Monday, May 12, 2014

Siddhartha

Everyone must journey through life. Everyone has a different path and a different goal in their lives but the one fact that remains the same is that everyone has someone or something to help them down the road of life. For some people this may be a person or animal. For others it may be a intangible thing like a god or in Siddhartha case, a word. His whole life Siddhartha is searching for peace and salvation from Self. He tries to seek refuge in religions and lifestyles until he realizes that it is simply not enough. Though many people help him along the way, Om is the thing that helps Siddhartha complete his journey to find peace.

First and foremost, Om is at the start of Siddhartha's journey and at the end of the journey when he finally achieves peace. At the beginning of the book Om is first introduced which is seen in this quote, "He [Siddhartha] had mastered Om, the Word of the Worlds" (Hesse 3). This proves that Om has been with Siddhartha almost his entire life, his the beginning of his journey to forget Self. Also it refers to Om as the word of worlds meaning that it is the sound that ties all the worlds together. Om also prods Siddhartha to go on the journey, Siddhartha realizes that he is not happy with his life yet at this point is unwilling to do anything about it. Until he meditates speaking Om does he realize that he will never find peace on another's path. "Thus he sat, cloaked in samadhi, thinking Om, his soul an arrow on its way to Brahman" (Hesse 8).  Om helps him to start the physical journey to find peace because while he is meditating he decides to he should start on his own path. Of course at this point Siddhartha has already started his spiritual journey but he just has yet to start his physical journey. Om is the thing that helps him find peace. "…the the great song of the thousand voices consisted only of a single word; Om, perfection"(Hesse 114). When he finally completes the cycle his journey he's actually right where he started knowledge wise the only thing that changed was Siddhartha's outlook on life. Which is kind of sad that Siddhartha traveled away from his home and away from his family just to find the answer to his peace was inside him the whole time.

Om also saves Siddhartha from killing himself and from his unfulfilling, worldly life. When Siddhartha comes across the child people all he wants is to find peace but instead he finds something else he wants, Kamala. This completely derails his path to