Hinduism / by Monier Williams.

  • Monier Monier-Williams
Date:
1877
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Hinduism / by Monier Williams. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    ‘ No knowledge equal to the Sankhya, no power equal to the Yoga.’ The Yoga. The Yoga, founded by Patanjali and regarded as a branch of the Sankhya, is scarcely worthy of the name of a separate system of philosophy. Yet it has undoubted, charms for the naturally contemplative and ascetical Hindu, and claims greater orthodoxy than the Sankhya proper, by directly acknowledging the existence of a Supreme Being. In brief, the aim of the Yoga is to teach the means by which the human soul may attain complete union with the Supreme Soul. This fusion or blending of the individual spirit (jivatman) with Purusha, ‘ the universal Spirit,’ may be effected even in the body by the constant habit of keeping the mind in its unmodified state—a state clear as crystal when uncoloured by contact with other substances, and by the practice of complete suppression of the pas- sions (vairagya). The last condition of suppression of all action is only to be achieved by contemplation on the Supreme Being, who is defined to be ‘ a Spirit unaffected by works, having for one of his appel- lations the mystical monosyllable Om.’ Indeed the repetition of Om is supposed to be all-efficacious in giving knowledge of the Supreme and preventing the obstacles to Yoga. The eight means of mental concentration are as follows :— I. _ Yama, ‘restraint.’ 2. Niyama, ‘religious observances.’ 3. Asana, ‘postures.’ 4. Pranayama, ‘suppression of the breath,’ or ‘breathing in a peculiar way.’ 5. Praiydhara, ‘re- straint of the senses.’ 6. Dharana, ‘steadying of the mind.’ 7. Dhydna, ‘contemplation.’ 8. Samddhi, ‘ profound medita- tion,’ or a state of religious trance, which is most effectually at- tained by such practices as fixing the eyes intently and inces- santly on the tip of the nose, &c.
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