INTRODUCTION
Gordan Djurdjevic
Sayings of Gorakhnāth (Gorakh-Bānī) is a title given to a compilation of the late
medieval North Indian vernacular texts, in Old Hindi, by and about the Nāth yogis, which
were collected, edited, and published by Dr. Pitāmbardatt Baṛthvāl in the mid-twentieth
century. 1 The main portion of these texts are translated here. 2 A good deal of the
translations, and in particular the sabads and pads, which are the two largest and
arguably most important groups of texts, are also accompanied by short annotations. The
principal purpose of this book is to present the translations of these important and often
rather enigmatic texts on yoga.
Although the traditional attribution of this literary corpus, as evident in the above
title, acknowledges the semi-legendary guru Gorakhnāth as its author, this is a claim that
cannot be objectively verified. The obvious discrepancy is presented by the fact that
Gorakhnāth probably lived c. 12th century C.E., while the language of the material in the
Gorakh-Bānī, aside from the lack of formal linguistic consistency, appears to be of a later
period, most of it typical of the 16th-18th century style of Hindi, and some of it possibly
even more recent.3 However, there is no inherent reason to suppose that the older material
could not have been adapted in order to reflect subsequent conventions of the spoken
language – a practice that is not unusual for, often orally transmitted, vernacular
literature.4 A pragmatic attitude, adopted here, is simply to treat Gorakhnāth as the
assumed persona of the author or authors of these texts, with the tacit supposition that this
is a traditional understanding of the provenance of the bānīs and not a historical fact. But
1
the supposed derivation of the authorial source is not irrelevant. In the pertinent
comments of Michel Foucault: irrespective of whether the assumed author of a work is an
actual person or not, their name “serves to characterize a certain mode of being of
discourse” and thus “shows that this discourse is not ordinary everyday speech,” but is on
the contrary “a speech that must be received in a certain mode and that, in a given
culture, must receive a certain status.”5
Guru Gorakhnāth is renowned in India as one of the main founders of the Order
(sampradāy) of the Nāth yogis,6 who are also popularly known as the jogis, as well as
kānphaṭa (“split-eared”), due to the fact that they typically wear earrings subsequent to
their initiation into the order. The term ““nāth”” (Skt. “nātha”) deserves a note of
explanation. The most general meaning of the word is “lord” or “master.” Baṛthvāl
(1946: 4) takes it as a designation for brahman, which generally refers to the absolute
ground of being, often conceived of as impersonal.7 According to Gopinath Kaviraj
(1987: 65), the Nāth yogis
speak of the Nātha, the Absolute, as beyond the opposition involved in the concepts
of Saguṇa [i.e. possessing describable attributes] and Nirguṇa [without describable
attributes] or of Sākāra [possessing of form] and Nirākāra [formless]. And, so to
them the Supreme end of Life is to realise oneself as Nātha and to remain eternally
fixed above the world of relations.
Akshaya Kumar Banerji (1992: 29) explains that the “state of Nātha is what is known in
philosophy as Kaivalya (detachment of soul [puruṣa] from matter [prakṛti], identification
with Supreme spirit).” He further adds (1992: 30) that the attainment of the ‘state of
2
Nātha’ is equivalent with the achievement of the perfected body (siddhadeha) and
becoming ‘liberated while living’ (jīvanmukta). Kalyani Mallik (1954: 1) defines the term
in a similar vein: “These Yogīs worshipped God as ‘Nātha’ or the Supreme Master, who
according to their faith transcends not only the finite, but the infinite as well.”
Hajāriprasād Dvivedī (1981: 3), in his study of the Nāth Order, relates a fanciful
etymology according to which “nā” means “eternal, without beginning” (“anādi”) and
“tha” means the “establishing, foundation” (sthāpit) of the three worlds; hence “nātha”
means “the eternal dharma, which is the cause of the foundation of the three worlds.”
According to another similarly fanciful etymology, “nā” stands for the “lord-brahman”
(“nāth-brahm”) that gives liberation and “tha” stands for the obstruction of ignorance;
accordingly, “nāth” or “nātha” stands for the support in witnessing brahman and
obstructing the māyā (see ibid.) Dharmvīr Bhārti (1988: 257) quotes legendary siddha
yogi Kanhapā’s pertinent statement, according to which the Nāth is the one whose mind
is still. Mallinson (2012: 263) suggests that prior to the 18th century, “the word
nātha/nāth, when used in Sanskrit and Hindi works in the context of haṭha yoga and
yogis, always refers to the supreme deity.”8
The Nāth yogis are commonly associated with the development of haṭha
(“forceful” or “vigorous”) yoga -- another important term that calls for a comment. In his
comprehensive account of the history of usage and meaning of the term “haṭha” in haṭha
yoga, Jason Birch (2011: 531) comments that “the word haṭha is never used in Haṭha
texts to refer to violent means or forceful effort” and argues that the “descriptions of
forcefully moving kuṇḍalinī, apāna [one of five vital breaths], or bindu [semen] upwards
through the central channel suggests that the ‘force’ of Haṭhayoga qualifies the effects of
3
its techniques, rather than the effort required to perform them” (548). Birch notes the
earlier occurrence of the term “in the eighteenth chapter of a Buddhist tantra called the
Guhyasamājatantra (eighth century), in a discussion of the attainment of a visionary
experience (darśana)” (535). More traditionally, and again based on a folk etymology,
the term “haṭha” is taken as a compound denoting the union between the Sun (“ha”) and
the Moon (“ṭha”). As Gerald Larson (2008: 142) comments, this allows further
correlations such as the union between breaths, sexes, between sound and silence,
macrocosmos and microcosmos, and finally, between Śiva and Śakti.
James
Mallinson
(2016)
has
demonstrated
that
the
12th
century
Dattātreyayogaśāstra, “the first text to teach the practices of haṭhayoga under the name
of haṭha,” already borrows technical and theoretical aspects of teachings from the
Amṛtasiddhi, a text composed in the Buddhist tantric (Vajrayāna) milieu. According to
Mallinson, this latter text is of seminal importance and was the first to include a number
of important concepts germane to haṭha yoga. His conclusions are extremely cogent in
the present context: “Because they share traditions of the 84 siddhas, several scholars
have posited connections between Vajrayāna Buddhists and the Nāth yogis, with whom
the practice of haṭhayoga has long been associated. The Amṛtasiddhi’s Vajrayāna origins
and its borrowings in subsequent haṭhayogic texts, some of which are products of Nāth
traditions, provide the first known doctrinal basis for this connection and a stimulus for
its further investigation.”9
In order to fully appreciate the significance of haṭha yoga, it is important to bear
in mind its distinctive qualities that separate it from the classical yoga, which is
commonly associated with the worldview articulated in Yoga Sūtra by Patañjali, probably
4
composed in the early centuries of the Common Era. There are several elements
constitutive of this distinction: temporally, the haṭha yoga emerges in the medieval
period, while the classical yoga is already mentioned in the late Upaniṣads (composed
around the beginning of the common era); sociologically, it is not an exclusive
prerogative of priests (brahmins) or even aristocracy (kṣatriyas), as it is also practiced by
what are often considered lower classes, some of them at least nominally Muslim (while
in a sense, the jogis consider themselves a separate denomination); methodologically, it
focuses not on the discipline of the mind but on the body and its occult centers of power.
These distinctive elements will be elaborated upon in due course.
According to a well-known legend, the original founder of this yogic Order was in
fact the great god Śiva himself, who is for that reason referred to as the Original Master
(Ādi Nāth). Śiva’s immediate disciple was supposed to be the guru Matsyendranāth,
whose yogic career is somewhat controversial and who may have been associated with a
particular style of practice that privileges the engagement with female yoginis, human or
divine (or both). His foremost disciple was Gorakhnāth. It hardly needs highlighting that
this account of the origin and the chain of transmission (parampar) is mythical and not
historical. Based on what we know, Matsyendranāth and Gorakhnāth, if indeed historical
personages at all, lived several centuries apart. Be that as it may, the popular story of the
origin of the Nāth Sampradāy could be summarized as follows:
Ṡiva’s wife Pārvatī asked him once to explain to her the secrets of yoga.
Acquiescing, he took her to an uninhabited island and expounded the teachings about the
haṭha yoga there, in the seclusion. In the meantime, Matsyendranāth in the form of a fish,
or swallowed into the belly of a large fish (depending on the version of the story),
5
overheard the dialogue and thus learned the secrets of yoga (Matsyendranāth, also known
as Mīnanāth, means the ‘Fish-lord.’) Later, while on a pilgrimage, Matsyendranāth
enjoyed a hospitality of a brahmin couple and as a sign of appreciation, upon hearing that
they were childless, gave to the woman a piece of magical ash (vibhūti) to eat. He
explained that in this fashion she would conceive of a child. The woman was however
persuaded by her friends not to eat it and instead threw the ashes on a cow-dung heap.
After twelve years Matsyendra returned and enquired about the child; the woman
confessed what she had done. The yogi went to the place where the ashes were thrown
and called to the child. From the bottom of the hole filled with the cow-dung a voice
replied, and when the place was cleared, a beautiful boy was found sitting in the yogic
posture. Matsyendra gave him the name Gorakhnāth (Skt. Gorakṣanātha), which may be
translated as ‘The Master Protected by Cows,’ or ‘The Master Who Protects the Cows.’
