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Gandhi's Reflective and Dialogical Approach to Search for the Truth

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Gandhi's Reflective and Dialogical Approach to Search for the Truth PERSPECTIVES emerging in a social process (Juergens- Gandhi’s Refl ective and meyer 2003). He noted that atma-darshan (self-refl ection) was a motivating force Dialogical Approach to for his involvement in public activities in South Africa in the early 1890s. His inter- Search for the Truth action with Christian missionaries and reading of Leo Tolstoy and John Ruskin’s books opened a vista to the notion of Ghanshyam Shah universal love (Gandhi 1927: 146–47). His experiments on his own self were Gandhi’s search for truth with ne’s lifeworld is constituted of his path to discover Truth. He believed constant self-introspection led a consciously or unconsciously that “Caged as we all are in our own him to admit his own Oimbibed value system about exclusive pride of limited truths.” In the oneself as well as others through sociali- last paragraph of his autobiography, My misconceptions and errors. sation. It is “the reservoir of implicitly Experiments with Truth, a self-narrative His path of self-refl ection and known traditions, the background as- of experiments (self-searching) with dialogue among different views sumptions that are embedded in language truth, he observed, and culture and drawn upon by individ- are the need of the time, to Ever since my return to India I have had ex- uals in everyday life” (Cohen and Arato periences of the dormant passions lying hid- fi nd deliberative ways to 1992: 427). It is also the source of defi ni- den with me. The knowledge of them has resolve confl icts. tions of the situation; and is the reposi- made me feel humiliated though not defeat- tory of the interpretive work of social ed. The experiences and experiments have sustained me. (Gandhi 1927: 464) thinkers as well as of past generations. Refl ective thinking begins with the In its preface, he underlined, availability of different kinds of experi- I claim nothing (more for the experiments) ences, cognitive know ledge, and inter- than does a scientist who, though he con- actions with people of different lifeworlds cludes his experiment with the utmost and world views. This provides a possibility accuracy, forethought, and minuteness, nev- er claims any fi nality about his conclusion, to refl ect on one’s lifeworld assumptions, but keeps an open mind regarding them … categories, value system, and also cognitive I am far from claiming any fi nality or infalli- dissonance. In the process of refl ective bility about my conclusion. (Gandhi 1927: 2; critical thinking, one begins interrogating emphasis added) one’s own lifeworld, gets engaged into He was constantly interrogating himself dialogue with one’s own self and others, and believed that inward growth was including ideologically holding opposite unending even (as a believer of the soul) positions on perception and interpretation “with the dissolution of his body” (CWMG, of rea lity (present and historical) and Vol 61, p 24). He declined to be a slave to normative values. This enables one to be precedents or practice which he could not free from dogmatism and get engaged in a “understand or defend on a moral basis” search for alternative explanations of a (CWMG, Vol 23, p 467). With such spirit, phenomenon, moral principles, and values he often admitted his mistakes and underpinning one’s vision for society modifi ed views and subsequent actions. and its transformation for common good Gandhi’s early lifeworld was shaped (Habermas 1984). through his socialisation in the upper-caste M K Gandhi was primarily a man of milieu in mid-19th-century Saurashtra. This is a revised version of a lecture delivered praxis. He had gradually developed a He belonged to a savarna (upper caste) at the Central University of Gujarat, Gandhinaga on 8 January 2019, and vision for an ideal non-exploitative society trading community. His father was a M S University of Baroda on 8 March 2019. with an individual autonomy embedded Dewan (chief minister) to princely states. I thank Rajeev Bhargava for his comments on in moral principles. Self-introspection in Most of his jati members were following the earlier draft of the paper. his own lifeworld coupled with refl ective the Vaishnava sect. His mother, besides Ghanshyam Shah (ghanshyam.shah2008@ thinking based on his experiences and following Vaishnava rituals, was also gmail.com) is an independent researcher based dialogue with himself as well as others following the Paranmi sect which has a in Ahmedabad and former professor, had been Gandhi’s path to search for the synergetic belief system of Hindu bhakti Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. Truth to deal with unfolding contradictions and Islam Sufi traditions. Jain monks who 38 MAy 9, 2020 vol lV no 19 EPW Economic & Political Weekly PERSPECTIVES were often visiting the family also had an civilisation in the context of