All one has to be, is a normal decent human being
by Anwar A Khan
World peace, or peace on Earth, is the concept of an ideal state of happiness, freedom and peace within and among all people and nations on earth. This idea of world non-violence is one motivation for people and nations to willingly cooperate, either voluntarily or by virtue of a system of governance that objects it will be solved by love and peace. Different cultures, religions, philosophies and organisations have varying concepts on how such a state would come about.
Various religious and secular organisations have the stated aim of achieving world peace through addressing human rights, technology, education, engineering, medicine or diplomacy used as an end to all forms of fighting. Since 1945, the United Nations and the 5 permanent members of its Security Council (the US, Russia, China, France and the UK) have operated under the aim to resolve conflicts without war or declarations of war. Nonetheless, nations have entered numerous military conflicts since then utterly brushing aside the UN resolution, especially American administration.
Our problem today is that we have allowed the internal to become lost in the external. We have allowed the means by which we live to outdistance the ends for which we live. So much of modern life can be summarised in that arresting dictum of the poet Thoreau, “Improved means to an unimproved end”. This is the serious predicament, the deep and haunting problem confronting modern man. If we are to survive today, our moral and spiritual lag must be eliminated. Enlarged material powers spell enlarged peril if there is not proportionate growth of the soul. When the “without” of man’s nature subjugates the “within”, dark storm clouds begin to form in the world.
This problem of spiritual and moral lag, which constitutes modern man’s chief dilemma, expresses itself in three larger problems which grow out of man’s ethical infantilism. Each of these problems, while appearing to be separate and isolated, is inextricably bound to the other. I refer to man-made racial injustice, poverty, and war bringing about unspeakable sufferings for people all over the world.
We live in a day, says the philosopher Alfred North Whitehead,”when civilization is shifting its basic outlook: a major turning point in history where the presuppositions on which society is structured are being analyzed, sharply challenged, and profoundly changed.” What we are seeing now is a freedom explosion, the realisation of “an idea whose time has come”, to use Victor Hugo’s phrase. The deep rumbling of discontent that we hear today is the thunder of disinherited masses, raising from dungeons of oppression to the bright hills of freedom, in one majestic chorus the rising masses singing, in the words of our violence free world of song.
Nonviolence has also meant that people in the agonising struggles of years have taken suffering upon themselves instead of inflicting it on others. It has meant, as I said, that we are no longer afraid and cowed. But in some substantial degree it has meant that we do not want to instill fear in others or into the society of which we are a part. The movement does not seek to liberate people at the expense of the humiliation and enslavement of America and its vassal states. It seeks no victory over anyone. It seeks to liberate the world society from fear, violence, war, economic sanctions and to share in the self-liberation of all the people of the world.
Violence is impractical because it is a descending spiral ending in destruction for all. It is immoral because it seeks to humiliate the opponent rather than win his understanding: it seeks to annihilate rather than convert. Violence is immoral because it thrives on hatred rather than love. It destroys community and makes brotherhood impossible. It leaves society in monologue rather than dialogue. Violence ends up defeating itself. It creates bitterness in the survivours and brutality in the destroyers.
In a real sense nonviolence seeks to redeem the spiritual and moral lag that we want to speak of as the chief dilemma of modern man. It seeks to secure moral ends through moral means. Nonviolence is a powerful and just weapon. Indeed, it is a weapon unique in history, which cuts without wounding and ennobles the man who wields it. Robert J. Burrowes wrote an article titled, “The Disintegrated Mind: The Greatest Threat to Human Survival on Earth” which appeared on 13th May 2019 in Sri Lanka Guardian, Sri Lanka and it is of primal importance in the context of establishing non-violence world society (Robert has a lifetime commitment to understanding and ending human violence. He has done extensive research since 1966 in an effort to understand why human beings are violent and has been a nonviolent activist since 1981. He is the author of ‘Why Violence?’)
I think it is the way to reestablish a broken community with everybody’s goodwill and efforts. It is the method which seeks to implement the just law by appealing to the conscience of the great decent majority people who through blindness, fear, pride, and irrationality have allowed their consciences to sleep.
The nonviolent resisters can summarise their message in the simple terms: we will take direct action against injustice despite the failure of governmental and other official agencies to act first. We will not obey unjust laws or submit to unjust practices. We will do this peacefully, openly, cheerfully because our aim is to persuade. We adopt the means of nonviolence because our end is a community at peace with itself. We will try to persuade with our words, but if our words fail, we will try to persuade with our acts. We will always be willing to talk and seek fair compromise, but we are ready to suffer when necessary and even risk our lives to become witnesses to truth as we see it.
This approach to the problem of superpowers injustice in different forms is not at all without successful precedent. It was used in a magnificent way by Mohandas K. Gandhi to challenge the might of the British Empire and free his people from the political domination and economic exploitation inflicted upon them for centuries. He struggled only with the weapons of truth, soul force, non-injury, and courage.
In the past years unarmed gallant men and women of the world have given living testimony to the moral power and efficacy of nonviolence. I am only too well aware of the human weaknesses and failures which exist, the doubts about the efficacy of nonviolence, and the open advocacy of violence by some. But I am still convinced that nonviolence is both the most practically sound and morally excellent way to grapple with the age-old problem of doing injustice through violence.
Suppressed people cannot remain suppressed forever. The yearning for freedom eventually manifests itself. This, too, will be a fierce struggle, but we must not be afraid to pursue the remedy no matter how formidable the task through non-violence acts. We are inevitably our brothers and sisters’ keeper because of the interrelated structure of reality. John Donne interpreted this truth in pictorial terms when he affirmed:
“No man is an Iland, intire of its selfe: every
man is a peece of the Continent, a part of the
maine: if a Clod bee washed away by the Sea,
Europe is the lesse, as well as if a Promontorie
were, as well as if a Mannor of thy friends
or of thineowne were: any man’s death
diminishes me, because I am involved in
Mankinde: and therefore never send to know
for whom the bell tolls: it tolls for thee.”
