Chapter 12 - Govinda - Siddhartha - Hermann Hesse

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Episode Transcript

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Chapter twelve Govinda, together with othermonks. Govinda used to spend the time
of rest between pilgrimages in the pleasuregrove, which the courtesan Kamala had given
to the followers of Gautama for agift. He heard talk of an old
ferryman who lived one day's journey awayby the river, and who was regarded

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as a wise man by many.When Govinda went back on his way,
he chose the path to the ferry, eager to see the ferryman because although
he had lived his entire life bythe rules, though he was also looked
upon with veneration by the younger monkson account of his age and modesty,

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the restlessness and the searching still hadnot perished from his heart. He came
to the river and asked the oldman to ferry him over, And when
they got off the boat on theother side, he said to the old
man, you're very good to usmonks and pilgrims. You've already ferried many
of us across the river, aren'tyou, two ferryman? A searcher for

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the right path? Quoth said Arthur, smiling from his old eyes. Do
you call yourself a searcher, ohvenerable one, though you are already old
in years and are wearing the robeof Gautamas monks. It's true, I'm
old, spoke Govinda. But Ihaven't stopped searching. Never I'll stop searching.

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This seems to be my destiny.You too, so it seems to
me have been searching. Would youlike to tell me something, oh honorable
one, quote, said Arthur,What should I possibly have to tell you,
oh venerable one, Perhaps that you'researching far too much, that in
all that searching, you don't findthe time for finding. How come,

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asked Govinda. When someone is searching, said said Arthur, then it might
easily happen that the only thing hiseyes still see is that which he searches
for. That he is unable tofind anything, to let anything enter his
mind, because he always thinks ofnothing but the object of his search,

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because he has a goal, becausehe is obsessed by the goal. Searching
means having a goal, but findingmeans being free, being open, having
no goal. You, oh venerableone, are perhaps indeed a searcher,
because striving for your goal, thereare many things you don't see which are

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directly in front of your eyes.I don't quite understand yet, said Govinda.
What do you mean by this,quoth said Arthur. A long time
ago, oh venerable one, manyyears ago, you've once before been at
this river and have found a sleepingman by the river, and have sat

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down with him to guard his sleep. But, oh, Govinda, you
did not recognize the sleeping man,Astonished as if he had been the object
of a magic spell. The monklooked into the fairyman's eyes. Are you,
said Arthur, He asked with atimid voice. I wouldn't have recognized

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you this time as well. Frommy heart, I'm greeting you, said
Arthur. From my heart, I'mhappy to see you once again. You've
changed a lot, my friend,and so you've now become a ferryman in
a friendly manner, said Arthur,laughed, a fairyman. Yes, many

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people, Govinda, have to changea lot, have to wear many a
robe. I am one of those, my dear be welcome Govinda, and
spend the night in my hut.Govinda stayed the night in the hut and
slept on the bed which used tobe Vasadiva's bed. Many questions he posed
to the friend of his youth,many things, said Artha had to tell

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him from his life. When inthe next morning the time had come to
start the day's journey, Govinda said, not without hesitation these words before I'll
continue my path, said Arthur,Permit me to ask one more question.
Do you have a teaching? Doyou have a faith or a knowledge you

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follow which helps you to live andto do right? Quoth said Arthur.
You know, my dear, thatI, already, as a young man
in those days when we lived withthe penitents in the forest, started to
distrust teachers and teachings and to turnmy back to them. I have stuck

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with this. Nevertheless, I havehad many teachers since then. A beautiful
courtesan has been my teacher for along time, and a rich merchant was
my teacher. And some gamblers withdice once. Even a follower of Buddha
traveling on foot has been my teacher. He sat with me while I had

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fallen asleep in the forest on thepilgrimage. I've also learned from him.
I'm also grateful to him, verygrateful. But most of all I've learned
here from this river and from mypredecessor, the ferryman Vasudeva. He was
a very simple person. Vasudeva,he was no thinker, but he knew

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what is necessary just as well asGautama. He was a perfect man.
A saint. Govida said stirl Oh, Siddhartha, you love a bit to
mock people, as it seems tome. I believe in you and know
that you have had followed a teacher. But haven't you found something by yourself?

