Philosophy in Siddhartha
Uploaded by littleindian on Nov 26, 2006
Through writing, Hermann Hesse was provided with a medium to spread Eastern Philosophy in a way that is more applicable to everyday life. In the passage on page 110 to page 111 in Siddhartha, Hesse writes how the foundation for the Buddhist religion was formed. The passage describes the scene where Siddhartha looks into the Gaya River and reaches enlightenment. In enlightenment, he discovers how life is unified. This description is historically accurate and Hesse develops this concept in a way that is easier to understand (Buddha.)
Prior to the passage, Hesse describes a scene where Siddhartha is sitting on the bank of the river, observing how the water flows in unison. He then listens to the river and hears it laughing. The passage describes how Vasudeva helped Siddhartha to hear everything the river has to say. When Siddhartha did so, the river spoke to him, telling him the origin of life and its significance. He saw pictures “of his father, his own picture, the picture of his son. [They] all flowed into each other. [Pictures of] Kamala, Govinda, and others emerged and passed on” (110) and heard “hundreds of voices, thousands of voices” (110.) The souls of individuals are represented by the pictures and voices which collectively merge to form one, unified system. The souls “flow” together towards a common goal (110), just like water in a river flows downstream. Individual voices, “voices of pleasure and sorrow, evil and good, laughing and lamenting” (110) blend together to form “the song of a thousand voices which consisted of one word: Om- perfection” (111). The effect the river has on the text is to metaphorically show how everything is unified in the Buddhist philosophy. On page 111, Siddhartha has gained “the serenity of knowledge” because he has found “salvation and is in harmony with the stream of events, the stream of life.” The word “stream” is repeated in the sentence twice adding to the river metaphor. “The stream of life” becomes an important phrase because it adds greatly to the river metaphor by saying all life is connected in a constant, unified flow.
In Siddhartha, Hesse portrayed a historically accurate beginning to Buddhism. He represented the abstract foundation to Buddhism in a clear manner. The river metaphor aided in the understanding of unity in...