Other chapters

I've had some requests to post questions on later chapters. So here are a few:

Chapter 11: OM

1. What was the one thing that S, the thinker, had, that childlike people lacked? Characterize in some detail what this realization is.
2. In what way are childlike people superior to S? Does this difference make a difference on the path to enlightenment?
3. According to S’s realization, what is the nature of wisdom?
4. How does S’s listening to the river and his seeing of the river an object outside of time (i.e., the cycle of the river), yield enlightenment?
5. Discuss whether when S hears the many voices of the river as Om, he is affirming the philosopher, Schopenhauer’s, recognition that “All the cruelty and torment of which the world is so full is in fact merely the necessary result of the totality of the forms under which the will-to-live is objectified?


Chapter 12: Govinda

1. Explain S’s observation that when seeking becomes the goal in-itself for Govinda, enlightenment is not possible. Is it that Govinda is not separate from hhis goal or is it that Govinda should not have a goal?
2. What does S mean when he says that wisdom cannot be communicated?
3. Evaluate S’s claim that ‘The opposite of every truth is just as true!”
4. What are some of the insights S has learned throughout is life?
5. What are some of the implications to the claim that time is not real?
6. How does Govinda know that S has reached enlightenment?