Originally written in the summer of 1987 and revised in the spring of 2013, the following essay is offered in honor of the memory and mission of the Jain muni (monk), Acharya Sushil Kumar, one of my most significant spiritual teachers. We first met in the summer of 1982. I continue to derive inspiration from his example and my varied experiences with him.

He was a highly accomplished, multifaceted, self-realized spiritual teacher, a distinguished scholar, organizational founder, global networker and activist for nonviolence, iconoclast, peacemaker, guru, head of a monastic order, ecumenist, seer, holder and conveyer of esoteric knowledge, master of sacred chanting for spiritual awakening and healing, advocate for the rights of animals, children, and all beings, and more.

I had the privilege of doing copy editing for his book, Song of the Soul: The Namokar Mantra (1987); of bringing one of my daughters, aged 7 at the time, to his summer yoga camp for children at Siddhachalam, his ashram in an idyllic location in the Poconos Mountains in Blairstown, New Jersey and the world’s first Jain tirth (pilgrimage site) outside of India; of participating in many chanting and meditation sessions he led, including some involving past life regressions, astral traveling, and more; of providing him and his fellow monk, Subhag Muni, with polarity therapy sessions; of learning from him some the sacred chants of the Jain tradition that I chant in my yoga classes to this day; of applying these chants also for healing; and of envisioning future collaboration.

In April of 1994, while I was grieving the death of my mother for whom I had chanted the Jain namokar mantra during her last days on earth to soothe and support her transition beyond embodied form, I learned that Acharya Sushil Kumar had died just eight days after my mom. He was at his ashram in Delhi, felt massive chest pains, realized he was dying, and sat in a meditation position to pass with dignity and courage. In the following essay, I give a glimpse of one aspect of his multifaceted work, that of peacemaker.

It was 1987. Across the 200-foot causeway leading into the Sikhs’ Golden Temple in Amritsar walked a solitary figure clad in thin white cloths from his shoulders to ankles. His white beard and hair, sparse and flowing in the air currents, as was his monk’s garb, signaled that he was no longer a youth. In fact, he was in his early 60s. His step was resolute, and he was of solid build. His gaze through his spectacles was concentrated, reflective, directly in front of him. Covering his mouth was a square,white cloth, called a Muhapatti, distinguished him as a Jain monk.

India’s northern Punjab province, where Amritsar is located, was in a state of emergency. Once again in India’s long history of religious conflicts, the partisans of two different faiths were in bloody, at times lethal, conflict against each other. In this case, it was Sikhs versus Hindus. News of the issues and protagonists was limited and spotty in the Western media. One heard that there was a secession movement, that some Sikhs wanted to establish a state of their own in the Punjab. The Prime Minister, Rajiv Gandhi, opposed any further division into even more nations of the already fractioned Indian subcontinent. When a bus was blown up, one saw a news blurb for a few seconds and quickly forgot it or filed it away in the vague recesses of a memory bank already overloaded with blurbs of the feuds of other faraway peoples. Among the scarcely noted items was news that a group of terrorists had taken possession of the holiest of Sikh sanctuaries, the Golden Temple in Amritsar. These heavily armed terrorists sat within the temple and controlled it. They were not averse to killing if they believed that by that means they could further their cause.  People could enter the temple, but the atmosphere was dominated by fear.

Then a Jain monk walked into the terrorists’ stronghold. He came on his own initiative. His religious tradition was not directly involved in the conflict, yet he intended to help resolve it. He was protected by no bodyguard.

When only a boy of 15, as part of his initiation as a monk, he  vowed that even if he were physically attacked, he would not raise a single finger in his own defense. One saw no timidity in his erect posture or in his stride as he disappeared into the Golden Temple. His dedication was to ahimsa, nonviolence. He sought dialogue with men whom most in the world feared as terrorists. He wanted to listen to them, to understand their motivation. He sought peace among the warring. Although a monk, he had not retreated from the world. Nor had he waited to be invited as a mediator. Loving the world’s religions for the spiritually inspired guidance and values they could, at their best, offer to an ailing humanity, he took upon himself the cross of reconciliation. “I shall be putting my head many times into the lion’s mouth” he had said to some followers in America.

