E-Book - Mahatma Gandhi

82 Contextualising Gandhian Thoughtpursuit of a lifelong moral and spiritual struggle. In his views,the moksha could not be postponed the last stage of life, viz.,sanyasa rather it should be integrated in the day to day lifepattern of an individual. Fourth, as a votary of the commonman, he was firmly of the opinion that the pursuit of mokshacould not be reserved for a select few. Hence, for him,participation in the phenomenal world and pursuit of mokshawas not only in consonance, rather, that is, only way to test itsefficacy. In fact, he went a step further and even expressed hisstrong disenchantment with their isolated style of life of yogisand their gross indifference to the problems of the mundaneworld. As he puts it:‘The truth is that those whom the world knows as yogisare not really yogis; nor what the world describes as fourmodes of liberation or spiritual enlightenment are such in fact.These phrases are used merely to deceive the world’. 22It is clear from the above that Gandhi was neverirreverent to yogis on a personal level, but he remainedskeptical about their contributions to the solutions of themundane problems, as they usually remained cut-off from thehustle and bustle of the phenomenal world. He did not reposehis faith in the concept of jivanmukta either. He had his ownarguments in favour of such a formulation. One, that so long asone remains embodied, some violence is found to be committedand even an iota of violence could deprive one from theattainment of moksha. Alternatively, if one is totally devoid ofegoistic attachment, then the body could hardly survive. Andthat is why he strongly believed that no one could attainmoksha so long as one is embodied. Thus, he avoided both theextremes: that of yogis claiming to be jivanmukta with this verybody and the claim that pursuit of moksha is an affair of the lastphase of one’s life. He took moksha as a life long pursuit whileparticipating in the mundane affairs.