Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Stars and u : what Patanjali says and what it could mean

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In the section titled vibhuti pada, verse 27, Patanjali (who is believed to be the reincarnation of Adishesh) says, "Bhuvanajanam surye samyamat', that means `by focusing on the sun the yogi attains knowledge of the seven spheres.' In the next verse, he assures, "Candra taravyuhajnanam." (meaning, by concentrating on the moon, a yogi can control the stars). In verse 29, he says, "Dhruve tadgatijnanam." (The yogi knows his destiny by focusing on the Pole Star).

You can take these verses at their literal face value. Or understand that the one-pointed fixity of the mind can lead us to be king over our destiny. Samayama is a yogic concept which marries the three stages of yoga practices -- of dharana, dhyana and samadhi. Dharana means concentrating on one object, dhyana is the next stage, when such concentration remains unbroken for long and samadhi is when the mind, sharpened by dharana and dhyana,  is merged with the divine. In samayama all these three states merge, to become one. And such a person, whose samayama is unbroken, he can indeed control his destiny.
The irrepressible Osho in his book Secrets of yoga also delves deeply into these verses, saying that Patanjali is talking about our inner astronomy. He feels that the pole star that the rishi refers to is actually the sakshin or the witnessing self, referred often in our ancient treatises as the `seer'. On verse 28, Osho says the focusing on the hara center, two inches below the navel, brings the marriage of the sun and moon elements in each of us, so that our emotions (which is depicted by the sun) get cooled by our  intellect(depicted by the moon). He believes once we learn to transmute our emotions through our intellect through the practice of yoga we can see all our stars which are nothing but our various centers. In that sense, yoga is indeed the ultimate alchemy. By bringing the samayama on these stars mysteries about yourself will be finally revealed to you.

2 comments:

evnathan said...

Swami Satyasangananda Sarsaswathi of the Bihar School of Yoga, on her treatise of Sri Saundarya Lahari, The Descent, authored by Sri Adi Sankaracharya, while explaining Stanza 39 Meidtation on Shiva-Shakti in swadhisthana, refers to sun as Shiva, the fire of dissolution, and moon as Shakti, the mother of cooling compassion.

meera gautam said...

I love Osho. He is my spiritual partner. I haven't yet read secrets of yoga. I am going to pic it up soon.