The awsome book, Siddhartha!
I just finished reading Hermann Hesse's most beloved book "Siddhartha." It is one of the best fiction books I have ever read, it's right up there with "The Way of The Peaceful Warrior", and Daniel Quinn's books "Ishmael", "My Ishmael", and "The Story of B". The book is about spiritual taditions with an analitical edge for philosophy, humanity and thus empathy and compassion....I don't if any of you have ever read it, but extatically encourage reading it!.... The book is set in India, Siddhartha is the story of a young Brahmin's search for ultimate reality after meeting with the Buddha. His quest takes him from a life of decadence to asceticism, form the illusory joys of sensual love with a beautiful courtesan, and of wealth and fame, to the painful struggles with his son and the ultimate wisdom of renunciation (I practically snaged that last bit from the discription in the book, I don't want any of you thinking I came up with that on my own). Well, I want to share something from the book that is so beautifully written, and thus put into words.
" I am telling you what I have found. Knowledge cna be communicated, but not wisdom. We can find it, we can live it, we can be carried by it, we can work wonders with it, but we cannot utter it or teach it. That was what I sometimes sensed in my youth, what drove me away from the teachers....but this is my best thought, this is it: The opposite of every truth is just as true! You see: A truth can be uttered and clad in words only if it is one-sided. One-sided is everyting that can be thought with thoughts and said in words-everuthing one-sided, everyting half, everyting is devoid of wholeness, of roundness, of oneness. When the sublime Guatama spoke and taught about the world, he had to divide it inot samsara and Nirvana, inot illusion and truth, inot sorrow and salvation. There is no other choice, there is no other way for the man who wishes to teach. But the world itself, the Being around us and within, is never one-sided. Never is a man or a deed all samsara or all Nirvana, never is a man all saintly or sinful. It seems otherwise because we are prey to the illusion that time is a reality. But time is not real, Govinda; I have experienced this time and time again. And if time is not real, then the span that seems to lie between world and eternity, between sorrow and bliss, between evil and good is also an illusion."
I'm barley even getting to type everything i need to. So just read the awsome book! But I will leave this last part. Wich is after the part I just type and right after the part I'm not going to have time to post.
"But I will say no more about it. Words are not good for the secret meaning, everything instantly becomes a bit different when we utter it, a bit adulterated, a bit foolish-yes, and that too is very good and appeals to me, I also very much agree that one man's treasure and wisdom always sound like foolishness to another."
Anyone can read this book, it is not a large book. About a 130 pages total. So if anyone wishes to perhaps see another angle of life, as if looking through a crystal or gem, you may have that chance by reading this book....If nothinh else, you can converse with me about it:)
The part where he is talking about no person ever being all saintly, or all Nirvana....That is where Christians disagree I believe. because we believe that Yehoshua, Christ was God in the flesh. Anyway that's a whole other topic. Anyone of any spiritual tradition or belief should be able to understand this story and what it's trying to say.
love, compassion, tolerance,
~Teiwaz
"Om is bow, the arrow is soul,
Brahma is the arrow's goal,
It must be struck unswervingly."
-Siddhartha
" I am telling you what I have found. Knowledge cna be communicated, but not wisdom. We can find it, we can live it, we can be carried by it, we can work wonders with it, but we cannot utter it or teach it. That was what I sometimes sensed in my youth, what drove me away from the teachers....but this is my best thought, this is it: The opposite of every truth is just as true! You see: A truth can be uttered and clad in words only if it is one-sided. One-sided is everyting that can be thought with thoughts and said in words-everuthing one-sided, everyting half, everyting is devoid of wholeness, of roundness, of oneness. When the sublime Guatama spoke and taught about the world, he had to divide it inot samsara and Nirvana, inot illusion and truth, inot sorrow and salvation. There is no other choice, there is no other way for the man who wishes to teach. But the world itself, the Being around us and within, is never one-sided. Never is a man or a deed all samsara or all Nirvana, never is a man all saintly or sinful. It seems otherwise because we are prey to the illusion that time is a reality. But time is not real, Govinda; I have experienced this time and time again. And if time is not real, then the span that seems to lie between world and eternity, between sorrow and bliss, between evil and good is also an illusion."
I'm barley even getting to type everything i need to. So just read the awsome book! But I will leave this last part. Wich is after the part I just type and right after the part I'm not going to have time to post.
"But I will say no more about it. Words are not good for the secret meaning, everything instantly becomes a bit different when we utter it, a bit adulterated, a bit foolish-yes, and that too is very good and appeals to me, I also very much agree that one man's treasure and wisdom always sound like foolishness to another."
Anyone can read this book, it is not a large book. About a 130 pages total. So if anyone wishes to perhaps see another angle of life, as if looking through a crystal or gem, you may have that chance by reading this book....If nothinh else, you can converse with me about it:)
The part where he is talking about no person ever being all saintly, or all Nirvana....That is where Christians disagree I believe. because we believe that Yehoshua, Christ was God in the flesh. Anyway that's a whole other topic. Anyone of any spiritual tradition or belief should be able to understand this story and what it's trying to say.
love, compassion, tolerance,
~Teiwaz
"Om is bow, the arrow is soul,
Brahma is the arrow's goal,
It must be struck unswervingly."
-Siddhartha