2.1.2. Daniel Again

Returning to Daniel and his first appearance in Gandhi's speeches in 1909, the expression "passive resistance" did not, in fact, fit with Daniel's actions. Two weeks later (7 June 1909), Gandhi explained at a meeting in Germiston that "soul force" (*satyagraha*) would be the better term. Active resistance, including violence, should be called "body force". In the demonstration of this "soul force", Daniel received company. The purest form of *satyagraha* was represented by Jesus Christ, Daniel, Socrates, and Tolstoy, who lived according to their convictions.<sup>21</sup> Daniel and Socrates were now a couple, accompanied by Jesus and Tolstoy (Gandhi 1958–1994, vol. 9, p. 243). "Soul force" should be taken literally, for Gandhi emphasized that the recognition of the existence of the soul as apart from the body and its permanent and superior nature connected with a living faith was a conditio sine qua non for a successful use of *satyagraha.*<sup>22</sup>

From June until November 1909, Gandhi remained in England for negotiations on the future of the South African Union. A recognition of theoretical equality (voting) and a satisfying solution for immigration rules could not be reached. The farewell party for Gandhi in London was dominated by the failed negotiations; however, on the way back, he would write his masterpiece *Hind Swaraj* on the future of independence (Gandhi 2009). In the speech at this party, he returned to the problem of the expression "passive resistance" and explained *satyagraha* through Daniel, who "refused to obey the laws of men which he did not approve" (Gandhi 1958–1994, vol. 9, p. 541 and vol. 10, p. 78).<sup>23</sup> What Daniel did was the same as what the South African Indians did when they refused to accept the laws concerning the Registration Act. The decision they made not to meet violence with violence forced them to act as Daniel did. Gandhi repeated the example in a speech at Kimberley, where he "likened the Transvaal passive resistance to the conscientious opposition offered by ... Daniel to the Laws of the Medes and the Persians".<sup>24</sup> The report offered an additional argument. Daniel's conscience spoke because the laws of the Medes and the Persians were "against reason and holiness". Daniel received the title "Prophet".

The last time for Daniel in South Africa came at the Durban farewell party before Gandhi, his family, and Kallenbach left South Africa definitely for (England) and India. Not conscience but courage was the theme of his speech when Gandhi referred to the power of passive resistance. Passive resistance is not "the weapon of the weak". You need "greater courage to be a passive resister than a physical resister". Moreover, "it was the courage of a Jesus, a Daniel, a Cranmer, a Latimer and a Ridley..., and Tolstoy who could go calmly to suffering and death" (Gandhi 1958–1994, vol. 12, p. 446). To Jesus, Daniel, and Tolstoy, three (Anglican) bishops were added. These three "Oxford martyrs" were burned at the stake during the persecutions of Mary Tudor (1555/1556), who tried to reverse the English Reformation. Now the emphasis was not on "conscience" but on "courage".

