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SUBJECT: Yoga
QUESTION: Should Christians engage in Yoga?
ANSWER:
No, they should not.
The following was seen in a Yoga magazine:
YOGA Today's lifestyle for health
It has been said to steady the mind, calm the emotions,
and tone the body. It claims that it is a way to Promote
fitness, flexibility, and relaxation and It can be practiced
in groups or by oneself at home.
“Nationally, yoga is a $22.5 billion industry.
Advertisements for yoga books, videos, clothes, wellness
retreats and even yoga business training classes can be
found in the back of magazines such as Yoga Journal, and the
phenomenon is now reaching into the mainstream.
...35 million Americans who will try yoga for the first
time this year. Once confined to New Agers with an interest
in Eastern spirituality, yoga is catching on among young
men, fitness fanatics, aging baby boomers and other unlikely
enthusiasts who claim the mind/body practice does everything
from heal illness to tighten abs”
A 2002 government survey of 31,000 adults found that 8
percent of Americans used TM [Transcendental
Meditation] as an alternative medical therapy. (Americans
seek stress relief through non-biblical techniques, October
17, 2005)
Wal-Mart's Web site has 990 yoga products; Target's has
4,235. (as of 2004)
Hatha yoga exercises are taught as part of YMCA physical
education programs, in health spas and given as physical
exercise on TV programs. Eighty percent of clubs now offer
yoga classes. Yoga is also incorporated into institutional
and liberal churches on the assumption that these techniques
are nothing more than benign physical exercises which
condition the mind and body. It has come in under the guise
of stress reduction. Touted as scientifically proven is more
an assumption, that is really at worst, presumption.
We probably all have seen Lilias on her PBS TV series
introduce people to the benefits of this physical exercise.
She has become an American icon for yoga, promising amazing
affects from vitality, tranquility to greater concentration.
Richard Hittleman was one of the first to have a television
show on yoga. Now the exercise classes are being carried on
TV as a new resurgence of interest is taking place.
B. K. S. Iyengar, the founder of the Hatha Yoga used in the
U.S. “Last year, (2004)
Time magazine named Iyengar one of the 100 most influential
people in the world, shortly after the word “Iyengar” made
it into the Oxford English Dictionary.”
His classic book “Light on Yoga” has sold more than 1
million copies, and has been translated into 17 languages” (http://www.denverpost.com/search/ci_3087074,
Yoga and its genius, By Colleen O'Connor 10/09/2005)
Newsweek magazine reported that “yoga classes are in demand
at urban health clubs across the country, and longstanding
yoga studios in New York, Chicago, and California report
sharp rises in attendance in the past years. It is estimated
that there are 10,000 yoga teachers in the United States (now
up to 70,000) who teach between 4 and 5 million
students a week (now up to
35 million). Newsweek also noted that “such
high-profile practitioners of the 6,000-year-old art as
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Raquel Welch (whose
exercise videos are promoting yoga).
Yoga's popularity has grown especially as of late. Peter
Jones in his Christian Witness to a Pagan Planet
e-newsletter reports that Twenty million Americans practice
Yoga—including Madonna, Oprah, Gwyneth Paltrow, Monica
Lewinski, Hillary Clinton, Phil Jackson (with
many L.A. Lakers) the Gores and Sandra Day
O’Connor, of the Supreme Court.
Because Hollywood is involved it has brought it more
attention to the practice.” Time magazine also reported that
the Berkeley-based Yoga Journal has nearly doubled its
circulation over the past five years. The widespread
teaching of yoga in America today, is probably, due more to
a tolerant attitude toward the religions of other cultures
than it is to an open mindedness about whatever wisdom may
be extracted from it. It seems to the secular population
that is being targeted to accept only that selected aspect
of yoga which fits their naive notion. That what yoga is
supposed to do, is to relieve stress and make a fit and
beautiful body. Many participants merely presume that the
exercises are neutral, harmless, if they are not practiced
with any spiritual intent. After all it only bodily
exercise!
