Why ancient sages preferred to abandon the society?
We learnt from the history that ancient sages and the philosophers (especially the Asian) liked to live in jungles. They don't like to live in big cities. What may had been the reason? Why they preferred ascetic life when they had every opportunities to live lavishly? Were they wrong or were they unaware of the pleasure of the life? Even ancient kings had revered the ascetic life, why?
I've studied this quite a bit myself and I can share my perspective with you. It's my understanding that many of them, especially the ones that were practicing Buddhist, felt a need to isolate from external influence to figure out who they really are at the core of their very existence. As someone that studies and shares my philosophy, I can tell you that it makes sense to me why they would do this.
Living in society, we are ultimately held to societal rules and norms. Well if society is in some way sick or we view it as broken, we can't really expect everyone else to conform to our singular perspective of what the world should look like. Essentially it's up to us to "find our own way" and be an example for others they may also be searching for alternatives to the societal norm.
Would we really consider these people philosophers or great thinkers if they were just doing what everyone else is doing? I think not. It's a calling that some of us feel and if we choose to pursue it, it comes with it's own challenges. It's hard to find peace in a world that you view as fundamentally void of peace and with self awareness it becomes evident that it is not up to any one person to tell every other how they should live their life and what they should believe. In turn, they go off on their own, or into the jungle as you said.
Yes, indeed. I think not only Buddhist but also the followers of other religions like Hindus, Christian, Jain and even Islam had chosen an ascetic life.
Sometimes, when one see and realize that this world is not a good place or the people are not according to one's wishes, mind tends to think about leaving the worldly things and leading a peaceful life. This peaceful state can be achieved in solitude.
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