Yogi Bhajan & KY Origins

[Guest guest]

Hi Jeremy

 

Welcome to the Kundalini Yoga list. We have links from our Web site -

http://www.kundaliniyoga.org

to several sites which include references to ancient Indian scriptures,

study of which will convince anyone with any knowledge of Kundalini Yoga

that its origins do go way back into the mists of time.

 

The system which Yogi Bhajan has brought to the West is exceedingly complex,

comprising literally thousands of kriyas or exercise sets, many with very

precise instructions indeed. When this is combined with the subtle interplay

of mantra, mudra, locks and breath control, and also the fact that it takes

1000 days to master an individual kriya, it would not have been possible for

any person or group of people, no matter how dedicated or gifted, to come up

with such a system in the space of a single generation.

 

Would it help the argument on either side to come up with the names of a

multitude of gurus who, because of the secretive nature of their practice,

no-one had ever heard of before?

 

Even at the level of an individual kriya, to select the precise combination

of exercises to optimize its effects would have taken an enormous amount of

educated trial and error, over a considerable period. The fact that

Kundalini Yoga is such an effective and powerful system bears witness to the

dedication of generations of gurus down through the ages who have worked

tirelessly to perfect it.

 

You are doing it a grave dis-service to draw comparisons with some of the

snake oil salesmen and other charlatans who at times parade themselves as

experts in some revolutionary new all-embracing life technology.

 

Sat Nam!

Gordon

 

-

Jeremy Frost <frost

<kundaliniyoga >

Sunday, August 27, 2000 01:30

Yoga

 

 

> Hello,

>

> My name is Jeremy Frost. I am relatively new to the list and I was

wondering

> if Kundalini Yoga is indeed Yogi Bhajan's creation or did he bring it out

of

> secret practice like he says? Keep in mind it matters very little to me

> whether he created it by synthesizing other yoga methods he had learned or

> if in fact he just brought Kundalini Yoga practice out in the open. The

> reason I ask this is because I have known instances where teachers (some

> are quite knowledgable too) lie to embellish the background of the system

> they created to make it seem like said system is hundreds or thousands

of

> years old pretty much because they think that their system won't be taken

> seriously unless it has a few hundred years of mysticism surrounding it.

Are

> there any records (of any type) of Kundalini Yoga practice which predate

> Yogi Bhajan? Who were Yogi Bhajan's teachers? I am just slightly skeptical

> about "secret" practices being brought out into the open.. because there

is

> truly no way to tell if a system is truly ancient or if is a modern

system

> with a contrived past. Being in the martial arts scene for quite a few

years

> I've seen tons of this type of thing. Regardless of Kundalini Yoga's

history

> it is certainly a very good system of Yoga I'm not knocking the system

nor

> Yogi Bhajan in any way I'd just like to find out more.

>

> Thanks everyone,

> Jeremy

[Guest guest]

Kundaliniyoga , "gordon" <gordon@g...> wrote:

 

I think Gordon did an excellent job in explaining why the idea that

KY is some contrived thing doesn't jibe. I'd just like to add a

couple of points. There are many specific things, like pranayams,

kriyas, meditations, etc. that one finds subtle reference to in older

yoga books which were written during a time when fully describing

these things to the public was just not done. A good example is

alternate nostril breathing. In trying to learn more about yoga

before I encountered KY, I read a number of these older books, and

although they rarely explained how to do it, they would refer to

alternate nostril breath. References to the 1-minute breath abound

as well. See the book series by Yogi Ramacharaka, written around the

turn of the century (that is 1900) for examples of what I'm talking

about.

 

Note also that there are more teachers than Yogi Bhajan who have

decided to come forth and teach practices which were also "kept

secret" (he appears to be the first in a groundswell of teachers

choosing to begin bringing to the public eye things that were only

taught to students in the past - and he has explained, and predicted,

the reasons why this is happening - see references to the transition

between Piscean and Aquarian age).

 

Although these are not KY, many of the underlying techniques are the

same, again supporting the idea that many of the basic tools are

ancient enough to have been disseminated through a variety of

teaching lineages - and, in fact, cultures and even countries.

Perhaps the techniques have been re-invented in identical form over

and over, but Occam's Razor (the simplest explanation is most likely

the accurate one) says otherwise.

 

Many blessings!

Sadhant Singh