The best performers the world has ever seen are those who start on themselves (George Bernard Shaw). Discuss
There is more truth in the statement than what appears on the surface. When reformers are mentioned very often the names or pictures of social reformers come first to vision readily. But the pictures must include the great religious reformers as well.
These reformers had visions themselves before they could pass them on to society. They thought and worked out the reforms and preached them without fear or favor. They had a lot of suffering in the form of ostracism, privations, and physical attacks. Still, we could see they themselves were the schools where they practiced the reforms. The tremendous success of those reforms which they conceived and gave birth to is even in usage today.
Let us take a few examples. We can start with the Buddha.. He was born a prince and was brought up as a prince. But when he chanced to see the sufferings of life his heart melted with compassion. He relinquished his wife and child and went in search of `knowledge’. He found the truth and hence he became the ‘Buddha’. He preached what he himself had lived through and thus a great part of the then known world came under the influence of Buddhism. The languages and climates were not a bar to the spread of Buddhism.
The next picture which comes to our mind is that of Lord Jesus Christ. He preached love, good neighborliness, service to the poor and the diseased, and finally his surrender and the forgiveness he gave to mankind. The Roman Government sentenced him to die for preaching. The personal example of Jesus is worthy of note.
Think of Mahatma Gandi as the modem apostle of non-violence, though he himself had admitted that he was greatly influenced by Jesus Christ. An important weapon in his repertoire was Satyagraha or civil resistance. He learnt its importance while he was in South Africa. He suffered a lot form the hands of the Whites there but he put up with them very gallantly and upheld the standard of nonviolence. Even Smuts was converted to his way of thinking later on. When Gandhiji returned to India he used the some weapon of non-violence and Satyagraha against the British and was able to see that India got independence. The greatest thing in India was to uplift the untouchables. He gave them o noble name and called them the ‘Harijans’. He proved himself what o great reformer he was. To the lost, he stood for the Hindu-Muslim unity which cost him his life just like Jesus Christ.
Martin Luther King, the Great American Block leader was influenced very much by the teaching of Gandhi and he practiced non-violence against the Whites. He was able to open the eyes of the American Government and like Gandhi, he was tragically murdered. His mortal person may not be there but what he did for the American Blocks will stand forever. What Martin Luther King did in our own times was attempted by Abraham Lincoln a century earlier.
Turning to social reformers, Florence Nightingale or “The Lady With The Lamp” as she was popularly called, may he mentioned. During the Crimean war, she did o great lot to lessen the sufferings of the soldiers at Scutari. Quite rightly she is recognized as the mother of modem nursing.
Then the name of Dr. Schweitzer comes to the mind. He went to the heart of Africa and started his hospital for the Africans at Lamberene. It was the gargantuan task which would have broken even the bravest heart. But the great doctor looked upon it as a life’s mission for him because life was so sacred.
There had been o number of fewer worthies but they too had spent their lives for the sake of reforms.
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