Hermann Hesse

“ When he realised what Govinda had said Siddhartha woke as if he had been sleeping. Then, gently and with no mockery in his voice, he said, “Govinda, my friend, now you have taken the first step, now you have chosen your path. You have always been my friend, Govinda, you have always followed me one step behind. I have often asked myself whether Govinda would one day take a step of his own, without me, from his own soul. Now see, you have become a man and chosen your own way. I hope you will follow it to its end, my friend! I hope you will find liberation!” ”

“ I truly hope that I, too, will be able to look and to smile, to sit and to walk as he does, so free, so venerable, so hidden, so open, so child-like and private. It is only the man who has penetrated to his innermost self who is truly able to look and to walk in this way. I, too, will do my utmost to penetrate to my innermost self.
I have seen one man, Siddhartha thought, just one, to whom I had to lower my eyes. I will not lower my eyes to any other man, not anyone. I will not be drawn into any teachings, as I was not drawn into the teachings of this man. ”

“ As Govinda was thinking these things, things which his heart strongly resisted, he bowed to Siddhartha once again, drawn by love. He bowed deeply as Siddhartha sat peacefully.
“Siddhartha,” he said, “we have grown into old men. It seems hardly likely that either of us will see the other in his present form ever again. I see, my dear friend, that you have found peace. I admit that I have not. Give me another word, venerated one, give me something that I can grasp, something I can understand! Give me something to take as I go on my way. My way is often difficult, often dark, Siddhartha.” ”

“ If you would like to tell me something of this it would bring joy to my heart.”
“Yes,” said Siddhartha, “there are some things that I have thought from time to time, and some things that I have seen. There have been times when, for one hour or for one day, I have felt there is knowledge within me, just as it is possible to feel life in one’s heart. I have had many such thoughts, but I would find it very hard to tell you about them. Govinda, listen, here is one of the thoughts that I have found: wisdom cannot be taught. If a wise man tries to teach wisdom it will always sound like folly.” ”

“ That is why he had had to go out into the world, to lose himself in fun and power and women and money, had had to be a businessman, a gambler, a drinker and to be greedy, till the priest and the samana within him were dead. That is why he had had to continue to endure these years of loathsomeness, to bear the disgust, the emptiness, the meaninglessness, of a life that was lost and barren, right till the end, till the bitter doubt, till Siddhartha the sybarite, Siddhartha the greedy, was even ready to die. ”

“ All this, all this yellow and blue, river and wood, entered into Siddhartha through his eyes for the first time, it was no longer the sorcery of Mara, no longer the veil of maya, no longer the meaningless and random diversity of the world of delusion that the deep thinking brahmin despises, that the deep thinking brahmin scorns in his search for unity. Blue was blue, river was river, this was where the divine lived hidden, the blueness and the river lay within Siddhartha but this was how the divine showed itself and it was nonetheless one ”

“ I am capable of loving a stone, Govinda, and also a tree or a piece of bark. Those are things, and it is possible to love things. But it is not possible to love words. That is why teachings are not for me, they have no hardness, no softness, no colours, no edges, no smell, no taste, they have nothing but words. Maybe that is what is preventing you from finding peace, maybe it is all those words. As even redemption and virtue, even sansara and nirvana are nothing but words, Govinda. ”

“ Like the potter’s wheel that, once set turning, will continue long to turn, and only slowly will tire and lose its motion, the wheel of asceticism in Siddhartha’s soul, the wheel of thinking, the wheel of discernment, continued to turn and was still turning, but it turned slowly and hesitantly and was close to stopping. Slowly, like damp that soaks into the trunk of a dying tree, slowly filling it and making it decay, the world and apathy had insidiously soaked into Siddhartha’s soul, slowly filling it and making it heavy, making it tired. ”

“ Kamala, listen: if you throw a stone into water it drops quickly to the bottom by the fastest route it can. Siddhartha does nothing, he waits, he thinks, he fasts, but he goes through the things of the world like a stone through water without doing anything, without making any effort; he is drawn, he lets himself fall. His objective pulls him to itself, for he allows nothing into his soul that might work against his objective. That, Kamala, is what Siddhartha learnt among the samanas. That, Kamala, is what fools call magic in the supposition that it is performed by demons. ”

“ Until now, even when immersed in the deepest meditation, he had been his father’s son, a brahmin, a man of high status, a spiritual man. Now he was merely Siddhartha, the awoken one, nothing more. He drew in a deep breath, and for a moment he froze and shuddered. No-one was as alone as he was. No nobleman who did not belong among noblemen, no handworker who did not belong among handworkers but found refuge among them, sharing his life with theirs and speaking their language. ”

“ For Siddhartha now, these drives and greeds were no longer childish, he saw how they gave people life, he saw how people could achieve the infinite, how they could go on journeys, wage war, bear infinite sorrows, and he was able to love them for it, he saw life, he saw the living, he saw the indestructible, he saw Brahman in all their sorrows and all their actions. These people had a faith that was blind, blind was their strength and their tenderness, and that made them deserving of both love and of admiration. ”

