Tucker, The Reverend Boyd W.

[Mr. Tucker, an American missionary and friend of Bishop Fisher, was Principal of Collins High School, Calcutta, and later taught at Santiniketan. He carried on frequent correspondence with Gandhiji.]

 Letter, February 24, 1928¹⁶⁵

The Ashram,
Sabarmati
February 24, 1928

My dear friend,
I have your very delightful letter which I deeply appreciate. I must not however accept your advice. "Resist not evil" with me has never meant passive resistance. The word "passive resistance" I have described as a misnomer for the resistance which I have known and offered. The paraphrase of "resist not evil" means resist not evil with evil, and therefore necessarily means resist evil with good. And, if at the present moment, I do not seem to be actively resisting evil, it is a mere appearance. For, if you are a constant reader of Bhagavad Gita, you will recall the passage, "He who sees action in inaction and inaction in action sees truly." Or is there not the corresponding English saying "He also serves who waits and prays" or something like that? Anyway such is absolutely my position today. If I could see my way clear leading to boycott movement, do not imagine for one moment that I would sit still for a single moment. But the way is not clear. It may clear any day. I want a living faith on the part of known workers in the boycott as I have prescribed from time to time in the pages of Young India. I am positive that no other boycott can possibly succeed, as I am equally positive that this boycott must succeed if there is enough work behind it. Huge demonstrations that have been taking place in Calcutta are good in their way, but not good enough for me. There is no reality behind them. They have their use too, but they cannot enthuse me as an active soldier.
I hope I am clear. If not, do please tackle me again. I am anxious for you to understand me and my movement through and through.

Yours sincerely,
Rev. Boyd W. Tucker
Collins High School
140 Dharamtala Street
Calcutta

 Letter, March 12, 1928¹⁶⁶

Satyagraha Ashram
Sabarmati
March 12, 1928

My dear friend,
I like the manner in which you are combating my views. I discovered the difference between us even in Orissa. For me, there is no difference between the individual and the social position. At the same time there is ample room for the compromise of the nature suggested by you, for the simple reason that I ever compromise my own ideals even in individual conduct not because I wish to but because the compromise was inevitable. And so in social and political matters I have never exacted complete fulfilment of the ideal in which I have believed. But there are always times when one has to say thus far and no further, and, each time the dividing line has to be determined on merits. Generally speaking where the sum total of a movement has been evil, I have held non-cooperation to be the only emedy and where the sum total has been for the good of humanity, I have held cooperation on the basis of compromise to be the most desirable thing. If I seem to be holding myself aloof from some of the political movements just now, it is because I believe their tendency to be not for the promotion of swaraj but rather its retarding. It may be that I have erred in my judgment. If so, it is but human and I have never claimed to be infallible. You will see this point somewhat developed in a recent autobiographical chapter dealing with my participation in the late War. Tell me now if I have answered your question, even if I have not solved the puzzle.
Andrews is here and will be for a few days longer. How nice it would be if you could come and pass a few days of quiet with me so that we could discuss the important problems you have been raising in your letters. This is however not to say that you may not discuss them through correspondence. Please do, so long as it is necessary.

Yours sincerely,
B. W. Tucker
Calcutta

 Letter, July 4, 1928¹⁶⁷

[Reverend Tucker wrote in a letter of June 28, 1928, that he had been ashamed of the critical attitude he took in some of his previous letters. He then informed Gandhiji that the Deputy Commissioner of Darjeeling had conveyed to him, on behalf of the Government, that his attendance at political meetings was a violation of the undertaking by the Board of Foreign Missions in America that its missionaries would loyally cooperate with the Government. The first meeting he was accused of attending was not a political meeting but dealt with social evils; but the Government considered that all such subjects have political implications. The Deputy Commissioner hinted that if he did not cease attending such meetings, the Government would stop its grant to his school and complain against him to the Board.
Mr. Tucker said he had written to the Board and to Bishop Fisher that if they insisted on conforming to the demand of the Government, he had no honourable course to take except to resign as a missionary. He continued:
"I have no desire to engage in politics... but I am vitally interested in the life of India, and want to identify myself as far as possible with her limitations and sufferings... I pray God that I may be privileged to remain in India where I most prefer to live and work. I cannot ask you to do anything about this matter... but I give you the liberty to use what I have written in any way that you see fit. I should be very pleased to receive advice from you as to what course you think one ought to pursue under the circumstances."
As regards the proposed visit of Gandhiji to the West, he wrote: "...I am not sorry that you have delayed your going. I agree with your plan not to deliver public lectures but to meet selected individuals and groups... You are well aware that the vast majority are unprepared to receive your message as yet, but you will find that even in America there are many who are attempting to find the way which you have found and in which you are leading."¹⁶⁸]

