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Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies

Volume 25 Article 4

November 2012

The Malleability of : A Response to Christian and Hindu Opponents of the Popularization of Yoga

Andrea R. Jain

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Recommended Citation Jain, Andrea R. (2012) "The Malleability of Yoga: A Response to Christian and Hindu Opponents of the Popularization of Yoga," Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies: Vol. 25, Article 4. Available at: https://doi.org/10.7825/2164-6279.1510

The Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies is a publication of the Society for Hindu-Christian Studies. The digital version is made available by Digital Commons @ Butler University. For questions about the Journal or the Society, please contact [email protected]. For more information about Digital Commons @ Butler University, please contact [email protected]. Jain: The Malleability of Yoga

The Malleability of Yoga: A Response to Christian and Hindu Opponents of the Popularization of Yoga

Andrea R. Jain Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis

FOR over three thousand years, people have yoga is Hindu. This assumption reflects an attached divergent meanings and functions to understanding of yoga as a homogenous system yoga. Its history has been characterized by that remains unchanged by its shifting spatial moments of continuity, but also by divergence and temporal contexts. It also depends on and change. This applies as much to pre- notions of Hindu authenticity, origins, and colonial yoga systems as to modern ones. All of even ownership. Both Hindu and Christian this evidences yoga’s malleability (literally, the opponents add that the majority of capacity to be bent into new shapes without contemporary fail to recognize that yoga breaking) in the hands of human beings.1 is Hindu.3 Yet, today, a movement that assumes a Suspicious of decontextualized vision of yoga as a static, homogenous system understandings of yoga and, consequently, the rapidly gains momentum. That movement Hindu and Christian oppositional movements opposes the contemporary popularization of they support, this article uncovers the context- yoga, maintaining that people have been fooled sensitivity of yoga by selecting from the vast into thinking that yoga is simply a fitness array of yoga traditions. Based on that product for enhancing well-being. Opponents assessment, I suggest that the history of yoga target the most widely embraced forms of evidences the absence of any unchanging today, those of postural yoga, essence to the function or meaning of yoga. which involve sequences of or postures Instead, it is a history of deconstruction and that are, through or “breathing reconstruction. In other words, the history of exercises,” synchronized with the breath.2 The yoga suggests that the meanings and functions movement warns that, although today millions of yoga are malleable, thus a decontextualized embrace postural yoga as a physical fitness definition of yoga cannot stand serious routine, yoga is in fact religious, and, more historical scrutiny. specifically, it is definitively Hindu. There are both Hindu and Christian Opponents of the Popularization of participants in the movement against the Yoga popularization of yoga. Though Hindu and Christian oppositions are not entirely the same, Christian opponents of the popularization at their core, they share the assumption that of yoga maintain that Christians should not

Andrea R. Jain is Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis. Her research interests include theories of religion as well as religion in relation to the body. More specifically, her research focuses on the transnational construction and global popularization of modern yoga. Andrea’s current projects include studies on the intersections of consumer culture and modern yoga as well as modern yoga . She recently authored an article entitled "The Dual-Ideal of the Ascetic and Healthy Body: The Jain Terapanth and Modern Yoga in the Context of Late Capitalism," which was published in Nova Religio.