## *2.2. Daniel in India*

The definite return to India brought a new context for Gandhi's use of exemplary characters from authoritative scriptures, tradition, and contemporaries. In "Ideas about Satyagraha" from 1917, Gandhi repeated that *satyagraha* was not the power of the weak, not passive: "it can only be used by the strong... and indeed it calls for intense activity". A real *satyagrahi* does not fear for his body; he has no fear of death; truth is his ultimate goal; he has compassion with his antagonists; he acts without waiting for others. Who were now together with Daniel in the "cloud of witnesses", who were real *satyagrahis*? Gandhi began with Harishchandra, continued with Prahlad and Mirabai, followed by Daniel and Socrates, and "those Arabs who hurled themselves on the fire of the French artillery" (Gandhi 1958–1994, vol. 13, pp. 521–23). The legendary King Harischandra of Ayodhya entered the life of Gandhi at an early stage. He saw the play as a child, identified himself with the tragic ruler who became the slave of *chandala,* and, preserving his dharma, was willing to sacrifice his dearest wife Taramati (Gandhi 1958–1994, vol. 39, p. 11 and vol. 30, pp. 252–53). Prahlad, a devotee of Vishnu, was the pious son of a king, who did not like his son's spiritual inclination and tried to kill him through poison, elephants, snakes, drowning, and fire. Prahlad survived all these trials and continued to worship Vishnu. The poet Mirabai, a 16th century *bhakta* and devotee of Krishna, refused to commit *sati* after her husband's death.25 Her inlaws tried to kill her through poison, snakes, and drowning, but they did not succeed. Mirabai stayed with her "real husband": Krishna. Harischandra, Prahlad, and Mirabai stuck to their truth, faced all trials, and were saved. Gandhi had these three Indian characters accompanied by the pair Daniel and Socrates and finally "the Arabs who hurled themselves on the fire...". He was referring here to a story from the Franco-Moroccan War (1911–1912), in which the Arabs ran into the artillery fire of the French. The French refused to continue the shooting and embraced the Arabs, impressed by their bravery. However, Gandhi had a *caveat* here. Those Arabs were *sayagrahis* indeed and the reaction of the French demonstrated that *satyagraha* is successful. However, the Arabs were not *satyagrahis* through a deliberate choice. They were religiously motivated but "had no love in their hearts. A *satyagrahi* does not lay down his life in anger" (Gandhi 1958–1994, vol. 13, pp. 517–18). Gandhi repeated the importance of a religious motivation in the same month, September 1917. According to Gandhi, *satyagraha* is a *religious* principle, and he underlined this with the conduct of Prahlad, Daniel, Mirabai, and others, whose guiding principle in their lives was religion (Gandhi 1958–1994, vol. 13, p. 531).

Guided by Gandhi's use of the figure of Daniel, the examples of Harischandra, Prahlad, and Mirabai appear here in the survey of his return to India. This does not mean a separation between a Greek-Judean-Christian lifeworld and the Indian one, nor a claim on priority. Gandhi would be the last to agree to such a scheme or claim. Chronologically, Mirabai already appears in 1907 in a wish "that we badly need thousands of women who can compare with Mirabai" (Gandhi 1958–1994, vol. 7, p. 51). A song of her demonstrates that the ultimate love of God makes anything else bitter tasting. Compared to *satyagraha* petitions and deputations are such a bitter tasting (Gandhi 1958–1994, vol. 9, vol. 9, p. 386). The same is the case with Prahlad, "God's devotee, (who) boldly embraced the red-hot pillar" as a demonstration of courage and honor (Gandhi 1958–1994, vol. 7, p. 123). In

an encouragement letter to the Tamils just before his third imprisonment in 1909, he reminds his audience that "we are both descendants of Prahlad ... passive resister of the purest type" (Gandhi 1958–1994, vol. 9, p. 199). The examples fulfil different functions in different situations and—more importantly—Gandhi tailors his examples to his audience or addressees.

Two years later, Daniel received other companions. In a letter to *The Times of India* (22 August 1919), Gandhi wrote about civil disobedience, and now the context and addressees required different examples. Next to Daniel, who disobeyed the law of the Medes and the Persians,<sup>26</sup> he referred to Henry David Thoreau,<sup>27</sup> through his "immortal essay" on civil disobedience (Thoreau 1849), and to John Bunyan,<sup>28</sup> the puritan, nonconformist preacher, who spent twelve years in jail after the restoration of the Stuart monarchy (Hofmeyr 2004). Civil disobedience against laws that wound the conscience was the link between Thoreau, Daniel, and Bunyan (Gandhi 1958–1994, vol. 16, p. 51).

In the same month, Daniel and Bunyan were brought together in a letter to his "dearest child", the Danish missionary Esther Faering, who wanted to stay in India and later lived in his *ashram:* "Success [of requests for a longer stay in India] could only be justified in the religious sense of the term, even as Daniel's and Bunyan's were justified" (Gandhi 1958–1994, vol. 16, p. 63).29 Daniel and Bunyan served as examples of religiously motivated acting. The reference fitted with Faering's background and the problems around her engagement in the *Sabermati Ashram*.

