The Yoga Sutras
of Patanjali
The Threads of Union
Translation by BonGiovanni
1. on Contemplations
2. on Spiritual Disciplines
3. on Divine Powers
4. on Realizations
Before beginning any spiritual text
it is customary to clear the mind of all distracting thoughts,
to calm the breath and to purify the heart.
Part One
On Contemplations
1.1 Now, instruction in Union.
1.2. Union is restraining the thought-streams
natural to the mind.
1.3. Then the seer dwells in his
own nature.
1.4. Otherwise he is of the same
form as the thought-streams.
1.5. The thought-streams are five-fold,
painful and not painful.
1.6. Right knowledge, wrong knowledge,
fancy, sleep and memory.
1.7. Right knowledge is inference,
tradition and genuine cognition.
1.8. Wrong knowledge is false, illusory,
erroneous beliefs or notions.
1.9. Fancy is following after word-knowledge
empty of substance.
1.10. Deep sleep is the modification
of the mind which has for its substratum nothingness.
1.11. Memory is not allowing mental
impressions to escape.
1.12. These thought-streams are controlled
by practice and non-attachment.
1.13. Practice is the effort to secure
steadiness.
1.14. This practice becomes well-grounded
when continued with reverent devotion and without interruption
over a long period of time.
1.15. Desirelessness towards the
seen and the unseen gives the consciousness of mastery.
1.16. This is signified by an indifference
to the three attributes, due to knowledge of the Indweller.
1.17. Cognitive meditation is accompanied
by reasoning, discrimination, bliss and the sense of 'I am.'
1.18. There is another meditation
which is attained by the practice of alert mental suspension until
only subtle impressions remain.
1.19. For those beings who are formless
and for those beings who are merged in unitive consciousness,
the world is the cause.
1.20. For others, clarity is preceded
by faith, energy, memory and equalminded contemplation.
1.21. Equalminded contemplation is
nearest to those whose desire is most ardent.
1.22. There is further distinction
on account of the mild, moderate or intense means employed.
1.23. Or by surrender to God.
1.24. God is a particular yet universal
indweller, untouched by afflictions, actions, impressions and
their results.
1.25. In God, the seed of omniscience
is unsurpassed.
1.26. Not being conditioned by time,
God is the teacher of even the ancients.
1.27. God's voice is Om.
1.28. The repetition of Om should
be made with an understanding of its meaning.
1.29. From that is gained introspection
and also the disappearance of obstacles.
1.30. Disease, inertia, doubt, lack
of enthusiasm, laziness, sensuality, mind-wandering, missing the
point, instability- these distractions of the mind are the obstacles.
1.31. Pain, despair, nervousness,
and disordered inspiration and expiration are co-existent with
these obstacles.
1.32. For the prevention of the obstacles,
one truth should be practiced constantly.
1.33. By cultivating friendliness
towards happiness and compassion towards misery, gladness towards
virtue and indifference towards vice, the mind becomes pure.
1.34. Optionally, mental equanimity
may be gained by the even expulsion and retention of energy.
1.35. Or activity of the higher senses
causes mental steadiness.
1.36. Or the state of sorrowless
Light.
1.37. Or the mind taking as an object
of concentration those who are freed of compulsion.
1.38. Or depending on the knowledge
of dreams and sleep.
1.39. Or by meditation as desired.
1.40. The mastery of one in Union
extends from the finest atomic particle to the greatest infinity.
1.41. When the agitations of the
mind are under control, the mind becomes like a transparent crystal
and has the power of becoming whatever form is presented. knower,
act of knowing, or what is known.
1.42. The argumentative condition
is the confused mixing of the word, its right meaning, and knowledge.
1.43. When the memory is purified
and the mind shines forth as the object alone, it is called non-argumentative.
1.44. In this way the meditative
and the ultra-meditative having the subtle for their objects are
also described.
1.45. The province of the subtle
terminates with pure matter that has no pattern or distinguishing
mark.
1.46. These constitute seeded contemplations.
1.47. On attaining the purity of
the ultra-meditative state there is the pure flow of spiritual
consciousness.
1.48. Therein is the faculty of supreme
wisdom.
1.49. The wisdom obtained in the
higher states of consciousness is different from that obtained
by inference and testimony as it refers to particulars.
1.50. The habitual pattern of thought
stands in the way of other impressions.
1.51. With the suppression of even
that through the suspension of all modifications of the mind,
contemplation without seed is attained.
End Part One.
Part Two
on Spiritual Disciplines
2.1 Austerity, the study of sacred
texts, and the dedication of action to God constitute the discipline
of Mystic Union.
