Gandhi and the Gita: The Religious Roots of Nonviolent Resistance in Colonial India

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How can a book that seeks to justify extreme violence inspire a man whose name is synonymous with peaceful protest? To answer this question, we will examine the life and thought of M. K. Gandhi through the lens of religion, focusing on the text that served as one of his chief inspirations, the Bhagavad Gita. The Gita is an ancient philosophical poem in which the god Krishna convinces the reluctant warrior Arjuna to initiate a war that will annihilate most of the human race. But to Gandhi, this text was the blueprint for the most successful nonviolent resistance movement in history, the campaign to free India from British control. By reading the Gita and works by and about Gandhi, students will examine the confluence of religion and politics that gave rise to Gandhi and to modern India.