IO The Buddha
The tradition is sometimes called the 'renouncer (sarrmyiisin)
tradition'. What we are concerned with here is the phenomenon
of individuals' renouncing their normal role in society as a mem-
ber of an extended 'household' in order to devote themselves to
some form of religious or spiritual life. The 'renouncer' abandons
conventional means of livelihood, such as farming or trade, and
adopts instead the religious life as a means of livelihood. That
is, he becomes a religious mendicant dependent on alms. What
our sources make clear is that by the fifth century BCE this phenom-
enon was both widespread and varied. Thus while 'renouncers'
had in common the fact .that they had 'gone forth from the
household life into homelessness' (to use a phrase common in
Buddhist sources), the kind of lifestyle they then adopted was
not necessarily the same. This is suggested by some of the terms
that we find in the texts: in addition to 'one who strives' and
'renouncer', we fil).d 'wanderer' (parivriijaka/paribbiijaka), 'one
who begs his share [of alms]' (bhik(fulbhikkhu), 'naked ascetic'
(ace/aka), 'matted-hair ascetic' (jatila), as well as a number of
other terms.^5 Some of these wanderers and ascetics seem to have
been loners, while others seem to have organized themselves
into groups and lived under a teacher. Early renouncers seem
to· have been for the most part male, although with the growth
of Buddhism and Jainism it is certainly the case that women too
began to be numbered among. their ranks.
Three kinds of activity seem to have preoccupied these wan-
derers and. ascetics. First, there is the practice of austerities,
such as going naked in all weathers, enduring all physical dis-
comforts, fasting, or undertaking the vow to live like a cow or
. even a dog.^6 Secondly, there is the cultivation of meditative and
contemplative techniques aimed at producing what might, for
the lack of a suitable technical term in English, be referred to as
'altered states of consciousness'. In the technical vocabulary of
Indian religious texts such states come to be termed 'meditations'
(dhyiina/jhiina) or 'concentrations' (samiidhi); the attainment
of such states of consciousness was generally regarded as bring-
ing the practitioner to some deeper knowledge and experience
of the nature of the world. Lastly there is the development of
