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Martino, Gabriel STRETCHING TRADITION. PHYSICAL ACTIVITY, BODY, AND HEALTH IN MODERN AND CLASSICAL YOGA Scripta Ethnologica, vol. XL, 2018, pp. 139-164 Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas Argentina

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STRETCHING TRADITION. PHYSICAL ACTIVITY, BODY, AND HEALTH IN MODERN AND CLASSICAL YOGA

Gabriel Martino*

Summary: In this paper we develop a contrastive analysis of some aspects of Modern and Classical yoga. With this purpose we first provide a brief discussion of what has been labelled ‘modern postural yoga,’ addressing the transfor- mation that, according to specialists, yoga has undergone in the last century and a half. This process, scholars argue, led to an emphasis in postural exercise and health, and located the focus of the practice on the body. We then analyse, in the second part of the work, Patañjali’s Yogasūtras, its relation to āyurvedic ancient literature, and concentrate our attention on the elements related to health, the body, and the physical activity we will propose are present in Patañjali’s treatise. In the third part, we discuss the respects in which the contemporary transnational yoga phenomenon represents a continuation of the ancient tradition of which Patañjali’s text is an expression. This contrastive analysis provides us an excellent opportunity to examine aspects of the classical yoga treatise that have yet to play a significant role in the discussion regarding the relationship between Modern and Classical yoga. Key words: Yogasūtras, Āyurveda, Modern Yoga, āsana, tapas

Introduction Western individuals interested in Indian reli- The last couple of years have been gion and a number of more or less Westernized highly important for the history of Yoga. As Indians over the last 150 years (De Michelis, is well known, on the 27 September 2014, 2005: 700). The identification of this phenom- India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi spoke enon as such evolves from the perception that at the General Assembly of the United Nations modern yoga is in relevant ways different from urging the world to adopt the International its classical form, and even from haṭha-yoga, Day of Yoga. Less than three months later, on and from this arises the need to study it as a the 11 December, 177 countries approved the different branch, at least, of the tree of yoga, proposal, establishing the 21 June as the Inter- and the youngest one (for example, De Michelis national Day of Yoga (IDY). In the following 2004, 1 ff.). The main difference that scholars year, hundreds of cities organized massive Yoga have pointed out between classical Yoga and its gatherings and classes to celebrate the first IDY, modern versions, as we shall see, is the stress, and the phenomenon was repeated in an even laid by the new Westernized trends of yoga, greater scale in the following years (1). on the bodily postural practices and the health The last two decades have also seen the birth benefits that these bring along. The emphasis of a new field of research called Modern Yoga on these aspects, according to the specialists, Studies (Singleton, 2010: 16 ff.). This recent contrasts with the exiguous attention paid to area of study focuses on those types of yoga physical activity and health in the classical yoga that evolved mainly through the interaction of text, the Pātañjala-Yoga-Śāstra.

* CONICET, UBA, USAL. Email: [email protected] 140 GABRIEL MARTINO

In the present paper we develop a contrastive ([sic] CYP, 2016: 2). The related booklet is- analysis of these aspects in Modern and Classi- sued by the Government of India contains a cal yoga. With this purpose in mind, we provide six page introduction about yoga, its history a brief discussion of what has been labelled and benefits; thirty pages dedicated to physical modern postural yoga (MPY), addressing the movements and postures; five pages devoted to transformation that, according to specialists, breathing techniques; and two pages in which yoga has undergone in the last century and a inner practices such as dhyāna (meditation), half. This process, scholars argue, led to an saṅkalpa (commitment) and the recitation of emphasis on postural exercise and health, and, a sacred verse (2) are explained. There is also hence, located the focus of the practice on the an interesting paragraph in the booklet entitled body. We then analyse, in the second part of the “How yoga can help” which, after succinctly work, Patañjali’s Yogasūtras with its bhāṣya stating that “yoga is essentially a path to lib- and center our attention on the elements related eration from all the bondages”, provides the to health and medicine, the body and physical following points about the benefits yoga offers: explicitly and implicitly present in it. In our • “Yoga is beneficial for physical fitness, last part we discuss the respects in which the musculoskeletal functioning and cardi- contemporary transnational yoga phenomenon ovascular health. represents a continuation of the ancient yoga • It is beneficial in the management of tradition of which Patañjali’s text is an expres- diabetes, respiratory disorders, hyper- sion. We focus, thus, on the points of contact, tension, hypotension and many lifestyle though not denying the divergences, between related disorders. classical yoga and its modern counterpart. This • Yoga helps to reduce depression, fa- contrastive analysis provides us a good oppor- tigue, anxiety disorders and stress. tunity to examine aspects of the Pātañjala-yo- • Yoga regulates menopausal symp- ga-śāstra that have not yet played a significant toms.” role in the discussion regarding this relationship The section ends with the statement that “in es- between classical yoga and the body. sence, Yoga is a process of creating a body and mind that are stepping-stones, not hurdles, to an exuberant and fulfilling life” (CYP, 2016: 8). Modern (Postural) Yoga The first thing to be noticed in this short pas- Aligned with the proposal of estab- sage is that two characterizations of Yoga are lishing the IDY noted above, India’s Ministry of provided: the first one, as a path to liberation Ayurveda, Yoga & Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha from all the bondages, and, the second one, as and Homeopathy (AYUSH) has created a Com- a process towards an exuberant and fulfilling mon Yoga Protocol (CYP) with the intention of life. Both of them are presented as the essence giving “a brief overview about Yoga and Yogic of yoga and one might ask if they are not con- practices to orient one towards comprehensive tradictory or, at least, if they clash in some way. health for an individual and the community” Secondly, one immediately notices the medical STRETCHING TRADITION (...) 141