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embrace yoga, which is Hindu and is as Pope Benedict XVI in 2005) and approved for consequently in conflict with Christian publication by Pope John Paul II (1920-2005).8 doctrine and an obstacle on the path to The CDF strives to prevent Catholics from salvation.4 undermining Church doctrine when they In 2010, Albert Mohler, renowned embrace ideas or practices that the Church evangelical leader and president of the deems non-Christian. The letter, however, goes Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, became beyond concern with doctrinal compatibility the most vocal representative of this position and deems “eastern” body practices a threat to when he publicly warned Christians about “the human stability. Although the letter does not contradictions between their Christian name yoga explicitly, it is implicitly the object commitments and yoga.”5 Mohler added: of attack, since contemporary Christians embrace it far more often than any other [in America] is a twisted eastern body practice. The letter suggests that tale of how something that is so essentially “psychophysical symbolism” can become an rooted in could become part of “idol and thus an obstacle” to experiencing God American popular culture and increasingly and states that body practices “can degenerate a part of the lives of many who would into a cult of the body.”9 In fact, the identify themselves as Christians – it’s a consequences of the bodily experiences that large number of persons.6 result from such practices can include “mental schizophrenia,” “psychic disturbance,” or Other contemporary evangelical Christian “moral deviations.”10 leaders who oppose the popularization of yoga Hindu opponents of the popularization of include: Pat Robertson, television evangelist yoga maintain that postural yoga is the product and founder of the Christian Coalition of of a profit-driven market featuring the co- America; John MacArthur, pastor of the Grace optation and corruption of an otherwise Community megachurch in Sun Valley, authentic, Hindu system. They are similar to California; and Mark Driscoll, pastor of the Christian opponents of the popularization of Mars Hill megachurch in Seattle, Washington. yoga insofar as they argue that yoga is Their positions range from describing yoga as definitively Hindu, though popularized forms self-destructive to associating it with Satan. For dramatically ignore or dilute its Hindu identity. example, in a 2010 discussion in front of a live The two positions also differ. On the one hand, audience, Driscoll made the following Christian opponents doubt yoga’s proclaimed statement about yoga: merits and warn Christians against its embrace. On the other hand, Hindu opponents valorize Yoga is demonic… It’s absolute paganism… what is perceived as a correct form of yoga by Yoga and and Easternism is [sic] reifying its associations with what they identify all opening to demonism… if you just sign as authentic Hinduism and denouncing up for a little yoga class, you’re signing up popularized varieties as inauthentic. In short, for a little demon class. That’s what you’re Hindu opponents are concerned that doing. And Satan doesn’t care if you stretch popularized forms of yoga are corruptions of as long as you go to hell.7 the single authentic yoga, and they do not think most contemporary yogis give Hinduism Christian opposition is not limited to these due credit for being the historical source of Protestant evangelicals. The Roman Catholic yoga. Church officially warned against yoga in 1989 Hindu opponents argue that the frequent when the Congregation for the Doctrine of the failure to acknowledge yoga’s Hindu origins is a Faith (CDF), responsible for overseeing Church self-conscious marketing strategy that is the doctrine, submitted the “Letter to the Bishops consequence of problematic stereotypes about of the Catholic Church on Some Aspects of Hinduism. A statement by the Hindu American Christian Meditation,” authored by Cardinal Foundation (HAF), for example, refers to the Joseph Ratzinger (b. 1927; elected to the papacy stereotype of Hinduism as nothing but “caste,

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The Malleability of Yoga: A Response to Christian and Hindu 5

