{S Sridharan was until recently the Managing Trustee, Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandiram, Chennai.  During his long association with KYM, he had the privilege of learning the nuances of Yoga Sastra directly under Yogi TKV Desikachar.  Sridharan is now an expert Yogi and a Yogic teacher.  In this series on Yogasutra, Yogi S Sridharan elucidates every aspect of YOGA.}

In the first, second and the third chapters Asana, Kumbhaka and Mudra-s have been stated respectively. The result of those practices is Rajayoga. Before stating that (in this present fourth chapter) Svatmarama composes an invocatory verse.

Since ‘all noble ventures are susceptible to myriad obstacles’ to overcome them the author composes an invocatory verse which is in the form of saluting the teacher who is not different from Siva.

“Salutations to Siva, the teacher, who is the embodiment of Nada, Bindu and Kala.  A person devoted to those attains the pure state.” (IV/1)

Since the authorship of this teaching, Hathayoga, is attributed to Siva who originally gave the teaching in private to Parvati, the teacher here is referred to as ‘Siva’.  The form of Siva is ‘Nada, Bindu and Kalaa.  Nada is the sound that resembles the resonance of the ringing of a bronze bell. Bindu refers to the sound that follows the ‘anusvara’,(m) the nasal sound which is marked by a dot above the line in devanagari script. Kalaa is a part of Nada.  A person devoted here refers to the one who practices “Nadanusandhana” the technique which will be described later.  The one who practices “Nadanusandha” gets purified.  Purification here is the removal of veil of ignorance.

(More to follow)

Srinivasaraghava Sridharan

laxmidharan@gmail.com