frame in which the discourse on yoga is pre- expression ‘Modern Postural Yoga’ for delim- sented. In this regard, Elisabeth de Michelis, itating the (new) field of their interest. one of the forerunners of Modern Yoga Studies, In order to examine such problems, let us first points out that modern yoga has been studied refer to the five-fold distinction of modern types in two main ways, one of them being from of yoga suggested by De Michelis. A distinction the point of view of the medical, sports and should be made, according to De Michelis, on fitness sciences. This approach, she states, has the basis of the specific practices emphasized been primarily concerned with testing selected and how these are used within the schools and and adapted yogic practices in order to assess in terms of wider social dynamics (2008: 21 their therapeutic and healing potential and the ff.). The first type is the modernpsychosomatic ways in which they work, and also to find out yoga of Vivekananda, enshrined in his Rāja how they may be used for the cultivation of Yoga first published in 1896. The bedrock of psychophysical fitness, health and well-being this variety, notes De Michelis, is a school’s (De Michelis, 2007: 2). Indeed, an increasing interpretation of Patañjali’s aṣṭāṅgayoga, to amount of research has been carried out in the which other elements from (neo-)Hindu or last decades in order to explore the effects of Western esoteric traditions are attached (4). postural and meditational yogic practices, and The second kind is the neo-Hindu style of these have helped to withdraw yoga from its Modern Yoga. This brand of yoga is especially religious Hindu aura and to transplant it in a receptive to influences from the martial and therapeutic, scientific landscape (Alter, 2004: gymnastic traditions of both indigenous and 77 ff.), which has allowed yoga to be perceived Western origins. It often encompasses either as universally valid, by both many westerners irenic or more confrontational notions of Hindu as well as Indians (3). revivalism, nationalism and / or supremacy (5). This approach, as we can appreciate from the Thirdly, De Michelis mentions postural forms Common Yoga Protocol, is not only the outsider of modern yoga. These include elements of the scholar’s point of view, but practitioners and two former forms and started to develop from advocates of yoga have incorporated it them- the 1920s onwards. The modern postural yoga selves, framing in it their presentation of the schools put a much stronger emphasis on pos- discipline, and its purposes and fruits. How- tural practice and have contributed the most to ever, one can ask to what degree this approach the development and codification of relatively remains simply a frame for legitimating the advanced and sophisticated canons of postural field, or whether,as we will argue, by implant- theory and practice. Their religio-philosophical ing the graft of ancient yoga onto new roots in aspects are relatively unfocussed and poly- foreign terrain, the result is a new plant which valent, says De Michelis, which make these nonetheless retains much continuity with its trends mostly compatible with transnational ancient stock. These kinds of questions have secularization and / or acculturation. When been addressed by specialists in Modern Yoga people talk about yoga in everyday English, Studies, and have in fact led them to coin the this is the type of practice that is intended (6). 142 GABRIEL MARTINO

Meditational yoga, as the fourth kind of yoga, be necessarily divorced and isolated from other presents a more complex situation. Also arising prior traditions of yoga: he holds, however, that in the 1920s, these schools focus primarily on in its dissemination in the Western world, yoga their own specific set of meditational practices underwent a radical transformation in response and are often headed by charismatic founders to the differing worldviews, logical predisposi- or leaders, whose authority pervades the insti- tions and aspirations of modern audiences (ibid, tution. Their teachings may develop towards 16-17). In his work, Singleton caries out a brief idiosyncratic forms of belief, which in turn overview of yoga in the Indian tradition with stimulate the creation of specific practices or particular reference to haṭha yoga in order to of specific interpretations of the practices (7). show that the modern postural orthopraxis does These developmental trajectories, explains not really resemble the yoga forms from which De Michelis, often bring them progressively it claims to derive. After examining the reasons closer to the fifth type, denominational forms for the exclusion of haṭha yogic practices from of yoga, which promote their own forms of the modern yoga renaissance, he then shows (meditational) yoga, worldviews and lifestyles, the way in which āsana was refashioned as a instead of connecting them with wider societal, key component of transnational yoga practice ideological or religious webs of meaning (8). by means of its interaction with the worldwide As De Michelis points out, the most widely physical culture movement. Gymnastics and diffused in many Western cities and commonly bodybuilding movements in India, often linked referred to nowadays by the word “yoga” is the to nationalistic manliness-building projects (see third kind of postural practice. In relation to this, Rosselli, 1980: 121-148), were active in the Mark Singleton holds that modern transnational second half of the nineteenth and beginnings yoga is predominantly an Anglophone phenom- of the twentieth centuries with the supreme aim enon, and he has consequently engaged in the of uplifting India from “the mire of physical study of English sources in which different decadence” (ibid. 95. See also Alter, 2004: 142 forms of yoga were formulated and transmitted ff.). “Harmonial gymnastics” is also indicated in a dialogical relationship between India and as a key ingredient and Singleton asserts, in the West through the medium of this language this regard, that “the breathing, stretching and (2010: 9-10). The conclusion he arrives at after relaxation classes attended every week by his examination of the sources of “transnational thousands of twenty-first-century Londoners Anglophone yoga”, as he prefers to identify it, as yoga recapitulate the spiritualized gym- is that the term “yoga”, in so far as it refers to nastics undertaken by their grandmothers and modern postural practice, is a homonym and great-grandmothers in the 1930s”. The fitness not a synonym, of the yoga associated with the oriented yoga available in virtually every health philosophical system of Patañjali or the one club in London today, he adds, may represent that forms an integral component of the Śaiva a historical succession from those regimes Tantras or the Bhagavad Gītā. This is not to of quasi-mystical body conditioning and cal- say that he understands contemporary yoga to listhenics devised exclusively for women in STRETCHING TRADITION (...) 143

the first half of the twentieth century. Despite or Vivekananda. “There can be no doubt that their lack of the “spiritual India” trappings, Vivekananda and Aurobindo defined the broad- contemporary yoga remains strikingly similar er intellectual context within which there was to these regimes both in form and content, he a renaissance in the practice of Yoga āsanas, claims (ibid, 152). kriyās, and prāṇāyāma. But the history of this As we can appreciate from our brief survey of renaissance seems to “slip past” these men, the research carried out by these specialists, since there is a much more direct link between it seems that modern yoga, including the one innovative Indian experimentation in the 1920s advocated by the CYP, cannot be understood and transnational ideas about health, strength, simply as “an invaluable gift of ancient Indian and physical fitness all over the world in the tradition” (CYP, 2016: v). The developments mid to late nineteenth century and early in evinced by the study of its modern history the twentieth” (2004: 28). Furthermore, the suggest that the trunk from which this young effect of the tendency alluded to by Alter has, branch is growing cannot be considered to be according to Singleton, exercised a profound rooted exclusively in Indian soil and to have effect even on the shape of yoga today (2007: sprouted purely from Hindu seeds. Indeed, if 135), and has led to a transmutation of yoga we continue the metaphor of the tree to explain into a system of stretching for health and fitness modern postural yoga we might rather say that (2013: 38). Chakraborty, along similar lines, it is the result of the conjunction of branches argues that this transmutation of yoga can also from trunks rooted in distant lands and grown be clearly appreciated in contemporary India, from dissimilar grains, whose offshoot bears a were the popularity of Guru Ramdev’s fitness resemblance with the original Indian fruit but program broadcasted on the Aastha television carrying a distinctly different fragrance and channel is a demonstration of how Hindu “as- flavour. Conceived as such, the main “flavour” cetics” are dipping into a new era of the fitness of modern postural yoga seems to be associated consumer. “He offers his fitness regimen,” with fitness, health and well-being, while the asserts Chakravorty, “as a national program for understanding of yoga as “a path to liberation the improvement of the nation’s health and for from all the bondages”, as it is stated in the a redefinition of the “self’ [and…] promotes a CYP, seems to have faded out. somaticised religio-nationalism as an alterna- We have already seen that the CYP empha- tive lifestyle” (2006: 387-390). sises the health benefits of yoga and that, in As we noted above, the transformation which essence, yoga is (also) the process of creating Modern Yoga is undergoing seems not to be a body and mind that are stepping-stones “to explainable in terms of the relocation of an an exuberant and fulfilling life” CYP,( 2016: ‘Oriental’ seed in ‘Occidental’ grounds. Rather, 8). Congruent with this point of view seems it has been understood as a re-enculturation to be Alter’s observation that modern postural process in which (postural) yoga was exported yoga owes more to Eugene Sandow, the father to the West, due largely to the Hindu Renais- of modern bodybuilding, than to Aurobindo sance, where it gained popularity and then sub- 144 GABRIEL MARTINO

