Religion and Ethics; Yoga Studies


  • Equinox
    • Equinox Publishing Home
    • About Equinox
    • People at Equinox
    • Terms and Conditions
    • Privacy Statement
    • FAQ’s
  • Subjects
    • Archaeology & History
    • Linguistics & Communication
    • Popular Music
    • Religion & Ethics
  • Journals
    • Journals Home Page
      • Archaeology and History Journals
      • Linguistics Journals
      • Popular Music Journals
      • Religious Studies Journals
    • Publishing For Societies
    • Librarians & Subscription Agents
    • Electronic Journal Packages
    • For Contributors
    • Open Access and Copyright Policy
    • Personal Subscriptions
    • Article Downloads
    • Back Issues
    • Pricelist
  • Books
    • Book Home Page
    • Forthcoming Books
    • Published Books
    • Series
      • Advances in CALL Research and Practice
      • Advances in Optimality Theory
      • Advances in the Cognitive Science of Religion
      • Allan Bennett, Bhikkhu Ananda Metteyya: Biography and Collected Writings
      • Applied Phonology and Pronunciation Teaching
      • British Council Monographs on Modern Language Testing
      • Collected Works of Christian M.I.M. Matthiessen
      • Collected Works of Ruqaiya Hasan
      • Communication Disorders & Clinical Linguistics
      • Comparative Research on Iconic and Performative Texts
      • Comparative Islamic Studies
      • Contemporary and Historical Paganism
      • Culture on the Edge
      • Discourses in Ancient Near Eastern and Biblical Studies
      • Discussions in Functional Approaches to Language
      • Eastern Buddhist Voices
      • Equinox English Linguistics and ELT
      • Equinox Textbooks and Surveys in Linguistics
      • Frameworks for Writing
      • Functional Linguistics
      • Genre, Music and Sound
      • Icons of Pop Music
      • J.R. Collis Publications
      • Key Concepts in Systemic Functional Linguistics
      • Middle Way Philosophy
      • Monographs in Arabic and Islamic Studies
      • Monographs in Islamic Archaeology
      • Monographs in Mediterranean Archaeology
      • Music Industry Studies
      • NAASR Working Papers
      • New Directions in Anthropological Archaeology
      • Oxford Centre for Buddhist Studies Monographs
      • Popular Music History
      • Pragmatic Interfaces
      • Reflective Practice in Language Education
      • Religion and the Senses
      • Religion in 5 Minutes
      • Southover Press
      • Studies in Ancient Religion and Culture
      • Studies in Applied Linguistics
      • Studies in Communication in Organisations and Professions
      • Studies in Egyptology and the Ancient Near East
      • Studies in Phonetics and Phonology
      • Studies in Popular Music
      • Studies in the Archaeology of Medieval Europe
      • Text and Social Context
      • The Early Settlement of Northern Europe
      • The Study of Religion in a Global Context
      • Themes in Qur’anic Studies
      • Transcultural Music Studies
      • Working with Culture on the Edge
      • Worlds of the Ancient Near East and Mediterranean
    • For Authors
    • E-Books
    • Textbooks
    • Book Trade
  • Resources
    • Events
    • Rights & Permissions
    • Advertisers & Media
  • Search
  • eBooks
Equinox Publishing
Books and Journals in Humanities, Social Science and Performing Arts
RSSTwitterFacebookLinkedInGoogle+

Krishnamacharya on Kuṇḍalinī

The Origins and Coherence of his Position

Simon Atkinson [+–]
scholar-practitioner
Simon Atkinson has been practising and studying yoga in the broad tradition following Krishnamacharya since the 1990s and has been learning Sanskrit since 2001. He teaches academic English and academic skills at the University of Cambridge.

Krishnamacharya on Kuṇḍalinī explores a distinctive teaching of ‘the father of modern yoga’, T. Krishnamacharya. Whereas most yoga traditions teach that kuṇḍalinī is a serpentine energy that rises, Krishnamacharya defined it differently. To him, kuṇḍalinī is a serpentine blockage which prevents prāṇa (breath or life- force) from rising and which represents avidyā (spiritual ignorance). Simon Atkinson draws from over 20 years of study and practice under teachers following Krishnamacharya. He combines analysis of quotations from yoga workshops with a detailed study of traditional Sanskrit texts. He traces the textual origins of Krishnamacharya’s position to two sects of Viṣṇu-worshiping temple priests, and shows how it is compatible with a stream of South Asian thought where snakes represent something to be overcome. Atkinson challenges claims that Krishnamacharya’s position can be found in his religious tradition of Śrīvaiṣṇavism. He questions the tradition’s reliance on textual sources, showing how the coherence of Krishnamacharya’s position can only be maintained by employing elaborate arguments and rejecting texts that teach otherwise. Atkinson also explores how Krishnamacharya’s teaching on kuṇḍalinī influences how yoga is practised. He argues that Krishnamacharya’s position is best viewed as a model for experience that guides practice.

