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A tribute to the memory of the greatest Indian of recent
times.
Mahatma Gandhi
A Personification of Power from Practice of Precepts
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He personified the ancient Indian heritage of spirituality.
That heritage made millions of followers of eight religions one.
He was an embodiment of the power one receives by living in the essence of
all religions.
With the power of 330 million followers that that power invoked, he broke
the greatest ever empire in three decades (1916-1947) to secure India's
freedom.
Rejecting Mahatma Gandhi, modern educated Indian leaders who were ignorant
of the power of spirituality rejected it broke the country and enshrined the
trinity of science, reason and secularism in article 28(1) of the
Constitution of India in 1950.
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Article 28(1) of the Constitution reads:
(1) No religious instruction shall be provided in any educational
institution wholly maintained out of State funds.
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Independent Indian State denies people its patronage to sustain through
education and knowledge their ancient heritage of prosperity and innate
power through spirituality .
Indian State perpetuates ignorance of the core of eight religions that the
British hammered in us to make us paupers and powerless?
Wither India?
One wonders.
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A few of the precepts that Mahatma Gandhi practised which bestowed on him
unasked his empowered mind and power show their origin in the religion of
oneness of Advaita in Vedanta that stands only on love for all as one with
us in reality.
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I find the greatest consolation from the Bhagwad Gita and Tulsidas'
Ramayana.
Young India September 25, 1925 (MKG 55)
It is the spirit running through the book (Ramayana) that holds me spell
bound.
Young India August 27, 1925 (MKG 66)
I am a stranger to yogic practices. The practice I follow is a practice I
learnt in my childhood from my nurse. I was afraid of ghosts. She used to
say to me: There are no ghosts, but if you are afraid, repeat Ramayana.
Harijan December 5, 1936 (MKG 48)
I derive the greatest consolation from my reading of Tulsidas Ramayana.
Harijan December 5, 1936 (MKG 48)
I have felt that the Gita teaches us that what cannot be followed out in day
to day practice cannot be called religion.
Young India August 6, 1931 (MKG 18)
Politics bereft of religion are a death trap because they kill the soul.
Young India April 23, 1924 (MKG 68)
For, I reiterate my opinion that every Hindu boy and girl should know
Sanskrit.
Young India August 25, 1927 (MKG 29)
He is no Sanatani Hindu who is narrow, bigoted and considers evil to be good
if it has the sanction of antiquity and is to be found supported in any
Sanskrit book.
Young India September 2, 1926 (MKG 58)
Any tradition, however, ancient, inconsistent with morality, is to be
banished from the land.
Young India September 22 1927 (MKG 65)
Where there is fear, there is no religion.
Young India September 2 1926 (MKG 59)
The Allah of Islam is the same as the God of Christians and the Ishwara of
Hindus.
Harijan May 14, 1938 (MKG 59)
His laws are immutable. Where should we all be if He changed them
capriciously?
Young India November 12 1925 (MKG 136)
I disbelieve history so far as details of acts of heroes are concerned…. I
positively refuse to judge men from the scanty material furnished to us by
history.
Young India April 9, 1925 (MKG 138)
Hinduism, not to speak of other religions, is ever evolving. …Gita itself is
an instance in point. It has given a new meaning to Karma, Sannyaasa and
Yajna, etc.
Harijan October 3, 1936 (MKG 150)
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From : http://www.mkgandhi.org/epigrams/r.htm
Rama, Allah and God are to me convertible terms. XXVI-28
For me, Rama and Rahim are one and the same deity. T-2-37
Rama was not only on the lips of Hanuman. He was enthroned in his heart. He
gave Hanuman exhaustless strength. TIG-48
My Rama, the Rama of our prayers, is not the historical Rama, the son of
Dasharatha, the king of Ayodhyaa.
TIG-110
Hinduism would not have been much of a religion, if Rama had not steeled his
heart against every Temptation.