sequently also gained popularity among urban exposition on yoga (10). This text comprises Hindus in India as a consequence (see Flood, both the Yogasūtra and its most ancient com- 1996: 267-268). This kind of phenomenon, mentary, the bhāṣya. While for centuries the labeled in the field of religious studies as the sūtra has been attributed to Patañjali and the pizza effect, illustrates the dialogical interac- bhāṣya to Vyāsa, current scholarship suggests tion between Indian and western protagonists that both are the work of a single author (see involved in the constitution of yoga as we know Maas, 2013: 57-69). The date of its composition it today. In summary, our brief discussion of seems to be around the fourth century AD (ibid, modern yoga’s bibliography has tried to show 66), though it certainly draws on pre-existing that the pizza effect applied to yoga should not traditions and (oral) texts, which the author in- be understood merely in terms of a growth in directly acknowledges and masterfully synthe- its popularity after its westernization, but as a sizes in a compact and well structured treatise. transformation in the ingredients of the orig- Historically, yoga and sāṅkhya have been inal recipe and in the way they are combined closely related and in many cases yoga has been together. Furthermore, applying to yoga what considered a theistic variant of sāṅkhyan phi- Stephen Jenkins has pointed out in relation losophy (11). Consequently, though early yoga to pizza (2002: 71-83), we can say that the is generally considered independent, and later re-enculturation of yoga allowed westerners as one of the six major Indian philosophical to delight themselves when finding in (re)Indi- currents or darśanas (12), it is probably more an(ized) yoga a reflection of their own fitness accurate to consider it an ancient ascetic prac- and self cultivation tendencies, (9) which in tice at some point assimilated to the sāṅkhyan turn they re-import to the west as “authentic” world view, which later progressively differen- Indian Yoga. After all, writes Jenkins quoting tiated itself from the latter (see Jakobsen, 2011: his rigorous yoga teacher in India, “Americans 74-82) (13). Notwithstanding the discussion of always want a workout” (2002: p.81). In this the (non)existence of an ancient history of yoga way, contemporary western image-mediated as an independent darśana (Bronkhorst, 1981: vanity manages to see itself replicated in the 316), there is a well documented textual tradi- catwalk of spiritual progress clothed in ancient tion stemming from the Pātañjala-Yoga-śāstra eastern ascetic wrappings. This process, we which extends itself until the present time (14). can add, though contorting Indian yoga, has The fact that our text integrates the yogic prac- stretched considerably tourism-related incomes tices and doctrines in a sāṅkhyan ontological in India (see Aggarwal, 2008: 457-464). framework should not be overlooked. Modern promoters of the Yogasūtra, in contrast, tend to cushion the strict dualism of sāṅkhya inherent Physical Activity, Body and Health in an- in the treatise encapsulating it in a neo-vedan- cient Yoga: a contextualized analysis tic interpretation. This reading, in fact, is an Let us now turn to the analysis of the important part of the history of modern yoga Pātañjala-Yoga-Śāstra regarding the classical and of the popularization of our treatise. We STRETCHING TRADITION (...) 145

have to bear in mind, in this regard, that two in Sanskrit, there is a short tract on the yogic of the most important protagonists of modern path to liberation. Dominik Wujastyk has yoga renaissance, Swami Vivekananda and recently provided a new translation of these Tirumalai Krishnamacharya, played a key role verses and has shed important light on the in the establishment of Patañjali as a source relationship between ancient ascetic traditions of authority for yoga in the modern global such as buddhism, yoga, and Āyurveda. The era (15). And both of these thinkers, and even passage contains thirty nine verses and occurs Krishnamacharya’s disciples, contributed to the in the Chapter on the Embodied Person in the canonization of such a neo-vedantic reading Compendium of Caraka (Caraka Saṃhitā, (16). This interpretation, moreover, was ap- Śārīrasthāna 1, verses 137-155), probably the plied not only to Patañjali’s text but also to the earliest surviving complete treatise on classical general widespread contemporary conception Indian medicine. Scholars agree that this yoga of yoga, of which, once again, the already cited tract predates Patañjali’s yoga system and Common Yoga Protocol gives us a clear and should be dated between the first century BCE recent expression. “According to Yogic scrip- and the first two centuries CE. It is a syncretic tures, the practice of Yoga leads to the union text about the path of yoga in which the pres- of individual consciousness with the universal ence of citations from early treatises on Vaiśeṣi- consciousness” (CYP: 3). This statement, ka and Sāṅkhya are evidence of a willingness though broadly applicable to other yoga-śāstras to synthesize across philosophical divides. The (17), does not follow from a close reading of text expounds a very early eight-fold path in the Yogasūtra, to which the CYP refers to on which smṛti (recollection) plays a central role the next page as the systematization and cod- in the acquisition of supernatural powers and ification of the ancient yogic practices, along ultimate liberation. The Buddhist technical with their meaning and related knowledge, vocabulary and the text’s focus on mindfulness accomplished by Patañjali (CYP, 2016: 3-4). suggest that the archaic yoga method integrated We now need to discuss a contextual aspect of in the medical treatise owed its origin to Bud- Yoga in antiquity that is relevant to our analy- dhist traditions cultivating smṛti (18). sis. So far we have outlined how the discourse In another important ancient medical treatise, on MPY is characterized as being presented in the Suśruta Saṃhitā (SS), there is an inter- a medical framework, and by its stress on the esting statement that also connects yoga and health benefits of yoga. Scholars, in fact, point Ayurveda. In the third chapter of its first sec- out these features as a hallmark of MPY that tion, the treatise introduces the different parts distinguishes it from its classical predecessor. of Āyurveda and mentions the numerous topics However, there are textual evidences that in included in the whole text (19). Right before Ancient India yoga and medicine have also alluding to the section dedicated to the body been closely related. It is to these references and the ten topics included in it we find: “These that we now turn. ten concerning the body have been pointed out Buried in one of the earliest medical treatises by the great sage (Suśruta) with the purpose of 146 GABRIEL MARTINO

