Gandhi distinguished between his idea of satyagraha and the passive resistance of the west.
Satyagraha is the philosophy of nonviolent resistance most famously employed by Mohandas Gandhi in forcing an end to the British Raj and also against apartheid in South Africa.
Satya is Sanskrit for Truth, and Agraha is used to describe an effort, endeavor. The term itself may be construed to mean any effort to discover, discern, obtain or apply Truth . The word is rooted in Sanskrit, Hindi and Gujarati.
Ghanidi's Principals of Truth and Non-Violence:
Thruth:
Gandhi dedicated his life to the wider purpose of discovering truth, or Satya . He tried to achieve this by learning from his own mistakes and conducting experiments on himself. He named his autobiography The Story of My Experiments with Truth . Gandhi found that uncovering the truth was not always popular as many people were resistant to change, preferring instead to maintain the existing status quo because of either inertia, self-interest or misguided beliefs. However he also discovered that once the truth was on the march nothing could stop it. All it took was time to achieve traction and gain momentum. As Gandhi said:
"The Truth is far more powerful than any weapon of mass destruction".
Gandhi said that the most important battle to fight was in overcoming his own demons, fears and insecurities. He thought it was all too easy to blame people, governing powers or enemies for his personal actions and well-being. He noted the solution to problems could normally be found just by looking in the mirror. One of the greatest contributions of Mahatma Gandhi was in the realm of ontology and its association with truth. For Gandhi, "to be" did not mean to exist within the realm of time, as it has in the past with the Greek philosophers. But rather, "to exist" meant to exist within the realm of truth, or to use the term Gandhi did, satya . Gandhi summarized his beliefs first when he said "God is Truth," but as typical of Gandhi, he evolved, later to correct himself and state that "Truth is God." The first statement seemed insufficient to Gandhi, as the mistake could be made that Gandhi was using Truth as a description of God, rather than the summative definition of the entire essence of God. Satya (Truth) in Gandhi's philosophy IS God. It shares all the characteristics of the Hindu concept of God, or Brahman. It lives within us, that little voice that tells us what to do, but also guides the universe.
Nonviolence
The concept of nonviolence (ahimsa) and nonresistance has a long history in Indian religious thought and has had many revivals in Hindu, Buddhist, Jain and Christian contexts. Gandhi explains his philosophy and way of life in his autobiography The Story of My Experiments with Truth . He was quoted as saying:
"When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love has always won. There have been tyrants and murderers and for a time they seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall -- think of it, ALWAYS."
"What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans, and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty and democracy?"
"An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind".
"There are many causes that I am prepared to die for but no causes that I am prepared to kill for".
In applying these principles, Gandhi did not balk from taking them to their most logical extremes. In 1940, when invasion of the British Isles by Nazi Germany looked imminent, Gandhi offered the following advice to the British people (Non-Violence in Peace and War):
"I would like you to lay down the arms you have as being useless for saving you or humanity. You will invite Herr Hitler and Signor Mussolini to take what they want of the countries you call your possessions.... If these gentlemen choose to occupy your homes, you will vacate them. If they do not give you free passage out, you will allow yourselves, man, woman, and child, to be slaughtered, but you will refuse to owe allegiance to them".
Even in 1946, by which time Gandhi had learned of The Holocaust, he said to biographer Louis Fisher: [pg17]
"The Jews should have offered themselves to the butcher's knife. They should have thrown themselves into the sea from cliffs."
However, Gandhi was aware that this level of nonviolence required incredible faith and courage, which he realized everyone did not possess. He therefore advised that everyone need not keep to nonviolence, especially if it was used as a cover for cowardice.
Source: www.wikipedia.org
Basic Concepts of Satyagraha: Gandhian Nonviolence: from the APT Nonviolence Trainer's Manual.
I. "Sat" --- which implies openness, honesty, and fairness: Truth.
