Part 2, Week/Lesson 7 – Satyagraha

My take aways, thoughts and assignment for this week…

Satyagraha means “clinging to truth”. Further, it involves the willingness to take on suffering in order to win someone over who is acting wrongly.

The basic principles and ingredients for success with satyagraha include that satyagraha is predictable rather than depending on luck or grace. It requires training on the part of those practicing it. One who is a trainee works to enhance his/her courage and humanity so that satyagraha can be practiced in its true power.
One important principle of satyagraha is that the means determine the ends. Meaning that violent means cannot be used to bring about peaceful ends. Violence will bring about further violence. So, a satyagrahi must use nonviolent means to bring about peaceful ends. One should also remember that we do not fight the evil doer. Rather, we are to oppose the evil instead. Satyagraha never operates by coercion, but always by persuasion. We do not try to twist the arm of our opponent, but we do work to draw him/her in with open arms. Also, it is important to work to overcome ill-will toward our adversaries. Our end goal is to become friends with our adversary! Whew! A tall order! ☺

So, ingredients of a successful nonviolent campaign include training, strategy, timing, concreteness rather than symbolic action, enough numbers of people and good publicity. A true satyagrahi will never hate the person causing danger, prepare for a violent emergency ahead of time or decide that using force will solve the problem being faced.

A real-life example of satyagraha was reported by my friend, John Dear, peace activist and author of a weekly blog “On the Road to Peace” in the National Catholic Reporter. John related the story of a gathering of 13 elderly Japanese peace activists, 13 hibakusha—survivors of the Hiroshima bombing—who came to the U.S. as a delegation to sew the seeds of peace. The motto of the group is “to foster peace, one friend at a time.” (Sounds like satyagraha to me!) Anyway, they gathered in New Mexico at Los Alamos at Ashley Pond, the site of the buildings where the Hiroshima bomb was built. They shared their stories of their experiences of surviving the bombing of their city and the many horrors they saw. They came to fight the evil of the nuclear bomb, rather than its makers. They came in friendship, sharing themselves and their plea for all of us to work together for a peaceful, nuclear free world. One of the things they brought with them was a letter from the Mayor of Hiroshima, Matsui Kasumi, who introduced the hibakusha as those who long for peace and who “still hope the people of the world will come to share that longing and choose the right path.” He encouraged the rest of us to respond by “becoming the force that drives the struggle to abolish nuclear weapons.” At Ashley Pond, the delegation brought with them 1,000 peace cranes and attached them to the wooden beams in the ceiling of the shelter there. The responses of those who met with the 13 delegates ranged from heart felt apologies for the actions of our country to the establishment of friendships among the participants.
I want to say that this coming together worked (will have long term effects of peacemaking) because of the relationship building that I think happened there. Yes, the plants at Los Alamos are stilling humming along trying to build even more devastating nuclear weapons, but there was no confrontation or coercion, no evidence of hatred toward the builders of the bomb, only truth telling and the warmth of friendship. I think one of the things that I learned by reading this account is that satyagraha does not have to involve confrontation. I think the simple stories that were told, the publicity of the event (via John’s blog and other publications as well as word of mouth) will bring to the attention of those of us who hear or read about this the willingness to forgive and the outstretched hand of friendship that the hibakusha offered to their oppressors.

Jean
11/4/13

I have 2 takeaways for this week’s lesson.

One is the point that satyagraha means “clinging to truth.” I did know this through previous studies, but it just made deeper sense this week. It was untrue that people of India were incapable of becoming independent. It was not true that African Americans were inferior to their white counterparts. Leaders of nonviolent movements awakened people to this “truth.” Their greatest weapon was that they had the truth on their side. In a modern context, it is not true that human beings are naturally violent or that war is necessary to maintain order. It is also not true that material possessions make us happy. While these misconceptions are seen as “reality” by the majority of the public today, some of us know that it is not the case. The role of nonviolent actions is to again open people’s eyes on this ultimate truth. This is also consistent with the point mentioned in “Hope or Terror,” that nonviolence must be used for a right cause in order to succeed.

Another takeaway for me was that, while truth will always prevail, in order for us to be successful as agents of nonviolence, we cannot just rely on that and relax. There are many “ingredients” we need to prepare to apply nonviolent force in a most effective manner. For a nonviolent movement to succeed, many factors come to play: timing, training, strategic thinking, number of people involved, etc. Just like any scientific experience, one must study these factors to channel the force. I used the tragedy of Tienanmen as an example in my assignment to illustrate this point.