(The metaphorical underpinning of the name lies in the fact that a ‘cow’ is also an
expression for the senses.)10
There are several features in this mythic story of origin that deserve comments
and elucidation. To start with, there is the mytheme of a divinely instituted tradition. This
is a widely attested motif, which obviously aims to lend legitimacy to a particular social
and religious institution. A well-known and illustrative example of such legitimizing
strategy is observable in Buddhism, where both Mahāyāna and Vajrayāna divisions,
emerging respectively (and approximately) five and ten centuries after the life of the
historical Buddha Śākyamuni, argued that their teachings were in fact originally
promulgated by the founder of the religion himself (and only ‘hidden’ from general
populace until the time for their revelation was ‘ripe’). It can be safely argued that such
6
legitimizing strategies are universal in the history of religions. Returning to the Nāths, the
additional element that is of relevance in the present context is the widely assumed notion
that Śiva is a supreme master of yoga himself: to be engaged in the practice of this
spiritual discipline thus amounts, among other things, to an imitatio Dei.
The fact that Śiva takes his wife to an isolated island in order to expound the
teachings about yoga underscores the importance of secrecy in the transmission of this
spiritual discipline: yoga is an esoteric tradition, on which see more later. I have argued
in earlier writings that an appropriate and useful theoretical model, which could be
adopted in order to approach and understand traditions of yoga and tantra, is the model of
esotericism (otherwise mostly associated with the academic study of Western
esotericism), and which also includes, or overlaps, categories such as magic and the
occult. 11 A significant, though by no means the most important, aspect of esoteric
teachings and practices is precisely the element of secrecy. Such teachings are not
intended for everyone – they presuppose initiation, an intimate and often exclusive
teacher-disciple relationship, they are expressed in a coded discourse (such as the
‘twilight language,’ sandhyā bhāṣā12), and they are therefore typically secret. Joseph
Alter in fact argued that “all techniques of yoga were conceived of as quintessentially
secret, being imparted by a guru only to select highly adept disciples.”13 Some other
aspects of esoteric worldview, such as the correlative thinking and the belief in occult
powers will be addressed subsequently.
Jogis are widely believed to be engaged in magic and perceived as miracleworkers. Arguably, the most peculiar ability that they are associated with is the power of
engendering children through non-sexual means. In addition, they are often, and in
7
particular at the level of popular culture, often seen and feared as ambivalent and even
negative characters. To take advantage of David Gordon White’s recent study and its
title, they are not rarely perceived as ‘sinister yogis.’14 We see all of these notions
displayed in the segments of the story under discussion: Matsyendra possesses a magic
powder that can produce a child when consumed, while the brahmin woman, although
barren and desiring children, is easily persuaded against eating the vibhūti, afraid that
Matsyendranāth might be one of those ‘sinister’ characters intent on harming her. The
power of his magic manifests itself, nevertheless, and the child is indeed produced, even
though not through the agency of a human mother.
Gorakhnāth is thus a ‘yogic-child’ par excellence, having no human parents. His
birth was not occasioned by an ordinary sexual act. He is conceived out of the magic
‘ash,’ and he gestated in, and was born from, the earth. All of these elements constitute
significant aspects of the Nāth worldview. According to them, the human sexual act is the
principal cause of aging and ultimately death, since it implies the loss of semen, which
they associate with the ‘elixir of immortality,’ amṛt. From their androcentric point of
view, the jogis believe that amṛt resides on top of the (male) head and that in the form of
a bindu (‘drop’) it trickles down the spinal column, until it is ejected through the sexual
act in the form of semen. This is the reason the yogis urge that the bindu needs to return
back to its place of origin (through the practice of yoga) and as a consequence, the sex is
discouraged and the vagina portrayed as a ‘vampire.’15 The ashes, widely used by Śaiva
ascetics and devotees (as a bodily adornment and a sign of sectarian identity), among
other things symbolize the burned semen and as such they signal victory over sexual
drive. I am inclined to interpret this segment of the story as a reference to Gorakhnāth as
8
the child of Śiva (symbolized by the ashes, the burnt ‘semen’) and his śakti (symbolized
by the earth) from one point of view, and also as the ‘child’ of the contact between two
cakras, the highest and the lowest, from another.16
In order to introduce the reader to the conceptual world of The Sayings of Gorakhnāth, an
exposition of the basic doctrinal features associated with the yoga of the Nāths is in order.
I have treated extensively the hermeneutics of the Nāth haṭha yoga in a previous work.17
The interested reader is also invited to consult the literature that focuses more fully on the
historical and anthropological approach to the Nāths, admirably presented in the
monographs by Briggs (1973 [1938]), Dasgupta (1995 [1969]), Gold (1992), Bouy
(1994), White (1996), Bouillier (1997; 2017), and Mallinson (2007).
It has already been established by Dasgupta that the Nāth haṭha yoga represents
an internalization of the principles of Indian alchemy, rasāyan.18 In this context, instead
of searching for the elixir of immortality by working on external substances, the yogis
attempt to achieve the same goal by manipulating the bodily fluids and energies of the
subtle body. This last-mentioned term deserves to be explained more fully.
André
Padoux (2013: 9) comments that the specific form of yogic body, consisting primarily of
cakras and conduits of energy, which is “imagined, visualized, even sometimes ‘felt’ as
present (‘intraposed’) within the physical body of the yogin, is usually called ‘subtle
body’ in English.” He prefers not to use the term, because in “all Sanskrit texts, the term
sūkṣmaśarīra (or sūkṣmadeha) designates not this structure but the transmigrating
element in the human being, which is made up of different tattvas and therefore has no
shape, no visible aspect. It cannot be visualized as is the inner structure of cakras and
9
nāḍis” (ibid: 10; emphasis in the original). I continue to use the term subtle body
nonetheless, among other reasons in order to acknowledge the commonality with the
variously imagined subtle body in Western esotericism (the common element being the
notion of the existence of another body superimposed, or ‘intraposed,’ within the
physical).19
The most important aspect of the Nāth sādhanā consists of the transformation of
the sexual fluids (often glossed as the ‘drop’ of the sperm, bindu) into the nectar of
immortality (amṛt). This is in practice achieved by the assumption of bodily postures
(āsan), breathing exercises (prāṇāyām,) chanting of the mantras (jap), and by meditation
(dhyān). In addition, and as already suggested, it may be argued that the ideological
universe of the Nāth yogis may appropriately be described as a form of esotericism, and
even as a form of magic. In the words of George W. Briggs, in his pioneering work on
the jogīs, “Quite in keeping with the claims to supernatural power, which skill the Yoga
is supposed to confer, is the popular belief that Yogīs work in magic.”20 The social
orientation of the Nāths is characterized by the critique of the traditional supremacy of
the brahmins and the associated varṇāśramadharma system (the doctrine of the
hierarchical ordering of society in accordance with social class and one’s stage of life).
In this respect, many of the poems in the collection resemble the content and tenor of
Kabīr’s poetry. The Nāth yogis eschew easy classification: they are both similar and
distinct from the classical yogis, tāntrikas, bhāktas, sants, Sikhs, and Indian sūfis. In a
sense, they are, and often consider themselves to be, a unique social and religious
group.21
10
MAJOR THEMES IN THE SAYINGS OF GORAKHNĀTH
The ideological universe of the Sayings of Gorakhnāth is circumscribed by the focus on
yoga. This type of yoga, as already mentioned, takes the body as a primary instrument of
achievement. Here the mastery of the body does not exactly refer to an ability to assume
a number of postures,22 but, more importantly, it implies an ability to redirect the flow of
the bindu and thus to escape or ‘trick’ death. Alternatively expressed, the engagement
with the body starts at the physical level, while the mark of adeptship lies in the mastery
of the subtle body and its properties. The process of yoga is often referenced through the
metaphor of ‘cooking,’ a notion associated with the concept of the ascetic ‘heat,’ tapas,
which is of fundamental importance in Indian spiritual culture.23 An important leitmotif
of The Sayings of Gorakh is that the scale of values among yogis is not the same as the
normatively established social scale of values characterized by the superiority of the
brahmins. Erudition and social class mean nothing when compared with the real
knowledge that is, in their opinion, exclusive to the yogis. And this knowledge is
primarily the knowledge of the occult properties of the body.
There is a cluster of related terms that are fundamental to the Sayings of Gorakh:
bindu, sabad, nād, and amṛt. Bindu is the “drop” of immortality that ordinary and
ignorant people waste in the form of semen ejaculated in sexual activity, thus falling into
the claws of death. Instead, the bindu needs to be controlled through celibacy and
returned to the top of the head through the process of yoga. Sabad and nād are related
terms: on the one hand, they represent an encapsulation of the yogic gnosis in the form of
the word (sabad) and sound (nād); on the other hand, they are the acoustic and verbal
equivalents of the bindu in its subtle transformations. At the highest station, on the top of
11
the head, the bindu turns into the elixir, amṛt. In its itinerary, from the bottom of the spine
to the top of the head, the bindu passes through a set of cakras. In particular, the subtle
center associated with the so-called ‘third-eye’ receives a great deal of attention, while its
location is esoterically glossed as the confluence of the ‘three rivers’ (triveṇī).
