Although this post reiterates my understanding of Hermann Hesse's ideology on existence, I feel immense pleasure in sharing his thoughts. Let me step back at this moment and reaffirm you that at no point am I claiming to have demystified the mystery of existence. All I am doing is sharing with you the point of view of a person's ideology on existence according to my understanding and this posting is a tribute to his ideology, his intellectual capacity and his spiritual heights.
Right from my childhood, I was closest to the Hindu religion (I although claim to be a full fledged Atheist) where the purpose of life has consistently been questioned and the Gita (The Religious book of Hinduism) claims to have answered it. I although am more convinced by Hesse's theories on Existence.
So what is life? what is the purpose of our existence in this universe? what is the purpose of every living and non-living things around us? what are we meant to achieve or pursue during our journey through the enigmatic path of life? Is it wealth, is it love, is it values or is it one of the numerous materialistic or spiritual things that exists around us?
The purpose of life is to think, feel and breathe thoughts of unity of all life. Even wicked people, theives, robbers, prostitutes have children, love them and are loved by them. The purpose of life is to regard people in a different light: not very clever, not very proud and therefore all the more warm, curious and sympathetic. The blind love of a mother for a child, the blind foolish pride of a fond father for his only son, the blind eager strivings of a young vain woman for ornament and the admiration of men, the blind path of a river, the voices of the hovering trees. All these little simple, foolish, but tremendously strong, vital, passionate urges and desires are what make life so special and beautiful.
Right from my childhood, I was closest to the Hindu religion (I although claim to be a full fledged Atheist) where the purpose of life has consistently been questioned and the Gita (The Religious book of Hinduism) claims to have answered it. I although am more convinced by Hesse's theories on Existence.
So what is life? what is the purpose of our existence in this universe? what is the purpose of every living and non-living things around us? what are we meant to achieve or pursue during our journey through the enigmatic path of life? Is it wealth, is it love, is it values or is it one of the numerous materialistic or spiritual things that exists around us?
The purpose of life is to think, feel and breathe thoughts of unity of all life. Even wicked people, theives, robbers, prostitutes have children, love them and are loved by them. The purpose of life is to regard people in a different light: not very clever, not very proud and therefore all the more warm, curious and sympathetic. The blind love of a mother for a child, the blind foolish pride of a fond father for his only son, the blind eager strivings of a young vain woman for ornament and the admiration of men, the blind path of a river, the voices of the hovering trees. All these little simple, foolish, but tremendously strong, vital, passionate urges and desires are what make life so special and beautiful.
To tie it all up my understanding is that existence by itself is meaningless. Life is meant to be felt in the unity of surroundings be it living or non living and to enjoy the harmonius existence of all matter in unity is the purpose of life.
2 comments:
A very lucid analysis of the book. People who read Siddhartha more than once and who are muddled and live with their subjective interpretation of the book should read this blog.
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