Yoga and Psychology
Subtitle: Language, Memory, and Mysticism (Suny Series in Religious Studies)
Publisher: State University of New York Press
Published: December 2002
Language: eng
Format: Paperback
Number of pages: 128
ISBN-13: 9780791455005
Subjects: Hinduism; Non-Western philosophy; Psychology; Philosophy; Psychology and religion; Movements - General; Religion - Commentaries / Reference; Yogasutra; Yoga; Psychology of Religion; Eastern - General; Eastern; Hinduism - General; East and West; Patanjali
Description: Annotation Harold Coward explores how the psychological aspects of Yoga philosophy have been important to intellectual developments both East and West. Foundational for Hindu, Jaina, and Buddhist thought and spiritual practice, Patanjali's Yoga Sutras, the classical statement of Eastern Yoga, are unique in their emphasis on the nature and importance of psychological processes. Yoga's influence is explored in the work of both the seminal Indian thinker Bhartrhari (c. 600 C.E.) and among key figures in Western psychology: founders Freud and Jung, as well as contemporary transpersonalists such as Washburn, Tart, and Ornstein. Coward shows how the yogic notion of psychological processes makes Bhartrhari's philosophy of language and his theology of revelation possible. He goes on to explore how Western psychology has been influenced by incorporating or rejecting Patanjali's Yoga. The implications of these trends in Western thought for mysticism and memory are examined as well.