Mahatma Gandhi's autobiography Sathiya Sodhani is one book which guides you as to what is right and wrong. Most importantly, the author should have experienced all these. The original was in Gujarati, and was later translated into English and other Indian languages. The book is in five parts, beginning with his birth, up until the year 1921. In the last chapter he writes, "My life from this point onward has been so public that there is hardly anything about it that people do not know...."
The introduction reads, "What I want to achieve - what I have been striving and pining to achieve these thirty years - is self-realization, to see God face to face, to attain Moksha. I live and move and have my being in pursuit of this goal."
The paper back edition of the book costs Rs. 30 being subsidized by the Navajivan Trust, Ahmedabad.
Just about the time when I gave up milk and cereals, and started on the
experiment of a fruit diet, I began fasting as a means of
self-restraint. In this Mr. Kallenbach also joined me. I had been
used to fasting now and again, but for purely health reasons. That
fasting was necessary for self-restraint I learnt from a friend.
Having been born in a Vaishnava family and of a mother who was given
to keeping all sorts of hard vows, I had observed, while in India,
the Ekadashi and other fasts, but in doing so I had merely copied my mother and
sought to please my parents.
At that time I did not understand, nor
did I believe in, the efficacy of fasting. But seeing that the
friend I have mentioned was observing it with benefit, and with the
hope of supporting the brahmacharya vow, I followed his example and began keeping the
Ekadashi fast. As a rule Hindus allow themselves milk and fruit on a fasting
day, but such fast I had been keeping daily. So now I began complete
fasting, allowing myself only water.
When I started on this experiment, the Hindu month of Shravan and
the Islamic month of Ramzan happened to coincide. The Gandhis used
to observe not only the Vaishnava but also the Shaivite vows, and
visited the Shaivite as also the Vaishnava temples. Some of the
members of the family used to observe pradosha1
in the whole of the month of Shravan. I decided to do likewise.
These important experiments were undertaken while we were at Tolstoy
Farm, where Mr. Kallenbach and I were staying with a few Satyagrahi
families, including young people and children. For these last we had
a school. Among them were four or five Musalmans. I always helped
and encouraged them in keeping all their religious observances. I
took care to see that they offered their daily namaz.
There were Christians and Parsi youngsters too, whom I considered it
my duty to encourage to follow their respective religious
observances.
During this month, therefore, I persuaded the Musalman youngsters to
observe the ramzan fast. I had of course decided to observe
pradosha myself, but I now asked the Hindu, Parsi and Christian youngsters to
join me. I explained to them that it was always a good thing to join
with others in any matter of self-denial. Many of the Farm inmates
welcomed my proposal. The Hindu and the Parsi youngsters did not
copy the Musalman ones in every detail; it was not necessary.
The Musalman youngsters had to wait for their breakfast until sunset,
whereas the others did not do so, and were thus able to prepare
delicacies for the Musalman friends and serve them. Nor had the
Hindu and other youngsters to keep the Musalmans company when they
had their last meal before sunrise next morning, and of course all
except the Musalmans allowed themselves water.
The result of these experiments was that all were convinced of the
value of fasting, and a splendid esprit de corps
grew up among them.
We were all vegetarians on Tolstoy Farm, thanks, I must gratefully
confess, to the readiness of all to respect my feelings. The
Musalman youngsters must have missed their meat during ramzan,
but none of them ever let me know that they did so. They delighted
in and relished the vegetarian diet, and the Hindu youngsters often
prepared vegetarian delicacies for them, in keeping with the
simplicity of the Farm.
I have purposely digressed in the midst of this chapter on fasting,
as I could not have given these pleasant reminiscences anywhere
else, and I have indirectly described a characteristic of mine,
namely that I have always loved to have my co-workers with me in
anything that has appealed to me as being good. They were quite new
to fasting, but thanks to the pradosha and ramzan
fasts, it was easy for me to interest them in fasting as a means of
self-restraint.
Thus an atmosphere of self-restraint naturally sprang up on the
Farm. All the Farm inmates now began to join us in keeping partial
and complete fasts, which, I am sure, was entirely to the good. I
cannot definitely say how far this self-denial touched their hearts
and helped them in their striving to conquer the flesh. For my part,
however, I am convinced that I greatly benefited by it both
physically and morally. But I know that it does not necessarily
follow that fasting and similar disciplines would have the same
effect for all.
Fasting can help to curb animal passion, only if it is undertaken
with a view to self-restraint. Some of my friends have actually
found their animal passion and palate stimulated as an after-effect
of fasts. That is to say, fasting is futile unless it is accompanied
by an incessant longing for self-restraint. The famous verse from
the second chapter of the Bhagavad Gita
is worth noting in this connection:
'For a man who is fasting his senses
Outwardly, the sense-objects disappear,
Leaving the yearning behind; but when
He has seen the Highest,
Even the yearning disappears.'
Fasting and similar discipline is, therefore, one of the means to the end of self-restraint, but it is not all, and if physical fasting is not accompanied by mental fasting, it is bound to end in hypocrisy and disaster.