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Though you found no teachings, youstill found certain thoughts, certain insights,
which are your own and which helpyou to live. If you would
like to tell me some of these, you would delight my heart, quoth
said Arthur. I've had thoughts,yes, and insight, again and again,

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sometimes for an hour or for anentire day. I have felt knowledge
in me as one would feel lifein one's heart. There have been many
thoughts, but it would be hardfor me to convey them to you.
Look, my dear Govinda, thisis one of my thoughts which I have
found. Wisdom cannot be passed on. Wisdom which a wise man tries to

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pass on to someone always sounds likefoolishness. Are you kidding, asked Govinda.
I'm not kidding. I'm telling youwhat I've found. Knowledge can be
conveyed, but not wisdom. Itcan be found, it can be lived,
It is possible to be carried byit. Miracles can be performed with

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it. But it cannot be expressedin words and taught. This was what
I, even as a young man, sometimes suspected what has driven me away
from the teachers. I have founda thought, Govinda, which you'll again
regard as a joke or foolishness,but which is my best thought. It

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says, the opposite of every truthis just as true. That's like this.
Every truth can only be expressed andput into words when it is one
sided. Everything is one sided,which can be thought with thoughts and said
with words. It's all one sided, All just one half. All lacks

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completeness, roundness, oneness. Whenthe exalted Gautama spoke in his teachings of
the world, he had to divideit into sansara and nirvana, into deception
and truth, into suffering and salvation. It cannot be done differently. There
is no other way for him whowants to teach. But the world itself,

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what exists around us, in insideof us, is never one sided.
A person or an act is neverentirely sansara or entirely nirvana. A
person is never entirely holy or entirelysinful. It does really seem like this
because we are subject to deception,as if time were something real. Time

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is not real, Govinda. Ihave experienced this often and often again.
And if time is not real,then the gap which seems to be between
the world and the eternity, betweensuffering and blissfulness, between good and evil
is also a deception. How come, asked Govinda timidly, listen well,

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my dear, listen well. Thesinner which I am and which you are,
is a sinner. But in timesto come he will be Brahma again.
He will reach the nirvana, willbe Buddha. And now see these
times to come, our a deceptionare only a parable. The sinner is
not on his way to become aBuddha. He is not in the process

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of developing, though our capacity forthinking does not know how else to picture
these things. No, within thesinner is now and today already the future
Buddha. His future is already allthere. You have to worship in him,
in you, in every one,the Buddha which is coming into being,

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the possible, the hidden Buddha.The world, my friend Govinda,
is not imperfect or on a slowpath towards perfection. No, it is
perfect in every moment. All sinalready carries the divine forgiveness in itself.

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All small children already have the oldperson in themselves, All infants already have
death, all dying people the eternallife. It is not possible for any
person to see how far another onehas already progressed on his path. In
the Robber and the dice Gambler,the Buddha is waiting. In the Brahman,

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the robber is waiting. In deepmeditation, there is the possibility to
put time out of existence, tosee all life which was, is and
will be, as if it weresimultaneous. And there everything is good,
everything is perfect, Every thing isBrahman. Therefore I see whatever exists as

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good. Death is to me likelife, sin, like holiness, wisdom,
like foolishness. Everything has to beas it is. Everything only requires
my consent, only my willingness,my loving agreement to be good for me
to do nothing but work for mybenefit, to be unable to ever harm

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me. I have experienced on mybody and on my soul that I needed
sin very much. I needed lust, the desire for possessions, vanity,
and needed the most shameful despair inorder to learn how to give up all
resistance, in order to learn howto love the world, in order to

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stop comparing it to some world Iwished I imagined some kind of perfection I
had made up. But to leaveit as it is, and to love
it, and to enjoy being apart of it. These, oh,
Govinda, are some of the thoughtswhich have come into my mind, said

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Arthur bent down picked up a stonefrom the ground and weighed it in his
hand. This, here, hesaid, playing with it, is a
stone, and will after a certaintime perhaps turn into soil, and will
turn from soil into a plant oran animal or human being. In the

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past, I would have said,this stone is just a stone, It
is worthless. It belongs to theworld of the Maya. But because it
might be able to become also ahuman being and a spirit in the cycle
of transformations, therefore I also grantit importance. Thus I would perhaps have

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thought in the past, But todayI think this stone is a stone,
it is also animal, It isalso God. It is also, Buddha,
I do not venerate and love itbecause it could turn into this or
that, but rather because it isalready and always everything. And it is

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this very fact that it is astone, that it appears to me now
and today as a stone. Thisis why I love it and see worth
and purpose in each of its veinsand cavities, in the yellow, in
the gray, in the hardness,in the sound it makes when I knock
at it, in the dryness orwetness of its surface. There are stones

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which feel like oil or soap,and others like leaves, others like sand.
And everyone is special, and praisethe Olm in its own way.
Each one is Brahman. But simultaneouslyand just as much it is a stone,
it is oily or juicy. Andthis is this very fact which I

