Patañjali explains that before samadhi is experienced the functioning of consciousness depends upon five factors: correct perception, misperception (where the senses mislead), misconception or ambiguousness (where the mind lets one down), sleep, and memory. The soul is pure, but through the sullying or misalignment of consciousness it gets caught up in the spokes of joys and sorrows and becomes part of suffering, like a spider ensnared in its own web. These joys and sorrows may be painful or painless, cognizable or incognizable.
Freedom, that is to say direct experience of samadhi, can be attained only by disciplined conduct and renunciation of sensual desires and appetites. This is brought about through adherence to the ‘twin pillars’ of yoga, abhyasa and vairagya.
Abhyasa (practice) is the art of learning that which has to be learned through the cultivation of disciplined action. This involves long, zealous, calm, and persevering effort. Vairagya (detachment or renunciation) is the art of avoiding that which should be avoided. Both require a positive and virtuous approach.
Practice is a generative force of transformation or progress in yoga, but if undertaken alone it produces an unbridled energy which is thrown outwards to the material world as if by centrifugal force. Renunciation acts to shear off this energetic outburst, protecting the practitioner from entanglement with sense objects and redirecting the energies centripetally towards the core of being.
Patañjali teaches the sadhaka to cultivate friendliness and compassion, to delight in the happiness of others and to remain indifferent to vice and virtue so that he may maintain his poise and tranquillity. He advises the sadhaka to follow the ethical disciplines of yama and niyama, the ten precepts similar to the Ten Commandments, which govern behaviour and practice and form the foundation of spiritual evolution. He then offers several methods through which consciousness detaches itself from intellectual and emotional upheavals and assumes the form of the soul – universal, devoid of all personal and material identity. The sadhaka is now filled with serenity, insight and truth. The soul, which until now remained unmanifest, becomes visible to the seeker. The seeker becomes the seer: he enters a state without seed or support, nirbija samadhi.
Sadhana Pada
In the second chapter, sadhana pada, Patañjali comes down to the level of the spiritually unevolved to help them, too, to aspire to absolute freedom. Here he coins the word kriyayoga. Kriya means action, and kriyayoga emphasizes the dynamic effort to be made by the sadhaka. It is composed of eight yogic disciplines, yama and niyama, Asana and pranayama, pratyahara and dharana, dhyana and samadhi. These are compressed into three tiers. The tier formed by the first two pairs, yama and niyama, Asana and pranayama, comes under tapas (religious spirit in practice). The second tier, pratyahara and dharana, is self-study (svadhyaya). The third, dhyana and samadhi, is Isvara pranidhana, the surrender of the individual self to the Universal Spirit, or God (Isvara).
In this way, Patañjali covers the three great paths of Indian philosophy in the Yoga Sutras. Karmamarga, the path of action is contained in tapas; jñanamarga, the path of knowledge, in svadhyaya; and bhaktimarga, the path of surrender to God, in Isvara pranidhana.
In this chapter, Patañjali identifies avidya, spiritual ignorance, as the source of all sorrow and unhappiness. Avidya is the first of the five klesas, or afflictions, and is the root of all the others: egoism, attachment, aversion and clinging to life. From these arise desires, sowing the seeds of sorrow.
Afflictions are of three types. They may be self-inflicted, hereditary, or caused through imbalance of elements in the body. All are consequences of one’s actions, in this or previous lifetimes, and are to be overcome through practice and renunciation in the eight yogic disciplines which cover purification of the body, senses and mind, an intense discipline whereby the seeds are incinerated, impurities vanish, and the seeker reaches a state of serenity in which he merges with the seer.
For one who lacks ethical discipline and perfect physical health, there can be no spiritual illumination. Body, mind and spirit are inseparable: if the body is asleep, the soul is asleep.
The seeker is taught to perform Asanas so that he becomes familiar with his body, senses and intelligence. He develops alertness, sensitivity, and the power of concentration. pranayama gives control over the subtle qualities of the elements – sound, touch, shape, taste and smell. Pratyahara is the withdrawal into the mind of the organs of action and senses of perception.
Sadhana pada ends here, but Patañjali extends dharana, dhyana and samadhi, the subtle aspects of sadhana, into the next chapter, vibhuti pada. These three withdraw the mind into the consciousness, and the consciousness into the soul.
The journey from yama to pratyahara, described in sadhana pada, ends in the sea of tranquillity, which has no ripples. If citta is the sea, its movements (vrttis) are the ripples. Body, mind and consciousness are in communion with the soul; they are now free from attachments and aversions, memories of place and time. The impurities of body and mind are cleansed, the dawning light of wisdom vanquishes ignorance, innocence replaces arrogance and pride, and the seeker becomes the seer.
Vibhuti Pada
The third chapter speaks of the divine effects of yoga sadhana. It is said that the sadhaka who in this state has full knowledge of past, present and future, as well as of the solar system. He understands the minds of others. He acquires the eight supernatural powers or siddhis: the ability to become small and large, light and heavy, to acquire, to attain every wish, to gain supremacy and sovereignty over things.
These achievements are dangerous. The sadhaka is cautioned to ignore their temptations and pursue the spiritual path.
Sage Vyasa’s commentary on the sutras gives examples of those who became ensnared by these powers and those who remained free. Nahusa, who belonged to the mortal world, became the Lord of heaven, but misused his power, fell from grace and was sent back to earth in the form of a snake. Urvasi, a famous mythical nymph, the daughter of Nara Narayana (the son of Dharma and grandson of Brahma), became a creeping plant. Ahalya, who succumbed to sensual temptation, was cursed by Gautama and became a stone. On the other hand, Nandi, the bull, reached Lord siva. Matsya, the fish, became Matsyendranath, the greatest hatha yogi on earth.
If the sadhaka succumbs to the lure of the siddhis, he will be like a person running away from a gale only to be caught in a whirlwind. If he resists, and perseveres on the spiritual path, he will experience kaivalya, the indivisible, unqualified, undifferentiated state of existence.
Kaivalya Pada
In the fourth chapter, Patañjali distinguishes kaivalya from samadhi. In samadhi, the sadhaka experiences a passive state of oneness between seer and seen, observer and observed, subject and object. In kaivalya, he lives in a positive state of life, above the tamasic, rajasic and sattvic influences of the three gunas of nature. He moves in the world and does day-to-day work dispassionately, without becoming involved in it.
Patañjali says it is possible to experience kaivalya by birth, through use of drugs, by repetition of mantra, or by tapas (intense, disciplined effort) and through samadhi. Of these, only the last two develop mature intelligence and lead to stable growth.
Man may make or mar his progress through good actions or bad. Yogic practices lead to a spiritual life; non-yogic actions bind one to the world. The ego, ahamkara, is the root cause of good and bad actions. Yoga removes the weed of pride from the mind and helps the seeker to trace the source of all actions, the consciousness, wherein all past impressions (samskaras) are