“An eye for an eye only ends up making the whole world blind.”
Gandhi said this when he was discussing with the other Indian leaders about how to respond to the British. Most of the Indians wanted to strike back at them, but Gandhi knew that this would not work. This is very true since when an Indian mob attack a small police force and behead one of them, it creates a chaotic mess. However, when Indians marched nonviolently against the British as a whole, they were successful. The very next day, the British decided to engage in meetings with Gandhi to discuss independence. I think that the main point that Gandhi was trying to support in saying this was that at one point, one side has to stop the cycle of revenge and violence, and in this case, it was the Indians. It sort of reminds me of a kindergarten argument between two kids. If one hits the other, then they would argue about things like "but he started it!" and other unimportant and immature details. However, the fact that this sort of behavior can be compared with the masses of entire countries shows how futile their fight was until Gandhi finally arrived.
"I am a Muslim, and a Hindu, and a Christian and a Jew; and so are you."
For a Hindu, this could be interpreted in a literal sense. When Gandhi stopped the car to say this to a crowd, he meant that all religions were a way to understand a single face of the whole Brahman, which means that all of them can be included in the vast net of Hinduism. However, for non-Hindus, this could be true as well. In the beginning, Gandhi told his friend that a preacher he knew would not exactly distinguish between which holy book he would read from when speaking. It was as if the religious barriers did not really matter as long as you were worshipping God and being true to His word; which is, essentially in every book, to live a good life. So, it shows that the religious blockades shouldn't necessarily create whole divides within a single society.
The insight that I gained after learning more about Hinduism was that I could probably be defined as one. I didn't realize this before since I knew nothing about it. I believe that there could be higher powers than us in the universe but don't actually know what they are. I guess in a way, I am searching for Brahman as well. I realize that this affects me in a spiritual way since I am trying to understand something that can not be fully understood; but the process itself is what defines me as a religious person. I also realized that we shouldn't be bound to one religion so much in the sense that we come to deny all other aspects. I think that's the beauty of Hinduism. It doesn't really matter what you believe in as long as it is towards the path of your own way of interpreting Brahman. So, acceptance of others comes hand in hand with this. I'm not saying Hinduism is superior or that any one religion is inferior to another. However, the main weakness of other religions is intolerance for one another, but Hinduism so aptly corrects this and which such a simple theory as well. If the only religion to exist had been Hinduism, I'm sure that at least 99% of the past wars could have been evaded. The main root of mass violence was violence and the conquest of others through the excuse that it was for religion. With Hinduism, many of these issues could have been evaded.
