Samnyasa Upanishads: Hindu Scriptures on Asceticism and Renunciation c5.s2.t6.36

c5.s2.t6.36

The period of initiatory studentship concludes with the ritual bath of the student and his return (*samāvartana*) from the teacher’s to his parents’ home. We saw that in the original formulation this was the critical time of a young adult’s life, when he had to make a decision regarding how he would live his adult life by choosing one of the four *āśramas*. In the classical formulation, however, the return of the student signals the completion of his first *āśrama* and the preparation for assuming the second *āśrama*.