The Indian Prime Minister himself had set up a hotline to be in ready communication with this monk who had never touched money in his life, who had no material possessions, who returned the prize one foundation had awarded him for this peacemaking work when he saw that the violence continued. Who was he? What was the source of his courage and altruism? How did he come upon his calling? In a world rife with terrorism, with violence on the city streets, with warfare and the menace of nuclear holocaust, what was the message of this solitary man with whom a Prime Minister and separatist militants were willing to talk? What was his message about the meaning, power, and beauty of his religion’s cardinal virtue, ahimsa, nonviolence?

His name was Sushil Kumar. He was known by various titles, such as Muni, meaning monk, and Acharya, indicating that he was the leading authority of a Jain monastic order. In his case, it was the Sthanakvasi order of the Svetambara, meaning “white-clad,” monks, in contradistinction to the Digambara, meaning “sky-clad” (naked), monks. Those who were closest to him called him, reverently and affectionately, Guruji, considering him an enlightened spiritual guide on the path of self-realization. In this connection, he emphasized that, “nonviolence is the path of human perfection.”

As he was my teacher from the time we met in in the summer of 1982, and as I continue to deepen my appreciation of his teachings and the chants I learned from him in the many years that have passed between then and the time of  my rewriting this article, I shall also refer to him as Gurujii. Through his public actions on behalf of nonviolence, peace, and reconciliation throughout his career, he was an exemplary teacher of spiritual wisdom and its relevance to large-scale human issues.

On May 6, 1987, for the first time in three years, the heavily armed Indian Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) withdrew temporarily from their sandbag pickets surrounding the Golden Temple.1 This retreat of forces, which surprised the Indian public, was repeated on the next two days. In all three instances, the absence of the guns-at-the-ready government troops coincided with Guruji’s visits to the temple. This, in fact, was a precondition to his meetings with Professor Darshan Singh Ragi, the one Sikh religious authority who seemed to be accepted by all the militant groups. From the evidence, Guruji commanded an unusual respect and inspired a willingness on the part of all contending parties to talk with him and, perhaps more importantly, with one another. After their meetings, Darshan Singh Ragi commented about Guruji, “He is not simply a messenger of the Centre (i.e. the central government), like a postman. He has authority. For the first time Delhi is talking to us.”2 Even the most violent of militant leaders were invited to the Temple during Guruji’s visits. An example was Avatar Singh Brahma, chief of the Khalistan Liberation Force, whom the police had been desperately trying to capture.

Earlier in the 20th century, the Jewish philosopher Martin Buber had observed that one of the greatest obstacles to peace on earth was the unwillingness of people of different opinions and world-views to engage with one another in open and honest dialogue. Guruji’s peace initiative in the Punjab showed that such dialogue was a realistic possibility, not a utopian fantasy. In this instance, an avowed apostle of nonviolence met with actively engaged militants and involved a government that had been closed to any dialogue with its separatist opponents. While the final word on the contentious issue had not been spoken, while violence sadly continued from both government soldiers and terrorists, a new factor had been introduced into the situation, and its hidden potency was yet to be revealed. Guruji’s faith in the actual power of nonviolence, not only its rightness, was unshakeable.

Guruji came back to America in late June of 1987 to fulfill a commitment. He had come to Blairstown, New Jersey to preside over the tenth annual children’s camp in America sponsored by one of the organizations he had created, the International Mahavir Jain Mission (IMJM). The camp occurred at the lovely 108-acre rural retreat center, Siddhachalam, that was the headquarters of the IMJM and was founded by Guruji. The campers, mostly children of Jain families from India residing in north America, received daily instruction from Guruji, as well as guidance in prayers, meditation, yoga, and chanting. My 7-year-old daughter, Améla, was one of the campers, and in addition to participating in many camp functions, I was also doing copy editing on the manuscript of Gurji’s forthcoming book, The Song of the Soul: The Namokar Mantra, to be published later that year.

The theme of Guruji’s first lecture at the camp was nonviolence. He encouraged the children to ask questions. A 10-year-old queried, “Why did you talk with terrorists?” His answer left no doubt as to his motivation. Guruji responded,

“What is our main principle? Nonviolence! If there is violence anywhere, we need to go there and change it to nonviolence. If someone is angry and wants to make peace, then where does he go? He approaches the angry person. If someone is sick, then where does the doctor go? How does it help society if I speak in church to religious people who already share my belief? I need to go near the violent person.”