Satyagraha Ashram,
Sabarmati
July 4, 1928

Dear friend,
I have your letter. Surely there was nothing in your previous letters to be ashamed of. Though I could not accept your judgment, I certainly appreciate the affection underlying your criticism. The attitude that you have taken up with the Deputy Commissioner appears to me to be correct. Indeed the conduct of foreign missions in India does not in any way appeal to me. It is more expedient and mundane than correct and religious. How can a religious body accept the terms that have been imposed upon foreign missions? The English missionary effort is frankly political. It is in alliance with the Government and takes its code of conduct generally from the Government. Such at any rate is my reading. I expect that one of the reasons which determined Andrews in giving up the Cambridge Mission was its over-secularity.169 But here too I write under correction. My own judgment is wholly independent of Andrews's attitude. The present crisis that has overtaken you, I, therefore, regard as a blessing in disguise. And if you have the conviction and the strength, you will sever your connection once for all. And, in my opinion, you will be all the fitter for becoming a messenger of Truth.
I understand what you say about my proposed visit to the West. If the external circumstances are favourable and if I keep good health, I hope to go next year.

Yours sincerely,

Reverend B. W. Tucker
"The Manse"
Darjeeling

 Letter, September 1, 1928

[Reverend Tucker wrote on August 15, 1928: "There is one question that was raised at the Council of the International Fellowship held at Sabarmati last January, about which I would appreciate some further explanation from you. It is in regard to your statement that people belonging to a certain religious group or holding certain religious views, ought not to even remotely desire that others should accept their viewpoint. I may not have quoted you correctly; as I remember it, your statement may have been even stronger than that..."170 That statement, Mr. Tucker said, had greatly disturbed liberal Christians.¹⁷¹ 
He also expressed happiness at the victory of Bardoli satyagraha.¹⁷²]

Satyagraha Ashram
Sabarmati
September 1, 1928

My dear Boyd,
Your letter has been on my file for some days.
I think you have stated my position fairly correctly except that the way in which you have put it may cause a misunderstanding. I did not say that I would not desire that others should accept my viewpoint. But I did say that I would not desire that others should accept my religion. Evidently you have used the word viewpoint as synonymous with religion. I do not. Whilst I would not press my religion upon others, I would press my viewpoint upon others, as every one of us must. Religion is a matter of feeling or the heart and, therefore, not a matter for argument, and I would hold everybody's feeling as dear as my own, because I expect him to do so with reference to my feeling. Viewpoint is a matter of reasoning, the mind, the intellect. It may shift from time to time without touching the heart. Change of religion is a change of status. Change of viewpoint is an accident often due to external causes. My feeling about the existence of God cannot be easily altered. My viewpoint regarding the connotation of the term may vary from time to time and expand with expansion of my reason. Religion is beyond explanation and it seems to me to be impertinent for anyone to touch another's religion. A viewpoint must always be capable of explanation. I have entered upon this distinction because it enables me to explain my position about religion more clearly than by any other means. I do not want you to become a Hindu. But I do want you to become a better Christian by assimilating all that may be good in Hinduism and that you may not find in same measure or at all in the Christian teaching. I can't explain why I delight in calling myself and remaining a Hindu, but my remaining does not prevent me from assimilating all that is good and noble in Christianity, Islam and other faiths of the world.
I wonder if I have explained my position to your satisfaction. If not please ask.
All you say about Bardoli is quite true.

Yours sincerely,

Rev. B. W. Tucker
Principal
Collins High School
140 Dharmtala Street
Calcutta

 Letter, May 5, 1931¹⁷³

[Under the Gandhi-Irwin Pact, signed in March 1931, the Indian National Congress agreed to participate in the second Round Table Conference in London to discuss the future political status of India. It decided at a session in Karachi on 2 April that Gandhiji would be its sole representative at the Conference. Gandhiji soon received invitations from the United States and press reports indicated that he would visit the United States after the Conference. Mr. Tucker, who attended the Karachi session, offered to accompany Gandhiji to London as his secretary.]

