Part 1: Question 5: What is the gap in the Buddha's teaching according to Siddhartha, why doesn't he join Buddha's followers?
In the chapter ‘Gautama,’ Govinda and Siddhartha have set out meet the Buddha. The Buddha exudes an aura of inner peace and everlasting calm, and, after hearing his teaching, Govinda decides to permanently join Buddha’s followers. Siddhartha, however, finds fault in the Buddha’s teaching. Deliverance, or freedom from suffering is what the Buddha teaches, but one thing Siddhartha points out is that while that is what the Buddha has achieved, he doesn’t share what he has experienced or how exactly to reach Nirvana. The Buddha also teaches that the world is an unbroken chain of being, made up of causes and effects, and to embrace the unity of their existence, which is not influenced by chance or gods. The contradiction Siddhartha finds in the teaching, however, is in the teaching of deliverance of suffering. If life is suffering and they are taught to overcome suffering, are they not are also taught to overcome life, the physical world, and reject the very unity that the Buddha himself preaches? Nonetheless, Siddhartha reveres the Buddha more than any other mortal, but doesn’t join his following as his goal is to achieve what the Buddha has achieved- inner peace, deliverance, illumination. Siddhartha knows that he will not obtain these things from simply listening to a teaching, no matter how enlightened it is, and sets out to experience these things firsthand, and earn his deliverance.
Part 2: Question 12: Who are the Child People, what are there values, concerns, weaknesses, and secret?
After leaving Govinda and the Buddha, Siddhartha seeks to learn the ways of the material world as part of achieving enlightenment. He comes across a village where he associates and interacts with more common, materialistic people on a day to day basis than he has been used to for a long while, if not his entire life. Siddhartha refers to these people as “the Child People.” Generally, Siddhartha mocks these people and looks down on them. The Child People are focused more on short term gains rather than long term, and have little to no introspection. They focus themselves in the moment rather than view themselves as an insignificant part of eternity, which allows them to place value in their existence and importance in their life. This, Siddhartha envies of them. However, he still criticizes their lack of law or teaching with themselves, and how easily they are ruled by their desires and anxiety, which he views as a weakness. That being said, Siddhartha realises there is some beauty to their existence in that they are capable of love, which he claims people like him and Kamala are not. That love, which they can give freely, is the secret to their existence and happiness.
