TEMPTATION: This step is about those material temptations that may lead the hero to abandon or stray away from his or her quest.
Siddhartha’s goal has been prevalent throughout the entire book: “to become empty of thirst, desire, dreams, pleasure and sorrow…no longer to be Self, to experience the peace of an emptied heart, to experience pure thought—that was his goal” (Hesse 14). With that, he embarks on a series of adventures to tap into his true self and to find Atman. Through this, he undergoes trials such as taking on the life of a Samana, separating from Govinda, and recentering himself and his goal along the way.
Although in the chapter “Awakening,” it seems as if Siddhartha has found a new goal in the way his perspective on the world changes, I interpreted it as a new means to still achieve his same objective established in the beginning of the book. He states how he will “no longer try to escape from Siddhartha” and will instead “learn from [him]self the secret of Siddhartha.” In doing this, he tries to gain experience himself, eventually meeting a woman named Kamala. Here, Siddhartha falls explicitly into the temptation stage of the Hero’s Journey. He begins to indulge in the life of materialism with Kamala, straying away from his original goal.
“Samsara” depicts his new life as he loses himself in overconsumption: “property, possessions, and riches had also finally trapped him. They were no longer a game and a toy; they had become a chain and a burden” (79). As the temptation stage suggests, these material possessions of riches have fueled his desires, constantly seeking more until he grows miserable of the cycle. Here, Siddhartha has found himself in the opposite position of his goal to find his inner self. He has strayed from his path, even if this new approach was a means to reach his end. While this chapter talks about material temptations—and therefore aligning with the corresponding stage in the Hero’s Journey—he is able to get lured into this new life because of his desire to find himself. The temptation to experience new things himself has distracted him, shackled by the burden of material desire. The readers see the impact of the temptation in further effect in the next chapter, when Siddhartha feels as if he’s deviated so much from his path that he believes his life is now meaningless.
This stage in the book deals with both internal desires as Siddhartha strives towards his goal and its overlap with material temptation. Desire comes both in the form of helping him achieve his objective and straying him away at the same time. However later in the book, Siddhartha comes to the conclusion that this experience was needed for him to learn from, and thus this step was essential to his journey. But—whether you agree this was Siddhartha being led astray from his path or further progressing on it—with the inclusion of “material temptations,” it is undeniable that these chapters overlap nearly perfectly with Joseph Campbell’s definition of the temptation stage in the Hero’s Journey.