Toward the end of his life, Gandhi was asked by many, from India and the rest of the world, whether he felt a great sense of accomplishment when India became free from British rule. His response was that he felt himself to be failure because his mission was not to rid India of the British but to remove the hatred one community feels toward the other, as in the hatred between Muslims and Hindus.It was then he came up with the statement “Be the change you want the world to be”.
And, as was his usual practice, he launched himself on the magnificent crusade of ridding himself and his own mind of hatred toward others;he was especially wont to point out that because of our intense loyalty to our own class, caste, race what have you,it is important to devote this effort toward other races and classes.
A man of introspection, self awareness and a man of action. A great moral force the likes of which the world has never known as Einstein has said.
On this holy day for Christians, it will do us good to remember that the lesson of Easter is one Gandhi had learnt and applied. Would that our leaders absorb some of that lesson!
Something I wrote a few months ago:
That I think sums up my own work, whether it’s in the classroom, in poetry, my professional writing, or when it comes to blogging. Friends and acquaintances have referred to my poetry as dark – sometimes gloomy, sometimes angry. The same is said about my sense of humor, and again the same could be said about what I do here in my little corner of blogtopia. Know that the anger that can periodically jump out at you has its foundations in love: for my family, my country, my planet, my faith, etc. I sincerely doubt I could create – whether in an off-the-cuff blog remark or something more substantive such as a scientific paper – with hate in my heart. Hate destroys. There’s no need to go there. And love in all its forms, is everywhere to be found.
It was Gandhi’s realization that our deep attachments to our own kind prevent us from seeing the pain of others that led him to become a vigorous advocate of Mulsim rights in predominantly Hindu India and ultimately led to his death by a crazed Hindu assassin.It is a tribute to his life that in India one sees no trace of any animosity for the British although Muslims are still looked at with suspicion and ,yes,one may say hatred.