Goodwill Tolerance and Brotherhood are the three pillars of a peaceful society

In the winters of January, 1945 as the soviet troops advanced the gates of an old looking dilapidated building, they never would have imagined what they were about to see. Rooms full of shoes, clothes & other personnel belongings and lastly, a central hall filled with undernourished walking corpse – the man, women & children alike – those were the gens, some 9000 add at the infamous Nazi Auschwitz death camp of Poland; and thus laid bane the evils of holocaust and a tumultuous German society.

But what made the Germans kill in scores their own countrymen – living in the same society as they did? It was the demonian of the three pillars on which laid a peaceful society -goodwill, tolerance & brotherhood.

But what are these three pillars and why are they so important? So important that they help sustain a harmonious society. Let’s ponder.

“Goodwill” can be defined as the value of seeing good qualities in others, value of imagining & believing good in others; inherent belief that two people always think positively of each other.

Tolerance, the second pillar is the ability to adjust & compromise for summon bonnum, i.e., the chief good, for both individual & society; the ability to ignore some things for the sake of larger things.

Of Brotherhood, the 3^rd pillar, the tripod is the feeling of fraternity, that all humans are brothers to each other so that just like we care & protect for our real blood brothers, we care & protect for mutual benefit of all Indian or all citizens in the society.

All three together form a holy Trinity over which a strong society rests. All are inter – dependent & inter – connected.

All peaceful societies, esp. the Indian society have for long been peaceful & harmonious due to synthesis of these cure values in our moral philosophies of Vasudev Kutumbakam & Atithi devo Bhava

Since time immemorial, when humans from Homo erectus to modern sapiens realized the collective benefits of living together in a society, there have existed these three pillars to sustain minimal co-operation & man good During the Neolithic times as Margaret mead points out, caring & brotherhood was the first signs of emergence of culture in a society that was peaceful. The evidences from shanidar cave of Iron prove the fact where a Meander that man fossil was found with wounds healed. Anthropologist theorized that society must have been peaceful due to this sign of brotherhood & goodwill among early humans.

Not only that, as we observe in the Indus Valley civilization which lasted almost a millennium, the reasons for almost a millennium, the reasons for such a long & prosperous society must have been these values when various diverse groups lived together with tolerance for each other belief system as observed from the pantheon of deities discovered by archaeologists since the 1920’s.

As we more down in time in the Vedic society, we found instance of violence & distrust in the society was due to absence of one of the three pillars. The Mahabharata war was fought between brothers when the pillar of brotherhood & goodwill were destroyed. When the Kauravas could not tolerate their brother pandavas becoming the kings. End result was a distraught mankind leading to thousands of casualties.

Times changed & societies changed, cultures changes but these three values have remained sin aqua non for a peaceful society.

But why humans lose these values? The answer lies in the human greed and culture of materialism, when tangible things become more important to satisfy camel greed than value system.

Even during the medieval times, the various revolts & violence & blood – step that happened in the name of religion or culture were results of lowing intolerance. The decline of Mughal empire could be attributed to the discontent in society due to policy of  revenue of Aurangzeb for other religions as contrary with policy of sulh – i -kul of Akbar when all lived in Harmony.

Revolts like French & Roman or American Revolution were the result of loss of goodwill, brotherhood and the ruled & the results see all know lead to a new global order.

Even today in modern times, with advent of consumerism, materialism, greed, intolerance have been increasing. With the advent of social media rhetoric as means for polarization, the feeling of brotherhood & goodwill getting lost in oblivion. The recent Mujaffarnagar riots, eycyanat riots, man condos & genocide of Rohingya in Myanmar, social  attacks like that of George Floyd in America can all be attributed to  these three pillars.

And not only this, the environmental destruction that we are threatened with today is also result of our intolerance to accept that wild animals and plants also have a right to peaceful co – existence with humans. The indiscriminate killing of fauna, unsustainable dulling mother earth for resources has led to various catastrophes that have disturbed our societal peace.

Pandemic like recent covid is a result of our intolerance for animal life. Even further, the covid induce discrimination where in cases as in upper caste covid patents refusing food cooked by dalit Cookes are result of growing intolerance & declining good will and brotherhood feelings. The long arduous journey of migrants on foot back home in the heat of June, July and our apathy towards them are a result of loss of brotherhood & sense of fraternity & so are the crimes against women

All these incidents do make us realize that how important is the trinity of these three values. head us and thinkers all around the would have emphasized on importance of these values.

Aristotle said. “Man is a social animal”. All the away, his philosophy has been based on the basic premise that man is inherently good against locks idea of man as selfish being. Aristotle stressed the peaceful Athenian society is due to man’s good native that encompassed the feeling of tolerance, brotherhood & goodwill even in India, philosopher like Buddha, Mahavira, have emphasized on these virtues for peaceful society. The “Madhyam Marg” of Buddha and the “Triratna” of Jainism are the manifestation of these ideas.

Jesus Christ always preached his entire life – “Tolerance & compassion lead to development of brotherhood among mankind. Voltaire said, “I may not agree with what you say but I will defend up till my death, your right to say it” exhibited the lightest level of tolerance as also manifested in our constitutional Right to freedom of speech in Art – 19.

Gandhi was the prophet of ideas of Hindu – Muslim brotherhood societal goodwill and religious tolerance as embodied in his philosophy of Vaishnav, jan and sarv dharma sambhav. He showed how these values he utilized to create man mobilization for India’s freedom struggle and via a peaceful society, he won independence for India along with several others who believed in inherent goodness of men.

However, we see that today, the pillars of modern peaceful society are crumbling under the weights of hatred, greed, communal politics poisoning our society, bigotry, chauvinism, materialism & consumerism that have made survival a zero sum game. As would becomes smaller, meaner and narrower (Shiv Shankar Menon), what is needed is to revive these pillars & strengthen them via mutual co-operation & not suspicion. As Gandhi said, that would have for everybody’s need; they should be no place for hatred &intolerance. We need to imbibe a philosophy of our ancient civilization that taught us to think of other before ourselves. We need to tackle & deal with those unruly elements that break fabric of social cohesion & preach love, brotherhood & tolerance or else, what happened to the Jews in Auschwitz could happen to another community today. Let’s all try not repeat what can be easily prevented. Lets spread love, not hate & more towards this would & our society a beautiful place..