History of Yoga
History of yoga:
Yoga was taught orally and was passed through the years in this form; hence it is difficult to precisely predict the exact years.
Indus Valley Civilization: Indus Valley civilization found in the northwestern parts of India was the oldest civilization which began in 3300 BCE and lasted up to 1300 BCE. They used seals for trading. The famous Pasupathi seal has a man sitting in a difficult yoga pose called Siddhasana. This is the first deception of yoga in history.
Vedas and Upanishads:100 BCE to 1100 CE
There is mention of yoga in Rigveda the first among the four Vedas and Upanishads. Also, the term Yoga was mentioned in “Bhagavad Gita” a 700 verse of Hindu scripture which is part of the epic “Mahabharata”.
Patanjali yoga: 2nd to 4rth Century
Patanjali, a sage in India, has captured yoga into writing called yoga sutras. This is the first written work and the beginning of classical yoga, which was later used as a reference in the medieval age. The famous verse “chiita vritti Nirodaha” which means yoga ceases the thought cycle, indicates that yoga was practiced by mastering both body and mind.
Medieval age:
Svatmaram in the 15th century wrote a book Hatha yoga pradipika which is a Sanskrit manual on hatha yoga. It is one of the three classic texts on Hatha yoga along with Ghendra Samitha and Shiva Samitha. Hata yoga masters at this time were Adi natha,Matsendra and Goraksanatha.
Modern yoga: 19th century to present:
Krishnamacharya is considered as the father of Modern yoga. He contributed to the revival of Hatha yoga. In 1924 under the patronage of Maharaja of Mysore, Krishna Raja Wadiyar IV he taught yoga, traveled, and demonstrated it to promote yoga. His style of yoga is called Vini yoga.
Krishnamacharya students are the most renowned and influential teachers who gave yoga the shape that it is today.
- Indira devi- power yoga
- B.K.S. Iyengar- Iyengar yoga
- K.Patthabi Jois- Ashtanga yoga
- Desikachar- Vini yoga
Parallelly in the north during this period Sivananda Saraswathi established a yoga teaching Ashram in Rishikesh. Shivananda yoga style is propagated all over the world by his disciple Vishnudevananda. His student Satayananda Saraswathi started the Bihar School of yoga.
