Nonviolence

"Nonviolence differs from pacifism," according to Rabbi Richard Libowitz of Congregation Ner Tamid in Springfield. "Nonviolence is a tactic" while pacifism is a "philosophy, a lifestyle," he said. Libowitz had chosen "Judaism and Nonviolence" as the topic of his sermon at Friday night's Shabbat service in recognition of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday. Rabbi Libowitz traced the tradition on nonviolence in Jewish history but cited episodes - from the time of the prophets of the Old Testament to the current conflict between Israelis and Palestinians - when "practical reality" forced Jews to stray from the abstract ideal of nonviolence.

TWENTY- FIVE years ago, the first Martin Luther King holiday was observed, and 12 years later, the practice of honoring Dr. King with a day of service began. By now, Philadelphia's own day of service is the biggest anywhere. Considering how other holidays commemorating the country's heroes and leaders are celebrated, King's is notable for stressing action, instead of car shopping. But the burial of Christina Green and other victims of the Tucson shooting rampage . . . as well as the burial of the city's six victims of gun violence so far this year, suggests this might be the year to return to a message of King's we seem to have forgotten: nonviolence.

When an assassin's bullet silenced India's Mohandas K. Gandhi in 1948, his message of nonviolence, tolerance and understanding was taken up by others, most notably the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Another of those touched by the message was Gandhi's 12-year-old grandson. Arun Gandhi, now 59, relies on the lessons his grandfather taught him to help with his life's mission - spreading the philosophy that nonviolence is the salvation of humanity. Saturday afternoon, at the commencement exercises of Gwynedd-Mercy College, Gandhi spoke of that philosophy to the college's 404 graduates, their friends and well-wishers.

The events in the Philippines have given us all an example of democracy prevailing through nonviolent resistance and diplomacy. I sincerely hope that Congress and the citizens of the United States will speak up in the spirit of our democracy to urge that the Reagan administration refrain from providing military and "humanitarian" aid to the contras fighting against the regime in Nicaragua. Instead, we must take action through diplomatic means such as the Contadora process to bring peace to the area.

As a weapon, prayer has mostly saints and martyrs to speak for its power: The language of faith says that no weapon is more effective. Now there are the followers of Corazon Aquino. On the Sunday before the collapse of the Marcos regime, thousands of Filipinos knelt in a field before the tanks of the government's armed forces. They recited the rosary. Flowers - symbols of God's beauty - were passed to the soldiers. The military, revving the engines of the tanks, ordered the people to clear a path.

In April, it will be 40 years since the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was gunned down on the balcony of a Memphis motel. With that anniversary in mind, a number of Philadelphia-area officials, institutions and community groups are calling for "40 Days of Nonviolence. " At a news conference at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia yesterday, U.S. Rep. Chaka Fattah (D., Phila.) and former Mayor W. Wilson Goode Sr. joined hospital officials and community groups to urge the public to take part in the effort that is set to begin on Monday, the Martin Luther King holiday.

Since 1945, nuclear deterrrence has been credited with keeping the peace. Yet many Europeans are now seeking more hopeful alternatives, seeing improved relations with their communist neighbors and inevitable catastrophe if the arms race is not stopped. Many proposals and strategies are under consideration. Some incorporate the same kind of nonviolent methods now in use by Chinese workers and students to win democratic rights and freedom from the communist regime. History and their own courageous determination suggest that sooner or later, despite whatever repression their government employs, the Chinese will succeed in their new revolution.

Anne Bernstein Richan, 67, a Quaker activist from Swarthmore whose commitment to nonviolent conflict resolution led her to start a community dispute-settlement program, died Friday of cancer at Crozer-Chester Medical Center. She also worked with prison inmates in a violence-alternatives counseling program. Ms. Richan, born in New York City, was a 1954 graduate of Oberlin College. She moved to the Philadelphia area in 1969. In 1976, she helped found the Community Dispute Settlement Program, which brought Delaware County residents, most with neighborhood conflicts, together to resolve their differences with the help of mediators.

"The accepted wisdom in South Africa," Lionel Abrahams, a literary critic, told the New York Times, ". . . has it that nothing will do but that hard black men come to grips with hard white men, to which end the soft men between must clear out of the way. " In revolution, the soft men between must always clear out of the way. Revolution is not for moderates. In time of upheaval, hardness is power. From Alexander Kerensky to Arturo Cruz nothing changes: the man of qualms, of balance, of ambivalence is lost.

