What has been written in the Gita about yoga?
The Gita is told when a Kshatriya has doubts as he stands in battle against his brothers. As Krishna tries to dispel his doubts, he explains about yoga. He tells him his alignment is not right. ‘Let’s go to the basics since your understanding of the problem is skewed. Examine from where your sorrow is arising.’
Three yogas have been talked about here—gyan yoga, bhakti yoga and karma yoga. Alignment by using your brain is gyan yoga, by emotion is bhakti yoga and by action is karma yoga—that is, aligning the head, heart and hands.
What did Patanjali write?
Patanjali has written the Yoga Sutra which contains short sentences for you to dwell on. The sutras are seeds for your mind’s soil from which a plant will gradually grow and you will get the fruits of knowledge. There is a nice definition of yoga here—yoga chitta vritti nirodha. The mind is seen as a lake which forms ripples when something is thrown in. The aim is to make the waves peaceful. So, broadly, yoga is the silencing of the whirlpools of the mind. Or your mind is like a rope whose many knots have to be untied one by one with patience. The Yoga Sutra is far more technical; the body has been given a lot of importance. It seems to be for ascetics who’ve renounced the world. The Bhagavad Gita is for worldly people.
There is a story about how Patanjali gains knowledge of yoga. Once, Shesh Naga asks Vishnu to show him Shiva’s tandava that he has often described to him. Vishnu asks him to become a human in return for the favour. Shesh Naga becomes Patanjali and goes to Chidambaram to see Shiva. He is denied entry by Nanda, Shiva’s guard. So Patanjali assumes the form of a snake and enters Shiva’s territory, watches him do yogasanas and writes them down.
This is a Puranic tale that imagines Patanjali as a snake, perhaps as Karkota (the snake around Shiva’s neck) or Shesh Naga on whom Vishnu rests. Shiva is known as Yogeshwara or Adinath (the source of yoga). The snake is significant because it is associated with the spinal cord which is the seat of the kundalinis—the spinal cord is very important in yoga.
What exactly is raja yoga?
Among the different schools of yoga, this is considered to be the best. Just as a king pays attention to all the areas of his kingdom, raja yoga considers all the points of yoga. Normally it is associated with ashtanga yoga and yoga sutra. Ashtanga means eight points which, starting from the bottom of the pyramid, are yama, niyama, asana, pranayama, pratyahara, dharana, dhyana and samadhi. Basically, it is about travelling from the outer world to the inner world.
First is yama or discipline in relationships. So speak the truth, don’t be greedy, control your desires and so on. Second is niyama, which is about self-discipline, self-study, maintaining hygiene and cleanliness and being satisfied or content. Third is asana—which includes standing, sitting and lying-down poses like Bhadrasana, Sukhasana (sitting peacefully), Padmasana (lotus posture), etc. This is the external manifestation or what can be seen from the outside. When you see statues in these poses, you know they’re yogis. Fourth is pranayama, which is about the regularity of breath (prana). This is considered very important. Breath joins the body (which can be seen) and mind (which cannot be seen). For instance, when you are angry, your breathing pattern changes. Breath, emotion and mind have a strong correlation, and in our country, prana has been given a lot of value. ‘Prani’ are creatures that breathe. Pranayama has different exercises—breathing in and out, holding breath, kumbhaka, rechaka, etc. Some yoga schools focus only on pranayama.
From here onwards the psychological world begins; the connection with the outside world breaks. This is pratyahara, which is about controlling your sense organs—eyes, nose, ears, tongue and skin. These are gyan indriya, senses that bring in information from the outside world. Everything that preceded this, including the asanas, focused on karma indriya or the organs of action—hands, legs, mouth, anus and genitals.
After this we go one step inside. Dharana means gaining awareness and understanding the context and observing the world without trying to control it—just paying attention and having perspective. Then there’s dhyana or focus. Perspective is on a larger canvas while focus is on one small thing. It means you retreat further into yourself.