T-2-150-
It is the function of God Rama to destroy evil, wherever it occurs and it is
equally the function of God Rama to give to his devotees like Bibhishana a
free charter of irrevocable self-government. T-2-297-128
Ramanama is for the pure in heart and for those who want to attain and
remain pure. TIG-114
Ramanama can be used only for a good, never for an evil end, or else the
thieves and robbers would be. the greatest devotees. T-7-79
Ramanama purifies while it cures, and , therefore, it elevates. TIG-114
Even Ramanama is by itself lifeless, but it has become a living symbol of
the deity because millions of people have consecrated it. T-5-92
By Ram Raj I do not mean Hindu Raj. I mean by Ram Raj, Divine Raj, the
Kingdom of God. T-2-375-
Rationalists are admirable beings, but rationalism is a hideous monster when
it claims for itself omnipotence.
TIG-91
The freedom from all attachment is the realization of God as Truth. TIG-37
Divine knowledge is not borrowed from books. It has to be realized in
oneself. TIG-94
Reason has to be strengthened by suffering, and suffering opens the eyes of
understanding. T-2-182
In man, reason quickens and guides the feeling; in brute, the soul lies ever
dormant. T-4-62
Faith is a kind of sixth sense which works in cases which are without the
purview of reason. MM-64
If I know Hinduism at all, it is essentially inclusive and ever-growing,
ever-responsive. It gives the freest scope to imagination, speculation and
reason. XXV-178
Nothing in the Shastras which is capable of being reasoned can stand if it
is in conflict with reason. T-4-42
There is no doubt that our last state will be worse than our first, if we
surrender our reason into somebody’s keeping.
i T-2-62
Faith becomes lame when it ventures into matters pertaining to reason.
T-7-36
Islam appeals to people because it appeals also to reason. XXVI-415
There can be no Ram Raj in the present state of iniquitous inequalities in
which only a few roll in riches, while the masses do not get even enough to
eat. T-7-404
Execution of the constructive programme in its entirety means more than
Swaraj. It means Ram Raj Khudai
Sultanat or the Divine Kingdom. T-7-32
Even the dog is described by the poet to have received justice under
Ramarajya. MM-326
My Hinduism teaches me to respect all religions. In this lies the secret of
Ramarajya. MM-327
A reformer’s business is to make the impossible possible by giving an ocular
demonstration of the. possibility in his own
conduct. XXVI-68
A reformer has to sail not with the current, often he has to go against it,
even though it may of the. possibility in his own him his life. T-7-114
Every Reform means awakening. Once truly awakened, the nation will not be
satisfied with reform only in one department of life. T-2-227
Religion is a thing to be lived. It is not merely sophistry. T-7-129
Religion is one tree with many branches. As branches, you may say, religions
are many, but as tree, religion is only
one. T-3-244
All religions were, at bottom, one, though they differed in detail and
outward form even like the leaves on a
tree. T-8-285
Even as a tree has a single trunk, but many branches and leaves, there in
one religion, but any number of faiths.
TIG-65
The essence of true religious teaching is that one should serve and befriend
all. T-7-385
Religions are different roads converging to the same point. X-29
Religion is the tie that binds one to one’s Creator, and
whilst the body perishes, as it to, religion persists even after death.
T-4-41
God-given religion is beyond speech. TIG-65
Religion should be dearer than life itself. T-8-153
Religion taught us to return good for evil. T-8-120
Religion all the world over offered God as the solace and the comfort for
all in agony. T-2-212
Religion to be true must satisfy what may be termed humanitarian economics,
that is, where the income and the
expenditure balance each other. T-2-268
A religious act cannot be performed with aid of the bayonet or the bomb.
T-4-314
Religion of non-violence is not meant merely for the rishis and saints.
T-2-5
Religion was entirely a personal matter. Each one could approach his Creator
as one liked. T-8-51
Religion is not like a house or a cloak which can be changed at will. T-4-41
All religions teach that two opposite forces act upon us and the human
endeavour consists in a series of eternal
rejections and acceptances. T-2-45
All the great religions of the world inculcate the equality and brotherhood
of mankind and the virtue of toleration.
