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The Philosophy of the Yogasutra
Karen O'Brien-Kop's introduction to the Yogasutra highlights its status as a significant work of philosophy. Approaching the Yogasutra as living philosophy, this book elucidates philosophical conceptions of yoga, recognises the logical structure the sutras follow and explains the rules and principles that have sustained Patañjali's system of thought for centuries. Moving beyond standard interpretations of Patañjali's text and commentary as an aphoristic practice manual, O'Brien-Kop uses branches of philosophy to read the Yogasutra. Covering reality, self, ethics, language and knowledge, Patañjali's philosophies come to the fore. The book introduces his reasoned positions on dual and nondu...
Routledge Handbook of Yoga and Meditation Studies
The Routledge Handbook of Yoga and Meditation Studies is a comprehensive and interdisciplinary resource, which frames and contextualises the rapidly expanding fields that explore yoga and meditative techniques. The book analyses yoga and meditation studies in a variety of religious, historical and geographical settings. The chapters, authored by an international set of experts, are laid out across five sections: Introduction to yoga and meditation studies History of yoga and meditation in South Asia Doctrinal perspectives: technique and praxis Global and regional transmissions Disciplinary framings In addition to up-to-date explorations of the history of yoga and meditation in the Indian sub...
Rethinking 'Classical Yoga' and Buddhism
This book revisits the early systemic formation of meditation practices called 'yoga' in South Asia by employing metaphor theory. Karen O'Brien-Kop also develops an alternative way of analysing the reception history of yoga that aims to decentre the Eurocentric and imperialist enterprises of the nineteenth-century to reframe the cultural period of the 1st – 5th centuries CE using categorical markers from South Asian intellectual history. Buddhist traditions were just as concerned as Hindu traditions with meditative disciplines of yoga. By exploring the intertextuality of the Patanjalayogasastra with texts such as Vasubandhu's Abhidharmakosabhasya and Asanga's Yogacarabhumisastra, this book highlights and clarifies many ideologically Buddhist concepts and practices in Patanjala yoga. Karen O'Brien-Kop demonstrates that 'classical yoga' was co-constructed systemically by both Hindu and Buddhist thinkers who were drawing on the same conceptual metaphors of the period. This analysis demystifies early yoga-meditation as a timeless 'classical' practice and locates it in a specific material context of agrarian and urban economies.
Yoga in Transformation
This volume explores aspects of yoga over a period of about 2500 years. In its first part, it investigates facets of the South Asian and Tibetan traditions of yoga, such as the evolution of posture practice, the relationship between yoga and sex, yoga in the theistic context, the influence of Buddhism on early yoga, and the encounter of Islam with classical yoga. The second part addresses aspects of modern globalised yoga and its historical formation, as for example the emergence of yoga in Viennese occultism, the integration of yoga and nature cure in modern India, the eventisation of yoga in a global setting, and the development of Patañjali’s iconography. In keeping with the current trend in yoga studies, the emphasis of the volume is on the practice of yoga and its theoretical underpinnings.
Indian Asceticism
Throughout the history of Indian religions, the ascetic figure is most closely identified with power. A by-product of the ascetic path, power is displayed in the ability to fly, walk on water or through dense objects, read minds, discern the former lives of others, see into the future, harm others, or simply levitate one's body. These tales give rise to questions about how power and violence are related to the phenomenon of play. Indian Asceticism focuses on the powers exhibited by ascetics of India from ancient to modern time. Carl Olson discusses the erotic, the demonic, the comic, and the miraculous forms of play and their connections to power and violence. He focuses on Hinduism, but evi...
Islam, Authoritarianism, and Underdevelopment
Analyzes Muslim countries' contemporary problems, particularly violence, authoritarianism, and underdevelopment, comparing their historical levels of development with Western Europe.
Living Folk Religions
Living Folk Religions presents cutting-edge contributions from a range of disciplines to examine religious folkways across cultures. This collection embraces the non-elite and non-sanctioned, the oral, fluid, accessible, evolving religions of people (volk) on the ground. Split into five sections, this book covers: What Is Folk Religion? Spirit Beings and Deities Performance and Ritual Praxis Possession and Exorcism Health, Healing, and Lifestyle Topics include demons and ambivalent gods, tree and nature spirits, revolutionary renunciates, oral lore, possession and exorcism, divination, midwestern American spiritualism, festivals, queer sexuality among ritual specialists, the dead returned, vernacular religions, diaspora adaptations, esoteric influences underlying public cultures, unidentified flying objects (UFOs), music and sound experiences, death rituals, and body and wellness cultures. Living Folk Religions is a must-read for those studying Comparative Religions, World Religions, and Religious Studies, and it will also interest specialists and general readers, particularly enthusiastic readers of Anthropology, Folklore and Folk Studies, Global Studies, and Sociology.
Traces of a Daoist Immortal
Traces of a Daoist Immortal is a Daoist-infused tour de force on the Daoist mountain hermit Chén Tuán 陳摶 (Xīyí 希夷 [Infinitesimal Subtlety]; d. 989) and his fellow “hidden immortals.” Breaking various academic taboos, including hyper-historicism, social constructivism, and conformist mentalities, here Komjathy, in an aspirational gesture towards unbridled inquiry, offers annotated translations and scholarly introductions to ten major works associated with the Daoist immortal. The book also contains a cutting-edge, mythopoetic introduction that addresses the life and legend of Chén Tuán, his connection to the Western Marchmount of Huàshān 華山 (Mount Hua; Huàyīn, Shǎnxī), Daoist views about sleeping, dreaming, waking, as well as Daoist time-being.
Embodying Transnational Yoga
Embodying Transnational Yoga is a refreshingly original, multi-sited ethnography of transnational yoga that obliges us to look beyond postural practice (āsana) in modern yoga research. The book introduces readers to three alternative, understudied categories of transnational yoga practice which include food, music, and breathing. Studying these categories of embodied practice using interdisciplinary methods reveals transformative “engaged alchemies” that have been extensively deployed by contemporary disseminators of yoga. Readers will encounter how South Asian dietary regimens, musical practices, and breathing techniques have been adapted into contemporaneous worlds of yoga practice both within, but also beyond, the Indian Ocean rim. The book brings the field of Modern Yoga Studies into productive dialogue with the fields of Indian Ocean Studies, Embodiment Studies, Food Studies, Ethnomusicology, and Pollution Studies. It will also be a valuable resource for both scholarly work and for teaching in the fields of Religious Studies, Anthropology, and South Asian Religions.