Table of Contents

Preface

Preface [+–]
Krishnamacharya on Kuṇḍalinī explores a distinctive teaching of ‘the father of modern yoga’, T. Krishnamacharya. Whereas most yoga traditions teach that kuṇḍalinī is a serpentine energy that rises, Krishnamacharya defined it differently. To him, kuṇḍalinī is a serpentine blockage which prevents prāṇa (breath or life- force) from rising and which represents avidyā (spiritual ignorance). Simon Atkinson draws from over 20 years of study and practice under teachers following Krishnamacharya. He combines analysis of quotations from yoga workshops with a detailed study of traditional Sanskrit texts. He traces the textual origins of Krishnamacharya’s position to two sects of Viṣṇu-worshiping temple priests, and shows how it is compatible with a stream of South Asian thought where snakes represent something to be overcome. Atkinson challenges claims that Krishnamacharya’s position can be found in his religious tradition of Śrīvaiṣṇavism. He questions the tradition’s reliance on textual sources, showing how the coherence of Krishnamacharya’s position can only be maintained by employing elaborate arguments and rejecting texts that teach otherwise. Atkinson also explores how Krishnamacharya’s teaching on kuṇḍalinī influences how yoga is practised. He argues that Krishnamacharya’s position is best viewed as a model for experience that guides practice.

Chapter 1

Introduction [+–]
Chapter 1 introduces the South Indian yoga teacher Tirumalai Krishnamacharya (1888- 1989) and the concept of kuṇḍalinī. Most yoga traditions describe kuṇḍalinī as a serpentine energy that rises, granting liberation. Krishnamacharya, however, taught that prāṇa (breath / vital energy) rises, not kuṇḍalinī. To him, kuṇḍalinī is a blockage that prevents prāṇa from rising. Kuṇḍalinī is not something to be raised: it is something to be destroyed. This is a unique perspective among modern teachers of yoga.

Chapter 2

The Yogayājñavalkya – Krishnamacharya’s Main Source on Kuṇḍalinī [+–]
The Yogayājñavalkya was Krishnamacharya’s source text on kuṇḍalinī. This chapter contains the first detailed critical analysis of translations of the Yogayājñavalkya by two of Krishnamacharya’s long-term students: T.K.V. Desikachar (Krishnamacharya’s son) and A.G. Mohan. It argues that these translators misrepresent the Yogayājñavalkya in different ways. Desikachar mistranslated the Yogayājñavalkya by introducing concepts not in the original Sanskrit text, thereby relocating kuṇḍalinī from the navel to the perineum. Mohan changed the original Sanskrit of one verse without informing his readers, conveniently avoiding content that contradicts Krishnamacharya’s position.

Chapter 3

Kuṇḍalinī in Other Vaiṣṇava Texts [+–]
Chapter 3 builds upon the work of academics including James Mallinson, Lidia Schwartz-Linder and Dominic Wujastyk and greatly expands upon their contributions to trace the textual origins of Krishnamacharya’s teachings on kuṇḍalinī. It shows how verses from the Yogayājñavalkya came from the Vasiṣṭhasaṁhitā, which in turn took some of those verses from the Pādmasaṁhitā – a text of the Vaiṣṇava (Viṣṇu- worshiping) sect of temple priests known as Pāñcarātra. The chapter traces similar teachings to another Pāñcarātra text, the Ahirbudhnyasaṁhitā. It presents lengthy translations from previously untranslated sections of the Ahirbudhnyasaṁhitā, together with original observations about the inconsistency of that text in relation to kuṇḍalinī. The chapter also identifies similar teachings in the rival Vaiṣṇava sect of Vaikhānasa.

Chapter 4

A Union of Yoga-s – Linking Haṭhayoga and Patañjali via Kuṇḍalinī [+–]
This is the most practical chapter of the book. It gives a fresh and original perspective on how yoga is actually practised by followers of Krishnamacharya and how his conception of kuṇḍalinī has influenced that. The chapter will be the first published study exploring how Krishnamacharya and his students used his position on kuṇḍalinī to connect teachings from two separate textual traditions: haṭhayoga and the Yoga Sūtra of Patañjali. It shows how Krishnamacharya’s conception of kuṇḍalinī and his overall approach to haṭhayoga were subsumed within the overarching framework of Patañjali.

