The Story of My Experiments with Truth Summary

Introduction

"The Story of My Experiments with Truth" is a book written by Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, who is also known as Mahatma Gandhi. In particular, this book is an autobiography of Mahatma Gandhi, but Mahatma Gandhi discards any opinions and ideas which express this book as an autobiography because his purpose is not to show or picture him in this book but to show truths that evolve over time. Originally this book was written in Gujarati and later translated into English and other languages.

The original name of this book is "Sathiya Sodhani," which means "My Experiments with Truth." This book was written by Mahatma Gandhi by coerce (pressure) of his closest friend "Swami Anand," who had become his (Gandhi's) literary manager. This book was published in a journal that was weekly published between 1925 and 1929, and the name of that weekly report was "Navjivan." Through this book, we learn about the experimental roots of Mahatma Gandhi's professional activism; Mahatma Gandhi also explains morality and spirituality and how this book mostly strays from politics. This book has been considered one of the most impressive spiritual works of the 19th century.

Some Words about Mahatma Gandhi

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, also known as Mahatma Gandhi, was born on 2nd October 1869 in Porbandar (Gujarat), India; he was a lawyer, politician, social reformer, and writer who became the leader of the nationalist movements that were raised against the British rule in India. He is also known as the father of India; Mahatma Gandhi is recognized for his principles of non-violent protests against British rule in India to obtain social and political progress.

There are thousands of followers of Mahatma Gandhi in India and worldwide; the literal meaning of Mahatma is "Great Soul." At the time of his death, a great number of faithful people gathered to see him; he wrote some woes of Mahatmas that are only known to the Mahatmas. He died on 30th January 1948 in Delhi; his fame spread worldwide during his lifetime and only increased after his death; now, the whole world knows him as Mahatma Gandhi.

Explanation

The start of this book explains the childhood and adult life of Mahatma Gandhi in Rajkot and Porbandar; he says that he used to eat meat and used to live a hedonistic lifestyle; he also says that he used to steal and drink very often, but he now aspires to redeem himself. He describes some of his favorite books, which include the plays Harishchandra and Shravana Pitrabhakti Nataka, a play in which Shravana has a deep respect for his parents, which inspired Gandhi Ji to do the same for his parents. Due to the practice of child marriage at those times, Gandhi Ji married when he was just thirteen; he regretted this for his whole life and called this act "preposterously early" and fully recriminating its moral bases. Gandhi Ji explained that when he (Gandhi) was young, his father (Karamchand Gandhi) died.

After his father's death, a family friend suggested that Gandhi Ji may study abroad in England. But for some reason, he could not go to London and studied at the local college of Bhavnagar, Samaldas College; he only studied there for one semester and then went to England to study law in 1888. He explains that his mother tried to stop him by saying that he would become addicted to alcohol, meat, and women in England, but Gandhi ji took a vow that he would never do such things and left for England; then he completed his studies for law in 1891 and also cleared the exams for a barrister, and enrolled in the Indian courts for a lawyer in 1893.

Once Gandhi Ji got back to India, he got under-confident in his decision to practice law because his education and credentials in law failed to restore and stop some mistakes that were made by him and his family members. He tried to prove legal relations between an acquaintance and his brother, but the condition got worse than before. The person whom Gandhi Ji called 'acquaintance' then became a political agent for England, which revealed that he was in charge of deciding the outcome of that legal appeal in which they were all involved some time ago; then Gandhi Ji decided to move to South Africa to accept an offer of work from a law firm for a complicated and lengthy case. After living there for one year, Gandhi Ji then decided to stay there and work for the welfare of the people; he stayed there till 1914, just two weeks before the beginning of the First World War.

When the First World War started in 1914, Gandhi Ji suddenly started to ask Indian citizens to participate in this war. When Gandhi Ji believed in nonviolent and religious tolerance, his followers fell in love with Gandhi ji based on his speeches advocating pacifism. That's why his sudden belief in the war got his followers confused.

Finding his work unseemly, Gandhi ji returned to India in 1915; in India, he continued to work as a public lawyer for the people of India. But this time, Gandhi Ji had a good reputation in South Africa for his social work and had more choices about the type of work he could do in India; Gandhi Ji worked on the civil disobedience movement, which became a leading advocate for nonviolent resistance.

Gandhi Ji explains that the work he has done all his life till now is the result of continuously taming his destructive passions; he also explains that the greed or desire for power exists in every human being by which that human gets ignorant, greedy, and violent. He says the desire to control people is much more harmful than physical war or violence. He describes that there is only one way to find salvation, and that is: by rejecting these impulses, pursuing a spiritual and virtuous life, and possessing tolerance for this world.

In the final section of this book, Gandhi Ji writes that he never thought that his writings would be considered autobiographical; he also hopes that the readers of this book will look past the style imputed to his work and readers will make good use of his experiences to produce insight into their own pasts and learn concepts of truth. According to Gandhi ji, the idea of truth is a process for developing a mind and concept of the world that always evolves; this concept of an ever-evolving process of having a mindset about the world, despite the studies of a static subject or object, is the central idea of Gandhi Ji's book.

Conclusion

The book, "My Experiments with Truth," is considered an autobiography of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, which was written by Gandhi Ji itself and published in 1993; Gandhi Ji is known as Mahatma, which literally means Great Soul. In this book, he describes the story of his childhood and onwards, how he gets the principles of his life, i.e., practices of nonviolence and resisting the rule of the British in India. In his lifetime Gandhi ji succeeded in inspiring the people of India to push back British Empire and proceed to the independence of India. In this book, Gandhi Ji explains moral messages to his readers; apart from his political beliefs and principles, Gandhi Ji discussed the Saint's outlook on his life, his vegetarianism, and self-discipline, his restrain to violence, his development in spirituality, and time in London (England).

Some Facts about Mahatma Gandhi

• When Gandhi Ji was young, he was so shy that he returned home early from school to avoid talking to other students.
• The United Nations declared the 2nd of October (the birth date of Mahatma Gandhi) as the International Day of Nonviolence in 2007.
• Mahatma Gandhi was nominated for Nobel Peace Prize five times, but due to several reasons, he didn't get any.
• In 1930 Mahatma Gandhi was selected as the "Person of the Year" by Time Magazine.
• Mahatma Gandhi took his vow of celibacy when he had four sons.