But the fact remains that even physical yoga is inextricably
united in the whole of Eastern metaphysics. I personally had
practiced yoga and meditation and at times was quite
dedicated. It was something I believed in, as I tried to
work my way to be in tune with the universe as well as my
body. One of the early pioneers of Hatha Yoga, Richard
Hittleman, (who was a
personal influence to practice Yoga) “stated that
as yoga students practiced the physical positions, they
would eventually be ready to investigate the spiritual
component which is “the entire essence of the subject”’ (Yoga
Journal, May/June 1993, p. 68)
This is how I began a spiritual journey into meditation. One
practice led to another as I wanted to grow in my spiritual
pursuit. From this spiritual philosophy I learned to be a
vegetarian, thinking I was cleansing the temple for the
energy to flow unobstructed. While vegetarianism can be
helpful to some people that are unable to digest meat, it is
not the optimum diet for all. It can at times make one
unhealthy if they do not get sufficient vitamins and
minerals.
This practice is ancient but can be traditionally traced to
approximately the 200 B.C., To a man named Patanjali. Who is
credited with being the originator of the yoga system. His
work is a collection of many short terse sentences which
convey the barest minimum of teaching about yoga. The rest
was learned from his teacher personally. Little is known
about him; he was supposedly a physician, Sanskrit scholar,
a yoga practitioner (yogi),
a teacher who lived in India. Some authorities believe that
he was more of a cataloguer than an author, and that he did
not originate this practice, but collected and edited the
teachings from traditions and is credited for its revival.
Yoga was introduced by Hindu's Lord Krishna in the Baghavad
Gita as the sure way to Hindu heaven. In one of the most
authoritative Hatha Yoga texts, the fifteenth-century
Hathayoga Pradipika, Svatmarama lists Lord Shiva, (one
of Hinduism's most feared Hindu deities, called “The
Destroyer”) as the first Hatha Yoga teacher.
Shiva is addressed as Yogeshzuara, or Lord of Yoga.
There are many types of Yoga. Besides the Ashtanga Yoga of
Patanjali, - the most famous forms of yoga are those
described in the Bhavagad Gita, the Hindus sacred
scriptures. The best-known part of the epic Mahabharata, the
Gita mentions Karma, Jnana, and Bhakti Yoga. These are not
different types of yoga but are different applications of
yoga to daily life. Since Yoga means to unite they are all
part of the whole. In addition to these, there is Raja,
Tantra, and Integral Yoga.
The concept presented is the body contains a network of
channels for divine and cosmic energy. Where these channels
cross, they create pulse points of psychic and spiritual
energy in the body known as chakras. There are said to be as
much as 88,000 chakras throughout the human body, but ... of
these, only seven are considered to be of supreme
importance, Each has its own corresponding color, musical
sound, psychological function, stone and gems, symbols,
endocrine gland, internal organ, illnesses and ailments.
Tantra, sometimes called Kundalini Yoga, is the worship of
God as the Divine Mother; (for
those who are femininely inclined) it stresses
the union of the male and female aspects of the individual,
to awake the Snake. Tantra's most important and unique
characteristic is its use of sexual imagery to portray
enlightenment, the return to Oneness beyond duality of life.
When Kundalini has been awakened, as a result of secret
yogic techniques, she rises through the chakras of the spine
slithering like a snake upward to reunion with Shiva at the
crown of the head. When god and goddess unite in sexual
embrace, enlightenment occurs, illusion vanishes, and there
is only One. This rising Kundalini flow also causes one to
go into an altered state of consciousness, as the heart
chakra opens. This can be one of the most dangerous
practices in yoga and is not to be underestimated in its
ability to harm. Connected with the Kundalini practice is an
elaborate occult system that sees the human body as
integrated to within and without. The occultists world view
is summed up by the statement as “within so without.” The
Beatles sang a song influenced by the Maharishi “life flows
within you and without you.” Yogis have the ability to slow
down their breathing surviving on almost no oxygen and to
remain motionless for hours, thus freeing themselves from
the supposed “illusion” of this life.
Without going into all the different aspects and functions
of each yoga, I would like for us to examine the one most
commonly practiced, Hatha yoga.
The words Ha and tha represent the energy which is on each
side of the spinal column. Hatha yoga suppresses the flow of
energies through these passages, forcing the kundalini (“serpent
power”) to rise from the base of the spine
through the psychic energy channel in the sushumn (the
spine), up through each of the chakras.
The goal of advanced yoga students is to attain their
highest possible degree of physical, mental, and spiritual
integration. Ultimately to reach union with Brahma is not
simply for exercise. It is a fact that yoga migrated to the
west first as a spiritual discipline. At the time
Vegetarianism and non-violence were promoted quite
successfully as key elements of yogic philosophy. It
actually helped change the culture and promote the hippie
lifestyle which later transformed and matured into the new
age movement we have today.
