Essay About Contrast Gilgamesh And Stories Of The Epic Of Gilgamesh

Compare and Contrast Gilgamesh and Siddhartha
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Critical Analysis Paper
I. The Individual Journey and Its Social Meaning
During our time in life many of us have to take different journeys to see and
understand how life is on the outside world. Some can be tough or easy and also be sad
or happy. As in the stories of The Epic of Gilgamesh translated by N.K.Sandars and
Siddhartha by Herman Hesse, both of the main characters goes on a journey.
Gilgamesh and Siddhartha share the same journey as they try to understand themselves
and find the meaning of life.
In the beginning, Siddhartha does not understand the meaning of life because he
has never experienced anything outside of his city. Siddhartha does not understand all
expression of life and therefore cannot experience Nirvana. So his spiritual voice sends
him on a journey to find and experience life. Through his journey he finds that there is no
such thing as time, “Nothing was, nothing will be, everything has reality and presence”.
Without his journey to understanding life he would have never found this wisdom and with
knowing and understanding that time is pointless, he would have never found Nirvana.
With that said, people from his culture must know without understanding life or
experiencing anything outside their own city they will not be able to find what theyre
looking for or trying to accomplish what theyre needing in life.
Gilgamesh is the same compared to Siddhartha because he also hasnt
experienced anything outside of his town Uruk. After the death of his best friend Enkidu
he realizes that he is not immortal and will die one day. Gilgamesh is scared because he
realize that one day he will die so he sets out on his journey to find immortality. After
meeting his father, Gilgamesh realizes that becoming immortal is impossible, so
Gilgamesh acknowledges that one day he will die because he is only human. With this
knowledge he goes back to Uruk and strives to be a good king for the rest of his life.
Siddhartha learns that only through life experiences can the spiritual self be understood
and Gilgamesh learns that even though one day everything will die, you have to do what
you can at the present time. Also, with learning the meaning of life, Gilgameshs people
of his culture will know all living things will die at some point and so just live your life to the
fullest.
II. Further Insight Into the Culture
As we look further into Siddhartha, Siddhartha and the people of his city believes in
reincarnation and ahimsa. Siddhartha also believed that it is in every person to achieve the goal
of enlightenment by following these four noble truths. 1) They believe that all life contains
suffering 2) Suffering is caused by desire 3) One can escape suffering by eliminating desire and
lastly 4) The Eightfold Path is the way. Siddhartha believed in every person. Siddhartha also
said that “no deity is required to achieve this”. As well as he did not believe in a god.
On the other hand, the people of Gilgamesh believed in gods and thought people could
obtain mortality. For example, Gilgamesh has extraordinary amount of power and people
describes his fist as iron. Also, he is described as “two-thirds god and one third man.”.
Gilgamesh thought he could obtain mortality but was inevitable. Another example is his best
friend Enkidu. Gods created Enkidu to be as strong as Gilgamesh so that he can follow
Gilgamesh throughout his journey and give him knowledge.
Siddhartha and Gilgamesh had two different belief in their culture. One believe in gods
and the other did not believe in gods. One wanted to obtain mortality and other wanted
enlightenment from all living things in the world. Siddhartha achieved his goal of enlightenment
and tells his people that they can achieve this goal by following the noble truth. Although,
Gilgamesh could not achieve mortality but Gilgamesh achieved his peoples gratitude of being the
greatest king of time. He lets his people know that he will take care of them and his city and to
protect them by building walls around his kingdom to keep terrorist out of his kingdom.
III. Myth and Religion
Myth are