As is typical of Indian traditional culture, particularly within the milieu of yoga
and tantra, the role of the spiritual teacher, guru, is of singular importance. The guru is a
person who performs the ceremony of initiation to a disciple, and who in the process
imparts the secrets of yoga. To paraphrase Gorakhnāth: only the person who has a guru
can hope to drink the elixir of immortality; the one who is without a guru remains
thirsty.24 Several poems in the collection address somewhat unusual dynamics between
Gorakhnāth and his own teacher Matsyendranāth. According to a well-known narrative,
Matsyendranāth in the course of his career temporarily forgot about his yogic identity
while living in the country of women, married to their queen, enjoying the pleasures of
sensual and familial life. He is brought back to his yogic vocation only after Gorakhnāth
personally intervened – disguised as a female dancer! – and through a series of poems
imparted the teachings of yoga back to his own teacher.25
A number of poems are enigmatic and display characteristics of the ‘twilight
language,’ sandhyā bhāṣā. The symbolic capital inherent in such poems simultaneously
attracts the attention of the listener, as all mysterious things do, while it also draws a line
of demarcation over which the erudition of the scholars (paṇḍits) cannot cross: the
solution to the enigmas of the Nāth lore lies not in books but in the practice of yoga and
mastery of the body (kāyā sādhanā). The employment of enigmatic discourse, the
‘twilight language,’ is otherwise typical of esoteric rhetoric, and its use among the Nāths
12
and tāntrikas in general exhibits a strong formal resemblance to the vocabulary of
Western alchemy and the so-called ‘language of the birds’ employed in the occult circles.
A comparative study of the two is a desideratum.
An important formal device is employed through the ‘upside-down’ (ulṭa bāmsī)
poems. The relevance of this stylistic device, which inverts the logical, causal, or
chronological structure of the described content, lies in its association with the
fundamental methodological orientation of the Nāth yogis. The project of the Nāth yoga
is not only the ‘cultivation of the body’ (kāyā sādhanā) but equally so the ‘cultivation of
the reversal’ (ulṭā sādhanā). The world (saṃsār) is a current that inevitably flows to
death and annihilation, just as on the microcosmic level the same predicament is the
result of the drainage of the bindu, which trickles from the top of the head towards the
destructive heat of the gastric fire and ejaculation in the act of sex. The way out, the
Nāths urge, consists in the reversal of this process: the flow of the bindu needs to be
reversed, which procedure also entails the reversal of the ordinary way of looking at
things. This apparent psychological paradox finds its expression in the ulṭa bāmsī poems.
This same discursive strategy marks the boundary between the jogīs and ordinary people:
their perception of truth and scale of values are mutually at odds.
In what follows, the above-summarized major themes and concepts that are
relevant for understanding the worldview of The Sayings of Gorakhnāth will be given
more extensive treatment.
13
THE PRACTICE OF REVERSAL: ULṬĀ SĀDHANĀ
The most distinctive methodological principle in the spiritual project associated with the
Nāth yogis is arguably the practice of reversal, the ulṭā sādhanā. This principle is evident
in several aspects of the Nāth worldview. First and foremost, it relates to their
fundamental insistence that the goal of yogic practice necessitates the reversal of the
natural trajectory of the bindu: while in the case of ordinary people the bindu is wasted
after it trickles down from its presumed source at the top of the head, and is either burnt
in the gastric fire or ejaculated in the sex act, the Nāths attempt to push it back to its place
of origin, the full success in which operation amounts to the achievement of immortality.
To reach the state of immortality is thus the ultimate goal of this form of yoga, at the
accomplishment of which the successful adept (siddha) becomes a ‘second Śiva.’
Incidentally, this accomplishment signals a different goal from the traditional orientation
prevalent in Indian spirituality, whose aim was liberation (mokṣa). Such differently
conceptualized goal connects the Nāths with the tāntrikas: not an escape from the world
but its conquering through divinization is the sought outcome of the practice. The
connection between the successfully performed redirecting of the path of the bindu and
divinization is aptly addressed in Dasgupta’s (1995 [1969]: 246) summary: “[I]t has been
emphatically declared in all texts of yoga that he, who has been able to give an upward
flow to the [seminal] fluid is a god, and not a man.” In the words of a sabad from the
Sayings of Gorakh: “The yogi who holds above what goes below / Who burns [the god
of] sex, abandons the embrace [of a woman] / Who cuts through māyā – / Even Viṣṇu
washes his feet!”26
14
A larger issue concerns the fact that the habitual trajectory of the bindu
corresponds paradigmatically to the orientation and predicament of the embodied
existence as such: the path of the bindu coincides with the path of saṃsār, and to redirect
its flow coincides with an attempt to oppose and conquer the force of saṃsār. This
implies a lifestyle conducted ‘against the grain.’ It is equivalent to swimming against the
current of saṃsār that otherwise carries ordinary people towards certain death and
inevitable (and unwanted) rebirth. Here we encounter what is both an archaic and
fundamental notion in Hinduism: the tendency towards liberation from the saṃsār is not
commensurable with the conventions of ordinary life. In its most radical form, the path of
mokṣa is set not only apart but even against the path of dharma, which is evident inter
alia by the fact that a person adopting the lifestyle of renunciation (saṃnyās) ritually
enacts this decision by cutting off the sacred thread that otherwise serves as an indication
of his “second birth” into one of the three higher classes of Hindu society: such a person
is subsequently considered as dead to the world.27 According to some interpretations,
Hinduism as a culture is in itself an attempt to reconcile the tension between dharma and
mokṣa by integrating the latter into the former in such a way so as not to disrupt the
regular functioning of the society (for example, by suggesting that renunciation is to be
undertaken only after the person has fulfilled his social obligations by study, marriage,
and fathering of children).
Ethically, this means, in the context of the worldview of the Nāths, that the
morality of the world is at odds with the morality of the yogis. The latter are “neither
smeared by sin, nor overcome by virtue” – a phrase often repeated in the literature of the
Nāths that has its locus classicus in the Bhagavad Gītā. 28 This position creates a
15
condition of moral relativism that advocates a philosophy ‘beyond good and evil,’ since
both good and evil refer to the categories that are intrinsic to saṃsār. As Gorakhnāth puts
it, “The sin and the virtue are the house of karma.”29 It is thus no surprise that such
gesturing away from the consensual morality lead to the perception of yogis as sinister
characters, as recently explored in a study by White (2011). But an additional
qualification is in order. The path of power (siddhi) is also in and of itself to a large
degree distinct or even opposed to the path of liberation (mokṣa) just as both of these
paths, attempting to transcend the force of saṃsār, differ from the rules and regulations
of ordinary, this-worldly, lifestyle dominated by the requirements of dharma. The “path
of power,” typical of tantra, stands in contradistinction to the “path of purity” that is
characteristic of the brahminical scale of dharmic values (Sanderson 1985). I have argued
elsewhere (Djurdjevic 2008) that the path of power is also typical of magic, as a form of
religious belief and practice, where power is approached as a manifestation of the sacred.
The practice of reversal also finds its echo in certain characteristic features of
yogic discourse, where some of their poetic compositions are expressed in the form of
‘upside-down’ poetry characterized by an inverted logic. To provide an example, we are
told in a pad from the Sayings of Gorakh that “The cuckoo is flowering / The mango is
scattering the perfume. / The fish in the sky / Swallows the heron.”30 Significantly, the
employment of inverted logic does not only indicate that the Nāths do things differently:
it also suggests, through mirroring, that the ways of the world are actually upside-down
and the message of yogic poetry expressed in this literary idiom serves as a reminder and
an invitation to realize the foolishness of secular lifestyle and thus, by implication, to
redirect the attention of the audience to the path of yoga. “Those who reverse the breath,
16
say reversed things, / Who drink the undrinkable: they are the ones who know
brahman.”31 The same principle of reversal is also observable in an unusual element
concerning the yogic hierarchy, where the student Gorakhnāth chastises and effectively
assumes the role of a teacher to his erstwhile guru Matsyendranāth, a ‘fallen’ yogi!
