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Ahimsa
by Swami Kriyananda
From the Ananda Course in Self-Realization

Ahimsa is a term that was popularized in our times by Mahatma Gandhi. By non-violent resistance he led India to political emancipation from Britain. But alas, he was not able to teach the Indian people the deeper implications of this teaching. It is seen by most people even today as the last hope of the underdog. Yet ahimsa, rightly understood, is the Ultimate Weapon of a strong man; it turns one's enemy into a friend, thereby banishing the possibility of further conflict.

In the practice of yoga, it is important to understand that the life flowing in our veins is the same life which flows in the veins of all creatures. All of us are expressions of God, in the same way (to use a favorite illustration of my guru's) that the individual jets on a gas burner, though appearing separate from one another, are only manifestations of the unifying gas underneath. If I hurt you, I am in a real sense hurting myself. The saying of Jesus, "Love thy neighbor as thyself," means, in a deeper sense, "Love thy neighbor; he is thy Self.

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