It is
Lent once more, and as I’ve often done in the past, I will take up
a theme that I will return to every now and then between now and
Easter. Since I am once again teaching my course on the Yoga Sutras
of Patanjali – the classic synthesis of yoga theory and practice as
understood some 1800 or more years ago – I thought I would return
to the Sutras, on which I’ve blogged before. (...)
This
time I will focus on what the Yoga Sutras ask us to do, and for this,
I focus on the Second Book (Pada), which begins this way: “Austerity,
appropriate study, and dedication to the master comprise the yoga of
action, / which is for the purpose of cultivating absorption and for
the purpose of diminishing the afflictions. / Ignorance,
ego-centeredness, desire, aversion, and longing for continuity are
the five afflictions. (II.1-3) (...)
Before
I go any further, full disclosure: I am not a particularly adept
practitioner of yoga, nor have I ever taught yoga. I teach the Yoga
Sutras as a brilliant intellectual system, and the Sutras themselves
are not a manual of how-to-do-yoga. Any practitioner who knows the
Sutras will agree, I think: Patanjali clarifies what yoga is for and
about, and synthesizes much older wisdom, but for the practice, even
in ancient times one might go to other texts.
But Patanjali, in his Sutras, gives much wisdom on what counts as
yogic practice, what the practice is for, and how the whole of a
yogic practice fits together. My suggestion is that this will help us
who are Christian and thinking not simply about what we do to observe
Lent, but also why we do what we do. Even observing Church and
community practices, such as fast on Ash Wednesday or some
acts of piety or self-denial in Lent merit some thinking: ok, I am
doing this — why?
The
first three sutras (small verses) of YS II, as cited above, get us
off to a clear start. The yoga of action involves austerity, study of
one’s appropriate and assigned texts, and turning to the
master (the lord). Vyasa and other early commentators do not give
here a list of ascetical practices, but do point out that 'austerity'
(tapas) is a matter of intensifying inner 'heat,' and this is
different from doing more and more exotic and painful things to one's
body and mind. Indeed, they stress that they must, as it were, follow
a middle path, hard enough to make a difference but not so hard as to
upset the delicate balance of the body and mind. Study, Vyasa says,
might be a simple practice of reciting sacred texts assigned for this
purpose, perhaps a mantra, or the reading of texts that lead to
lasting freedom. Turning to the master — most often taken to
mean a turning to God, one’s chosen deity — is mentioned
here, and in Book I, as a salutary practice that can change one’s
life. It does not mean that Patanjali’s yoga is theistic, much less
Christian; but it does mean that he recognizes this “turning to”
the lord as beneficial.
Why do
this? It is here that Patanjali starts to get more technical, and we
begin to exercise our minds in thinking about whether yoga works for
a Christian in Lent. The second sutra gives two reasons: “the
purpose of cultivating absorption and for the purpose of diminishing
the afflictions.” Absorption — samadhi — is in the
first book of the Sutras conceived of as an ultimate, utterly simple
state of consciousness, in which all the fluctuations of the mind and
brain come to a halt, so that there is no more observing and knowing
the world around us, no more errors and fancies about that world, and
not even any more of those images that float in our minds in sleep,
or even in memory. (See the beginning of Book One of the Sutras).
This is indeed a high state, the clear and luminous mind, at rest. In
Book One he says that for this state, one might practice repeatedly,
and/or become detached, and/or turn to the master (lord).
Clearing
the mind for this state of simple absorption requires that we turn to
the other side of this, the “diminishing of the afflictions.”
This is not about inventing a life without pain, but lessening, to
the point of disappearance, those distractions and upsets of mind
that make it turbulent, complicated, and unable to rest quietly in
itself.
What
those afflictions are is given in the third sutra: “Ignorance,
ego-centeredness, desire, aversion, and longing for continuity are
the five afflictions.” These might serve as the material for an
examination of conscience early in Lent, even if we tend to give them
a moral tone: Ignorance: what are we ignorant of, that causes
suffering for ourselves and others? Ego-centeredness: how
destructive is my ego, insistence on seeing the world in light of
myself? Desire: what do I crave, insatiably, so as to distort my
view of reality? Aversion: what do I run away from, as I divide
the world into the parts I can accept and like, and the parts I will
not tolerate? Confronting both desire and aversion: such are the
basis of indifference, that great Ignatian virtue. The last in the
list requires us to look to the commentaries, since longing for
continuity, which Patanjali notes in a subsequent sutra to be an
affliction even of the spiritually advanced, turns out to be a
deep-down and very stubborn desire to keep on living, no matter what:
a fear of dying, a fear of letting go. The yogic and Lenten virtue,
dying that one might live, is very hard actually to do, even for the
saints.
We can
see that there is much here to think about. There is common ground,
things we too might be doing in Lent and for not dissimilar reasons.
But just as no wholesale rejection is of any particular aspect of
this yoga of action as we have thus far seen it, neither need we
insist that all of this is “the same as what Christians do in
Lent.” Turning to God is not just an option, one of several;
nevertheless is also something we do. Metaphorically, we can
speak of a deep, quiet clearing of the mind, an utter calmness in
God’s presence, and all the purifying supports that go with that.
As the Psalm says: “Be still and know that I am God.” (Psalm 46)
Or think of Jesus: we need not imagine that his mind was very busy
and his mouth very talkative during those weeks in the desert: a mind
entirely empty of everything but God.
Or, if
absorption and this serenity is not our goal in Lent, how would
characterize what we are up to, when we pray or study or fast in this
season? Why vex the body, do less of this and more of that?
I
welcome particularly the feedback of those who know the Sutras and
the practice of yoga well. (...)
Fonte:
