Hatha Yoga from an Entirely Different Standpoint
BY: HAMSAVATAR DAS
May 18, 2011 — OCALA, FLORIDA, USA (SUN) — Dear Rocana Prabhu, I felt to write something about this teaching of Hatha Yoga, especially since it is one of our main "programs" for setting the stage, if you will, to also introduce kirtan, as well as distribute prasadam at every opportunity. I agree with you wholeheartedly regarding the conduct of sannyasis and GBC who are supposed to be properly representing ISKCON in a way we know Srila Prabhupada would approve of. It seems that a great number are failing miserably and it is obvious that their great attachment to opulence, wealth, fame, women and just plain "sense gratification" in some form or another compromises ISKCON's position as a bona fide institution in the line it purports to be representing. The temples' programs should be conducted in the mood in which Prabhupada established.
However, practically it is a vastly different story. We make efforts to preach outside of ISKCON and would never consider sending devotees there. Having done so in the past, my experience is they end up leaving with an awful "sour taste" in their mouths. All of the complaints that have been voiced in the Sun about corruption, arrogance and ill treatment of devotees is obvious to anyone with an ounce of intelligence. Only dysfunctional people for the most part will actually join the rank and file of ISKCON in the US or Europe now. This is why the Indian community has become so important to the survival of the temples there.
In any case, this is not the subject of my writing today. There are more than a few very sincere devotees that teach Hatha Yoga and have created very successful programs by doing so. There are so many people wanting to go to such classes, and 99% of what they have access to is simply what we call "gym yoga". It is an exercise program. Whether it is Bikram's absurd yoga classes given in a room kept at a temperature of over 100 degrees, or those that teach various classes they devise new "names" for to attract students, none of them can possibly lead to a student's actually gaining some knowledge of what yoga is really all about.
Others purport to teach some convoluted yoga philosophy and actually mislead people, many being quite innocent and genuinely interested to learn what yoga truly contains within its teachings. The many yoga centers mostly stress Pantanjali's Yoga Sutras, as though they are some revelatory scripture set apart on their own, but verily hardly any of these yoga students has a clue of what the real goal of yoga is, or how it can change a person's life. As you termed it, they are mostly simply "businesses", or at best "pseudo-spiritual" philosophical treatises. For us, as well as other devotees I have met with yoga centers, it is hardly something worthwhile just as a business. One would have to live a very spartan lifestyle to subsist on profits made from giving yoga classes.
The truth of the matter is that it is a wonderful way to get people that have somehow found some interest and attraction to yoga together in a place where you can introduce them to higher principles of human life and behavior first of all. Even the yoga centers that have little or no spiritual basis also often sponsor kirtan programs, and devotee yoga centers have kirtans that surpass the boundaries of these others, for the leading chanters are all actual bhaktas.
If you only knew how many people we have started on the road to spiritual life (and we are by no means the only devotees that have been and are increasingly successful in this regard) I think your attitude would be different. Our classes have also provided an impetus for many students changing their diets to being completely vegetarian and beginning to contemplate what the goals of human life really are.
Bhagavad Gita IS the original "yoga scripture". Many ISKCON devotees "think" they are imbibing the messages within its text, but fail to also change their own dysfunctional or unsavory thinking patterns. How many devotees have failed to really try to emulate the higher human traits of honesty, compassion, etc. If you asked many to tell you what the yamas and niyamas are, they might well stare at you blankly. We teach these principles as a basis for even beginning to practice yoga on any level.
No, Hatha Yoga is not a viable means for attaining self-realization. In this age only Hare Nama is the process. However, by giving those seeking it what they want, then teaching them things they never imagined they were actually looking for, is this not "using one's intelligence how to preach"? Srila Prabhupada said those exact words to me once in Honolulu. Not only is it honest and clean in terms of "business" (which as I said is not one that has ever done much more than "break even" in fiscal terms, at least for us), but it naturally opens the door to Bhakti Yoga.
When my wife and I were married back in the early 1990's in England, we had the wedding yagya and reception at the Bhaktivedanta Manor. It was beautiful, extremely well done by Kripamoya Prabhu, and a day that we will always remember. My wife Yogamaya and I had been successful in giving traveling classes and programs back then, and we traveled all over the UK to do so. Vedic astrology, Ayurveda and yoga were the main subjects that we taught introductory classes and gave lectures on. Incorporated into it, really "woven into it" was the philosophy Srila Prabhupada taught us. I actually had devotees who came to hear us speak, comment that if they didn't know better they'd think that some of my lectures were Srimad Bhagavatam classes! That was indeed a great compliment and our "mission" was to present the philosophy within these sacred Vedic sciences, that is verily none other than that taught to us by Prabhupada and within the Bhagavad Gita and Srimad Bhagavatam. It was simply "packaged" differently.