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like and regard as wonderful and worthyof worship. But let me speak no
more of this. The words arenot good for the secret meaning. Everything
always becomes a bit different as soonas this is put into words gets distorted,
a bit, a bit silly.Yes, and this is also very
good, and I like it alot. I also very much agree with

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this that this what is one man'streasure and wisdom always sounds like foolishness to
another person. Govinda listened silently.Why have you told me this about the
stone, he asked hesitantly, aftera pause. I did it without a
specific intention. Or perhaps what Imeant was that love this very stone and

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the river and all these things weare looking at and from and which we
can learn. I can love astone, Govinda, and also a tree
or a piece of bark. Theseare things, and things can be loved.
But I cannot love words. Thereforeteachings are no good for me.
They have no hardness, no softness, no colors, no edges, no

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smell, no taste. They havenothing but words. Perhaps it is these
which keep you from finding peace.Perhaps it is the many words, because
salvation and virtue, as well sansaraand nirvana as well are mere words,
Govinda. There is no thing whichwould be nirvana. There is just the

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word nirvana, quoth Govinda. Notjust a word, my friend, is
nirvana? It is a thought,said Arthur. Continued, I thought it
might be. So I must confessto you, my dear, I don't
differentiate much between thoughts and words.To be honest, I also have no

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high opinion of thoughts. I havea better opinion of things here on this
ferry boat. For instance, aman has been my predecessor and teacher,
a holy man who has for manyyears simply believed in the river, nothing
else. He had noticed that theriver spoke to him, He learned from
it, It educated and taught him. The river seemed to be a god

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to him. For many years hedid not know that every wind, every
cloud, every bird, every beetlewas just as divine and knows just as
much and can teach just as muchas the worshiped river. But when this
holy man went into the forests,he knew everything, knew more than you

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and me, without teachers, withoutbooks, only because he had believed in
the river. Govinda said, butis that which you call things actually something
real, something which has existence?Isn't it just a de say option of
the maya, just an image andillusion? Your stone, your tree,

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your river? Are they actually areality? This too, spoke said Arthur.
I do not care very much aboutlet the things be illusions or not.
After all, I would then alsobe an illusion. And thus they
are always like me. This iswhat makes them so dear and worthy.

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A veneration for me, they arelike me. Therefore I can love them.
And this is now a teaching.You will laugh about love, oh,
Govinda, seems to me the mostimportant thing of all to thoroughly understand
the world, to explain it,to despise it. Maybe the thing great
thinkers do. But I'm only interestedin being able to love the world,

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not to despise it, not tohate it, and me to be able
to look upon it and me andall beings with love and admiration and great
respect. Act this, I understand, spoke Govinda. But this very thing
was discovered by the Exalted One tobe a deception. He commands benevolence,

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clemency, sympathy, tolerance, butnot love. He forbade us to tie
our heart in love to earthly things. I know it, said said Arthur.
His smile shone golden. I knowit, Govinda. And behold with
this, we are right in themiddle of the thicket of opinions in the

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dispute about words. For I cannotdeny my words of love are in a
contradiction, a seeming contradiction, withGautama's words. For this very reason I
distrust in words so much, ForI know this contradiction is a deception.
I know that I am in agreementwith Gautama. How should he not know

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love? He who has discovered allelements of human existence in their t storinus,
in their meaninglessness, and yet lovedpeople thus much to use a long
laborious life only to help them,to teach them. Even with him,
even with your great teacher, Iprefer the thing over the words. Place

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more importance on his acts and lifethan on his speeches, more on the
gestures of his hand than his opinions, not his speech, not in his
thoughts. I see his greatness onlyin his actions, in his life.
For a long time, the twoold men said nothing. Then spoke Govinda,

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while bowing from a farewell, Ithank you, sir Arthur, for
telling me some of your thoughts.They are partially strange thoughts, not all
have been instantly understandable to me.This being as it may, I thank
you and wish you to have calmdays. But secret le he thought to

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himself, this Siddhartha is a bizarreperson. He expresses bizarre thoughts. His
teachings sound foolish. How differently soundthe exalted One's pure teachings clearer, purer,
more comprehensible, nothing strange, foolishor silly as contain'd in them.

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But different from his thoughts, seemedto me, said d'arthur's hands and feet,
his eyes, his forehead, hisbreath, his smile, his greeting,
his walk. Never again, afterour exalted Gautama has become one with
the nirvana. Never since then haveI met a person of whom I felt
this is a holy man. Onlyhim, this Siddhartha, I have found

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to be like this. May histeachings be strange, may his words sound
foolish. Out of his gaze andhis hand, his skin, and his
hair, out of every part ofhim shines a purity, shines, a
calmness, shines a cheerfulness and mildnessand holiness, which I have seen in

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no other person since the final deathof our exalted teacher. As Govinda thought
like this, and there was aconflict in his heart, he once again
bowed to sid Arthur. Drawn bylove deeply, he bowed to him who
was calmly sitting sid Arthur, hespoke, we have become old men.