2.2 This discipline is practised
for the purpose of acquiring fixity of mind on the Lord, free
from all impurities and agitations, or on One's Own Reality, and
for attenuating the afflictions.
2.3 The five afflictions are ignorance,
egoism, attachment, aversion, and the desire to cling to life.
2.4 Ignorance is the breeding place
for all the others whether they are dormant or attenuated, partially
overcome or fully operative.
2.5 Ignorance is taking the non-eternal
for the eternal, the impure for the pure, evil for good and non-self
as self.
2.6 Egoism is the identification
of the power that knows with the instruments of knowing.
2.7 Attachment is that magnetic pattern
which clusters in pleasure and pulls one towards such experience.
2.8 Aversion is the magnetic pattern
which clusters in misery and pushes one from such experience.
2.9 Flowing by its own energy, established
even in the wise and in the foolish, is the unending desire for
life.
2.10 These patterns when subtle may
be removed by developing their contraries.
2.11 Their active afflictions are
to be destroyed by meditation.
2.12 The impressions of works have
their roots in afflictions and arise as experience in the present
and the future births.
2.13 When the root exists, its fruition
is birth, life and experience.
2.14 They have pleasure or pain as
their fruit, according as their cause be virtue or vice.
2.15 All is misery to the wise because
of the pains of change, anxiety, and purificatory acts.
2.16 The grief which has not yet
come may be avoided.
2.17 The cause of the avoidable is
the superimposition of the external world onto the unseen world.
2.18 The experienced world consists
of the elements and the senses in play. It is of the nature of
cognition, activity and rest, and is for the purpose of experience
and realization.
2.19 The stages of the attributes
effecting the experienced world are the specialized and the unspecialized,
the differentiated and the undifferentiated.
2.20 The indweller is pure consciousness
only, which though pure, sees through the mind and is identified
by ego as being only the mind.
2.21 The very existence of the seen
is for the sake of the seer.
2.22 Although Creation is discerned
as not real for the one who has achieved the goal, it is yet real
in that Creation remains the common experience to others.
2.23 The association of the seer
with Creation is for the distinct recognition of the objective
world, as well as for the recognition of the distinct nature of
the seer.
2.24 The cause of the association
is ignorance.
2.25 Liberation of the seer is the
result of the dissassociation of the seer and the seen, with the
disappearance of ignorance.
2.26 The continuous practice of discrimination
is the means of attaining liberation.
2.27 Steady wisdom manifests in seven
stages.
2.28 On the destruction of impurity
by the sustained practice of the limbs of Union, the light of
knowledge reveals the faculty of discrimination.
2.29 The eight limbs of Union are
self-restraint in actions, fixed observance, posture, regulation
of energy, mind-control in sense engagements, concentration, meditation,
and realization.
2.30 Self-restraint in actions includes
abstention from violence, from falsehoods, from stealing, from
sexual engagements, and from acceptance of gifts.
2.31 These five willing abstentions
are not limited by rank, place, time or circumstance and constitute
the Great Vow.
2.32 The fixed observances are cleanliness,
contentment, austerity, study and persevering devotion to God.
2.33 When improper thoughts disturb
the mind, there should be constant pondering over the opposites.
2.34 Improper thoughts and emotions
such as those of violence- whether done, caused to be done, or
even approved of- indeed, any thought originating in desire, anger
or delusion, whether mild medium or intense- do all result in
endless pain and misery. Overcome such distractions by pondering
on the opposites.
2.35 When one is confirmed in non-violence,
hostility ceases in his presence.
2.36 When one is firmly established
in speaking truth, the fruits of action become subservient to
him.
2.37 All jewels approach him who
is confirmed in honesty.
2.38 When one is confirmed in celibacy,
spiritual vigor is gained.
2.39 When one is confirmed in non-possessiveness,
the knowledge of the why and how of existence is attained.
2.40 From purity follows a withdrawal
from enchantment over one's own body as well as a cessation of
desire for physical contact with others.
2.41 As a result of contentment there
is purity of mind, one-pointedness, control of the senses, and
fitness for the vision of the self.
2.42 Supreme happiness is gained
via contentment.
2.43 Through sanctification and the
removal of impurities, there arise special powers in the body
and senses.
2.44 By study comes communion with
the Lord in the Form most admired.
2.45 Realization is experienced by
making the Lord the motive of all actions.
2.46 The posture should be steady
and comfortable.
2.47 In effortless relaxation, dwell
mentally on the Endless with utter attention.
2.48 From that there is no disturbance
from the dualities.