T-3-257
Purest religion is highest expediency. Many things are lawful but they are
not all expedient. XX-58
Religion is no test of nationality, but a personal matter between man and
his God. MM-103
All religions enjoined worship of the One God who was all-pervasive. He was
present even in a drop of water or in a
speck of dust. T-7-115
Unity among the different races and the different communities belonging to
different religions of India is
indispensable to the birth of national life. XXVI-241
Religions are not for separating men from one another, they are meant to
bind them. MM-68
All religions are branches of the same mighty tree, but I must not change
over from one branch to another for the
sake of expediency. T-7-283
All religions of the world describe God pre-eminently as the Friend of the
friendless. Help of the helpless, and
Protector of the weak. T-3-192
No religion taught man to kill fellow-man because he held different opinions
or was of another religion. T-7-204
That religion and that nation will be blotted out of the face of earth which
pins its faith to injustice, untruth or violence.
It is a tragedy that religion for us means, today, nothing more than
restrictions on food and drink, nothing more than
adherence to a sense of superiority and inferiority. T-3-280
A religion cannot be sustained by the number of its lip-followers denying in
their lives its tenets. T-3-220
The highest fulfilment of religion requires a giving up of all possessions.
MM-191
To befriend the one who regards himself as your enemy is the quintessence of
true religion. T-7-385
The external is in no way the essence of religion, but the external often
proclaims the internal. T-2-273
True material welfare is never inconsistent with performance of religious
obligations. T-3-225
A man without a religion is life a ship without a rudder.
T-3-223
To change one’s religion under the threat of force was no conversion but
rather cowardice. T-7-274
It is not part of religion to breed buffaloes or, for that matter, cows.
T-2-267
Hypocrisy and distortion are passing currently under the name of religion.
T-7-128
Physician, heal thyself’ is more true in matters religions than mundane.
T-2-132
It was a travesty of true religion to consider one’s own religion as
superior and other’s as inferior. T-7-132
It is impossible that God, who is the God of Justice, could have made the
distinctions that men observe today in the
name of religion. T-3-236
Where there is fear, there is no religion. T-2-230
I cannot picture to myself a time when all mankind will have one religion.
XXVI-285
I believe that religious education must be the sole concern of religions
association. EWE-30
I desire no honour if I have to conceal my religious beliefs in order to
have it. XIV-235
I know of no religion or sect that has done or is doing without its house of
God, variously described as a temple, a mosque, a church, a synagogue or
agiari. (Flame)
T-4-194
I have felt that the Gita teaches us that what cannot be followed out in
day-to-day practice cannot be called
religion. T-2-311
By religion I have not in mind fundamental ethics but what goes by the name
of denominationalism. EWE-31
In matters concerning religion, I consider myself not a child but an adult
with 35 years of experience. XIV-74
I claim to represent all the cultures, for my religion, whatever it may be
called, demands the fulfilment of all the
cultures. T-5-272
It was through the Hindu religion that I learnt to respect Christianity and
Islam. XIV-74
Mine is not a religion of the prison-house. It has room for the least among
God’s creation. XX-74
My religion is a matter solely between my Maker and myself. MM-116
My religion has no geographical limits. T-2-6
My knowledge of the letter of the Shastras is better, but of true religion
they are able to give me but little. Bunch-108
My religion enables me, obliges me to imbibe all that is good in all the
great religions of the earth. MM-100
My religion is based on truth and non-violence. Truth is my God.
Non-violence is the means of realising Him. XXV-558
My religion teaches me that a promise once made or a vow once taken for a
worthy object may not be broken. T-2-154
My personal religion peremptorily forbids me to hate anybody. MM-183
My religion forbids me to belittle or disregard other cultures, as it
insists, under pain of civil suicide, upon imbibing and
living my own. EWE-19
My religion says that only he who is prepared to suffer can pray to God.
T-2-152
My religion teaches me that whenever there is distress which one cannot
remove, one must fast and pray. T-2-148
My religion teaches me that I should by my personal conduct instil into the
minds of those who might hold different views the conviction that cow
killing is a sin.
XXV-518
My respectful study of other religions has not abated my reverence for or my
faith in the Hindu scriptures. T-2-230
My life is dedicated to the service of India through the religion of
non-violence which I believe to be the root of
Hinduism. T-2-6
My Hindu instinct tells me that all religions are more or less true. T-2-132
My politics and all other activities of mine are derived from my religion.