He went on to inform the children of a tragic occurrence in New Delhi where a large gathering were celebrating a child’s birthday. Terrorists suddenly shot with machine guns into the crowd randomly, killing many people, with the sole aim of instilling fear into the hearts and minds of the entire city and state.

When I interviewed Guruji, I asked him the converse question to the boy’s. “Why were the terrorists willing to talk with you, Guruji?” He responded,

“Whereas they do not trust the government or other people, they trust me. They know me and that I am so honest in my objective. I have no kind of selfish motive. As a Jain monk, who cannot even harm an insect, it is not possible for me to do any of them any harm. They know that nonviolence is my specialty. They feel that I have so much love for them. Yes, they are killing innocent people, and I feel very bad about this. No doubt! My heart is weeping and crying. Still I need to listen to them and understand them.”

An astute observer, Guruji commented on the impression made on him by the terrorists he had met.
“I did not see the light of human life on the faces of the terrorists. They were afraid. Their eyes were very dry and dull. Their faces were full of fear. They looked about everywhere with suspicion.”

As he narrated this to the children at the Arhum Yoga Camp, his listeners were attentive.
“But we were peaceful. They had a lot of weapons. We had no weapons. Nonviolence is life. Violence is death.”

While Guruji’s approach with the children at the camp in New Jersey was to extol the virtues of nonviolence, he had not simply walked into the terrorists’ midst and preached to them. To the contrary, he listened. In fact, it was his conviction that there cannot be terrorism in the world if there were not some factual grievances of a severe nature that needed attending to by the authorities. In the Punjab, he saw the scarcity of land and the lack of jobs, especially for the youth, as substantial issues. Traditionally, many Sikhs of the Punjab had found jobs in the Indian army. However, the government had established a quota system so that then only 1 to 3 percent of the army personnel could be Sikhs. Although he was a monk who had, some 45 years earlier, renounced any worldly aspirations to power, wealth, and pleasure, Guruji spoke in practical terms about the economic and political realities of the Punjab. One newspaper reporter had asked him, “Don’t you think you will be taken for a ride by politicians?” His response affirmed the integrity of his purpose that could not be corrupted:

“Anybody can misuse anybody. I am willing to sacrifice everything to bring about peace in Punjab. I am not bothered about what others do. My aim and ambition is to teach brotherhood to mankind.”3

The same interviewer asked him, “Why should you as a religious preacher involve yourself in political matters?” Guruji made clear that in doing so he was adhering closely to the tradition to which he had devoted his life:

“The duty of a Jain monk is not only to preach religion but to spread peace. When Mahavir Jain was asked this question, he did not say preach Jainism., but he said, ‘Go from village to village and maintain peace among mankind.’”4

This same purpose to promote peace among humanity led Guruji to break a millennial tradition that had prohibited Jain monks from traveling by any means other than by foot. This had been one of the factors that had kept the religion confined to a small minority in India. In 1975, Guruji walked 25 miles from a Jain monastery to an airport in Delhi where thousands of supporters awaited to send him off to the West as, in recent centuries, the first Jain monk to bring  abroad the message of this spiritual tradition. He felt that the teachings of the Arihants, the enlightened ones of the nonviolent path, could not be selfishly confined to the relatively small community that had safeguarded it over the long periods of time it has existed. So, he reached out to a wider world with the Jain faith. In so doing, he did not ask anyone to convert to the religion. In fact, he stated his belief that Jainism was the only religion with no formal method of conversion.

“Any Christian, Muslim, Hindu, or Buddhist can also be a Jain, as long as he or she has total faith in nonviolence. This belief can fit into any culture or religion. It is a matter of a change of heart, to awaken mercy and feel oneness with all living beings.”5

Since the Jains had not been immune to division and sectarianism, Guruji organized three International Jain Conferences and one Indo-American Jain Conference with the sole aim of promoting unity. He appealed to Jains everywhere,

“We are the children of the Arihantas. We are soldiers of nonviolence and peace. We must unite...Each individual must make efforts to spread the teachings of nonviolence.”6

Guruji’s efforts to bring about more peace and unity among religious people were consistent and untiring over many years. His work in the Punjab was one more chapter in an amazing story. Another organization that Guruji had founded was the World Fellowship of Religions (WFR). In a series of conferences sponsored by this organization, religious leaders of diverse faiths met together to discover beyond their differences, their underlying oneness. “All religions have some truth; no religion has all truth,” Guruji had stated.7 The first WFR conference was in 1957, and Indian Prime Minister Nehru, at first hostile to the idea, not only responded favorably to Guruji’s personal appeal, but even offered the Red Fort in Delhi as the location for the event. This was the first time in Indian history that this location had been the venue for a non-governmental function.

