My dear B. (is it Barbara or Brian?) Mullquist,

Unless you are a non English person, the Scottish sounding Highlander name does not mean you could be speaking one of the Gaelic languages only. They do teach Queen's English in the Great Britain the translation provided by B.K.S. Iyengar is sufficient.

BKS Iyengar works with a sanitized version of Patanjali, the original work has been either destroyed or hidden from the prying eyes of the world. Patanjali could be one person or many who worked at an ancient native form of, "do it yourself nirvana," thingy, so popular among the Beatnics and Yuppies of the west.

Just kidding. Yoga practice of self attainment without the help of external deity worship so common in those days of Patanjali as today was restricted to very few as it required proper initiation from the guru and renunciation of normal humdrum lifestyle of a common man. I say man because fewer women go for that kind of ascetic lifestyle.

Like all higher learning and secret ritualistic practices of those days, women and Shudras were barred from either knowing or practicing the techniques. The do it yourself form of Yoga cannot be done without proper guidance hence cadre of Yoga teachers, gurus and commentators cum Yoga missionaries floating around. Literally, as they jet set from places to places to propagate this cash cow of Hindus.

The entire second chapter of Patanjali's "yoga sutra," deals with "saadhanapaadaH." Which is to say "How to do it." In deliberate manner, Patanjali describes the dos and don'ts of Yoga.

B.K.S. Iyengar is not exactly a modern western man and has some problems with making things better than literally translating the words and expressions which are not even current in today's India. His exact translation of the said verse goes like this:

"Cleanliness of body and mind develops disinterest in contact with others for self-gratification."

Pretty simple and straightforward literal translation. If I were to make it come alive, in my own unique style, I would have made it crystal clear,"purging the body and mind of materialistic pleasures have a bitter side effect, you lose your sexuality."

Swamis and gurus hate as much as the defenders of Hindu faith to admit the sensual aspect of one's body wherein a normal sexuality is considered as a bane for spiritual attainment. Not for our youknowwho meister, Bhagwan Rajanish who had fun, frolic and yeah, fourletterwording galore in attaining name and spiritual fame in the recent history.

Yoga, as preached and practiced in modern times, be it in California or Poona, makes Patanjali some kind of traveling salesman with gadgets and gizmos to sell. Yoga is a philosophy and like any other I know or heard of needs a total immersion. with all the rules and regulations of the mentor and founder including but not limited to the star disciples' true words, actions and interpretations in place.

I love Yoga's 'do it yourself nirvana' part. No textbook or teacher required. B.K.S. Iyengar goes overboard with charts, diagrams and phony baloney conceptual imagery to entice western, educated class of people to bite the bullet. If they do it would be a laughable matter as none can be substantially replicated or corroborated. One swami says one thing and the other says exactly the opposite. Don't forget that each has an expurgated, pirated copy of Patanjali, the original had references to holy Hindu cow flesh eating, which is a definite no no to the chaste Hindus.

As I said this "jugupsa," thingy is hard to practice. Literally, it means aversion and or severe censure. the term "svaa.ngajugupsaa," even has severe aspect that a materialistic person in western materialistic world could never totally attune to. The sensual part of human body is not only the self propagator but also the self preserver.

Try not to eat, drink, sleep, not the sex kind of meaning, the dream kind of daily bad habit and sensual gratification as we get accustomed to the comforts to keep body functioning at its best. In thery, cannot be done and in practice cannot be done raised to cannot be done. A little oil and lube job to keep wheels
turning smoothly, that is my interpretation of seeking comforts. If as Patanjali states, "shauchat.h," by purging your body of all the sensory impurities one develops an intense hatred to one's own sensuality, "svaa.ngajugupsaa," and shuns " asa.nsargaH" the others, "paraiH," including one's close relatives, friends and in general the entire habitat, neighborhood and society at large. I don't see how one can practice this armchair philosophy of western Yoga.

Can't be done under the best of intentions. Luckily, all Yuppies, I don't know if it is true of B. Mullquist, stop at Yoga calisthenics, which is good. The entire track of classical Yoga is strewn with insurmountable humps or dips that appear as mountains or chasms that cannot be glossed over, crossed over or leaped over by an average Yuppie.

God bless Venkataraman, Sid and B. Mullquist as they try to fathom the complex world of Sanskrit imagery which may or may not ever become reality. There is lot of junk in Sanskrit and Hindu philosophy and no definitive answers come by with literal translations or deep philosophical debate and discussions.

The last but not the least, Venkataraman and B. Mullquist be better served if they do not push the envelope. In other words, a good Sanskrit dictionary is sufficient to progress in one's chosen track. You go further and deeper and deeper you sink. Sanskrit, after all was supposed to be Brahmin's secret tool to keep the cutting edge developments in the family.