cows and curry.”11 Aseem Shukla and Sheetal Shah argue that marketers emphasize yoga’s Hindu opponents maintain that, although benefits for mental and physical health without yoga is Hindu, anyone can embrace it, but, mention of Hinduism in order to maximize according to Shukla, they should be warned profit.12 Ramesh Rao suggests that “savvy that yoga is definitively Hindu and will make marketers” avoid defining yoga as Hindu in Hindu anyone who embraces it: order to appease Christians who want to practice yoga and “hang on to Jesus.”13 But be forewarned. Yogis say that the Though concerns about problematic dedicated practice of yoga will subdue the stereotypes are understandable, Hindu restless mind, lessen one’s cravings for the opponents respond to them with yet another mundane material world and put one on problematic, simplistic vision of yoga. Some go the path of self-realization – that each beyond arguing for yoga’s Hindu origins and individual is a spark of the Divine. Expect suggest that yoga is the property of Hinduism. conflicts if you are sold on the exclusivist In such accounts, the yoga market represents claims of Abrahamic faiths – that their God the “theft of yoga.”14 Shukla, for example, awaits the arrival of only His chosen few at argues: heaven’s gate – since yoga shows its own path to spiritual enlightenment to all [Yoga is] a victim of overt intellectual seekers regardless of affiliation.19 property theft, absence of trademark protections and the facile complicity of Given such warnings, it is not surprising that generations of Hindu yogis, gurus, swamis Mohler finds allies in Hindu opponents of the and others that offered up a religion’s popularization of yoga.20 spiritual wealth at the altar of crass commercialism.15 Pre-Colonial Yoga Systems The definition of yoga as Hindu is premised Hindu opponents also argue that authentic on the idea that a pre-colonial Hindu ur-system yoga is corrupted when yoga undergoes or ur-text from which subsequent yoga systems popularization. They prescribe yoga, not only draw exists. Yet such a system or text does not as postural yoga, but also as a Hindu path exist, rather pre-colonial yoga systems are toward the experience of deep, spiritual characterized by dramatic variation. For this realizations. For example, the HAF approves of reason, provides pre-colonial yoga as a means of health, “But the Foundation yoga with the following wide-reaching argues that the full potential of the definition: “disciplined and systematic physiological, intellectual and spiritual benefits techniques for the training and control of the of asana would be increased manifold if human mind-body complex, which are also practiced as a component of the holistic understood as techniques for the reshaping of practice of Yoga.”16 That “holistic practice” is human consciousness towards some kind of equated with the system prescribed in the higher goal.”21 ancient Indian text, the Yoga Sutra of .17 The history of yoga evidences that its aims The HAF adds: are specific to particular contexts. Even before yoga connoted “disciplined and systematic Yoga, as an integral part of Hindu techniques,” the term yoga (from the philosophy, is not simply physical exercise root yuj, meaning “to bind” or “to yoke”) in the form of various and appeared in Indian literature beginning with its pranayama, but is in fact a Hindu way of life. earliest known text, the Rig Veda Samhita (c. The ubiquitous use of the word ‘Yoga’ to fifteenth century BCE), and referred to the yoke describe what in fact is simply an asana used to bind an animal to a plow or chariot and exercise is not only misleading, but has lead also to an entire war chariot. A wartime to and is fueling a problematic delinking of connotation of yoga was prevalent in ancient Yoga and Hinduism...18 . In the , heroic warriors

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about to die are described as yoga-yukta, “yoked liberation from suffering existence. In to yoga,” the yoga or chariot believed to deliver Yogadrishtisamuccaya, Haribhadra synthesized a them to heaven.22 systematic yoga discipline, based on both the In a strikingly different application of the Yoga Sutra and Jain doctrine. term, the , a dialogue in the In the tenth to eleventh centuries, hatha Mahabharata between the warrior, Arjuna, and yoga (“yoga of forceful exertion”) emerged as his charioteer, Krishna, prescribes yoga as a yet another yoga system. This system of yoga multivalent path to liberation from the cycle of included a view of the body as a microcosm of rebirth. That path requires detachment from the universe and emphasized the practitioner’s the fruits of actions, theistic devotion to ability to channel subtle energy within the Krishna, and the cultivation of mystical body. As a component of , was knowledge. based on a non-dualist philosophy, and And what about Patanjala yoga as practitioners sought to increasingly refine expounded in the Yoga Sutra of Patanjali (c. consciousness, not as a means of liberation fourth to fifth century CE), famously identified from embodied existence, but as a means of as the “classical” text on yoga? The author achieving a state of divine consciousness while propounds an eightfold ascetic discipline remaining in embodied existence.25 grounded in a dualist philosophy, Samkhya, Participants in the yoga tradition were which emphasizes meditation as a means of the earliest systematizers of hatha yoga and refining consciousness, a process that leads up emphasized bodily immortality, sexual to liberation from embodied existence. The aim pleasure, as well as supernatural and socio- is to still the mind in order to realize the true political powers as yoga’s aims.26 Such benefits nature of the self as radically distinct from the were associated with yoga prior to the Nath body, the ego, and the rest of the material Yogis, but they were the first to identify these world, thus ensuring the self’s progress toward benefits as the explicit aim of the .27 liberation. Sometimes these aims were nefarious, and thus Thought the Rig Veda Samhita, the Nath Yogis had reputations as sinister villains.28 Mahabharata, and the Yoga Sutra are Images of pre-colonial practitioners of traditionally identified as Hindu, the history of yoga, whether they were philosopher-ascetics yoga is also characterized by religious variation engaged in rigorous meditation in pursuit of and interreligious exchange. According to liberation or sinister villains channeling bodily Samuel: energy in pursuit of supernatural powers, are hardly the images that we tend to envision [I]t is important to take ‘yoga’ in a wide when we think of contemporary forms of yoga. sense, and to include the variety of related Those contemporary forms include the Buddhist and Jain practices, which may or “holistic” yoga prescribed by some may nor (sic) be called yoga, as well as the contemporary Hindus as well as the postural yogic and tantric traditions within the yoga popularly practiced around the globe. various religious currents that eventually led to modern Hinduism. . . developments Modern Yoga within these various traditions were closely In popular discourse across much of the entwined with each other.”23 world today, yoga is virtually synonymous with postural yoga. But postural yoga is only one Examples of interreligious exchange include thread of modern yoga, which, throughout its those between the Patanjala Yoga of the Yoga history, has itself been characterized by a vast Sutra (fourth to fifth century CE), the and diverse array of systems. Buddhist Yogacara school (third to fourth Largely in response to British colonial and century CE), and the Jain thinker, Haribhadra orientalist as well as Indian elite hostility (eighth CE).24 Like Patanjala yoga, Yogacara toward hatha yoga for what was deemed a prescribed an eightfold discipline that regressive, uncultivated concern with the emphasized meditation as the means of manipulation of the body, early modern yoga