The foregoing does not imply that Guruji was blind to the shadow side of religions. To the contrary, he was alert to this since personally witnessing atrocities in 1947 when Hindus and Muslims viciously rampaged against one another in the upheaval attendant upon the partition, on religious grounds, of Pakistan and India. In statements to the press, Guruji was adamant that, “Fundamentalism in the name of any religion is the main enemy of mankind.”8

At the children’s yoga camp in New Jersey, Guruji said that the defining characteristic of fundamentalists is the inability to think. Since he believed that religions could bring much help to humanity, Guruji saw their distortion in fundamentalism as a severe threat to the fate and wellbeing of humans.

As a Jain monk, Guruji benefitted from a long tradition of subtle philosophy in support of nonviolence. A key concept of Jain epistemology is anekantavada, or relative pluralism with regard to truth. Guruj reflected,  “Anekantavada means that truth is vast and many-faceted. No one angle of vision offers a view of the whole of truth. So we need to embrace truth in all its varied expressions.” Anekantavada is nonviolence in the realm of thought. If only fundamentalists could exercise the latent capacity for thinking and practice dialogue with an openness to listen to people of different persuasions, they would possibly experience the validity of anekantavada and be less motivated to eliminate divergent opinions along with the people who hold them. At a gathering held to honor Guruji in the spring of 1987, in the presence of the Indian President, Mr. Zail Singh and many academic notables, Guruji pledged that the Arhat Sangh, the religious order he had founded in 1979, would work against the forces of fundamentalism and disruption. 

Guruji’s work for peace in the Punjab received prominent attention in the Indian press but was scarcely noticed in the media of other nations. Unfortunately, quiet work for nonviolence was not then, and still is not, recognized by most reporters and editors as among the most newsworthy stories unfolding on the planet, where we are all ultimately threatened by the excesses of violence to which terrorists, criminals, and governments alike resort.

Guruji did not hesitate to criticize the government’s violence in India either: “You cannot end violence with more violence. The Sikhs have some legitimate grievances, and we should try to assuage their hurt feelings.”9 His meetings with Professor Darshan Singh Ragi led to the issuance of a four-point plan for peace in the region that involved, among other things, “The release of all innocent prisoners, including Hindus, rehabilitation of army deserters, withdrawal of the CRPF from the state, and the dropping of all court cases against the underground youth.”10 In the same news article, Guruji described his intervention as “a new initiative to solve problems nonviolently,” and indicated that he has been actively involved in the Punjab crisis since 1983.

Once again evincing an unblinking realism about the complexities of the political situation in the Punjab, Guruji recognized, “These are not merely communal riots but a systemic and planned effort and conspiracy against the nation.”11 He was well aware of foreign interests in the domestic unrest in India. Even when he traveled outside his homeland and devoted himself to spiritual counsel and guidance, he still met with people who might exercise some influence on the side of peace and mutual tolerance. Thus, he posed his “new experiment” as a model and alternative to a very old and dismally failed approach: “The blood-for-blood approach has been tried a lot. It has only created rebellion. Why can’t we stop this? What is the benefit of trying these experiments again and again? Why can’t we turn to ahimsa (nonviolence)?”12

Guruji’s work in the Punjab, with the World Fellowship of Religions, the Arhat Sangh, and the International Mahavir Jain Mission, as well as his mentorship of spiritual disciples whom he guided more personally, had already made an impressive career at the time of my writing the first draft of this essay. By then, Guruji was 62 years old, an age when many people retired to pursue  personal pleasures. By contrast, Guruji, who had renounced the world at the age of 15 in becoming a Jain monk, still had much work to do and was planning initiatives on a much larger scale. He announced this in June, 1987. Devotees had been planning to celebrate his birthday that year. He asked them to cancel such festivities all over the world and instead to observe June 21 as Ahimsa Divas (Nonviolence Day). As reported in the press, “The Jain saint said that the best way to know and understand the sin of violence and killing was to meet and listen to the sorrow and grief of the families of the victims of violence.”13 This is something he has unsparingly done himself. He told me personally of one widow with four daughters whom he had met and listened to. Not only had terrorists killed the innocent father of this family, but they had traumatically disrupted safety and security in the family, the very basis for raising children and perpetuating social life.

