<div dir="ltr"><div><font face="georgia,serif">Good Morning Visionaries:</font></div><div><font face="georgia,serif"></font><br></div><div><font face="georgia,serif">I was preparing my column for next week's Daily News,but I'm posting this now from a longer article I've written about Gandhi and King.</font></div><div><font face="georgia,serif"></font><br></div><div>
<p style="margin:0px;text-indent:0.5in"><font color="#000000"><b><span style="margin:0px;font-family:"Georgia",serif">Kings’ Six
Principles of Non-Violent Action</span></b><span style="margin:0px;font-family:"Georgia",serif"><span style="margin:0px"> </span></span></font></p>
<p style="margin:0px;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;font-family:"Georgia",serif"><font color="#000000">King eventually formulated six principles that he
adapted from Gandhi’s ethics of nonviolence and his Christian faith.<span style="margin:0px"> </span>He declared that “they were nothing more and
nothing less than Christianity in action” (<i>Essential
Writings</i>, p. 86).</font></span></p>
<p style="margin:0px"><span style="margin:0px;font-family:"Georgia",serif"><font color="#000000"><span style="margin:0px"> </span><span style="margin:0px"> </span></font></span></p>
<p style="margin:0px;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;font-family:"Georgia",serif"><font color="#000000">(1) <b>Active Nonviolence</b>.<b>
</b>Rejecting criticism that this was a “method of cowardice and stagnant
passivity,” King described the nonviolent resister this way: “His mind and
emotions are always active, constantly seeking to persuade this opponent that
he is wrong. The method is passive physically, but strongly active
spirituality” (<i>Essential Writings</i>, p.
87). </font></span></p>
<p style="margin:0px;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;font-family:"Georgia",serif"><font color="#000000"> </font></span></p>
<p style="margin:0px;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;font-family:"Georgia",serif"><font color="#000000"><span style="margin:0px"> </span>(2) <b>Convert the Opponent</b>. The
nonviolent activist does not seek “to defeat or humiliate the opponent, but to
win his friendship and understanding”(ibid.)<span style="margin:0px">
</span>It has as its aim the conversion of the opponent to your way of
thinking. “The aftermath of nonviolence is the creation of the beloved
community, while the aftermath of violence is tragic bitterness” (ibid.) It is
significant that the British left as friends of a free, democratic India, and
today Mississippi has the highest number of African-Americans political office holders
in the nation, while Alabama has the highest percentage.</font></span></p>
<p style="margin:0px;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;font-family:"Georgia",serif"><font color="#000000"> </font></span></p>
<p style="margin:0px;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;font-family:"Georgia",serif"><font color="#000000">(3) <b>Attack the Problem
not the Person. </b>The targets are oppressive laws and unjust actions and not
the oppressors themselves, because they are the ones you want to convert.<span style="margin:0px"> </span>This is a version of Christian motto “hate
the sin but love the sinner.” The battle is between the forces of justice and
those of injustice, not between blacks and whites.<span style="margin:0px"> </span>And the victory will be for all persons not
just the minority.</font></span></p>
<p style="margin:0px;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;font-family:"Georgia",serif"><font color="#000000"> </font></span></p>
<p style="margin:0px;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;font-family:"Georgia",serif"><font color="#000000">(4) <span style="margin:0px"> </span><b>The Principle of Self-Suffering. <span style="margin:0px"> </span></b>This is the willingness to accept
suffering rather than to inflict it.<span style="margin:0px"> </span>This
is Gandhi’s specific discovery but it is an eminently Christian concept as well.<span style="margin:0px"> </span>King quotes Gandhi on the redemptive power of
suffering: “Rivers of blood must flow may have to flow before we gain our
freedom, but it must be our blood” (ibid., p. 18).</font></span></p>
<p style="margin:0px;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;font-family:"Georgia",serif"><font color="#000000"> </font></span></p>
<p style="margin:0px;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;font-family:"Georgia",serif"><font color="#000000">(5) <b>No Violence of Word
or Thought.</b><span style="margin:0px"> </span>For King the nonviolent
resister not only “avoids external physical violence but also internal violence
of spirit. You not only refuse to shoot a man, but you also refuse to hate him”
(ibid, p. 453) The Buddha rejected the Jain idea that karma is produced only by
physical acts; instead, he believed, as Christians do, that all sin begins in
intentions. </font></span></p>
<p style="margin:0px;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;font-family:"Georgia",serif"><font color="#000000"> </font></span></p>
<p style="margin:0px;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;font-family:"Georgia",serif"><font color="#000000">(6) <b>Self-Sacrificing
Love</b><i> </i>(<i>agapē</i>)<i>. </i><span style="margin:0px"> </span>King is particularly eloquent about Christian <i>agapē</i>: it is “an overflowing love that
is purely spontaneous, unmotivated, groundless, and creative.” It is a love that
is not dependent on mutual response of another; <i>agapē</i> is an unconditional love that expects nothing in return. The
best way to test whether you are capable of <i>agapē</i>
is to try to love someone you hate.</font></span></p>
<p style="margin:0px;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;font-family:"Georgia",serif"><font color="#000000"> </font></span></p>
<p style="margin:0px;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;font-family:"Georgia",serif"><font color="#000000">There is a dramatic
scene in the movie <i>Gandhi</i>, which apparently
has no factual basis, but it nonetheless is a tale that tells truth. It is true
that in early September, 1947, Gandhi agreed to end his fast after the warring
Muslim and Hindu factions signed a truce, which led to the surrender of their
weapons and the halt all hostilities. What the movie shows is a Hindu man who
promises Gandhi that he would take a Muslim orphan and raise her as his own and
a Muslim man who promises to do the same with a Hindu orphan. This may not be
either spontaneous or unmotivated, but it is a creative love that seeks nothing
in return.</font></span></p>
<font color="#000000"></font><font face="Times New Roman"></font><br clear="all"><br>A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they shall never sit in. <br></div><div class="gmail_signature"><div dir="ltr"><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><br>-Greek proverb</div><div><br>
“Enlightenment is man’s emergence from his self-imposed immaturity.
Immaturity is the inability to use one’s understanding without guidance
from another. This immaturity is self- imposed when its cause lies not
in lack of understanding, but in lack of resolve and courage to use it
without guidance from another. Sapere Aude! ‘Have courage to use your
own understand-ing!—that is the motto of enlightenment.<br>
<br>
--Immanuel Kant<br>
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