classifi cation of self-respect and later equality. In the impact on him. His family ethos and school of human society in the categories of civil- process, his views on Africans had under- education shaped his religious sensitivity isation. This discourse was initiated by gone changes. In 1939, he asserted that and moral values. He was an obedient Western intellectuals. It was essentially Africans, as well as Indians, needed to child, carrying out the orders of the elders, an Occidental concept placing Western be placed on an absolutely equal footing “not to scan their actions” (Gandhi 1927: society of the post-Enlightenment as with Europeans. He pleaded for the unity 6). Popular stories with moral messages— superior to earlier societies or “more prim- of all the exploited races of the earth to speak and stand for Truth, be compas- itive” contemporary ones in other parts (CWMG, Vol 90, 366). sionate, be magnanimous, be repentant of the world (Elias 1994: 5). Some admin- Gandhi also had undergone a change for mistakes, etc—deeply infl uenced the istrators and Christian missionaries work- in his views on Western civilisation. young mind. He tried these moral lessons ing in India imagined Indian society to be Earlier in Hind Swaraj (1909), he asserted by putting them into practice in everyday static and advocated its change. There was that Indians have “nothing to learn from life. During his childhood, he introspected a widely prevalent notion among this elite anybody else.” Later, he confessed that several times about his actions, admitted (including self-styled modernist Indians) “I have learned a lot from the West” blunders, repented for wrong action and that it was the white man’s burden to (Parel 1997: 67). In 1936, he compared tried to improve his behaviour. In his au- civilise, that is, modernise the Indian London to our Mecca or Kashi. However, tobiography, he writes, “one thing took natives. Western indologists of that period the grip of cultural essentialism domi- deep root in me—the conviction that conceptualised the Indian subcontinent nated his worldview throughout his life morality is the basis of things, and that as Hindu civilisation. Some of them and (Shah 2013). His imagination of Indian truth is the substance of all morality” Brahmin elite social reformers projected civilisation was essentially Brahminical (Gandhi 1927: 29). At a later stage, golden days of Vedic India with its pris- as conceived by European and Indian he reformulated “God is the Truth” as tine beauty of village society. They ro- Indologists. It was largely manifested in “Truth is God.” His search for truth was manticised ancient Indian culture. his notion of Indian “tradition” embedded both cognitive as fact/reality perceived Gandhi inhaled such Brahminical dis- in the Varna and caste system. He believed by himself as well as intuitive as inner course from his childhood and that had in the Varna system as an ideal social voice and experimental in relation to become the core content of his lifeworld. order (Gandhi 1945: 52). “Varna thus con- social ethics (Puri 2015: 98). A section of the fi rst generation of ceived is no man-made institution but Western-educated upper-caste Gujaratis— the law of life universally governing the Civilisation and Indian Society social reformers and littérateurs—were human family … Varna reveals the law During his early ideological formations of a carrier of the discourse. Like others, of one’s being and thus the duty one has the fi rst three decades—the late 19th cen- Gandhi from his young age believed that to perform, it confers no right …” (Gandhi tury—two important public discourses Indian civilisation was unique: “the civi- 1962: 7). In his opinion, “Varnashrama, as were prominent on the nature of Indian lisation that India has evolved is not to I interpret it, satisfi es the religious, social society. This discourse had idea list (that is, be beaten in the world” (1909–39: 60). and economic needs of a community primacy to the idea) framework for social He believed that not only such culture (Gandhi 1962: 13–36).” At the same time, analysis, in which culture was the deter- existed during the golden Vedic period, he did not endorse scriptures or Puranas minant category. One of the discourses but it could also be recreated in the as the authority. In fact, he margin- was on the hierarchical caste-based present era if each individual becomes alised “the Sastras and deprived them social order imposing civil and economic morally upright and ethical. of their religious and moral authority” restrictions on lower castes. This was When he went to South Africa in (Parekh 1997). protested by several non-Brahmin and a 1893, at the age of 23 to serve as a legal When he encountered the ground re- few Brahmin saints. The Bhakti move- counsel to an Indian merchant, like ality on caste and discrimination, he was ment preached the idea of equality before other Indians he was embedded with often uncomfortable to deal with the sit- god.
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