The most characteristic feature of the practice of reversal, as already indicated,
concerns the redirecting of the flow of the bindu. The bindu itself is a complex subject
with a polyvalent range of meanings (see below). In the parlance of the jogis, it refers
mostly to the ‘drop’ of seminal fluid with potentially ambrosial properties. “Where the
bindu dwells, there is life,” states a sabad from the Sayings of Gorakh. 32 In the ordinary
circumstances, people waste their bindu through sexual activity and seminal emission: a
lamentable state of affairs from the yogic viewpoint. “Bindu in the mouth of yoni
becomes [like] mercury in the mouth of fire,” warns Gorakhnāth.33 Hence the need to not
only preserve it through sexual abstinence but, more importantly, to redirect it towards its
place of origin at the top of the head. “In the circle of the sky [i.e. in the cakra on top of
the head], there is an upside-down well / There the nectar [amṛt] resides.”34 In theological
terms, the importance of the bindu – as well as the often-understated significance of the
feminine menstrual blood – is made evident in the verse that proclaims: “Śakti is
[manifest] in the form of menstrual blood /Śiva is [manifest] in the form of semen
[bindu].”35 And once the bindu has reached its point of origin, the achievement manifests,
or rather, it is symbolically connoted, as the vision of the eternal child (buḍhā bāl, ‘old
youth’) in the act of speaking that is beyond names and words: “In the summit of the sky,
a child, who cannot be named, is speaking.”36
17
THE CULTIVATION OF THE BODY: KĀYA SĀDHANĀ
Aside from being engaged in the practice of reversal, the Nāth yogis are also
distinguished by the cultivation of the body (kāyā sādhanā) for the purpose of achieving
their spiritual goals. As is very well known, “there are primarily two systematic forms of
South Asian yoga.”37 The classical yoga associated with the system elucidated in the
Yoga Sūtras of Patañjali focused primarily on the discipline of the mind as a way of
reaching “isolation” (kaivālya) of the subject (puruṣ) from its misidentification with
aspects of the objective world of “nature” (prakṛti). In its philosophical background, this
form of yoga relies on the worldview of sāṃkhya, the traditional school of thought that
envisions reality as consisting of ontologically distinct but empirically intertwined dyad:
the subject (puruṣ) consisting of pure consciousness without any describable qualities
that could be attached to it, and the world of phenomena (prakṛti) that consists of not
only material and corporal objects but also includes emotions, thoughts, and the sense of
personality (ahaṃkār). The origin of misidentification of puruṣ with prakṛti is not fully
explained but is accepted as existentially given. By stilling the body through a steady
posture (āsan), regulating the breath (prāṇāyām), and turning the attention inward
(pratyāhār), the yogi is ready to engage with the control of the mind (saṃyam). This is
achieved by first “holding” the mind (dhāraṇā) on a certain object (whether visualized
externally or within the body, such as the navel or the middle of the forehead). By
prolonging this mental stillness (dhyān), one eventually and hopefully reaches the stage
of “unity” (samādhi) – in other words, one achieves an “isolation” (kaivālya) of the pure
consciousness of puruṣ from prakṛti. Thus envisioned, the goal of Pātañjala yoga
coincides with the acosmic tendency of Indian renunciate traditions, which focus on the
18
escape from the phenomenal world (saṃsār) that is characterized by illusion and
suffering predicated upon the endless succession of rebirths and, more importantly, redeaths .
The virtually simultaneous emergence of tantric traditions within Hindu and
Buddhist environments signaled, among other things, a reevaluation of the nature of the
manifest reality and, by implication and as a consequence, a reformulation of the goal of
spiritual practice. While not suggesting that “tantrism” is a unified phenomenon (it is
not), in simplified terms it may still be possible to define it as a religious and
philosophical “style” of thought and practice that embraces rather than rejects the world,
and that aspires towards power rather than liberation. 38 One consequence of this
orientation lies in the increased interest in the religious potentials of the human body,
including – in some strands of tantric theory and practice – the power of sexuality.
Another important aspect of tantric traditions concerns the increased presence of what
may be termed the occult or magical elements in their ideology and practice. Tantric
traditions are for the most part a medieval phenomenon and although not extinct, their
current position within Hindu society is rather marginal, with some notable exceptions to
the contrary.39
To what degree are the Nāth yogis a tantric denomination is an open question.
Their style of yoga certainly focuses on the occult aspects of the body that are being
harnessed for the ultimate purpose of becoming a “second Śiva.” Despite the fact that the
haṭha yoga, associated with the Nāths, contains a number of physical postures in its
textual repertoire, the real issue here is not the engagement with the physical body but
with its “subtle” constituents: the cakras, the conduits of the subtle energy (nāḍīs), elixir
19
(amṛt), and what the jogis call “the fire of brahman” (brahmāgni), which is for all
practical purposes identical with what is otherwise generally and better known as the
kuṇḍalinī. (In other forms of tantric Hinduism, kuṇḍalinī is also, in one of its registers, a
Goddess – the Nāths are typically androcentric and this may explain the alternative
choice of designation for this inner force.) The whole purpose of the Nāth sādhanā lies
not in the ability to assume corporal postures but in the mastery of the occult powers
hidden in the body, just as their ideological worldview rests on the belief that the human
body (piṇḍ) represents a telescoped equivalent of the external universe (brahmāṇḍ): the
microcosm being analogous to the macrocosm. This is a fundamental esoteric notion,
maintained in a number of traditional religious worldviews, and in this specific case it
also stands as a particular development of the earlier upaniṣadic concept of bandhu
(“relation”), which concept also includes the ontological equation between ātman and
brahman.40
The Nāths insist that to know and master the human body, especially in its occult
aspects, amounts to the mastery of yoga, which leads to power, the siddhis, and in the
final instance to immortality.41 “Understand the body! Obtain the siddhi!” urges the short
text (included here) “The Seven Days” (v. 4). In a similar vein, the Sanskrit Gorakṣa
Śataka (v. 13) asks rhetorically: how is it possible to obtain success in yoga unless one
knows what are precisely esoteric corporal constituents: cakras, “channels” (naḍi), and
“sheaths” (vyoma) of, and within, the body? The esoteric (“subtle”) human body, the
main focus of the Nāth sādhanā, is an analogical replica of the external universe. As
Gorakhnāth says, “Within the one there is the infinite, and within the infinite there is the
one. / By the one the infinite is produced. / When the one is experienced within, / The
20
infinite is contained within the one.”42 The cosmos is mirrored and present within the
human body in both physical and metaphysical aspects. 43 The body contains inner
replicas not only of this-worldly phenomena, such as rivers, mountains, places of
pilgrimage, and astronomical luminaries, but also the heavenly and demonic realms,
gods, demigods, and demons, and their respective domains.
In the Sayings of Gorakh, the esoteric correlation between the individual and
cosmic body implies that the engagement with the body as the locus of yogic practice
ultimately leads to metaphysical truths and accomplishes spiritual goals: “[The one who]
investigates the body and finds the indestructible [God] / Attains the unreachable
immortal rank,”44 claims Gorakhnāth. More elaborate enumeration of the spiritual and
other cosmological phenomena hidden in the body is provided in the text (included here)
called “A Line of Hair” (referring to the fine line of hair above the navel that is
considered a mark of beauty). Here we are told that within the body are present inter alia
the Hindu and Muslim pīrs (elders, teachers), the four Nāth gurus, the four cardinal
directions, the Sun with its twelve aspects, and Moon with its sixteen aspects. The
assumed presence of the Nāth gurus within the body is of significance that deserves
further comments. Broadly speaking, one of the hallmarks of the Hindu tantric traditions
concerns the assumed presence of the god Śiva in the highest cakra, and of his spouse
(often glossed simply as śakti, “energy”) in the lowest cakra in the human body (in the
form of kuṇḍalinī). This situation mirrors the macrocosmic stations of these deities: Śiva
is on the top of the mount Meru or Kailās (esoterically and microcosmically identified
with the spinal column) while his spouse is present on and as the phenomenal universe
and the Earth. The Nāths also adopt this viewpoint, although, as already mentioned, there
21
is a tendency – particularly in the bānīs translated here – to use the term “the fire of
brahman” instead of, and as an equivalent of, kuṇḍalinī. Nevertheless, the following pad
(GB P19) makes explicit reference to both Śiva and Śakti as follows:
Śakti is inside the twelve petals of the Sun,
And Śiva’s place is inside the sixteen [petals] of the Moon.
Mūla[dhār]45&and Sahasrār46 are the house of jīva&and Śiva.
As already stated, an interesting variant on the theme of the body as the locus of
metaphysical realities as found in the Sayings of Gorakh consists of the suggestion that
the Nāth masters esoterically dwell within the human body as well. “In everybody’s heart
is Gorakh / In everybody’s heart is Mina [Matsyendranāth]” [GBS 38]. This establishes
an elaborate set of mutual mirroring based on the notion of the identity between a disciple
and the teacher. Just as Gorakhnāth, as an accomplished adept, is essentially identical
with the great god Śiva, so is an individual yogi identical with Gorakh, who dwells ‘in
everybody’s heart.’ This line of thinking, as already suggested, is in itself one of the
many contextualizations of the upaniṣadic dictum regarding the ontological identity
between the universal brahman and individual (but transpersonal) ātman.
An esoteric understanding of the nature of Gorakhnāth is already assumed in the
important, first sabad in the present collection of texts, which deserves a comment. The
sabad states: “Neither full nor empty, neither empty nor full: /It is inaccessible,
mysterious. /At the summit of the sky, a child, /Who cannot be named is speaking.” The
sabad describes a vison of the ultimate reality as it is experienced in the highest cakra, on
the top of (or, rather, above) the head. This location is described as “the summit of [the
22
mountain in] the sky” (“gagan sikhar”), which implicitly suggest the mythical Meru
mountain, the axis mundi of the Indian spiritual traditions, and its esoteric correlate, the
human subtle body where the central conduit of the vital energy passes through the spinal
column, adorned by the six (or seven) cakras. This reality transcends the dualities
inherent in the phenomenal world (saṃsār), which is indicated here by its depiction of
being neither of the pairs of opposites characteristic of this world. What obtains in this
“inaccessible and mysterious” reality is the presence of a ‘child’ who cannot be named,
given that the nature of this child similarly transcends the descriptive capabilities of
ordinary language. The ‘child,’ who by inference is Gorakhnāth himself (as a ‘second
Śiva’), delivers a speech: arguably, the bānīs, sayings of truth, that constitute the body of
this collection of texts.
