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Siddhartha

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I read this in high school, but not because it was assigned. At the time I was really into "rare" Queen MP3s, and there's a studio recording of the fast version of "We Will Rock You" where Brian May reads a passage from this book before the music starts. An odd way to be inspired to read a book, but I still think I got a fair bit out of it.

Thanks for sharing it ! Not everyone listen to music only for the beat. It looks more like a success story than an odd one if you ask me. Music must inspires.

Is this it? From wikipedia:

'A studio version was made for John Peel's BBC Radio 1 show at the Maida Vale Studios on 28 October 1977 and first broadcast soon after on 14 November. It includes a separate section that begins with an abridged session version of the original comprising the first verse, chorus and guitar outro - this part has become known as We Will Rock You (slow). Between the two parts there is a brief reading of Hermann Hesse's novel Siddhartha, used in a BBC Radio documentary. This audio was found on the BBC tapes being reused to record the session and was retained by the band.'

That's the one! And all this time I'd been holding on to something I read on a mailing list or website back then, attributing the reading to Brian May "just because he liked that book."

Here's a nice e-book copy: https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/hermann-hesse/siddhartha/g...

I read this annually, typically in a day, usually when I'm feeling lost. For me it distills the human experience into a simply story that helps me find meaning for where I am in my own journey.

The book that does that for me is Notes from Underground, I also read it annually.

This book literally saved my life.

I read it in high school and it was okay. 15 years later I was taking a flight and needed something to read (pre-downloaded video was not quite a thing yet). I was NOT in a good place mentally, and hadn't been for a while. I was depressed and hiding it, suffering in my own head.

I'll be honest: I had a date picked out, and it was coming up.

This was in my library because I had grabbed a handful of free books from somewhere. I beasted the entire thing in 3 hours.

Something about it rung me like a bell. I saw myself in the dark place this character was 2/3rds of the way through the book. Lost, suffering, unfulfilled, failing to rise to his potential, lamenting choices and compromises of my past, looking back and knowing I would be a disappointment to the brilliant young man I used to be.

I can think, I can wait, I can fast.

These became my mantra.

I had the tools I needed. I could find a way out of this hole, I could be patient until the opportunities I needed arrived, and I could endure discomfort and hardship to get there.

I can think, I can wait, I can fast.

I told my wife I needed therapy. I told my therapist I needed meds. I've gotten more than ten years past that date.

I haven't quite found my river yet, but I'm on the road.

... so you should read this book.

I liked this quite a bit the first time I'd read it. A decade later, not as much.

Narcissus and Goldmund is my favorite book by Hesse - it's beautifully crafted.

Love this book. I have three sons and read this when them when they're about 12 or 13.

It takes them a short bit to get into it, but by the time Sid is with the Samanas they're into it. Even though they sometimes get lost in some of the revaltory moments about the "self", the plot holds together and is compelling even at this level.

Best of all, the walk away with a couple good ideas worth considering and remember it fondly.

Off topic: Im curious what’s the most prominent religion among HNers? Is it different from the normal population?

Buddhism seems to be number 1 after atheism which isn’t a religion.

Buddhism isn't a religion either... or is that what you meant?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddhism

"Buddhism, also known as Buddha Dharma, is an Indian religion"

Buddhism is both religion and not religion. Most of the core ideas are not metaphysical, and most modern (certainly western) practitioners don’t engage with the metaphysical (what most would consider to be “religious”) aspects at all.

Having come from a conservative Christian religious background (and finding I was wholly incompatible with it), I avoided anything even remotely resembling religion for most of my 20s.

It wasn’t until my mid 30s that I went down the Buddhism rabbit hole and what I found was entirely unlike what I expected based on my former experience with western religion.

There are also many forms of a Buddhism with varying positions e.g. Zen Buddhism is explicitly non-religious, tapping into the core insights without asking the practitioner to believe anything.

Scientifically religion is a much wider concept than the protestant christian tradition of centering belief, sola fide and so on.

This is almost exactly the path I went down as well, except on a shorter timeline.

However, I believe Zen Buddhism is one of the more ritualistic versions, as opposed to 'Secular Buddhism', which removes the spiritual aspect for a more personal philosophical take on some of the core principals.

A couple of the principals of Secular Buddhism resonate with me in particular:

- Karma is not some metaphysical storage of actions, but instead just consequences. If you constantly speed everywhere, eventually you'll probably end up with a ticket - Thats your "karma" (consequences) of your own actions you chose to take.

- Rebirth is instead interpreted as the rebirth of the self, in that each living moment you are not the same person you were a moment ago. The idea is that in striving to be a better person, you are 'reborn' as a better version of yourself in each moment which compounds over time. Almost like the "1% rule" where your goal is to be 1% better in some aspect than you were yesterday.

Funny that you mention this definition straight from the book, this is one of the themes that are quite intertwined in the book as well. My impression is that humans in the search of enlightenment (for the lack of other word, i.e the reason you get into a religion in the first place) get too attached to their -ism and forget about what exactly were the actions of the person that created it and what were they trying to solve.

For a book with similar tongue in cheek philosophical take on the theme "religion on a first person account" I recommend "The Gospel According to Jesus Christ" by Jose Saramago.

