Ruler / statesman · Contemporary
Mohandas K. Gandhi
1869–1948 · Satyagraha (non-violent resistance)
A devout Hindu who revered the Sermon on the Mount and Tolstoy, and held all religions to be true.
Gandhi led India's independence movement by satyagraha, “truth-force,” a disciplined non-violence rooted in ahimsa, vows of poverty and chastity, fasting and prayer; he insisted that means are ends in the making, fought untouchability, and distrusted modern industrial civilization in favor of the self-governing village. “Truth is God” was his final creed.
Why he matters: His non-violence shaped Dorothy Day, Thomas Merton and the Catholic peace tradition (Gaudium et Spes 78), John Paul II prayed at his memorial at Raj Ghat in 1986, and Nostra Aetate 2 commends what is true and holy in Hinduism; he is also a test of what Dominus Iesus says about the uniqueness of Christ.
Where to be careful
His religious pluralism (“all religions are true”) is the indifferentism rejected in Mirari Vos and Dominus Iesus 4 and 22; his belief in reincarnation and an impersonal Absolute sits against CCC 1013 and Dei Filius; his austerities toward the body (brahmacharya even within marriage) go beyond, and sometimes against, the Church's teaching on the goodness of marriage.
Reading
-
An Autobiography: The Story of My Experiments with TruthM. K. Gandhi · His own account of his formation.
-
Hind SwarajM. K. Gandhi · The short, radical critique of modern civilization.
-
Gandhi on Non-Violenceed. Thomas Merton · A Catholic monk's selection and introduction.
Documented positions
Where this thinker stands on each dispute the test covers.