The term āsana describes a posture or position1. In Raja Yoga, also known as Royal Yoga, āsana is the third link of an eight-stage path. Patanjali wrote the so-called Yoga Sutras around 2000 years ago , in which he describes the philosophy and practice of yoga in concise sentences. This work forms the basis of practice for many yoga schools today and is also commonly known as ashtanga yoga, which can be translated as structure or sequence of steps.
In the original sense, however, āsana does not refer to the body positions that are so widespread today, but rather initially refers to a certain sitting posture on the floor. In the yoga sutras, āsana is described relatively briefly in three verses.2
II, 46: sthira-sukham-āsanam
The sitting position is stable and comfortable.
The āsana was by no means a method for optimizing the body, but an important basis for further meditation practice, in which the body found its natural place. On the one hand, it should be experienced as stable and firm, as belonging to matter, not imposing itself and, on the other hand, expressing a certain lightness.
This description can also be translated as “truly happy position”.
II, 47: prayatna-śaithilya-ananta-samāpatti-bhyām
It is characterized by freedom from tension and an orientation towards the infinite.
On the one hand, the tensions can refer to physical conditions, or more broadly to mental tensions, which are naturally given by the earthly world and accompany people simply by being in the world.
However, as the transient earthly world and thus the body found their corresponding intuitive classification, the consciousness was able to align itself more clearly with the opposite pole of the infinite. This movement can also be viewed the other way round, in that the orientation towards the infinite creates freedom from tensions. The withdrawal of material, earthly tensions is therefore connected with the orientation of consciousness towards a spiritual dimension.
III, 48: tato dvaṅdva-an-abhighātaḥ
This attitude allows freedom from polarities and freedom from attacks.
The earthly world is characterized to a certain extent by duality, which finds its expression in the most diverse phenomena. Man also finds himself in this field of tension as long as he does not rise above it by virtue of his consciousness and approach a greater dimension that is free of earthly polarities.
This is the state we strive for by implementing and practicing the further steps of the eight-step path. The consciousness therefore does not identify with the body, with the transient, but instead focuses freely on a non-earthly, spiritual dimension. This orientation, in turn, leads people from ignorance to knowledge, from darkness to light, from non-being to being. Through this realization, people can face circumstances in a fundamentally different way and confront circumstances, tensions and attacks of all kinds without becoming entangled in them.
1 Heinz Grill,Die Vergeistigung des Leibes, Lammers-Koll, 2004
2 http://yoga-praxis.de/wp-content/uploads/2 015/12/Yoga-Sutra.pdf