Asking whether Buddhism is a religion is like asking if Christianity is homophobic. You can point to parts of the scriptural canon where it indubitably is, and you can point to practitioners who clearly subscribe to a version of it that is, but not everybody who practices it or makes it a part of their lives subscribes to every part of it indiscriminately. Anybody who engages with it as an influence on their own lives, as opposed to keeping it at an academic arm's length, inevitably starts to make their own version(s) of it, even if they don't intend to, because any two people's understanding will be conditioned by two different cultural backgrounds, two different personal histories, two different ongoing experiences, and two different sets of relationships to other people.

When I was Christian, we didn't want to call our system a religion.

Years later when I was exploring Buddhism, no Buddhist I met wanted to refer to Buddhism as a religion.

So the mentality seems to be that everything else is "religion" and what "we" have here is something deeper.

I don't think it's common for Christians not to consider Christianity a religion. At least not where I grew up, in the American bible belt.

Although I can see how calling Christianity a religion implicitly makes it equal to other religions, which Christians might be opposed to, but that doesn't seem like a mainstream point of view.

I remember Bill O'Reilly said in an argument that "Christianity is NOT a religion, it’s a philosophy."

https://youtu.be/T8yyHzA1swA

As a former Christian, I never experienced anyone avoiding the idea that we were participating in a religious system. In fact, it was a matter of pride, and part of how the church encouraged its members to differentiate themselves from the world.

> Years later when I was exploring Buddhism, no Buddhist I met wanted to refer to Buddhism as a religion.

Having spent hundreds of hours exploring this topic over the last few years, I have to point out that this is because many forms of Buddhism aren't religious at all.

The differences between Christianity and Buddhism in both the underlying philosophical ideas and the manner in which most people practice those ideas could not be more stark.

And as I mentioned in a sibling comment, Zen is a good example of an explicitly non-religious form of Buddhism.

Hinduism is similarly often described by practitioners as a "way of life" to avoid the religion label.

While non-religious and religious are reasonably disjointed sets, atheism is not disjoint with religious. That is the set containing the union of atheist with religious is not the null set.

That's right. There are religions without any gods, so they are atheistic, but they still have other religious beliefs.

And there are many people that continue to be religious even after becoming atheists. "The little book of atheist spirituality" from André Comte-Sponville, touches on this subject, and many others. I'm would also call myself an atheist-catholic.

I remember a joke in the book where two rabbis are discussing the issue of god's existence during the supper, at the end, they both agree that god must not exist and then go to sleep. At the next day one rabbi finds the other doing his early prayers and confounded asks him why he is praying if there is no god, to which the other one answers "what does praying has to do with god?".

I like the one that goes "why did god create the universe? because he didn't have a choice".

Right. I actually meant what you said. What I said is a mistake.

How about "waiting to see which AI god emerges supreme"?

Psychedelics bypasses religion and ushers you to spirituality via secret shortcut. Warning on box: "Some assembly required."

Vim

I'd suggest "cultural Christianity" as the most likely candidate, possibly followed by "cultural Hinduism" and "cultured Buddhism". In short, I don't think the average participant on this site is directly religious but nearly all are inculcated in the religious traditions of the place they grew up in and carry those traditions - minus the supernatural aspects - with them whether they like this or not. The "cultured Buddhism" bit is related to those picking up "fashionable religions" which they wear as if they are clothes - optional accessories which can be discarded when they no longer serve their purpose.

As to myself I'd say I fit in the first category, having been through Catholic schools and a Jesuit college without the religious aspects really making an impact from a very young age onwards. I may not believe in any gods but I understand why some people do and I mostly like the society built around those ideas, especially when compared to other societies built around other ideas like Islam, Confucianism or Animism. I dislike the negative aspects of organised religion which range from free-ranging paedophile priests in Catholic churches to the "mosques are our barracks, the domes our helmets, the minarets our bayonets and the faithful our soldiers" attitude of the likes of Erdogan just like I dislike the negative aspects of party politics and consider the two to have a lot in common.

startups.

The internet is a nirvana automata. It wants to hack you, all your emotions, desires, your lust for rage, your hunger for dopamine, your wish to sit under the baobab tree and stare at the glowing stones lights indefinably, blissfully unaware of the world.

Thus without ever reading any of the teachings of the one in the lotus flower, one must rediscover detachment from the hackable self, or be enslaved forever.

The young relative of mine was required to read one non-western book to fulfill a high school obligation.

Hen came to me since I was known as a reader, and I suggested Siddhartha "but ask your teacher if it's ok". It was.

Few days later I saw my relative and a disgruntled friend. Disgruntled friend had picked War and Peace.

One of the greatest authors of all time. Hesse taps into the mind of the modern human and beautifully presents its inner workings. Each of his books takes a different angle, a different perspective or philosophy with which to observe the evolving personhood.

I'm very grateful that this was assigned reading in high school, since it was a sort of gateway book for reading more about Buddhism. It's short. If you haven't read it, I highly recommend it.

Great book, I suggest everyone read this at least once in their life.

great book. I recommend people read it every 10 years or so as your perspective on life changes.

Huh, funny this should pop up here.

I recently started commuting by subway into work, so I had to pick up a subway book. I had been meaning to read this, so I went to my local book store and grabbed a copy.

It’s a really great book. Such a fascinating story. And short, too. I highly recommend giving it a read. It might synthesize some of your loose connections about Hinduism, Buddhism, and your own place in a chaotic world and what it means to live a happy life.

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