MM-102
Fasting and prayer are common injunctions in my religion. T-2-152
To me the Mahabharata is a profoundly religious book, largely allegorical,
in to way meant to be a historical record. . TIG-95
Hindu religious literature, indeed all religious literature, is full of
illustrations to prove the truth. XXVI-158
Hinduism has become a conservative religion and, therefore, a mighty force
because of the swadeshi spirit underlying it. MM-410
Hinduism is not a codified religion. T-2-285 religion. religion. religion.
T-2-285
Hinduism is not an exclusive religion. In it there is room for the worship
of all the prophets
in the world. MM-92
Hinduism with its message of ahimsa is to me the most glorious religion in
the world.
MM-93
Hinduism had absorbed the best of all the faiths of the world and in that
sense Hinduism
was not an exclusive religion. T-8-120
Hinduism would not have been much of a religion if Rama had not steeled his
heart
against every temptation. T-2-150
Hindu dharma is like a boundless ocean teeming with priceless gems.
TIG-85
If we would be pure, if we would save Hinduism, we must rid ourselves of
this
poison of enforced widowhood. MM-299
We cry for cow protection in the name of religion, but we refuse protection
to the human cow in the shape of the girl-widow. T-2-227
Calling them devadasis, we insult God Himself in the name of religion.
T-2-280
In the name of religion, we force widowhood upon our three lakhs of
girl-widows who
could not understand the import of the marriage ceremony. T-2-227
It is no religions to have for one’s wife a girl who is fit only to sit in
one’s lap, but it is
the height of irreligion. T-2-273
Widowhood imposed by religion or custom is an unbearable yoke and defiles
the home
by secret vice and degrades religion. T-2-227
It is difficult for me to regard anyone who obeys no moral principle in his
conduct to
be a religious man. XXVI-58
The fragrance of religious and spiritual life is much finer and subtler than
that of
the rose. TIG-72
Religion of our conception, thus imperfect, is always subject to a process
of evolution
and re- interpretation. TIG-65
If we import compulsion in matters of religions, there is no doubt that we
shall be
committing suicide. XXVI-270
Dharma is one and one only, Ahimsa means moksha, and moksha is the
realization
of truth. MOG-17
Ahimsa is the height of Kshatriya dharma as it represents the climax of
fearlessness.
XXV-563
Belief in one God is the cornerstone of all religions. MM-67
That is dharma which is enjoined by the holy books, followed by the sages,
interpreted
by the learned and which appealed to the heart. MM-65
Even a little of this dharma saves one from many a pitfall. T-2-89
Truth is my religion and ahimsa is the only way of its realization.
T-4-250
Politics bereft of religion are absolute dirt, ever to be shunned. MM-102
The final goal of all religions is to realise the essential oneness.
MM-419
True religion being the greatest thing in life and in the world, it has been
exploited
the most. BINCH-42
To benefit by others’ killing and delude oneself into the belief that one is
being very
religions and non-violent is sheer self-deception. MM-429
To reject the necessity of temples is to reject the necessity of God,
religion and
earthly existence. T -3-195
"Do not worry in the least about yourself, leave all worry to God," this
appears to be
the commandment in all religions. MOG-19
Passive resistance seeks to rejoin politics and religion and to test every
one of our action
in the light ethical principles. XX-201
No Indian who aspires to follow the way of true religion can afford to
remain aloof
from politics. XX-201
Love is the basis of our friendship as it is of religion. MM-398
God, who is the embodiment of Truth and Right and Justice, can never have
sanctioned
a religion or practice which regards one-fifth of our vast population as
untouchables.
T-3-280
Conversion without a clean heart is a denial of God and religion.
T-4-79
The practice of truth and non-violence melted the religious differences, and
we learnt
to see beauty in each religion. T-5-225
Any imposition from without meant compulsion. Such compulsion was repugnant
to
religion. T-8-61
Every person, as every institution, and, above all, every religion was to be
judged not
by the amount of atrocities or the wrong committed but by the right conduct.
