Siddhartha: Part 2, Chapter 9 Summary & Analysis

Siddhartha knows he wants to stay by the river, and resolves to find the ferryman who had showed him kindness before. He thinks this is the way to start his new life. He watches the crystal movement of the water and the voice within him is strong and loving. He knows that the man who has grasped the secrets of the river must know many other things. One of these secrets is the water’s constancy – it is always running but never runs out. Siddhartha does not fully understand this secret but knows that it is special.

Siddhartha suffers greatly with hunger but he carries on and gets to the river and sees the old ferryman standing in his boat. The ferryman agrees to ferry Siddhartha across and as they go, Siddhartha compliments him on the river life he has chosen. The ferryman thinks it must be nothing to a man in such fine clothes.

Siddhartha does not wish any longer to be judged for these clothes. He offers them to the ferryman in exchange for his apron. He also asks if he can be the ferryman’s assistant and learn how to row the ferry. Now the ferryman recognizes Siddhartha as the samana from years ago. He introduces himself as Vasudeva and asks Siddhartha to share his hut again and tell him the story of how he came to be a finely dressed man.

Siddhartha watches Vasudeva row with admiration for his calm strength and focus. He remembers the fondness he had felt for the ferryman when they’d first met. When they reach the hut, Vasudeva offers Siddhartha plenty of bread and mangoes and Siddhartha eats with gusto. Then as the light disappears, the pair settles by a tree and Siddhartha begins the long story of his life.

Vasudeva listens carefully. Listening is the ferryman’s great virtue. Siddhartha feels that Vasudeva is absorbing all that he is telling him, without judgment, and when he comes to the most recent chapter of his story, about finding the ‘om’ by the river, the ferryman listens so carefully that he closes his eyes. Vasudeva is very pleased to learn that he the river has spoken to Siddhartha as it has to him. He invites Siddhartha to stay with him, and sleep on the pallet that his late wife used to sleep on.

Siddhartha accepts and praises Vasudeva for his ability to listen, hoping to learn it from him one day, but Vasudeva says he will only learn it from the river itself. He tells Siddhartha that he has already learned how the water moves downward, and he will learn something else from it too, but he won’t explain what that other thing will be. Vasudeva reminds Siddhartha that he is no sage, that he has a ferryman’s knowledge and that for some people the river is not a hindrance but a source of the deepest knowledge. After this, the pair goes to sleep.

Siddhartha lives with Vasudeva and learns all the skills of ferrying and fixing the boat. But he learns most from the river, about how to listen with an open heart. Vasudeva is a man of few words, but when Siddhartha asks him about the secret of time, which he has learned from the river, he knows exactly what Siddhartha means and is excited to share it. The river has taught Siddhartha that the source occurs at the same moment as the end, and there is no separation, and he learns to see his own life this way, from his birth to his death, all one whole. They are both very happy in this knowledge.

On another occasion, Siddhartha asks the ferryman if it is true that the river is all voices, each woman, man and creature. Vasudeva says that it is true and that the voice is the holy word ‘om’. With these lessons, Siddhartha becomes more and more like the ferryman, joyful and smiling. The pair sits like brothers beside the river and even sometimes, as they listen to the river, have the same thoughts, as if the river is speaking to them at once.

The travelers that crossed the river felt this special spirit emanating from the ferrymen and often found themselves opening up to them, telling their life stories. After a while, people come to the river just to see the ferrymen, because word has spread that they are sages or wizards, but when they meet them, they find two friendly old men, quiet and strange, and wonder how the rumor started.

Years pass, uncounted, until one day, hoards of monks and pilgrims start arriving at the river, and tell the ferrymen that they are going to see Gautama, the Buddha, who is mortally ill and will soon die his final human death and pass into glory. Siddhartha reflects on the great voice of this teacher, and remembers him fondly. He remembers his young self, dubious of teaching, trying to separate himself. Now he knows that though he had needed to separate himself from teaching, he no longer believes in separations. He knows that he is connected to everything.

Amongst the hoards is Kamala, who is also on a pilgrimage to visit the dying Buddha. Since knowing Siddhartha, Kamala has given up the life of a courtesan to be a supporter of the monks and a pilgrim herself. She brings Siddhartha’s son, named after his father, with her. He follows his mother in a sulk, not understanding why he has to tag along. He demands rest stops every so often.

On one of these rest stops, as Kamala is resting her eyes, a black snake attacks and bites her. They try to go on towards the river but Kamala collapses. Young Siddhartha is distraught. Luckily, Vasudeva hears Kamala’s cry and comes to her and carries her to the hut. Siddhartha sees the boy first, and a strange feeling rises inside him, then he recognizes the mother and knows that the boy must be his son.

Siddhartha and Vasudeva try to look after Kamala, giving her a healing potion, but she is already in a bad way. When she wakes, she sees the familiar face of Siddhartha over her and then remembers her son and worries for him. Siddhartha assures her that he is looked after. Kamala tells Siddhartha that he has grown old but that he still looks like the young samana she first knew, and has the eyes of her young son. She asks if he recognizes her and her son. Then, tired and troubled, she closes her eyes again.

Young Siddhartha is afraid for his mother and Siddhartha tries to comfort his son. He remembers a prayer he learned from the Brahmins and sings it. His son calms down and sleeps. Siddhartha and Vasudeva know that Kamala is dying. She awakes again in great pain. She tells Siddhartha that he looks both the same and different, that his eyes have changed. She sees that he has attained peace. She tells him of her hope to travel to the Buddha and look into his eye, but, as Siddhartha tells her that she will find peace too, she knows that she has found it in her old lover’s eyes and it is just as good as Gautama. Unable to speak, she gazes at Siddhartha until her body gives out.

Siddhartha watches Kamala’s pale face, now old and without the color of the fig that he once saw. He lets the sight take him over, and sees his own figure stretched out and pale. He has a deep feeling of the eternity of life. Vasudeva prepares food for him, but he doesn’t eat. He spends the night sitting outside the hut, every so often listening for his son.

Early in the morning, Vasudeva comes out and Siddhartha tells him that he has been reflecting, listening to the river tells him about oneness. Vasudeva sees that Siddhartha has been touched by sorrow but that it has not entered his heart. Siddhartha cannot be sad when his life has been enriched by finding his son. Vasudeva tells him that his son is welcome to stay with them, but now they must build Kamala a pyre in the same way that Vasudeva had built one for his wife when she passed.