SEXUALITY AND IMMORTALITY: BINDU AND AMṚT
As we have seen, the human body, and in particular the esoteric body, as envisioned by
the jogis is a site of numinous realities. One constitutive element of such esoteric
physiology, already referenced on several occasions, deserves special mention. The
conceptual vocabulary of the Sayings of Gorakh contains numerous mentions of, and
allusions to, what is often translated as the ‘seminal drop,’ the bindu. It calls for an
immediate remark that the bindu indicates more than its corporeal referent, the semen,
which represents only the material form of an essentially subtle-body phenomenon. The
really important properties of the bindu are consequently occult, and for that reason
Gorakhnāth declares: “Very few know the mystery of this bindu.”47 In simplified terms,
the bindu is the causal ‘root’ of the body. At the same time, it has connections with the
23
subtle realities represented by the sound, nād (see below) and the ambrosia, amṛt. From
another point of view, the bindu correlates with the breath and the state of the mind in
that all of these three need to be controlled or ‘fixed’ by the method of yoga. 48
Conversely, the state of spiritual ignorance in which most of the people habitually dwell
is characterized by the lack of control when it comes to their mind, breath, and sexuality
(which in the worldview of the nāths often paradigmatically equates with the focus on
bindu). The accomplished yogi, siddha, is the one who has ‘preserved the bindu.’49 The
call to preserve the bindu is a leitmotif in the Sayings of Gorakh; as the statement in “A
Line of Hair” declares, “The bindu is the seal that needs to be sealed.”
According to the 11th century tantric text Śāradā Tilaka (“The Ornament of the
Goddess”), “Bindu has the nature of Śiva, bīja of Śakti, and nāda is their mutual
conjunction: it is declared so by all those who are versed in the Āgamas [i.e. Tantras].”50
The Sayings of Gorakh rarely reference Śakti, as their worldview is predominantly
androcentric. Thus, their primary tenor is the one expressing the concern for the
preservation of the bindu understood as a vehicle of immortality, which should not be
wasted through the sexual act. As the Sanskrit Gorakṣa Śataka declares, “As long as the
bindu stays in the body, how could there be the fear of death?”51 This imperative
naturally presupposes the practice of celibacy, which among other things also finds its
reflection in the matters of social value judgment: the celibate yogis are considered
superior to the householder Nāths. For this reason, it is rather curious to come across a
sabad that seems to suggest a situation where the sexual activity is acceptable as long as
it does not culminate in the seminal discharge: “Those who in the sexual intercourse
preserve the bindu: They are Gorakh’s guru-brothers [or, fellow-disciples].”52
24
The most important attribute of the bindu relates to its ambrosial properties. At its
place of origin in the head cakra, the bindu equates with the elixir of immortality, amṛt.
The yogi is supposed to drink the downward oozing amṛt by the process of reversal or by
employing the technique of the khecarī mudra, which involves cutting the frenulum
linguae and blocking with the tongue the throat cavity so as to stop the leakage of the
elixir.53 Having obtained the control of the flow of the semen, “the body becomes young,
immortal, and settled.”54 This is the goal of yoga as envisioned by the Nāths: “The living
yogi drinks day and night / the continually flowing elixir of immortality.”55 “Becoming
immortal, he [the yogi] should be called the Lord of yoga.” 56 This achievement
establishes a state that is equivalent to the condition of the gods, who are also immortal,
amar. The success in this form of yoga thus renders the yogi a “second Śiva.” An
important early Nāth text, the Khecarīvidyā (attributed to Ādināth, i.e. Śiva), declares that
as a result of successfully executed practice, “[b]y applying himself thus for six months
he [the yogi] assuredly becomes ageless and undying. Truly, he becomes all-knowing,
equal to Śiva [and] free of disease.”57
THE SONIC THEOLOGY OF THE NĀD AND SABAD
The practice of yoga associated with the Nāths, and as referenced in the Sayings of
Gorakh, suggests that one of the signs of success in this discipline entails an experience
of hearing the inner sound. This inner, ‘subtle,’ sound is frequently glossed as an
‘unstruck sound’ (anahāt nād), while the locus of its experience is typically, though not
exclusively, at the region of the heart, in the anahāt cakra. (It is important to bear in mind
that according to Indian, and in fact pan-Asian traditional worldview, the heart is also the
25
locus of the mind.) To become cognizant of this subtle sound, inaudible to ordinary
sensory perception, does not only indicate an ability to experience other, more refined
levels of reality, but more importantly, it implies an increase in knowledge, in wisdom.
Here, the act of perception entails a kind of knowing, or rather, it denotes the true
knowing. This relates to some fundamental axioms of Hindu epistemology and
spirituality, which may be described as the theology of sound and mysticism of language,
already firmly rooted in the oldest layers of Vedic religion, which in itself emerges as a
revelation of the sacred verbal formulas, mantras. The principal attribute of a mantra lies
in its sound, the meaning being secondary in importance and even superfluous.58 The
most well-known example of such mantra is OṂ or AUṂ.59 Simultaneously, an essential
assumption, shared by all forms of Indian spirituality, asserts that whatever is more subtle
is by this very token more real.
In the Sayings of Gorakh, the category of nād is often correlated (it would be
inappropriate to state, conflated) with the notion of sabad, while both are simultaneously
connected to the process of ‘fixation’ of the bindu. Expressed in a somewhat simplified
manner, the success in reversing the direction of the seminal fluid, the bindu, at a certain
stage of practice results in the experience of the inner sound (nād) or word (sabad).
Hence, Gorakhnāth urges: “You should perfect both nād and bindu / And then play the
unstruck sound.”60 At another place, providing more substance to the methodology of the
process, he elaborates that “The nād is the anvil, and the bindu is the hammer. / The Sun
and the Moon [i.e. the right and left channels of the prāṇa] are the bellows of the breath. /
[When you] press the root [cakra], seated firmly in the posture [āsan], then birth and
death disappear.”61
26
The scholar of Sikhism Hew McLeod has made a pertinent comment regarding
the proficiency in the practice of yoga and its connection with the experience of the
unstruck or (as he translates the term) soundless sound.62 He observes that
the word [sabad] is characteristically used in conjunction with anahad, or
anahat, and refers to the mystical ‘sound’ which is ‘heard’ at the climax of the
haṭha-yoga technique. The anahad śabad is, according to such theories, a
‘soundless sound’, a mystical vibration audible only to the adept who has
succeeded in awakening the kuṇḍalinī and caused it to ascend to the suṣumṇā.63
Several statements found in the Sayings of Gorakh corroborate such view and underscore
the importance of hearing the subtle sound or word. In one of the verses, Gorakhnāth
proclaims that “acknowledging the sabad, the duality [a principal characteristic of
saṃsār] ends.”64 At another place, he sings with a triumphant certainty: “I have found it,
listen, I have found this good! / With firmness [I have reached] the place of sabad. / I had
a vision of it [embodied] in form. / Then I reached a complete faith.”65 Most tellingly, and
making the experience of the sabad the central element of the yogic endeavor,
Gorakhnāth states: “Sabad is truly the lock, sabad is truly the key. Sabad wakes sabad. /
When sabad meets sabad, sabad is contained in sabad.” 66 Similarly, the Sanskrit
Gorakṣa Śataka declares that the internal sound is heard when the subtle conduits (nāḍis)
are cleansed through the process of breath control.67
What all these mutual connections and analogies between the word, sound, breath,
semen, and mind indicate is the dominant presence and importance of correlative
thinking, itself a fundamental building block of esoteric worldview. Reality consists of
27
layers that mutually differ from each other relative to their subtlety, and what is – from
this perspective – more real is simultaneously more hidden from those whose
epistemological convictions, whether based on traditional religious authority or on the
evidence supplied by their ordinary senses, lack the experiential certainty possessed by
the accomplished yogis.
THE CONCEPT OF UNMAN
The texts collected in the Sayings of Gorakh frequently reference an important technical
term, unman (or, unmanī). The Hindi word literary denotes “no mind” or what is “beyond
the mind.” This state of “no mind” is a desirable condition sought after by the yogis and,
for all practical purposes, it functions as an equivalent of samādhi, which Patañjali
depicts as the goal of yoga and his commentator Vyāsa, in his Bhāṣya on Yoga Sūtra 1:1,
glosses as the definition of yoga itself: “Yoga is samādhi” (“yogaḥ samādhiḥ”). The
notion of unman is also conceptually related to what Patañjali terms nirvicāra, denoting
one of the two types of samādhi, characterized by the absence of discursive thinking
(vicāra). Significantly, Patañjali states that in this samādhi devoid of conceptualizations
“there is lucidity of the inner self” (Yoga Sūtra 1:47; trans. Bryant 2009: 157). In a
similar manner, in GBP 11: 4, Gorakhnāth relates that “in the tenth gate dwells Nirañjan,
beyond mind.”68 Nirañjan is a typical name that refers to the formless god worshipped by
the Nāths (the Hindi term literally means “devoid of embellishment”), while the “tenth
gate” denotes brahmarandhra, the aperture located either on the top or slightly above the
head, itself a locus of numinous occurrences. The implication is that the state, which
transcends the ordinary mind (as such a part and parcel of saṃsār) is ipso facto a state
28
where one becomes cognizant of either personally or impersonally constellated
theophany. The correlation between Nirañjan and what Patañjali calls the “inner self”
(adhyātmā) is underscored in a sabad (GBS 231), which literally states that Nirañjan is
“your own self.” What is distinctive in the Gorakhnāth’s account (in GBP 11:4) is that
this state of unman is also related to the esoteric anatomy of the subtle body, being
accessible at a specific area of this body.
