Mahatma Gandhi

Your first link doesn't work.

I don't deny it is a fierce debate between INFJs and INFPs for him because both sides want him. He started out as a religious and ended up as a secularist, so his early studies and practices tell us very little about him. But nobody denies he was reserved, and nobody denies he was idealistic, where the contention comes in is with the J and P. Was he Fi dominant or Ni dominant? I think his entire life deomonstrates a person who could forsee the patterns and predict the best course of action, so I argue that he was an INFJ.
 
Satya said:
Your first link doesn't work.

I don't deny it is a fierce debate between INFJs and INFPs for him because both sides want him. He started out as a religious and ended up as a secularist, so his early studies and practices tell us very little about him. But nobody denies he was reserved, and nobody denies he was idealistic, where the contention comes in is with the J and P. Was he Fi dominant or Ni dominant? I think his entire life deomonstrates a person who could forsee the patterns and predict the best course of action, so I argue that he was an INFJ.

SAME. He will always be an INFJ to me. *bows and worships (exactly what he wouldn't want happen to him)*
 
Here's the correct link: I hope this one works! If not, then just go to infjorinfp.com and scroll down the pull-down menu to the entry "Gandhi." http://www.infjorinfp.com/docs/Gandhi.htm

But I'm not going to agrue the point any further. Why? Not only because we INFJs are so darned decided that changing our minds can be a herculean effort, but because everyone has their role models who we like to believe are like ourselves in some fundamental way. I think INFJs are particularly attached to that idea. And Gandhi's such a biggie: Giving him up would be like giving up that oft-quoted "we're rarest personality type" claim: Not gonna happen!
 
I lied. I'm not done yet. One more thing....

If someone could write out evidence of Gandhi preferring Introverted Intuition, Extraverted Feeling, Introverted Thinking, and Extraverted Sensing (yes, all of them!), I might be more convinced.

Anyone care to try?

I'll work on the same for the INFP code.
 
Elizabeth said:
Here's the correct link: I hope this one works! If not, then just go to infjorinfp.com and scroll down the pull-down menu to the entry "Gandhi." http://www.infjorinfp.com/docs/Gandhi.htm

But I'm not going to agrue the point any further. Why? Not only because we INFJs are so darned decided that changing our minds can be a herculean effort, but because everyone has their role models who we like to believe are like ourselves in some fundamental way. I think INFJs are particularly attached to that idea. And Gandhi's such a biggie: Giving him up would be like giving up that oft-quoted "we're rarest personality type" claim: Not gonna happen!

Nice link.

Always argue. Hasn't anyone ever told you the point of arguing is to lose? I was just kidding on my previous post. lol...

He does display many INFP qualities, but inferior Te doesn't fit him well.

We also must consider that he was very mature and is close to a balance. He displays strong willpower and sense of finality when he fasts and in other decisions he makes. That makes me think he is more J, but a lot of his quotes are quite INFP.
 
sriv said:
...He displays strong willpower and sense of finality when he fasts and in other decisions he makes. That makes me think he is more J...

I agree! You know why? Because Introverted Feeling is....drumroll please....a judging function!Who says that INFPs can't have strong convictions to which they remain true? From what I've read, and from experience, that's very much an INFP trait. A "P" in a type code does not indicate "spineless wimp here!" Ever encounter an INFP with a cause? Their Fi becomes an inner pillar of steel.

And as for the Te, Gandhi was educated as a lawyer. Law is quite a Te career, isn't it? Yes, Te is INFP's inferior function, but "inferior" doesn't mean "cannot ever be accessed." It's also the aspirational function, something that, deep down, we really, really want to be good at. Example: My inferior/aspirational function is Extraverted Sensing. I've had an interest in the performing arts since I was very young. I was not only the first chair flute in my high school band, I was also the assistant conductor! I even went to an acting school for a while (and was in the same class as Scarlett Johansson...don't ask). If I can tap into my inferior function like that, why couldn't Gandhi?

Gandhi's law career had a very NF slant, of course. In "Please Understand Me II," David Keirsey recounts an incident in which Gandhi settled a bitter dispute between two businessmen, and quotes him as saying (paraphrasing here, can't find the book right now) that he was filled with joy at the outcome, because he had discovered the true purpose of law: To reconcile the hearts of men.

Reconcile the hearts of men. Reconciling. Healing. Keirsey calls the INFP the "Healer." Linda Berens and Dario Nardi call the INFP the "Harmonizer Clarifier."

As for the Ne/Si thing, here's a quote from Gandhi from another page on the website to which I linked:

"When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love has always won. There have been tyrants and murderers and for a time they seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall -- think of it, ALWAYS."

See what's happening here? He's pointing out a pattern. I've been reading Lenore Thomson lately, and she refers to Ne as a function that looks for patterns, not within, but in the world at large. Si, according to Berens and Nardi, is a function that "compar[es] and contrast the current situation with similar ones." And furthermore, "The process also involves reviewing the past to draw on the lessons of history, hindsight, and experience." That's just what Gandhi's doing there!


Okay...that's all I can manage for now. More thoughts later, if I have anymore Ni "A-ha" moments!
 
Great points. I'll concede and settle with INFp.
 
Yah, the INFPs can have him. We still have Martin Luther King and Mother Teresa. And i have absolutely no doubt that MLK is an INFJ simply because of his speeches, his approach to life, and what his family has said about him. Plus come on, "I have a dream..." is about as Ni dominant as you can get.
 
Holy Toledo! I've convinced other people of something! This is a happy day. :D

I agree about MLK - I can definitely see INFJ prefs there.
 
Nah ghandi was OBVIOUSLY an ENTP... Doesn't anybody remember his speech calling for genocide, mass slaughter of the weegily whumpers? and then Declaring war on the British before passing out in the street? To general acclaim of course.
 
