Ashtanga Yoga - The Intermediate Series. Gregor Maehle

warfare in one place or another, people are identified with their bodies and wallets rather than with their divine selves, and, finally, corrupt teachers and teachings abound. You can make up your own mind whether this sounds like an accurate description of the world we live in.

      I find myself reading fewer books on yoga written by modern authors and listening less often to modern and contemporary teachers. Instead I rely more and more on the original teachings encrypted in shastra. In this day and age it is necessary for all of us to take personal responsibility for our spirituality and obtain the advice and teaching of the ancient sages who lived during the Golden Age (Satya Yuga). This advice is readily available in the shastras.

      The more shastras you have read and internalized, the less likely you are to become lost in the jungle of different opinions that exist in the world today. Despite our great progress, this jungle appears to have become denser as our history has progressed. I recommend that you find your way back to the original roots and sources of yoga. Try not to read modern interpretations of the shastras, which are creations of the Kali Yuga; instead read the shastras in the original, direct translations. Make sure that the direct translations include the original Sanskrit script type (called devanagari). While reading, keep an open mind, and when you come to passages that do not seem to make much sense, scan over the Sanskrit. Usually the obscurity or ambiguity arises through the translator’s choice of English terms. Start to develop your own alternative choices of English terms. More often than not, there are no direct translations of Sanskrit terms, as there are so many more words in Sanskrit than in English. You need to understand that each choice of an English term constitutes an interpretation. Once you get used to this method of trying to understand the Sanskrit rather than accepting an ambiguous interpretation, you will quickly find that the voices of the ancient teachers find a direct road to your heart.

      Two major pitfalls await you when you read the scriptures directly. The first pitfall may occur when you try to get an overview of the many types of shastra. Because each scripture says something different, you may get confused and not see the forest for all the trees. Remember that there is one common truth underlying all the scriptures, but it is clothed in many different ways. The second pitfall may occur if you read only one shastra or one class of shastra. Because you have no other points of reference, you can quickly come to the conclusion that what you are reading contains the whole of the truth, when in fact there are many shastras and all of them contain a wealth of wisdom.

These pitfalls exist primarily because of the way the shastras were written. They use exaggerated language called stuti to glorify the methods they present, while at the same time they critique the opposing school of thought with equally exaggerated language. This style of writing was employed mainly to attract followers, not to denigrate other teachings. Stuti often takes the form of stating that success can be had only by following the set of practices outlined in the present shastra. The Hatha Yoga Pradipika, for example, states that as long as the life force is not moved into the central channel (sushumna), all rambling about liberation is only the useless jabber of idiots.⁸ This does not necessarily mean that the Jnana Yoga (which does not explicitly deal with moving prana into the sushumna) is idiocy. The stanza also advises those who practice Hatha Yoga to diligently proceed with their techniques and to not be concerned that the Jnanis (practitioners of Jnana Yoga) meditating next door are saying that they will soon leave the Hatha practitioners behind spiritually. Boasting about the prowess of one’s school was as popular among ancient yogis as it is among supporters of modern football teams.

Similarly, some Vedanta texts advise against practicing yoga techniques. For example, Shankara, in his Aparokshanubhuti, says those who still practice pranayama are ignorant and should know better.⁹ To interpret this statement accurately, you need to know that it is addressed not to just anyone, but to those who have already reached the stage of merely meditating on Brahman. Once this stage is reached, the shastras strongly advise against reverting to the practices that led to this stage. They do this for obvious reasons. Before you wear a particular garment, you will wash it if it has become dirty. Once it is clean, however, there is no point in continuing the washing process, as every time you will want to wear it, you will find it wet on the clothesline. One of my Indian teachers repeatedly used this analogy when referring to Westerners who limited their yoga practice to asana. The washing here is the preparatory practice such as asana or pranayama, while the wearing of the garment represents the realizing of consciousness (Brahman).

Luckily enough, Shankara sets the record straight in a treatise called Yoga Taravali, which was written for the benefit of the “dim-witted” yogis who were incapable of following him to the lofty heights of instant enlightenment.¹⁰ In Yoga Taravali he advocates pranayama, the very practice he criticizes in Aparokshanubhuti. This tendency to have it both ways is typical of many great Indian teachers and may be seen as the wisdom to point different students in different directions.

      Glorification (stuti) of the approach taught in a particular shastra often takes the form of grossly overstating the effects of practice. Patanjali, for example, states that merely abstaining from greed will lead to a shower from the diamond-spewing celestial mongoose. The wise will take such exaggerations with a grain of salt. When reading shastra, it is a good idea to visualize the author as a wise Indian sage dispensing advice with a twinkle in his eye.

1 Samkhya Karika of Ishvarakrishna XI.

2 Bhagavad Gita IV.6.

3 Arthur Avalon, Introduction to Tantra Shastra (Madras: Ganesh, 2004), pp. 4ff.

4 Mandukya Upanishad I.1.

5 Brhad Aranyaka Upanishad II.4.10.

6 William Dwight Whitney, Sanskrit Grammar (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1962), p. xii.

7 Swami Prakashanand Saraswati, The True History and Religion of India (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 2001), p. 236.

8 Hatha Yoga Pradipika, IV.113.

9 Swami Vimuktananda, Aparokshanubhuti of Sri Sankaracharya (Kolkata: Advaita Ashrama, 1938), p. 65.

10 He uses the Sanskrit term mudha, which can also be translated as “idiot.”

       Chapter 4

       The Mythology of the Intermediate Postures

      

      The postures of the Intermediate Series have been given names with spiritual or mythological significance to stir devotion in the heart of the yogi. When you study the myths related to each posture,