PEACE IN HINDUISM

PEACE IN DIFFERENT RELIGIONS ~ 115 ~ Toynbee, has called this a ‘live and let live’ concept of peace. That is, we should give peace to others and in exchange receive peace from them. It was 2500 years after the establishment of Hinduism that Mahavir was born in a Hindu family in India. He laid down five principles of religion, and although the term ‘non-violence’ probably did not exist at that time in the ancient Hindu scriptures, the first and most important of these principles was ahimsa, which means non-injury. According to this principle, violence and aggression of any kind are absolutely wrong. Jain belief can be summed up in these words: The killing of a sensate being is a sin. The Hindu religious leaders accepted Mahavir as their 24th avatar. In this way, the concept of ahimsa too became a part of Hinduism. In the 20th century too, there is the great example of Mahatma Gandhi, a Hindu reformer of world repute, who interpreted the Bhagwad Gita in the light of the principle of non-violence, and launched a full-fledged freedom movement entirely committed to this principle. The Encyclopaedia Britannica (1984) explains the degree