GANDHI TO VINOBA: The New Pilgrimage

A biography of Vinoba by Lanza del Vasto, a Frenchman whose philosophical writings are reviewed below. Vinoba (Vinayak Bhaave) was Gandhi's spiritual heir -- most people in the West tend to assume Nehru was, for the latter synthesized many of the beliefs of his admittedly beloved teacher. Not the best known, but considered the ""purest"" of the disciples, Gandhi chose Vinoba to be the leader of the first ashram outside his very own. Vinoba followed Gandhi's activist nonviolent teachings, demonstrating by actions rather than words the path of rightness. The author, who later founded the Community of the Ark in France, joined Vinoba on a march in 1954, during which this latter-day saint persuaded both rich and poor to donate portions of their land to the even more unfortunate -- a policy subsequently adopted in somewhat different style by Nehru. The second part of this semi-biography is a journal of those months -- traveling third class by rail or on foot -- and is a rather stunning proof that profound changes can be enacted -- not by legislation -- but by the direct appeal of one admittedly extraordinary human being to another.