Experiments with Theosophical Truth
This chapter argues that there is strong textual evidence to suggest that M. K. Gandhi’s notion of Hinduism, his specific view of Christianity, and his general belief that all religions refer to the same truth were shaped by the ideas of the Theosophical Society. The chapter presents the respective sources, discusses their plausibility, and puts these findings into perspective. This perspective is provided by a global history approach, which holds that the religious concepts in play since the nineteenth century were already products of globally “entangled histories.” Furthermore, it is argued that the impact of esotericism on global religious history, from the nineteenth to the early twentieth centuries, needs to be investigated with more academic rigor.