Finally there is samadhi, which is a bit complex. It means union, absorption in the Almighty or bhagavan. This is in the spiritual zone, beyond the psychological. It has different meanings. One is, you give up the world, then your body and finally unite with the atma. Buddhists, who don’t believe in atma, call it nirvanaprapti. Your ego, sense of identity or aham gets finished. You don’t exist any more; you merge with the world. This is connected with death as well as there is voluntarily renunciation of the body, like a sage taking samadhi.
Samadhi can have another interesting meaning from the two words ‘sama’ and ‘adi’. Adi means first. Sama in music is when you come back to the first note. Your starting point is the world—the source of all the disturbance and pain. After you’ve progressed deep into yourself and resolved the conflicts of worldly life within yourself (chitta vritti nirodha), you come back to the beginning and restart from a point of peace.
Can you tell me the meaning of tantra yoga?
Today, tantra evokes all kinds of images! In common language, tantra means technology. In India, there were different ‘technologies’ to manage various aspects of life. One was to use the mind to manage the world; the second was to use the body; and the third was to use instruments. These methods were mantra, tantra and yantra, respectively.
In tantra yoga, the body or the physical aspect is important. Yogis keep the indriya (sense organs) at bay, but in tantra they are used through colour, smell, sound and touch to acquire knowledge of the world and atma. There are five ‘makars’ that are important to the rituals: mantra, mudra (bodily gestures), matsya (fish), mamsa (meat) and madira (alcohol). Everything that excites your indriya is accepted.
Tantra is associated with yoga as the aim is the same: to achieve knowledge, siddhi, samadhi, to know the world and to seek release from maya. The approach here is very different as it is more physical. There is no dhyana or dharana here. There are many rituals, puja–paath, where gods and goddesses are invoked and so on. It’s a very external approach.
15
Eight Types of Marriage
Marriage is a big subject in India. Parents are anxious about their children’s marriage and weddings are usually celebrated with a lot of pomp. Why is it such a big deal in India?
Marriages are important in all cultures. It’s a sanskar, a rite of passage. In India, it perhaps became more important out of the fear that if people didn’t get married, they would become bhikkhus or sanyasis (ascetics). The Buddhist or Shraman parampara is a strong influence; the gurus of both traditions talk about the transience and sorrows of material life and that people should liberate themselves from moha, maya and the like. So when their children get married parents feel relieved as though their duty is done. They feel that their children’s own lives have begun. The second reason could be that parents feared their children would go astray, get ‘corrupted’, and would not become responsible. Marriage in India is associated with maturity and responsibility.
Why is marriage considered a responsibility?
In the Puranas, Shiva is called a destroyer. What does it mean? He destroys kama agni or vasana (desire) with his third eye. If all men became ascetics like Shiva and refused to procreate, what will happen to society? It will collapse. To prevent this, marriage is essential. There is a recurring story in the Puranas about a rishi meditating. His ancestors appear in his dream and they’re suspended upside down. They say they are in Pitr-loka (land of the dead) but will descend into Putta—into eternal oblivion—because he hasn’t produced a child. ‘We’ll be stuck and can never be reborn. You’re indebted to us (pitr rin).’ This concept of indebtedness is strongly associated with marriage.
The other reason is very practical. With marriage, wealth and power are exchanged. The Pandavas do not have anything and are dependen
t on their cousins. But after they marry Dhrupad’s daughter, Draupadi, they achieve a certain status as Dhrupad’s sons-in-law and are able to challenge their cousins. So Draupadi is literally the incarnation of Lakshmi for them because she brings in wealth, power and status. The Pandavas are able to demand their share in property, etc., only after they are married.
The girl’s womb is associated with the Amrita kalash and she with Goddess Lakshmi because when a girl comes into a house, the lineage can be carried forward, the family name can continue. Otherwise, it will die. A girl is a source of social mobility in India and helps to repay our ancestors’ debts. Temples also have images of gods as couples. If the gods are unmarried, they are called garam devata as they have a lot of heat (tapa). Hanuman is said to have more radiance (tej) and more energy because of this. Many people thus do not keep his idols in the house.
