Unity is Strength

Senior Lecturer, Pandit,
Dr. Ven. Dodamgoda Sumanasara Thero
Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences
University of Sri Jayewardenepura

The word ‘Unity’ has been defined as “the state of being one; oneness” in the Merriam dictionary. The words like union, integration, amalgamation, federation, confederation, unification, and coalition are the synonyms given in the Oxford English dictionary pertaining to

the word ‘Unity”. Also, words like harmony, peace, collaboration, togetherness, cooperation, oneness, etc. have also been used to further mean the word unity.

These synonyms directly or indirectly reveal the exact meaning of the English word ‘unity’ that we mean throughout this short article.

On the other hand, the opposite word of unity is disunity, and its synonym is division. It means conflict or disagreement and the inability or stay together as one person in groups, organizations etc.

Living and engaging in work together in this society brings peace and happiness to an individual’s life. As well as unity creates a great bond among the people as they engage in activities together.

If someone falls due to any reason, then the others can help him or her to rise from issues. So, giving a hand to others when they are in difficult situations is very important according to our religion.

On the contrary, when we observe the environment carefully, we can see the collaboration and unity in the lives of birds, animals, and reptiles.

Animals and birds assist each other in good harmony to build their homes, gather food for the rainy season, feed their babies, protect them from enemies, and so on. Similarly, the Rukkhadhamma jataka story is one of the examples in the Buddhist literature that reminds us of the worth of unity.

Accordingly, both trees and creepers show their strength and the bondage growing together mutually in the environment without any harm from the wind and any other natural disasters as well. On the other hand, there are some isolated trees around us or on the grounds which fall down even by a light wind.

According to the message of this story, we should live together in collaboration with each other without any mutual division.

The Sammodamana jataka story also explains the value of living in unity with each other.

According to this story, a snipe shooter caught the snipe birds casting his net when they were quarreling.

On the contrary, this Jataka story reveals that how the snipe shooter failed to catch the snipes as they were united. It is further stressed meaningfully from the following Sinhala poem as thus.

“Samagiya balaya ve

semada sathuta ethi ve

Asamagiya duka ve

eyin sematama vipath ethi ve”

(Unity is strength – Making all happy

Disunity is suffering – Bring harm to all)

Once the Buddha advised the monks stressing upon the worthiness of maintaining and bearing peace and harmony in each individual to tame their minds to eradicate all mundane hindrances to obtain the bliss of Nibbana.

Further he revealed that the monks’ concord would bring happiness to everyone to live in harmony in this society. On the other hand, the monks’ concord would ensure the longer lasting of the Order of the Maha Sangha as well.

As we see in today's society, some people are unnecessarily divided due to diverse reasons and there is no peace, harmony, communication, and joy in their minds at all.

These divisions could mainly be caused by selfishness, political dogmatism, the gap between the poor and rich, different religious and ethnic views and opinions, cast, employment, social position, rank,

egoism, jealousy, failing and disliking to tolerate other’s views and opinions, unwillingness pay respect to others, lack of knowledge to identify other’s prevailing issues and problems, living in isolation, keeping social distance and so on.

However, as intelligent human beings, we should not be divided for any reason because humans can discuss and compromise, raising any issues and problems with the people who live in this society, regardless of age, colour, social standing or professional differences.

In general, both joyful and unjoyful actions may spring up among the people in this worldly society when living together due to vivid reasons such as worries, wholesome and unwholesome deeds, annoyances and nuisances, harmful and offensive actions, meritorious and de-meritorious actions, etc.

If people are wise, they should be able to bear up both good and bad actions arising from others by tolerating and identifying the causes for those actions.

To conclude, according to our social experience, unity has become an elusive goal in peoples’ lives in our society. So, when this great concept of unity sweeps out from the human minds, there cannot be any collaboration or any other bondage in human activities. As a result of this, human society would collapse and deteriorate day by day.

Hence, by functioning together effectively as one nation as well as by working together as one, irrespective of the race, religion, or any other view or opinion based on vivid religious dogmas, we humans may be able to approach the prosperity of our lives and the country.

The novelist Rowling has stated that “We are only as strong as we are united, as weak as we are divided.” Thus, make every effort to act storing unity and peace in every human heart remembering these remarkable thoughts.