the knowledge of the body for the physicians The Pātañjala-yoga-śāstra: health, the body and even for the yogins” (20). This statement, and phisical activity though brief and isolated, reinforces the idea The Pātañjala-yoga-śāstra itself also just discussed that medical knowledge had confirms this close connection between yoga close associations with yogic practice. It even and medicine and, thus, its concern about health provides an interesting contrast with the infor- and the body. Let us first quote an explicit mation provided in the Caraka Saṃhitā (CS), parallelism between yoga and medicine that since while the latter treatise relates yoga with we find in the commentary tosūtra II 15 of the inner meditational practices and the cultivation bhāṣya section (23). of recollection (smṛti), the SS mentions the usefulness of anatomical and physiological data “As the science of therapeutics (cikitsā śāstra) for yogins. In both texts, however, the reference has a four-fold arrangement, disease, the cause to yoga is associated with the Chapter on the of disease, absence of disease and the practice Embodied Person (the Śārīrasthāna). of healing, likewise, even this science has a Additionally, the yoga passage of the CS, four-fold arrangement, namely, the cycle of despite its emphasis on meditation, has some rebirth (saṃsāra), the cause of the cycle of other interesting features that can be highlight- rebirth, liberation and the path towards liber- ed. One of the outcomes of the yogic discipline ation. Of these, the cycle of rebirth, abundant described there is the end of all pains (duḥkha) in pain, is to be avoided. The association of the (21), but another and more important one, is puruṣa with nature is the cause (of what is) to the achievement of supernatural powers, one of be avoided. The cessation that reaches beyond which is beauty (kānti). In fact, the description the association is the destruction (of pain). provided by Caraka about the yogic powers is The path towards the destruction (of pain) is very much in line with Patañjali’s teaching on accurate contemplation”. siddhis, which we discuss below (Wujastyk, 2012: 34). In relation to the close connection If we accept the already mentioned identifi- between yoga and medicine, it should be also cation defended by Maas between Patañjali noticed that the composition of a medical and the bhāṣya-kāra, this passage gives us treatise was attributed to Patañjali himself, in clear evidence that Patañjali had a systematic addition to grammatical and yogic texts. The knowledge of a medical system and that he also first testimony of this tradition is found in the expected his audience to share it. An analogy, in opening lines of Bhoja Rāja’s (XIth. century) fact, operates as a means of explanation when commentary to the Yogasūtra. There, Bhoja one of the members of the analogy is known asserts that Patañjali had contributed to the and can be used as a means for elucidating the removal of impurities from the body, speech other less known member. It also suggests that and mind (22). Patañjali might be thinking his soteriologi- cal philosophy in the frame of a therapeutic paradigm. He identifies, firstly, the fourfold STRETCHING TRADITION (...) 147

arrangement of the medical system, which threefold division also provides a close link to he calls cikitsā śāstra, consisting of disease, Āyurveda, since it is explicitly mentioned in the cause of disease, health and the means to the SS (Sū. XXIV). obtain health; (24) and then offers a parallel A further connection is provided by sūtra III 29, fourfold arrangement of his own science (śās- which states that by concentration (saṃyama) tra): saṃsāra or the cycle of rebirth, the cause on the navel chakra knowledge of the arrange- of saṃsāra, liberation and the means to obtain ment of the body (kāya-vyūha) is attained. liberation. The yoga-śāstra, hence, is presented Bhoja’s commentary to this sūtra states that this as the therapy for the disease of saṃsāra that region is the root of the subtle channels and, afflicts the self, a therapy which, when suc- in fact, the ancient medical texts hold that the cessfully applied, leads to the recovery of the origin of the twenty four different ducts of the essential, liberated, “healthy” state of puruṣa body have their origin in the navel (26). The (see Halbfass, 1992: ch. VII). bhāṣya to this sūtra provides further informa- Our text also presents other specific evidences tion that in the body there are three doṣas and of medical knowledge. In sūtra I 30, we find seven dhātus and gives an enumeration of both a first reference to disease. In this aphorism kinds of components. These lists, though not Patañjali enumerates the obstacles that pro- free from textual problems, also have a high duce distractions for the mind which prevent degree of consonance with the Āyurvedic the- the yogi from achieving samādhi or the state ories expounded in the early medical treatises of supreme concentration. Disease (vyādhi) is (Maas, 2008: 125-162). the first distraction mentioned, and is defined These ingredients of our text, if taken together, in the bhāṣya as unevenness (vaiṣamya) in the confirm that the author of the PYŚ was ac- dhātus, rasas and karaṇas, terms that make quainted with an early version of Āyurvedic allusion to the respective humours recognized medical knowledge which played an important by Āyurveda, the different qualities of food and role in his understanding. Obviously, if Maas drinks, and the organs of action and sensation is correct, this means that Patañjali himself had of the body. It is very relevant to note that in made this connection. But even if one is not the CS (Sū. IX 4) disease is defined precisely as convinced by Maas, we have to accept none- dhātu-vaiṣamya, and is there directly associated theless that yoga was associated with Āyurveda with pain (duḥkha) (25). The next sūtra of the both before Patañjali, as the Āyurvedic texts PYŚ (I, 31) states that duḥkha is the counterpart discussed above show, and also a century or of disease and of the other obstacles in general. so later, as the bhāṣya evinces. Either way, all The bhāṣya here distinguishes three kinds of this provides a frame for thinking about the pains: ādhyātmika, ādhibhautika and ādhid- yoga śāstra in terms of a therapeutic science. In aivika. This classification makes reference to other words, medical knowledge appears as an the origin of diseases, which can be relative integral element inside the larger purview of the to one’s self (ātmika), other living entities classical yogic path. The relationship between (bhautika) and environmental (daivika). This yoga and medicine in the PYŚ, hence, appears 148 GABRIEL MARTINO

to be of mutual inclusiveness, since medicine is rasāyana at the beginning of the sixth chapter presented both as a general model for explicat- or Cikitsā Sthāna. In this section, we read that ing yoga and also as a specific aspect related to one of the two branches of bheṣaja or therapeu- the body (and the body-mind complex) in the tics promotes strength in the healthy while the broadest path of yogic endeavor. other one restores health (VI, I 4). The division Furthermore, yoga appears to surpass medicine described as promoting strength in the healthy even in relation to the body. There is, in fact, is, in turn, described as being either rasāyana an important section of the treatise devoted to (promotive treatment) or vṛṣya (aphrodisiac) the exposition of different extraordinary powers (VI, I 5). In the sixth verse we are even told that the practitioner achieves as a result of the the fabulous results obtained from rasāyana: a practice of yoga. Larson, for example, divides long duration of life (dīrgham āyur), memory these into cognitive capacities and powers (smṛti), mental vigour (medhā), absence of (Larson and Bhattacarya, 2008: 119 ff.), Sar- disease (arogya), the vigor of a young person backer into abilities of knowledge and of action (tarunaṃ-vayaḥ), splendour in figure, tone of (2011, 204), while Key Chapple points out that voice and generosity (prabhā varṇa-svara- according to one of the approaches present in audārye), a superior strength of the senses and the text, the accomplishment of yoga brings the body (dehendriyabalaṃ param), perfection about bodily perfection (2011, 234). Let us of speech (vāksiddhi), respectability (praṇati), concentrate, hence, in the extraordinary powers and beauty (kānti) (I 7-8). It seems to us that the related to action and bodily perfection, due to author of the bhāṣya intended to make reference which yoga would appear as a superior option to these outstanding results of the application to medicine with regards to the fruits that both of herbal promotive treatments as examples of disciplines bring about in relation to the im- yogic perfections attained from drugs. provement of the body. We will focus now, however, on one of the The firstsūtra of the fourth book called Kaiva- other options mentioned as the cause of yogic lya Pāda states that the yogic powers (siddhi-s) powers: tapas or austerity. Patañjali gives a arise as the result of supreme concentration very important role to tapas in his system. The (samādhi), practice of austerity (tapas), repe- first element included in the yoga of action or tition of mantra, birth or from drugs (oṣadhi). kriyā-yoga (II 1) is, in fact, tapas, and it also This last option refers us again to Āyurveda, appears as one of the niyamas or observances since the scientific study of medicinal plants (II 32). The bhāṣya (II 1) even states that for the and herbs is an important part of the discipline, person not engaged in tapas yoga does not suc- though it had been carried out even in the Vedic ceed (sidhyati), and in the commentary to sūtra period (27). It is also relevant to note in this II 32 different kinds of austerities are enumer- regard that the bhāṣya here relates oṣadhi to ated: endurance of the pair of opposites such rasāyana, a very important notion for Āyurve- as hunger and thirst, cold and heat, standing dic science. The Caraka Saṃhitā, in fact, ded- and sitting, the absence of all expression, the icates a lengthy section to the description of absence of speech, fasting, etc. Patañjali further STRETCHING TRADITION (...) 149