Further a great evil confronting our world is that of war by war-mongering nations – USA and its client states. Recent events have vividly reminded us that those nations are not reducing but rather increasing their arsenals of weapons of mass destruction. The best brains in the highly developed nations of the world are devoted to military technology. The proliferation of nuclear weapons has not been halted, in spite of the Limited Test Ban Treaty.
When I speak of love, I am not speaking of some sentimental and weak response which is little more than emotional bosh. I am speaking of that force which all of the great religions have seen as the supreme unifying principle of life. Love is somehow the key that unlocks the door which leads to ultimate reality. This Hindu-Muslim-Christian-Jewish-Buddhist belief about ultimate reality is beautifully summed up in the First Epistle of Saint John19:
Let us love one another: for love is of God; and everyone
thatloveth is born of God, and knoweth God.
He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.
If we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and His
love is perfected in us.
Let us hope that this spirit will become the order of the day. As Arnold Toynbee said, “Love is the ultimate force that makes for the saving choice of life and good against the damning choice of death and evil. Therefore, the first hope in our inventory must be the hope that love is going to have the last word.” We can no longer afford to worship the God of hate or bow before the altar of retaliation. The oceans of history are made turbulent by the ever-rising tides of hate. History is cluttered with the wreckage of nations and individuals that pursued this self-defeating path of hate. Love is the key to the solution of the problems of the world.
We are sorry, but we do not want to be an emperor. That’s not our business. We do not want to rule or conquer anyone. We should like to help everyone - if possible - Christians, Muslims, Buddhists… We all want to help one another. Human beings are like that. We want to live by each other’s happiness - not by each other’s misery. We do not want to hate and despise one another. In this world there is room for everyone. And the good earth is rich and can provide for everyone. The way of life can be free and beautiful, but we have lost the way. That has to be reclaimed.
Greed has poisoned men’s souls, has barricaded the world with hate, and has goose-stepped us into misery and bloodshed. We have developed speed, but we have shut ourselves in. Machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical. Our cleverness is hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little. More than machinery, we need humanity. More than cleverness, we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost…
The internet has brought us closer together. The very nature of this invention cries out for the goodness in mankind - cries out for universal brotherhood - for the unity of us all. Even now my voice is reaching millions throughout the world - millions of despairing men, women, and little children - victims of a system that makes men and women torture and imprison innocent people.
To those who can hear me, I say - do not despair. The misery that is now upon us is but the passing of greed - the bitterness of men who fear the way of human progress. The hate of men will pass, and dictators die, and the power they took from the people will return to the people. And so long as men die, liberty will never perish.
Soldiers of super powers don’t give yourselves to brutes - men who despise you - enslave you - who regiment your lives - tell you what to do - what to think and what to feel! Who drill you - diet you - treat you like cattle, use you as cannon fodder. Don’t give yourselves to these unnatural men - machine men with machine minds and machine hearts! You are not machines! You are not cattle! You are men! You have the love of humanity in your hearts! You do not hate! Only the unloved hate - the unloved and the unnatural! Soldiers! Don’t fight for slavery! Fight for liberty!
In the 17th Chapter of St Luke it is written: “the Kingdom of God is within man” - not one man nor a group of men, but in all men! In you! You, the people have the power - the power to create machines. The power to create happiness! You, the people, have the power to make this life free and beautiful, to make this life a wonderful adventure.
Then - in the name of non-violence - let us use that power - let us all unite. Let us fight for a new world - a decent world that will give mankind a chance to work - that will give youth a future and old age a security. By the promise of these things, brutes have risen to power. But they lie! They do not fulfil that promise. They never will!
We have the personal faith that mankind will somehow rise up to the occasion and give new directions to an age drifting rapidly to its doom. In spite of the tensions and uncertainties of this period something profoundly meaningful will take place. Old systems of war, violence, exploitation and oppression will be passed away, and out of the womb of a frail world new system of justice and equality will be born. Doors of opportunity are gradually being opened to those at the bottom of society.
The shirtless and barefoot people of the lands are developing a new sense of “some-bodiness” and carving a tunnel of hope through the dark mountain of despair. The people who sat in darkness have seen a great light. Here and there an individual or group dares to love, and rises to the majestic heights of moral maturity. So, in a real sense this is a great time to be alive. Therefore, we should not yet be discouraged about the future.
Granted that the easygoing optimism of yesterday is impossible! Granted that those who pioneer in the struggle for peace and freedom will still face uncomfortable jail terms, painful threats of death; they will still be battered by the storms of persecution, leading them to the nagging feeling that they can no longer bear such a heavy burden, and the temptation of wanting to retreat to a more quiet and serene life. Granted that we face a world crisis which leaves us standing so often amid the surging murmur of life’s restless sea! But every crisis has both its dangers and its opportunities. It can spell either salvation or doom. In a dark confused world the kingdom of God may yet reign in the hearts of men and women.
Dictators free themselves but they enslave the people! Now let us fight to fulfil that promise! Let us fight to free the world - to do away with national barriers - to do away with greed, with hate and intolerance. Let us fight for a world of reason, a world where science and progress will lead to all men’s happiness. Soldiers in the name of non-violence, let us all unite, not divide! All one has to be is a normal decent human being.
-The End –
The writer is a senior citizen of Bangladesh, writes on politics, political and human-centred figures, current and international affairs.
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