Śivasaṃhitā 4.103

This verse specifies a concrete temporal threshold: ṣaṇmāsa, six months. Haṭha practice promises no instant results; it demands sustained commitment measured in months. The phrase pratyahaṃ guruśikṣayā insists that each of those six months must be accompanied by the guru’s active instruction, not autonomous practice from memory.

Ṣaṇmāsa is a reduced dvandva compound: ṣaṭ (six) + māsa (month, also ‘moon’). Guruśikṣayā in the instrumental means ‘by means of the guru’s teaching’: śikṣā derives from the root śak (to be able) with a causative suffix, pointing to the active process of making the student capable. The particle vai adds assertive emphasis to the statement.

The six-month prescription also appears in the Haṭhapradīpikā for certain prāṇāyāma practices. This period corresponds roughly to two seasons in the Indian calendar, suggesting the body needs to traverse complete natural cycles before physiological and subtle transformation consolidates. It is not an arbitrary number but an empirical threshold of the tradition.