Sūtra 3.8

Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation of Sūtra 3.8:

तदपि बहिरङ्गं निर्बीजस्य ॥ ३.८ ॥

tadapi bahiraṅgaṃ nirbījasya || 3.8 ||

8. It is still a stranger to the seedless.

The Rajamartanda commentary by King Bhoja:

[English translation of the 11th century commentary by Bhoja called the Rājamārtaṇḍa]

[Sanskrit text for commentary available]

To point out that it is nevertheless a stranger compared to another, he says:

[Read Sūtra 3.8]

“To the seedless” (nirvījasya [nirbījasya]), i.e., to the meditation which depends on nothing, or carries on pondering with reference to vacuity. To it the threefold members of the Yoga are strangers, (vahiraṅga [bahiraṅga]), because they are only secondarily subservient.

Notes and Extracts

[Notes and comparative extracts from other commentaries on the Yogasūtra]

[Having in the next preceding aphorisms described the last three of the eight members of the Yoga, to be essential to the Yoga, the author makes a distinction, by saying that though they are essential in the case of discriminate meditation, or that in which there is a specific object of thought, they are not so when the Yogi, rising above all specific objects, makes vacuity (śūnya) the object of his pondering. This form of meditation is called “seedless” (cf. C. I, A. lxi), and it needs no aid and can derive no help from steadfastness, contemplation and objective meditation.]

Having now clearly explained the subject of Sañjama, wishing to disclose the nature of perfection of the different members of Yoga, he describes successively the three modifications.