Joining the Samanas

Joining the Samanas is the first major action Siddhartha takes after leaving his father's house, a decisive break from the Brahmin world of ritual, study, and family expectation. It is the beginning of a three-year immersion in radical asceticism, undertaken with his friend Govinda, who follows him as a shadow. The decision itself is born from Siddhartha's growing conviction that the teachings of the Brahmans, however venerable, cannot satisfy his deepest spiritual thirst. He has come to suspect that his father and the other wise men have revealed all they know, yet his vessel remains unfilled, his soul unquiet. The Samanas, ascetics on a pilgrimage—three skinny, withered men with dusty and bloody shoulders, almost naked and scorched by the sun—appear in his town as embodiments of a more extreme, more desperate search. Behind them, Siddhartha senses a hot scent of quiet passion, of destructive service, of merciless self-denial. He announces his intention to Govinda with the finality of an arrow shot from a bow, and after a night of silent, motionless vigil in his father's chamber—a vigil that lasts until the first light of day and reveals the trembling in his knees but the unwavering fixity of his gaze—he receives his father's reluctant blessing. He leaves the still-quiet town in the first light, and Govinda, who had been crouched like a shadow near the last hut, joins him. That evening, they catch up with the ascetics and offer their companionship and obedience; they are accepted.

Life Among the Ascetics

Siddhartha immediately adopts the Samanas' harsh disciplines. He gives his garments to a poor Brahman, wearing only a loincloth and an earth-colored, unsown cloak. He eats once a day, never anything cooked, and fasts for fifteen days, then for twenty-eight. The flesh wanes from his thighs and cheeks; feverish dreams flicker from his enlarged eyes; long nails grow on his parched fingers; a dry, shaggy beard covers his chin. His glance turns icy when he encounters women, and his mouth twitches with contempt when he walks through a city of nicely dressed people. He sees merchants trading, princes hunting, mourners wailing, whores offering themselves, physicians trying to help the sick, lovers loving, mothers nursing—and all of it seems to him to stink of lies, to be merely concealed putrefaction. The world tastes bitter; life is torture. His single goal is to become empty: empty of thirst, empty of wishing, empty of dreams, empty of joy and sorrow. He seeks to be dead to himself, to find tranquility with an emptied heart, to be open to miracles in unselfish thoughts. To this end, he silently exposes himself to the burning rays of the sun, standing until he feels neither pain nor thirst; he stands in the rainy season until the cold no longer touches him; he cowers in thorny bushes until blood and pus drip from his skin and he feels nothing. He learns to breathe sparingly, to stop breathing, to calm the beat of his heart until it is almost none. Instructed by the oldest of the Samanas, he practices self-denial and meditation according to new rules. He learns to slip his soul into other forms: he becomes a heron, flying over the bamboo forest, feeling a heron's hunger, speaking its croak, dying its death; he becomes a dead jackal on the sandy bank, bloating, stinking, decaying, being dismembered by hyenas and skinned by vultures, turning to dust. He kills his senses, kills his memory, slips out of his self into thousands of forms—animal, carrion, stone, wood, water—and every time he awakes to find his old self again, the sun or moon shining, and feels the agony of the cycle forced upon him.

The Realization of Futility

Despite mastering these feats, Siddhartha grows increasingly disillusioned. He confides to Govinda that he could have learned what the Samanas teach—meditation, holding one's breath, insensitivity to pain—more quickly and by simpler means, perhaps even in a tavern among carters and gamblers. He argues that what the Samanas call meditation is merely a short escape from the agony of being a self, a temporary numbing of the senses, no different in kind from the drunkard's escape into rice-wine. Govinda protests, insisting that a Samana is no drunkard and that their path is a spiral, ascending level by level. But Siddhartha remains unconvinced. He points out that their oldest Samana, about sixty years old, has not reached nirvana and will not, even at seventy or eighty. He concludes that out of all the Samanas, perhaps not a single one will reach the goal; they find only comfort, numbness, and feats to deceive others, but not the path of paths. His thirst for knowledge remains as strong as ever, and he begins to believe that the desire to know is itself the worst enemy of knowledge. When news reaches them of Gotama, the Buddha—a man who has overcome suffering and halted the cycle of rebirths, who wanders the land teaching, without possession, without home, with a cheerful brow—Siddhartha recognizes that this rumor has already given them its best fruit: it has called them away from the Samanas. He informs the oldest Samana of his decision to leave, and when the old man becomes angry, Siddhartha uses the very arts he learned from him—a concentrated, spellbinding gaze—to subdue the old man's will, making him mute and motionless, forcing him to bow and offer a blessing. Govinda is astonished, but Siddhartha dismisses the feat: he does not seek to walk on water. He leaves the Samanas behind, having exhausted their path and found it wanting.

Significance and Aftermath

Siddhartha's time with the Samanas is not a failure but a necessary stage of purification and disillusionment. It strips away his Brahmin identity, his possessions, his comfort, and his pride in learning, leaving him raw and open. It teaches him the techniques of self-denial—thinking, waiting, fasting—which he will later call his three noble and undefeatable feats, the solid staff of his youth. Yet the experience also teaches him the limits of technique: no amount of fasting or meditation can kill the self; it can only be temporarily escaped. The self always returns, and the cycle of suffering continues. This hard-won knowledge prepares him for his encounter with Gotama, whom he will recognize not by his teachings but by the perfection of his calm, and for his subsequent awakening, when he realizes that he must learn from himself, not from any teacher. The Samana years also leave a permanent mark on his character: even as a wealthy merchant, he will remain a Samana at heart, watching the childlike people with a mixture of love and disdain, and his ability to think, wait, and fast will serve him again when he stands by the river, ready to drown himself, and hears the sound of Om. The bird in his chest, which he feared had died, has not died; it has only been sleeping.