Class 10 English Chapter 23 The Sermon at Benares answer to each chapter is provided in the list so that you can easily browse throughout different chapters NCERT Class 10 English Chapter 23 The Sermon at Benares and select need one.
Class 10 English Chapter 23 The Sermon at Benares
Also, you can read the SCERT book online in these sections Solutions by Expert Teachers as per SCERT (CBSE) Book guidelines. These solutions are part of SCERT All Subject Solutions. Here we have given Assam Board Class 10 English Chapter 23 The Sermon at Benares Solutions for All Subjects, You can practice these here.
The Sermon at Benares
Chapter – 23
ENGLISH
TEXTUAL QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
Before you read :
1. What is a Sermon? Is it different from a lecture or a talk? Can this word be used in a negative way or as a joke (as in ‘my mother’s Sermon about getting my work done on time…’?
Ans: A Sermon is a spoken or written address on a religious or moral subject, especially one given from a pulpit in a church. It is different from a lecture or a talk.
This word can be used ironically in a negative sense or as a joke.
2. Ans: Afflicted with: affected by suffering, disease or pain.
Be composed: be made up of, get under control, calm.
Desolation: in a ruined condition.
Lamentation: expression of sorrow.
Procure: to collect.
Be subject to: be under effect.
3. Have you heard of the Sermon on the Mount? Who delivered it? Who do you think delivered a Sermon at Benares?
Ans: Yes, the Sermon on the mount was delivered by Lord christ.
Goutam Buddha delivered the Sermon at Benares.
Thinking about the text:
1. When her son dies, Kisa Gotami goes from house to house. What does she ask for? Does she get it? Why not?
Ans: Kisa Gotami asks the people for medicine to cure her son. She doesn’t get it because her child was dead and no medicine could bring back his life.
2. Kisa Gotami again goes from house to house after she speaks with the Buddha. What does she ask for, the second time around? Does she get it? Why not?
Ans: Kisa Gotami asks for a handful mustard-seed. She visits from house to house for the second time. She must get it from a house where no one has ever lost a child, husband, parent or friend. She does not get it because there was no house that faced no death.
3 What does Kisa Gotami understand the second time that she failed to understand the first time? Was this what the Buddha wanted her to understand?
Ans: Kisa Gotami understood the second time that death is common to all. This she failed to understand the first time. she was being selfish in her grief. There was no house where some beloved had not died.Yes, this was what the Buddha wanted her to understand.
4. Why do you think Kisa Gotami understood this only the second time? In what way did the Buddha change her understanding?
Ans: Kisa Gotami understood this only the second time because it was then that she found that there was not a single house where some beloved had not died. She became selfish in her grief. People asked her not to remind them of the death of their beloved ones.
Buddha made her understand that death is common to all.
5. How do you usually understand the idea of ‘selfishness’? Do you agree with Kisa Gotami that she was being ‘selfish in her grief?
Ans:’ selfishness ‘ means looking for one’ s own interest. Yes, Kisa Gotami was selfish in her grief because her only concern was her son. In the light of her tragedy, she was unable to see that death is something that strikes all things living.
Thinking about Language
1. This text is written in an old-fashioned style, for it reports an incident more than two millennia old. Look for the following words and phrases in the text and try to rephrase them in more current language, based on how you understand them.
1. Give thee medicine for thy child.
2. Pray tell me.
3. Kisa repaired to the Buddha
4. There was no house but someone had died in it.
5. Kinsmen.
6. Mark!
Ans: 1. give you medicine for your child.
2. Please tell me.
3. Kisa went to the Buddha
4. there was no house in which nobody died.
5. relatives.
6. Look!
2. You know that we can combine sentences using words like and, or, but, yet and then. But sometimes no such words seems appropriate. In such a case we can use a semicolon (;) or a dash (-)to combine two clauses.
She has no interest in music; I doubt she will become a singer like her mother.
The second clause here gives the speaker’s opinion on the first clause.
Here is a sentence from the text that uses semicolon to combine clauses. Break up the sentence into three simple sentences. Can you then say which has a better rhythm when you read it, the single sentence using semicolons, or the three simple sentences?
For there is not any means by which those who have been born can avoid dying; after reaching old age there is death; of such a nature are living beings.
Ans: 1. No living-being can avoid death.
2. Death follows old-age.
3. Living-beings are of such a nature.
Speaking:
The Buddha’s sermon is over 2500 years old. Given below are two recent texts on the topic of grief. Read the texts, comparing them with each other and with the Buddha’s sermon. Do you think the Buddha’s ideas and way of teaching continue to hold meaning for us? Or have we found better ways to deal with grief? Discuss this in groups or in class.
