For a good discussion, see, TahtinenUnto,
Ahimsa: Non-violence in Indian Tradition
(Ahmedabad:
Navajivan, 1976). See also D.
Bhargava, Jaina Ethics (Delhi: Motilal Banarasidas, 1968);
articles by BhattacharyaH.D.ChakravartyA.RadhakrishnanS.
(editor), History of Philosophy, Eastern & Western
(London: George Allen and
Unwin Ltd., 1952); E. Conze, Buddhism: Its Essence
and Development (Oxford: Cassirer, 1960 and 1974); A. Schweitzer,
Indian Thought and its Development (New York: 1936, Bombay:
Wilco, 1960); de
BaryWilliam
Theodore, Sources of Indian Tradition
(Delhi: Motilal
Banarasidas, 1972, two
volumes).
2.
Gandhi thought that Tolstoy understood
non-violence better than anyone including the ancient Indian thinkers. ‘I know
of no author in the West who has written as much and as effectively for the
cause of non-violence as Tolstoy has done. I may go even further and say that I
know no one in India or elsewhere who has had as profound an understanding of
the nature of non-violence as Tolstoy had and who has tried to follow it as
sincerely as he did.’ IyerRaghavan,
The Moral and Political Writings of Mahatma Gandhi
(Oxford: Clarendon
Press, 1987), vol 1, p
228.
3.
Ibid, p
212.
4.
Ibid, p
220.
5.
Ibid, p
237.
6.
Ibid..
7.
Young India, 11 August
1920.
8.
Ibid, 9 September
1925.
9.
Iyer, op cit, note 2, vol
II, p 220.
10.
Ibid, p
264.
11.
Ibid, p
214.
12.
Ibid, p
395.
13.
Ibid, p
352.
14.
Ibid, p
223.
15.
Young India, 30 January
1930.
16.
Iyer, op cit, note 2, vol
II, pp 274, 307.
17.
Ibid, p
276.
18.
Ibid, p
270.
19.
Ibid, p
271.
20.
Ibid, pp
234f, 276f.
21.
Ibid, p
269f.
22.
Ibid, p
272.
23.
Harijan, 9 June
1946.
24.
Iyer, op cit, note 2, vol
II, p 282.
25.
Ibid, p
280; also Harijan, 3 July 1937.
26.
Iyer, op cit, note 2, vol
II, p 223.
27.
Harijan, 1 September
1940.
28.
Iyer, op cit, note 2, vol
II, p 221f.
29.
Ibid, p
387.
30.
Young India, 29 May
1924.
31.
Iyer, op cit, note 2, vol
II, p 317.
32.
Young India, 9 September
1926.
33.
Ibid, p
212. For Gandhi not so much the intention as the disposition of
the moral agent was crucial to the evaluation of his act. See also M.K. Gandhi,
Non-violence in Peace and War (Ahmedabad: Navajivan, 1942),
vol II, p 129f.
34.
Iyer, op cit, note 2, vol
II, pp 266, 268, 346.
35.
Ibid, p
274.
36.
Young India, 18 May
1921.
37.
Young India, 14 April
1927; and 17 July 1927.
38.
Harijan, 9 June
1946; 5 May 1946; and 7 July 1946.
39.
Ibid, pp
307, 347.
40.
Ibid, p
287.
41.
Ibid, p
432.
42.
Ibid, p
212.
43.
Ibid, p
432.
44.
Ibid, p
307.
45.
Ibid, p
347.
46.
The Collected Works of Mahatma
Gandhi (in 90 volumes) (New Delhi:
Publications Division of the Government of India,
Navajivan, 1958–84), vol 37, p 270;
Young India, 13 September 1928; Harijan, 5
May 1946; 9 September 1946; and 10 November 1946.
47.
Iyer, op cit, note 2, vol
II, p 431; vol 24, p 140f; vol 25, p 168; and
Harijan, 25 August 1940.
48.
Iyer, op cit, note 2, vol
II, p 432.
49.
Ibid, p
347.
50.
Ibid, vol II, p
298.
51.
Harijan, 9 December
1939; and 21 October 1939.
52.
Iyer, op cit, note 2, vol
II, p 438.
53.
Young India, 15 December
1921; 4 August 1920; and 8 May 1941.
54.
Young India, 16 June
1927; and 11 October 1928. See Iyer, op cit,
note 2, vol II, p 451, where Gandhi says ‘A coward is less than man. He does not
deserve to be a member of a society of men and women’.
55.
I am most grateful to Dhirubhai Sheth and
Umashankarbhai Joshi for their perceptive comments on an earlier draft of this
article.