As Ian Whicher (1997: 1) notes, the “saṃsāric identity of self – ineluctably
locked into an epistemological and ontological duality with the objective world – is
ingeniously captured by Patañjali … in the expression cittavṛtti [“whirling of the mind”]”
We identify with the modifications of our minds (Whicher’s translation of the term
cittavṛtti) but given that the mind is an aspect of nature, prakṛti, it cannot be the source of
our true identity, since we are a puruṣ [“person”] – as argued by the dualist philosophy of
sāṃkhya, which yoga typically takes for granted. In order to reach our true identity, we
then need to go beyond the mind. The philosophical position of yoga is that the
harnessing of the mind by stopping its constant fluctuations through a process of
meditation results in an epistemological and ontological breakthrough into the realm of
true reality and our genuine identity. The Nāths call that realm “no-mind,” unman. What
they also suggest is that the goal is equally reachable by the process of disciplining the
subtle body and its currents of the occult energy. As a sabad (GBS 55) proclaims, one
should remain in the unmanī by joining the Sun and the Moon, which in the Nāth
parlance refers either to the conjunction of the two main cakras or the two main channels
in the subtle body, but in either case to an aspect of the esoteric physiology and its
29
assumed properties. This esoteric orientation, as arguably a major component of the Nāth
sādhanā, deserves some elaboration.
ESOTERICISM OF THE NĀTHS
As already indicated on several occasions, and as I have previously argued elsewhere
(Djurdjevic 2005; 2008; 2014), I propose that there are theoretical advantages in
categorizing the spiritual project of the Nāth yogis as a form of esotericism. Broadly
speaking, esotericism is that form of cultural and religious life that is characterized by
analogical or correlative thinking (“like attracts like,” “as above, so below,” “as in metal,
so in the body”); by secrecy; by coded discourse; by cultivated imagination (Sanskrit
dhyāna includes this within its range of meanings); by an insistence that the hidden
aspects of reality both permeate and influence everyday world; and by a conviction that
the human potential is ultimately godlike.69 Typical forms or currents of esoteric theory
and practice include magic, alchemy, astrology, divination, and what is loosely termed
the “occult” in general. This important and vast area of human activity was considered
unworthy of serious academic research until several decades ago. Currently, there are
university departments, journals, dictionaries, learned societies, and international
conferences dedicated to the subject. The academic field, still young, is vital and fast
growing.
However, the bulk of the scholarship focuses on what is termed Western
esotericism, with the argument that there pertains historical, ideological, social, and
cultural similarity, and by the same token a uniqueness, in the manifestations of the
current in the “West” (the term itself is neither monolithic nor unchallenged)70 since the
30
appearance of Alexandrian Hermeticism in the late antiquity all through the
contemporary New Age in the bewildering variety of its forms. As part of the same
argument, and proceeding from the aforementioned historical and cultural contingences,
it is suggested that the category should not be extended outside of the boundaries of the
West. It is assumed that by doing so the category might collapse in the attempt to morph
into some vacuous “universal” esotericism. Consequently, forms of foreign (or, “exotic”)
spirituality (such as yoga, tantra, Daoism, etc.) are interrogated only to the degree that
they influence Western esotericism. Finally, one of the arguments against considering
segments of specifically South Asian religious traditions as forms of esotericism proposes
that such a move would represent a kind of neocolonialism: a non-Indian category is
being employed in order to explain her own cultural forms. Esotericism is, in this view, a
type of Procrustean bed, and since the bed is Western, nothing foreign should fit into it,
except by force.
My position is that it makes perfect sense to consider Western esotericism (for a
major part) culturally cohesive and as such distinct and different from, let us say, South
Asian esotericism. At the same time, there is no denying that we see evidence of all the
major traits of esotericism, as described above, displayed in Indian traditions since at
least the emergence of the Āraṇyakas and Upaniṣads (several centuries before the
common era) as the “texts” that explain hidden meanings behind the Vedic sacrificial
ritual. We know that the Indian traditions engaged to a great extent in forms of
knowledge and associated activities, which are otherwise typically considered esoteric,
such as already mentioned alchemy (rasāyaṇa), astrology (jyotish), and magic (one of the
words for which is actually yoga). Aside from these, some forms yoga – and in particular
31
the haṭha yoga associated with the Nāths – as well as tantric traditions in general, are
arguably the closest parallels to Western forms of esotericism and occultism in South
Asian cultural milieu. Focusing for the moment on the Nāths, the concepts of the subtle
body with its cakras and channels of energy, the pursuit of extraordinary powers (siddhi),
often associated with the ‘awakening’ of the ‘serpent’ kuṇḍalinī, the transmission of
secret knowledge through rituals of initiation, the involvement with magic, the
internalization of the alchemical process and the associated notion of the elixir of
immortality (amṛt), just as well as the prospect of divinization – this all is a
straightforward and ‘hardcore’ esotericism.
While by no means proposing that esotericism exists as some universal, unified,
and unchanging category, I still maintain that what we designate by that name can be
observed in other, non-Western, cultures. I suggest that it makes most sense to talk about
regional (e.g. European, Indian, Chinese), denominational (e.g. Christian, Hindu,
Buddhist, Daoist), and/or historical (e.g. ancient, medieval, contemporary) forms of
esotericism. Each one of these forms is entangled in respective social, historical,
religious, and cultural negotiations specific to their time and place, and these particular
contingencies make them each specific, unique, and different from other forms of
esotericism. What does make them similar are those traits that we, as scholars and
theoreticians, postulate as characteristic of this notion that we have created as a second
order category and call esotericism. It is a conceptual rather than ontological category.
Even in the case of Western esotericism, the term itself is only a few centuries old (while
it covers almost two millennia of perceived history), and most of the exponents we
designate as esotericist did not apply the term self-referentially. One could argue that it is
32
as artificial to call these people esotericists as it is to apply the term to, say, the Nāth
yogis.
To insist that only in the Western cultural sphere we find ideas and practices that
privilege hidden aspects of reality, occult powers of the human body and mind, belief in
magic, belief in the existence of intermediary beings, in coded discourse, the existence of
initiatic models of the transmission of secret knowledge, and other related notions and
activities effectively implies uniqueness, exclusivity, and even superiority of the West.
Such exceptionalism does not stand up to comprehensive scrutiny. At the same time, it is
worthwhile to recall that this category is only one possible and by no means sole
interpretative and heuristic model that one can apply to a particular form of cultural life
such as, let us say, the yoga of the Nāths. To the degree that doing so helps us understand
such cultural manifestations better, more fully, more clearly, and to the degree that it
provides a basis for meaningful comparative investigations, the category is useful. It is in
that sense and to that degree that I feel justified in employing it while applying it to the
Nāths and the tantric traditions in general. A great deal of insight and sophistication
related to the understanding of magic and the ‘occult’ has been made in the last few
decades by the scholars of esotericism and our knowledge of these forms of religious life
will be furthered by going beyond the narrow category of ‘Western,’ and by embracing
and investigating other, and in particular Asian, forms of this category.
CONCLUSIONS
Considering the totality of texts gathered in the Sayings of Gorakhnāth translated here, it
would be rather challenging to summarize their content in a cohesive and concise
33
manner. The subject matter is obviously not unified, and the focus of instruction often
shifts. But a definite picture of the Nāth worldview does emerge. The previous sections of
this introduction addressed the major themes that are discernible in the textual material at
hand. To paraphrase one more time the principle aspects of the ideological universe
present in the bānīs, it could be said that Gorakhnāth (as the authorial persona behind the
texts) emphasizes the experiential path of yoga, as opposed to the bookish knowledge
associated with the Hindu and Muslim priestly authorities. This path is also distinct from
the focus on the external trappings of yoga connected with the pursuits of those that
Gorakhnāth considers as hypocrites (see GBS 47 and GBS 190): yoga does not depend on
the sectarian paraphernalia, it is not concerned with pilgrimages, it is not achieved by
talking. Instead, the path lies inward and all the external accoutrements associated with
the spiritual way of life are simply symbolic of the inner realities and qualities: “Mind is
the yogi and the body is the temple; five elements make the robe. / Forgiveness is [sitting
in] the six postures. / Wisdom is the supporting crutch and good judgment the wooden
slippers. /Thinking is the walking stick” (GBS 48).
Properly approached and understood path of yoga further consists of several
major domains of practice. The posture (āsan) is frequently mentioned, but never does it
imply anything comparable to the contemporary postural yoga. In that sense, the bānīs
are in sync with Patañjali’s injunction (YS II: 46), which requires that the practice of
yoga is conducted in a steady posture – not a series of postures. The control of breath
(prāṇāyām)is also recommended, often understood as the “chant without chanting (ajapā
jap),” which amounts to the awareness of the natural (sahaj) cycles of breathing. Finally,
the focus tends to be directed towards the subtle body, its cakras, the bindu that needs to
34
be redirected in its flow, and, eventually, the elixir obtained. Occasionally, it is suggested
that the results associated with the success in yoga could also be achieved through the
alchemical means, and that the body may also be transformed in that manner (see GBS 49
and GBP 54: 1). There are clear indications that to achieve the goal in these endeavors
amounts to the divinization of the yogi (see in particular GBS 17-19). Aside from
references to Śiva as the highest god, the absolute is also frequently addressed as
Nirañjan, and understood as formless.
