Insight Spring 2021

Yoga: A Legitimate Part of Hinduism?

Kyle Park ’23 Dating back to the pre-Vedic period, yoga originates from the Indus Sarasvati Valley Civilization and remains a key component of Indian culture. Found in the Bhagavad Gita and the Yoga Sutra, two major texts of Hinduism, yoga is deeply connected to religious practices about “realizing god” (Vivekananda). Nonetheless, throughout the last decade, yoga has become a popular “exercise cult with expensive accessories” in the Western world; Westerners have benefited from yoga’s mental and physical perks (Bardach). While the West’s portrayal focuses on yoga’s physical advantages and cultural fluidity, yoga is not only a physical practice but one that promotes religious and spiritual upliftment of humanity: the truth that is often neglected due to Edward Said and Sophia Arjana’s notion of “Muddled Orientalism”––the “[adoption] of Eastern practices [...] while retaining the power” of the West (Arjana 96).

“Yoga is a deeply beneficial and life-changing habit. I’ve seen people use yoga to drag themselves out of eating disorders, depression, marital issues, PTSD, and illness” (Cassandra). Following Indian monk Swami Vivekananda’s introduction of yoga to the West, Western yoga has naturally centered around the Asana, the third path of the Eightfold Path, which focuses on the physical practice of poses; each path in Pantanjali’s yoga system leads to the final goal of the God-realization (“Invitation to World”).

To face and overcome the aforementioned problems in life, Western individuals rely on Asana and incorporate the various tenets of yogic spirituality into their lives. Hence, is the Western cultural appropriation of yoga beneficial? Indeed, as it provides thousands of practitioners an opportunity to embark on a journey based on rituals: “a patterned behavior designed to bring about a specific objective”––in this case, the goal of overcoming life obstacles (Nattier 7). Moreover, there were only 14 yoga Asanas initially, yet with the growth of hatha yoga, there are now over 100 unique Asanas: an example showcasing the flexibility of culture and religion (Basavaraddi).

The outcome of yoga’s worldwide expansion is a testament to how “culture is fluid,” and that fluidity is what allows yoga to change its shape to fit the needs of different communities (Cassandra).

Nevertheless, one must not forget the utmost importance of “[recognizing] the roots of yoga” to understand the cases when Orientalism and 18