Gandhi: A Spiritual Biography

Arvind Sharma, author of many books on various aspects of Hinduism especially that of Advaita Vedanta, has a new book scheduled for release at the end of July. This time Professor Sharma presents us with Gandhi: A Spiritual Biography. The reference to the influence of Theosophy on Gandhi’s spiritual development is perfunctory, mentioning briefly Blavatsky’s Theosophical Society and that he had read Blavatsky’s Key to Theosophy “at the insistence of some Theosophist friends and remarks that the book stimulated in him the desire to read books on Hinduism.” Two theosophists, “who happened to be related,” invited him toward the end of his second year in London to read the Bhagavad Gita with them in its English translation by Edwin Arnold, The Song Celestial. The book would become the cornerstone of his philosophy. Sharma comments:

Thus we encounter here once more an illustration of the archetype of the “stranger” (or in this case “strangers”), who reveals the treasure hidden at one’s own hearth.

Gandhi: A Spiritual Biography is published by Yale University Press.