Gandhian religion

Though religion and politics are separate entities of their own with their own
trajectories often in practical life we find both these spheres coincide with each
other and create multifarious results. Though modern politics undermines the need
and importance of religion in political sphere, we cannot neglect the dominance of
religion in political space. Thus when Mahatma Gandhi is associated with religion
and politics simultaneously it becomes a modicum of analysis to see how we can
see assimilation of both the spaces in a somehow seamless manner. And as vinay
lal posits the question- whether we should see this development as Gandhis
religion or Gandhi and religion. We need to also understand the whole issue in
the context of Indian national movement and how Gandhian ethics and metaphysics
served the cause of the movement.

Before going to the question of Gandhis interpretation of religion there are certain
issues that need to be dealt with. Religious plurality is adjusted to, most of all,
behaviorally in the Hindu context. The two major strategies adopted are assimilation
and the water-tight compartment response. Because Hinduism is a non-
institutionalized religion it does not face the problem of defining itself vis-a-vis "the
other". In this context Gandhi actually extended the sphere of religion by giving
way to ethics and utilitarian values and social harmony which could be realized by
people of faiths other than Hinduism and even by those people who dont follow
religion actively. For him, religion was a sort of rationality which comes out of your
relation with others. According to vinay lal, there is a wide spectrum of opinions on
Gandhis religiosity, his deployment of religious symbols and language, and his
adherence to, or departure from, conventional understandings of religion.

Gandhi believed that all people had a right to practice any religion they chose to
identify with, and that forms of worship should not be dictated by the state.
Although himself a Hindu, he carried on a sympathetic dialogue with those of other
faiths, arguing that each represented a different path towards Truth. David
hardiman believes that his views were in part a product of his upbringing in
Saurashtra, a region in which there was no obvious history of communal antagonism
and in which the local rulers had for centuries pursued a policy of religious
tolerance. For Margaret chaterjee, it was the day-to-day experience of living in a
religiously plural environment and especially an awareness of the potential~ for
conflict that this contained, which shaped Gandhi's response.

Gandhi tried to see unity within the major religions in the form of the universal
notions of love, unity, self surrender and suffering offered by them. Thus through
the espousal of these values he tried to levy social and moral unto religious
institution. For example, he points out that there is a need to eradicate the
dichotomy between rich and poor as mutual enemies but poor should see rich as
their beneficiaries and rich should act like one. Thus not only Gandhi tried to deduce
a universal philosophy out of religions he altered the space from repository of empty
rituals to moral and social moors. His understanding of religion and truth was
ontological which helped him transcend the fizzy boundaries of individual religions.
According to Margaret chaterjee, Gandhi was inclined to set store by the common
ethical values which seemed to go along with diverse religious beliefs. But he was
too realistic to rely on what is after all a, somewhat theoretical point since centuries'
long lip-service to a host of ethical precepts has not prevented violence from
dogging the entire history of humankind. Gandhi therefore cast about for new
experiments in living, consciously bringing together people of different communities
in these experiments. The common observance of festivals, avoidance of food that
gave offence to others, attempting to value what others valued , instituting a
common prayer meeting for all - these were some of the ways in which Gandhi
responded to a religiously plural situation. On his return to India, all these
experiments fit under a larger umbrella, that of nationalism.

Similarly for vinay lal, there was no question of Gandhian religion outside the sphere
of human activity, and he was equally certain in his mind that religion was to be
measured by the extent to which it impinged upon the activities of daily life rather
than by religious rituals, temple observances, and, though perhaps one must be
more guarded about such an assertion, even prayer. According to david hardiman,
Gandhi didnt believed in the faulty and poisonous distinction between the Hindus
and Muslims of the country and believed that India cant remain a single nation until
and unless there is no unity between the two groups. The politics that Gandhi was
endorsing was not defined by the subjective individual conscience, but that of an
alleged collective that was defined in religious terms. He thus both politicized
religion and communalized the proto-democracy that was being forged in India at
that time. By supporting the Muslim clergy, Gandhi also endorsed the position of a
group that was often reactionary and divisive, even though according to hamza
alavi, in this process of assimilation of different faiths for national cause he
alienated some of his secular muslim comrades like Muhammad ali Jinnah.

According to ajay sakaria, Gandhi affirmed to a politics which is haloed by dharma.

For him, there can be no politics without religion. Religion provides him with
another way of thinking freedom and equality. From a postmodernist lens religion
always work with a response rather than an autonomous will, a response that is
prescribed but not imposed. What it means that though religion offers a path of
freedom but the way is not that of free will but have ample space for obligations to
set in and here we can understand the nuances of Gandhian religion which see
religion as a path to emancipation of human dignity by linking it to the self
satisfaction and universal kinship but this idea is not utopian dream but to make it a
pragmatic reality infuses this freedom with a moral obligation- that is to link
individual well being with social harmony and greater good of the society. And the
means to achieve this harmony is within the chief facets of religion- surrender and
sacrifice. Gandhi linked god to the idea of truth and truth was personalized and
universalized at the same time, personalized by giving credence to individual
perceived notions of truth and at the same time seeing it as an eternal ontological
reality.

Gandhi adhered to the view that there cant be any politics without religion and
similarly politics without morality. These views were reinforced in different periods of
his life, and also his belief that religion and politics are far too intertwined to permit
a thoroughgoing separation between the two spheres. At the same time, vinay lal
points out that there are many paradoxes in Gandhian understanding of religion or
his understanding of Hinduism. At some point, he is a devout follower of
Ramacharitmanas, but at other point he admonishes him for his misogynist stand.
Similarly he at different points of time supports or rejects temple as the site of
spirituality. But thats where we can trace through the ambiguities of Gandhian
ethical position his idea to transcend the narrow confines of religious materialism to
ontological moral ethical spiritualism that has an intellectual, Social and communal
bearing on people and society. According to margarita chaterjee, Gandhi
recognized certain features of different religions- doctrine, ritual, specific practices
and situations seen as provocative. The doctrine of the Incarnation, ritual in temples
to which Harijans were denied entrance, practices regarding the slaughter of
animals, the playing of music in front of mosques all these were occasions of
offence to some community or other., These examples bring out the inadequacy of
injunctions about tolerance, equality or underlying unity, for these worthy concepts
are all abstractions and therefore lack the power to defuse the inherent violence
which Gandhi found so very near the surface in the pluralist societies he was
familiar with. Thus the features that we see in Gandhian vision of religion even
though grounded in hindu society from where it takes its paraphernalia is actually
an admixture of different religious and non religious traditions which had different
teleology depending upon individual discretion but which all converge to social
harmony.

David hardiman try to analyze the political consequence of his vision by placing it in
practice in the 1920s and 30s where Gandhi is more than once forced to express
himself. Some commentators have argued that Gandhi's attempt to forge communal
harmony was doomed because he was so obviously a Hindu. His massive popularity
with the majority was gained through his religious appeal, but in the process he
alienated the religious minorities. W. Norman Brown claims, for example, that: 'He
could not in his time have become the political leader of the majority group in India,
fortified by mass support, without being religious, he could not be religious without
being a Hindu. He could not be a Hindu without being suspect to the Muslim
community. but this criticism is invalid both on theoretical and empirical grounds
considering the support Gandhi got from muslims even at a time of increasing
religious intolerance. According to bheekhu pareekh, Gandhi through his
metaphysics was trying to counter two of the most dominant ideologies of his time-
capitalism and communism. But he also had to counter other religious obstructions
particularly forged by