Chapter 5

The Symbolism of Serpents [+–]
Chapter 5 critically analyses and evaluates claims from two prominent teachers in the tradition, A.G. Mohan and Kausthub Desikachar (Krishnamacharya’s grandson), who both attempted to validate Krishnamacharya’s teachings about the serpent of kuṇḍalinī by putting it into a wider cultural context. Building upon the theoretical framework of Laurie Cozad (2004), this chapter will be the first published work showing how snakes are used in South Asian texts to represent something to be overcome: māyā (illusion / magic), avidyā (nescience / spiritual ignorance), ajñāna (nescience / spiritual ignorance), ahaṁkāra (ego), ahaṁmāna (egotism), abhimāna (erroneous self- conception), māna (pride), and moha (delusion) – the deadly poison of saṁsāra (rebirth). The chapter shows that this stream of South Asian thought, in which snakes represent something to be overcome, is consistent with Krishnamacharya’s use of the term kuṇḍalinī to represent a blockage to prāṇa. However, even when writers use snakes to represent something to be overcome in some contexts, it does not necessarily follow that they use kuṇḍalinī in the same way.

Chapter 6

Kuṇḍalinī in Śrīvaiṣṇavism [+–]
Chapter 6 will be the first published exploration of teachings about kuṇḍalinī in Krishnamacharya’s religious tradition of Śrīvaiṣṇavism. It examines quotations that T.K.V. Desikachar attributed to the Śrīvaiṣṇava polymath Vedāntadeśika, showing how those quotations misrepresent Vedāntadeśika. The chapter’s conclusions are based on a survey of over 90 texts and confirmed by an interview with the pontiff of a leading Śrīvaiṣṇava organization, who described Krishnamacharya’s position as “unacceptable”. Śrīvaiṣṇavism uses the term kuṇḍalinī as a synonym for the suṣumnā nāḍī (a type of conduit, nerve or artery), not to mean a blockage to it, as Krishnamacharya taught.

Chapter 7

Discussion and Conclusion [+–]
The Discussion and Conclusion draws together the findings of the previous chapters and evaluates Krishnamacharya’s position. Krishnamacharya’s teaching on kuṇḍalinī has a valid textual basis but the number of supporting texts is limited. The chapter challenges a claim that all texts support Krishnamacharya’s view, arguing that his conception of kuṇḍalinī is one of several textually-valid conceptions. Those arguing for Krishnamacharya’s position need to be very selective in which texts they cite and which manuscripts they use for particular verses. They also need to employ complex exegesis to paper over the cracks in some texts and they need to critically reject other parts of the same texts that describe kuṇḍalinī differently. The book ends by challenging the tradition’s emphasis on traditional texts and its presentation of Krishnamacharya’s conception of kuṇḍalinī as an accurate realist account of something that has objective existence. Instead, it argues that his conception is best regarded as an idealized and simplified model for one’s subjective experience. Krishnamacharya’s teaching on kuṇḍalinī should be judged primarily by how useful it is in describing experience and guiding practice, not by how well it is supported by texts.

Appendix

Dating the Yogayājñavalkya and Related Texts [+–]
Krishnamacharya on Kuṇḍalinī explores a distinctive teaching of ‘the father of modern yoga’, T. Krishnamacharya. Whereas most yoga traditions teach that kuṇḍalinī is a serpentine energy that rises, Krishnamacharya defined it differently. To him, kuṇḍalinī is a serpentine blockage which prevents prāṇa (breath or life- force) from rising and which represents avidyā (spiritual ignorance). Simon Atkinson draws from over 20 years of study and practice under teachers following Krishnamacharya. He combines analysis of quotations from yoga workshops with a detailed study of traditional Sanskrit texts. He traces the textual origins of Krishnamacharya’s position to two sects of Viṣṇu-worshiping temple priests, and shows how it is compatible with a stream of South Asian thought where snakes represent something to be overcome. Atkinson challenges claims that Krishnamacharya’s position can be found in his religious tradition of Śrīvaiṣṇavism. He questions the tradition’s reliance on textual sources, showing how the coherence of Krishnamacharya’s position can only be maintained by employing elaborate arguments and rejecting texts that teach otherwise. Atkinson also explores how Krishnamacharya’s teaching on kuṇḍalinī influences how yoga is practised. He argues that Krishnamacharya’s position is best viewed as a model for experience that guides practice.

ISBN-13 (Hardback)
9781000000000
Price (Hardback)
£75.00 / $100.00
ISBN-13 (Paperback)
9781000000000
Price (Paperback)
£24.95 / $32.00
ISBN (eBook)
9781000000000
Price (eBook)
Individual
£24.95 / $32.00
Institutional
£75.00 / $100.00
Publication
01/04/2022
Pages
224
Size
234 x 156mm
Readership
students scholars and yoga practitioners
Illustration
photos and figures, colour and black and white

Related Journal

Related Interest

  • Search Equinox

  • Subjects

    • Archaeology & History
      • Food History
      • Journals
    • Linguistics & Communication
      • Spanish and Arabic Language
      • Writing/Composition
      • Journals
    • Popular Music
      • Jazz
      • Journals
    • Religion & Ethics
      • Buddhist Studies
      • Islamic Studies
      • Journals
  • Tweets by @EQUINOXPUB
We may use cookies to collect information about your computer, including where available your IP address, operating system and browser type, for system administration and to report aggregate information for our internal use. Find out more.