By the River

Siddhartha wandered in the forest, already far from the town, and knew nothing but this one thing: that he could not go back, that this life, as he had led it now for many years, was over and gone, tasted and sucked dry to the point of disgust. Dead was the songbird he had dreamed of. Dead was the bird in his heart. He was deeply entangled in Samsara; he had soaked up disgust and death into himself from all sides, as a sponge soaks up water until it is full. He was full of surfeit, full of misery, full of death; there was nothing left in the world that could lure him, that could gladden him, that could comfort him.

He longed ardently to know nothing more of himself, to have rest, to be dead. If only a bolt of lightning would come and strike him dead! If only a tiger would come and devour him! If only there were a wine, a poison, that would bring him numbness, forgetting and sleep, and no more waking! Was there any filth left with which he had not soiled himself, any sin and folly he had not committed, any desolation of the soul he had not taken upon himself? Was it still possible to live? Was it possible, again and again and again, to draw breath, to let breath out, to feel hunger, to eat again, to sleep again, to lie with a woman again? Was this cycle not exhausted and closed for him?

Siddhartha came to the great river in the forest, the same river over which, long ago, when he was still a young man and coming from Gotama’s town, a ferryman had taken him. By this river he stopped and stood hesitating on the bank. Weariness and hunger had weakened him, and why should he go on, anyway, where to, toward what goal? No, there were no more goals; there was nothing left but the deep, painful longing to shake off this whole desolate dream, to spit out this stale wine, to make an end of this miserable and shameful life.

Over the riverbank a tree hung bent, a coconut palm; against its trunk Siddhartha leaned his shoulder, put his arm around the trunk, and looked down into the green water that flowed and flowed beneath him, looked down and found himself filled through and through with the wish to let go and go under in this water. A ghastly emptiness was mirrored back at him from the water, and the terrible emptiness in his soul answered it. Yes, he was at the end. There was nothing left for him but to snuff himself out, to smash the failed shape of his life, to throw it away, at the feet of jeering gods. This was the great vomiting he had longed for: death, the smashing of the form he hated! Let the fish devour him, this dog of a Siddhartha, this madman, this depraved and rotten body, this slack and abused soul! Let the fish and crocodiles devour him, let the demons tear him to pieces!

With a distorted face he stared into the water, saw his face mirrored there, and spat at it. In deep weariness he loosened his arm from the trunk of the tree and turned a little, to let himself fall straight down, to go under at last. He sank, with his eyes closed, toward death.

Then, from remote regions of his soul, from pasts of his wearied life, a sound quivered up. It was a word, a syllable, which he spoke to himself without thought in a slurring voice, the old first word and last word of all Brahmin prayers, the holy “Om,” which means something like “the perfect” or “perfection.” And at the moment the sound “Om” touched Siddhartha’s ear, his slumbering spirit suddenly awoke and recognized the folly of what he was doing.

Siddhartha was deeply shaken. So this was how things stood with him; so lost was he, so astray and abandoned by all knowledge, that he had been able to seek death, that this wish, this child’s wish, had been able to grow great in him: to find rest by snuffing out his body! What all the torment of these last times, all the disillusionment, all the despair had not brought about, this moment brought about, when the Om entered his consciousness: he recognized himself in his misery and in his error.

Om! he said to himself: Om! And he knew of Brahman again, knew of the indestructibility of life, knew again of all that is divine, which he had forgotten.

But this was only a moment, a flash. At the foot of the coconut palm Siddhartha sank down, struck down by weariness, murmuring Om, laid his head on the root of the tree, and sank into deep sleep.

Deep was his sleep and free of dreams; for a long time he had not known such a sleep. When he woke after many hours, it seemed to him that ten years had passed; he heard the soft flowing of the water, did not know where he was or who had brought him here, opened his eyes, saw with wonder trees and sky above him, and remembered where he was and how he had come here. But this took him a long while, and the past seemed to him covered as if by a veil, infinitely distant, infinitely far away, infinitely indifferent. He knew only that he had left his former life (in the first moment of reflection this former life seemed to him like a long-past, earlier incarnation, like an early pre-birth of his present self)—that he had left his former life, that full of disgust and misery he had even wanted to throw his life away, but that by a river, under a coconut palm, he had come to himself, the holy word Om on his lips, had then fallen asleep, and now, awake, was looking out at the world as a new man. Softly he spoke to himself the word Om, over which he had fallen asleep, and it seemed to him that his whole long sleep had been nothing but a long, absorbed speaking of Om, a thinking of Om, a submerging and complete entering into Om, into the nameless, the perfected.

