Let’s start with an invocation

ॐ द्यौ: शान्ति रन्तरिक्षँ शान्ति:
पृथिवी शान्ति राप: शान्तिरोषधय: शान्ति:।
वनस्पतय: शान्ति र्विश्वे देवा: शान्ति र्ब्रह्म शान्ति:
सर्वँ शान्ति: शान्तिरेव शान्ति: सा मा शान्तिरेधि॥
ॐ शान्ति: शान्ति: शान्ति:॥
=यजुर्वेद ३६:१७

Aum dyauḥ śāntirantarikṣaṁ śāntiḥ
pṛthivī śāntirāpaḥ śāntiroṣadhayaḥ śāntiḥ
vanaspatayaḥ śāntirviśvedevāḥ śāntirbrahma śāntiḥ
sarvaṁ śāntiḥ śāntireva śāntiḥ
sā mā śāntiredhi
Aum śāntiḥ, śāntiḥ, śāntiḥ
=Yajurveda 36:17

May there be peace in this realm and in the universe
May there be peace all over this earth and in water

May there be peace in herbs and vegetation

May there be peace with gods and brahma
May there be peace everywhere.
And may there always exist peace and only peace.
Aum peace, peace and peace!

This is a beautiful invocation is from Yajurveda.  It expresses the deepest desire that we all carry within us.  We want a sense of peace and harmony all around us.  Such a desire is universal and eternal.  Violence is the opposite of peace.

The deep desire for peace led all religions to command us to not commit violence against each other.  Violence begets violence.  Hinduism even stopped us from committing violence against our household animals. They linked vegetarianism to our religion.  We go further and say that we must protect vegetation and trees.  In Jainism, the most common mantra is “ahimsa parmo dharma”.  Non-violence is the highest religion. Jain munis walk barefoot and are careful not to step on any insects in their way.  Some leaders even forbid farming as it may kill worms who live beneath the surface soil.  There is even a shloka in Veda which prays that we use earth in a way that we do not hurt it.

In yoga sutra, Patanjali laid out a eight step process to achieve liberation.  The first step is the external discipline or “Yama” .  The five Yama are–Ahimsa (non-violence), satya(truthfulness), asteya(non-stealing), brahmacharya(celibacy/proper conduct), aparigraha(not being acquisitive).  So the first part of the first step to liberation is listed as ahimsa or nonviolence.  

All of this religious training and concepts deeply imbed the concept of non-violence in our psyche.  

Also in the last century we have celebrated the success of Mahatma Gandhi, Mandela and Martin Luther King Jr.   All these people resisted major injustice and brought about political change without using any violence.  Also, the modern political thought treats all people as equal.  As famously enshrined in the American Declaration of Independence–preservation of life, liberty and pursuit of happiness is a fundamental right for all of us.  Certainly life and liberty of all humans is accepted as an equal right for everyone in most societies.  Even free speech is protected in the constitution. people should be able to do and say what they want and that we must accept it as their fundamental right.

This is the political context in which we believe that violence is not to be used in our political and social sphere.

So does our religious and political belief lead us to a conclusion that under no circumstance should we use violence. And that people have a fundamental right to say and do what they want. Is it an absolute right?  What are the limits to this right?  And if some limit is crossed, can we use violence to prevent others from crossing that limit?

Let’s say that you are a policeman.  And while on your daily patrol you see a person with an AK-47, he starts shooting randomly into a crowd of people and kills a few people.  You draw out your gun and shoot down the terrorist. Would your killing this terrorist be an act of violence or nonviolence.  If you think of the violence that you stopped and realize that it is greater than the violence you committed then, then it is really an act of nonviolence.

So it is easy to see the dharmic nature of violent acts done by police and army while protecting the broader population and reducing overall violence.  But what about a common person.

