PATANJALI YOGA SUTRAS
Sanskrit text with Translation and Commentary By
Swami Vivekananda
Contents
INTRODUCTION
CHAPTER I - SAMADHI PADA
CHAPTER II - SADHANA PADA
CHAPTER III – VIBHOOTI PADA
CHAPTER IV – KAIVALYA PADA INDEPENDENCE
1.janmaushadhimantratapahsamadhijah siddhayah
The Siddhis (powers) are attained by birth, chemical means, power of words, mortification or concentration.
Sometimes a man is born with the Siddhis, powers, of course from the exercise of powers he had in his previous birth. In this birth he is born, as it were, to enjoy the fruits of them. It is said of Kapila, the great father of the Sankhya Philosophy, that he was a born Siddha, which means, literally, a man who has attained to success.
The Yogis claim that these powers can be gained by chemical means. All of you know that chemistry originally began as alchemy; men went in search of the philsopher’s stone, and elixirs of life, and so forth. In Inidia there was a sect called the Rasayanas. Their idea was that ideality, knowledge, spirituality and religion, were all very right, but that the body was the only instrument by which to attain to all these. If the body broke now and then it would take so much more time to attain to the goal. For instance, a man wants to practice Yoga, or wants to become spiritual. Before he has advanced very far he dies. Then he takes another body and begins again, then dies, and so on, and in this way much time will be lost in dying and in being born again. If the body could be made strong and perfect, so that it would get rid of birth and death, we should have so much more time to become spiritual. So these Rasayanas say, first make the body very strong, and they claim that this body can be made immortal. The idea is that if the mind is manufacturing the body, and if it be true that each mind is only one particular outlet to that infinite energy, and that there is no limit to each particular outlet getting any amount of power from outside, why is it impossible that we should keep our bodies all the time? We shall have to manufacture all the bodies that we shall ever have. As soon as this body dies we shall have to manufacture another. If we can do that why cannot we do it just here and no, without getting out? The theory is perfectly correct. If it is possible that we live after death, and make other bodies, why is it impossible that we should have the power of making bodies here, without entirely dissolving this body, simply changing it continually? They also thought that in mercury and in sulphur was hidden the most wonderful power, and that by certain preparations of these a man could keep the body as long as he liked. Others believed that certain drugs could bring powers, such as flying through the air, etc. Many of the most wonderful medicines of the present day we owe to the Rasayamas, notably the use of metals in medicine. Certain sects of Yogis claim that many of their principal teachers are still living in their old bodies. Patanjali, the great authority on Yoga, does not deny this.
The power of words. There are certain sacred words called Mantrams, which have power, when repeated under proper conditions, to produce these extraordinary powers. We are living in the midst of such a mass of miracles, day and night, that we do not think anything of them. There is no limit to man’s power, the power of words and the power of mind.
Mortification. You will find that in every religion mortifications and asceticisms have been practised. In these religious conceptions the Hindus always go to the extremes. You will find men standing with their hands up all their lives, until their hands wither and die. Men sleep standing, day and night, until their feet swell, and, if they live, the legs become so stiff in this position that they can no more bend them, but have to stand all their lives. I once saw a man who had raised his hands in this way, and I asked him how it felt when he did it first. He said it was awful torture. It was such torture that he had to go to a river and put himself in water, and that allayed the pain for a little. After a month he did not suffer much. Through such practices powers (Siddhis) can be attained.
Concentration. The concentration is Samadhi, and that is Yoga proper; that is the principle theme of this science, and it is the highest means. The preceding ones are only secondary, and we cannot attain to the highest through them. Samadhi is the means through which we can gain anything and everything, mental, moral or spiritual.
2. jatyantaraparinamah prakrityapoorat
The change into another species is by the filling in of nature.
Patanjali has advanced the proposition that these powers come by first, sometimes by chemical means, or they may be got by mortification and he has admitted that this body can be kept for any length of time. Now he goes on to state what is the cause of the change of the body into another species, which he says is by the filling in of nature. In the next aphorism he will explain this.
3. nimittam aprayojakan prakritinan varannabhedastu tatah kshetrikavat
Good deeds, etc., are not the direct causes in the transformation of nature, but they act as breakers of obstacles to the evolutions of nature, as a farmer breaks the obstacles to the course of water, which then runs down by its own nature.
When a farmer is irrigating his field the water is already in the canals, only there are gates which keep the water in. The farmer opens these gates, and the water flows in by itself, by the law of gravitation. So, all human progress and power are already in everything; this perfection is every man’s nature, only it is barred in and prevented from taking its proper course. If anyone can take the bar off in rushes nature. Then the man attains the powers which are his already. Those we called wicked become saints, as soon as the bar is broken and nature rushes in. It is nature that is driving us towards perfection, and eventually she will bring everyone there. All these practices and struggles to become religious are only negative work to take off the bars, and open the doors to that perfection which is our birthright, our nature.