elaborates in sūtra II 43 that the perfection of Once again, Patañjali insists in the ability that the body and the senses (kāyendriya-siddhi) yoga has to act upon the body by providing it occurs because of the practice of austerities, with different extraordinary as well as ordinary due to the destruction of impurities that they qualities, though the latter would be achieved to bring about (28). The perfection of the body the highest degree. These features of yoga relate and the senses alluded to in this aphorism can it to medicine, making yoga a complement to be considered to be a state of perfect health. We medicine since they yield similar results. But must remember that disease is understood as a yoga, nevertheless, goes far beyond medicine, distraction that prevents the mind from attain- firstly, because of the spiritual goals of yoga if ing samādhi, so it would be difficult to imagine we consider, at least, that these are not attained that Patañjali conceives of a body and senses in medicine, an opinion the Caraka Saṃhitā that are perfect and, at the same time, suffering seems to challenge. And, secondly, because some sort of disease. But the kind of perfection of the powers obtained by the yogic practice, dealt with in this sūtra also implies the mani- though, again, their inclusion in the yoga pas- festation of certain extraordinary powers. The sage of the CS (together with the possibility of bhāṣya, in fact, makes a quick reference here obtaining them through drugs) make it difficult to the powers, attributing aṇiman (becoming to exclude the acquisition of (at least some) small as an atom) and others to the body, and powers altogether from the sphere of results clairaudience, clairvoyance and others to the attained by medical knowledge. senses. We would like to discuss, lastly, the role of Two other aphorisms deal with the notion physical activity in the PYŚ. This topic has of bodily perfection. Sūtra 45 of the third been the subject of a great deal of debate in book states that a special type of meditation the last decades about the differences between (saṃyama) results in the absence of limitations modern and classical yoga, as we pointed out of the natural abilities of the body and in the in the previous section. In this regard, Mark attainment of its perfection (kāya-sampat). Singleton, for example, makes the following In the commentary to this sūtra the complete statement. “Even—perhaps especially—in list of the eight powers (aṣṭāvaiśvaryāṇi) is the āsana-heavy systems that have become provided. These powers include mastery over synonymous with yoga for many Westerners, the elements and the absence of obstructions the Y[oga]S[utra] is today habitually invoked from them. This absence from obstructions, as a source and authority for practitioners, in we can infer, apart from allowing the yogin spite of the infrequency of material on āsana to perform extraordinary actions, would make in the YS and its commentaries (beyond terse him remain in perfect health. The following references to static meditation “seats”) and the sūtra (III 46) provides more details about the fact that there is ‘no evidence’ for an ‘ancient notion of perfection of the body: it implies tradition’ of āsana practice” (2008: 91). Indeed, beauty (rūpa) grace (lāvaṇya), strength (bala) the allusion to the “scarcity” of information and adamantine hardness (vajra-saṃhanana). provided by Patañjali in relation to āsana and 150 GABRIEL MARTINO

its contrast to the great emphasis given to it in sitting in meditation, that is why it needs to be MPY has become a common place in recent pleasant and still (Bryant, 2009: 284). In fact, academic literature (see Singleton, 2010: 27). later texts claim that meditating when moving Let us examine, hence, the role of āsana in around is distracting while while lying down our treatise. provokes sleep (31). This could explain why One of the most famous, though not necessar- Patañjali adds āsana, which actually means ily well-known, aspects of the Yogasūtra is its “seating posture”, to the pre-existing lists of eight-fold synthesis. In the sūtra twenty nine of limbs of yoga (32). The bhāṣya enumerates the second book, the Sādhana Pāda or Book of different kinds of āsanas that can be rendered Practice, Patañjali enumerates the eight (aṣṭa-) as follow: the Lotus Posture (padmāsana), the limbs (aṅgāni) of yoga: yama (restraint), niya- Good Fortune Posture (bhadrāsana), the Hero ma (observances), āsana (posture), prāṇāyāma Posture (vīrāsana), the Lucky Mark (svastika), (regulation of breath), pratyāhāra (withdrawal the Staff Posture (daṇḍāsana), the Supported of the senses), dhāraṇā (concentration), dhyāna (sopāśraya), the Couch (paryaṅka), Sitting (meditation) and samādhi. The first thing to Like a Sarus Crane (krauñcaniṣadana), Sitting note is that the term aṣṭāṅga (eight limbed) is Like an Elephant (hastiniṣadana), Sitting Like so common in Āyurvedic literature that it later a Camel (uṣṭraniṣadana), Being Situated Flat became a synonym for Indian medical science (samasaṃsthāna), Steady Calm (sthitapraśrab- (Wujastyk, 2012: 31). Patañjali´s choice of dhi), and As is Comfortable (yathāsukha) terminology (and numbering), hence, seems (Wujastyk, 2015). Though Patañjali does not not arbitrary, especially considering that there describe these postures, Śaṅkara’s commentary were also available previous systematizations does explain their distinctive features. It must of yoga that included only six members (29). be noted, as well, that the bhāṣya ends his Patañjali´s preference for an eight-fold yogic list with an ādi (“beginning with” or, simply, path, just like Caraka’s and in close terminolog- “etcetera”), which implies that the catalog of ical relation to Āyurveda as it appears alluded postures provided is not exhaustive. Śaṅkara, in to in the Mahābhārata (30), might also indicate fact, states that one should understand the ādi the therapeutic frame of reference in which he as referring to any other posture which has been presents his yoga śāstra. taught by the teacher. This comment allows Āsana, in particular, is the third member of the us to infer that yoga teachers, at least at the sequence and Patañjali dedicates three sūtras end of the first millennium when theVivaraṇa and some brief comments in the bhāṣya to was composed, would include the teaching of explain it. In the forty sixth sūtra, āsana is diverse āsanas in their instruction. described as steady (sthira) and comfortable It is also worth mentioning that the natural (sukha). We may understand that the relevance consequence of accomplishing a firm posture and function of āsana for classical yoga are which requires no effort is that the yogin is to train the body so that it does not disturb or not overcome by the pairs of opposites such distract the mind of the yogin in any way when as heat and cold (33). This outcome of āsana STRETCHING TRADITION (...) 151

