The Use of Stones as a Setting in Siddhartha

If most of us were to trace the progress of our lives, we might use a journal or a timeline. Few of us would consider a simple rock to be sufficient to represent the complex development of our minds and spirituality, but then again, very few of us can claim to be on par with Buddha. Siddhartha can make this claim, and this claim emphasizes a focused nature which only simple object, a stone, can justly represent. Stones play a minor role in the setting, which is already a minor aspect of the book. Nonetheless, the stone’s most significant appearances well symbolize the progress of Siddhartha while he experiments with asceticism and being a Samana, and at the end of the novel when Siddhartha reaches enlightenment.

"... he slipped out of his Self in a thousand different forms. He was an animal, carcass, stone, wood, water, and each time he was reawakened" (12). This first mention of a stone is during Siddhartha’s experimentation with the Samanas, when he learns to deny and lose the Self. His immersion of the Self into the stone, among other plain objects, illustrates the simple path of asceticism that Siddhartha felt was inadequate. "Although Siddhartha fled from the Self a thousand times ... dwelt in animal and stone, the return was inevitable..." (12). Siddhartha tries to find inner peace with the Samanas, but their philosophy only satisfies Siddhartha briefly, just as Siddhartha only found brief satisfaction while dwelling in stone. The temporary inhabitance in the stone reflects Siddhartha’s temporary, insufficient search for enlightenment at the beginning of the novel.

The older, wiser Siddhartha finds Nirvana at the end of the book. "There shone in his face the serenity of knowledge, of one . . . who has found salvation, . . . belonging to the unity of things" (111). Siddhartha realizes that a simple stone reflects the same splendor that Siddhartha himself has now found, and he relates his wisdom to Govinda in a long discourse. " ‘...This stone is stone; it is also animal, God and Buddha . . . it has already long been everything and always is everything . . . I see value and meaning in each one of its fine markings and cavities . . . each one is different . . . each one is Brahman’ " (117). The stone now reflects Siddhartha’s successful quest for Nirvana. Siddhartha explains how the stone is everything, how the stone is Brahman, and how the stone has essentially reached its own enlightenment. The stone’s condition echoes that of the illuminated Siddhartha.

Siddhartha doesn’t need a journal to remind him of his progress; all he has to do is pick up a stone. He can wrap his fingers around the object that he used to dwell in to remind him of when he was young and still had very transient "answers," or he can examine the stone carefully to find meaning and reason in every facet, just like he found meaning in his own life when he was older.