Showing posts with label Religion. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Religion. Show all posts

Monday, September 5, 2016

Gandhi Journal Article-II ( September 2016 )

Kabir and Gandhi as Apostles of Human Unity Transcending Religion and Caste-based Distinctions

By Saral Jhingran
 
Kabir asserted the basic unity of all human beings not on the basis of some spiritual hypothesis of God's immanence in every heart, but on a very rational and scientific basis. Shorn of conventional man-made distinctions, basically, all human beings are the same, according to him. He derives a morality of compassion and non-violence from his basic thesis of unity of all living beings. The paper argues that Kabir's vision of the essential unity of all human beings can provide an idealistic foundation to all our efforts at both the resolution of mutual conflicts and restoring dignity to the downtrodden. The Mahatma's interpretation of the same vision gives us two messages which can contribute to realizing the above goals. They are: sincere religious toleration of and respect for other faiths on the basis of a frank acknowledgement of the possible faults of our own religion; and the need to see the 'Divine' in the hearts of the 'dumb millions', which must in turn lead us to the service of those millions as the only way to realize the 'Divine' in our hearts.


Saturday, April 9, 2016

Gandhi Journal Article-III (April 2016) - Reinterpreting Gandhi's Notion of "Dharma": An Entanglement of Duty, Religion, and Ethics

Gandhi Journal Article-III (April 2016)

Reinterpreting Gandhi's Notion of "Dharma": An Entanglement of Duty, Religion, and Ethics

The term 'dharma' is an enigmatic term. It is one of the purusarthas of Hindu tradition. Scholars belonging to classical age have described 'dharma' variously: faith in God(s), recognition of the quality of an object, and understanding the laws of the cosmos. These descriptions are found in classical manuscripts such as Mahabhrata, Ramayana, Bhagavad-Gita, Upanishads, Vedas, and Manusmruti. But there has been a gradual change in the interpretation of 'dharma' with time. In modern times, 'dharma' is interpreted as 'duty', 'ethics', and 'religion'. This paper examines the modern interpretations of 'dharma' from the Gandhian perspective and critically evaluates Gandhi's view on 'dharma' in relation to purusdrthas. It discusses why 'dharma' must be given highest priority among the purusarthas. Finally, it attempts to answer how dharma is associated with duty, religion, and ethics.

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