Yoga

Yoga is one of the six schools of Hindu philosophy, focusing on meditation. In India, Yoga is seen as a means to both physiological and spiritual mastery. Outside India, Yoga has become primarily associated with the practice of asanas (postures) of Hatha Yoga (see Yoga as exercise).

Yoga as a means of spiritual attainment is central to Hinduism (including Vedanta), Buddhism and Jainism and has influenced other religious and spiritual practices throughout the world. Hindu texts establishing the basis for yoga include the Upanishads, the Bhagavad Gita, the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, the Hatha Yoga Pradipika and many others.

The four main paths of Yoga are Karma Yoga, Jnana Yoga, Bhakti Yoga and Raja Yoga. A committed practitioner of yoga is referred to as a yogi, yogin (masculine), or yogini (feminine).

Sanskrit yoga is a derivation of yugam “yoke”, cognate to modern English yoke, and Latin iugum in Latin, all from Proto-Indo-European *yugom, from a root *yeug- (Sanskrit yuj-) meaning “to join” or “unite”. Because its emphasis is on the body through asana and pranayama practice, many western students are satisfied with the physical health and vitality it develops and are not interested in the other six limbs of the complete Hatha yoga teaching, or with the even older Raja Yoga tradition it is based on.

In all branches of yoga, the ultimate goal is the attainment of liberation from worldly suffering and the cycle of birth and death (Samsara). Yoga entails mastery over the body, mind, and emotional self, and transcendence of desire. According to the followers, the Yogi eventually reaches the enlightened state (Moksha) where there is a cessation of thought and an experience of blissful union. This union may be of the individual soul (Atman) with the supreme Reality (Brahman), as in Advaita Vedanta; with a specific god or goddess, as in Dvaita or dualistic forms of Hinduism and some forms of Buddhism.

Common to most forms of yoga is the practice of concentration (dharana) and meditation (dhyana). Dharana, according to Patanjali’s definition, is the “binding of consciousness to a single point.” The awareness is concentrated on a fine point of sensation (such as that of the breath entering and leaving the nostrils). Sustained single-pointed concentration gradually leads to meditation (dhyana), in which the inner faculties are able to expand and merge with something vast. Meditators sometimes report feelings of peace, joy, and oneness.

The focus of meditation may differ from school to school, e.g. meditation on one of the chakras, such as the heart center (anahata) or the ‘third eye’ (ajna); or meditation on a particular deity, such as Krishna; or on a quality like peace. Non-dualist schools such as Advaita Vedanta may stress meditation on the Supreme with no form or qualities (Nirguna Brahman). This is in many ways analogous to Buddhist meditation on Emptiness.

The goals of yoga are expressed differently in different traditions. In Hinduism, with its variegated viewpoints and sects, Self-Realization and God-Realization are used interchangeably, with the underlying belief that the true nature of self (truth, consciousness, and bliss), revealed through the practice of yoga, has the same nature as the universal self, which may or may not be identified with a ‘creator God’ depending on the philosophical standpoint of the practitioner. In Buddhism, which does not postulate a creator-type god, yoga may help people deepen their wisdom, compassion, and insight. In Western nations, where there is a strong emphasis on individualism, yoga practice may be an extension of the search for meaning in self, and integration of the different aspects of being.

For the average person still far from enlightenment, yoga can be a way of increasing one’s spiritual awareness, or cultivating compassion and insight. While the history of yoga strongly connects it with Hinduism, proponents claim that yoga is not a religion itself, but contains practical steps which can be found in the esoteric spiritual practices of all religions, as well as those who do not consider themselves religious.

It is quite likely that Buddha (Siddhartha Gautama), who is estimated to have lived 563 to 483 BC, actually studied what was known of yoga at that time as part of his extensive education in Hindu philosophy. It is also very likely, given the rapid growth of Buddhism after his death and before the Bhagavad Gita and Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras were composed, that Buddhism had some influence on those works.

In either case, there is a considerable overlap between the Hindu yoga tradition and Buddhism. Of particular interest is a comparison of the Buddhist eight-fold path and the eight limbs of Patanjali’s Yoga. Their moral precepts (the sila of Buddhism, the yama and niyama of yoga) share the Hindu principle of non-violence (ahimsa); their final steps point towards a common goal – 6. Buddhist Samma Vayama (Effort) vs Yogic Dharana (Concentration), 7. Buddhist Samma Sati (Mindfulness) vs Yogic Dhyana (Meditation) and 8. Buddhist Samma Samadhi vs Yogic Samadhi. In relation to views of the Self, yoga’s asmita-samapatti is designed to eradicate the wrong views on the Self much in the same way Buddha did it in Anatta-lakkhana-sutta.

Yoga is central to Tibetan Buddhism. In the Nyingma tradition, practitioners progress to increasingly profound levels of yoga, starting with Mah? yoga, continuing to Anu yoga and ultimately undertaking the highest practice, Ati yoga. In the Sarma traditions, the Annutara yoga class is equivalent. Other tantra yoga practices include a system of 108 bodily postures practiced with breath and heart rhythm timing in movement exercises is known as Trul khor or union of moon and sun (channel) prajna energies, and the body postures of Tibetan ancient yogis are depicted on the walls of the Dalai Lama’s summer temple of Lukhang.

Yoga is often mentioned in company with Tantra, and it is true that these traditions have influenced one another over time. They are both families of spiritual texts, practices, and lineages with origins in the Indian subcontinent and both have been popularized in the West.

Tantra has roots in the first millennium, and incorporates Shiva and Shakti worship. It focuses on the kundalini, a three and a half-coiled ‘snake’ of spiritual energy at the base of the spine that rises through chakras until union (‘samadhi’) between Shiva and Shakti is ultimately achieved. These concepts were formally introduced into yoga with the Hatha Yoga Pradipika, and because of the subsequent popularity of Hatha Yoga, many Hindu and western yoga teachers now accept these essentially tantric concepts within the yogic philosophy, and this is the most obvious major intersection between tantra and yoga today. The acceptance of tantric kundalini teachings into modern yoga was reinforced by the New Age movement which accompanied (and simultaneously reinforced) the rise of popularity of yoga in the West.

However, Tantra and Yoga have notable points of difference. Where body consciousness is seen as the root cause of bondage in Yoga, Tantra views the body as a means to understanding, rather than as an obstruction, which bears certain similarities with the Natya Yoga. As a result, in India particularly, one of the two branches of Tantra often carries quite negative connotations involving sexual misbehavior and black magic, although it must be said most forms actually follow quite mainstream social mores and this is simply an expression of prejudice.

The actual method of Tantra is quite different to traditional Raja Yoga. It emphasises mantra (Sanskrit prayers, often to gods, that are repeated), yantra (complex symbols and archetypal geometric pattering or sacred geometry housing deity, manifesting in a plethora of forms with a discernable syntactic pattern), and rituals that range from simple murti (a statue housing a deity) or image worship to meditation on a corpse or of coitus in a charnel ground – which is challenging for some, but simply an active meditation with the intention to resolve the perceived duality of the creative and destructive universal principle.