Satyagraha: The Means

“As human beings, our greatness lies not so much in being able to remake the world – that is the myth of the atomic age – as in being able to remake ourselves.” (Mohandas Gandhi) Gandhi’s idea of remaking “ourselves” started with the remaking of his own self during his time in South Africa when he first began to speak out against the oppression his people experienced under British rule. This change that overtook Gandhi was unquestionably one of the most influencing decisions that he was ever to make, and consequently the result was one of the greatest changing forces in our world today, but more at a changing force in India, and the establishment of one of Gandhi’s principle innovations: satyagraha. The word satyagraha is a combination of two Hindu words that mean “truth” and “holding firmly,” but the literal translation is more often aimed at the meaning of “truth force.” It is this satyagraha that is one of Gandhi’s chief ideas, and eventually, methods of targeting people into remaking themselves, and showing them the “truth” that he perceives is in everyone, only longing to be found.

Satyagraha is the epitome of resistance to injustice, and part of that resistance was nonviolence, a transition from passive resistance, which Gandhi disavowed due to his resistance being anything but passive. It was Gandhi’s belief that humans could not understand their falsities, their inability to see truth, until they were confronted with it, and part of that was portraying truth in the resistance he taught. “The means may be likened to a seed, the end to a tree, and there is just the same inviolable connection between the means and the end as there is between the seed and the tree. . . We reap exactly as we sow.” It is here in Gandhi’s quote that one can learn many things about him. He speaks of nonviolence, because if one resists with violence then violence will be found inherent in the system that arises from it. Gandhi also uses a quote from the Christian Bible in Matthew 13, a tribute to his realization that it does not matter what religion one follows, for he believe they all held central truths that bound them together.

Gandhi soon realized that if satyagraha was to become a convenient and realistic political tool, it had to put pressure on its opponents. So it was that greater aspects soon overtook satyagraha, dimensions that were less a function of its spiritual derivation than its practicability. Humans had limits to personal sacrifice, there were inevitable limits. Gandhi knew that he, and his most dedicated resisters could absorb only so much pain and suffering; the pride and prejudices characteristic of their oppressors could not be dissolved quickly. Gandhi said, “I do not believe in making appeals, when there is no force behind them, whether moral or material.”