What a wonderful sleep this had been! Never had sleep so refreshed him, so renewed him, so rejuvenated him! Perhaps he had really died, had gone under and been reborn in a new form? But no, he knew himself, he knew his hand and his feet, knew the place where he lay, knew this self in his breast, this Siddhartha, the willful one, the strange one; but this Siddhartha was nevertheless transformed, was renewed, was remarkably well rested, remarkably awake, joyful and curious.

Siddhartha sat up; then he saw a person sitting opposite him, a stranger, a monk in a yellow robe with a shaved head, in the posture of reflection. He looked at the man, who had neither hair on his head nor beard, and he had not looked at him long before he recognized in this monk Govinda, the friend of his youth, Govinda, who had taken his refuge in the exalted Buddha. Govinda had aged, he too, but his face still bore the old features, spoke of zeal, of faithfulness, of seeking, of anxiousness. But when Govinda, feeling his gaze, opened his eyes and looked at him, Siddhartha saw that Govinda did not recognize him. Govinda was glad to find him awake; evidently he had been sitting here a long time waiting for him to wake, though he did not know him.

“I have been asleep,” said Siddhartha. “How did you come here?”

“You have been asleep,” answered Govinda. “It is not good to sleep in such places, where there are often snakes and the animals of the forest have their paths. I, O sir, am a disciple of the exalted Gotama, the Buddha, the Sakyamuni, and I was making a pilgrimage along this road with a number of our people when I saw you lying asleep in a place where it is dangerous to sleep. So I tried to wake you, O sir, and when I saw that your sleep was very deep, I stayed behind my companions and sat with you. And then, so it seems, I fell asleep myself, I who wanted to guard your sleep. I have done my duty badly; weariness overcame me. But now that you are awake, let me go, so that I can catch up with my brothers.”

“I thank you, Samana, for watching over my sleep,” said Siddhartha. “You disciples of the Exalted One are kind. Now you may go.”

“I am going, sir. May the gentleman always fare well.”

“I thank you, Samana.”

Govinda made the sign of greeting and said: “Farewell.”

“Farewell, Govinda,” said Siddhartha.

The monk stood still.

“Permit me, sir, how do you know my name?”

Then Siddhartha smiled.

“I know you, O Govinda, from your father’s hut, and from the Brahmin school, and from the sacrifices, and from our going to the Samanas, and from that hour when you took your refuge in the Exalted One in the grove of Jetavana.”

“You are Siddhartha!” Govinda cried out. “Now I recognize you, and I no longer understand how I could not recognize you at once. Welcome, Siddhartha; great is my joy at seeing you again.”

“It gladdens me too to see you again. You have been the guardian of my sleep; again I thank you for it, though I would have needed no guardian. Where are you going, O friend?”

“I am going nowhere. We monks are always on the road, as long as it is not the rainy season; we always move from place to place, live by the rule, proclaim the teaching, accept alms, move on. It is always so. But you, Siddhartha, where are you going?”

Siddhartha spoke: “It is the same with me, friend, as with you. I am going nowhere. I am only on the road. I am on pilgrimage.”

Govinda spoke: “You say you are on pilgrimage, and I believe you. But forgive me, O Siddhartha, you do not look like a pilgrim. You wear the clothes of a rich man, you wear the shoes of a man of rank, and your hair, which smells of scented water, is not the hair of a pilgrim, not the hair of a Samana.”

“Yes, my dear, you have observed well; your sharp eye sees everything. But I did not say to you that I was a Samana. I said: I am on pilgrimage. And so it is: I am on pilgrimage.”

“You are on pilgrimage,” said Govinda. “But few go on pilgrimage in such clothes, few in such shoes, few with such hair. Never have I, who have been on pilgrimage for many years, met such a pilgrim.”

“I believe you, my Govinda. But now, today, you have met just such a pilgrim, in such shoes, in such a garment. Remember, my dear: the world of forms is transient, transient, most transient are our garments, and the way we wear our hair, and our hair and bodies themselves. I wear the clothes of a rich man; you have seen rightly. I wear them because I have been a rich man, and I wear my hair like the people of the world and the voluptuaries, for I have been one of them.”

