MORE ANIMAL THAN HUMAN

[Prof. Dr. Yogendra Yadav]

Prof. Dr. Yogendra Yadav

Gandhian Scholar

Gandhi Research Foundation, Jalgaon, Maharashtra, India

Contact No. – 09415777229, 094055338

E-mail- [e-mail];[e-mail]

 

 

MORE ANIMAL THAN HUMAN

 

 

 

Let us examine his arguments. He says that non-violence cannot be attained by the mass of people. And, yet, we find that the general work of mankind is being carried on from day to day by the mass of people acting in harmony as if by instinct. If they were instinctively violent, the world would end in no time. They remain peaceful naturally and without any police or other compulsion. It is when the mass mind is unnaturally influenced by wicked men that the mass of mankind commit violence. But they forget it as quickly as they commit it, because they return to their peaceful nature immediately the evil influence of the directing mind is removed. Hitherto, one has been taught to believe that a species is recognized and differentiated from the rest by its special characteristics. Therefore, it would be wrong, I presume, to say that a horse is animal first and horse after. He shares something in common with the other animals, but he dare not shed his houseline’s and yet remain an animal. Having lost his special virtue, he loses also his general status. Similarly, if a man lost his status as man and began to grow a tail and walk on all fours, lost the use of his hands, and, more than that, lost the use of his reason, would he not lose with the loss of his status as man his status also as animal? Neither the ox nor the ass, neither the sheep nor the goat will claim his as theirs. I would suggest to the medical friend that man can be classed as animal only so long as he retains his humanity. Neither is there any force in referring me to the Australian savage.

Even that Australian savage was fundamentally different from the brute, because the brute always will remain brute, whereas the savage has in him the capacity for developing to the fullest height attainable by man. We need not go to the Australian savage. Our Indian ancestors also were at one time, it will hardly be disputed, just as good and noble savages as the Australians. I entirely endorse the remark of the correspondent that even in our so-called civilized state; we are not far removed from savages. But he is willing to allow that at least we, the civilized descendants of our savage ancestors, may be differentiated from the brute creation. It is natural for the brute to be brutal. We would resent the adjective if it was applied to us. The correspondent apologizes for suggesting that I might regard myself as a ‘remote cousin of the ape’. The truth is that my ethics not only permit me to claim but require me to own kinship with not merely the ape but the horse and the sheep, the lion and the leopard, the snake and the scorpion. Not so need these kinsfolk regard themselves. The hard ethics which rule my life, and I hold ought to rule that of every man and woman, impose this unilateral obligation upon us. And it is so imposed because man alone is made in the image of God. That some of us do not recognize that status of ours makes no difference, except that then we do not get the benefit of the status, even as a lion brought up in the company of sheep, may not know his own status and, therefore, does not receive its benefits; but it belongs to him, nevertheless, and the moment he realizes it, he begins to exercise his dominion over the sheep.

But no sheep masquerading as a lion can ever attain the leonine status. And to prove the proposition that man is made in the image of God, it is surely unnecessary to show that all men admittedly exhibit that image in their own persons. It is enough to show that one man at least has done so. And, will it be denied that the great religious teachers of mankind have exhibited the image of God in their own persons? But, of course, my correspondent even contends that it is not natural to man to find and know God and; therefore, he says ‘man makes God in his own image’. All I can say is that the whole of the evidence hitherto produced by travelers controvert this astounding proposition. It is being more and more demonstrated that it is the worship of God, be it in the crudest manner possible, which distinguishes man from the brute. It is the possession of that additional quality which gives him such enormous hold upon God’s creation. It is wholly irrelevant to show that millions of educated people never enter a church, mosque or temple. Such entry is neither natural nor indispensable for the worship of God. Those even who bow their heads before stocks and stones, who believe in incantations or ghosts, acknowledge a power above and beyond them. It is true that this form of worship is savage, very crude; nevertheless, it is worship of God. Gold is still gold though in its crudest state. It merely awaits refinement to be treated as gold even by the ignorant. No amount of refinement will turn iron ore into gold. Refined worship is doubtless due to the effort of man. Crude worship is as old as Adam, and, as natural to him as eating and drinking, if not more natural. A man may live without eating for days on end; he does not live without worship for a single minute. He may not acknowledge the fact as many an ignorant man may not acknowledge the possession of lungs or the fact of the circulation of blood.

The correspondent puts sexual gratification on a level with eating and drinking. If he had read my article carefully he would have avoided the confusion of thought that one traces in the thing quoted by him. What I have said and repeat is that eating for pleasure, for the gratification, of the palate, is not natural to men. But eating to live is natural. And so is the sexual act, but not gratification, for the sake of perpetuation of the species, natural to man. I fear I shall preach to the end of my days complete renunciation of sexual desire. And this correspondent is the first medical man to tell me that such renunciation is not possible except through ‘our exhaustive fulfillment of the sexual desire’. On the contrary, medical authorities tell me that ‘an exhaustive fulfillment leads not to renunciation, but to ruinous imbecility. Complete renunciation of the desire no doubt requires an effort, but is it not worth the prize? If a lifetime may be devoted to the exploration of the properties of sound or light and heat, which after all only show us the phenomenal world to advantage, is it too much to expect an equal effort to attain complete renunciation which leads to self-realization, or, in other words, to a certain knowledge of God? And one who is fairly on the road to renunciation will not need to be told that ahimsa (love), not himsa (hate), rules man, I was almost about to say, the world.

Illustrations that the correspondent gives to prove my own himsa betrays his ignorance of my writings. The ignorance, of course, does not matter, because No one need read Young India. But ignorance of a man’s views is unpardonable when one ventures to criticize them. I have advocated boycott only foreign cloth and there is no violence done to the British workers who may be thrown out of employment because of the boycott of cloth manufactured by them, for the simple reason that purchase of foreign cloth is not an obligation undertaken by India. Violence is all the other way. It is done to India in the name and on behalf of British workers by imposing British cloth upon India. A drunkard does no violence to the owner of a drink-shop when he becomes a teetotaler. He serves both the publican and himself. And so will India serve both the foreigners and herself, when she ceases to buy foreign cloth. Foreign workmen will not starve, but will find better employment. And if they will voluntarily give up manufacturing cloth for India, they will have taken part in a great humanitarian movement.