Epistemology is the study of how we know what we know. In Sanskrit the word pramana describes the ‘means of knowing’ or instruments of knowledge, i.e. what methods are available to you for knowing the world around you, including yourself.
One means of knowledge is pratyaksa, direct perception. Through direct perception you can gain knowledge of things that can be objectified. The eyes are a means of knowledge for perceiving light and form, they have no access to sound. All modes of knowledge have their unique spheres of knowledge reception.
If we apply an epistemological analysis to Yoga, two questions arise. What is Yoga from its own standpoint? And, what are the texts that describe Yoga’s identity and process? Are these Yoga texts rooted in other texts? The saddarshanas all except Veda as pramana, as a valid means of knowledge, which implies the Veda has a unique sphere of knowledge not accessed through other means of knowledge.
By analysing the Vedic means of knowing, we’ll begin to understand the role knowledge plays in Yoga, in understanding your self-reality. Through the lens of pramana, we’ll explore if Asana or Meditation is a means for self-knowledge? Is the self you seek to understand an object in the creation? If so, then pratyaksa will suffice. If the self that you seek is not an object/form in the creation, but the very subject/formlessness of all experience, how will you come to know yourself? What means of knowledge are available to you?
Yoga: An Epistemological Approach to Self, seeks to demystify the current consumer industrial complex by rooting the practice of Yoga into the theory of pramana.
The first 30 minuets will be used to conceptually explore prama, what is valid knowledge, pramana, the means of knowledge and the pramata, the knower.
We’ll then engage the practice of Asana, Pranayama and Dhyanam, mediation to discern between direct and indirect modes of knowledge as they pertain to Yoga and the pursuit of self-knowledge.
This Yoga workshop is open to all levels.
Sri Louise
