Yoga-sutras (with Vyasa and Vachaspati Mishra)
by Rama Prasada | 1924 | 154,800 words | ISBN-10: 9381406863 | ISBN-13: 9789381406861
The Yoga-Sutra 1.12, English translation with Commentaries. The Yoga Sutras are an ancient collection of Sanskrit texts dating from 500 BCE dealing with Yoga and Meditation in four books. It deals with topics such as Samadhi (meditative absorption), Sadhana (Yoga practice), Vibhuti (powers or Siddhis), Kaivaly (isolation) and Moksha (liberation).
Sūtra 1.12
Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation of Sūtra 1.12:
अभ्यासवैराग्याभ्यां तन्निरोधः ॥ १.१२ ॥
abhyāsavairāgyābhyāṃ tannirodhaḥ || 1.12 ||
Abhyāsa,—by practice. vairāgyābhyām—by desirelessness, unattachment. tad—their. nirodhaḥ—restraint, control.
12. They are restrained by practice and desireless-ness.
The Sankhya-pravachana commentary of Vyasa
[English translation of the 7th century commentary by Vyāsa called the Sāṅkhya-pravacana, Vyāsabhāṣya or Yogabhāṣya]
[Sanskrit text for commentary available]
Well then, what is the means for restraining them? “They are restrained by practice and desirelessness.”
The stream of mind flows both ways; flows towards good and it flows towards evil. That which flows on to perfect independence (kaivalya) down the plane of discriminative knowledge, is named the stream of happiness. That which leads to re-birth and flows down the plane of undiscriminative ignorance, is the stream of sin.
Among these the flow of the desirables is thinned by desirelessness; the flow of discrimination is rendered visible by habituating the mind to the experience of knowledge.
Hence suppression of the mental modification is dependent upon both.
The Gloss of Vachaspati Mishra
[English translation of the 9th century Tattvavaiśāradī by Vācaspatimiśra]
The Commentator asks the means of restraint. “Well then, what, &c.” He answers by the aphorism:—‘They are restrained by practice and desirelessness? The operation of practice and desirelessness on the manifestation of restraint is collective, on account of each operating as a branch of the other. They are not optional. For this reason he says:—“The stream of mind flows both ways, &c,”
‘Flows towards’: The word prāgbhārā in the original means bank, limitation; and the idea is that the stream is so banked, i.e., limited in its flow as to reach the state Of perfect independence (kaivalya).
“Down the plane The word ‘nimna’ in the original means down, an inclination of the ground, such as makes it possible for water to flow in a particular direction. It also means depth, into which water would always flow.