God Is Love ; God is Truth and Truth is God!!!!!!!!! part 1

[Guest guest]

Truth and God

 

Mahatma Gandhi

 

You have asked me why I consider that God is Truth. In my early youth

I was taught to repeat what in Hindu scriptures are known as one

thousand names of God. But these one thousand names of God were by no

means exhaustive. We believe - and I think it is the truth - that God

has as many names as there are creatures, and, therefore, we also say

that God is nameless and since God has many forms we also onsider Him

formless, and since He speaks to us through many tongues we consider

Him to be speechless and so on. And so when I came to study Islam I

found that Islam too had many names for God. I would say with those

who say *God is Love, God is Love. *

 

But deep down in me I used to say that though *God may be Love, God

is Truth*, above all. If it is possible for the human tongue to give

the fullest description of God, I have come to the conclusion that for

myself, *God is Truth. *But two years ago I went a step further and

said that *Truth is God.* You will see the the fine distinction

between the two statements, viz., that God is Truth and Truth is God.

 

And I came to that conclusion after a continuous and relentless

search after Truth which began nearly fifty years ago. I then found

that the nearest approach to Truth was through love. But I also found

that love has many meanings in the English language at least and that

human love in the sense of passion could become a degrading thing

also. I found too that love in the sense of ahimsa had only a

limited number of votaries in the world. But I never found a double

meaning in connection with Truth and not even atheists had demurred

to the necessity or power of truth.

 

But in their passion for discovering truth the atheists have not

hesitated to deny the very existence of God - from their own point of

view, rightly. And it was because of this reasoning that I saw that

rather than say that God is Truth I should say that Truth is God. I

recall the name of Charles Bradlaugh who delighted to call himself an

atheist, but knowing as I do something of him, I would never regard

him as an atheist. I would call him a God-fearing man, though I know

that he would reject the claim. His face would redden if I would

say, "Mr. Bradlaugh, you are a truth-fearing man, and not a God-

fearing man." I automatically disarm his criticism by saying that

Truth is God, as I have disarmed the criticisms of many a young man.

 

Add to this the great difficulty that millions have taken the name of

God and in His name committed nameless atrocities. Not that

scientists very often do not commit cruelties in the name of truth. I

know how in the name of truth and science inhuman cruelties are

perpetrated on animals when men perform vivisection. There

are thus a number of difficulties in the way, no matter how you

describe God. But the human mind is a limited thing, and you have to

labour under limitations when you think of being or entity who is

beyond the power of man to grasp.

 

And then we have another thing in Hindu philosophy, viz., God alone

is and nothing else exists. In fact the Sanskrit word for Truth is a

word which literally means that which exists - Sat. For these and

several other reasons that I can give you I have come to the

conclusion that the definition - Truth is God - gives me the greatest

satisfaction. And when you want to find Truth as God the only

inevitable means is Love, ie., non-violence, and since I belive that

ultimately the means and end are convertible terms, I should not

hesitate to say that *God is Love.*

 

Happy Easter !