connects it closely to tapas. As we have seen, such as it is conceived in the PYŚ: whether it in the bhāśya to II 32, when describing the can be understood as a kind of physical activity. different niyamas or observances, the bhāṣya- We must bear in mind, firstly, that its treatment kāra states that tapas consists in endurance of is included in the Sādhana Pāda or Book of the pair of opposites and the same traditional Practice, and that it could be identified with example of heat and cold is included. If we look a kind of tapas, which is a constituent of kri- closely at both passages, we can understand yā-yoga or yoga of action. From these points, the connection between these two practices as together with its characterization given in II implying that when āsana is conquered (jaya-), 46 and the catalog of āsanas provided in the as the practitioner is not overcome by the pair bhāṣya, we can affirm thatāsana is an initially of opposites, he is practicing (a kind of) tapas. active though eventually static practice which Patañjali, however, does not explicitly assert results from bodily training in order to be able that the correct practice of āsana is a form of to abide steadily and comfortably an otherwise tapas, in fact, he includes them as different strained physical posture during prolonged elements of the eight-fold path. Nevertheless, times of prāṇāyāma and inner meditative the inclusion of tapas as an element of the practices. Whether this can be taken as a form second aṅga does not prevent Patañjali from of physical activity or not, we can evaluate it assigning to it a broader and more encompass- through a definite modern conception of this ing role in the system. Tapas, we have already notion. noted, is one of the three elements of the other The World Health Organization, for exam- systematization that the treatise provides in II ple, defines physical activity as “any bodily 1, kriyā-yoga, or the yoga of action. And in the movement produced by skeletal muscles that bhāṣya to II 52, where we find that the result requires energy expenditure” (34). This defini- of practicing prāṇāyāma is the weakening of tion, we can say, hits the nail right on the head. the karma which binds the yogin to saṃsāra, Of course, āsana does not involve movement. we also read: “(there is) no superior tapas than On the contrary, a perfected āsana is not only prāṇāyāma!”. Thus, if we bear in mind that the a still posture but it even excludes the slight regulation of prāṇa is the fourth of the eight trembling of the motionless limbs (35). In fact, limbs, we have grounds to suggest that the the stillness of āsana seems to reduce energy notion of tapas is in fact taken as a compre- expenditure as much as possible. What implies hensive practice that exceeds the second limb. movement and demands energy expenditure Additionally, if we consider that bhāṣya II 49 is the training necessary for being able to ac- states that when there is conquest of āsana, complish the āsana comfortably, which would prāṇāyāma may occur, we have further reasons involve stretching and maybe the strengthening to assume that perfected āsana is at least a of certain muscles. The alluded definition of preparatory tapas to the supreme form of tapas physical activity, hence, is not applicable to which is the control of prāṇa. āsana if we understand it solely as a result. Let us now address a last issue regarding āsana However, if we include in the category of āsa- 152 GABRIEL MARTINO

na the needed training to completely achieve being unprecedented phenomena, as we have the posture taught by the teacher, in contrast, attempted to demonstrate by our analysis of then it is reasonable to apply to it the notion of classical sources of yoga and Āyurveda. Natu- physical activity. I understand, from the above rally, modern western medical knowledge and analysis, that Patañjali is thinking of the notion discourse is in relevant ways different from an- of āsana in the first sense, as the completeresult cient Āyurveda. But as long as we acknowledge of a training process which, when achieved, is ancient Āyurveda as a historical form of medi- at the same time a total abandonment of that cine we are forced to accept that the connection effortful process. It is interesting to consider between medicine, health and yoga has existed in this regard Vācaspati Miśra’s comment on for many centuries and that Modern Postural II 47. “This natural effort of the body does Yoga should not be conceived as divorced, in not bring about the posture that is meant to this regard, from Pātañjala yoga (38). be taught. It is, in fact, its antagonistic.[…] Somehow less evident is the link between con- Therefore, he who practices posture as an ob- temporary yoga’s stress on physical activity and servance taught here should employ an effort the concept of āsana included in the yoga sys- which consists in suppressing the natural efforts tematized by Patañjali. In order to shed some of the body. Otherwise, the posture taught here light on this relation let us recall, firstly, that will not be accomplished” (36). As we can āsana is not included in the eight-fold yogic see, Miśra understands that āsana is not an path described in the Caraka Saṃhitā (Wujas- exercise that implies applying an effort (37). tyk, 2012: 41). The list of the six-limbed yoga In fact, if effort arises, he says, the āsana is not (ṣadaṅgā…yoga) provided in the Maitri Upa- being accomplished. The commentator, hence, niṣad, which includes prāṇāyāṃa, pratyāhara, seems to take āsana in the first sense, which, dhyāna, dhāraṇā, tarka (reasoning or inquiry) though requiring a previous training process, and samādhi also exclude āsana (39). The implies nonetheless that the effort involved in Bhagavad Gītā, in contrast, does include the the training is no longer present. term āsana in the chapter on Dhyāna-yoga or Yoga of Meditation, in the description of how the yogin has to prepare himself for meditation, Concluding remarks: stretching tradition but the meaning of the term there is simply In this last section we discuss how we “seat”, not “posture” (40). We believe that the consider that our analysis of āsana, body and fact that these pre-Patañjalian treatises do not health in the PYŚ can contribute to achieving include the term āsana as Patañjali uses it, nei- a better understanding of the relationship be- ther in the systematizations of the yogic path tween classical and modern postural yoga. One provided on the first two texts noted above, of the most evident conclusions in this regard nor in the description the Gītā gives, could be is that the emphasis laid by Modern Postural understood as a sign of Patañjali’s innovation Yoga in health, and that the medical discourse (41). Our author, thus, seems to be introducing which frames its presentation, are far from into the orthodox textualized understanding STRETCHING TRADITION (...) 153

