Chapter seven, on

Chapter 7

1. Why did S envy the childlike people?
2. What is the nature of S’s “inward voice”? Is his inward voice the same thing as his conscience? Explain the similarity and difference between the two faculties.
3. Why is S’s wealth seen as a burden? Isn’t wealth and prestige what most persons seek? Aren’t these the things that make a person happy?
4. Explain the main points of S’s method of self-analysis.
5. In what ways is S’s life more wretched than the childlike people?
6. Why did Kamala expect S to leave without explanation and farewells? Why does Kamala free the golden song-bird?
7. Complete and explain the analogy between the potter’s wheel and samsara. What is samsara?
8. Explain why despair might be seen as an inherently “game-playing” attitude towards life. Why isn’t the game of Samsara worth playing?

Chapter 8

1. S had apparently concluded that the game of samsara is a game not worth losing his life over, and so he left the life of sensation. Why, then, does he fall even deeper in despair as he assertively abandons the ways of his old life?
2. S replies to Govinda’s inquiries, “I am on a pilgrimage.” What is S’s pilgrimage? What does it mean?
3. S claims that this meeting with Govinda taught him something significant. What is it that S learns?
4. Is S experiencing a mid-life crisis? Consider the following from psychologist Gail Sheehy: “The work of adult life is not easy. As in childhood, each step presents not only new tasks of development but requires the letting go of the techniques that worked before. With each passage some magic must be given up, some cherished illusion of safety and comfortably sense of familiar sense of self must be cast off, to allow for the greater expansion of our distinctiveness.
5. What do you suppose is the “wheel of physical manifestation’? Would it be related to samsara? Speculate on possible connections. Buddha explains the wheel of existence: “There are ten ‘fetters’ by which beings are bound to the wheel of existence: self-illusion, skepticism, attachment to mere rule and ritual, sensual lust, ill will, craving for the world of pure form, craving for the formless world, conceit, restlessness, ignorance…An arhat, or holy person, is freed from all fetters.
6. What factors enabled S to recover from his despair? At the beginning of the chapter, he wished to learn no more about himself, yet at the end of the chapter, he begins his pilgrimage anew. How did this transformation occur?

Chapter 9
1. S somewhat awkwardly offers the reason “I must learn to handle the boat” as a motive for being Vasudeva’s assistant. This doesn’t seem to be S’s real intention. What does S genuinely seek?
2. Vasudeva implies that he is holy. Interpret Vasudeva’s metaphor of the river with respect to holiness. When does a life become sacred?
3. Why does V accept S as his assistant?
4. In what manner would the river not be an obstacle for travelers?
5. Explain the idea that there is no suffering without time. Can you interpret the metaphor of the river with respect to the aphorism, “The more things change, the more things stay the same”?
6. Hesse emphasizes in this chapter that V learned to listen to the river. Compare Hesse’s description of this process with that of Zen Buddhist teacher, Shunryu Suzuki: “When you listen to someone, you should give up all preconceived ideas and your subjective opinions: you should just llisten to him, just observe the way he or she is. We put very little emphasis on wrong and wrong, good or bad. We just see things the way things are with him, and accept them…Usually when you listen to some statement, you hear it as a kind of echo of yourself. You are actually listening to your own opinion.