Yoga Sagar

SR No.: 014011
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Paramhamsa Satyananda
Publisher: Bihar School of Yoga Munger
Publication Year: 1994
Total Pages: 436
Language: English
Classification: Seminar & Articles
File Size: 24 MB

Page 226

which is deep within him, all around him, beyond him, and that he calls God.
The deeper the transparency is experienced within, the greater the light. What I am saying is that the image of God is very dark indeed, in all traditions, due to ideological reasons, ideological necessities. In the Old Testament, for example, it says that, “Thou shalt not worship any other God before me. If thou worshippeth idols, I shall not only bring down my wrath upon you, but generation after generation, after your children." That is not the real God, but that concept of God was necessary because the Jewish people had just come into a region where there was a confluence of the Egyptian, Syrian, Palestinian and Hittite cultures. So they needed to have an identity, a special exigence by God that, “I am thy only Lord, one above all, and thou shalt not worship any other God before me", for the sheer reason of survival. So, let us not confuse ideological reasons for spiritual truth. The same principle also applies for myth.
The World Parliament of Religions was not really a "World Parliament". It was a trade fair in Chicago, celebrating the 400 years after the discovery of the New World, America, on Columbus Day. When Swami Vivekananda spoke there, it was simply that event. The Parliament of World Religions does not have any statutory or legislative power. But the English word is parliament, so in India it was understood to be a great Parliament of Religion, when actually it was a simply a trade fair. At this trade fair, there was parley of religious teachers sharing their ideas. Of course, Vivekananda did make an impact in that parley of religious exchange of ideas, and he really shone there, but that has been exaggerated in India.
As a matter of fact, yoga in the west is yet another great myth. No one is coming to beat on your door in western countries to learn yoga. It is still a very fringe movement, hardly a ripple. For example, for the past quarter of a century during which I have been coming to England, yoga has been practised there by hardly one fifth of one percent of the population. So, it is not a great movement, it is a fringe movement.
If there are 57 million people in Britain, let us say that one percent is 570,000. So, there are maybe 170,000 people practising yoga today in England, and there are three main groups
201