“And now, Siddhartha, what are you now?”

“I do not know; I know it as little as you do. I am on the road. I was a rich man, and I am one no longer; and what I will be tomorrow, I do not know.”

“You have lost your wealth?”

“I have lost it, or it has lost me. It has slipped away from me. The wheel of forms turns quickly, Govinda. Where is the Brahmin Siddhartha? Where is the Samana Siddhartha? Where is the rich man Siddhartha? The transient changes quickly, Govinda; you know that.”

Govinda looked at the friend of his youth for a long time, doubt in his eyes. Then he greeted him as one greets people of rank, and went on his way.

With a smiling face Siddhartha watched him go; he loved him still, this faithful one, this anxious one. And how could he, at this moment, in this glorious hour after his wonderful sleep, pervaded by Om, not have loved anyone and anything! That was precisely the enchantment that had taken place in him in his sleep and through the Om: that he loved everything, that he was full of glad love for everything he saw. And precisely this, so it seemed to him now, was what he had been so sick from before: that he had been able to love nothing and no one.

With a smiling face Siddhartha watched the departing monk. The sleep had strengthened him greatly, but hunger tormented him greatly, for he had now eaten nothing for two days, and the time was long past when he had been hardened against hunger. With grief, and yet also with laughter, he thought of that time. Back then, he remembered, he had boasted to Kamala of three things, had known three noble and invincible arts: fasting—waiting—thinking. This had been his possession, his power and strength, his firm staff; in the diligent, laborious years of his youth he had learned these three arts, nothing else. And now they had left him; not one of them was his any longer, not fasting, not waiting, not thinking. For the most wretched thing he had given them up, for the most transient, for sensual pleasure, for good living, for wealth! Strange indeed was the way it had gone with him. And now, so it seemed, now he had really become one of the child people.

Siddhartha thought about his situation. Thinking was hard for him; at bottom he had no desire to do it, but he forced himself.

Now, he thought, since all these most transient things have slipped away from me again, now I stand under the sun again as I once stood as a small child; nothing is mine, I know how to do nothing, I am capable of nothing, I have learned nothing. How strange this is! Now that I am no longer young, now that my hair is already half gray, now that my strength is failing, now I am starting again from the beginning and as a child! Again he had to smile. Yes, his fate was strange! Things were going downhill with him, and now he stood in the world again empty and naked and stupid. But he could feel no grief about it; no, he even felt a great urge to laugh, to laugh at himself, to laugh at this strange, foolish world.

“Things are going downhill with you!” he said to himself, and laughed at it, and as he said it, his eye fell on the river, and he saw the river too going downhill, always wandering downward, and singing and being merry as it went. That pleased him well; he smiled kindly at the river. Was this not the river in which he had wanted to drown himself, once, a hundred years ago, or had he dreamed it?

Strange indeed has my life been, he thought; it has taken strange detours. As a boy I had to do only with gods and sacrifices. As a youth I had to do only with asceticism, with thinking and meditation; I was in search of Brahman, I revered the eternal in Atman. But as a young man I followed the penitents, lived in the forest, suffered heat and frost, learned to hunger, taught my body to die. Wonderfully, then, insight came to meet me in the teaching of the great Buddha; I felt knowledge of the unity of the world circling in me like my own blood. But from the Buddha too, and from the great knowledge, I had to go away again. I went and learned the pleasure of love from Kamala, learned trade from Kamaswami, piled up money, squandered money, learned to love my stomach, learned to flatter my senses. Many years I had to spend in losing the spirit, in unlearning thinking again, in forgetting unity. Is it not as though, slowly and by great detours, I had turned from a man into a child, from a thinker into one of the child people? And yet this way has been very good, and yet the bird in my breast has not died. But what a way it was! I have had to go through so much stupidity, through so much vice, through so much error, through so much disgust and disappointment and misery, merely to become a child again and be able to begin anew. But it was right this way; my heart says yes to it, my eyes laugh at it. I had to experience despair, I had to sink down to the most foolish of all thoughts, to the thought of suicide, in order to be able to experience grace, to hear Om again, to be able to sleep properly and wake properly again. I had to become a fool in order to find Atman in me again. I had to sin in order to be able to live again. Where else may my way lead me? It is foolish, this way; it goes in loops; perhaps it goes in a circle. Let it go as it will; I want to walk it.