of yoga an aspect of the practice that previous Patañjali, we should accept that the PYŚ, with texts preferred to maintain unmentioned. And its inclusion of physical activity, is indeed an if the sūtra gives this aspect of the practice the important antecedent in the orthodox textual- status of a “limb” of yoga, the bhāṣya moreover ized conception of yoga, which can be seen in supplies a catalog of postures, mentions the full expression today. Moreover, maybe the physiological effects of a perfected āsana and latest expression of this normative orthodox provides enough details of what is conceived current can be seen in the Common Yoga Pro- as āsana in order for the yogin to know when tocol, where physical activity as well as the it has been achieved and when he is still at a body and health (and even Patañjali) play an training stage. important role. Though in strict terms this last distinction We would like to focus attention finally, on the seems to disqualify physical activity from the relationship between tapas and āsana as it is notion of āsana, it does acknowledge the exis- understood in some currents of Modern Pos- tence of bodily training involved in the process tural Yoga. We have already discussed that the of achieving the perfected posture. Hence, PYŚ, in virtue of the common results accrued though not a “limb” of yoga, this feature allows from both (II 32, II 48) and of the comprehen- us to consider the preparatory physical activity sive character of the category of tapas which for accomplishing a successful āsana at least an explicitly includes prāṇāyāma in the bhāṣya II essential preliminary exercise for this limb. Can 52, would also admit subsuming the category anyone really imagine practicing completely of āsana under that of tapas. This seems to be effortlessly any of the postures catalogued in how some trends of MPY also conceptualize the bhāṣya without previously undertaking āsana. Smith, for example, has underlined a training routine? Although scholars have the importance that tapas has in Pattabhi Jois’ frequently stressed the insignificant number writings and teaching of yoga, and the central of sūtras that Patañjali dedicates to this aspect role that it plays in Patañjali’s Yogasutras in this of the practice, I believe that the quantitative regard (2008: 140-160). He also points out that approach might have eclipsed the qualitative āsana, with its close relation to the production change that our text is introducing in relation of inner heat (and sweat), is conceived as a to previous textual systematizations of yoga. form of tapas undertaken in order to purify and Unless we are willing to rule out āsana from strengthen the body as a preliminary stage in Patañjali’s codification, just like the previous the practice of yoga (2008: 146). systematizations of yoga did, we have to B. K. S. Iyengar, in his Light on the Yoga Sutras accept that from Patañjali onwards physical of Patañjali, also explicitly considers āsana as activity is a key ingredient of, at least, those a practice of tapas. “Tapas, writes Iyengar, is orthodox textualized yogic traditions that stem a burning desire for ascetic, devoted sādhanā, from the Pātañjala-yoga-śāstra. Therefore, in through yama, niyama, āsana and prāṇāyā- the light of our conclusions, if contemporary ma” (Iyengar, 2002: xv) (42). It is also worth yoga claims a pedigree that stretches back to mentioning how Iyengar understands āsana. 154 GABRIEL MARTINO

In the same book he devotes some pages to ous later texts and traditions have also contrib- characterizing the different “yogic disciplines”; uted to the modern phenomenon (43). However, regarding the third of them, āsana, he writes: the link should not be underestimated and its “In the beginning, effort is required to master study could contribute, in my perspective, to a the āsana. Effort involves hours, days, months, better understanding the ways in which modern years and even several lifetimes of work. When postural transnational yoga manages to synthe- effortful effort in an āsana becomes effortless size later haṭha-yogic traditions and texts (as effort, one has mastered that āsana. In this way, well as physical culture) with the PYŚ. each āsana has to become effortless” (ibid. In conclusion, contemporary yoga definitely 31-32). This description seems coherent with presents distinctive features that set this global what we have discussed regarding Patañjali’s phenomenon apart from the now almost two treatise, though we concluded that the stage that thousand year-old Patañjalian text. Modern included effort should not be strictly identified Yoga Studies have provided valuable con- as (perfected) āsana. However, if we take into tributions to our better understanding of this consideration that Iyengar defines tapas as world-wide heterogeneous movement, its “burning desire to practice yoga and intense development and the factors involved in its effort applied to practice” (ibid. 23) we could constitution as we know it today. However, a suggest that by associating effort and tapas, on closer dialogue between Modern Yoga studies the one hand, and tapas and āsana, on the other, and Classical Yoga studies could certainly help the inclusion of the effortful training stage as to put into perspective some of the conclusions a facet of āsana is the result of considering it to which both fields of research have arrived. as a practice of tapas. This association, which From our point of view, the strong connection implies a broadening of the notion of āsana that the Pātañjala-yoga-śāstra evinces with justified by its inclusion under the category of Āyurvedic sciences, the therapeutic frame in tapas, might shed light on the fact that many which classical yoga is presented (not only in trends of Modern Postural Yoga see intense the metaphorical sense of a therapeutic for the physical exercise as an essential part of yoga self but also regarding the importance given to and also why this should not be considered so health and bodily perfection), and the explicit incompatible with Patañjali’s conception of and innovative inclusion of physical activity yoga. This last brief comment on how modern as āsana and tapas in the orthodox textualized versions of transnational yoga tend to conflate yogic tradition, allows us to consider that the āsana and tapas, which should certainly be connection between Modern Postural Yoga and developed in further detail, provides us further its classical antecedent is more robust than has insights into the link between modern and hitherto been recognized by scholars. Pātañjala yoga. It would be an overstatement to say that Patañjali’s conceptualization of āsana and tapas has a direct bearing on the modern conception of their relationship, since numer- STRETCHING TRADITION (...) 155

Notas 6. De Michelis (2008: 40) includes the 1. We must also mention that in 2016 Yoga Influential and widely known postural was inscribed on the Representative List schools established by some of Tiruma- of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of lai Krishnamacharya’s pupils, B.K.S. Humanity by UNESCO. Iyengar’s Iyengar Yoga, Pattabhi Jois’ Ashtanga Yoga, and the yoga taught by T.K.V. Desikachar (formerly Viniyoga). 2. “śantiḥ pātha”, CYP 2016, p.38. The latter, adds the author, could also be seen to be veering toward the psychoso- 3. “There is little doubt that the modern matic mode. She also mentions the more medical domain, both orthodox and al- postural aspects of Swami Vishnudeva- ternative, has proved to be the most suc- nanda’s Sivananda Yoga and Bikram’s cessful context within which globalized Yoga. forms of Modern Yoga have progressed toward acculturation in most developed 7. The examples cited are the Self Reali- societies”. (De Michelis, 2008: 25-26). zation Fellowship of Swami Yogananda See also Hoyez, 2007: 172 ff.. and Brahma Kumaris (2008, 40).

4. In this first group the author includes 8. De Michelis mentions the Transcenden- Swami Sivananda of Rishikesh and his tal Meditation movement of Maharishi many pupils who established yoga-pro- Mahesh Yogi and ISKCON, among moting organizations worldwide and the others (2008: 30 note 43). Himalayan Institute of Swami Rama.

9. Liberman, for example, describes the 5. Contemporary examples of this type typical day of a yoga student in Varanasi are, according to De Michelis, the or Rishikesh, Kovalam or Goa, Mysore Bharatiya Yog Sansthan and the “yoga or Poona (2004: 23-32). phenomenon” of Swami Ramdev. “The Santa Cruz (Mumbai) Yoga Institute and the Kaivalyadhama Institute at Lonavla 10. Singleton suggests that the monolithic (Maharashtra) should probably be clas- deference to the authority of the Yogas- sified as combinations of these first two ūtra is a modern phenomenon and that types (i.e., psychosomatic and neo-Hin- the manifold practice traditions of India du)”, says the author (2008: 30). do not necessarily owe any significant debt to this text (2008: 78 ff). Gordon White discusses interesting textual evi- 156 GABRIEL MARTINO

dence that opposes Singleton’s sugges- (2012). tions (2014: ch.9).