I am inclined to speculate that the thematic variations in the bānīs result from the
fact that they are not addressing a uniform audience. I suspect that the key to the intended
recipients of particular verses lies in the division of the yogis into four main classes (see
GBS 136 and “Royal Understanding” v.1). The insistence on proper ethical behaviour
and the clarification of social priorities are of interest and value to the beginner yogis,
while the difficulties inherent in the drinking of the elixir and the mystical states
associated with the success in doing so are clearly intended for the benefit of the
perfected yogis. Expressed somewhat alternatively, the subject matter varies depending
on the stage of yoga that the texts are addressing, while the exposition is not
chronologically or thematically arranged. But even if that suspicion is correct, and even if
that brings certain light to the texts, there does remain so much in them that is enigmatic
and that escapes scholarly analysis and comprehension. But such is the nature of
theoretical knowledge and the texts gathered here themselves acknowledge that: as
Gorakh says, “Only rare yogis understand these states” (GBS 6).
35
A NOTE TO THE TRANSLATIONS
The following translations of the sabad and pad sections from the Gorakh Bānī collection
were done in Benares (Varanasi), India, in the period between November 2002 and early
April 2003. I arrived in India on a doctoral research grant in October 2002 and
immediately began to inquire about the possibility of working with someone on this text.
I was fortunate enough to rather quickly get in touch with Dr. Shukdev Singh, a former
professor of Hindi at the Benares Hindu University. Shukdev Singh had already
successfully collaborated with Western scholars on several projects.71 We arranged our
first meeting over phone; the next day he came with his driver to pick me up and we then
went to his house and agreed on the procedure of our future sessions. We initially decided
to meet three, and later five, times a week; I was to work on the translations on my own,
and he would be checking them and providing commentaries during our meetings.
I would translate as much as I could in between our meetings. On those days
when we were to have our session, I would start in the morning from my residence close
to Assi ghāṭ in the southern part of Benares, and ride a bicycle to my destination. It
would take me approximately a half-hour of a slow bicycling through the congested
streets of the city to reach his house in Sundarpur, in the outskirts of Benares. We would
typically sit together for an hour, often longer, drinking tea and 'fighting with the text' as
he was prone to say in his Rajput idiom. I would read my translations and he would
correct them, spicing his commentaries with innumerable stories about Nāths, tāntrikas,
and Indian culture in general. Sometimes my translations would be accepted as correct in
toto ("Śābāś," he would say, "bahut acchā translation,"); sometimes, more often than I
36
liked, I would cross some of them out completely as incorrect. In general, the wording
and the style were my own, but there were also a significant number of corrections. Dr.
Singh was always happy when we entered into occasional disagreement over the
translations: he often felt that I was too complacent in accepting his corrections and that I
should fight more forcefully for my perspective. From the beginning to the end, we both
felt and talked about this as a mutual project.
Upon my return from India, I tried to improve and correct what I felt to be the
more problematic translations. On a few occasions, I asked for and received comments on
these from my Ph.D. Thesis supervisor, Dr. Ken Bryant from the Department of Asian
Studies at the University of British Columbia. We did not go through the whole text but
on the basis of samples that he read, Ken expressed his impression that the translations
were generally correct. My wife Sasha Paradis went through the complete material,
corrected grammatical mistakes and gave several stylistic suggestions, but did not
intervene in the text itself. This first version of the translations, containing the sabads and
pads from the collection, was included as an Appendix to my doctoral thesis (Djurdjevic
2005).
From December 2006 through early January 2007, I met with Dr. Singh in
Benares again: we worked on the selections from the additional texts in Gorakh Bānī that
we considered more important and genuine. The one text we did not have time to work
on was “Machindra Gorakh Bodh,” which I eventually translated alone. Shukdev Singh
passed away in September 2007.
In preparing the present edition, I revisited the complete translations once again
and made numerous corrections and alternate renditions. In order to facilitate
37
understanding, where possible and appropriate, I also provide short annotations. These
typically address technical terms and provide cultural and religious context. My notes are
in the square brackets and they appear either after a particular sabad (given that these are
short: only two lines of text in the Hindi original and four lines of text in our
translations), or after an individual verse in longer poetical compositions (such as pads).
Unfortunately, in the case of prose texts, it proved cumbersome to comment within the
body of text and for that reason these comments were moved to the endnotes. I refrain
from providing the notes in cases where these would be redundant, unnecessary, or where
the text is too enigmatic for a comment.
Any remaining errors and inaccuracies in these translations are my own
responsibility.
The research on which these translations were based was funded by the
Government of India (GoI) through the India Studies Program of the Shastri IndoCanadian Institute (SICI). Neither the GoI nor SICI necessarily endorses the views
expressed herein.
1
See Baṛthvāl 1946. Baṛthvāl also provided loose, descriptive (and incomplete)
translations and commentaries on the texts. These were quite helpful in preparing present
translations and I would like to take this opportunity to acknowledge my indebtedness to
Baṛthvāl’s scholarship. As Agrawal (2011: 11) rightly states: “It is also widely
recognized that Barthwal’s edition of the Gorakh-bānī … remains the only decent critical
edition of that important text so far published.”
38
2
To clarify: we have translated all the texts included in Baṛthvāl’s volume (1946: 1-221),
except for the three “Appendices,” which we considered less authentic, both historically
and with respect to their content.
3
Regarding the historical context of Gorakhnāth’s life, Mallinson (2011b: 263) states that
the “earliest datable reference to Gorakṣa are found in two texts written in the early part
of the thirteenth century. They are from opposite ends of the subcontinent and refer to
him as a master of yoga, suggesting that his reputation was already well established.”
4
“The fact that modern forms are included [in Hindi works attributed to Gorakhnāth]
provides no conclusive evidence for a late date of composition since scribes occasionally
modernized forms when copying texts. Conversely, the inclusion of Tantric Buddhist
elements cannot be used as definite proof of the text’s antiquity, for scribes sometimes
inserted apparently older concepts.” Offredi 1999b: 270. Ondračka (2011: 130),
commenting specifically on the Bengali versions of “The Victory of Gorakṣa” but also on
the vernacular North Indian Nāth texts in general, similarly argues that we cannot be
certain of the exact date of the composition of these works, since the language was
changing over time and these, primarily oral songs transmitted by the lower strata of
society, were never fixed in a written form the way more respected poetry was. Lorenzen
(2011: 21) surmises as the best estimate that “the earliest surviving Gorakh bani probably
date from the thirteenth or fourteenth century or even later. It is also likely that they have
been somewhat altered in the process of transmission from manuscript to manuscript.”
5
A more extensive quotation will be appropriate here: “Hermes Trismegistus did not
exist, nor did Harpocrates [nor, we may add, Gorakhnāth] – in the sense that Balzac
existed – but the fact that several texts have been placed under the same name indicates
39
that there has been established among them a relationship of homogeneity, filiation,
authentification of some texts by use of others, reciprocal explication, or concomitant
utilization. The author’s name serves to characterize a certain mode of being of discourse:
the fact that the discourse has an author’s name, that one can say ‘this was written by soand-so’ or ‘so-and-so is its author’, shows that this discourse is not ordinary everyday
speech that merely comes and goes, not something that is immediately consumable. On
the contrary, it is a speech that must be received in a certain mode and that, in a given
culture, must receive a certain status.” Foucault 1979: 147.
6
Mallinson has established that it was in the 15th century that the order of yogis that came
to be known as the Nāths began to attribute Hindi and Sanskrit works to Gorakṣa and to
claim him as one of the founders. Based on his research, Mallinson (2012: 263) argues
that “there is no evidence for the use of the name ‘Nāth’ to denote an order of yogis until
the eighteenth century.”
7
The speculations about the nature of brahman have been a constant feature of Indian
philosophy and spirituality since the compositions of the Upaniṣads (the oldest of which
could be dated to c. 5th century BCE). For a translation, see (among a dozen others)
Olivelle 1996.
8
It could be argued that at least several instances of the term nāth that are found in the
Sayings of Gorakh more likely refer to a yogi rather than a deity, but the point is
somewhat moot since in most of those instances such yogi has either achieved
immortality or is sufficiently advanced on the path of yoga that he can be deemed
godlike.
40
9
For the translation of the Dattātreyayogaśāstra, see Mallinson 2013; for the Sanskrit
text with a Hindi gloss, see Avasthī (ed.) 1982.
10
This summary is based on Gautam 1998 [1981?]: 5-9, whose source of information
was most probably Candranāth Yogi’s Yogisaṃpradāyāviṣkṛti. See also a summary of
the story in Tantreś 1993: 28-31. The earliest, and in some important details different,
version of the story is given in the 16th Chapter of Kaulajñānanirṇaya, traditionally
attributed to Matsyendranāth, which Bagchi places in the mid-11th century and Kiss
(2010: 26) “as composed before 1300 A.D.” There, it is narrated how a book containing
the secret knowledge of the Kaulas (early Śaiva Tantric group) was stolen by Śiva’s son
Kārttikeya, and thrown into the sea. Śiva rescued it by catching and killing the fish that
ate the book, and for that reason he was also called Matsyaghna (“fish-killer”), an
alternative name for Matsyendranāth. See Bagchi (ed.) and Magee (trans.) 1986. On
Matsyendranāth, see Karambelkar 1955; Bagchi 1986: 6-22, and passim; and Kiss 2010.
