By Amolak Singh, New Orleans
NEW ORLEANS, LA: Few years ago, one Canadian asked one of our dedicated Sikh, “Are you militant?” The world militant sounded more or less like terrorist or at least a man behind a gun fighting for his political aim. The answer as we would expect was, “No, I am not a militant. 1am a moderate Sikh,” That Canadian then replied, “If this is true, then I am not talking 10 you, as it shows that you are not fully dedicated to your cause!” This Sikh narrated this story to the present writer in London about four years ago. Let us discuss what the world ‘militant’ means. The Reader’s Digest September 1993 issue on its famous page ‘Il pays to enrich your Vocabulary” mentioned militant as: militant Adj— a: aggressive. B: opinionated. CY practical, D; organized.
The meaning was given as: militant A; Aggressive and vigorous in support of a cause; as, a militant political activist. Also, warlike. Latin military {to serve as a soldier).
In fact all the four options mentioned above seem to very essential qualities of a militant — as discussed below:
Aggressive; Inclined to move or act in a hostile fashion. Also means: Assertive; Bold; Enterprising. Definition varies between hostile and enterprising. It appears as if aggressiveness shows the degree of determination. A militant has to be aggressive.
Opinionated: If a person has not formed an opinion as to what is good for him, can’t be a militant in true sense.
Practical: Militant has to be practical; hitting the opponent’s strong parts is not very practical as compared to hitting his weak parts.
Organized: Of course a militant has to be organized. Without being properly organized is not only dangerous to oneself butts against the preaching of Sikhism. When liberty destroys order, the hunger for order will destroy liberty! The famous Scientist, Carl Sagan, (in his recent article “A new way to think about rules to live by’) said, “The codes of Ashoka (India) and Hammurabi (Babylon), which once held sway over mighty civilizations, are today largely defunct. Perhaps they misjudged human nature and asked too much of us. Perhaps experience from one epoch or culture is not wholly applicable to another, Nonviolence worked, up to a point. Even Gandhi had trouble reconciling the rule of nonviolence with the necessities of defense against those with less lofty rules of conduct.”
Article extracted from this publication >> December 10, 1993
Article extracted from this publication >>