Marriage is like the taming of a man and a woman for the good of society.
When did this institution begin?
There is a story about this in the Mahabharata. A young boy, Shwetaketu, sees his mother with a strange man and feels bad and goes and speaks to his father, Uddalaka, about it. His father says everyone is free to do what they want. Shwetaketu asks him, ‘How can I be sure that you are my father?’ The father replies, ‘A man becomes a father by love. That I love you as a son is sufficient proof.’ But Shwetaketu is not convinced. He wants to know who his biological father is. So he makes the rules of marriage. Husband, wife, fidelity and pati- or patnivrata are all words that he coined. Before the Mahabharata, there was no institution of marriage.
There is another story about Kashyapa Muni. The Manasputras (sons of the mind), which includes Saptarishi, Dasa Prajapati and Kashyapa Muni, are created by Brahma. To have a child, Kashyapa Muni has to marry. Some women too have been borne of the mind, whom he marries and produces all the living beings on earth.
The origin of marriage is also associated with Shiva who did not want to marry. The gods fear that it will cause pralaya (complete devastation) and the world will come to an end. Devi goes to him first as Sati, daughter of Daksha, and marries him. She dies and later returns, reborn as Parvati, and marries Shiva again. This time, she insists he come to the wedding mandap as a bridegroom. So he gradually becomes a householder (grahasth) from a sanyasi. Shiva is a vairagi, an ascetic, who has no need for wealth, property or even children, so why should he get married? Parvati emphasizes that marriage is not only about these things and until you experience bhog and worldly matters, you cannot know these yourself. So the Parvati image in temples often has a mirror in one hand to suggest that their marriage gave Shiva a mirror in which he could see himself. Marriage has, thus, also been seen as a way to gain self-knowledge.
Some say that marriage is a metaphor not to be taken literally. It is to suggest that there should be an engagement among human beings, rejecting the idea of an individualistic or hermitic society. You should live and engage with society. This is an important idea in Indian philosophy.
In modern times, we have love and arranged marriages. What are the classifications in our shastras?
There are eight kinds in the shastras: Prajapatya vivaah, Brahma vivaah, Daiva vivaah, Rishi vivaah, Asura vivaah, Rakshasa vivaah, Gandharva vivaah and Pishacha vivaah.
Prajapatya vivaah was considered the best kind where the boy requested the father for the hand of his daughter in marriage (daan). If many suitors turned up, a competition, like archery, was held to select the best one.
In Brahma vivaah, the girl’s father approaches the boy. Here, the concept of dowry appears. ‘Marry my daughter and you’ll get kingdom, wealth and power.’
In Daiva vivaah, a boy works in a house as an apprentice or does some service which impresses the father so much that he gives him his daughter in marriage.
In Rishi vivaah, a rishi goes to a king and says he wants to get married because his ancestors have asked him to produce a child. The king gives him a cow, a bullock and a girl. The cow is a source of food (milk) and fuel (dung) and the bullock is used to till the land, so all the material to set up a household is provided.
These were considered positive types of weddings because the father was in full control. In the others, the father had none.
Gandharva vivaah is love marriage, such as of Dushyant and Shakuntala. They fall in love and marry; there are no witnesses. So the problem occurs later when Dushyant refuses to recognize Shakuntala and she is helpless because their marriage has not been socially sanctioned.
In Rakshasa vivaah, the couple elopes, or the girl is kidnapped. Fathers cannot accept that their girls have eloped so they always see it as abduction. But like in Krishna’s stories of elopement, the girls go of their own accord.
In Asura vivaah, the girl is bought with money. Pandu married Kunti in a swayamvara, so it probably was a Brahma vivaah where Kunti selected Pandu among other suitors. It is believed that the Kurus were not happy with Kunti. They said she was not so pretty and had probably had a child before wedlock, so they bought another wife for Pandu—Madri. In the Ramayana, Kaikeyi was said to have been bought because it was certain she would produce a worthy male child. Sometimes those girls were bought whose kundali or birth chart predicted a male child.