2.49 When that exists, control of
incoming and outgoing energies is next.
2.50 It may be external, internal,
or midway, regulated by time, place, or number, and of brief or
long duration.
2.51 Energy-control which goes beyond
the sphere of external and internal is the fourth level- the vital.
2.52 In this way, that which covers
the light is destroyed.
2.53 Thus the mind becomes fit for
concentration.
2.54 When the mind maintains awareness,
yet does not mingle with the senses, nor the senses with sense
impressions, then self-awareness blossoms.
2.55 In this way comes mastery over
the senses.
End Part Two
Part Three
on Divine Powers
3.1 One-pointedness is steadfastness
of the mind.
3.2 Unbroken continuation of that
mental ability is meditation.
3.3 That same meditation when there
is only consciousness of the object of meditation and not of the
mind is realization.
3.4 The three appearing together
are self-control.
3.5 By mastery comes wisdom.
3.6 The application of mastery is
by stages.
3.7 The three are more efficacious
than the restraints.
3.8 Even that is external to the
seedless realization.
3.9 The significant aspect is the
union of the mind with the moment of absorption, when the outgoing
thought disappears and the absorptive experience appears.
3.10 From sublimation of this union
comes the peaceful flow of unbroken unitive cognition.
3.11 The contemplative transformation
of this is equalmindedness, witnessing the rise and destruction
of distraction as well as one-pointedness itself.
3.12 The mind becomes one-pointed
when the subsiding and rising thought-waves are exactly similar.
3.13 In this state, it passes beyond
the changes of inherent characteristics, properties and the conditional
modifications of object or sensory recognition.
3.14 The object is that which preserves
the latent characteristic, the rising characteristic or the yet-to-be-named
characteristic that establishes one entity as specific.
3.15 The succession of these changes
in that entity is the cause of its modification.
3.16 By self-control over these three-fold
changes (of property, character and condition), knowledge of the
past and the future arises.
3.17 The sound of a word, the idea
behind the word, and the object the idea signfies are often taken
as being one thing and may be mistaken for one another. By self-control
over their distinctions, understanding of all languages of all
creatures arises.
3.18 By self-control on the perception
of mental impressions, knowledge of previous lives arises.
3.19 By self-control on any mark
of a body, the wisdom of the mind activating that body arises.
3.20 By self-control on the form
of a body, by suspending perceptibility and separating effulgence
therefrom, there arises invisibility and inaudibilty.
3.21 Action is of two kinds, dormant
and fruitful. By self-control on such action, one portends the
time of death.
3.22 By performing self-control on
friendliness, the strength to grant joy arises.
3.23 By self-control over any kind
of strength, such as that of the elephant, that very strength
arises.
3.24 By self-control on the primal
activator comes knowledge of the hidden, the subtle, and the distant.
3.25 By self-control on the Sun comes
knowledge of spatial specificities.
3.26 By self-control on the Moon
comes knowledge of the heavens.
3.27 By self-control on the Polestar
arises knowledge of orbits.
3.28 By self-control on the navel
arises knowledge of the constitution of the body.
3.29 By self-control on the pit of
the throat one subdues hunger and thirst.
3.30 By self-control on the tube
within the chest one acquires absolute steadiness.
3.31 By self-control on the light
in the head one envisions perfected beings.
3.32 There is knowledge of everything
from intuition.
3.33 Self-control on the heart brings
knowledge of the mental entity.
3.34 Experience arises due to the
inability of discerning the attributes of vitality from the indweller,
even though they are indeed distinct from one another. Self-control
brings true knowledge of the indweller by itself.
3.35 This spontaneous enlightenment
results in intuitional perception of hearing, touching, seeing
and smelling.
3.36 To the outward turned mind,
the sensory organs are perfections, but are obstacles to realization.
3.37 When the bonds of the mind caused
by action have been loosened, one may enter the body of another
by knowledge of how the nerve-currents function.
3.38 By self-control of the nerve-currents
utilising the lifebreath, one may levitate, walk on water, swamps,
thorns, or the like.
3.39 By self-control over the maintenance
of breath, one may radiate light.
3.40 By self-control on the relation
of the ear to the ether one gains distant hearing.
3.41 By self-control over the relation
of the body to the ether, and maintaining at the same time the
thought of the lightness of cotton, one is able to pass through
space.
3.42 By self-control on the mind
when it is separated from the body- the state known as the Great
Transcorporeal- all coverings are removed from the Light.
3.43 Mastery over the elements arises
when their gross and subtle forms,as well as their essential characteristics,
and the inherent attributes and experiences they produce, is examined
in self-control.
