page_title: Yogaśāstra
hierarchical_section_title: Yogaśāstra
caption_attribution_description: English: This Jain text Yogasastra manuscript survives in an incomplete form, as its last 8 chapters. The complete version has 12 chapters and was authored by the Jain monk Hemachandra of the Svetambara tradition within Jainism. The text is in Sanskrit. The text is notable for its 1 mm size Devanagari script. Even more miniaturized Devanagari and South Indian scripts were written by Indians, some of which are preserved in the Saraswathi Mahal Library in Thanjavur, Tamil Nadu. This yoga text follows the style of earlier Buddhist and Hindu yoga texts. It also teaches breath exercises, meditation, and ethics, but is set in Jain theology and divination framework. Cecil Bendall purchased this manuscript in February 1885 in Bombay. The manuscript is now preserved as MS Add.2277 at the Cambridge University LIbrary. Language: Sanskrit Script: Devanagari (miniature) The photo above is of a 2D manuscript artwork created about 800 years ago, itself a copy from a text that was authored earlier. The artwork and this 2D photograph, therefore, fall under Wikimedia Commons PD-Art licensing guidelines. Any rights I have as a photographer is herewith donated to wikimedia commons under CC 4.0 license.
context_page_description: Yogaśāstra is a 12th-century Sanskrit text by Hemachandra on Svetambara Jainism. It is a treatise on the "rules of conduct for laymen and ascetics", wherein "yoga" means "ratna-traya", i.e. right belief, right knowledge and right conduct for a Svetambara Jain. As a manual with an extensive auto-commentary called Svopajnavrtti, it was instrumental to the survival and growth of Svetambara tradition in western Indian states such as Gujarat and the spread of Sanskrit culture in Jainism.
  The Yogasastra is unlike the conventional much older yoga texts found in Buddhism and Hinduism, but shows their influence. Probably titled "yoga" because its royal patron was attached to yogic traditions of 12th-century India, the Yogasastra treatise is a systematic exposition of Jain doctrine using the Svetambara scriptures and tradition, as well as the teachings of many prior Jain scholars such as Umasvati, Subhachandra, and Haribhadra.
  The first three chapters are on the Jain "three jewels", the Ratnatraya. These include within its scope the Svetambara's equivalent to the sravakacara – also called upasaka dhyayana – of the Digambara tradition of Jainism.
context_section_description: Yogaśāstra (lit. "Yoga treatise") is a 12th-century Sanskrit text by Hemachandra on Svetambara Jainism. It is a treatise on the "rules of conduct for laymen and ascetics", wherein "yoga" means "ratna-traya" (three jewels), i.e. right belief, right knowledge and right conduct for a Svetambara Jain. As a manual with an extensive auto-commentary called Svopajnavrtti, it was instrumental to the survival and growth of Svetambara tradition in western Indian states such as Gujarat and the spread of Sanskrit culture in Jainism. 
  The Yogasastra is unlike the conventional much older yoga texts found in Buddhism and Hinduism, but shows their influence. Probably titled "yoga" because its royal patron was attached to yogic traditions of 12th-century India, the Yogasastra treatise is a systematic exposition of Jain doctrine using the Svetambara scriptures (sruta) and tradition (sampradaya), as well as the teachings of many prior Jain scholars such as Umasvati, Subhachandra, and Haribhadra.
  The first three chapters are on the Jain "three jewels", the Ratnatraya. These include within its scope the Svetambara's equivalent to the sravakacara – also called upasaka dhyayana – of the Digambara tradition of Jainism. The text is far more extensive, and incorporates various forms of Jain yoga in an eightfold scheme similar to Patanjali, as well as Jain ethics and philosophy. Hemachandra includes and discusses topics such as pranayama, asana found in Hatha yoga, nadis, divination, Maitrī (friendship to all beings), Sadhana found in Buddhist yoga, dhyana as well as forms of Jain tantric meditation. The treatise also discusses pratima (murti), puja (devotional worship), vrata (fasting), sraddha (reverence to distant ancestors) and sangha seva (service to the Jain community).
  The śāstra along with its auto-commentary was translated into English by Olle Quarnström in 2002.
caption: Hemacandra's Yogasastra manuscript sample page (miniature Devanagari script, Sanskrit)
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