1. A Guide to Coping With the Death of a Loved One
Martha is having difficulty sleeping lately and no longer enjoys doing things with her friends. Martha lost her husband of 26 years to cancer a month ago.
Anya, age 17, doesn’t feel like eating and spends the days in her room crying. Her grandmother recently died.
Both of these individuals are experiencing grief. Grief is an emotion natural to all types of loss or significant change.
Feelings of Grief
Although grief is unique and personal, a broad range of feelings and behaviours are commonly experienced after the death of a loved one.
1. Sadness. This is the most common, and it is not necessarily manifested by crying.
2. Anger. This is one of the most confusing feelings for a survivor. There may be frustration at not being able to prevent the death, and a sense of not being able to exist without the loved one.
3. Guilt and Self-reproach. People may believe that they were not kind enough or caring enough to the person who died, or that the person should have seen the doctor sooner.
4. Anxiety. An individual may fear that she/he won’t be able to care for herself/himself.
5. Loneliness. There are reminders throughout the day that a partner, family members or friends is gone. For example , meals are no longer prepared the same way. Phone calls to share a special moment don’t happen.
6. Fatigue. There is an overall sense of feeling tired.
7. Disbelief. This occurs particularly if it was a sudden death.
Helping Others who Are Experiencing Grief
When a friend, loved one, or co-worker is experiencing grief- how can we help? It helps to understand that grief is expressed through a variety of behaviours.
Reach out to others in their grief. but understand that some may not want to accept help and will not share their grief. Others will want to talk about their thoughts and feelings or reminisce.
Be patient and let the grieving person know that you care and are there to support him or her.
2. Good Grief
AMITAI ETZIONI
Soon after my wife died- her car slid off an icy road in 1985 – a school psychologist warned me that my children and I were not mourning in the right way. We felt angry; the proper first stage, he said, is denial.
In late August this year, my 38 years old son, Michael, died suddenly in his sleep, leaving behind a 2 year old son and wife expecting their next child.
There is no set from for grief, and no right way to express it. There seems to be an expectation that, after a great loss, we will progress systematically through the well know stages of grief. It’s wrong, we are told, to jump to anger- or to wallow too long in this stage before moving towards acceptance.
But I was, and am, angry. To make parents bury their children is wrong; to have both my wife and son taken from me, for forever and a day, is cruel beyond words.
A relative form Jerusalem, who is a psychiatrist, brought some solace by citing the maxim: we are not to ask why, but what’. The what is that which survivors in grief are bound to do for one another. Following that advice, my family close friends and I keep busy, calling each other and giving long answer to simple question like, How did your day go today? We try to avoid thinking about either the immediate past or the bereft future, we take turns playing with young window, and will be among those holding her hand when the baby is born.
Focusing on what we do for one another is the only consolation we can find.
Ans: The texts are related to death. In the first Martha grieves over the death of her husband and in the second Anya grieves over the death of her grandmother Both of them reacted differently. Grief is a neutral emotion. In the sermon at benares Kisa Gotami grieved over her son. Grief is common to all. They need a person like the Buddha to understand reality. Buddha’s ideas and way of teaching still continue to hold meaning for us.
In Good Grief we have seen that consolation lies in socialisation. People should get together, talk and share their love and affection.
Writing:
Write a page (about three paragraphs) on one of the following topics, and add your own ideas and experiences to them.
1. Teaching someone to understand a new or difficult idea.
2. Helping each other to get over difficult times.
3. Thinking about oneself as inquire, or as one among billions of others.
Ans: Teaching Someone to Understand a New or Difficult Idea
New or difficult ideas are usually beyond our understanding. So it is difficult to teach someone such ideas. It will be easy, in such a case, to lead someone through such situations as life’s real situation. And it will be easy to understand that idea relating to that situation. Any one who gets direct experience is automatically taught the idea that was difficult for him to perceive.
Helping Each Other to get over difficult Times
The best way to get over difficult times is to help each other. Man is a social animal and cannot live alone. He is not independent but he is interdependent. So for one’s survival others are needed. Sorrow is lessened when expressed and joy increases. So to stand by others and help we can have fellow-feelings and easily get over difficult times.
Thinking about oneself as unique, or as one among billions of others
Ans: In fact everyone is unique in this world. No two individuals are the same. In characteristics, qualities and all other aspects every individual is unique. But all are individuals and part of the total mankind. Death is common to all, so is grief. Everyone feels this emotion in his own way. Still as a member of the society we all should follow the social system understanding the law of nature. The mortal law brings death to all living beings-earlier or later.