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The Malleability of Yoga: A Response to Christian and Hindu 7

reformers sought to reconstruct yoga as a builders, martial experts, and contortionists.33 refined Indian spiritual system that was Inspired by the new ideology underlying compatible with modern thought.29 These , which deemed the cultivation attempts resulted in modern yoga. of the body to be a means of moral reform, One such reformer was early twentieth-century Indian yogis began to (1863-1902), a nineteenth-century proselytizing emphasize modern renditions of yoga postures, Hindu nationalist known for disseminating which they associated with hatha yoga, as yoga to Americans. Both Hindu and Christian muscle-building and stretching exercises for opponents of the popularization of yoga point the sake of physical fitness.34 Though new yoga to Vivekananda’s teachings as the modern systems continued to share with pre-colonial paragon of yoga even though his rendition of yoga an emphasis on training and controlling yoga was a unique response to the dominant the mind-body complex, postural yoga values and concerns of his historical time and repurposed yoga for the sake of modern place.30 Vivekananda reconstructed previously conceptions of health, beauty, and well-being.35 existing yoga systems in light of modern ideas Tirumalai Krishnamacharya (1888-1989), and practices, but he also differed dramatically who lived and taught in Mysore, India, and from future yogis who would eventually (1887-1963), who lived and construct those popular yoga systems taught in Rishikesh, India, became the first performed on yoga mats across the world widely influential teachers of postural yoga.36 today. Vivekananda was influenced by the Krishnamacharya’s disciples—most “harmonial” ideas of emergent European and significantly, B.K.S. Iyengar, Patabhi Jois, and American metaphysical movements, such as T.K.V. Desikachar—as well as Sivananda’s New Thought, which sought a modern, holistic disciples—most significantly, Vishnudevananda approach aimed at the balance of mind, body, (1927-1993)—went on to mass-market postural and soul.31 Though Hindu opponents of the yoga in many of the forms that are popular popularization of yoga trace their vision of today. authentic yoga, not just to Vivekananda, but By the late twentieth century, a plurality of also to a pre-colonial ur-system based on a yoga brands had emerged, many of which were “holistic” practice, holistic care is a modern readily available for consumption in urban notion, and its associations with yoga is a areas across the world.37 Though popularized modern phenomenon.32 varieties are most often forms of postural yoga, Having largely censored yoga of most pre- they do not all look the same. The most colonial practices and denounced successful yoga brands include: , hatha yoga, Vivekananda emphasized which emphasizes the use of fitness tools, such meditation and the psychological dimensions as belts, bricks, and ropes; Ashtanga Yoga, of yoga. He constructed a holistic yoga system which emphasizes the flow from one posture to based on his modern philosophical another in set sequences; and , interpretation of both the Yoga Sutra and Hindu which includes a single sequence of postures in non-dualist thought. a room heated to one hundred and five degrees Though hatha yoga is traditionally believed Fahrenheit and with forty percent humidity. to be the ur-system of modern postural yoga, Despite their differences, all of these aim at equating them does not account for the modern notions of physical fitness and health historical sources. Posture only became and are made up of postural sequences, which prominent in modern yoga in the early are synchronized with the breath. These brands twentieth century as a result of the dialogical of yoga are not linked explicitly to any exchanges between Indian reformers and particular religious orientation, and their nationalists and Americans and Europeans proponents consider them compatible with any interested in health and fitness. Postural yoga’s religion that accepts a modern biomedical historical sources include British military worldview with regard to the body and values calisthenics, modern medicine, and the health and well-being as defined by that physical culture of European gymnasts, body- worldview.38