Now they want to put it in attractive packages and sell to the wide eyed westerners and some curious Hindus. Ain't gonna work. There shall be more B. Mullquists and more cynics like Venkataraman to either question the legitimate meanings or deny all those whose reputation makes their interpretations banal by definition, for instance that of yours truly.

Nirvana yesterday, nirvana today and nirvana forever, for those who seek. Finding it is such a losing proposition. The fun is in the chase. What Adi Sankara said then is what J. Krishnamurti said in different terms, 'you are only a flick of a switch away from nirvana,' are you going to do it or chase the endless paths to achieve what is built in?

Sid



In article <37BAA9C7.770C60F5@malexcite.com>, gautamasiddarth@malexcite.com says...
>
> My dear B. (is it Barbara or Brian?) Mullquist,
>

It's a nick-name, an adaptation of a Finnish expression "saatanan[you bloody!] mulkvisti") used to address someone the speaker
thinks is a very nasty person. So, the "B." mean simply "be!" :]

We are having fun. Anne has taken my challenge and I hers. If you feel like contributing to this highly charged discussion, feel free to jump in. More the merrier. To answer your question truthfully, Adi Sankara didn't, J. Krishnamurti didn't and Sid cares less. It is not the gift of eternal salvation that counts, it is the thought behind the gift.

Throw in some of your wisdom. Vulgarities from my side would suddenly find their switch and vanish in the blue yonder. The medium of internet discussion does not lend to a real discussion as it is tempting to throw all ones might to feel the satisfaction of winning. Rules are broken to get
one's pound of flesh, the name and fame on internet discussion.

Anne has a terrible sense in making this street theater to look like the haloed halls of academia. She may bring more cheers than my usual charcoal to this discussion, provided that the silent readers participate and make it a truly enjoyable debate, no holds barred.

Sid

who_is@my-deja.com wrote:

> In article <37BAA9C7.770C60F5@malexcite.com>,
> Sid Harth <gautamasiddarth@malexcite.com> wrote:

Nirvana yesterday, nirvana today and nirvana forever, for those who seek.
Finding it is such a losing proposition. The fun is in the chase. What Adi Sankara said then is what J. Krishnamurti said in different terms, 'you are only a flick of a switch away from nirvana,' are you going to do it or chase the endless paths to achieve what is built in?


Nicely put! By the way, have you flipped the switch yet?

Sid Harth <gautamasiddarth@malexcite.com> wrote in
37BAAD0E.AFEC3BF1@malexcite.com...
> Care to comment on my little commentary on B.K.S. Iyengar's good book,
"Light on the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, Foreword by Yehudi Menuhin, Harper
Collins, Delhi, 1947. paperback, pp.337?

With great pleasure Sid (which, as you say, is your name and not a Freudian slip).

Sid Harth <gautamasiddarth@malexcite.com> referred to
37BAA9C7.770C60F5@malexcite.com...

>Yoga practice of self attainment without the help of external deity worship so common in those days of Patanjali as today was restricted to very few as it required proper initiation from the guru and renunciation of normal humdrum lifestyle of a common man. I say man because fewer women go for that kind of ascetic lifestyle.

What has self-attainment to do with worshipping the deity (whether internal or external) in the Asian (or Indian) traditions? Except for what has been talked about the Bhakti tradition (especially by the European intellectuals, and picked up later on by the Indians), 'self-attainment' stands radically divorced from any notion of deity -- as far as one can tell. The path of yoga (to stick to what this word refers to in the popular western consciousness) is different from that of meditation or bhakti, in the sense that the former focusses on control (as against 'letting go' in the Buddhist traditions for instance). Renunciation, contrasting it to the 'normal humdrum lifestyle', is a pre-requisite primarily because this 'attainment' (of 'self', 'knowledge', Mukti, or whatever) is predicated upon a meta-reflection (and a deep understanding) of the 'humdrum' life. Such a reflection is cognitively impossible when you are involved (entangled would perhpas be a better word here) precisely in the very dynamic on which you have to reflect.

>Like all higher learning and secret ritualistic practices of those days, women and Shudras were barred from either knowing or practicing the techniques.

