Scholars will forever debate the role Mahatma Gandhi played in history: his campaign to kick the British out of India; his inspiration of the American Civil Rights Movement. Boring. Let's talk about his sex life!

According to a new biography by Joseph Lelyveld, Mahatma Gandhi used to sleep (chastely!) with naked ladies, but the real apple of his eye was a hunky German-Jewish bodybuilder named Hermann Kallenbach.

From the Wall Street Journal:

Yet as Mr. Lelyveld makes abundantly clear, Gandhi's organ probably only rarely became aroused with his naked young ladies, because the love of his life was a German-Jewish architect and bodybuilder, Hermann Kallenbach, for whom Gandhi left his wife in 1908. "Your portrait (the only one) stands on my mantelpiece in my bedroom," he wrote to Kallenbach. "The mantelpiece is opposite to the bed." For some reason, cotton wool and Vaseline were "a constant reminder" of Kallenbach, which Mr. Lelyveld believes might relate to the enemas Gandhi gave himself, although there could be other, less generous, explanations.

Gandhi wrote to Kallenbach about "how completely you have taken possession of my body. This is slavery with a vengeance." Gandhi nicknamed himself "Upper House" and Kallenbach "Lower House," and he made Lower House promise not to "look lustfully upon any woman." The two then pledged "more love, and yet more love . . . such love as they hope the world has not yet seen."

Ah, the old "Lower House" and "Upper House" pickup line. It was his favorite right after "An eye for an eye and the whole world goes blind... what's your sign?"

[Image of a young Gandhi and Hermann Kallenbach via Wikipedia]