ABSTRACT
The concept of Truth (Satya) is fundamental to the thought of Gandhi. It is not without significance that the sub-title of his autobiography is ‘The Story of my experiments with Truth’, and his whole life might well be interpreted as an attempt to live in accordance with or an existential quest for Truth. Followers of Gandhi explicitly maintain that he was essentially a practical man with no concern for metaphysics or philosophical speculation, yet it is clear that whenever he attempted to explain what he meant by Truth he was involved in metaphysical speculation whether he or his followers realized it or not. My contention is that the unity of Gandhi’s thought and the interrelatedness of the various aspects of his teaching spring from firmly-held metaphysical beliefs and that the nature of these beliefs become very much apparent when he expounds what he means by Truth. I am not suggesting that he arrives at the meaning of Truth as the result of philosophical or metaphysical speculation in a vacuum. He is not a neutral observer who first learns to define Truth and then applies it to different aspects of life. Rather he is a participant in a form of life and the meaning of Truth for him is made apparent from the way in which it is used in that form of life.