Today it is now popular to bring the children to Yoga
classes to calm them down from their hyperactivity and get
them under control.
The typical American taking yoga classes has little or no
idea of the how’s and why's of yoga's seeming effectiveness.
Yoga is a series of exercises and postures (asanas)
which are advertised as a way to tone up, reduce stress and
experience tranquility. In the traditional understanding,
physical yoga has a great deal more to do with the
practitioner's invisible, “subtle” body, than it does with
the flesh and bones and muscles that encase it. While yoga
does purport to first of all work on the muscular,
glandular, and physical nervous systems, its real import, as
Danielou says, is as “a process of control of the gross body
which aims at freeing the subtle body.” (Danielou,
p. 18 referenced from SCP Journal).
This subtle body is extremely complex, but can be
superficially described as consisting of 72,000 invisible
psychic channels called nadis, which constitute an
other-dimensional body that directly corresponds to the
physical, or gross body. she subtle body is connected to the
gross body at several points, which are the seven chakra
points. Almost all those who practice new age therapies
would be familiar with energy points called chakras.
There is no Hinduism without its practice, it is essential
and spiritual. There is no yoga that is strictly aimed for
the physical body, it is essentially spiritual because of
its purpose. Asanas (the
body postures) are one of the first methods of
arousing the Kundalini. Yoga is used to escape from this
unreal world of time and sense which is called Maya, an
illusion. The goal is to reach moksha, a Hindu Nirvanna.
Yoga was developed as an escape from endless reincarnations.
Georg Feuerstein, Ph.D., founder and director of the Yoga
Research and Education center says that Yoga has two
meanings: it’s the discipline and the actual union. When we
have the union, we don’t need the gear anymore. But few
people can claim to have reached that level. There are
practitioners who have been allowed glimpses of it, but full
enlightenment is a very rare accomplishment.
The word yoga is Sanskrit; it derives from a verbal root,
yuj, meaning “to yoke or join or fasten or harness, as in
horses to a chariot; to concentrate the mind in order to
obtain union with the Universal Spirit; to be absorbed in
meditation.”' Its meaning in plain language is union or
yoking with the God consciousness.
Yoga is an intrinsic part of Hinduism. Swami
Vishnudevananda, well known authority of Yoga, in his book
“The Complete Illustrated Book of Yoga” explains the purpose
of Yoga, “It is the duty of each developed man to train his
body to the highest degree of perfection so that it may be
used to pursue spiritual purposes... the aim of all yoga
practice is to achieve truth wherein the individual soul
identifies itself with the supreme soul of God.” In the
Hindu philosophy is taught that the ultimate reality is
consciousness or energy (God-Brahman).
Each individual soul (Atman)
has seven energy centers known as chakras in his body that
run along the spinal column. By opening up these energy
centers aligning these chakras, for the energy to merge with
the ultimate cosmic energy and to experience “Atman who is
Brahman.”
B. K. S. Iyengar, the founder of the more popular form of
Hatha Yoga used in the U.S. states yoga is, “the means by
which the human soul may be completely united with the
Supreme Spirit pervading the universe and thus attain
liberation” (Yoga Journal,
May/June 1993, p. 69). The yoga teachers do admit
that its function is spiritual not just physical.
Focusing on a series of stretching exercises, breathing
practices, and meditation to reach a state of peace and
harmony, this physical discipline is merely a means to an
end. It is a spiritual exercise and the spiritual awakening
is really the serpent power (Kundalini)
an energy that when released streams up the spine, where
tremors, spasms and sometimes violent shaking and twisting
are experienced.
The yoga positions are designed to reach the state of
Samadhi, or a state of union with self as God. Hatha yoga in
its postures bring the subtle body into a specific alignment
with the physical which will alter the consciousness of the
participant. In other words one is practicing one of the
essential elements of Hinduism when doing their Hatha Yoga
exercises; whether they are aware of it or not.
“Hatha Yoga plays an important part in the development of
the human being... the body working in harmony with the
mind, to bring the seeker into closer contact with the
Higher Self.”
Swami Sivenanda Radha, a well-known yoga teacher, has said
in the book on Hatha Yoga, “Asanas are a devotional
practice...each asana creates a certain state of mind...to
bring the seeker into closer contact with the Higher Self”.
Pranayama is the breathing process; by inhalation,
exhalation one absorbs vital energy. Some claim by
controlling Prana (life
force), one can control all the forces of the
universe, gravity (this why
some claim to
levitate), magnetism, electricity and their own
nerve currents.
