Rajayoga

[Elizabeth De Michelis]

Dear Dermot, Jim and members of the list,

please allow me to clear up an inaccuracy which found its way in my book, and was echoed by Jim as expressed in his email below.
 
As Jim points out, I stated that Vivekananda played a pioneering role in defining rājayoga
asYogasūtra-type meditative practice as opposed to
other forms of yoga,and especially haṭha. Georg Feuerstein correctly pointed out in a
review of my book(http://www.traditionalyogastudies.com/reviews_yoga_modern-yoga.html)that such a distinction, and in the same terms, is
already made byVijñānabhikṣu in his Yogasārasaṃgraha (which as many of you will know is a work attempting to summarise and and explain the Yogasūtra and Vyāsabhāsya). The translationof that passage (:55 in English; : 39 in Sanskrit in the same book) goes:
 
"We do not enter into the details of Postures,
because our subjectmatter is _Raja-Yoga_ (in which postures occupy only a
secondaryposition). For a full treatment of all forms of
postures and thepurification of the veins and arteries we refer the
reader to works on_Hatha-Yoga_. Postures have been described."
 
Here are the full biblio details of the book from the
Bodleian Library(Oxford) records:
 
Author             Vijñānabhiksu,
16th cent.
Uniform Title             Yogasārasangraha.
English & Sanskrit
Title             Yogasārasangraha
/ Vijñānabhiksupranīta ; anuvādaka Gangānātha Jhā
Edition             Punarmudrita
samskarana
Publisher             Dill°i
: Caukhambā Samskrta Pratisthāna, 1992
Description             102,
64 p. ; 22 cm
Series             Vrajajīvana
prācya bhāratī granthamālā ; 6
Notes             Basic
tenets of the Yoga school in Hindu philosophy; includes
translation in English
English and Sanskrit
Reprint. Originally published: Madras : Theosophical
Pub. House, 1933
(T.P.H. oriental series ; no. 10)
Title on added t.p.: Yoga-sāra-sangraha of
Vijñāna-Bhiksu
Subjects             Yoga
Philosophy, Indic
Alternate Title             Yoga-sāra-sangraha
of Vijñāna-Bhiksu
Other Names             Jha,
Ganganatha, Sir, 1871-1941.

I plan to correct the above, and integrate the latest research on the this and related topics (such as Jim's and Jason's) in a second edition of my _History of Modern Yoga_ which is under discussion with the publishers.

With all good wishes,

Elizabeth De Michelis
Independent scholar
Cambridge, UK



________________________________
 From: Jim Mallinson <jim at KHECARI.COM>
To: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk 
Sent: Thursday, 3 May 2012, 21:32
Subject: Re: [INDOLOGY] Rajayoga
 
Dear Dermot and other members of the list,

As Prof. Slaje points out, my colleague Jason Birch's recent article is a fine survey of the use of the word haṭha in the context of yoga. Since haṭha is almost always found in conjunction with rāja yoga, Jason's article discusses rājayoga too.

The compound rājayoga suffers from the ambiguity inherent in the word yoga itself: it can mean both the practice of yoga and the goal. In the majority of its occurrences in haṭhayogic literature (which is, I think, the only type of Sanskrit literature in which it is found) it means simply samādhi. Occasionally it does refer to a specific type of yoga practice. In these instances it is meant to denote the best variety of yoga and so its use is comparable to that made popular by Vivekananda et al. - "my yoga is better than yours". (By the way, according to my notes - I don't have the books with me - Singleton 2008:84, referencing de Michelis 2004, writes that it was probably M.N.Dvivedi in a Yogasūtra translation of 1890 who first popularised the equation of rājayoga with Pātañjalayoga.) Thus in the Amanaska, which Jason is editing, it refers to a technique said to bring about the no-mind state. But in the Haṃsavilāsa, for example, rājayoga is
 a practice that involves ritual sex (and is said to be much better than haṭhayoga, which Haṃsamiṭṭhu, like many other medieval/early modern authors, sees as including Patañjali's yoga).

The Yogatattvopaniṣad (c.17th-century) passage you cite is taken directly from the Dattātreyayogaśāstra (c. 13th-century), as is most of the rest of the YTU.

Re the mahīpālavidhi: since the first attestation of the compound rājayoga (of which I am aware) is not for another thousand years or so, it seems unlikely that there is a connection between the two. The one nirukti of rājayoga of which I am aware (but Jason may know of others) does not understand it as meaning "the yoga of kings": rājatvāt sarvayogānāṃ rājayoga iti smṛtaḥ | rājānaṃ dīpyamānaṃ taṃ paramātmānam avyayaṃ | dehinaṃ prāpayed yas tu rājayogaḥ sa ucyate (Amanaskayoga 2.4).

Yours, with best wishes,

Jim

On 3 May 2012, at 10:55, Dermot Killingley wrote:

> Can anyone help me with the history of the term rAjayoga?
> 
> De Michelis (History of Modern Yoga p. 178), and D. G. White (Yoga in Practice p. 
> 20) say that in modern yoga movements it's identified with Patanjali, and that this 
> started with Blavatsky. Theosophical writers also oppose rAja-yoga (spiritual and 
> superior) to haTha-yoga (physical and inferior) (e.g. Sinnett Esoteric Buddhism p. 
> 27). This usage, especially the identification with Patanjali, is followed by 
> Vivekananda, who owed more to Theosophy than he liked to admit.
> 
> Going further back, the haTha-yoga-pradIpikA (HYP 2.76) says rAja-yoga and 
> HaTha-yoga should be practised together, but also lists rAja-yoga as one of the terms 
> for the highest state (HYP 4.3-4). 
> 
> White (Yoga in Practice p. 17) says that according to HYP haTha-yoga leads to jIvan-
> mukti and rAja-yoga leads to videha-mukti, but I don't find this in the text.
> 
> Further back again, the yoga-tattva-upanishad lists mantra-yoga, laya-yoga, haTha-
> yoga and rAja-yoga (Dasgupta Hist Ind Phil vol 1 p. 229; Eliade Yoga p. 129).
> 
> And has the term rAja-yoga anything to do with the mahIpAla-vidhi (MBh 12.308.25) 
> which Edgerton observes "agrees perfectly with the Gita's usual definition of yoga" 
> ("The meaning of sAMkhya and yoga" (American Journal of Philology vol. 45) p. 45)?
> 
> Can anyone fill any of the many gaps in this story? For instance, granted that 
> Blavatsky popularised the identification of rAja-yoga with Patanjali, she can't have just 
> invented it, so where did she get it from?
> 
> Dermot Killingley
> 


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