Borsad,
May 5, 1931

My dear Boyd,
I was delighted to have your letter and to find that you were having a little respite from the heat of India's plains. Of course there is no truth in the rumoured visit to America. But as soon as the rumour went abroad, I got a peremptory cablegram signed by Mr. Page, Dr. Sherwood Eddy, Rev. Holmes, Dr. Ward and others warning me against going to America. They say emphatically that I would be exploited if I went there and that I would serve the cause better from a distance than by appearing in the midst of the people of America. All this, mind you, in the cablegram. And by this mail I have received a letter from an unknown American friend who, whilst appreciating my work and message, pleads with me not to go to America. I do feel exactly like these friends. Therefore even if I went to London and could spare a few weeks I should not care to go in the teeth of these warnings from friends whose opinion I respect. Would not yours coincide with theirs after further reflection? Now about London. There is no probability of my going there so long as the Hindu-Muslim problem remains unsolved. Even if I went there, whilst I should value your society, I do not know of the use I could make of your services. Andrews is already there and as you know he will take possession of me body and soul. I have a letter from him in which he takes my London visit for granted, has appointed himself as my chaprasi, tells me where I should stay. There is again Henry Polak who was in my office in South Africa for years. Then there is Muriel Lester. Therefore if you went with me to London you would not go as Secretary. Then I must not forget Mira. She will of course be with me. But of course everything is premature. I felt that you should know all about the appointments should the visit come forth. I was glad you were with me in Karachi. I was only sorry that I was not able to have long chats with you. That you continually lost your things was certainly bad but that would be no disqualification for taking you with me. I could have much better use for you than to make you keeper of my belongings.

Boyd Tucker, Esq.
C/o Postmaster
Srinagar (Kashmir)

Letter, May 19, 1931¹⁷⁴

[Mr. Tucker wrote to Gandhiji explaining his desire to accompany him to London, and sent some comments on missionary enterprise. He wrote:
"I am in full agreement with you in your protest against the methods employed by Christian missions in their efforts to gain proselytes through education, medical services and the like...
"This Government [of India] has demanded that the non-British missionary not only remain neutral in such vital matters as the economic and political evils of this country, but has compelled him to give a pledge, which the Government has interpreted to mean that the missionary shall actively support the Government... It is a standing indictment of the alliance of Christian missions in India with the world's greatest collective evil, imperialism, that they have acquiesced in this arrangement."]

As at Sabarmati,
May 19, 1931

My dear Boyd,
I have your letter. I understand more fully the reason for your wanting to accompany me to London should I go there. At the present moment however there is neither any prospect of going to London nor to America, to America much less. I shall certainly publish your letter regarding missionary enterprise.¹⁷⁵

Boyd Tucker, Esq.
c/o Postmaster
Srinagar (Kashmir)

 Letter, August 19, 1931¹⁷⁶

Ahmedabad
August 19, 1931

My dear Boyd,
I purposely refrained from writing to you in answer to your letter as I was waiting to know what was to happen. Now of course you know the result. But supposing all the negotiations that are going on materialise and that ultimately I am obliged to go, I should still feel that you should not go as one of the companions. But several would be travelling on their own and you may also do likewise. What I feel is that I should be going just as I am. I do not know whether you appreciate the force of my going in that absolutely detached condition. This may either come from arrogance or from utter trustfulness in God. I am certain that it is the latter with me. The more I think of the tremendous difficulties ahead and my own very limited powers, the clearer my helplessness becomes to me. I therefore say to myself "I will rely only upon God and no one else, nothing else." But He chooses many instruments for His purpose and if He wants to use them He will also see that they are there ready to be used.

Yours sincerely,

Rev. Boyd Tucker
Santiniketan
Birbhum

Letter, March 4, 1933¹⁷⁷

[Mr. Tucker wrote to Gandhiji on February 21, 1933, that the temple-entry programme (to secure admission of Harijans into temples) ran counter to his fundamental religious conceptions. He wished to present his difficulties to Gandhiji.
"My reading of the history of religion is that every great religious advance has been away from organised and formal religion. The great religious truths which the prophets of religion have apprehended and proclaimed have always been lost when their disciples have tried to localise them in priestcraft and temples. Truth is too universal to be confined and made sectarian. Therefore I consider temples, mosques and churches to be a prostitution of religion...
"Therefore I can see no advantage in gaining permission for Harijans to enter the temples."
He believed that Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore agreed with him.178]

