Recent studies of yoga reveal the formative influence of (wait for it) Buddhism, Jainism, Sufism, television, military calisthenics, Swedish gymnastics and the YMCA, as well as of radical Hindu nationalism, upon today’s postural yoga practice. There is no doubt that the Vedas, Upanishads, and folk traditions of India have been formative toward yoga: yoga is almost inseparable from them. Nevertheless to assert that yoga is essentially and primarily a Hindu practice means to ignore millennia of generative influence from other quarters. Worse still, it means to step blindly into a political fight for the heart of India that has simmered for over two hundred years.
Roman Palitsky
Roman Palitsky (MDiv) is an academic-on-hiatus and a yoga teacher. He has a passionate interest in India: his studies at Harvard Divinity School focused on Indian religion and the psychology and anthropology of religion. Roman is particularly concerned with contemporary yoga practices in India and America, and the marvelous transformations that these practices entail. He currently teaches yoga and is a tutor in New York, and will be lecturing at Hunter College beginning in the summer of 2011.