Let’s say that there is no policeman there.  One person who is sitting in her car is witnessing this horrible massacre.  She has the opportunity to hit the person with her car and stop the killing. Should she do it? Of course, she would save so many innocent lives.  So any person can and should commit the smaller violence to prevent the much larger violence.  This is easy to see in case that there is immediate danger to other people’s life, the violence in defense can be justified to stop a violent act.

Now let us go deeper into situations which are not as black and white.  Situations where there is no immediate danger to someone’s life.  We hear so many of these cases, people beat up other people because they suspect them of eating a particular food.  Or someone is not willing to shout a slogan in praise of the country.  Or someone may stone a person suspected of disrespecting a book or religion.  Or a person is shot dead because as a doctor they performed an abortion.  What of these situations?

The argument that people make is that the hurt such actions cause to the sentiments of millions of people justifies the violence against the person who does such actions.  

Actions like burning sacred objects like books, images, flags can hurt. Certainly when we get into issues like abortion even boundary of living beings are tested.  That much is true.  Words can hurt.  Non-violent actions can also hurt.  Just because no direct bodily harm is being done, does not mean that no violence is being committed.

The second part of the justification is that since the actions were causing hurt, violence was necessary to stop it.  This is where the problem is.  Let us take a simpler example.  Let us say that someone bumps your car on the highway and it causes damage to the car.  You are also shaken up.  So hurt was caused to you.  Does that mean that you can kill the other person.  No.  There are laws to deal with the any such where the violence is committed against one person by another person.  

We can easily see this in non-religious situations, like a car accident.  When it comes to religious topics, we are not willing to accept the rule of law. How can any situation between two groups be ever solved unless they share a common code of behavior?

Every society comes up with laws and rules to deal with all such situations.  And where laws are present, any such actions which hurts the religious sentiments of the masses, should only be dealt with according to the law of the land.  For example, cow slaughter is prohibited in the Indian constitution in its article 48.  24 out of 29 states in the country have laws on the statute to prevent cow slaughter.  However, there is no law against slaughter of water buffalo and almost all of the beef available in India is from water buffalo.  So if someone is suspected of killing a cow they should dealt with under the law.  Taking the law in your own hands in such a case would  not be justified.  Similarly, most countries have laws against hurting religious sentiments of people.  If someone burns a book or draws a cartoon which is offensive, it should be dealt with under the law of the land.  As these acts do not pose a direct immediate threat to anyone’s life.

You may say that law is man made and religious beliefs are divine revelations.  Some people assert that living according to their religious belief is there fundamental right.  That is true.  But not if their religious beliefs violate fundamental rights of other people.  Then it is no longer a right without boundaries.  Most countries have multiple religions.  Which divine revelation is the ultimate truth.  Sometimes the books are contradictory and sometimes the same book is contradictory in different places.  Certainly the interpretation of faith based systems can be contradictory.  Without a framework in which all impacted citizens can agree on the right way to proceed, there can be no lasting peace.  Even in Hinduism, sacrificing a buffalo and eating its meat is mentioned in Vedas.  As a Vaishnav vegetarian, how would you resolve this debate against a Hindu from Bengal or Kerala.  Modern constitutions and legal frameworks above the religious decrees are such a framework.  They are formed by taking into consideration the current will of the people in the current situations.  Will of all the people, not just of one religion, or one group.  

So to dole out vigilante justice when there are existing laws to deal with the situation is not dharmic.

So let’s go one step further.  What if there is no law which prevents an action which a group feels hurtful.  Example is the Charlie Hebdo cartoon of Prophet Mohammed.  There is no law preventing the magazine from publishing the cartoon.  Muslims believe that any representation of the Prophet is wrong.  The French magazine believed that humor is a good way of looking at social and political issues.  They were an equal opportunity offender of many sacred cows (pun intended).  Since there is no law preventing the publication, is violence justified in such cases?