Authorities are staging four "Safe Surrender" days in South Jersey, giving nonviolent offenders with arrest warrants the opportunity to have their cases resolved quickly, often without jail time. State authorities say more than 400 people turned themselves in Saturday, the first day of the program at Grace Assembly of God Church in Atlantic City. After a break Sunday, the program will resume Monday and continue through Wednesday. The program is being staged from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. each day, with cases being adjudicated at temporary courtrooms a few blocks away.

Calling addiction a treatable disease, Gov. Christie said Thursday that he would require treatment for nonviolent criminals with drug dependence, a program that would take at least a year to start. In the meantime, Christie would offer yearlong drug treatment to 1,000 to 1,500 low-level offenders now in prison. "I believe that this will be, if we do it the right way, one of the lasting legacies of this administration," Christie said at a news conference at the Rescue Mission of Trenton.

Calling addiction a treatable disease, Gov. Christie said Thursday that he would mandate treatment for nonviolent criminals with drug dependence, a program that would take at least a year to start. In the meantime, Christie would offer yearlong drug treatment to 1,000 to 1,500 low-level offenders now in prison. "I believe that this will be, if we do it the right way, one of the lasting legacies of this administration," Christie said at a news conference at the Rescue Mission of Trenton.

So far this year, about 20 people have been murdered in Philadelphia, killed in acts of rage and stupidity, ego and revenge, and whatever else motivates one person to take another's life. A 30-year-old man in Juniata allegedly shot at seven teenagers sitting in a car, killing three. The boys allegedly planned to fight the supposed shooter's stepsons. Over the weekend, a recent Temple University graduate was savagely beaten to death in Old City by a carload of thugs who police say may have thought the man was cursing them out. Less publicized, though equally tragic, were the stabbing deaths of a man and woman in South Philadelphia, and the fatal shootings of a North Philadelphia man and teenagers in Strawberry Mansion and Olney.

  SHOCKED and angered by the senseless shooting deaths of three teenage boys in Juniata Park last week, Mayor Nutter asked: "Can we be nonviolent for just one day in this city?" After a weekend in which a young man was beaten to death by thugs in Old City - the 20th homicide of the new year - maybe today, Martin Luther King Jr. Day, will be that nonviolent day. About 85,000 Philadelphians will volunteer citywide, and Nutter will speak at a 4 p.m. community anti-violence meeting at Bethel Temple Community Bible Church, on Allegheny Avenue near Ella Street in Kensington.

A bill under consideration in Harrisburg would give more of the state's ex-offenders a clean slate and a needed second chance to become productive citizens. Expected to be brought to a vote early next year, the bill would allow records of convictions for low-level offenses - such as shoplifting, check fraud, drug possession, and other nonviolent misdemeanors - to be expunged. The measure would allow a judge to expunge records of third-degree convictions for those who have gone arrest-free for at least seven years.

Gov. Christie said Monday that he wants to divert nonviolent drug offenders from prison and into rehabilitative programs, a move expected to save money and help lower the recidivism rate. During a visit to Camden, the governor signed an executive order to expand the state's drug-court program and to create a task force to centralize the state's prisoner-reentry efforts and determine what barriers exist for inmates upon release. The governor also wants to create a recidivism database that tracks the success of reentry programs.

Born in St. Louis, raised in Tredyffrin, educated at the University of Chicago and Stanford University Law School, Philadelphia lawyer Larry Krasner, 50, is a longtime advocate for free-speech movements. The son of a Jewish father who wrote murder mysteries and a mother who was a Methodist minister, Krasner has respect for underdogs and the civil-disobedience traditions of Mohandas K. Gandhi and the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Working pro bono and "low-bono," as he calls it, he has represented, directly and indirectly, about 1,000 activists of every stripe.

LOS ANGELES - When Occupy LA demonstrators recently proclaimed a downtown intersection "our street," police watched as annoyed drivers honked horns and tried to maneuver around gyrating protesters. Officers only moved in after the third intersection takeover - telling protesters they had to quit or face arrest. The activists turned around and marched back to camp chanting slogans. That has not happened in some other cities and may not have been possible in Los Angeles that long ago. Occupy LA, a 485-tent camp surrounding City Hall, has marched to a different beat in its drum circle after protesters, police, and city officials established a relationship based on dialogues instead of dictates.