We had sent out an announcement that we were having a "traditional Vedic fire ceremony" for our wedding and that it was being held at the "Radha Krishna temple at Bhaktivedanta Manor". We invited anyone that felt an urge to experience, share or participate in some way in the event to come. This announcement went out to all the yoga centers, healing centers and so-called "spiritual" groups that were the main places that used to sponsor our talks and programs. When the day came we were blown away by the number of people (over a hundred) that we had met only once, or maybe twice, that felt enough for us to want to come. Most came distances, some as far as Scotland and northern England, others from Wales and within at least 2-4 hours of Letchmore Heath.
Some of the Manor devotees queried us, "who are these people?", since many had neck beads on and were carrying bead bags, as well; "we have never met any of them." I replied that they were friends and well-wishers that had somehow been touched by Srila Prabhupada by reading his books after being introduced initially through meeting us at a lecture or workshop on astrology, yoga or Ayurveda. "How did you make them devotees?" I was asked. "I didn't", was my reply, "Prabhupada did"; I was simply nice to them, treated them with as much love and respect as I am capable of, and then got out of the way. We seemed to make a far better impact on people than they did with their version of "sankirtan" at that time, which was more about collecting money by giving out stickers or some such thing, and saying the collections were for something that it actually was not. The days of "honest sankirtan" in North America and western Europe seem to be gone, for the most part anyway. At least there are still chanting parties that go out from some temples, although not anywhere close to the extent it was during Prabhupada's lila here.
We should judge by results. Is this not a valid case in point? Hatha Yoga is a wonderful way to then teach the true path of yoga for this age, to spread the Holy Name and to distribute prasadam (since everyone loves prasadam!). It is not a viable business, though. Just ask anyone that does it. There's some money to be made doing retreats for training yoga teachers, but that's really about it. We always subsidized our yoga classes and programs with the profits made through my more viable businesses. Any devotees that teach Hatha Yoga with a view towards introducing higher spiritual principles, lifestyle and the true yoga for this age should be praised and recognized as doing a service that fills a "niche". Otherwise all these people that are looking for yoga classes have nowhere else to go but to the cheaters and charlatans. I felt your comments:
"Now if some householder wants to make a living by teaching Hatha Yoga classes, that's their business. They're not representing anyone but themselves. Perhaps a grihasta finds that it's easier to support his household doing this than by doing other things. This is not unlike a householder deciding to go on holidays whitewater rafting..."
were biased, unfair and unknowledgeable as to how most devotees see their yoga teaching. Then you went on to say:
"Even for the householders, it is problematic if they try to integrate preaching Krsna conscious philosophy with these other activities. In the example of teaching Hatha Yoga, if you're representing Srila Prabhupada by preaching Krsna Consciousness in a Hatha class, then you're obliged to bring up the fact that Srila Prabhupada does not approve of this, and you must make clear to the students why he does not approve."
It's not "fun", hardly profitable in financial terms and we are representing a higher aspect of yoga, the path of Bhakti. Our mission is to hopefully act doing something that will produce results that Srila Prabhupada would be pleased with. Why would you then say that Prabhupada wouldn't approve of it?! That was back then and it applied to preachers living in the temple and as you pointed out:
"Especially during Srila Prabhupada's lila period, we were fully engaged from the time we woke up till the time we laid our heads down at night in serving Srila Prabhupada and engaging in his program, which left no time for doing anything else".
That was then and this is now. Due to the state of ISKCON and its leaders today we are forced to "go it alone" for the most part, unless of course you are advocating we should throw it all in and fall in line behind our "glorious" GBC! I know that you certainly do not advocate that and are a wonderful advocate for sleeping devotees with blinders on to "wake up" and see these leaders for what they have become, and not just sit back and say "Krishna is in control".
All of your other quotes from Srila Prabhupada were also referring to teaching Mayavadi philosophy or teaching Hatha Yoga as though it were a viable and real means for achieving the goal of yoga. That is not what we are doing. We are teaching from an entirely different standpoint. It is unfair to present such quotes as being "proof" that Prabhupada would not approve of the way devotees today are teaching Hatha and their reason for doing so. (Note that I do NOT condone sannyasis doing this and for them it is utter nonsense, and I agree with your assessment thereof 100%.) Srila Prabhupada was preaching in those classes against such nonsense and at the same time, making the point he made time and again that "Hare nam is the only means for this age".
I hope that you take my criticisms in the light they are meant. I highly respect you, Rocana Prabhu, and your work with the Sampradaya Sun is a bold and wonderful beacon of light in the world of devotees today. We can't paint everyone into the same box, though. Prahladananda Swami's business should be to represent the order of sannyasa and ISKCON as an example of one in the renounced order of life. However, although I agree with you in principle, his attachment to Hatha Yoga doesn't hold a candle to some of the "attachments" of some other sannyasis and GBC members. But alas, that is why we do what we do independently of ISKCON "proper", yet fully dependent on the mercy of Srila Prabhupada and the Supreme Lord at the same time.
I beg to remain
Your servant,
Hamsavatar das