Disappointing Sid. Not because, rightly in my view, you complain about the position of either the Shudras or Women in Indian society, but because of the uncritical manner in which you make the 'popular' discourse your own. Those coming from the Christian West, especially from the eighteenth century onwards, spoke of 'secret ritualistic practices' because: (a) they were convinced that the 'heathen' religions of India worshipped the Devil and his minions; (b) as such, its practitioners had hideous rituals as it befitted the False God whom they worshipped; and (c) that it was practiced in 'secret'. Being the latter, almost as a matter of simple logic, it had to exclude; (d) and, of course, it had to exclude 'the majority' (otherwise it cannot be secretive, can it?). Who qualifies for this 'majority' you think? Of course the Women and the 'other majority', viz. the Shudras.
Now this is trash: to say that Yoga did not have practising women (during Patanjali's time, for heaven's sake, Sid) requires more than a mere complacent feminist extrapolation from contemporary India alone. It requires a kind of dumbfounding intelligence (that many intellectuals from the West apparently possess), which cites Dharmashastra to understand India or the Koran to understand the Arab countries, peoples and cultures.

> The do it yourself form of Yoga cannot be done without proper guidance.
Right Sid. But this applies to *all* the Indian traditions (from Yoga through Bhakti to Meditative practices). Far more interesting it is to ask oneself 'why'. Again, not in order to understand what Guru means (or does not) in these traditions, but to begin to come to grips with what this 'self-attainement' is or could be. Your remarks about the 'cash cow of the Hindus' cut deeper and wider than the scope of your words: it picks up (indiscrimately as it were) a Tibetan monk, a Japanese Zen master .... But then, I am not sure about your intentions either.

> The entire second chapter of Patanjali's "yoga sutra," deals with "saadhanapaadaH." Which is to say "How to do it."

A better, more accurate and a faithful rendition would sound: 'the path of assiduous practice'. All knowledge requires 'saadhana', which is more than assiduous practice. It connotes an order of skill which requires 'mindful' practice as well.

>Swamis and gurus hate as much as the defenders of Hindu faith to admit the sensual aspect of one's body wherein a normal sexuality is considered as a bane for spiritual attainment.

Once again, yes and no. Yes: in the sense that any practitoner from some specific tradition finds that his (her) chosen path either forecloses or integerates other paths. This is true not just for the Swamis and the Gurus from the 'Hindu faith' (did I not read a posting from you somewhere that denied the existence of the 'Hindu Religion'?), but for all those Asian traditions that are different from and other than those who pursue the path of 'self-attainment' through Sensuality. Some of the Tantric traditions follow the sexual path to 'self-attainment' as well Sid. In this sense, the answer is also no.

>Yoga is a philosophy and like any other I know or heard of.

That is precisely the problem Sid. The only 'philosophies' one knows today are (a) either Western or (b) pale imitations of the West. One writes, as it were, for the imagined eyes and audience from the West. This has the effect of making the Asian (Indian) thinkers and practitioners appear downright stupid (at best) or mentally defective (at the worst). Which intelligent human being can possibly believe that the whole world is an illusion, maaya? one feels like asking. Were they really so dumb that they did not cognize the 'existence' of the World? If yes, how come they went around talking about plurality of worlds, for god's sake? It appears as though one has answers -- after all, one can either read the original works or texts in tanslations. The only problem is: we do not know what they are answers to. One needs to ask oneself this: Which were the questions these people tried to answer? Are they ours as well? If yes, translation please: into an understandable vocabulary from our own times, and addressing our concerns.
Now, of course, one could also make them sound 'esoetric' and 'exotic', much the same way the German Romantics did. Either way, the point and purpose get lost.

(( A jump of several paragraphs, Sid, begging your forgiveness. Much requires to be written and said about them than I can possibly undertake now.))


> There is lot of junk in Sanskrit and Hindu philosophy and no definitive answers come by with literal translations or deep philosophical debate and discussions.

Again, yes and no. There is a lot of junk both from today and yesteryears, this part is true. No 'definitve' answers? Yes: if you mean by 'defintive', that which is true for all time to come. The only one who can give such answers, according to the Judaic, Christian and Islamic religions anyway, is the personal being refered to as 'God'. They agree too that 'literal translations and deep philosophical debates and discussions' do not bring 'definitive answers', and that only *revelation* does. Tertullianus, one of the early church fathers, summarized this thought in a rhetorical question: What has Athens to do with Jerusalem? Nothing, he said. "Our wisdom comes from the porch of Solomon", and not from the Academy (referring to the Greek and Roman institutions of learing). Surely, you do not want to say this Sid. At least, I do not. In this sense, the reply is a no as well: all answers (in so far as we search and hypothesize) are tentative, hypothetical, and provisional as it befits the beings who formulate them, viz., human beings. Human knowledge is fallible, and it is not infallible 'divine knowledge'. So
what? That is the only kind of knowledge we produce.

I shall keep the rest for another time and place. If and when you reply, my dear Sid, keep in mind the following thought: you asked for my comments.

Greetings