Customer Reviews

The Philosophy of Classical Yoga

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This book is for the intermediate to advanced student or teacher of yoga who wishes to understand the definitions and inter-relationships between the concepts of classical yoga. For those interested in the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, this text will help you access the ideas that lead to liberation. A clear understanding helps one's spiritual practice. This is a short book that is read slowly and digested. It serves as a reference to review from time to time as well. Enjoy! It would be a good gift for someone who is really into yoga, but not the choice for the novice.

Those familiar with some of Georg Feuerstein's popular books, such as "Yoga for Dummies" may mistake this very short book for something similar, but with more emphasis on theory and less on practice. Despite being brief and -- considering the subject -- clearly written, it would probably be unreadably difficult for someone not already somewhat familiar with at least the names and major tenets of the major philosophical schools of the Hindu tradition, and their various relations (or supposed relations) to Yoga. Despite its brevity (or maybe because of it), this is the sort of book one needs to prepare to read. (Feuerstein's own description on the Amazon site is "for Advanced Students," and he suggests his "Encyclopedia of Yoga" -- there are also several excellent general works on Indian philosophy, including Zimmer's old "Philosophies of India," which I found helpful.)

Feuerstein attempts nothing less than a re-visioning of the place of the Yoga-sutras (attributed to Patanjali) within the development of Indian philosophies (including Buddhism). The book is in some ways a companion to his own "The Yoga-Sutra of Patanjali: A New Translation and Commentary," and picks up many of the issues argued there in relation to the received text and its classic interpretations.

Feuerstein also surveys relevant positions taken by modern scholars. His phrasing in these discussions is sometimes, to my way of thinking, a bit unfair (although engagingly lively). For example, Mircea Eliade, whose "Yoga: Immortality and Freedom" is probably still the most widely accepted academic work in the field, is congratulated for disagreeing with his Indian mentors, and blamed for agreeing with them, strictly according to Feuerstein's views on the matter at hand. This is helpful insofar as it makes some of the issues stand out clearly, but I find that it grates a little.