Not really, there were other steps possible, like working to reintroduce blasphemy laws into the legal system.  These have been taken out from the french law at least since 1881. The last person to be hanged for blasphemy in England was hanged in 1637.  The current society in France has determined that they do not want to support blasphemy laws.  So the muslims have very little hope of changing the law.

So were they justified in using violence.  Before we answer this question, let us look at another situation.  That of jews under the Nazi germany.

Under Nuremberg Race Laws and many such laws enacted in Nazi Germany.  The killing of Jews was considered legal.  So what were the Jews and other people in the world to do?   

Gandhi gave an interview in 1946.  In the interview, he said that Jews should have willingly offered themselves to the knives of the butcher.  They should have thrown themselves from the cliffs into the sea.  His argument was that such actions would have melted the hearts of Germans and brought an end to the atrocities nonviolently.

I don’t think so.  In such a situation, violence would be justified.  If there was an armed rebellion or other violent means of overthrowing the Nazi government, it would have been totally justified.  Actually the actions of Allied forces to defeat the Nazi germany are hailed by everyone as just and morally right.

Many people also take refuge in their interpretation of Gita to justify their own violent reactions.

In Gita, chapter 4, verse 7 and 8

यदा यदा हि धर्मस्य ग्लानिर्भवति भारत ।

अभ्युत्थानमधर्मस्य तदात्मानं सृजाम्यहम् ॥४-७॥

परित्राणाय साधूनां विनाशाय च दुष्कृताम् ।

धर्मसंस्थापनार्थाय सम्भवामि युगे युगे ॥४-८॥

The verse in Roman script—

Yada yada hi dharmasya glanirbhavati bharata

Abhythanamadharmasya tadatmanam srijamyaham

Paritranaya sadhunam vinashaya cha dushkritam

Dharmasangsthapanarthay sambhavami yuge yuge

These two famous shlokas lay out the promise that whenever dharma is harmed, God herself is reborn to re-establish dharma and to destroy the ones doing the bad acts.  

This is Krishna encouraging Arjun to pick up his bow and arrows and fight the just war.  He is encouraging him to kill his own cousins, teachers and elders.  This is the height of violence. But it is in service of nonviolence. It is being pursued, when all negotiations, all exhortations have failed to change the mind of the Kauravas in doing what is just with Pandavas.

In such a situation, Krishna helped Arjuna understand that now the only dharmic next step is to go to war.  And that fighting the just war was Arjuna’s dharma.  And acting on one’s dharma without concern for the outcome is the right way to live.

So the last step is to answer is there deterioration of dharma.  And deterioration of dharma which can’t be addressed through the normal nonviolent ways.  So, it is safe to say that there are definitely limits to toleration of injustice.  

What is the difference between the killing of Jews by Nazi germany and the publication of the cartoon by a magazine.  Both were being done within the law of the land and both were greatly upsetting to a large number of people.

The difference is that in the case of Holocaust, the deterioration of dharma is clearly visible as the preservation of life itself is threatened for a large number of people.  In the case of the cartoon, there is no threat to the life or liberty of any one.  So to take the violent step of killing the cartoonist to stop them can’t be justified.

Using violence is to stop an act is like using the nuclear option.  There will be tremendous fallout and impact.  So it is to be used carefully and that to when everything else has failed.

We must apply the following step by step thinking to provocative situations

1. Is there immediate and irreversible danger to anyone’s life or liberty (not just my own)?  
2. If yes, can it be prevented by doing less overall damage? If yes, do prevent it even if it means using violence.
3. If no, then can the action be reversed or otherwise addressed through the accepted processes and laws.  If yes, push for addressing it (never accept it, this is the Gandhian way of civil disobedience or non-cooperation)
4. If there is no law, then work to help create such laws.  The reason a law does not exist is that enough people did not find the need for it. (this is also the Gandhian way)

In summary, violence can only be justified in two circumstances–in self defense or defense of other people.  Or when there is deterioration of the common order that the life and liberty of a population is at risk and nothing in the laws of the land can help you stop the threat.