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Other popular postural yoga varieties do build rigid walls around yoga for the sake of explicitly align themselves with particular arguing that it belongs in the Hindu tradition religious orientations. Anusara Yoga is one and accordingly does not belong in others, example. Inspired by tantra, cannot withstand historical scrutiny, which created Anusara Yoga in 1997. It is a mix of points to the fact that, when it comes to both postural yoga and a life-affirming religiosity meaning and function, yoga is malleable. based on the idea that “everything in this world is an embodiment of Supreme Notes

Consciousness, which at its essence pulsates 1 39 According to , “Every with goodness and the highest bliss.” With group in every age has created its own version over a thousand licensed teachers worldwide, and vision of yoga. One reason this has been Anusara is one of the most common yoga possible is that its semantic field—the range of systems in the global yoga market. meanings of the term ‘yoga’—is so broad and Perhaps more than any other example of the concept of yoga so malleable, that it has postural yoga, Christian Yoga, which been possible to morph it into nearly any emphasizes postures and breath control as practice or process one chooses” (David Gordon means of focusing on Christ, evidences yoga’s White, “Introduction,” Yoga in Practice, ed. malleability. Consider Holy Yoga, an David Gordon White (Princeton: Princeton “international non-profit ministry,” founded by 40 University Press, 2012), 2). In accordance with Brooke Boon in 2003. Since introducing her White’s vision of yoga, Geoffrey Samuel unique brand of yoga, she has trained hundreds suggests: “[Yoga] has retained some of its of Holy Yoga instructors who now teach in integrity as a specific set of techniques for self- many areas of the and, according cultivation through all of these to the website, will soon be teaching in , transformations. To make sense of such a the Philippines, , the , 41 historical complex and varied phenomenon as , India, Afghanistan, and Africa. yoga, it is, however, essential to retain as much Proponents of Christian Yoga argue that yoga awareness as possible of the social itself is not a religion, but a universal set of environment and historical specificity of each techniques that can be used to strengthen a specific context within which it was adopted Christian’s relationship with Christ. and transformed. In this way, we can begin to

give meaning to each of these various forms of Conclusion yoga, and to understand them within the life Contemporary Christian and Hindu and culture of those who created them and opponents of the popularization of yoga are shaped them” (Geoffrey Samuel, “Endpiece,” strikingly similar in their attempts to return to Asian Medicine: Tradition and Modernity 3(1) what they perceive as the unchanging (2007): 186). doctrines and practices of their respective 2 For the history and development of modern religions, which are perceived to have been postural yoga, see Elizabeth de Michelis, A intact before modern ideas and their cultural History of Modern Yoga: Patanjali and Western products, including the popularization of Esotericism (New York: Continuum, 2004); and postural yoga. Both define yoga as a static, Mark Singleton, Yoga Body: The Origins of Modern homogenous system in opposition to its Posture Practice (New York: Oxford University popularization. Press, 2010). But the history and development of yoga 3 A perusal of recent articles in popular yoga demonstrate that yoga is anything but publications, such as , shows that homogenous and unchanging. Yoga has a long many contemporary practitioners of yoga history whereby adherents of numerous colloquially self-identify as yogis. In South Asian religions, including Hindu, Jain, Buddhist, New yoga traditions, the term was not used until the Age, and Christian traditions, have twelfth- to thirteenth-century Nath Yogi deconstructed and reconstructed it anew. tradition. According to White, “The Nath Yogīs Opponents of the popularization of yoga, who were and remain the sole South Asian order to