T-8 -25
The renunciation of the Gita is the acid test of faith. T-2-310
The secret of happy life lies in renunciation. Renunciation of life.
MM-192
Knowledge and devotion, to be true, have to stand the test of renunciation
of the fruits of
action. T-2-309
The sanyasa of the Gita is all work and yet no work. T-2-312
The sanyasa of the Gita will not tolerate complete cessation of activity.
T-2-311
Prayer is the only means of bringing about orderliness and peace and repose
in our
daily life. TIG-43
All research will be useless if it is not allied to internal research.
T-2 -272
Let India become alive by self-purification, that is, self-restraint and
self-denial, and she
will be a boon to. herself and mankind T-2-56
Justice should become cheap and expeditious. Today it is the luxury of the
rich and the
joy of the gambler. T-4-182
I own no property and yet I feel that I am perhaps the richest man in the
world.
XXVI-561
The true source of rights is duty. T-2-179
If we all discharge our duties, rights will not be far to seek. XXV-564
No people have risen who thought only of rights. Only those did so who
thought of
duties. XXV-573
Out of the performance of duties flow rights, and those that knew and
performed their
duties came naturally by the rights. XXV-573
A man can give up a right, but the may not give up a duty without being
guilty of a
grave dereliction. T-2-324
There being no absolute and universal standard of right, terrorism must be
held to be
wrong in every case. XXV-442
Immediately I arrogate to myself the exclusive title to being in the right,
I usurp the function
of the Deity. XXV-442
If all simply insist on rights and no duties, there will be utter confusion
and chaos.
T-8-31
If leaving duties unperformed we run after rights, they will escape us like
a will-o' -the
wisp. TIG-152
One man cannot do right in one department of life whilst he is occupied in
doing wrong
in any other department. Life is one indivisible whole. MM-440
The only things that separates us from the brute, with which we have so much
in common,
is the capacity to distinguish between right and wrong. T-4-158
Violence becomes imperative when as attempt is made to assert rights without
any
reference to duties. T-4-13
Swaraj would be real Swaraj only when there would be no occasion for
safeguarding
any rights. T-3-92
Execution of the constructive programme in its entirety means more than
Swaraj. It
means Ram Raj, Khudai Sultanat or the Divine Kingdom. T-7-32
Even the dog is described by the poet to have received justice under
Ramarajya.
M-326
My Hinduism teaches me to respect all religions. In this lies the secret of
Ramarajya.
MM-27
All research will be useless if it is not allied to internal research.
T-2-272
Justice should become cheap and expeditious. Today it is the luxury of the
rich and
the joy of the gambler. T-4-182
Out of the performance of duties flow rights, and those that knew and
performed their
duties came naturally by the rights. XXV-573
If all simply insist on rights and no duties, there will be utter confusion
and chaos.
T-8-31
If leaving duties unperformed we run after rights, they will escape us like
a will-o' -the
wisp. TIG-152
I believe in Advaita, I believe in the essential unity of man and for that
matter of
all that lives. XXV-390
The most distinctive and largest contribution of Hinduism to India’s cu
lture is the doctrine
of ahimsa. T-2-341
True ahimsa should mean a complete freedom from ill-will and anger and hate
and
an overflowing love for all. T-2-318
Ahimsa and love are one and the same thing. TIG-19
The removal of untouchability is one of the highest expressions of ahimsa.
T-4-239
A votary of ahimsa cannot subscribe to the utilitarian formula (of the
greatest
good of the greatest number). He will strive for the greatest good of all
and die
in the attempt to realize the ideal. TIG-139
Woman is the incarnation of ahimsa. (Ahimsa means infinite love. Which again
means
infinite capacity for suffering.) T-5-227
In Swaraj, based on ahimsa, people need not know their rights, but it is
necessary for
them to know their duties. MM-135
The scriptures of Christians, Mussalmans and Hindus are all replete with the
teaching
of ahimsa. XXV-521
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For readers interested in EPIGRAMS FROM GANDHI JI arranged alphabetically
for each subject, the exhaustive web site is
http://www.mkgandhi.org/epigrams/contents.htm
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