To-day the evolution theories of the Yogis will be better understood in the light of modern research. And yet the theory of the Yogis is a better explanation. The two causes of evolution advanced by the moderns, viz., sexual selection and survival of the fittest, are inadequate. Suppose human knowledge to have advanced too much as to eliminate competition, both from the function of acquiring physical sustenance and of acquiring a mate. Then, according to the moderns, human progress will stop and the race will die. And the result of this theory is to furnish every oppressor with an argument to calm the qualms of conscience, and men are not lacking, who, posing as philosophers, want to kill out all wicked and incompetent persons (they are, of course, the only judges of competency), and thus preserve the human race! But the great ancient evolutionist, Patanjali, declares that the true secret of evolution is the manifestation of the perfection which is already in every being; that this perfection has been barred, and the infinite tide behind it is struggling to express itself. These struggles and competitions are but the results of our ignorance, because we do not know the proper way to unlock the gate and let the water in. This infinite tide behind must express itself, and it is the cause of all manifestation, not competition for life, or sex gratification, which are only momentary, unnecessary, extraneous effects, caused by ignorance. Even when all competition has ceased this perfect nature behind will make us go forward until everyone has become perfect. Therefore there is no reason to believe that competition is necessary to progress. In the animal the man was suppressed, but, as soon as the door was opened, out rushed man. So, in man there is the potential god, kept in by the locks and bars of ignorance. When knowledge breaks these bars the god becomes manifest.
4.nirmannachittanyasmitamatrat From egoism alone proceed the created minds.
The theory of Karma is that we suffer for our good or bad deeds, and the whole scope of philosophy is to approach the glory of man. All the Scriptures sing the glory of man, of the soul, and then, with the same breath, they preach this Karma. A good deed brings such a result, and a bad deed such a result, but, if the soul can be acted upon by a good or a bad deed it amounts to nothing. Bad deeds put a bart to the manifestation of our nature, of the Purusa, and good deeds take the obstacles off, and its glory becomes manifest. But the Purusa itself is never changed. Whatever you do never destroys your own glory, your own nature, because the soul cannot be acted upon by anything, only a veil is spread before it, hiding its perfection.
5. pravrittibhede prayojakam chittam ekam anekesham
Though the activities of the different created minds are various, the one original mind is the controller of them all.
These different minds, which will act in these different bodies, are called made-minds, and the bodies made-bodies; that is, manufactured bodies and minds. Matter and mind are like two inexhaustible storehouses. When you have become a Yogi you have learned the secret of their control. It was yours all the time, but you had forgotten it. When you become a Yogi you recollect it. Then you can do anything with it, manipulate it any way you like. The material out of which that manufactured mind is created is the very same material which is used as the macrocosm. It is not that mind is one thing and matter another, but they are different existences of the same thing. Asmita, egoism, is the material, the fine state of existence out of which these made-minds and made-bodies of the Yogi will be manufactured. Therefore, when the Yogi has found the secret of these energies of nautre he can manufacture any number of bodies, or minds, but they will all be manufactures out of the substance known as egoism.
6. tatra dhyanajam anashayam Among the various Chittas that which is attained by Samadhi is desireless.
Among all the various minds that we see in various men, only that mind which has attained to Samadhi, perfect concentration, is the highest. A man who has attained certain powers through medicines, or through words, or through mortifications, still has desires, but that man who has attained to Samadhi through concentration is alone free from all desires.
7. karmashuklakrishnnam yoginah trividham itaresham Works are neither black nor white for the Yogis; for others they are threefold, black, white, and mixed.
When the Yogi has attained to that state of perfection, the actions of that man, and the Karma produced by those actions, will not bind him, because he did not desire them. He just works on: he works to do good, and he does good, but does not care for the result, and it will not come to him. But for ordinary men, who have not attained to that highest state, works are of three kind, black (evil actions), white (good actions), and mixed.
8. tatastadvipakanugunanam evabhivyaktirvasananam
From these threefold works are manifested in each state only those desires (which are) fitting to that state alone. (The others are held in abeyance for the time being.)
Suppose I have made the three kinds of Karma, good, bad, and mixed; and suppose I die and become a god in heaven; the desires in a god body are not the same as the desires in a human body. The god body neither eats nor drinks; what becomes of my past unworked Karmas, which produce as their effect the desire to eat and drink? Where would these Karmas go when I became a god? The answer is that desires
can only manifest themselves in proper environments. Only those desires will come out for which the environment is fitted; the rest will remain stored up. In this life we have many godly desires, many human desires, many animal desires. If I take a god body, only the god desires will come up, because for them the environments are suitable. And if I take an animal body, only the animal desires will come up, and the god desires will wait. What does that show? That by means of environment we can check these desires. Only that Karma which is suited to and fitted for the environments will come out. These proves that the power of environment is the great check to control even Karma itself.
9. jatideshakalavyavahitanam apyanantaryam smritisanskarayoh ekaroopatvat There is connectiveness in desire, even though separated by speices, space and time, there being identifi-cation of memory and impressions.
Experiences becoming fine become impressions; impressions revivified become memory. The word memory here includes unconscious co-ordination of past experience, reduced to impressions, with present conscious action. In each body the group of impressions acquired in a similar body only will become the cause of action in that body. The experiences of dissimilar bodies will be held in abeyance. Each body will act as if it were a descendant of a series of bodies of that species only; thus, consecutiveness of desires will not be broken.
10. tasam anaditvam chashisho nityatvat
Thirst for happiness being eternal, desires are without beginning.
All experience is preceded by desire for becoming happy. There was no beginning of experience, as each fresh experience is built upon the tendency generated by past experience; therefore desire is without beginning.
Kaivalya Pada
Sutra
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