19 Facts About Yoga Yajnavalkya

Yoga Yajnavalkya is a classical Hindu yoga text in the Sanskrit language.

The Yoga Yajnavalkya contains one of the most comprehensive discussion of yoga components such as the Pranayama, Pratyahara, Dhyana, and Dharana.

Yoga Yajnavalkya is estimated to have lived in around the 8th century BCE, and is associated with several other major ancient texts in Sanskrit, namely the Shukla Yajurveda, the Shatapatha Brahmana, the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, the Dharmasastra named Yajnavalkya Smrti, Vriddha Yajnavalkya, and Brihad Yajnavalkya.

Yoga Yajnavalkya is mentioned in the Mahabharata and the Puranas, as well as in ancient Jainism texts such as the Isibhasiyaim.

Actual author of Yoga Yajnavalkya text was probably someone who lived many centuries after the Vedic sage Yajnavalkya, and is unknown.

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Divanji cites Tantra texts, Ayurveda tradition texts, and literature of Advaita Vedanta from the 4th century CE, which mention the Yoga Yajnavalkya, thereafter concluding that the text or some version of the Yoga Yajnavalkya text must have been in existence by the 4th century CE.

However, no other text affirms that Gargi was the wife of Yoga Yajnavalkya; rather, Maitreyi and Katyayani are listed as his two wives, leading to the theory that the Pune manuscript is a corrupted and more modern edition of the original text.

Yoga Yajnavalkya text is structured as a conversation between a man and a woman, in the presence of an audience.

Yoga Yajnavalkya agrees, but first attributes his knowledge to the Hindu god Brahma who taught him this jnana and karma.

Yoga Yajnavalkya is the essence of this knowledge, and it has eight components: Yama, Niyama, Asana, Pranayama, Pratyahara, Dharana, Dhyana and Samadhi.

Yoga Yajnavalkya starts its description of yoga practice with a statement of virtuous self-restraints that a yogi or yogini needs to adhere to.

Yoga Yajnavalkya begins his reply by asserting that the height of every adult human being is about 96 times the width of his or her Angula.

Yoga Yajnavalkya can be learned, with the help of a teacher, within three to four months if practiced six times a day.

Yoga Yajnavalkya dedicates significant amount of text to explain the art of mastering each stage of breathing, that is inhalation, exhalation and stoppage between the two.

Yoga Yajnavalkya describes Sanmukhi mudra, Kevaka kumbhaka and Sahita kumbhaka in chapter 6, asserting that the best exercises are those that make one feel lightness in the body and relaxation in the mind.

Yoga Yajnavalkya Yagnavalkya explains that warm air inhaled passes to the Brahmarandhra via the navel which helps in curing diseases.

One distinctive feature of the Yoga Yajnavalkya is that kundalini is mostly described as a blockage that prevents prana from entering the susumna and rising.

Yoga Yajnavalkya [Krishnamacharya] took the pains of writing the whole manuscript.

Presence of Gargi in Yoga Yajnavalkya is significant in a historical sense, as encouraging yoga to women.