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David Gordon White notes that "'Yoga' has a wider range of meanings than nearly any other word in the entire Sanskrit lexicon." [56] In its broadest sense, yoga is a generic term for techniques aimed at controlling body and mind and attaining a soteriological goal as specified by a specific tradition:
Yoga as therapy is the use of yoga as exercise, consisting mainly of postures called asanas, as a gentle form of exercise and relaxation applied specifically with the intention of improving health. This form of yoga is widely practised in classes, and may involve meditation , imagery, breath work (pranayama) and calming music as well as ...
A few decades later, a very different form of yoga, the prevailing yoga as exercise, was created by Yogendra, Kuvalayananda, and Krishnamacharya, starting in the 1920s.It was predominantly physical, consisting mainly or entirely of asanas, postures derived from those of hatha yoga, but with a contribution from western gymnastics (Niels Bukh's 1924 Primary Gymnastics [6] [7]).
Haṭha yoga's non-postural practices such as its purifications are much reduced or absent in yoga as exercise. The term "hatha yoga" is also in use with a different meaning, a gentle unbranded yoga practice, independent of the major schools, often mainly for women. Practices vary from wholly secular, for exercise and relaxation, through to ...
Bikram Yoga is a system of hot yoga, a type of yoga as exercise, spread by Bikram Choudhury and based on the teachings of B. C. Ghosh, that became popular in the early 1970s. [1] Classes consist of a fixed sequence of 26 postures , practised in a room heated to 105 °F (41 °C) with a humidity of 40%, intended to replicate the climate of India .
Early Nāth works teach a yoga based on raising kuṇḍalinī through energy channels and chakras, called Layayoga ("the yoga of dissolution"). However, other early Nāth texts like the Vivekamārtaṇḍa can be seen as co-opting the hatha yoga mudrās. [8]
The Sanskrit noun योग yoga is derived from the root yuj (युज्) "to attach, join, harness, yoke" [7] (yoga is a cognate of the English word "yoke" [8]).According to Timothy Miller, the term yoga may designate various spiritual practices in Hindu traditions, translating it as "union" or "discipline". [2]
Asanas are also called yoga poses or yoga postures in English. The 10th or 11th century Goraksha Sataka and the 15th century Hatha Yoga Pradipika identify 84 asanas; the 17th century Hatha Ratnavali provides a different list of 84 asanas, describing some of them. In the 20th century, Indian nationalism favoured physical culture in response to ...