The existence of time

[Jackie]

In the novel, Siddhartha learns to listen to the river and is able to learn many things that greatly contribute towards his path of enlightenment. One of the things Siddhartha is taught by the river is that time, simply does not exist. He shares this with Vasudeva, who agrees and responds, " Surely this is what you really mean; that the river is everywhere at once, at its source and at its mouth, at the waterfall, the ferry, at the rapids, at the sea, in the mountains, everywhere, at the same time, and it possesses only a present, without any shadow of a future?" (58.)

The river used its own nature to show Siddhartha that time is an illusion. Much like the river, time itself exists all at once. There is no is present without the past or future, all remaining connected. Do you guys agree with what Siddhartha and Vasudeva believe about time ?

[Mary]

I would definitely agree that time is an illusion because the fact that only reason we do so is based on our own physical change. But when nature changes it is all cyclical, if one were to stare at only one tree as the seasons passed all the memories of the tree would blur to together due to the changing yet stagnation of the said tree.Nature like, " The river pressed towards its goal[...] it pressed onward again, it flow(s) again"(73). While we on the other hand cannot relive life as our younger selves but at at old age revert to childlike behavior in an unnoticed cycle.

[Mary]

I would definitely agree that time is an illusion because the fact that only reason we do so is based on our own physical change. But when nature changes it is all cyclical, if one were to stare at only one tree as the seasons passed all the memories of the tree would blur to together due to the changing yet stagnation of the said tree.Nature like, " The river pressed towards its goal[...] it pressed onward again, it flow(s) again"(73). While we on the other hand cannot relive life as our younger selves but at at old age revert to childlike behavior in an unnoticed cycle.

[Angie]

I completely agree with Mary and Jackie that time doesn't exist and its also shown when Siddhartha shows Govinda everything around them and is in shock once the vision is stopped, "No longer knowing whether time existed, whether that vision had lasted seconds or hundred years" (Hesse 81). Govinda is shown all that "time" he experienced was irrelevant because Siddhartha showed him that everything is happening at the same time and we can only explain it by time passing. The only reason we believe why our bodies age is because of time but it's truly difficult to understand everything is now! Not later. That concept may be insane for many but time was created by man, meaning that time doesn't exist and is only there as comfort for humans.

[Jaspreet]

"He saw all these forms and faces in a thousand relationships to each other, all helping each other, loving, hating, destroying each other and become newly born. Each one of them was mortal, a passionate, painful example of all that was transitory. Yet none of them died, they only changed, were always reborn, continually had a new face: only time stood between one face and another"(121).

As he sees the world, Siddhartha never witnesses a change of people. Everything is essentially a cycle of rebirth, meaning that there is no time to restrict the soul to an ending. Time is a mechanism that prevents us from experiencing eternity of peace.

[Maisha]

"Also, Siddhartha’s previous births were no past, and his death and his return to Brahma was no future. Nothing was, nothing will be; everything is, everything has existence and is present" (Hesse 111).

I believe that this quote accurately captures Siddhartha and Vasudeva's idea of time as a means of an illusion, incurring that life and death are occurring simultaneously and that time itself is used to distract us from this continuous cycle.