Wonderfully he felt joy welling up in his breast.

Where, then, he asked his heart, where do you get this gladness? Does it come from this long, good sleep that has done me so much good? Or from the word Om that I spoke? Or from my having escaped, from my flight being accomplished, from my being free again at last and standing under the sky like a child? Oh, how good this having fled is, this having become free! How pure and beautiful the air is here, how good to breathe! There, in the place I ran away from, everything smelled of ointment, of spices, of wine, of excess, of sloth. How I hated this world of the rich, of the gluttons, of the gamblers! How I have hated myself for staying so long in this terrible world! How I have hated myself, have robbed myself, poisoned myself, tormented myself, have made myself old and wicked! No, never again will I imagine, as I once so liked to do, that Siddhartha is wise! But this I have done well, this pleases me, this I must praise: that there is now an end to that hatred of myself, to that foolish and dreary life! I praise you, Siddhartha; after so many years of folly you have once again had an idea, have done something, have heard the bird in your breast singing and have followed it!

So he praised himself, took joy in himself, listened curiously to his stomach, which was growling with hunger. A share of sorrow, a share of misery, he had now, so he felt, tasted to the full and spat out in these last times and days, eaten his way through it to despair and to death. So it was good. He could have stayed with Kamaswami for a long time yet, earning money, squandering money, fattening his belly and letting his soul die of thirst; he could have lived for a long time yet in this soft, well-upholstered hell, had this not come: the moment of perfect desolation and despair, that extreme moment when he hung over the flowing water and was ready to destroy himself. That he had felt this despair, this deepest disgust, and that he had not succumbed to it, that the bird, the glad spring and voice in him, was still alive after all: over this he felt this joy, over this he laughed, over this his face beamed under his graying hair.

“It is good,” he thought, “to taste for oneself everything one needs to know. That worldly pleasure and riches are not good, I learned as a child. I have known it a long time; I have experienced it only now. And now I know it, know it not only with my memory, but with my eyes, with my heart, with my stomach. Happy am I that I know it!”

For a long time he pondered his transformation, listened to the bird as it sang for joy. Had this bird not died in him, had he not felt its death? No, something else in him had died, something that had long been longing to die. Was it not what he had once wanted to kill in his ardent years as a penitent? Was it not his self, his small, anxious, and proud self, with which he had fought for so many years, which had defeated him again and again, which was there again after every mortification, forbade joy, felt fear? Was it not this that had finally met its death today, here in the forest by this lovely river? Was it not because of this death that he was now like a child, so full of trust, so without fear, so full of joy?

Now Siddhartha also sensed why he had fought in vain with this self as a Brahmin, as a penitent. Too much knowledge had hindered him, too many holy verses, too many rules of sacrifice, too much mortification, too much doing and striving! He had been full of arrogance, always the cleverest, always the most zealous, always a step ahead of everyone, always the knowing one and the spiritual one, always the priest or the sage. Into this priesthood, into this arrogance, into this spirituality his self had crept, sat fast there and grew, while he thought he was killing it with fasting and penance. Now he saw it, and saw that the secret voice had been right, that no teacher could ever have delivered him. That was why he had had to go into the world, had had to lose himself in pleasure and power, in women and money, had had to become a trader, a dice player, a drinker and a greedy man, until the priest and Samana in him was dead. That was why he had had to go on enduring these ugly years, enduring the disgust, the emptiness, the senselessness of a dreary and lost life, to the end, to bitter despair, until Siddhartha the voluptuary, Siddhartha the greedy man, could die too. He had died; a new Siddhartha had awakened from sleep. He too would grow old; he too would one day have to die; Siddhartha was transient, every form was transient. But today he was young, was a child, the new Siddhartha, and was full of joy.

These thoughts he thought, listened smiling to his stomach, listened gratefully to a humming bee. Cheerfully he looked into the flowing river; never had any water pleased him as much as this one; never had he heard the voice and the parable of the moving water so strongly and beautifully. It seemed to him that the river had something special to tell him, something he did not yet know, something that was still waiting for him. In this river Siddhartha had wanted to drown himself; in it the old, tired, despairing Siddhartha had drowned today. But the new Siddhartha felt a deep love for this flowing water, and resolved within himself not to leave it again so soon.