Humans have an innate tendency to strive for truth as rational beings, and to strive for justice as social and political beings. Civilization results. But once in about a thousand years, the structure of social organization changes. History is punctuated at odd times by critical events whose revolutionary effects set them apart as the reference points by which we relate to our collective past. Such critical periods include, for example, the agricultural revolution, the emergence of city states, and the rise of nations and empires. Social life before and after such landmark events is markedly different, because there occurs a shift in the constellation of forces which govern the state of affairs. Indeed, each of these moments marks the closing of an aeon and the opening of another--old patterns give way to new ones. The ensuing vortices of transformation leave no aspect of life unchanged. Today, there are ample signs that the world is undergoing another period of major transformation. An old world order is passing away--and a new one emerging--before our very eyes.
Until the 18th century, the world was organized as separate and effectively independent sovereign nation states. Nations conquered nations, and mighty religions waged devastating ``holy'' wars. The earth was still to a large extent a flat, infinite plane, so that land and natural resources could be assumed to be inexhaustible. Exponential growth in riches and power was thus possible in some cases, a prized ideal indeed. Now, on the other hand, the situation is markedly different. National sovereignty today is a relic of the past. Which nation state today can be said to be fully sovereign? Indeed, nations today are more interdependent than independent. There have been corresponding, parallel changes occurring at practically every level of human society. Completely new economic processes have emerged, and sometimes frustrate attempts to sustain stable growth. The interconnectivity and complexity of the world are daily increasing, driven in part by breath-taking scientific and technological advances and their corollary effects on other facets of human civilization. Interestingly, this radical transformation in human life has begun to affect the entire planet. Greenhouse gases generated by human activity, and global warming, for example, can affect entire ecosystems--nay rather the entire biosphere. The earth is becoming a smaller, different place: so different, in fact, that many current social problems have no historical precedent. Humankind stands at a crossroads.
We now have a fresh opportunity to benefit from a critical re-examination of the principles that guide our individual and collective lives. Already, our rapidly changing world is searching for new human values, new guiding principles. The ideologies of the past are struggling to stay relevant: nationalism, ethnocentrism, racism, religious fundamentalism, partisan politics, sexism and radical feminism, atheism, consumerism, materialism, communism, supremacist theories, etc. are, one and all, being questioned. People everywhere appear to be awakening to the possibility that a new, nonviolent, approach to civilization is possible: one based on human values. Specifically, we are struggling to find levels of knowledge and modes of behavior that are consistent with the world's current condition.
In this context, this book presents some of the more pertinent teachings of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi and of the Bahá'í Faith, arguably two of the more important agents that have contributed to the shaping of human society since their birth in the 19th century and that continue to influence people's thinking today. The reader of this book will note many striking similarities between the worldview of Gandhi and that of the Bahá'ís. Accordingly, most of the following chapters focus on the similarities in their thinking. There are, however, a handful of important differences between the Gandhian and the Bahá'í viewpoints that cannot be dismissed. Hence one chapter is devoted entirely to examining these major differences.
Some effort has been made in most chapters to present Gandhian and Bahá'í perspectives on an equal footing, in order to render this book as objective and impartial as may be possible. Such an unbiased approach has obvious advantages, but may inadvertently send the wrong message to some readers. A casual reader, for example, may get the (false) impression that the Bahá'í Faith is equal, on many levels, to the philosophy of Gandhi. A majority of Gandhi's admirers worldwide are not Bahá'ís; similarly not all Bahá'ís may know exactly who Gandhi was or what he did. Hence, such points need to be addressed explicitly from the very outset. The core question relates to what Gandhi and the Bahá'ís believe about their respective teachings. Gandhi claimed to be a free thinker and an ardent seeker of truth, but he never made claims to any kind of special divine authority. Most importantly, Gandhi did not set out to start a new religion. In contrast, the Bahá'í Faith is an organized world religion that Bahá'ís believe is an independent divine revelation. This major difference between the Gandhian and Bahá'í perspectives tinges, to however small an extent, virtually every other consideration of the subject matter. Hence, it is not altogether inconceivable that comparing Gandhian and Bahá'í teachings may be as inappropriate as comparing apples and oranges. And yet such comparisons need not be fruitless--e.g., are not both apples and oranges sweet?
This short book could never represent a comprehensive treatment of the subject matter, for the collected works of Gandhi comprise 90 volumes, while the writings of Bahá'u'lláh, the prophet-founder of the Bahá'í Faith, alone number over 100 volumes. For more information about the Bahá'í Faith, the reader is first referred to John E. Esslemont's classic textbook on the subject.[1] For more information about Gandhi, the reader is referred to any of the very good books about him, e.g., by Raghavan Iyer and Eknath Easwaran. [2,3,4] The next few pages briefly introduce the reader to the basic history and teachings of the Bahá'ís and of M. K. Gandhi.