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RE: Siddhartha, the mendicant | "The Keyword of the Week" | [es-en]
Wow!
We have a saying - nasty, but true: First comes the food and then the moral...
Wow!
We have a saying - nasty, but true: First comes the food and then the moral...
I have to thank you. This week's keyword prompted me to do some research, and I was surprised to see that in the three most widely practiced religions, there is an order or movement that literally renounces all material things (ascetics in Buddhism/Hinduism; fakirs in Islam; mendicants in Catholicism).
In the case of Siddhartha, when he becomes an ascetic, it was curious to read how many times the author writes the word "plate or bowl" as part of "attached to them," and furthermore describes them as silent beggars at the doorsteps of houses, empty plates in hand, waiting to be fed as if it were an obligation.
I practice Siddhartha, but I don't know if the saying you share fits him (at least the image I've created of him). I could describe him as arrogant, know-it-all, proud, but never hypocritical. I don't think it fits him, at least I believe in the sincerity of his search for enlightenment.
What is the interpretation given to the saying in your culture?
A good question - and not so simple...
You say yourself - all cultures, all religions have their ascetics, their hermits, their ‘enlightened ones’. And they all have those who only pretend, who sacrifice their own values in order to survive in a consumer-orientated world. We in Germany tend to categorise people (if you know one, you know them all...) So we probably wouldn't even recognise a true renunciate if we saw one.
Yes, I understand your point now, and I think the saying you shared applies.