“ Nothing has been and nothing will be; everything is, everything has its essence and its presence.”
Siddhartha spoke with delight, this elucidation had made him deeply happy. For was not, then, all suffering time, was not all self-torture and self-fear time, was not all difficulty, all hostility in the world expunged and overcome as soon a time has been overcome, as soon as time could be removed from our thoughts? He spoke with gleeful passion, but Vasudeva simple gave him a bright smile and nodded agreement, he nodded in silence, touched Siddhartha’s shoulder and went back to his work. ”

“ All that is thought with thoughts and can be spoken in words will be one-sided, all will be half, all will be lacking in wholeness, in roundness, in unity. When the noble Gotama spoke of the world in his teachings he had to divide it into sansara and nirvana, into delusion and truth, into suffering and liberation. He who wishes to be a teacher has no choice in the matter, there is no other path for him to follow. The world itself, though, that which exists around us and within us, is never one sided. ”

“ That very morning, as he left the grove of Jetavana, the grove of the noble one, already awaking, already on the way to himself, it was his intention, an intention that seemed to be natural and a matter of course, that he would bring his years of living as an ascetic to an end and return home to his father. But now, only now at this moment when he stopped walking as if a snake lay on the path in front of him, he awoke also to this insight: I am no longer the person I once was, I am no longer an ascetic, I am no longer a priest, I am no longer a brahmin. ”

“ He had learned to play with dice and on the chess board, to observe dancers, to be carried on a litter and to sleep on a soft bed. But he had always felt he was different from others, superior to them, he always looked on them with a touch of laughter, with a touch of jeering contempt, with that very contempt that a samana always feels for people of the world. When Kamaswami was in a bad mood, when he became quarrelsome, when he felt he had been treated badly, when he felt over-burdened with the worries of business, Siddhartha had always found it laughable. ”

“ You are certainly quite right, beliefs alone are not of great importance. But allow me to say one thing more: I have never for a moment had any doubts about you. I have never for a moment doubted that you are a buddha, that you have reached the end of your path, the highest objective that so many thousands of brahmins and brahmins’ sons pursue. You have found liberation from death. You have attained this by your own searching, by travelling your own path, by thought, by meditation, by knowledge, by enlightenment. You have not attained it by listening to the teachings of others! ”

“ No, the prospective buddha is already within the sinner, now and today, his future is all already there, within him, within you, within everyone is that which will be, that which is possible, that which is the hidden buddha to be honoured. The world, Govinda my friend, is not imperfect, nor is it trapped on a weary road to perfection: no, it has perfection in every glance of the eye, every sin contains mercy within it, every little child has the old man within it, every suckling has death within it, every dying man has eternal life within him. ”

“ Do you not bind him in the bondage of your love? Do you not shame him every day, making it more difficult for him with your goodness and patience? Do you not compel this arrogant and spoilt child to live in a hut with a pair of aged banana eaters for whom even rice is a luxury, whose thoughts cannot ever be his thoughts, whose heart is old and quiet and who are following a different path from his? Is all of this not a compulsion on him, not a punishment?”
Siddhartha saw that Vasudeva was right and looked down at the ground. ”

“ In matters of love Siddhartha was still a child, he was inclined to throw himself blindly and insatiably into his pleasures as if into a bottomless pit, but Kamala taught him from the very basics, she taught him that you cannot receive pleasure without giving pleasure, that every gesture, every stroke, every touch, every look, every tiny part of the body has its secret, and waking those secrets will bring happiness to whoever knows about them. ”

“ As a boy I had nothing to do with anything but the gods and making sacrifices to them. As an adolescent I had nothing to do with anything but asceticism, with thinking and meditation, I sought to find Brahman, venerated the eternal in Atman. As a young man, though, I followed the path of penitence, lived in the forest, suffered heat and frost, learnt to hunger, taught my body to die away. It was wonderful when, at that time, knowledge came to me through the teachings of the great buddha, I felt knowledge of the unity of the world, felt it flow within me like my own blood. ”

“ The realisation, the knowledge of what wisdom actually is, and of what it was that he had been seeking for so long, was slow to blossom, slow to ripen in Siddhartha. It was nothing more than the readiness of the soul, a capability, a secret talent, to think the thought of the one at every moment, in the middle of life to feel the one, the ability to breathe the one. ”

“ But most of all, I have learned from the river here, and from my predecessor, Vasudeva the ferryman. He was a very simple man, Vasudeva, he was not a thinker but he knew the important things as well as Gotama, he was a perfect man, he was a holy man.”
“I think you’re mocking me again, Siddhartha,” said Govinda. “I believe you and I both know that you have never followed any teacher. But even if you have never followed a teacher have you not had certain thoughts, found certain kinds of knowledge yourself, knowledge which is your own and which have helped you through life? ”

“ But tell me: have you seen how many samanas I have, how many brothers who have taken refuge in my teachings? And do you think, samana from a foreign place, do you think all of these would be better off if they abandoned the teachings and went back to life in the world with all its enjoyments?”
“Such a thought is far from me,” Siddhartha exclaimed. “I hope they will all remain with the teachings, I hope they will reach their goal! It is not up to me to judge how others lead their lives. I can only judge my own life, I must choose for myself, must reject for myself. ”