The focus of this thesis will be consideration of the practicality of Mohandas K. Gandhi's philosophy of ahimsa, courageous non-violence and non-violent resistance, Satyagraha, in the contemporary world and the twenty-first century. This consideration is important to people today because, as will be seen in this exploration, the question of living a nearly non-violent life is the same question that people have struggled with throughout history. It is a question of whether the ideal of love and non-violence that Jesus taught in The Sermon on The Mount and in The Gospels is still applicable. This ideal of love and non-violence is a rejection of following a path of revenge, retaliation and oppression in our dealings with others. This ideal also carries with it an implication that people are their brothers and sisters keepers and that they should work to promote earthly success and goodness for others as well as for themselves. This ideal is one-sided, and from a strictly rational, human perspective, would be difficult to ever completely attain in daily life because of the many forces of nature and human instinctive reactions to the surrounding world that must be confronted in daily affairs. The key, however, to making this law of love meaningful, according to Mahatma Gandhi, is in the recognition of a holistic philosophical view of life in which nothing humanly-conceived remains completely unchangeable, but that life itself is a continual meaningful struggle to discover Truth and harmony for a particular moment and in particular situations. People continue this struggle, all the while knowing that new struggles lie ahead so that greater good can prevail over the many forces that continually work to disrupt this good. This is a view that attempts to conform to the natural order and flow of life rather than to a humanly conceived mathematical or rational view where an artificial scheme is created in the minds of humans who then try to fit the many diverse elements of the universe and human existence into pre-prepared spaces, much as one would attempt to fit the parts of a puzzle together in a rational order that makes sense to the preconceived scheme of the puzzle board. In the Gandhian view, life is fluid and elements of existence are ever moving and changing and must be dealt with as one comes into contact with them. In the rational view, the elements are static and everything has its place in the artificial vision that one accepts as his or her rational justification for the occurrence of events and human behaviors. Both views are probably valid as far as humans are concerned. Human life demands logical, reasonable solutions to immediate problems, but as far as human relations and human meaning are concerned, it is genetically and spiritually required that people continually work for greater good for others and themselves. In the present and future world, people should also work for the well-being of all creatures and for the preservation of nature. As will be seen, the rational human view should not be given precedence over a more inclusive view of love and non-violence for all creation or people will begin to suffer and violence will prevail over love. Gandhian ahimsa offered the world a more inclusive view of applying the law of love in ordinary human affairs. His view is not new, because Jesus and many others defined and promoted this view. The significance of Gandhi is that he gave the world a contemporary example of how the law of love might be applied and his many ideals comprise a holistic philosophical framework for the application of this law which might be relevant to contemporary thinking.
In order to effectively consider questions related to this topic, it is necessary to first consider the foundations of Gandhi's philosophy. Fortunately, in his excellent autobiography, The Story of My Search For Truth, Gandhi mentioned many of the literary and religious works that inspired him to search for ways of bringing about practical social change without violence. These foundations are very credible, having been accepted by many generations of religious believers from around the world. These sources include the Hindu Bhagavad-Gita; Jesus' teachings in The Sermon on the Mount and the Gospels; the Qu'ran, the holy book of Islam; and the teachings of Gautama, the Buddha. As far as literary sources are concerned, Gandhi remarked that he was influenced by the writings of 19th Century Oxford professor John Ruskin, and the later writings of the great Russian writer Leo Tolstoy. Edwin Arnold's The Light Of Asia, which deals with Buddhism, is also mentioned as a source of inspiration in forming a philosophy of resistance to oppression through non-violent means. Since the Buddha taught ahimsa or non-violence 500 years before Christ, this is a significant source for the foundations of Gandhian philosophy.
This inquiry will be presented in three sections. The first section will explore the roots of Gandhi's philosophy by looking at certain relevant aspects of the above sources in relation to Gandhi's formation of his philosophy.
The second section will consider Gandhi's philosophy of divinely inspired Truth, ahimsa (courageous non-violence) and satyagraha (active non-violent-resistance to oppression). It will also consider Gandhi's reasoning in the formation and in the practical application of his philosophy, and will attempt to state the overall intent of the philosophy itself.
The final section of this thesis will be discussion on how Gandhi's philosophy might be applied to the contemporary world. The thesis of this final section will be that in our diverse, materialistic and fragmented society, selected aspects of Mohandas K. Gandhi's philosophy of Truth, ahimsa and satyagraha, might be applied to contemporary thinking in a manner that might enable diverse groups and individuals to see their commonality and work together for greater unity in political, social and personal relationships. It will be argued that the contemporary world of centralized and institutionalized control of people's lives has promoted considerable fragmentation in society and in contemporary thinking. Gandhi had some specific ideas that might help people have a more holistic vision of elements of meaning, value and justice in their lives. The final section will attempt to apply Gandhi's ideas to some of what I consider to be pressing problems in contemporary Western society in order to see if some reasonable solutions might be found.
It is often said that people should attempt to understand things from the other person's perspective in order to resolve differences of opinion and to gain a better understanding of oneself. For the Christian, exploring the ideas of Mahatma Gandhi gives one a renewed and more positive view of one's own Christian faith and also a positive view of other religions. The life, accomplishments and teachings of Mahatma Gandhi do reaffirm the spiritually-uplifting message of love that Jesus and others have brought to mankind.