Gandhi was an INFP and deep down you all know it! So there!
 
Mahatma Gandhi was a pervert - according to his biographer

http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/books/gandhis-sex-life-laid-bare-in-new-book-20100426-tn6t.html
Gandhi's sex life laid bare in new book

NEW DELHI

April 27, 2010

A new book on Mahatma Gandhi has delved into the intimate life of the Indian icon whose famous vow of chastity did not prevent him sleeping with naked women and conducting bizarre sex "experiments".
Gandhi: Naked Ambition by British historian Jad Adams sheds new light on the spiritual leader and independence hero whose spartan existence and resistance to earthly pleasures are an integral part of his popular image.
The book has been released in Britain and will be available soon in India where it is bound to make waves in a country where Gandhi's image is fiercely protected and a source of national pride.
Advertisement: Story continues below
That his attitudes to sex were censorious and unusual is well known. He wrote of his disgust at himself for having intercourse with his wife Kasturba, aged 15, when his father died in 1885.
In later life, having fathered four children, he forbade even married couples in his ashram retreats from having sex and lectured men on the need to take a cold bath when they felt lustful.
More than 60 years after Gandhi's death, Adams has gone through hundreds of pages of his writings and eyewitness accounts to build a behind-closed-doors picture of a man considered both a saint and the father of the nation in India.
"One of things you find about Gandhi is how much he wrote about sex," Adams said by telephone from his home in London.
"When we look at his sexuality, what happens is that he has a perfectly normal sex life for the first part of his life, one that would be recognisable to almost anyone in the world.
"He gets married and has a family of four.
"But what interested me was that he made a decision that it would be a good idea to be chaste (in 1900). Six years later, he makes a vow and puts it into practice."
But contrary to the image of the abstemious Hindu ascetic, in later life Gandhi frequently bathed with nubile young women, had nude massages and often shared a bed with one or more of his followers, Adams' book said.
Adams says he has no evidence that Gandhi broke his vow of chastity with any of the women, though he was defining the idea in a rather limited way.
"He's talking about penetration. However he's defining sex so narrowly that he's ignoring a lot of activities that many people would consider sensual, if not actively sexual.
"My interpretation is that he was expecting these women to try to stimulate him sexually in order that he could demonstrate his resistance."
The sister of Gandhi's secretary, Sushila Nayar, was one of the women who took part, as was his 18-year-old grandniece, Manu.
In other cases, the wives of men in his ashram were called upon to share his bed, even though they were forbidden to sleep with their husbands, leading to complaints from some of his most devoted male followers.
Adams believes the "experiments" were like a game of striptease in which there was non-contact sexual activity.
"He wanted to see if sex could be controlled because he felt it was such a powerful force," he said.
Gandhi's views and activities - he also believed in conserving his semen, which he saw as a source of spiritual energy - did not endear him to fellow independence leader and India's first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru.
"Nehru considered them abnormal and completely distanced himself from Gandhi's behaviour," Adams said.
And what of Gandhi's long-suffering wife Kasturba, whom he married when he was 13?
As with his long absences abroad, his sometimes indifferent treatment of his children and frequent extreme fasts, she appears to have gone along with the chastity and sex experiments, albeit reluctantly.
"She didn't give much credit to the restrictions on eating or seemingly any of the things that he did, but she went along with them because she was a devoted and devout Hindu wife," said Adams.
The author says that Gandhi's practices were commonly discussed when he was alive but after his assassination in 1948 the details were glossed over in his elevation to the stature of national icon.
"I don't think that an understanding of any individual's sexuality necessarily casts them in a poor light. To suggest it does implies a negative view of sex, which I don't have," he said.
Adams is a visiting research fellow at London University and has previously written biographies of British politician Tony Benn, pioneering British feminist Emmeline Pankhurst and India's Nehru dynasty.
AFP
other articles:
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-e...the-truth-about-gandhis-sex-life-1937411.html

http://rupeenews.com/2007/12/25/six-stories-of-mohandas-gandhi-his-failures-sexual-perversion/
 
Last edited:
Yah, the INFPs can have him. We still have Martin Luther King and Mother Teresa. And i have absolutely no doubt that MLK is an INFJ simply because of his speeches, his approach to life, and what his family has said about him. Plus come on, "I have a dream..." is about as Ni dominant as you can get.

Indian INFJ here, Gandhi wasn't that good actually if you take close look at him. And few things about him just don't look INFJish. Like an INFJ feels guilt of their wrong doings very intensly and quickly but Gandhi, at times, kept doing wrong doing. And he was very devoted to his beliefs but an INFJ is more realistic and concerned with truth.
Regarding, his Te, let me tell you his father was a natural administrator so we can assume he was a Te user. This could have led Gandhi to learn Te ways (it happened to me, my father is entj).
But two things that still I can't explain about Gandhi being Non-INFJ is his plans and his autobiography. His plans were detailed along the lines of Big picture which gives an impression of Ni
And his biography, People praise Gandhi for being honest in his biography (I will admit I haven't read any of his books yet so this opinion is based on general thinking of public) but as INFJ I can see it is not actually a big thing. You can choose the bad things you would like to show to public. And of course there are two types of bad things- one that can be accepted by society (like theft) and one that cannot (incest, it's just an example by the way, I am implying nothing here). If I have done both in my life (theft and incest) I may write about theft in my autobiography but not incest. You see how easily it can be faked. You just have to add acceptable bad things in your autobiography to make it real. And in my personal opinion, a person should actually never tell all the dark truths about him, both for his sake and society's.
So, regarding his autobiography, I will say Gandhi was either dishonest or a fool
 
Back
Top