Peace Through Transformation

 

"We must be the change we wish to see in the world." - Mahatma Gandhi

There are two specific alternatives before us to reach our destination of peace:

Change the way we think and perceive about nonviolence, and apply ourselves to reach the goal.

Our first aspiration, evidently, is to think, believe, and internalize that nonviolence is a practical weapon and that each of us is capable of utilizing it. Nowhere is the power of thought greater than in this area. Change in thought will go a long way in implementing peace-oriented action.

Second, we need to actually "practice" our beliefs in our lives in however small ways. Thanks to such invigorating activism, several grass roots groups, peace activists and non-governmental organizations are seen as far more effective in making headway toward peace. It is becoming increasingly evident that citizens of nations have lost hope that elected governments and other powerful dictators or rulers are capable of delivering long lasting peace.

More and more it is increasingly evident that each of us hold the future of peace in our own hands. "I have not the shadow of a doubt that any man or woman can achieve what I have, if he or she would make the same effort and cultivate the same hope and faith" encouraged Mahatma Gandhi to future nonviolence practitioners. As Sir Richard Attenborough rightly reminds us, Gandhi himself "was without wealth, property, official title or office. Mahatma Gandhi was not a commander of armies nor a ruler of vast lands. He could not boast of any artistic gifts or scientific achievements." Despite those odds, Gandhi is unanimously declared the nonviolent prophet.

Gandhi explains about his transformational process as follows:

"I have learned through bitter experience the one supreme lesson to conserve my anger, and as heat conserved is transmuted into energy, even so our anger controlled can be transmuted into a power which can move the world."

Badshah Khan summarized his transformation in his own words:

As a young boy, I had had violent tendencies; the hot blood of the Pathans was in my veins. But in jail I had nothing to do except read the Koran. I read about the Prophet Mohammed in Mecca, about his patience, his suffering, his dedication. I had read it all before, as a child, but now I read it in the light of what I was hearing all around me about Gandhiji's struggle against the British Raj...When I finally met Gandhiji, I learned all about the ideas of nonviolence and his Constructive program. They changed my life forever.

Gandhi had his beginnings as a shy lawyer and an ardent citizen of the British Empire, who changed his path and took on the arduous task of transferring power to Indians from the greatest empire in history without a war. With the guiding principles of nonviolence, love, and truth, Gandhi's victory was a peaceful one.

Timothy Flinders, in his Afterword in Eknath Easwaran's Nonviolent Soldier of Islam comments further on this aspect:

In (Gandhi's satygraha or) "truth struggling" nothing is lost or repressed; energy is conserved and transmuted. Thus in its transformative aspect nonviolence is not nonviolence at all, but violence harnessed, used."

Badshah Khan's metamorphosis was even more unique. Khan was raised as a wealthy and fierce warrior in the Pushtun tribe in the Northwestern Province of colonial India, or present day Afghanistan. The Pushtuns were notorious for their thirst for blood and violence. The British branded the province as a dangerous and rugged territory, and ill-treated the Pushtuns in prisons.

Although his origins were with a cursed tribe, Khan rose to a higher calling when he transformed himself and 100,000 other Pushtun warriors into "Khudai Kismatgars," or "Servants of God". These Servants of God ceased killings and surrendered themselves to a higher cause. The sacrifices of Khan and his fellow tribesmen gained the attention and admiration of Mahatma Gandhi and others.

Easwaran remarks,

"In one of history's more improbable turnabouts, it was left to Khan's ragged tribesmen to explode the myth that nonviolence works only for those who are already peaceful."

Speaking of self-reform, Flinders elaborates:

"The story of Khan's movement among the Pathans demonstrates the power of nonviolence to harness the negative forces in personality and use those same forces to transform an individual, a community, or even a society. Transformative nonviolence could find a special place in the regeneration of our own postindustrial democracies, wherever political tyranny has been replaced by subtler forms of oppression, meaninglessness, alienation, pervasive dissatisfaction, ennui."

Gandhi and Khan have shown that we have the power to stop hatred and violence, and that we can act as peacemakers in our families, communities, and nations. Yet, their self-transformation demonstrates that peace is not limited to the resolution of conflict in the face of battle. The path to peace lies in our choices and evolution.

There is no way out. Mankind has to get out of violence only through nonviolence.

The traditional methods of aggression and nuclear supremacy in resolving conflicts have failed abysmally forcing us to adopt a new paradigm for a safer existence. We are inundated with theories and techniques on making peace and resolving conflicts. We're told of peace treaties between countries that have not served their purpose, witnessed armed personnel marching in to guard short-lived peace and tranquility, and heard of failures in conventional diplomatic negotiations. Most of these efforts falter in their attempts deliver peace, and their failure to bring about the desired changes is discouraging.

Such disillusion has led to a passive resignation to the onslaught of violence and a baseless assumption that war is inevitable. It has fostered many unproductive "scientific" distortions that violence and aggression is intrinsic to the human brain.

First, we need to break loose from a subjugated thinking that we have no choice but to endure the current situation. 21 Scholars from different scientific fields from around the world developed the Seville Statement of Violence to persuade against such thinking. Signed on May 16, 1986 in Spain and later adopted by UNESCO in 1989, the Statement of Violence declares:

"It is scientifically incorrect to say that we have inherited a tendency to make war from our animal ancestors...Warfare is a peculiar human phenomenon and does not occur in animals....

The fact that warfare has changed so radically over time indicates that it is a product of culture.

It is scientifically incorrect to say that war or any violent behavior is genetically programmed into our human nature.

It is scientifically incorrect to say that in the course of human evolution there has been a selection for aggressive behavior more than for other kinds of behavior. In a well-studied species, status within the group is achieved by the ability to co-operate and to fulfill social functions relevant to the structure of the group...Violence is neither in our evolutionary legacy nor in our genes.

It is scientifically incorrect to say that humans have a "violent brain."...How we act is shaped by how we have been conditioned and socialized. There is nothing in our neurophysiology that compels us to react violently.

It is scientifically incorrect to say that war is caused by "instinct" or any single motivation...The technology of modern war has exaggerated traits associated with violence both in the training of actual combatants and in the preparation of support for war in the general population. As a result of this exaggeration, such traits are often mistaken to be the causes rather than the consequences of the process.

The group of scientists concludes "biology does not condemn humanity to war, and that humanity can be freed from the biological pessimism and empowered with confidence to undertake the transformative tasks needed...in the years to come. Just as 'wars begin in the minds of men', peace also begins in our minds."