In response to all he had witnessed, Guruji said,

“he planned to undertake a worldwide tour to persuade the non-governmental agencies (NGOs) and religious and spiritual leaders to support the movement by declaring 1988 the international year of nonviolence in which national, state, and city-level committees should deliberate, devise and implement steps to combat the curse of violence in all its dimensions and try to eradicate the seeds which sprout violence of all sorts, including fundamentalism, communalism, racialism, militarism, state terrorism and the nuclear race.”14

Guruji was hoping that the nonviolent resolution of the Punjab problem would not only bring peace to the fear-stricken and beleaguered residents of that region, but would also be an example for reconciliation in other parts of the world. When he went on his worldwide tour, he endeavored to establish an international network for nonviolence by 1988. He further envisioned a University of Ahimsa to be created near the United Nations headquarters in New York City. Ever the progressive visionary, five years later, in 1992, he embraced the ecological dimension of nonviolence and founded the World Movement of Nonviolence for Peace and Environment in conjunction with his participation in the Sacred Earth Gathering at Rio de Janeiro that year.

On Ahimsa Day in 1987, Guruji urged his followers to “pray for peace and solace to the bereaved families of the violence victims.”15 Even when working organizationally, Guruji did not lose sight of the human person and of those warm, interpersonal relations that support individuals and are the focus and sustenance of most people’s lives. Although a spiritual renunciate, Guruji embraced all humans as his family. While his main efforts were in this domain, they did not stop there as he labored prodigiously for the rights and protection of animals also.

To set the theme of Ahimsa Day, the World Fellowship of Religions issued a series of slogans:

•“If violence lives, mankind will die; let mankind live.

•Life is a gift of God; no man has the right to take it.

•He who kills commits a crime against God.

•He who kills has no religion.

Guruji’s message for the occasion highlighted his affirmation that, “The path of ahimsa is emerging as the only effective counter to the atom bomb.” This message is relevant to this day for all people who wish for life on earth to continue with dignity, hope, and joy, as for those who have taken to heart the grief of the innumerable victims of violence and their loved ones.

He further stated,

“Like wars, violence, hatred, and prejudice are born in the hearts of men and women. Violence of thought and word leads to violence of action and death and destruction. Let us first banish violence, suspicion, fear, prejudice, and hatred from our hearts and learn to love and respect life. Let us pray for nonviolence and peace, the only way for troubled mankind. Do not even hate the killers; pity them, for God has forsaken them and destroyed their souls. Let us pray that God rescues them  from the spiritual pollution which material greed, individual and collective egoism, communalism and lust for power have plunged them into. The greatest need today is to banish the scourge of violence, communalism and racialism from our land and all the lands of the world, But before we cleanse others, let us honestly and sincerely cleanse ourselves of these poisons.”

In metaphorically putting his head into the mouth of the lion of violence that is devouring our world, Guruji devoted his lifetime of service so that others, all of us, may live. In affirming nonviolence as the quintessential spiritual value, he pointed spiritual aspirants of any path in a salutary direction. May peace and nonviolence prevail on earth!

References

1.The Sunday Observer, Bombay, May 31, 1987.

2. Ibid.

3.Free Press Journal, Sunday Press, May 24, 1987.

4.Ibid.

5.Newsletter, Siddhachalam, November, 1986.

6.Ibid.

7.Ibid

8.The Patriot, New Delhi, March 30, 1987.

9.Free Press Journal, op. cit.

10. The Hindu, May 16, 1987.

11. The Hindustan Times Weekly, New Delhi, May 31, 1987.

12.Evening News. The Hindustan Times, New Delhi, May 15, 1987.

13.Times of India, June 17, 1987.

14.Ibid.

15.World Fellowship of Religions Press Release