My dear Boyd,
I have your long and good letter but none too long to mar my pleasure. You were quite right in writing the letter. The best appreciation I could show was to publish the relevant parts of it and to offer my own criticism. I had prepared the article for this week's issue of the Harijan, but it had to stand aside for matters more urgent. I hope however it will go in next week. I shall send you a proof copy and as I have said there all I had to in connection with your letter I will not repeat the argument just now.
The reference to Gurudev I have not given in the Harijan. I know he has been specially tender towards me of late. Perhaps Truth suffers through his reticence if he has absolutely strong and confirmed views on the question as your letter would suggest he has. I should hold it to be a great tragedy if through the tenderness of friends, untruth had crept into my life or had passed current among the people. If what I hold is truth, it must stand the light of fiercest criticism even of friends who have hitherto worked with me. I have no end to serve but that of Truth. If my defeat means victory of Truth, I would count that defeat itself as victory. I do not regard my judgements as infallible and even though I may be right in 99 cases out of 100, I do not want to trade upon it and assume or expect other people to assume that the 100th judgement is also right. I have for that reason called Gurudev the great sentinel, and I have always appreciated his warnings even when I have not been able to depart from my course by reason of his warnings. They have put me on my mettle and made the people think and choose. It is not good for individuals or nations to be under the hypnotic influence of any single person. It is a golden cover that hides the face of Truth.
You may, if you like, read this to Gurudev, and if he is clear in his mind, after reading the article that you will see in a few days, that he has no doubt in his mind that I am in error, let him issue his warning by way either of a public statement or a letter addressed to me for publication. But if he has any doubt I want the benefit of that doubt, because I do not want the people to be confused. As it is, on this temple-entry question I do not hold the field undisputed. They have all kinds of arguments put before them for examination. I do not want Gurudev's to be one of this crowd of arguments against the simple issue. His must be an overpowering deliverance standing by itself in its strength and originality.
I am personally not quite sure that Gurudev agrees with you in your attitude, for Santiniketan has its own temple or church or mandir, whatever you like to call it. Where two or three people gather together in a particular place in the name of God to offer worship, it becomes a temple. In Santiniketan we have a humble but beautiful building where prayers are offered, incenses burnt and sermons given. In Sabarmati we have no building, no walls, but the cardinal points are the walls, the sky is the roof and mother earth is the floor; nevertheless, the spot that has been selected for the morning and the evening prayers has all the essentials of a temple. But in accordance with your letter even that bare ground is a prostitution of religion. Surely, Gurudev will not agree with you in this attitude if I have understood it correctly.
With love from us,

Yours sincerely,

[Gandhiji published Mr. Tucker's letter and his comments in Harijan of 11 March. He wrote:
"I know of no religion or sect that has done or is doing without its house of God, variously described as a temple, mosque, church, synagogue or agiari.179 Nor is it certain that any of the great reformers including Jesus destroyed or discarded temples altogether. All of them sought to banish corruption from temples as well as from society. Some of them, if not all, appear to have preached from temples. I have ceased to visit temples for years, but I do not regard myself on that account as a better person than before."¹⁸⁰]

 Letter, March 23, 1933¹⁸¹

[Mr. Tucker wrote on March 18, 1933:
"My indictment of temples, churches and mosques as being a `prostitution of religion' does not imply that there is an utter absence of essential good both in priesthood and temples... I myself have received great uplift of soul in visiting certain cathedrals...
"I appreciate that the throwing open of the temples to the Harijans is a moral and spiritual necessity for the caste Hindus... What I do regret is that you should have seemed to lay such stress upon the temple as an essential part of Hinduism."¹⁸²]

My dear Boyd,
You can never tire my patience, for I value the interest you are taking in everything I say or write or do. I know also that you do not argue in any spirit of controversy. I see your difficulty. You take or seem to take only one view of things. I have a profound faith in the Jain doctrine of Anekantvad. It is the many-sidedness as opposed to one-sidedness. To illus trate this celebrated doctrine we have a well-known story of "the elephant and seven blind men," all of whom described the same creature in seven different ways, and the poet ends by saying "they were all true and they were all false," and we may add "God alone is true, no one and nothing else is or can be wholly true."
Holding this view I can appreciate and defend your attitude, but I can also defend my own. If the world will be influenced by my attitude on the question of temple-entry, not in its own way but in my way, I have no fear about its moral safety.
You will be pleased to know that I have an energetic letter from a Maharashtrian, completely defending your position and wholly dissenting from my reply. You must have seen Gurudev's splendid letter on the question. It came to me when the ensuing Harijan was filled up. I hope therefore to publish it next week.183 I believe that he has sent it to me for publication. But you may enquire. If he does not desire publication, I will naturally withhold it, but in that case, please telegraph at once. I hope he is doing well. With love and respects from us all to him. Yours sincerely,
[Mr. Tucker wrote to Gandhiji on May 5, 1933, on the eve of a 21-day fast for self-purification undertaken by Gandhiji in connection with the Harijan movement: "Our prayers shall be with you during these days." On May 10, 1933, Ramchandra Shastri wrote to Mr. Tucker conveying Gandhiji's appreciation of the message. Mr. Tucker wrote in another letter of May 19, 1933:
"I am indeed fortunate in that I have never had to fight against any race or class prejudice so that technically speaking I have been free from the sin of untouchability. But as I have been searching my heart in these days, I have come to realise that in my most intimate friendships whether with Indians or Europeans, I have only sought for fellowship with those who are intellectually and spiritually inspiring... There has been too much of the sentimental in my sympathy for the oppressed and the under-privileged. I have been content to accept a standard of living which has isolated me from the most intimate fellowship with the poor and the ignorant. Therefore your fast is as much for my impurity as for that of any orthodox Hindu. I am seeking for inner guidance as to a way of life which will purify me from all selfishness in my human relationships, and am grateful to you and to God for your having undertaken this fast on my behalf as well as on behalf of others."¹⁸⁴]