Hatha Yoga: The Report of a Personal Experience

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The Lay of Alha is a traditional epic poem from northern India, celebrating the heroic deeds of Alha and Udal, legendary warriors of the Bundelkhand region. William Waterfield's work on this epic involves translation, commentary, and preservation of the ancient ballads that highlight themes of bravery, loyalty, and valor. The poem reflects regional history and folklore, offering insight into medieval Indian warrior culture. Waterfield's edition makes this important oral tradition accessible to a wider audience interested in Indian literature and history.

Theos Casimir Bernard (1908-1947) was an American explorer and author known for his studies on yoga and Tibetan Buddhism. He is best remembered for his book Hatha Yoga: The Report of a Personal Experience, which provides rare insights into traditional hatha yoga practices. Bernard traveled extensively, learning Tibetan and documenting his experiences in Tibet. Despite controversies over his claims, including exaggerated accounts, his contributions to Western interest in Eastern spirituality are significant. He died tragically in 1947 during India's Partition.

THIS STUDY is the report of a Westerner who has practised Yoga under a teacher in India. The primary purpose of the investigation was to test by personal experience the techniques of Hatha Yoga. For this purpose I went to India and Tibet. First I made a general acquaintance with India, meeting and talking with people from every walk of life, rajas to beggars, kavirajas to magicians, scholars to students, saints to sadhus. I visited colleges, libraries, museums, temples, shrines, ashramas and ghats from Calcutta to Bombay, from Kashmir to Ceylon, including all the outstanding cities, such as Allahabad, Benares, Agra, Delhi, Lahore, Srinagar, Peshwar, Uddipur, Hyderabad, Mysore, Bangalore, Madras, Madura, and Trichinopoly. This alone consumed several months, but provided an impression of India's culture to be had in no other way.

After the 'grand tour' I submitted to a course of traditional training in Hatha Yoga, taking notes and making critical observations in order to appraise the results in the light of experience rather than of theory. I was, in fact, induced to make this practical trial of Yoga because of the disappointments I experienced in connection with Yoga theory. The theories, about which there is an abundant literature, were confusing rather than informative regarding the practical content and discipline of Hatha Yoga. To this end I became the sincere disciple of a highly esteemed teacher and settled down at his retreat in the hills near Ranchi. Under his supervision and guidance I adhered to the rigid discipline imposed upon one who wishes to practice Hatha Yoga.

In order to further my studies, it was suggested by my teacher that I go to Tibet. According to him, what has become mere tradition in India is still living and visible in the ancient monasteries of that isolated land of mysteries. Immediately I set forth. My first intimate contact with the training as it is found in Tibet was through a renowned hermit on the Tibetan border in northern Sikkim. With him, by means of an interpreter, I was able to converse about the doctrines and literature of Tibetan Lamaism. Through him I was able to make a general inventory of the literature of the Kargyupa sect, which contains the earliest material taken into Tibet from India from the seventh to the eleventh century. My travels culminated in a pilgrimage to the holy city, Lhasa, where I was accepted as an incarnation of a Tibetan saint. This removed all obstacles and enabled me to take part in the religious ceremonies of the Jo-Wb Kang and the Ramoche, the two sacred temples in Lhasa, in rites held at the tomb of the last Dalai Lama in the Nam Gyal Ch'oide of the Potala, as well as to attend the services held in many of the smaller shrines of that great palace. Opportunity was given for me to participate in ceremonies and discuss the teachings with some of the leading lamas of the famed monasteries of Drepong, Sera, Ganden, Dochen, Dra-Yarpa, Palk'or Ch'oide, at Gyantse, Tashi-Lumpo, in Shigatse, and Saskya, 'the Oxford of Asia', which was the original seat of learning in Tibet and today houses one of the largest libraries of the land.

During my stay in Lhasa, a learned geshe from the Sera monastery lived with me. He helped me to find and classify the literature I sought and instructed me as well in the religious practices used in the monasteries of the Gelupa sect, the ruling sect today. At the same time I was able to have the guidance of another lama, who was the head of a small Karg-yupa monastery a few days distant from Lhasa. He was with me daily for some time, and we discussed Kargyupa beliefs and practices as contrasted with those of other sects. Throughout my entire stay in Tibet I was constantly in touch with other lamas of good repute, checking what I had heard and read. A survey of this sort could only scratch the surface, but it helped me to interpret my practical discipline and to obtain a sense of what Yoga means in their lives. I do not report my Tibetan experience here, because it was merely background for my training in India.

Any attempt to prove the merits of the 'art of Yoga' would be futile. If a thousand volumes were quoted in its favour and all the rules of logic and sophistry were employed, the doubts and scepticism of modern man would still remain. Therefore this study is not an attempt to prove the merits of Yoga or to explain its results. Instead, I here present a report of my personal experiences in learning and practising the basic techniques of Hatha Yoga, in order to give the Western reader an accurate account of the conduct of a typical oriental course in that Yoga; and I accompany my description with references to the relevant passages from the classic texts in order that the critical reader may estimate the extent to which tradition is followed and may more readily correlate theory and practice.

HATHA YOGA is a discipline involving various bodily and mental controls, but central to them all is the regulation of the breath. Hatha is derived from two roots, 'ha' (sun) and 'tha' (moon), which symbolically refer to the flowing of breath in the right nostril, called the 'sun breath', and the flowing of breath in the left nostril, called the 'moon breath'. Yoga is derived from the root 'yuj' (to join); herefore, Hatha Yoga is the uniting of these two breaths. The effect is believed to induce a mental condition called samadhi. This is not an magi nary or mythical state, though it is explained by myths, but is an actual condition that can be subjectively experienced and objectively observed.

In order to bring about a stabilization of the breath, considerable emphasis is placed upon purification of the body and the use of various physical techniques. The training of the physical body as an end in itself is called Ghatastha Yoga. It is maintained that the methods employed do not violate any of the physical laws of the body, so they have been given the name Physiological Yoga. The practices are said to make dynamic a atent force in the body called Kundalini; hence the term Kundalini yoga is frequently employed. All processes utilized are directed toward the single aim of stilling the mind. For this condition the method applied known as Laya Yoga. The complete subjugation of the mind is con-sidered to be the Royal Road and is called Raja Yoga. All these forms are often classified under the general heading Tantrik Yoga, since they represent the practical discipline based on tantrik philosophy; but 'tan-tra' is used loosely for a variety of systems, chiefly for the purpose of distinguishing them from other forms of non-physiological discipline.

These other forms of Yoga offer intellectual and devotional processes for subduing the mind and producing tranquillity, but do not prescribe any system of physiological or bodily discipline.

The techniques of Hatha Yoga are given in the classic texts: Hatha Yoga Pradipika, Gheranda Samhita, and Siva Samhita. These are the leading treatises on the subject. The first is considered to be the standard authority, and in many instances the verses of the second correspond closely. The third presents a fuller account and introduces a brief outline of the general attitude toward Hatha Yoga, showing its importance and metaphysical foundation. The other texts assume that the student is thoroughly familiar with these principles. None of them discuss Yoga, for they were meant to be outlines, and the details were supposed to be supplied by the teacher. Yoga was never intended to serve as a 'spiritual correspondence course', but was given as a method of 'self-culture' to be practised under direct supervision. It was never intended that Yoga should be practised without the guidance of a teacher. It is just as impossible to do so as it is to become a finished musician from a mail-order course. The texts were meant only to serve as a guide; a teacher was to furnish the details necessary in each individual case. All the texts are couched in the 'mysterious', or technical, phraseology of tantrik literature which presents such a stumbling block for the western mind.

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