Saying His Peace

Video

Rare English Gandhi Recording from 1947

Mahatma Gandhi Speaks: In what may have been the final speech of his life that recorded Mahatma Gandhi speaking in English, the leader of India's independence movement addressed a gathering of Asian leaders in New Delhi on April 2, 1947.

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Even more than nonviolence, courage was Gandhi's central message: During his "pilgrimage" to put an end to the sectarian strife, for example, he sought out Muslim hosts during his nightly halts to demonstrate to his fellow Hindus that most Muslims wanted to live in peace.

When grieving people caught up in the sectarian strife came to him for solace, Gandhi offered little comfort. He asked them why they were not braver, why they were not willing to welcome the blows of their tormentors. Evil and violence, he counseled, quoting Jesus, could not be overcome through resistance, but only through patient suffering -- "resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also." To colleagues aghast at such coldness, Gandhi explained his job was not to give people consolation, but to show them their own hidden reserves of strength.

When Hindus retaliated against Muslims in the state of Bihar, Gandhi inflamed angry Hindus when he demanded that state leaders protect Muslims. He warned his colleagues in the Congress Party of dire political consequences -- and a fast unto death -- if they did not protect minorities.

Gandhi's interlocutors rarely enjoyed these interactions, because they knew he was not bluffing. When the old man said he planned to fast unto death, it was not a tactic. In his everyday actions, it was clear he really did value his principles above his own life.

It is Gandhi's sincerity that gives his words in the April 1947 speech their power. Many leaders have been far more articulate. If Gandhi is compelling, it is because we know he is that rare person who actually means what he says.

With the horrors of the Holocaust and Hiroshima fresh in his mind, Gandhi talked about finding a way to help the West turn away from violence.

"What I want you to understand -- if you can -- that the message of the East, the message of Asia, is not to be learned through European spectacles, through Western spectacles, not by imitating the tension of the West, the gunpowder of the West, the atom bomb of the West," Gandhi told his listeners.

"If you want to give a message again to the West, it must be a message of love; it must be a message of truth; there must be a conquest -- " Gandhi's words are cut off at this point by a rousing cheer.

Characteristically, Gandhi stops the applause: "Please, please, please," he says. "That will interfere with my speech and that will interfere with your understanding also. I want to capture your hearts, and don't want to receive your claps. Let your hearts clap in unison with what I am saying, and I think I shall have finished my work."