John Weldon and Clifford Wilson wrote in Occult Shock and
Psychic Forces that Yoga is really pure occultism.
Hans-Urich Rieker, in his book The Yoga of Light, also warns
that misunderstanding the true nature of Yoga can mean
“death or insanity.” Also a little known fact is that
virtually every major guru in India has issued warnings
similar to these; i.e., deep breathing techniques such as
the ones taught in Yoga are a time-honored method for
entering altered states of consciousness and for developing
so-called psychic power.”
Yoga is one of the basic means of reaching this altered
state of consciousness. And the altered state is the doorway
to the occult. Sir John Eccles, Nobel Prize Winner for his
research on the brain, said the brain is “a machine that a
ghost can operate.' In a normal state of consciousness one's
own spirit ticks off the neurons in his brain and operates
his body. We are spirits connected with a body. But in an
altered state, reached under drugs, Yoga, hypnosis,
visualization, this passive but alert state, the connection
between the spirit and the brain, is loosened. That allows
another spirit to interpose itself, to begin to tick off the
neurons in the brain, and create an entire universe of
illusion. You've then opened yourself up to the spiritual
realm which God forbids for us to enter. It's called
sorcery. Those encouraged to use meditation, yoga,
visualization, chakra energizing, Spirit guides could
certainly take advantage of these open areas.
Unbeknown to many people they are literally teaching
themselves how to be demonized, asking guiding spirits to
help teach and relieve them of their stress. All in the name
of stress reduction and developing one's full potential. The
fact is that one practicing yoga, the Asana's, are to be
able to release themselves from the trappings of
reincarnation by working off their karma.
Yoga is to help one neutralize their karma and find a way
off the cycle of rebirth (reincarnation).
How can this spiritual exercise by sanitized for Christian
use. And for what reason would it be used? To relax! The
Bible teaches God will “keep him in perfect peace, whose
mind is stayed on You, because he trusts in You.” (Isaiah
26:3). One cannot make an excuse that they want to use it to
experience peace and or the divine.
The poses that they so diligently practice in their
stretching are named after Hindu Gods, and what one is
actually doing, is calling on them. In that worshipful pose,
they are bowing and for all intents and purposes worshipping
that God. Our God says “You shall have no other Gods before
me. You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of
anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the
waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship
them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God.
As Christians who are in relationship with the God who
created the universe, we should not be among those who
exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worship and serve
created things rather than the Creator (Romans 1:25). While
many Christians rationalize the exercises as neutral they
only need to ask a professional Yoga instructor what it is
really about to find that it is in fact religious. As a
Christian we need to ask ourselves would Jesus or the
apostles be doing yoga? If not why not. Would they promote
another religions way to be united with a different gods?
According to the Bible Yoga is an idolatrous practice which
leads one away from the one true God and into the spiritual
realm of false gods and demonic spirits, and there are
consequences? If we sin ignorantly God understands, He is
merciful, giving us grace on the one hand, but not to
continue after we receive knowledge of the truth. On the
other He cares of our sin, not willing to leave us to our
deception. “My people are destroyed from lack of
knowledge.” In Hosea’s time people had a lack of knowledge
concerning God. As a result, they turned to other gods, and
their idolatrous practices became a snare to them and a
delusion. They became the prey of false gods-even while
thinking that their lifestyle was pleasing to the true God.
There is absolutely no problem in stretching exercises in
and of themselves. What would be wrong is taking yoga
positions assuming they are stretching exercises and
non-religious, when in fact they are worshipful poses to
Hindu gods. No one can deny that stretching helps the blood
flow that breathing in oxygen helps our overall health.
There are numerous other ways unattached to a religion that
can accomplish this. There are numerous exercise programs
that incorporate stretching that in no way relates to yoga (and
its worldview) that one can substitute. Religious
syncretism is probably the most dangerous we can involve
ourselves in because we can rationalize its purpose. From
the Hindu viewpoint nothing is merely physical, because in
Hinduism the physical is merely maya, an illusion, so when
you practice yoga it is not a physical exercise for the body
but a spiritual exercise. All exercise helps the blood flow
and keeps us limber. Breathing in oxygen helps our overall
health and vitality. All these can be pursued in other ways
than having it attached to a religion that teaches to
discover you are god.
Essentially one cannot practice a portion of Hinduism and
continue to walk with the true Christ who is not a Hindu
Guru. |