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self-identify as yogis” (White, “Introduction,” 11 Hindu American Foundation, “Yoga Beyond 17). Asana,” posted in 2009, accessed on October 22, 4 Some contemporary Christians disagree, 2010, arguing instead that the benefits of yoga can be http://www.hafsite.org/media/pr/yoga-hindu- separated from the religious dimensions and origins. then reconstructed as a component of the 12 Aseem Shukla and Sheetal Shah, “The Rape of Christian life. One Catholic yogi, Jean Marie Yoga,” The Pioneer, June 21, 2011, accessed on Déchanet, prescribed yoga for Christians and July 1, 2011, coined the term Christian Yoga in her book by http://www.dailypioneer.com/252823/The- that title (Jain Marie Déchanet, Christian Yoga rape-of-Yoga.html. (New York: Harper & Brothers Publishers, 13 Ramesh Rao, “It is Wrong to Deny Yoga’s 1960). The Reverend Anthony Randazzo, a Hindu origins,” Guardian, posted December 2, Catholic priest at Notre Dame Roman Catholic 2010, accessed July 1, 2011, Church in North Caldwell, N.J., has practiced http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/be and taught yoga for over ten years and argues lief/2010/dec/02/yoga-hindu-rebranded- that it has always brought him closer to Christ wrongly/print. and that he is “more deeply rooted in the 14 Aseem Shukla, “The Theft of Yoga,” Newsweek, Christian faith than ever” (Alvarez, Lizette, posted April 18, 2010, accessed October 26, “Bending With a Holy Twist,” New York Times, 2010, posted November 27, 2010, accessed May 1, http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith 2011, /panelists/aseem_shukla/2010/04/nearly_twen http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/11/2 ty 7/stretching-and-bending-with-a-holy- _ million_people_in.html. Accessed on October twist/?pagemode=print). 26, 2010. 5 Albert Mohler, “The – Should 15 Ibid. Christians Practice Yoga?” posted September 16 Hindu American Foundation, “Yoga Beyond 20, 2010, accessed September 21, 2010, Asana”; Aseem Shukla “The Theft of Yoga.” http://www.albertmohler.com/2010/09/20/th Newsweek, April 18, 2010, accessed on October e-subtle-body-should-christians-practice- 26, 2010, yoga/. http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith 6 Albert Mohler, “The Meaning of Yoga: A /panelists/aseem_shukla/2010/04/nearly_twen Conversation with Stephanie Syman and Doug ty_ million_people_in.html. Groothuis,” Thinking in Public, 17 Ibid. AlbertMohler.com, posted September 20, 2010, 18 Hindu American Foundation, “Hindu accessed September 21, 2010, Americans Take Global Stage at Parliament of http://www.albertmohler.com/2010/09/20/th World Religions,” posted on December 13, 2009, e-meaning-of-yoga-a-conversation-with- accessed on October 24, 2010, stephanie-syman-and-dough-groothius/. http://www.hafsite.org/media/pr/haf-prw. 7 Mark Driscoll, “Mark Driscoll on Yoga,” 19 Shukla, “The Theft of Yoga.” YouTube, posted on July 10, 2010, accessed on 20 When a New York Times front-page article October 20, 2010, brought the HAF’s campaign widespread http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BhcoBLdM attention, Mohler interpreted it as a 8CQ. “vindication” for his own position on yoga (see 8 Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Paul Vitello “Hindu Group Stirs a Debate Over “Letter to the Bishops of the Catholic Church,” Yoga’s Soul,” The New York Times, posted 1989, accessed on May 1, 2011, November 27, 2010, accessed November 27, http://www.ewtn.com/library/CURIA/CDFME 2010, D.HTM. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/28/nyregio 9 Ibid., 10. n/28yoga.html; and Albert Mohler, “Help from 10 Ibid. Hindu Quarters – The New York Times on ‘Take Back Yoga,’” AlbertMohler.com Blog, posted on