White 2003 also contains a good deal of relevant information about Matsyendra and an
extensive discussion on, and interpretation of, the Kaulajñānanirṇaya.
11
See Djurdjevic 2008 and 2014.
12
Alternatively construed as “intentional language,” sandhā bhāṣā.
13
Alter 2005: 121. For the role of secrecy in (what I call) Indian and Western esotericism
viewed from a comparative perspective, see Urban 1997 and Urban 2003.
14
See White 2011b.
15
See, as an example, Gorakh Bānī pad [henceforth, GBP] 48.
16
The conjoining of the opposites, represented inter alia by these two cakras, is a typical
methodological principle in tantra. See the relevant discussion on the “Polarity
41
Symbolism in Tantric Doctrine and Practice” in the classical study by Bharati (1965:
199-227).
17
Djurdjevic 2008.
18
For a useful and informative summary, see White 2011a.
19
For a classic but rather dated study of the ideas regarding the subtle body in the
Western culture, see Mead 1919; for a recent collection of essays that explore the subject
from multicultural perspective, see Samuel and Johnson 2013.
20
Briggs 1973 [1938]: 128.
21
For an extensive discussion of this topic, see Lorenzen 2011.
22
There is a growing consensus among scholars that the postular yoga, as it is currently
known and widely practiced in the West, did not emerge prior to the 19th century. See, in
particular, Singleton 2010.
23
See as an illustration Gorakh Bānī sabad [henceforth, GBS] 191.
24
See GBS 23.
25
One of the earliest treatments of this episode is given in the Maithili verse-play
Gorakṣavijaya (“The Victory of Gorakṣa”) by the medieval poet Vidyāpati. See the
Appendix.
26
GBS 17.
27
“Renunciation was considered the ritual death of the renouncer; that a renouncer is a
ritually dead person, even though he is physically alive, is a significant aspect of the
Brāhmaṇical theology of renunciation.” Olivelle 1992: 89-90.
28
BG 5: 10: “lipyate na sa pāpena” – “he is not smeared by sin,” referring to a person,
contextually a yogi, who acts without attachments.
42
29
“The String of Breaths,” v.2.
30
GBP 60: 2.
31
GBS 90. To “drink the undrinkable” is a reference to the ‘elixir of immortality,’ the
amṛt.
32
GBS 57.
33
GBS 142.
34
GBS 23.
35
GBP 12: 5. See also Gorakṣa Vacana Saṃgraha 38: “Bindu is Śiva, menstrual blood is
Śakti.”
36
GBS 1. See also Baṛthvāl’s (1946: 1) pertinent comments on this verse.
37
Larson 2012: 73. Larson echoes the opinion of P.V. Kane (1977: 1427) who similarly
suggests that there are only two main types of yoga and that “the difference between the
two is that the Yoga of Patañjali concentrates all effort on the discipline of the mind,
while Haṭhayoga mainly concerns itself with the body, its health, its purity and freedom
from disease” (qtd. in Larson 2008: 140). It could be argued that Kane presents a modern,
‘medicalized’ view of haṭha yoga (see Alter 2004; Singleton 2010) and that the
traditional forms were much more oriented towards magic and the occult. In other words,
the pre-modern haṭha yoga focused primarily on the subtle body and esoteric physiology.
38
By now classical essay by Sanderson 1985 explores magisterially the nature of the
tantric worldview understood as the path of power, contrasted as such with the
brahminical path of purity.
39
See, for example, Urban 2010, a work that focuses on the worship of the goddess
Kāmākyhā in Assam.
43
40
“The quest for homology or identity (nidāna, bandhu, upaniṣad) finds its Vedic
culmination in the ultimate identity between Ātman, or essential Self, and Brahman, or
cosmic foundation” (Kaelber 1989: 95). “The final upaniṣad or equation is between
Ātman, the essential I, and Brahman, the ultimate real” (Olivelle 1996: lvi). I regard the
Upaniṣads as quintessentially esoteric texts. Faivre (1994: 36) defines esotericism in a
“restricted meaning” as “illumination & salvation via knowledge of … links between
men & intermediary or Divine.” With a grain of salt, this is congruent with and
comparable to the general tenor of the Upaniṣads, which insist that the true spiritual
liberation consists of knowing the links (bandhu) between various aspects of reality (what
Olivelle [1996: lii] calls “cosmic connections”).
41
This and the next paragraph are adapted from Djurdjevic 2008: 54-7.
42
GBP 14: 1.
43
See, for example, Banerjea (1999 [1962]): 195-205.
44
GBS 252.
45
Mūladhār is the lowest cakra. “The wheel (cakra) at the base of the spine where
Kuṇḍalinī lies coiled like a snake. From Her seat at mūladhara, Kuṇḍalinī controls all the
activities of the physiological system through its network of 72,000 nerves.” Grimes
(1996), s.v. “Mūladhara, 2.”
46
Sahasrār is the uppermost cakra. “The topmost spiritual center or thousand-petaled
lotus located in the crown of the head. It is the seat of Śiva, the supreme guru. When
Kuṇḍalinī Śakti unites with Śiva in the sahasrāra, the yogi achieves the state of Selfrealization.” Grimes (1996), s.v. “Sahasrāra.”
47
GBS 148.
44
48
“A Line of Hair” declares: “The mind is the tie that needs to be tied; the breath is the
secret that needs to be penetrated; the bindu is the seal that needs to be sealed.” Mallinson
(2016) has demonstrated that the correlation between the bindu, breath, and mind occurs
for the first time in the 12th c. Vajrayāna text, the Amṛtasiddhi.
49
See as an example GBP 5: 5.
50
Śāradātilakam, I: 9.
51
Gorakṣa Śataka 70. In Briggs (1973 [1938]): 298. I have slightly emended the
translation.
52
GBS 141. Similarly, “The bindu in the mouth of yoni is [like] mercury in the mouth of
fire. Whosoever preserves it, he is my guru.” GBS 142.
53
See Mallinson 2007.
54
“Self-Understanding,” v.14.
55
GBS 192.
56
“The Five Measures,” v.3.
57
Khecarīvidyā, III:22, in Mallinson (2007): 132.
58
It could be argued that this is truer of tantric, rather than Vedic, mantras. However, the
principle applies to both categories, irrespective of their (arguably significant)
differences.
59
The greatness of OṂ is celebrated already in the classical, Vedic Upaniṣads: “This
whole world is nothing but OṂ” (Chāndogya Upanisad, 2.23.3). “Brahman is OṂ”
(Taittirīya Upanisad, 1.8.1). “Accordingly, the very self (ātman) is OṂ” (Māṇḍūkya
Upaniṣad, 12). (Trans. Olivelle 1996.)
60
GBS 184.
45
61
GBP 14:2.
62
It is to be remembered that Sikhism emerges, historically and culturally, in a milieu
shared by the Sants (members of a devotional movement characterized by the orientation
towards formless divinity), the Muslim Sufis, and the Nāth yogis. All of these often
shared a common vocabulary and concerns, while providing different interpretations and
mutual criticism. For the relationship between Guru Nānak, the founder of Sikhism, and
the Nāth yogis, contextually focused on the Siddh Goṣṭ, the supposed conversations
between them, see Nayar and Sandhu 2007.
63
McLeod (1968): 191. Note that the author assumes an essential identity between the
sound (nād) and word (śabad).
64
GBS 15.
65
GBS 80.
66
GBS 21. Compare “The Ornament of Wisdom”: “Sabad is truly the lock, sabad is truly
the key. Sabad is truly enlightened by sabad “ (1).
67
See Gorakṣa Śataka 101 in Briggs (1973 [1938]): 304.
68
GBS 135 also relates unman and the tenth opening in the body.
69
Standard introductory overviews of the field are Faivre 1994, von Stuckrad 2005, and
Goodrick-Clarke 2008. Hanegraaff 2012 is a more ambitious historical survey of the
scholarly and intellectual engagement with the field, perceived and imagined as “the
domain of the Other” (3; emphasis in the original).
70
For an insightful criticism of the term ‘Western’ as employed in this context, see
Granholm 2013. The author demonstrates “how the term is problematic and vague
throughout the history of Europe, how the appeal of the exotic other is an integral
46
element of esoteric discourse and has often involved a ‘turn to the East’, how the term
‘Western’ in the study of esotericism is directly derived from emic occultist discourse,
and how late-modern societal processes of globalization, detraditionalization, increased
pluralism and post-secular re-enchantment further complicate the already problematic
issue of what is to be placed under the banner ‘Western’” (Granholm 2013: 31).
Josephson-Storm similarly criticizes the term, in a manner that is largely identical with
my own views on the issue, by stating: “I generally avoid the formulation ‘Western
esotericism.’ The expression is useful insofar as it evokes European appropriations of
South and East Asian thought, but the excessive emphasis on ‘Western’ presents an
Orientalized East-West binary and ignores esotericism’s global impact” (359, n.11;
emphasis added).
71
The best known of these collaborations is probably Hess and Singh 1986 [1983]). See
also a more recent translation of "The Deeds of Prahlād," trans. David Lorenzen and
Shukdeo Singh, in Lorenzen (1996): 41-74.
47