Classical Discourses of Liberation

O’Brien-Kop, Karen

doi:10.1558/rosa.37021

Cited by 8 publications

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“…Buddhist, Jain, Ājīvika) renunciates (Bronkhorst 2007;Samuel 2008). Instead of distinct 'origins' and clear 'lineages', the early Brahmanic, Buddhist, and Jain histories of yoga and meditation are completely intertwined and cross-pollinated (Maas 2018;O'Brien-Kop 2018;Samuel 2008;Wujastyk 2018). In contemporary contexts, the concepts of 'yoga' and 'meditation' may sometimes be equally overlapping, even if in popular imaginaries 'yoga' is more associated with practices involving physical postures and 'meditation' with mental exercises conducted in a paradigmatic cross-legged sitting position (De Michelis 2004, 8).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Meditation in contemporary contexts

Husgafvel¹

2020

Routledge Handbook of Yoga and Meditation Studies

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In recent decades, the practice of meditation has entered the Western (and increasingly global) cultural mainstream. This is most evident in the introduction of mindfulness-based training programmes as institutionalised approaches in various public and corporate contexts. The popularisation and widespread application of mindfulness practices are related to rapidly increasing academic interest in meditation within both the humanities and sciences. This chapter focuses on current discussions in the humanistic and social scientific study of contemporary meditation and, in particular, mindfulness practice. The main themes include challenges of definition, historical and comparative approaches, research positions, and critical discourses. Analysis of these can indicate some important contributions and debates in the growing field of meditation studiesand the need for dialogue beyond disciplinary boundaries.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Meditation in contemporary contexts

Husgafvel¹

2020

Routledge Handbook of Yoga and Meditation Studies

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Dharmamegha in yoga and yogācāra: the revision of a superlative metaphor

O’Brien-Kop

2020

J Indian Philos

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The Pātañjalayogaśāstra concludes with a description of the pinnacle of yoga practice: a state of samādhi called dharmamegha, cloud of dharma. Yet despite the structural importance of dharmamegha in the soteriology of Pātañjala yoga, the śāstra itself does not say much about this term. Where we do find dharmamegha discussed, however, is in Buddhist yogācāra, and more broadly in early Mahāyāna soteriology, where it represents the apex of attainment and the superlative statehood of a bodhisattva. Given the relative paucity of Brahmanical mentions of dharmamegha in the early common era, Patañjali appears to adopt this key metaphor from a Mahāyāna context—and to revise its primary meaning from fullness to emptiness. This article traces the early elaborations of dharmamegha in Buddhist texts, and, drawing on conceptual metaphor theory, lays out four arguments that each, in part, accounts for the stark contrast in how classical yoga and yogācāra employ the superlative metaphor of dharmamegha.

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Sarvāstivāda Buddhist Theories of Temporality and the Pātañjala Yoga Theory of Transformation (pariṇāma)

Maas

2020

J Indian Philos

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This article discusses a peculiar Sā$$\dot {\text{n}}$$ n ˙ khya-Yoga theory of transformation (pariṇāma) that the author of the Pātañjalayogaśāstra created by drawing upon Sarvāstivāda Buddhist theories of temporality. In developing his theory, Patañjali adaptively reused the wording in which the Sarvāstivāda theories were formulated, the specific objections against these theories, and their refutations to win the philosophical debate about temporality against Sarvāstivāda Buddhism. Patañjali’s approach towards the Sarvāstivāda Buddhist theories was possible, even though his system of Yoga is based on an ontology that differs considerably from that of Sarvāstivāda Buddhism because both systems share the philosophical view that time is not a separate ontological entity in itself. Time is a concept deduced from change in the empirical world. This agreement results from the common philosophical orientation of Sarvāstivāda Buddhism and Yoga, which takes the phenomenon of experience as the basis of philosophical enquiry into the structure of the world. The intention that guided Patañjali’s adaptive reuse was twofold. On the one hand, he aimed at winning the debate with Sarvāstivāda Buddhism about how the problem of temporality can be solved. He thus integrated four mutually exclusive theories on temporality into a single theory of transformation of properties (dharma) involving a second-level and a third-level theory on the transformation of the temporal characteristic mark (lakṣaṇa) and on the transformation of states (avasthā), respectively. On the other hand, Patañjali intended to achieve philosophical clarification regarding the question of how exactly properties relate to their underlying substrate in the process of transformation of the three constituents or forces (guṇa) sattva, rajas and tamas of matter (pradhāna) that account for all phenomena of the world except pure consciousness (puruṣa). Patañjali’s theory of transformation is thus of central importance for his Sā$$\dot {\text{n}}$$ n ˙ khya ontology, according to which the world consists of 25 categories or constituents (tattva), i.e., of primal matter (prakṛti) and its transformations and pure consciousness.

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Classical Discourses of Liberation

Cited by 8 publications

References 0 publications

Meditation in contemporary contexts

Meditation in contemporary contexts

Dharmamegha in yoga and yogācāra: the revision of a superlative metaphor

Sarvāstivāda Buddhist Theories of Temporality and the Pātañjala Yoga Theory of Transformation (pariṇāma)

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