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It is unlikely for one of usto see the other again. In this
incarnation. I see, beloved,that you have found peace. I confess
that I haven't found it. Tellme, oh, honorable, one one
more word. Give me something onmy way which I can grasp, which
I can understand. Give me somethingto be with me on my path.

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It is often hard, my path, often dark, said Arthur. Sir
Arthur said nothing and looked at himwith the ever unchanged quiet smile. Govinda
stared at his face with fear,with yearning, suffering, and the eternal
search was visible in his look,eternal not finding. Sir Arthur saw it

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and smiled. Bend down to me, he whispered quietly in Govinda's ear.
Bend down to me like this,even closer, very closer, kiss my
forehead, Govinda. But while Govinda, with astonishment and yet drawn by great
love and expectation, obeyed his words, bent down closely to him and touched

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his forehead with his lips. Somethingmiraculous happened to him while his thoughts were
still dwelling on Sid Arthur's wondrous words, while he was still struggling in vain
and with reluctance to think away,time to ignore Nirvana and send Sarah as
one while even a certain contempt forthe words of his friend was fighting in

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him against an immense love and veneration. This happened to him. He no
longer saw the face of his friend, said Arthur. Instead he saw other
faces, many a long sequence,a flowing river of faces, of hundreds
of thousands, which all came anddisappeared, and yet all seemed to be

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there simultaneously, which all constantly changedand renewed themselves, and which was still
all, said Arthur. He sawthe face of a fish, a carp
with infinitely painful opened mouth, theface of a dying fish with fading eyes.
He saw the face of a newbornchild, red and full of wrinkles,

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distorted from crying. He saw theface of a murderer. He saw
him plunging a knife into the bodyof another person. He saw in the
same second this criminal in bondage,kneeling and his head being chopped off by
the executioner with one blow of hissword. He saw the bodies of men

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and women naked in positions and crampsof frenzied love. He saw corpses stretched
out, motionless, cold void.He saw the heads of animals, of
boars, of crocodiles, of elephants, of bulls, of birds. He
saw gods, he saw Krishna,he saw Agne. He saw all of

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these figures and faces in a thousandrelationships with one another, each one helping
the other, loving it, hatingit, destroying it, giving rebirth to
it. Each one was a willto die, a passionate, painful confession
of transitoriness. And yet none ofthem died. Each one only transformed,

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was always reborne, received evermore anew face, without any time having passed
between the one and the other face. And all of these figures and faces
rested, flowed, generated themselves,floated along and merged with each other,
and they were all constantly covered bysomething thin, without individuality of its own,

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but yet existing, like a thinglass or ice, like a transparent
skin, a shell or mold,or mask of water. And this mask
was smiling, And this mask wassad Arthur's smiling face, which he Govinda,
in this very same moment touched withhis lips. And Govinda saw it

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like this, this smile of themask, this smile of oneness, above
the flowing forms, this smile ofsimultaneousness, above the thousand births and deaths,
this smile of Siddhartha was precisely thesame, was precisely of the same
kind as the quiet, delicate,impenetrable, perhaps benevolent, perhaps mocking wise,

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thousandfold smile of Gautama, the Buddha, as he had seen it himself
with great respect a hundred times likethis, Govinda knew, the perfected ones
are smiling, not knowing any morewhere the time existed, whether the vision
had lasted a second or a hundredyears, not knowing any more whether there

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existed a Siddhartha, a Gautama,a Me, and a yew feeling in
his innermost self, as if hehad been wounded by a divine arrow,
the injury of which tasted sweet.Being enchanted and dissolved in his innermost self,
Govinder stood still for a little while, bent over sid Arthur's quiet face,

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which he had just kissed, whichhad just been the scene of all
manifestations, all transformations, all existence. The face was unchanged, after under
its surface the depth of the thousandfoldnesshad closed up again. He smiled sweetly,

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smiled quietly and softly, perhaps benevolently, perhaps very mockingly, precisely as
he used to smile the exalted One. Deeply Govinder bowed. Tears he knew
nothing of ran down his old facelike a fire burnt the feeling of the
most intimate love, the humblest venerationin his heart. Deeply he bowed,

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touching the ground before him, whowas sitting motionlessly, whose smile reminded him
of everything he had ever loved inhis life, what had ever been valuable
and wholly to him in his life. End of Chapter twelve and end of

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Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse