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yogani
USA
5245 Posts |
 Posted - Dec 02 2010 : 12:31:35 PM
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Hi All:
This is a new book (with Amazon link):
Yoga Body: The Origins of Modern Posture Practice by Mark Singleton
It is a scholarly work that traces the evolution of asana (postures) over the past several hundred years, to become the vast industry it is today. The journey entails ancient knowledge, greatly altered by social, religious and political forces in colonial India, and carried forward by popular western fitness movements since the early 1900s. An interesting read for anyone who seeks to understand how modern hatha yoga is related to spiritual practice, and how it is not.
There is nothing wrong with postures for health and fitness. But for anyone who aspires to spiritual practice, modifications to a postures-dominated practice will be necessary to encompass the full scope of the eight limbs of yoga. This is what the AYP Asanas, Mudras and Bandhas book is about. It is also covered in AYP Easy Lessons - Volume 2 (including an enhanced AYP asana routine), which will be out in a few weeks.
All the best!
The guru is in you.
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dave
USA
15 Posts |
Posted - Dec 03 2010 : 08:39:48 AM
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Mark Singleton does omit an important fact that the whole medical gymnastic movement is actually based off Chinese Taoist Cong Fou.
“. . .when the Jesuit P. M. Cibot (3) presented Europeans with a short but celebrated paper on the strictly macrobiotic exercises of the physiological alchemists. His ‘Notice du Cong-fou[Kung-fu] des Bonzes Tao-see[Tao shih]’ of 1779 was intended to present the physicists and physicians of Europe with a sketch of a system of medical gymnastics which they might like to adopt—or if they found it at fault they might be stimulated to invent something better. This work has long been regarded as of cardinal importance in the history of physiotherapy because it almost certainly influenced the Swedish founder of the modern phase of the art, Per Hendrik Ling. Cibot studied at least one Chinese book, but also got much from a Christian neophyte who had become expert in the subject before his conversion.”(Science and Civilisation [sic] in China by Joseph Needham, Vol. 5, page 170)
Taoism is heavily influenced by buddha and yoga or vice versa depending on your perspective. Its interesting how circular things are.
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Yoga Body: The Origins of Modern Posture Practice
