Quotes about Nonviolence

“Put your sword back in its place,” Jesus said to him. “For all who draw the sword will die by the sword.

If someone strikes you on one cheek, turn to him the other also. And if someone takes your cloak, do not withhold your tunic as well.

not dependent on wine, not violent but gentle, peaceable, and free of the love of money.

When insult comes our way, we look for a way to respond in love (Matthew 5:38-39).

Nonviolence as a lifestyle and perpetual strategy will allow us to be on the offense instead of continually on the defense. We will be able to move the ball down the field with team decisions and playmaking versus constantly thinking about how the opposing forces are moving the ball.

Whatever else it is, the kingdom of God is decidedly not a call to violent revolution.

recall Gandhi's remark that if you take the principle "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth" to its logical conclusion, eventually the whole world will go blind and toothless.

Most importantly, he countered violence with nonviolence, and hatred with love. "Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred," he exhorted his followers. "We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again, we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.

King clung to nonviolence because he profoundly believed that only a movement based on love could keep the oppressed from becoming a mirror image of their oppressors. He wanted to change the hearts of the white people, yes, but in a way that did not in the process harden the hearts of the blacks he was leading toward freedom. Nonviolence, he believed, 'will save the Negro from seeking to substitute one tyranny for another.

There is a certain kind of dignity we admire, and to which we aspire, in the person who refuses to meet anger with anger, violence with violence, or hatred with hatred.

in the sentiment of Mahatma Gandhi, when we practice the law of an eye for an eye, we all end up blind.

Social justice cannot be attained by violence. Violence kills what it intends to create.