The Awakening of Kundalini by Gopi Krishna

Author:Gopi Krishna
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: evolution, enlightenment, kundalini, yoga, prana, shakti, spiritual process, cosmis consciousness
Publisher: Institute for Consciousness Research

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The True Aim of Yoga [3]

In all the ancient literature of India, Yoga adepts hold a place unequaled by any other class of individuals. The amount of literature on Yoga is enormous. Only a fraction of it has been translated into the languages of the West, and one of the results of this lack of sufficient information on the subject has been that the real significance of Yoga is not yet clearly understood.

Broadly speaking, all systems of Yoga in India fall into two categories, Raja Yoga and Hatha Yoga. Raja in Sanskrit denotes king, and Hatha means violence. Raja Yoga implies the kingly or easy way to self-realization and Hatha the more strenuous one. Both systems base their stand on the Vedas and the Upanishads; the main practices and disciplines are common to both.

In Hatha Yoga the breathing exercises are more strenuous, attended by some abnormal positions of the chin, the diaphragm, the tongue, and other parts of the body to prevent expulsion or inhalation of air into the lungs in order to induce a state of suspended breathing. This can have drastic effects on the nervous system and the brain; and it is obvious that such a discipline can be very dangerous. Even in India, only those prepared to face death dare to undergo the extreme disciplines of Hatha Yoga.

It should not be thought, even for a moment, that Yoga in these forms has provided the only channel for self-realization. On the contrary, there is hardly any mention of Yoga in the Vedas, the oldest written religious scripture in the world. Even in the principal Upanishads, the fountainhead of all philosophical systems and spiritual thought in India, there is only a passing reference in two or three of the older ones. The most popular scripture of India—the Bhagavad-Gita—and some of the greatest spiritual teachers recommend other disciplines for the attainment of the goal. These are nishkama-karma (selfless action as service to God), bhakti (an attitude of intense devotion to the divine power), jnana (exercise of the intellect in distinguishing the real from the false), and upasana (worship and other forms of religious discipline prescribed in almost all great religions of the world).

However, Yoga has its own value and importance. It combines a number of disciplines in an intense course of training with the aim of making spiritual enlightenment possible in the span of one lifetime. In India it is told that the human soul undergoes a long series of births and deaths, coming again and again into this world of happening and sorrow to reap the fruit of action done in previous lives. The cycle continues, with the practice of religious discipline, until one succeeds in cutting asunder the chain of cause and effect to reach the final state of union with the all-pervading, all-knowing First Cause of the Universe.

The most authoritative book on Raja Yoga is Patanjali's Yoga-Sutras, a highly respected work more than 2,000 years old. The authoritative books on Hatha Yoga are Hatha-Yoga-Pradipika, Shiva-Samhita, and others that take their stand on the Tantras.

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