Gandhi and Truth

'There should be Truth in thought, Truth in speech and Truth in action,' Gandhi wrote in From Yeravda Mandir. 'Devotion to Truth is the sole justification of our existance.' This Truth is honesty, and also something else: 'It is impossible for us to realize perfect Truth so long as we are imprisoned in this mortal frame...if we shatter the chains of egotism, and melt into the ocean of humanity, we share it's dignity. To feel that we are something is to set up a barrior between God and ourselves; to cease feeling we are something is to become one with God. A drop in the ocean partakes of the greatness of its parent, although it is unconscious of it. But it is dried up as soon as it enters upon an existence independant of the ocean.'

Truth is identification with God and humanity. From Truth, non-violence is born. Truth appears different to different individuals. 'There is nothing wrong in every man following Truth acoording to his lights,' says From Yeravada Mandir. Each person must be true to his own truth. But if the seeker after Truth began to destroy those who saw truth in their way he would recede from the Truth. How can one realize God by killing or hurting? Non-violence, however, is more than peacefulness or pacifism; it is love, and excludes evil thought, undue haste, lies, or hatred.

Louis Fischer - The Life Of Mahatma Gandhi