Decision to become a Samana
The Decision to become a Samana is the foundational act of Siddhartha's quest, a deliberate rupture with his privileged Brahman life that sets the entire narrative in motion. It is not a youthful whim but a profound, existential crisis made manifest through a silent, night-long vigil that breaks his father's will and redefines Siddhartha's relationship to authority, tradition, and the self.
Causes and Background
Siddhartha, the handsome son of a Brahman, was loved by everyone—his father saw in him a future prince among Brahmans, his mother felt bliss at his very walk, and the young daughters of Brahmans were touched by love when he passed through the lanes. Yet Siddhartha himself was not a source of joy for himself. He had started to nurse discontent, feeling that the love of his father, his mother, and his friend Govinda would not bring him joy forever, would not satisfy him. He suspected that his venerable father and the other wise Brahmans had already revealed to him the most and best of their wisdom, but the vessel was not full, the spirit was not content, the heart was not satisfied. The ablutions were good, but they were water; they did not wash off sin, did not heal the spirit's thirst. The sacrifices and the invocation of the gods were excellent—but was that all? He questioned whether the gods themselves were not creations, subject to time and mortal. Where was the Atman to be found, if not in one's own self? And nobody showed this way, not the father, not the teachers, not the holy sacrificial songs. They knew everything, but was it valuable to know all of this without knowing the one and only thing, the solely important thing? Even his own father, the pure and venerable scholar, did he live in blissfulness? Did he not have to drink from holy sources again and again, as a thirsty man? Siddhartha's thirst, his suffering, was this: the pristine source in one's own self had to be found, and everything else was a detour.
The Decision and the Vigil
When Samanas—ascetics on a pilgrimage, three skinny, withered men with dusty and bloody shoulders, almost naked, scorched by the sun—travelled through Siddhartha's town, he saw in them a path. After the hour of contemplation, he told Govinda: "Early tomorrow morning, my friend, Siddhartha will go to the Samanas. He will become a Samana." Govinda turned pale, realizing that now Siddhartha was taking his own way, and his fate was beginning to sprout. Siddhartha entered his father's chamber, where his father sat on a mat of bast, and stood behind him until his father felt his presence. He stated his longing: "With your permission, my father. I came to tell you that it is my longing to leave your house tomorrow and go to the ascetics. My desire is to become a Samana." The Brahman fell silent for so long that the stars in the small window wandered and changed their relative positions. He spoke with indignation, saying it was not proper for a Brahman to speak harsh words, but indignation was in his heart. Siddhartha remained standing silently, his arms folded. When his father asked what he was waiting for, Siddhartha replied, "You know what." The father left, indignant, and went to his bed. After an hour, since no sleep had come, he stood up, paced, looked through the window, and saw Siddhartha standing, not moving from his spot, pale shimmering in his bright robe. He returned to bed with anxiety. After another hour, he rose again, saw the moon had risen, and looked again: Siddhartha stood, not moving, moonlight reflecting from his bare shins. With worry, the father went back. He came back after an hour, after two hours, looked through the small window, saw Siddhartha standing in the moonlight, by the light of the stars, in the darkness. Hour after hour, he returned, filling his heart with anger, unrest, anguish, and sadness. In the night's last hour, before the day began, he stepped into the room and saw the young man standing there, who seemed tall and like a stranger to him. He asked again what he was waiting for, and Siddhartha again said, "You know what." The father asked if he would stand and wait until morning, noon, and evening; Siddhartha said he would. When told he would become tired, he said he would become tired. When told he would fall asleep, he said he would not. When told he would die, he said, "I will die." Asked if he would rather die than obey his father, Siddhartha replied, "Siddhartha has always obeyed his father." The first light of day shone into the room. The Brahman saw that Siddhartha was trembling softly in his knees, but in his face he saw no trembling; his eyes were fixed on a distant spot. Then his father realized that even now Siddhartha no longer dwelt with him in his home, that he had already left him.
The Father's Permission and Departure
The father touched Siddhartha's shoulder and spoke: "You will go into the forest and be a Samana. When you'll have found blissfulness in the forest, then come back and teach me to be blissful. If you'll find disappointment, then return and let us once again make offerings to the gods together. Go now and kiss your mother, tell her where you are going to." He took his hand from his son's shoulder and went outside. Siddhartha wavered to the side as he tried to walk, put his limbs back under control, bowed to his father, and went to his mother to do as his father had said. As he slowly left on stiff legs in the first light of day, a shadow rose near the last hut—Govinda, who had crouched there, and joined the pilgrim. "You have come," said Siddhartha and smiled. "I have come," said Govinda.
Consequences and Significance
This decision is the first and most consequential act of Siddhartha's life, the template for all his later departures. It establishes his core method: a silent, immovable resolve that outlasts all opposition, a method he later describes as the ability to think, wait, and fast. The night-long vigil is a direct, non-verbal confrontation with paternal authority, a ritual of self-assertion that leaves his father no choice but to yield. It also binds Govinda to him as a shadow, a follower who will later choose a different path. Years afterward, when Siddhartha tells his life story to the ferryman Vasudeva, this departure is the first chapter, and when he confesses his wound over his own son's rebellion, he remembers how he himself had forced his father to let him go. The river itself later laughs at him, showing him the repetition of this same pain across generations. In his final meeting with Govinda, when Govinda asks for a teaching, Siddhartha's entire life—beginning with this decision to leave all teachers—is the only answer he can give. The decision to become a Samana is thus not merely a youthful rebellion but the inaugural gesture of a lifelong search that can only be undertaken alone, a search that will lead him through asceticism, sensuality, wealth, despair, and finally to the river, where he learns that wisdom cannot be passed on.
