The Spiritual and the Political in Gandhi’s Philosophy.

Establishing a positive relationship between the spiritual and the political, between the pursuit of moksha and that of artha, has been one of Gandhi’s major contributions to political philosophy. He was helped in this by the theory of the purusharthas. The four purusharthas, in his view, were best understood as interacting with one another rather than counteracting each other. Interpreters in the past had little difficulty in defending the need for the ethical (dharma) to interact positively with the spiritual (moksha). However, they were not willing to concede a similar role to the political (artha). Going beyond them, Gandhi sought to establish a positive relationship not only between the ethical and the spiritual, but also between the political and the spiritual. In what follows I shall first give a brief account of what he meant by the spiritual. This will be followed by an analysis of his concept of the political. Next I shall examine the three means that he believed were needed for the maintenance of the right relationship between the political and the spiritual, viz., prayer, virtue and training. I shall conclude by comparing his conception of the relationship between the spiritual and the political with that of contemporary South Asian Islamic fundamentalism. The point of the comparison is to highlight the fact that not all theories that promote a close relationship between the political and the spiritual, ipso facto, promote peace and amity in the world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]