Patience and the ability to give and take, were the stuff of survival in such crowded quarters. Mohan learned both, plus a special knack for tuning out what he did not want to hear.
In later years, Gandhi freely credited his mother with his religious devotion. It apparently never occurred to him that he may have owed his father for something equally as important - his instinct for practical politics and diplomacy. While officially the servant of the ruling prince, Karamchand Gandhi was really a negotiator in grievances and long-suffering subjects. .
Though poorly educated, Gandhi's father had a common-sense approach to problems that made his judgement highly valued in official circles. He had a name for absolute loyalty. After an assistant political agent for the British insulted the Rajkot prince, others sat in silence, but Karamchand stood up and reprimanded him. He was arrested immediately, but refused to apologise, thereby giving his son his first lesson in passive resistance. .
Young Gandhi spent virtually all his hours after school with his mother, who he said was "the embodiment of the traditional Hindu virtues - love, humility and self-sacrifice." He accompanied her to the temple, squatting nearby, listening as she comforted the widowed mother of the prince; helping her tend the sick, often throughout the night. He was as struck by her powers of endurance as he was awed by her spirit of willing self-denial, and she was undoubtedly his inspiration during some of the most troubled times of his adult life. .
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Ahimsa is the cornerstone in Gandhi's tactics, strategy and ethics. Ahimsa is generally translated to English as "non-violence". More accurately, the term means the absence of himsa. Himsa is a Sanskrit word indicating doing harm to others or being hateful. Thus the first layer of meaning to ahimsa involves a substantial portion of the Hindu belief system. This, in turn, broadly influences and guides other levels of social interaction.
