SATURDAY, MAY 18, 2024
Eusebio Gomes
Seven hundred years before Jesus’ birth a Greek slave named Aesop compiled a collection of stories. Today we know them as Aesop’s Fables. One of the fables deals with a dispute between the sun and the wind. The dispute was over which of the two was the stronger. One day an opportunity arose to settle the dispute. A person dressed in a coat was walking down a deserted country road. The sun said to the wind: “Whoever makes that person remove the coat faster will be the winner.” The wind not only agreed but decided to go first. He blew and blew, but the more he blew, the tighter the person held on to the coat. Finally, exhausted the wind gave up. Then the sun took over. It merely shone in all its glory. Within minutes, the person took off the coat. Aesop said the moral of the story was this: you can achieve more by gentleness than by violence.
The original meaning of the word gentleness is “freedom from harshness and violence,” with the Latin root gentilis. A gentle person is affable, kind, good-natured and compassionate. His benign disposition creates harmony and graciousness among living beings. Gentleness of a person purges undesirable harmful actions. Jesus Christ in his Sermon on the Mount addresses the gentle persons saying they shall inherit the earth. The earth is in great need of these gentle persons to establish peace, harmony and tranquillity. The earth has been violated by the selfish and rich countries with their plunder of resources from the poor countries, violated by greedy people with deforestation. Humanity has been vitiated by venom of hatred spilled by high castes over low castes, by RSS orchestrated programs against minorities, by white dominative powers against blacks. The recent case is of George Floyd in USA, a Black whose neck was pressed repeatedly by a White police officer with his knee.
The latest case of serious concern is the sudden attack by Chinese soldiers against Indian soldiers at Galwan Valley in Ladakh. It is a heart-wrenching incident. Anger surges in the country over this brawl on the border. “China is India’s No. 1 enemy,” remarked George Fernandes, then Union Defence Minister soon after taking over the charge. As blood of Indian soldiers was split at the hands of the treacherous Chinese soldiers on 15-16 night of June, the words of the socialist leader has been proven right. The Chinese soldiers acted violently like barbarians using nail-struck rods and sticks with barbed wire to bludgeon Indian soldiers. Diplomatic relations and gentleness are better solutions to take on the dragon. Violent means will beget more violence. We are living in the land of Mahatma Gandhi who said: “Non-violence is the first article of my faith. It is also the last article of my creed.” Pope Francis says: “The path of peace in the world, in our societies and also in our families is that of humility, gentleness and patience.” The terrible COVID-19 pandemic is an occasion for us to sit at home and introspect and choose the path of gentleness for harmonious living.
