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INTRODUCTION
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7. JAINISM Last of all Gandhi takes up the Jaina system of philosophy, a system he himself espouses. As noted earlier, it is in this connection that Gandhi enumerates the four questions regarded by him as basic to all philosophical investigation. The questions are :
(1) What is the nature of the universe ? (2) What is the nature of God ? (3) What is the nature and what the destiny of
soul ? (4) What are the laws of the soul's life? Gandhi's account of the Jaina answer to these four questions is worthy of a most serious consideration. For here we have a fine illustration of Gandhi's inexhaustible capacity to make the Jaina positions comprehensible to a non-Jaina audience ; (and so far as his published lectures are concerned Gandhi was always addressing a non-Jaina audience--and a non-Jaina Western audience at that). Gandhi's 'four questions' clearly prove that his understanding of what constitutes a philosophical investigation was truly all-comprehensive. Thus he would expect a philosophical system to touch upon the problems of metaphysics, psychology, ethics, as well as religion. Of course, Gandhi knew (and the present lecture-series is an evidence thereof) that not all philosophical systems are equally interested in discussing these various generic types of problems, but he was convinced-perhaps, rightly—that the neglect of any of these types of problems on the part of a philosophical system is bound to affect the soundness of its final findings.
It is hoped that this preliminary introduction to Gandhi's lecture-series on the systems of Indian Philosophy will help the reader in viewing it in a proper perspective.
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