Amrita 6: Asana through the ages - Magazine - Page 12
The Origins of Yoga
MODERN YOGA PLACES a strong emphasis on the practice of
himself is said to have never undertaken postural austerities,
sana, physical yoga postures. Here I examine the relevance of
the earliest known usage of sana to refer to a physical posture
sana during the history of hatha yoga, from the earliest puris in Avaghoha’s 50 CE epic poem of Buddha’s life, Buddhaported origins of yoga in the Indus valley civilisation, through
carita. The text does not name the posture, but it is clearly dethe Vedic period and ascetic traditions, to the classical, tantric,
scribing what we would now call lotus pose.
medieval and modern periods. Some place the origins of physApproximately five hundred years after Avaghosa, roughly
ical seated yoga practice in the Indus Valley civilisation, due to
contemporary with the Yoga Sutras, Kaundinya provided a list
pictorial representations such as the Paupati Seal. There is no
of seven postures which could be used for pranayama practice,
academic evidence for this, however: it is only currently based
ending with ‘etc.’ indicating that others were known at that
on a projection of later knowledge into the archaeological evitime. While Patañjali sets out the system of eight limbed yoga,
dence, attractive though this idea may be.
one of which being sana, different types of sana are not elabWhether or not the Harappans were practising a form of
orated in the stras. Two alternate commentaries on the Sutras
yoga, most agree that it was descendants of Aryan immigrants
from the same time period do however describe numbers of
into India from the north-west who composed the Vedas and
specific sana, such as vrsana, with the purpose of facilitating
Upanisads. Probably the earliest reference to yoga was in the
breath and meditative practices. Therefore, despite the absence
Ktha Upanisad, where yoga is described
of elaboration of different sanas in the Sutras,
as ‘stilling of the five perceptions and of
there is evidence that in the period between the
the mind’. The slightly later vetvatara “In hatha yoga, there Buddhacarita and the Sutras, descriptions of both
Upanisad relates that one should practice
specific seated and standing sanas had emerged
was no need for
yoga by ‘holding the body erect’. Similarly
as practices in their own right.
elaborate initiation
the Bhagavad Gt also talks of ‘preparing
Tantric scriptures emerged during the second
the seat [..] neither too high nor too low’ or complax mantra, half of the first millennium of the Common Era,
for meditation. With the exception of this
often prescribing many differing and detailed
yantra or mandalas.” methods of yoga practice. The eighth century
need to sit erect in a carefully prepared
seat, which would facilitate efficient
aiva Vijñnabhairavatantra, for example, specibreathing, control of the body did not play a significant part in
fies 112 types of yoga. The tantras did not place
early Upanisadic yoga. Practices instead centred on upsana
importance on sana though, apart from recommending seat(contemplation), and did not fully embrace ‘yoga’ until the later
ed positions to adopt for meditation, mantra or pranayama.
Maitr Upanisad. Maitr ‘six-fold yoga’ resembled practices deMatsyendranth, founder of the aiva Nth sampradya, and
scribed in early Buddhist literature and the later Patanjali’s Yoga
his student Goraksanth, are accredited with evolving the techSutras. It still, however, contained no mention of sana.
niques and philosophy of the aiva Tantras into the teachings
Where and when then do we find the first reference to saof hatha yoga around the twelfth century. It was with the rise
na? Hatha yoga was probably being practiced in ascetic comof hatha yoga that descriptions of sanas began to proliferate;
munities before its codification; certainly ascetics were carrythe thirteenth century Mahudi Gate at Dabhoi, Gujarat, shows
ing out tapasya (austerities to burn off karma), and many of
the oldest dated depictions of complex yoga postures.
these were extreme and physical. For some, the terms yoga
The fifteenth century Hathapradpik (‘Light on Hatha’) elaband tapas are interchangeable, but no correlation is drawn beorates fifteen sanas, of which eight are not seated postures.
tween tapas and sana in the Vedic corpus. Although Buddha
Despite Hathapradpik now being the best known of medieval
10 AMRITA Issue 6 / Spring 2021
