H. Adler - Panorama

Josef wants to hear the gong, but he doesn’t say anything, yet Johannes has sensed his desire, saying that he will play it, but only just a bit, “Perhaps a bit of evening chimes in order to help us finish the day.” Josef has never heard such playing, the tower room awash with a soft music, Johannes sitting quietly across from him, the touch of his hands and the stroke of the drumstick creating a uniform work, a little stroke of the gong releasing something immensely stirring that was satisfying, faint reverberations also bouncing off the heavy curtains and the folding screens. Johannes does not in fact play very long, but unless you checked the clock it was hard to say how long it is, the gong slowly emptying of sound, after which Johannes stands up, cheerful, and says, “I know that it pleased you. It pleases everyone, and that’s good.” Josef thanks him, but Johannes says quietly that there’s no cause for thanks, for as long as you are grateful inside it is not necessary. “True thanks is silence. Words are of no use. What one wants to and can say has already been said. One should perhaps say something only in order to teach others just that.” Thomas states which old masters had in fact taught this, but Johannes interrupts him, saying, “It certainly has been taught quite often, but one should also do it oneself.” Then he turns to Josef. “What do you think? And, may I ask, how does it speak to your own experience?” Josef answers, “I try to listen within myself. I believe that everything is inside of us already. Unfortunately, it’s difficult for me to always hear what is there. The self is a tune composed of ‘I’ and ‘thou,’ of each person and the All.”

This appears to please Johannes, as he says, “It’s all quite simple. Only the person himself is the greatest hindrance. He falls into confusion. Each should know this, and not criticize others when it happens but rather work on himself. Man’s path is a pilgrimage, but one that ends within himself. There are two ways of approaching the world. In the first, one looks at the world through a peephole. One yearns for the world all the more, until somehow you step into it. But then the ground is swept from under your feet, or in fact what really happens is you lose your way, as you cannot merge with the world by striving to enter what you want to get lost inside of. Only through the second approach can one unite with the world. In this, one closes his actual eyes and looks inside himself at the same time. The real world that then arises is the true world. The observer is stuck in the middle, and here he recovers the entire world once again, only more beautiful and complete. In this it is also possible to unite with the entire world. Much more wonderful than any gaze is not to look at all. This you learn when you first learn the second approach. Then you recognize how everything repeats itself and always remains the same: it is all one. It is what is also called emanation. Whoever recognizes this ceases to look outward, for he has unified the outer and the inner worlds within himself. What one really knows, that is what one has, this being our true estate. One no longer has to observe the world going by.” Josef affirms that he also thinks the same, but to manifest it within oneself is hard, to which Johannes adds, “That is the mistake people make, namely to say it’s hard. Thus people deny themselves the chance at paradise. It’s not hard. It’s easy. As easy as breathing.” Josef is deeply moved and says in a hoarse voice that he is pleased and would like very much to come again sometime, if that would be all right with Johannes, who then stands up with a huge smile and says, “Come whenever you like, Josef. But please, just not on Saturday or Sunday!”

Josef and Thomas warmly say goodbye, Frieda stepping in as well to spiritedly suggest that Josef visit again, after which there is a lot of handshaking until they reach the stairway outside, where Johannes and Frieda say “Goodbye!” several times, the door hardly having closed behind them above when Thomas triumphantly and proudly declares, “Well? Didn’t I tell you that Johannes was marvelous? You could have met him much sooner if it weren’t for your stubbornness.” Josef has to agree, yet how could he have imagined how wonderful Johannes would be, for who knows what the others are like, which is still a concern, to which Thomas responds, “What do you expect? There is no one like Johannes. But among his friends there are wonderful people whom you will certainly like.” Curiosity is indeed stronger than resistance, which is why Josef is ready to visit again on Wednesday, though he doesn’t want to do so among so many strange people, and so he arranges things with Thomas, wishes him good night, and heads home lost in thought. What an unusual building Johannes lives in, it looking like a huge, erect flat iron, the sound of drumbeats pressing out from the nightclub located down below, as well as squeaking saxophones playing awful pop hits so loudly they can be heard in the street, whose own noise mixes with the sounds of the dance clubs nearby, creating a hellish mixture that nonetheless doesn’t reach as high as the tower room, where Johannes resides above the stony sea of this godforsaken city, which, in contrast to Thomas, Josef described as a lovely stone corpse because of its magnificent churches and splendid palaces. In the middle of this corpse is the pulse of the living dead, the dusty tumult of noisy streets, where cars race by in a continuous stream, where strangers forever rush about, and where last year scrawny little trees were planted in thin rows at the edge of the sidewalks, the smoke and soot having already killed them this year.

What would it be like if Johannes ruled this city from his tower above? But he has nothing to do with the lovely stone corpse, the city not a part of his truth, but rather something foreign to him, since it disturbs his peace, and yet the way of the world goes on in this city without ceasing, so who can escape it except through high-minded longing, such that the blessed peace that Josef dreams of can exist only within the tower, it not allowing itself to be found in the light of day. Yet the moment you say that, then you are already divided and at odds with yourself, the true path lost. In contrast, Thomas believes he has found the true path, and he is able to unite his thoughts and his senses as he sits there motionless, while all around him move demons and spirits with crude gestures, this underworld raging because it has no power over Thomas, simply fading when he turns away from it, though what kinds of demons can they be unless they are nothing but illusions? Then they are the powers of fate which afford no one any peace, but Josef knows nothing of such demons, for if he thinks about his childhood, things were different then, there was only fear and unspeakable anxiety, those also being demons in the way they interfered with everything, though they eventually withdrew without Josef’s doing anything. Perhaps it is as Herr Koppelter says, namely that Josef already possesses some of the true teachings inside, but it’s not certain if they are entirely true, though one has to believe in something in order to have something on which to stand, so that everything is once again easy and given, nothing to worry about, all you need is to meditate regularly, it helps you to get through life, it all being like music, where all you have to do is listen, there being a music in all things, an overall tone, of which the gong serves as an emblem, since everything consists of symbols, as do the true teachings, and all we need do is make sure that the symbols never deteriorate into allegories. Perhaps a man is also a symbol, such that all such questions are pointless, as they would contain the answers already, while what stands between a question and its answer is only a conclusion, but just a kind of short circuit, the question and the answer melt together into a single entity, and so one must not draw conclusions, for one can save oneself a tiresome detour only by forgoing all questions. This is what Johannes has in mind when he asserts that it’s not hard but easy to discard both types of approach, or at least to be leery of them, as they prevent your arriving at an unquestioning state, yet what can you do when the meaning of life is riddled with doubt? Once you have discovered the truth, every day that follows is pointless, and everything is over. Yet this idea is erroneous, because it’s blasphemous, for it presumes the ability of the creator to judge creation, whereas one is a part of creation, a piece of creation that cannot hold sway over creation, and thus the nature and point of existence remains unknown. Yet such a consideration cannot be a mere fantasy, we are also born into life’s design, even if each of us is mortal, for life is limitless and is not just the appearance of a being that begins and then ends, but its essence is transformation, we having come from others and then passing on into others, however unknown to us they may be, but we know this feeling of having seen something or experienced something before and wish to understand what it is. This never works, for the capacity of our memory is too small, it cannot include either birth or death.