Exploring Hesse's Siddhartha

Hesse (2)

first, religion is not:

• necessarily monotheistic,
• necessarily a body of moral rules
• necessarily a belief in the supernatural, heaven, hell, or even life after death
• necessarily an explanation of the origins of creation.

Religion is:

• notion of sacred reality
• orders and brings understanding to human existence
• has lasting effect on thinking, feeling, acting

Outline of Siddhartha

Directions

In each group do the following:

1. Choose 1 person to keep notes
2. Discuss the 2 sections among yourselves – with the goal of being able to give the class a summary of that section of the book
3. Choose 1 or 2 people who will draw a picture on the board to illustrate the plot and your discussion

6 Themes of Siddhartha

1. Self-realization
2. Personal experience vs. Formal training
3. Persistence
4. Folly of materialism or less is more
5. paradox of unreal reality (reality is an illusion)
6. knowledge v. wisdom

With your group discuss:

1. most important illustration of the theme from the text
2. How important was that theme in the context of the whole work
3. What does the theme tell us about religion?

Exam 1

• If you answered just about anything you would get credit for the question – leading to a probably C
• The vocabulary was to be found in the 2 books we read to date
• The essays were marked on a scale of 1-3 (needs improvement, adequate, good job)
• The grades from the 5 parts were averaged