What is Patriotism?

Pujya Swami Chinmayanandaji defines love in three ways. There is first the lower kind of love which is called sneha, and then a higher kind of love which is called prema. The lower kind of love is based on demanding and wanting while prema, the higher kind of love is based on giving. It is a love which makes one give to others. When this higher love is placed or directed towards an altar very high, like the Lord, prema translates itself into bhakti or devotion. In devotion, when such a love is placed at a high altar, Pujya Gurudev says our mind expands, our vision deepens and our functionalities become more efficient. Patriotism lies in the realm of bhakti. 

Patriotism which is the love that one has for one’s land is called desh bhakti, the devotion that one shows to one’s country. By logic, it would imply that this is a love which is based on giving to the nation and not demanding from the nation. It is founded on what we can give, what we can do for the nation. To love a country means to give to the country and to serve the country.

What does it mean to give to or serve the country, as ‘country’ is a very abstract entity. What does it really mean? It means to give and serve the things which make up a country, which are the institutions and the people. Patriotism or desh bhakti means giving and serving, in a selfless manner, the people and institutions of a country, and that is what is demanded of all of us.

Read about “Great Minds Made a Great Nation” by Pujya Gurudev Swami Chinmayananda.

Pujya Gurudev mentions, in another context, a beautiful story….

A poor man from the village comes to the city, works very very hard and after many years of hard work, becomes very rich and ends up owning a large portion of the city itself. His son is, of course, fully endowed with the wealth that his father has earned. However, he has seen his father work hard. So he might not work if he has the money, but since he has seen how his father has worked, he is at least careful in the way in which he spends that money. 

His son, unfortunately, has neither seen his father work, nor has he seen the hard work of his grandfather, and therefore thinks this wealth to be his birthright and assumes he can enjoy and spend it any which way he likes without giving back anything. That person ends up finishing all the wealth, having nothing in the end. This is what typically happens, even in a nation’s history. 

There is one group of people who work and fight hard to win independence. The next generation of people who have seen the others work and are enjoying its results still want to treat it carefully and give something back.

The third generation is tricky, for they have never seen the hardship and work that has gone into making them privileged partakers of this freedom and therefore, they think it is their birthright only to be enjoyed.

Therefore, what we must learn is that we must continue to act and strive all the time, so that every generation coming after learns from the previous generation that it is their duty to continue to serve the land, to continue to give back to the institutions, to continue to give back to the people of the land, and to sustain this freedom, and that is what is demanded of patriotism.

The Hindu thought construct places more emphasis on duty over right. Before asking the nation what is my right, we must ask ourselves first, what is my duty. If and only if one is able to perform one’s duty, then and then alone one becomes deserving and eligible to enjoy something in return. This we must all keep in mind. It is this thought of serving the nation which is beautifully captured in the Chinmaya Mission Pledge as ‘we live a noble life of sacrifice and service’ emphasising that we must serve first before asking for things in return. 

Whichever profession one is in, whichever vocation one is in, in whichever station in life one is in, whether one is fifteen or fifty years old, we can still ask this question to ourselves – what am I giving to the nation. It is a noble ideal such as this that we must first fix in our minds, which will inspire us to do things.

The Chinmaya Mission Pledge graciously gives us this idea when it says ‘to produce more than what we consume, to give more than what we take’. If each one of us can make this the ideal in our lives, whatever be our profession, we can dramatically change our vision of the very acts we are involved in. 

For example, a doctor treating a patient can say that ‘I treat so that I will get money in return’; or he could say ‘I treat so that the patient is well and happy’; or he could say ‘I treat the patient because I want the nation to be healthy’. If the aim is for the nation to be healthy, then the doctor will not wait for the patient to come to their office but will take proactive measures to make sure that no patient comes to their office. That is what it means to make a nation healthy, whether physically, emotionally, intellectually or spiritually. That must be our aim. 

We, each one of us, must have a noble ideal, we must work towards that noble ideal in the spirit of selfless, dedicated, and inspired service, in the yagna-bhava or spirit of collective effort and contribution, putting duty before rights.

Reference: http://www.chinmayamauritius.com/resources/food-for-thought/thoughts-on-patriotism

This is an edited transcript of an informal talk given on 26th November 2017 by the author in conclusion to a symposium for youth and adults on the topic of ‘Patriotism and Nation Building’ organised by the devotees of Chinmaya Mission Mauritius from L’Escalier, in a build-up to the 50th Anniversary of the independence of Mauritius.