19. Wujastyk (2012: 31) believes that the 11. Cfr, for example, Bhagavad Gītā V 4 Caraka Saṃhitā might be earlier than and Madhava’s Sarvadarśanasaṅgra- this. Meulenbeld (2001, p.2) suggests ha, where Yoga is described as Seśvara that the Suśruta might represent a later Sāṅkhya or Sāṅkhya whith Lord. stage, due to its reference to Dhanvan- tari, unknown in the Vedic tradition. Pat- terson (2001, p.118), on the other hand, 12. For example Müller (1899: ch.VII) and dates the Suśruta Saṃhitā to around 100 Hamilton (2001). BC.

13. For a discussion on the different ap- 20. Suśruta Saṃhitā I 3, 17.Nirdiṣṭāni proaches regarding the relationship daśaitāni śarīrāṇi maharṣinā Vi- between Sāṅkhya and Yoga see Burley jñānārthaṃ śarīrasya bhiṣajām yo- (2007: ch.II). gināmapi

14. For a brief discussion on the varieties 21. For similar characterizations of yoga of ancient yogic traditions see Muñoz in previous and later texts see Bryant (2016: 465-479). (2009: 10 ff.)

15. In this regard, on Krishnamacharya see 22. Bhojadeva Rājamārtaṇḍa verse 5. Lar- Singleton (2012: 337-352) and Gordon son and Bhattacarya (2008: p.57) refer, White (2014: ch.12). On Vivekananda as well, to Bhartṛhari’s Vākyapadīya I see De Michelis (2004) and Gordon 147 (V c. CE), where the author also White (2014: ch.7). states that the impurities related to the fields of intellect, speech and body are 16. Cfr. for example, Iyengar (1979: 22). completely cleansed with the treatises of yoga (adhyātma), language and med- icine. 17. The Bhagavad Gītā, for example.

23. We follow in our work Maas’ conclu- 18. For a brief explanation of the (two) sion, already alluded to, that the bhāṣya meaning(s) of the term see Wujastyk is the work of the same author of the STRETCHING TRADITION (...) 157

sūtra. yatha cikitsāśāstraṃ caturvyūham 31. Vedānta Sūtras IV 1, 7-10. | rogo rogaheturārogyaṃ bhaiṣajyamiti |evamidamapi ṣāstraṃ caturvyūhameva |tadyathā saṃsāraḥ samsāraheturmokṣo 32. Āsana is not a limb in the six-fold path mokṣopāya eveti |tatra duḥkhabahulaḥ of the Maitri Upaniṣad. saṃsāro heyaḥ | pradhānapuruṣayoḥ saṃyogo heyahetuḥ | saṃyogasyātyan- 33. PYŚ II 48. tikī nivṛttirhānam |hānopāyaḥ samyag- darśanam | 34. http.//www.who.int/topics/physical_ac- tivity/en/ 24. This fourfold division presents some similarities with that offered in Caraka Saṃhitā, Sū. IX 19. 35. Cfr. PYŚ I 31.

25. On the relationship between the defini- 36. Vācaspati Miśra, Tattvavaiśāradī II 47. tion provided in the PYŚ and the Caraka The translation is from Rāma Prasāda Saṃhitā see Maas (2008, pp.125-162). (1924: 171).

26. Cfr. Suśruta Saṃhitā, Śā. 9, 2. 37. Though it could be thought as an effort to reduce the effort.

27. Cfr. Oṣadhi sūkta, Ṛg Veda 10.97. 38. In the light of these conclusions, state- ments such as the following seem too 28. For a detailed discussion on tapas see short-sighted, “breathing techniques Carpenter (2003: 25-50). (prāṇāyāma) and posture practice (āsa- na) have been associated with health and 29. Maitri Up. VI 18. curative effects from the 1920s onwards. Following Singleton, teaching the health benefits of yoga goes back to Shri Yo- 30. Mahābhārata 2, 5, 80. (cikitsāyām-aṣṭāṅ- gendra […]”. (Hauser 2013: 110). gāyāṃ). Cfr. Wujastyk (2003: p.394) where there seems to be, however, a typological error in the reference to the 39. Maitri Up. VI 18. Note that five out passage. of six limbs coincide with Patañjali’s eight-fold path. Only tarka is not taken 158 GABRIEL MARTINO

up by Patañjali. The translation of the Bibliografía other five is provided in our discussion Aggarwal, A. K., M. Guglani M. y R.K. Goel of Patañjali’s aṣṭāṅga yoga. 2008 Spiritual & Yoga Tourism: A case study on experience of Foreign 40. BhG. VI 11. Van Buitenen (1981: 95) even translates “stool”, since the text Tourists visiting Rishikesh, India. explains how the yogin must prepare Conference on Tourism in India – the seat with grass, a deerskin and a Challenges Ahead, 15-17 May 2008, cloth. In chapter 11, verses 15 and 42, the term āsana appears again. Only in Indian Institute of Management the first case it could be understood as Kozhikode, pp. 457-464. related to yoga, but the meaning of the term is, again, “seat”. The Śvetāśvatara Upaniṣad (II 8) gives a brief description Alter, J. S. of how the body must be kept straight 2004 Yoga in Modern India. The body and erect during meditation, but the word between Philosophy and Science. āsana is not used. Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press. 41. We intend to carry out in a following work an analysis of the notion of āsana in the Mahābhārata in order to contrast Birch, J. it with the present hypothesis. 2018 The Proliferation of Āsana-s in Late-Medieval Yoga Texts. In: Yoga 42. See also table 18 in Iyengar, 2002: 316. in Transformation. Historical and Contemporary Perspectives. K. 43. For a detailed analysis and for the textual Baier, A. P. Maas and K. Preisendanz references regarding the development of the notions of āsana and of the yogic (eds.). Göttingen: V&R Unipress, pp. body in works later than the Pātanja- 101-179. la-yoga-śāstra see Mallinson and Sin- gleton, 2017: ch. 3 and 5. See also Maas, 2018: 49-100 and Birch, 2018: 103-179. Bonkhorst, J. 1981 Yoga and Seśvara Sāṅkhya. Journal of Indian Philosophy, 9(3): 309-320. STRETCHING TRADITION (...) 159

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diosos, a un énfasis en el ejercicio postural y en la salud y situó el foco de la práctica en el cuerpo. En una segunda sección, analizamos el Yogasūtra de Patañjali, su relación con la literatura antigua del Āyurveda y concentramos nuestra atención en los elementos relacionados con la salud, el cuerpo y la actividad física que, tal como nos proponemos poner de manifiesto, están presentes en el tratado de Patañjali. En una tercera parte, examinamos algunos puntos respecto de los cuales el yoga contemporáneo transnacional representa una continuación de la tradición antigua de la cual el texto de Patañjali es una expresión. Nuestro análisis contrastivo nos provee una buena oportunidad para exami- nar aspectos del tratado clásico del yoga que todavía aguardan ser tenidos en cuenta en la discusión especializada acerca de la relación entre el yoga moderno y el yoga clásico. 164 GABRIEL MARTINO