and views the empirical knowledge of the West as the complement of the intuitive wisdom of the East, a humanistic appreciation of the classics by a mind which is free from the shackles of dogma, the preservation of an atmosphere of intellectual freedom so that life is lived for the sheer joy of intellectual and artistic creation. This approach is reflected in some of his more important speeches during the last twenty years. In fact, this writer has often reflected on the need to publish these speeches. For these speeches reflect some of the great moments in contemporary Indian history–moments of ecstatic joy and moments of deep anguish. He delivered a memorable speech on the midnight of August 14, 1947, which immortalized the moment of our freedom. And the new nation was born just at the moment when he ended his speech. It would be relevant in this context to quote a few extracts from his speech: “History and legend will grow round this day. It marks a milestone in the march of our democracy. A significant date it is in the drama of the Indian people who are trying to rebuild and transform themselves...When we see what the Dutch are doing in Indonesia, when we see how the French are clinging to their possessions, we cannot but admire the political sagacity and courage of the British people. We on our side, have also added a chapter to the history of the world. Look at the way in which subject peoples in history won their freedom. Let us also consider the methods by which power was acquired. How did men like Washington, Napolean, Cromwell, Lenin, Hitler and Mussolini get into power? Look at the methods of blood and steel, of terrorism and assassination, of bloodshed and anarchy by which these so-called great men of the world came into the possession of power. Here in this land under the leadership of one who will go down in history as perhaps the greatest man of our age we have opposed patience to fury, quietness of spirit to bureaucratic tyranny and are acquiring power through peaceful and civilized methods...The greatest among the Englishmen, wished to modernize the country, to raise its intellectual and moral standards, its political status. They wished to regenerate the whole people. But the small among them worked with sinister motives... The freedom we are attaining is the fulfilment of this dual tendency among British administrators.”
Shakespeare
can freeze your blood by dropping a kerchief. And it is said that Schiller
cannot produce this sensation o terror even while describing a burning city. On
a different plane, this writer felt that General Kaul is not able to sustain
his argument or even make an intelligent point in his The Untold Story. Obviously
General Kaul has not mastered the subtle art of indictment! Radhakrishnan
criticized Nehru and Menon for their ‘credulity and negligence.’ Indeed this
celebrated indictment which was broadcast in the wake of the NEFA disaster
conveyed a sense of national shock which the General is unable to reflect in
his clumsily written book.
While
reflecting on Dr. Radhakrishnan’s speeches, one must refer to his great speech
which was delivered on January 26, 1967. It was a truly great speech, which
reflected the disillusionment and frustration of the Indian people. And this
speech also cost him a second term as the President of India. For Mrs. Indira
Gandhi was obviously piqued by his warning that “unless we destroy corruption
in high places, root out every trace of nepotism, love of power, profiteering
and black-marketing which have spoilt the good name of this country in recent
years, we will not be able to raise the standards of efficiency and
administration.” This speech was a commentary on Congress misrule in India–a
commentary by one of India’s greatest philosophical commentators!
Dr.
Radhakrishnan believes that there is great scope for a deeper dialogue between
India and the West based on a fellowship of faiths and an understanding of
cultures. He has argued that the Western influence on Hinduism has transformed
it into “an ethical religion with a social gospel.” Similarly the development
of the discipline of comparative religion, facilitated by the anthropological
vistas unveiled by Sir James Frazer, was also due to the publication of the
Sanskrit classics in Europe. The impact of Indian philosophical thought on
Western intellectuals like Schopenhauer, Goethe, Emerson, Whitman, Thoreau,
Yeats and several others, and Western influences on Indian leaders such as
Gandhi and Tagore, are some aspects of this cross-fertilization of cultures
leading on to a more fundamental understanding between India and the West.
Viewed
in this perspective, Dr. Radhakrishnan’s works, The Hindu View of Life, An
Idealist View of life, East and West in Religion, Eastern Religions and Western
Thought, East and West and Religion in a Changing World can be
regarded as significant contributions to study of comparative religion and the
East-West cultural dialogue. Dr. Radhakrishnan’s greatness lies in the fact
that he has always emphasized the need to realize “the truth of the world’s yet
unborn soul by a free interchange of ideas and the development of a philosophy,
which will combine the best of European humanism and Asiatic religion, a
philosophy profounder and more living than either, endowed with greater
spiritual and ethical force.”