Gandhi on Non-Violence Author:Edited and with an Introduction by Thomas Merton For this volume, Thomas Merton has selected the basic statements of principle and interpretation which made up Gandhi's philosophy of non-violence (Ahimsa) and non-violent action (Satyaghraha). These teachings of the Indian independence leader and saint are now more important to us in America than ever because of their direct relevance to two of... more » the most critical problems of our time: the Negro "revolution" and the crusade for disarmament to forestall nuclear destruction. Martin Luther King and other American leaders have acknowledged their debt to Gandhi's example.
For many, throughout the world, Mohandas Gandhi stands as the greatest figure of the 20th Century. In his long introduction to this book - and we believe it to be one of his most challenging essays - Father Merton shows how Gandhi linked the thought of East and West in his search for universal truth, and how, for him, non-violence sprang from realization of spiritual unity in the individual.
Merton relates Gandhi's Ahimsa to traditional Hindu Dharma, to the Greek and our own concepts of personal freedom, and to the thinking of Thomas Aquinas and later Catholic theologians on conscience, good-and-evil, and peace.
The Gandhi text follows that established by the Navajivan Trust. Its sections deal with "Principles of non-violence," "Non-violence, true and false," "Spiritual dimensions of non-violence," and "The purity of non-violence."« less