A Dialogue with a Practitioner on a Connection between Hermeneutics and Yoga

This is an e-dialogue I had with a practitioner who frequently attends some of my group classes. I thought the topic was particularly interesting. I hope you enjoy it.

upsidedowncarl

========================


Practitioner: Hi Carl,

Remember that class when I asked if yoga could "be done to you" and then you told us several definitions of yoga? I am trying to remember all that you said, but so far the only two I clearly remember are 1) yoga is the process of calming the unnecessary activities of the mind and 2) yoga takes a person to a place s/he has never been before. If you don't have time to tell me all the ways to define yoga, is there some resource I could turn to? I am asking out of personal curiosity, but also because I am taking one graduate course this semester, and think that yoga maybe very similar to Gadamer's definition of hermeneutics. OK-it might be a loose connection, but I am interested nonetheless.

See you tomorrow,
P

Carl: The ones that I said that I can remember off hand are the two you mentioned and:

1) Yoga is Relationship. In the first one you are bringing the mind to calmness for a sense of connectedness or one pointed focus. One of the ways you do this is by bringing the mind into relationship with something that attracts the interests of the mind. The yoga sutras talks a lot about that which is observing (the aspect of the mind which is observing) and that which is being observed (what ever it is you are bringing your attention to). This is a relationship between two things. And any kind of relationship can be a powerful process for growth.

2) Any spiritual (or what I would call awareness) process. Any process of cultivating awareness or "spiritual" development.

3) Any process that makes things better. This really is not any different than any of the other things and in truth they could all be seen as different ways of saying the same thing.

You will have to tell me about the connection between Yoga and Hermeneutics. I am sure it is fun. I find Yoga and depth psychology have a lot in common. I find yoga and alchemy do as well. Truthfully yoga has a lot in common with any mystical tradition so.... :o)

Take care.

Carl,

Practitioner: Thanks for your response. Something you said today in class sums up a lot of Gadamer (the guy we have to read) says about hermeneutics: "you are always a beginner because this particular moment has never happened." Gadamer argued that it is folly to think that there is an objective, ultimate truth that scholars can find. Instead, the way a person understands something is a dynamic relationship between text (or work of art, document, etc) which continually evolves as time passes. We all bring certain assumptions to and even anticipate the meaning of what we seek to understand. But that is fine--it is just essential that we realize this aspect of the process of understanding. What we can do is identify the assumptions we bring to thing we understand and evaluate the validity of those assumptions. Gadamer also felt that meaning evolves with history since we all understand things via our cultural paradigms. I came up with the above off the top of my head, and I'm sure I have left out a lot, and could have explained what I said more precisely. But, hey, this is just an email to a friend.

What does Gadamer have to do with yoga? In the first place, Gadamer and the yoga sutras both differentiate between the objective thing we look at and the being which observes, and see their relationship an an evolving process that doesn't have an explicit end. (I may have done a bit of inferring on the part of the yoga sutras since I haven't really read them!) Also, I think Gadamer would think of us all as "beginners" each time we try to understand something. But what we have learned in the past should shed light on the task at hand. Finally, how about the way we physically understand a shape of the human body, say standing up with your arms extended in front of you parallel to the floor. Our understanding of that shape changes when we turn the shape around. Plank pose feels different than the shape standing on two feet, and both of those feel different than making the same shape lying down or lying on your side.

The ideas above are really rough, but they are running through my head. So that is why I asked, and thanks again.

See you next time (or should I say "next beginning?")
P

========================

You can visit this site for more information about therapeutic yoga and Yoga in New York with Carl Horowitz.

Here you can find out more about the background of New York City Yoga Teacher, Carl Horowitz.