Pishacha vivaah was the worst kind of marriage—through rape. This was also considered a form of marriage, but of the lowest kind. Typically, the males always seek out the females, even in the animal kingdom, and there is rivalry among the males for the females. Among birds too it is the female who selects her mate. So the males suffer an anxiety about not getting a female to mate with. This is a big issue in nature. Every female is precious, whereas a male is not. Due to this, battles have been waged over women.
Pishacha vivaah is a violent act. Why is it considered a type of marriage?
Here, the word ‘vivaah’ is probably used to describe the union of a man and woman. Pishacha vivaah has been included to show that this can happen violently as well. In the shastras, the desh (place), kaal (time/era) and guna (attribute) determine the value of what is written; there is no inherent value given to anything. This is a very strong aspect of Indian tradition, that what is good today may not be good tomorrow. In these forms of marriages, you don’t always see the desire or will of the girl, only that of the boy or the father. However, the girl’s will is very important in the Puranas.
The story of Krishna and Rukmini proves this. Rukmini is the daughter of the king Bhishmaka, and she asks Krishna to rescue her from being forcibly married. Krishna knows this is happening because her brother, Rukmi, hates him. While the wedding preparations are in full swing at Rukmini’s house and Krishna is about to set off with his army, she sends him a letter. The next day Krishna arrives at the Durga temple where she goes for puja. When Krishna asks why she wanted them to meet secretly instead of at the palace, she says she wanted to prevent needless bloodshed. She prefers to elope instead.
So Rukmini asks Krishna to kidnap her?
Yes. In the Puranas, she sends him an elaborate letter saying that her will is being snatched away. It is a matter of consent, of choice. For society it is a Rakshasa vivaah, but for the two of them it is a Gandharva vivaah. It can be seen as a combination of both.
With regard to marriage, I’ve heard terms like sapind vivaah and sagotra vivaah. Can you explain these?
These are words to describe whom you can marry and whom you can’t. Across India, there are many variations. Pind is what is offered to your ancestors. So if you have common ancestors—a grandfather or great-grandfather—marriage is not allowed in some communities. In some, first cousins cannot marry, in others even second and third cousins cannot marry. In the Puranas, you see many variations. Subhadra and Arjuna, who are first cousins, get married.
Gotra tells you about your lineage—the ancestor you come from. Sagotra means having a common ancestor, like Krishna, Bharadwaj, etc. Some communities do not allow sagotra vivaah. But it is not a standard rule and differs with tradition, community, caste and so on. r />
Each yuga has different kinds of marriage traditions. These were prevalent in Vedic times; today new ones have emerged.
16
Hero/Prophet
We’ve all heard about Alexander the Great. Is he mentioned in the Puranas?
No. Alexander reached India 2300 years ago. We’ve heard stories of him and Porus. When he defeated Porus and asked him how he wanted to be treated, Porus replied, ‘As a king would treat a king.’ This impressed Alexander. All these stories come from folklore. These are not in the Puranas. In fact, the Puranas were probably not even composed then. There is no proof of whether there was an oral tradition then. The Puranas were written 2000 years ago and Alexander came earlier, during the reign of the Mauryas.
In the Shraman parampara, Alexander is mentioned in some folk tales, particularly in the Jain tradition. When he set out from Greece on his conquest of the world (Digvijay Yatra), he conquered all of Persia (today’s Iran and Iraq) and then Afghanistan and came up to Pakistan. Here he met a sage, probably a Jain muni, known as ‘gymnosophist’ in Greek (a naked saint whom we know as Digambara). Alexander had many conversations with him following which, according to Jain stories, he got disillusioned with the trappings of the material world. He lost his ambition to conquer India and turned back homewards. This is a theory that’s not completely accepted by historians. But perhaps one of the reasons he left India was because he learnt about Shraman parampara and dwelt on concepts like atma for the first time.
What are the stories from Greek mythology?