The Congress Report on the Punjab Disorders of 1920 contained a chapter on *satiyagraha.* It demonstrated the long-lasting need of delimiting *satyagraha* from "passive resistance". Again, it was necessary to emphasize that the former as the weapon of the strong excluded physical force or violence while the latter not. The examples Gandhi used were now almost all traditional: Daniel, Socrates, Prahlad, and Mirabai. Daniel refused to obey a law that was against his conscience and calmly suffered the punishment; Socrates wanted to teach the truth to the Athenian youth and was sentenced to death; Prahlad refused his father's orders because they were inconsistent with his religious beliefs; Mirabai followed her conscience against her husband's orders. Gandhi emphasizes their common ground: "none of them had any ill will towards their persecutors. Daniel and Socrates were model citizens of their state, Prahlad a model son and Mirabai a model wife" (Gandhi 1958–1994, vol. 17, pp. 152–53).

The first months of 1922 were dominated by the dramatic Chauri Chaura killings (Tidrick 2006, pp. 176–80; Guha 2019, pp. 155–57), when aggressive protesters torched a police station, killing 22 policemen, because they had fired on an advancing crowd. For Gandhi, the incident demonstrated that the people were ill prepared, not ready for real *satyagraha* and *ahim. sa¯*. He himself went on a five-day fast and called the Non-Cooperation Movement off.30 The British sentenced 170 men to death by hanging and Gandhi, also arrested, to 6 years in jail.<sup>31</sup> Deeply affected by the spiral of violence, Gandhi emphasized two other elements of *satyagraha*. The idea of *excitement* should be excluded, and he illuminated it by the examples of Daniel, Bunyan, Latimer, and Prahlad. Without excitement, Daniel "opened his doors (windows)" for praying to his God; Bunyan turned into a non-conformist without excitement, Latimer at his execution said calmly that his hand should be burnt first, because "it was this hand had offended writing contrary to his heart". Prahlad "rushed to the pillar his father had heated and embraced it" without excitement. All these actions were deliberate decisions. A new aspect had been added: "deliberate decisions taken without excitement are the real test for true civil disobedience" (Gandhi 1958–1994, vol. 23, p. 53).

The second element was non-retaliation. One week after the Chauri Chaura events, Gandhi reacted with remarks on retaliation (Gandhi 1958–1994, vol. 22, p. 363. YI 9 February 1922). His own life had been devoted to non-retaliation, because "the greatest teachers of the world: Zoroaster, Mahavira, Daniel, Jesus and Mohammed, Nanakand and a host of others" inspired him.<sup>32</sup> The commandments were no obligation to blood-revenge but a restriction of it.33

Twenty-four years later, in April 1946, Gandhi returned for the last time to Daniel, adding again a new aspect to the Daniel image. Christian missionaries had asked Gandhi whether an independent India would guarantee the rights of mission and proselytization. His answer was negative, because a real believer leaves the outcome of his work to God, as Daniel did. Obeying his conscience, he went into the lion's den, and after he was saved by God, the king recognized "that the God of Daniel is the living God, enduring forever" (Dan 6:26). "Who is the living God will come to light without statute or guarantee" (Gandhi 1958–1994, vol. 84, p. 52). Therefore, the missionaries did not need any guarantee if they really believed their own message.

## *2.3. The Gandhian Daniel and Company: Summary*

After Jesus, Daniel was the most important biblical character for Gandhi. Daniel was paired with Socrates, spiritually "his elder brother", and accompanied by characters suitable for the addressees of his writings and speeches in their own context. Though at an early stage Daniel was "one of the greatest *passive resisters* that ever lived", Gandhi used the Daniel narrative time and again to explain the idea and practice of *satyagraha* as the better definition of what "passive resistance" really meant.

Daniel and company demonstrated the wide range of Gandhi's use of authoritative scriptures. For Gandhi, there were no boundaries between the scriptures of different religions. Past and present, holy writ and tradition can come together. History, legend, and myth are mixed.

Which aspects of *satyagraha* represent the character Daniel? Daniel was—next to Socrates—a comforting figure during imprisonment. Just as Gandhi did, Daniel, a model civil servant and citizen, opposed laws in conflict with his conscience. Gandhi's comparison that Daniel did the same as the Indians did with their opposition against the Registration Act goes in a twofold direction. First, it serves as an encouragement in the direction of the Indians, and second, as a signal to his English audience that the events in South Africa mirrored the situation and the actions of the biblical hero Daniel, a figure of their own tradition. The object of the conscientious opposition received an additional qualification as "Law of the Medes and the Persians" (Dan 6:12.15), a symbol for an unchangeable decision that became a trap for the king himself (Dan 6:14). Daniel's defiance of such a law enlarged his conscientious decision, for the content of the law itself was "against reason and holiness", important concepts in Gandhi's thought (Noort 2022, section 2.2.1, p. 3). According to Gandhi, "Soul force" should be taken literally, and this required a belief in the superior nature of the soul combined with a living faith. The Gandhian Daniel embodied the courage of a real *satyagrahi*. *Satyagraha* was and is the weapon not of the weak but of the strong. Immense courage will be needed. It was Gandhi's crucial message when he definitely returned to India. Daniel by then received other companions. Harischandra, Prahlad, and Mirabai preceded Daniel and Socrates. The American biblical scholar Daniel Smith-Christopher drew attention to the social resistance of Mirabai. Her *religious* devotion was a critique of domestic power in which marriage was strictly regulated and in this way demonstrated active resistance (Smith-Christopher 1993, pp. 327–28). When Daniel and Socrates represented conscience against unjust laws, the Indian background transferred it with the Gandhian examples to resistance against royal and domestic power. Such a resistance needed a deliberate choice. If not, if there was no love for the antagonist, the most important aspect of *satyagraha* was missing. The conditio sine qua non of Daniel's civil disobedience was nonviolence.<sup>34</sup> *Satyagraha* should be offered without excitement. There is no place for retaliation and the outcome of *satyagraha* should be left to God. Daniel resisted nonviolently and was prepared to suffer. There was no fear of death.

#### **3. The Gandhian Daniel and His Reception**

Gandhi's model Daniel as the exemplary *satyagrahi* has had a limited reception. In especially Christian reception history, the book of Daniel has been considered largely for its view on the future and the supposed tools it offered to reveal the secret meaning of history, powers, and empires (Koch 1997).

As far as I can see, there has been only one serious engagement with Gandhi's approach to demonstrate the relevance of the Gandhian Daniel (Smith-Christopher 1993, 1996). Emilsen mentioned it and it came to life again in the commentary of Newsom on Daniel, especially in the sections about the reception history (Emilsen 2001a, 2001b; Breed 2014; Newsom 2014).

Daniel Smith-Christopher's point of departure was the question as to whether readings from different cultural contexts "could give us new ideas about what the (biblical) text historically meant" (Smith-Christopher 1993, p. 323).35 He analyzed how the Gandhian Daniel really acted in Dan 6, whether his active resistance fitted into the exegesis of the court tales, and what this meant for an implied attitude to foreign rule in Daniel 1–6. The crucial verse, Dan 6:10, reads (KJV):

"Now when Daniel knew that the writing (royal decree) was signed he went into his house; and his windows *being open* in his chamber toward Jerusalem, he kneeled upon his knees three times a day, and prayed, and gave thanks before his God, as he did aforetime".<sup>36</sup>

Gandhi supposed that Daniel actively *opened* his windows. In this way, he demonstrated his opposition against the unjust royal decree. Retelling the narrative in 1946, Gandhi made Daniel's active resistance even clearer. Normally, according to Gandhi, Daniel prayed *behind closed doors*, but now the windows were open so that all could see him (Gandhi 1958–1994, vol. 84, p. 52). Smith-Christopher supported Gandhi by referring to the Septuagint, rendering the active form "he opened" instead of the passive form of the MT.<sup>37</sup> This may seems to be a very small detail, but it proved that there was a textual tradition that gave Daniel an even more active role in his opposition.<sup>38</sup> Drawing the circle wider, Smith-Christopher concluded that the court tales read in the context of the "highly politicised apocalyptic visions of Dan 7–12... take on political significance as Jewish calls to remain steadfast". Taking up the recent trend of judging the Persian rule less positively than earlier in the scholarly debate, he raised the possibility of understanding the court stories as folk tales of subordinated Jews taking up a court setting but longing for freedom and power (Smith-Christopher 1993, pp. 333–37). The Daniel stories served as resistance literature for Jews under foreign rule.39 As I will argue in the next sections, reading the court narratives together with the apocalypses offers even more possibilities than Smith-Christopher indicated in his pioneering paper.

#### **4. The Book of Daniel and Its Context**