Additional Questions & Answers
1. Describe Gautam Budhha’s life?
Ans:- Gautam Budhha began life as a prince named Siddhartha Gautama, in northern India. At twelve, he was sent away for schooling in the Hindu sacred scriptures and four years later he returned home to marry a princess. Heretofore shielded from the sufferings of the world, while out hunting chanced upon a sick man, then an aged man, then a funeral procession, and finally a monk begging for alms. He wandered for seven years and finally sat down under a peepal tree, where he vowed to stay chanced upon and came across by chance enlightenment a state of high spiritual knowledge 134 until enlightenment came. Enlightened after seven days, he renamed the tree the Bodhi Tree (Tree of Wisdom) and began to teach and to share his new understandings.
2. Why did Gautam Budhha Leave his house? What will he do later?
Ans:- Siddhartha left the palace at night, never to return. He left behind a young wife and son, as well as his father.
Over the next seven years Siddhartha wandered from place to place, in search of the mystery of life and death. He sat under a peepal tree in Bodh Gaya and began to meditate. After many days of meditation he attained enlightenment and came to be known as Buddha or the ‘Enlightened One’.
3. Why did Kisa Gautami come to Buddha?
Ans:- Kisa Gotami had an only son, and he died. In her grief she carried the dead child to all her neighbours, asking them for medicine, Kisa Gotami repaired to the Buddha and cried, she said“Lord and Master bring my son back to life.
4. What did Goutam Budhha say in his first sermon?
Ans:- Goutam Budhha’s first sermon at the city of Benares, most holy of the dipping places on the River Ganges; that sermon has been preserved and is given here. It reflects the Buddha’s wisdom about one inscrutable kind of suffering.
5. What did Gautam Budhha advise Kisa Gautami? What did she learn?
Ans:- Buddha asked her to look for mustard seeds and the seeds must be procured from a house where there had been no death. Filled with hope, Kisa Gotami once again went on a search from house to house but she could not find mustard seeds from a house according to Buddha’s condition.
Thus, she was disheartened and sat at the edge of the road where she realised how selfish she had been. She realised the fact that men are mortal. Also, no one could escape the cycle of life. This was the only fact that Buddha wanted her to understand. ‘‘The life of mortals in this world is troubled and brief and combined with pain.
A. Choose the correct options for the following:
1. Why was kisa gautami sad?
(i) Her only son had died
(ii) She was in trouble
(iii) Her money was lost
(iv) She is thinking something
Ans:- (i) Her only son had died
2. Who is the author of the lesson “The sermon at Benares?
(i) Lucio Rodrigues
(ii) Lokesh Abrol
(iii) Betty Renshaw
(iv) Arup Kumar Datta
Ans:- (iii) Betty Renshaw.
3. Where did buddha sit?
(i) Peepal tree
(ii) Fig tree
(iii) Banana tree
(iv) Mango tree
Ans:- (ii) Fig tree
4. What is Gutam Budhha’s real name?
(i) Gutama
(ii) Siddhartha Gautama
(iii) Prince Gautama
(iv) None of the above
Ans:- (ii) Siddhartha Gautama
5. How many years did Buddha spend schooling in the Hindu sacred scriptures……….
(i) 3 years
(ii) 4 years
(iii) 6 years
(iv) 7 years
Ans:- (ii) 4 years.
6. Kisa Gautami was asking for ____ to all her neighbours
(i) Help
(ii) Shelter
(iii) Medicine
(iv) All of the above
Ans:- (iii) Medicine
7. What does Kisa search from house to house the second time?
(i) Medicine
(ii) Pumpkin seeds
(iii) Mustard seeds
(iv) All of the above
Ans:- (iii) Mustard seeds
8. At length, Kisa Gautami met a ___ who replied to her request?
(i) Lady
(ii) Men
(iii) Woman
(iv) Kid
Ans:- (ii) Men
9. At what age Gautam Buddha sent away for schooling?
(i) 10 years
(ii) 12years
(iii) 5 years
(iv) 8 years
Ans:- (ii) 12years.
10. Gautam Buddha began his life as.
(i) King
(ii) Scholar
(iii) Prince
(iv) Businessman
Ans:- (iii) Prince
11. He went out into the world to seek……..
(i) Shelter
(ii) Wisdom
(iii) Peace
(iv) Enlightenment
Ans:- (iv) Enlightenment
12. She felt she was selfish in her-
(i) Work
(ii) Joy
(iii) Grief
(iv) All of the above
Ans:- (iii) Grief.
Hi, I’m Dev Kirtonia, Founder & CEO of Dev Library. A website that provides all SCERT, NCERT 3 to 12, and BA, B.com, B.Sc, and Computer Science with Post Graduate Notes & Suggestions, Novel, eBooks, Biography, Quotes, Study Materials, and more.
