the longest book

What’s the longest book you’ve ever read?

“You have a right to perform your prescribed duties, but you are not entitled to the fruits of your actions.”— Bhagavad Gita 2.47

The little monk sat beneath the old tree with a thick book resting on his knees.

The white-bearded sage looked at him and smiled.

Sage: “Little monk, what is the longest book you have ever read?”

The monk thought for a moment.

Monk: “Perhaps the longest book is not always the book with the most pages.”

The sage raised an eyebrow.

Sage: “Then tell me about it.”

The monk opened his first book. The book that took me back in time.

Monk: “The first was Hikayat Abdullah. I found it at Bishan National Library in Singapore. I wanted to understand the history of the Malay world and know more about the writer, Abdullah Munshi.”

“I spent about two weeks reading it from cover to cover. The old Malay language was not easy for me, so I read slowly, trying to understand every page.”

The monk smiled.

“Sometimes I felt as though I had stepped through the pages and travelled backwards in time. I was no longer simply reading history. I felt as though I was sitting inside it.”

The sage nodded.Sage: “So the book carried you into another time.”

The monk opened the second book.The book that kept returning“

This one was The Science of Getting Rich by Wallace D. Wattles.”

“I probably first read it as an e-book around 2020. Then, a year later, while cleaning my father’s little library, I found the physical book again.”

“I started reading it again because I wanted to understand what had happened in my own life and why things seemed to have turned upside down.”

The monk scratched his head.

“Sometimes I understood a word. Sometimes I didn’t. Sometimes I thought I finally understood the whole idea, and later I somehow lost the understanding again.”

The sage laughed gently.

Sage: “And what did you do?”

Monk: “I read it again.”

The sage nodded.

Sage: “That is how rereading works. The words may remain the same, but the reader changes.”

The monk looked at the book.“Perhaps I wasn’t rereading the book. Perhaps the book was rereading me.”

The sage smiled.

The book that brings me back to myself. The monk then placed the biggest book in front of him.

Monk: “And then there is the Bhagavad Gita.”

The sage became quiet.“

I have read it in English. I have tried reading the Sanskrit version. But somehow, every time I open it, I end up reading myself.”

“I see my confusion.

My struggles. My mistakes. The places where I feel as though I am drowning in my own hell.”

The monk sighed.

“And after reading it, sometimes I am still clueless.”

The sage chuckled.

Sage: “Perhaps that is why you keep reading it.”

The monk looked puzzled.“Why?”

Sage: “Because you are not merely trying to finish the book.”He pointed toward the monk’s heart.

Sage: “You are trying to understand the reader.”

The monk became silent.He remembered the ISKCON Bhagavad Gita summary videos that had helped him understand the teachings more simply.

“Those explanations helped me a lot. Sometimes I would read the Gita and nearly fall asleep. But when someone explained the meaning and showed how it could be applied to my own life, something became clearer.”

The sage nodded.

Sage: “There are many ways to approach wisdom. Reading, listening, reflecting and applying. Understanding does not always arrive on the first reading.”

The monk closed the three books and placed them beside one another.

One had taken him into the past.

One had made him repeatedly question his understanding of life.

And one kept bringing him back to himself.

The sage looked at him.

Sage: “So, little monk, which was the longest book?”

The monk smiled.

Monk: “The one I still haven’t finished.”

The sage laughed.

Sage: “And which book is that?”

The monk placed his hand on his chest.

Monk: “Myself.”

“Let a man lift himself by his own Self; let him not lower himself.”— Bhagavad Gita 6.5