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November 29, 2010, accessed November 30, 33 N. E. Sjoman, The Yoga Tradition of the Mysore 2010, Palace (New Delhi: Abhinav Publications, 1996); http://www.albertmohler.com/2010/11/29/hel Joseph S. Alter, Yoga in Modern India: The Body p-from-hindu-quarters-the-new-york-times- between Science and Philosophy, Princeton: on-take-back-yoga/). Princeton University Press, 2004; Singleton, 21 Geoffrey Samuel, Origins of Yoga and Tantra: Yoga Body. Indic Religions to the Thirteenth Century 34 Singleton, Yoga Body. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008), 35 De Michelis, ; Suzanne 2. Newcombe, “Stretching for Health and Well- 22 White, “Introduction,” 3. Being: Yoga and Women in Britain, 1960-1980” 23 Samuel, “Endpiece,” 179. Asian Medicine: Tradition and Modernity 3(1) 24 On interreligious exchange in the history of (2007): 37-63; Singleton, Yoga Body. yoga, see Louis De la Vallée Poussin, “Le 36 Sarah Strauss, : Balancing Acts Bouddhisme et le yoga de Patañjali,” Mélanges Across Cultures (New York: Berg, 2005); Chinois et Bouddhiques 5 (1936-1937): 223-242; G. Singleton, Yoga Body. J. Larson, “An Old Problem Revisited: The 37 See Andrea R. Jain, “Branding Yoga: The Cases Relation between Sāmkhya, Yoga and of Iyengar Yoga, Yoga, and Anusara ,” Studien zur Indologie und Iranistik 15 Yoga,” Approaching Religion, forthcoming. (1989): 129-146; J. Bronkhorst, The Two 38 Iyengar Yoga has affiliated its form of Traditions of Meditation in Ancient India, (Delhi: postural yoga with the yoga tradition presented Motilal Banarsidass, 1993); J. Bronkhorst, The in the Yoga Sutra, usually attributed to Two Sources of Indian , second edition Patanjali, by introducing an invocation to (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1998); Olle Patanjali at the beginning of each yoga class. Qvarnström, “Losing One’s Mind and Becoming Iyengar, however, insists that yoga, though a Enlightened,” Yoga, The Indian Tradition, ed. Ian part of an ancient South Asian yoga lineage, is Whicher and David Carpenter (London: not specific to any religious tradition (On the Routledge Curzon, 2003), 131-133; and Samuel, invocation to Patanjali in Iyengar Yoga, see Joy Origins of Yoga and Tantra. Laine, “Contemporary Yoga and its Contested 25 White, “Introduction,” 12. Domains,” paper presented at the annual 26 David Gordon White, The Alchemical Body: meeting for the American Academy of Religion, Siddha Traditions in Medieval India (Chicago: San Francisco, California, November 19-22, Press, 1996); David 2011). Gordon White, Sinister Yogis (Chicago: 39 Anusara Yoga, “Philosophy,” posted 2009, University of Chicago Press, 2009). accessed March 1, 2012, 27 White, “Introduction,” 17-18. http://www.anusara.com/index.php?option=co 28 For a detailed account of this yogi tradition, m_content&view=article&id=51&Itemid=85. see White, Sinister Yogis. 40 “About Holy Yoga,” accessed March 25, 2012, 29 See Singleton, Yoga Body. https://holyyogafoundation.com/about/3/. 30 See Albert Mohler, “The Meaning of Yoga”; 41 Ibid. Hindu American Foundation, “Yoga Beyond Asana.” 31 On the influence of New Thought on Vivekananda, see de Michelis, A History of Modern Yoga, 168. 32 On modern conceptions of the “holistic” development of the individual, including those found in modern gymnastic systems and “harmonial” religious systems, such as New Thought, and their influence on modern yoga, see Singleton, Yoga Body, 81-162.

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