3.44 Thereby one may become as tiny
as an atom as well as having many other abilities, such as perfection
of the body, and non-resistence to duty.
3.45 Perfection of the body consists
in beauty, grace, strength and adamantine hardness.
3.46 By self-control on the changes
that the sense-organs endure when contacting objects, and on the
power of the sense of identity, and of the influence of the attributes,
and the experience all these produce- one masters the senses.
3.47 From that come swiftness of
mind, independence of perception, and mastery over primoridal
matter.
3.48 To one who recognizes the distinctive
relation between vitality and indweller comes omnipotence and
omniscience.
3.49 Even for the destruction of
the seed of bondage by desirelessness there comes absolute independence.
3.50 When invited by invisible beings
one should be neither flattered nor satisfied, for there is yet
a possibility of ignorance rising up.
3.51 By self-control over single
moments and their succession there is wisdom born of discrimination.
3.52 From that there is recognition
of two similars when that difference cannot be distinguished by
class, characteristic or position.
3.53 Intuition, which is the entire
discriminative knowledge, relates to all objects at all times,
and is without succession.
3.54 Liberation is attained when
there is equal purity between vitality and the indweller.
End Part Three
Part Four
on Realizations
4.1 Psychic powers arise by birth,
drugs, incantations, purificatory acts or concentrated insight.
4.2 Transformation into another state
is by the directed flow of creative nature.
4.3 Creative nature is not moved
into action by any incidental cause, but by the removal of obstacles,
as in the case of a farmer clearing his field of stones for irrigation.
4.4 Created minds arise from egoism
alone.
4.5 There being difference of interest,
one mind is the director of many minds.
4.6 Of these, the mind born of concentrated
insight is free from the impressions.
4.7 The impressions of unitive cognition
are neither good nor bad. In the case of the others, there are
three kinds of impressions.
4.8 From them proceed the development
of the tendencies which bring about the fruition of actions.
4.9 Because of the magnetic qualities
of habitual mental patterns and memory, a relationship of cause
and effect clings even though there may be a change of embodiment
by class, space and time.
4.10 The desire to live is eternal,
and the thought-clusters prompting a sense of identity are beginningless.
4.11 Being held together by cause
and effect, substratum and object- the tendencies themselves disappear
on the dissolution of these bases.
4.12 The past and the future exist
in the object itself as form and expression, there being difference
in the conditions of the properties.
4.13 Whether manifested or unmanifested
they are of the nature of the attributes.
4.14 Things assume reality because
of the unity maintained within that modification.
4.15 Even though the external object
is the same, there is a difference of cognition in regard to the
object because of the difference in mentality.
4.16 And if an object known only
to a single mind were not cognized by that mind, would it then
exist?
4.17 An object is known or not known
by the mind, depending on whether or not the mind is colored by
the object.
4.18 The mutations of awareness are
always known on account of the changelessness of its Lord, the
indweller.
4.19 Nor is the mind self-luminous,
as it can be known.
4.20 It is not possible for the mind
to be both the perceived and the perceiver simultaneously.
4.21 In the case of cognition of
one mind by another, we would have to assume cognition of cognition,
and there would be confusion of memories.
4.22 Consciousness appears to the
mind itself as intellect when in that form in which it does not
pass from place to place.
4.23 The mind is said to perceive
when it reflects both the indweller (the knower) and the objects
of perception (the known).
4.24 Though variegated by innumerable
tendencies, the mind acts not for itself but for another, for
the mind is of compound substance.
4.25 For one who sees the distinction,
there is no further confusing of the mind with the self.
4.26 Then the awareness begins to
discriminate, and gravitates towards liberation.
4.27 Distractions arise from habitual
thought patterns when practice is intermittent.
4.28 The removal of the habitual
thought patterns is similar to that of the afflictions already
described.
4.29 To one who remains undistracted
in even the highest intellection there comes the equalminded realization
known as The Cloud of Virtue. This is a result of discriminative
discernment.
4.30 From this there follows freedom
from cause and effect and afflictions.
4.31 The infinity of knowledge available
to such a mind freed of all obscuration and property makes the
universe of sensory perception seem small.
4.32 Then the sequence of change
in the three attributes comes to an end, for they have fulfilled
their function.
4.33 The sequence of mutation occurs
in every second, yet is comprehensible only at the end of a series.
4.34 When the attributes cease mutative
association with awarenessness, they resolve into dormancy in
Nature, and the indweller shines forth as pure consciousness.
This is absolute freedom.
End Part Four
The end of the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali