Did Jesus Practice Yoga?
Jesus a Yogi?
Yoga has been gaining increasing interest from many around the world, even children. Did Jesus practice Yoga in His meditations? Click comments to find out.
posted by Neil @ 8:43 PM
Sunday, August 07, 2005
Jesus a Yogi?
Yoga has been gaining increasing interest from many around the world, even children. Did Jesus practice Yoga in His meditations? Click comments to find out.
"O gracious and Holy Father, give us wisdom to perceive you, diligence to seek you, patience to wait for you, eyes to behold you, a heart to meditate upon you, and a life to proclaim you; through the power of the Spirit of Jesus Christ our Lord." (Prayer of Saint Benedict)
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Capricon, Assertive, Adventurer, Opportunist, likes to experience freedom which God promises, Child of God, Guitar Junkie
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Was Jesus a Yogi?
by Errol C. Fernandes
There is a keen interest in yoga the world over, even among Christians. To some, it is a means of relaxation and easing of tension, others see it as a form of exercise promoting fitness, and some have claimed cures from serious medical conditions. But yoga is primarily a spiritual discipline, and there are Christians who promote yoga as a help to meditation and prayer. There is much confusion in the mind of the average Catholic – lay and cleric – because yoga as promoted among Catholics is neither entirely a health discipline nor entirely a spiritual discipline, but sometimes one, sometimes the other, and often a mixture of both.
One well-known proponent of yoga has been quoted as saying that Jesus was a yogi. And presentations of Jesus in yogic postures of meditation are becoming more common, even in the rooms of some priests.
It is in this regard, particularly, that the sincere Christian should enquire into yoga’s compatibility with Christian spirituality, and the wisdom of incorporating its techniques into Christian prayer and meditation. What is yoga? Derived from a word meaning to yoke or unite, it is a spiritual discipline aimed at enabling the practitioner to attain liberation from the human condition and realize his/her own divinity.
As we look into the meaning and significance of the discipline of yoga as presented by persons whose own background and spirituality is Hindu, we encounter a reality disturbingly different from the innocuous “relaxing and breathing exercises” presented to us by Catholic promoters of yoga – some of whom, unfortunately, are priests. Examples of these follow:
‘The absolute is within oneself,’ declares the Chandogya Upanishad, ‘Tat tvam asi’ or ‘Thou art That’. The Divine dwells within each one of us through his microcosmic representative, the individual self or jiva. In the Bhagavad Gita, Lord Krishna describes the jiva as ‘My own eternal portion.’” (“Gain the Self, Lose the I” The Speaking Tree, 18-08-2002).
“The manifestation of inherent divinity is in reality the revelation of the divine self of man. This is not different from the Supreme Self that permeates even the tiniest particle in the universe. It is accessible to all human beings.” (“Cosmic Vision Alone Reveals the Truth” –Ashutoshji Maharaj, The Speaking Tree).
Plainly stated, the objective of yoga is the deification of man. Such a view is radically different from Christianity, which clearly distinguishes between Creator and creature, God and man. In Christianity God is the “other”, and never the “Self”. As the “Letter to the Bishops of the Catholic Church on Some Aspects of Christian Meditation” states it, “Christian prayer is always determined by the structure of the Christian faith, in which the very truth of God and creature shines forth.”
While everyone has the freedom to believe as one personally chooses, the Christian cannot be oblivious to the striking parallel between this view and the serpent’s promise to Eve: “But the serpent said to the woman, ‘You will not die. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God . . .’” (Genesis 3:4-5)
There are two questions we need to ask: 1. Was Jesus a yogi? And 2. Is yoga compatible with the practice of the Christian faith and Christian spirituality?
To answer the first, “Was Jesus a yogi?” A yogi is one who practises yoga with a view to achieving its stated objective. The objective of yoga is the realization, the awareness, that one is divine, sharing identity with the ultimate reality, the impersonal Absolute.
The Jesus of orthodox Christianity, revealed in the Bible and the consistent faith of the Church, is the eternal divine Word, the Son of God, who became a man in order to identify with sinful man and atone for the sins humanity. Jesus did not “attain” or “regain” divinity through meditation and yoga. Nor is Jesus a “guru” – a guru is one who, having meditated and practised yogic disciplines, has achieved enlightenment and divinity, and now shows his disciples how to likewise become enlightened and divine. The guru’s traditional pose, right hand held up in the upadesa mudra (thumb and index finger forming a circle, the other three fingers upright) has two important meanings: one, the guru communicates what he has himself attained; and two, his communication is not by spoken words or logic or reason or coherent ideas.
To call Jesus a yogi is to deny His intrinsic divinity, holiness and perfection, and suggest that He had a fallen nature subject to ignorance and maya, that He needed to be liberated from the human condition through the exercise and discipline of yoga.
Moreover, Jesus instructs His disciple by His word: “Jesus then said to the Jews who had believed in him, ‘If you continue in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.” (John 8:31-32)
This “knowing the truth that makes one free” comes from hearing, obeying and abiding in Jesus’ word – for He Himself is the eternal Word. And His word transforms and renews the disciple’s mind with a knowledge of what is good, true, holy and according to the will of God: “Do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may prove what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.” (Romans 12:2).
In contrast, the yogi is to suspend the will, still the mental faculties, and make no choices (Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras, I.1-3).
The second question is whether yoga is at all compatible with Christian spirituality. Precisely because it is pantheistic (God is in everything and everything is God) and holds that there is only one Reality and all else is maya or illusion, the philosophy behind yoga presents serious problems for the Christian. Flowing from the elimination of any distinction between Creator and creation, we encounter other basic beliefs that are incompatible with Christianity.
If there is only one Absolute Reality, and all else is illusory, there can be no relationships, and no love. Intrinsic to the Christian faith is the Trinity, the perfect model of living in relationship. Christianity is all about relationships, with God and among men: “And he said to him, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it, You shall love your neighbour as yourself.’” (Matthew 22:37-39)
Moreover, good and evil, like pain and pleasure, are regarded as maya or illusion, and therefore unreal. For example, Swami Vivekananda, one of the most respected icons of modern Hinduism, has said, “Good and evil are one and the same” and “The Murderer, too, is God.” (Vivekananda: the Yogas and Other Works, pub. Ramakrishna-Vivekananda Centre, NY, 1953). The same idea was expressed by “Bhagwan” Rajneesh a.k.a. Osho, “My ashram makes no difference between the demonic and the divine” (The Sound of Running Water, Pub. Poona Rajneesh Foundation, 1980).
In Christianity, the vexing problem of sin as an offence against the holiness of God is inseparable from our faith, because sin is the reason why we need a Saviour. The Incarnation, the baptism and ministry, passion, death and resurrection of Jesus was “for us men and for our salvation” (Nicene Creed).
Some attempt to dismiss these very fundamental differences as irrelevant to the absorption of yoga and other eastern meditation techniques into Christian spirituality. Their argument is that throughout her 2,000-year history, the Church has borrowed and “Christianized” elements of the local culture and religion.
That argument may have some validity when applied to external rituals and celebration of festivals. The difference with yoga is its intrinsic incompatibility with Christianity, arising from its very objective of self-deification. If this spiritual discipline, almost as old as the Church, has for 2,000 years been shaped, developed and employed for the specific purpose of achieving divinity – regardless of whether it ever succeeded! – how can it, or the techniques it employs, now be used to achieve the very opposite – the Christian’s total surrender to God?
Again, the concepts in Hindu philosophy have no accurate parallels in Christian theology, because they are rooted in a totally different set of ideas. The differences go beyond just language and culture, and cannot be bridged by mere translation. For example, the term moksha is often translated as “salvation” but its meaning is very different from the Christian concept of salvation. Moksha is a kind of liberation from the tyranny of the human condition, and a flight into nothingness. Christian salvation, on the other hand, is the destruction of sin, reconciliation with God and the resurrection of the body. This is just one of very many examples, but glib translations have obscured the difference to the average Catholic.
It has been argued – and even stated in one foreword to a book promoting yoga as a way of spiritual growth – that “The Catholic Church rejects nothing that is true and holy in these religions. She regards with sincere reverence those ways of conduct and of life, those precepts and teachings which, though differing in many aspects from the ones she holds and sets forth, nonetheless often reflect a ray of that Truth which enlightens all men.” (Vat II, NA2). As has now become customary, the foreword omitted the very next sentence, without which the two sentences quoted mean quite the opposite of what they were meant to communicate: “Indeed, she proclaims, and ever must proclaim Christ ‘the way, the truth, and the life’ (John 14:6), in whom men may find the fullness of religious life, in whom God has reconciled all things to Himself.”
The foreword referred to also implies that a spiritual discipline conceived, developed and employed for the deification of man is necessarily “true and holy”, and necessarily “reflects a ray of that Truth which enlightens all men.”
A desire to become God is the first sin (chronologically) recorded in the Bible: “You said in your heart, ‘I will ascend to heaven; above the stars of God I will set my throne on high; I will sit on the mount of assembly in the far north; I will ascend above the heights of the clouds, I will make myself like the Most High.’ But you are brought down to Sheol, to the depths of the Pit.” (Isaiah 14:13-15)
Errol C. Fernandes
Very good post!
What are your views about
something similar...
taichi- qigong which seems
to be popularized by some priests even.
blessings
ger
Thanks Gerard for your comment. Will see if there is anything about taichi and qi-gong which contradict to our Christian beliefs and understanding about the relationship between GOD, man and nature. Do you have any such info avail?
GOD bless!
Your blog keeps getting better and better! Your older articles are not as good as newer ones you have a lot more creativity and originality now keep it up!
You have really great taste on catch article titles, even when you are not interested in this topic you push to read it
Very interesting Neil:D
btw-much confusion with Christians/Catholics....we are not to be into astology and our "signs"...just an FYI...look to Catholic answers for more on that. Peace+
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