a simple lifestyle as he experimented with approaches that would combine
indigenous health practices with religious orientations forged by the influ-
ences of Jain non-violence, Christian ethics, and a reinterpretation of the
Bhagavadgı ̄ta ̄as the story of an internal battle wherein each one was obliged
to “wage war” with the passions and temptations within. These elements
were combined with a political strategy that sought to unite all Indians,
including Hindus and Muslims, upper castes and “outcastes” (whom Gandhi
called “harijans” or “children of God”) for the purpose of attaining political
and financial independence of India from British rule. Through fasts
and marches, identifying with highly placed and low alike, many joined
Gandhi in protesting British policy. Nonetheless, when independence finally
came in 1947, Gandhi was deeply disappointed that the country was divided
into two nations – India and Pakistan – and that his call for village-based
economics and simple lifestyle went largely unheeded.^53
Another significant figure during this period was Rabindranath Tagore
(1861–1941). The fourteenth child of Debindranath Tagore, Rabindranath
did not need to earn his own livelihood, so had time as a youth to experiment
with writing. By 1912 he had published Gita ̄njalı ̄(song offerings) for which
he won the Nobel Prize for literature. He founded a school at Shantiniketan,
which became a retreat and a center for the cultivation of the creative arts.
Here too a university was established in 1921 for the promotion of “world
brotherhood and cultural interchange.”^54
Tagore was soon a world traveler and global figure. He was impatient
with Indian nationalism, whether of the Gandhian or the Benga ̄lı ̄ variety.
Tagore’s was a “religion of man” (the title of one of his books), characterized
by a fundamental faith in humanity and its divine source and in the notion
that humankind’s hopes lay in the reaffirmation of the fundamental spiritual
values to be found in all religions. India’s role was not only to be reawakened
to its own spiritual roots, but also open to more of the world at large.
Throughout his life, he celebrated the variety and beauty of life, was prolific
in the production of poetry, drama, and song and sought to infuse India
with a sense of its kinship and place in the world at large. One brief poem
captures Tagore’s spirit:
Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high;
Where knowledge is free;
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow
domestic walls;
Where words come out from the depth of truth;
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection;
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the dreary
desert sand of dead habit;Streams from the “West” and their Aftermath 187