Siddhartha Reflection Paper

Siddhartha finally comprehends why he knows nothing about himself, its because he is afraid to; he has a feeling of awakening as he understands that he now must become his own pupil and “learn the secret of Siddhartha” (Page 39, Paragraph 2).

Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse discusses the many paths of teaching that relate to Hinduism that Siddhartha followed on his journey through life and how each path helped him realize what he wanted with his life. Siddhartha follows many teachings or paths in which to reach his spiritual destination, which at the beginning was to reach Nirvana.

Siddhartha, by Herman Hesse, is the story of a young man searching for enlightenment. Through his journey, Siddhartha follows several Buddhist and Hindu paths to achieve his ultimate goal of enlightenment. Siddhartha follows the path of the Brahmin, the Samana, the materialistic gambler, and eventually the Buddhist middle path. Being the son of a Brahmin, Siddhartha leads a privileged life, but this isn’t enough for him. Siddhartha had an insatiable appetite for knowledge, and after a time, he leaves his father to find his own path to Nirvana. Although Siddhartha was raised in a strict Hindu society, his path to Nirvana was a combination of Buddhism, and Hinduism.

    In Hesse's novel, Siddhartha the title character, Siddhartha leaves the Brahmins in search of Nirvana - spiritual peace.  The journey he endures focuses on two main goals - to find peace and the right path (http://www.ic.ucsb.edu/~ggotts/hesse/life/jennifer/html).  Joseph Mileck, the author of Hermann Hesse:  Life and Art, asserts that Siddhartha focuses on a sense of unity developed through Siddhartha's mind, body, and soul (Baumer).  Hesse's Siddhartha revolves around three central journeys - a physical, a mental, and a spiritual journey.

There have been many teachers in one’s lifetime, some more important than others. These teachers and instructors affect different people in different ways, and lessons are learned that are important to prepare for real life situations. In the book Siddhartha by Herman Hesse, a young Brahmin named Siddhartha is not content with his current spiritual self. Siddhartha is directed to spiritual enlightenment and Nirvana because of his guidance and teaching from Kamala, Kamaswami, and Vasudeva.

Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse is a novel about the spiritual journey of a man named Siddhartha whose living in the time of Gotama Buddha. In this novel, Hesse explains in detail what Siddhartha learns as he searches for Nirvana. For Siddhartha to learn, he needs teachers, just like everyone else if they wish to pursue and education. There are four major teachers that Siddhartha truly takes something from, these teachers are Govinda, Kamala, Vasudeva, and the river itself. Another important thing is the aspect of self realization and teaching, which is ultimately what helps Siddhartha put those teachings together and reach Nirvana. This also allows Siddhartha himself to accept his new role as a teacher to his friend Govinda, which is the

“Yes, he thought breather deeply, I will no longer try to escape from Siddhartha. I will learn from myself, be my own pupil; I will learn from myself the secret of Siddhartha.” (Page 32)

Siddhartha, written by Herman Heese, is a book about a man’s journey to find his inner self beginning when he is young and ending when he is of old age. Siddhartha, while on this quest, searched for different mentors to teach him what they know, hoping to find truth and balance in and of the universe. At the end of the novel, Siddhartha reaches the enlightenment through many teachings.

        During this period-the realm of the mind, Siddhartha actively sets about letting the self die, escaping his Self. 

Siddhartha comes to realize that he has discovered who he really is, he is Siddhartha. He knows himself more than any other teaching or religion. As he comes to self-realization, he comprehends he has been letting himself slip away, he has been running away from himself.

Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse, is a novel about a young boy who is trying to find his spiritual enlightenment in life. The novel begins with a young naïve boy who is living with his father following the family’s traditions of the Brahmin. To reach spiritual enlightenment Siddhartha and his friend Govinda leave the town to seek

Siddhartha’s life was more of a journey, a journey filled with whimsical decisions and many questions; Siddhartha simply did as he pleased. After living this capricious lifestyle, he noticed that he felt empty inside. He wondered why he felt this way for a long time and decided to leave his current life. He abandoned all possessions and left his father in a quest to seek peace with the shramanas. Soon the cycle of the nature of Siddhartha was formed. Siddhartha would seek something and pursue that something blindly and by abandoning his previous lifestyle. It was not until he was an old man did he finally reach peace through the guidance of a river. Siddhartha’s life had changed immensely numerous amounts of times by the time he was old, but the change he experienced was not necessarily caused by of outside influences. He experienced change, but every change originated inside of him; of what he wanted to follow next. Of course, this still required Siddhartha to change to his new surroundings in every instance he obeyed new lifestyle. When he followed the shramanas, he left everything he had previously known and owned. When he left for the city, he completely changed his demeanor and became rich. Once again, when he lived by the river, he abandoned all possessions and former values. I believe that Siddhartha

Siddhartha is a young man on a long quest in search of the ultimate answer to the enigma of a man's role on this earth. Through his travels, he finds love, friendship, pain, and identity. He finds the true meaning behind them the hard way, but that is the best way to learn them.

In the departure phase of his journey, Siddhartha completely shuns both internal and external desires and lives a more than humble life. During Siddhartha’s conversation with his father about leaving home, Siddhartha’s father, “returned again after an hour and again after two hours, looked through the window and saw Siddhartha standing there in the moonlight, in the starlight, in the dark” (11). Hermann Hesse’s use of dark and light imagery, emphasizes Siddhartha’s stubbornness for his desire to go with the Samanas, whose religious ideals are severe self discipline and restraint of all indulgence; he is adamant about leaving home, as his father checked on him countlessly and Siddhartha stood there unwavering despite the many hours and change of daylight so he could earn his father’s blessing to live the lifestyle of an ascetic. Furthermore, Siddhartha travels to the Samanas with Govinda to destroy Self and the multitudinous amount of desire by quelling each desire and all together Self even though he knows it is a difficult goal to achieve, “Although Siddhartha fled from Self a thousand times, dwelt in nothing, dwelt in animal and stone, the return was inevitable” (16). The effect of Siddhartha’s multiple attempted destructions of Self as a consequence of living as a Samana are failure in his attempt to discover Nirvana. Moreover, Siddhartha travels with Govinda to the Buddha after leaving the

     Siddhartha first tries to follow the path of the Brahmins.  His father thinks of him as "a prince among Brahmins" (Hesse 4).  Siddhartha washes "in the daily bath of atonement" (Hesse 5) so that his soul might be cleansed of guilt in order to merge with the all-perfect being (Archie 60).  He also offers sacrifices to the gods.  The Brahmins teach him that Atman created the world and that this great god can be found by men only when they sleep (Hesse 7).  Despite the love and