The Story of Joseph and Pugil: A retelling of Hermann Hesse's Magister Ludi
Around 300 CE in the deserts of Egypt there were spiritual healers living ascetic lives. I want to introduce you to Joseph an eremitic monk who lived alone in the desert where the “sun seared and parched him. He scraped his knees on rock and sand as he prayed. He waited, fasting, for the sun to set before he chewed a few dates” for dinner (Hesse, 1969, p. 301). He prayed and struggled with temptations and spiritual battles for years and in the “fervor” of Joseph’s life and devotion a “gift of listening” developed and blossomed “as his hair began to gray” (Hesse, 1969, p. 301). “Whenever a brother … came to Joseph and told him of his deeds, sufferings, temptations, and missteps” Joseph would listen and take the man’s suffering within his own bosom and dissipate it. Joseph was more than a decade younger than another famous eremitic monk who had also developed a gift of healing through years of discipline and devotion. The other healer’s name was Pugil and “[Pugil] was celebrated for bein