Yoga has become an extremely popular pastime in America in the past few decades. Most people involved with Yoga believe it to be nothing more than physical exercise and stretching. The fact that Marilyn Ferguson listed Yoga within her list of psychotechnologies proves it is more than physical, but designed to introduce individuals into the occult. One expert offers an extreme warning:
“I advanced in the occult sphere so fast that I soon became the youngest guru in the Western Hemisphere, and one of the most advanced and powerful. Twice a week I taught yoga on television. Hatha-Yoga sounds like a nice simple set of exercises; everyone thinks it is just gymnastics. I want to warn that it is just the beginning of a devilish trap. After I became an instructor in Hatha-Yoga, my guru showed me that the only thing these exercises do is open your appetite for the occult. They are like marijuana; they usually lead you on to a drug that is worse and stronger, binding you so completely that only Christ can deliver you. Many people think that occult power is just the power of the mind. This is not true. There is a point beyond which the power of the mind ends and the demonic power takes over.”1)cited by Dave Hunt, Yoga and the Body of Christ, , Berean Call, 2007, p. 70
The facts behind yoga shows that it is hardly a form of exercise and stretching.
“The truth is, yoga, regardless of the form, doesn’t offer a comprehensive way to get fit. According to a study by the American Council on Exercise, a national nonprofit organization that certifies fitness instructors and promotes physical fitness, dedicated yoga practitioners show no improvements in cardiovascular health. It’s not the best way to lose weight either. A typical 50-min. class of hatha yoga, one of the most popular styles of yoga, in the U.S., burns off fewer calories than are in three Oreos – about the same as a slow 50-min. walk.”2)Pamela Paul, Time magazine, Oct 15, 2007, p. 71
Not only is it a useless way to “get fit,” it is also extremely dangerous.
“But with more than 14 million people practicing yoga or tai chi nationwide, up 136% since 2000, orthopedic surgeons, physical therapists and chiropractors across the country are dealing with the increase fallout from yoga gone awry. Over the past three years, 13,000 Americans were treated in an emergency room of a doctor’s office for yoga-related injuries, according to the Consumer Product Safety Commission.” 3)ibid
We are bombarded with the idea that yoga is not only a healthy exercise for the physical body, but the mind as well. Once again, the statistics shows otherwise. 76% of cases experienced psychological disorders, 43% had to have psychiatric or medical treatments. Out of the psychological disorders observed 63% experiences tiredness, 52% experiences states of anxiety, 45% experiences depression, 39% experiences nervousness, 39% experienced regression [a child like dependency], 26% experienced a nervous breakdown, and 20% expressed serious suicidal tendencies. These statistics are based on a study of the TM (Transcendental Meditation) form of yoga, and was pursued by the German Government youth department (Ministry of Youth, Family and Health), which was verified by the nations Supreme Courts after careful review.
With such statistics, the obvious question should arise, “why would someone develop such a dangerous form of exercise?” The answer to that question, unfortunately, is not so obvious. Yoga was not developed for the purpose of physical exercise or relaxation.
“If you’re doing meditation correctly, you’re in for some very rough and frightening times. Meditation as a relaxation response is a Joke.”4)The Pundit of Transpersonal Psychology, Yoga Journal, September/October 1987, p. 43
Yoga was developed for a religious purpose. Yoga is traced back to the oldest Hindu scriptures known as the Rig Vedas, and is which speaks of yoking our mind to the “Sun of Truth.” In the Hindu scriptures known as the Bhagavad-Gita, lord Krishna is said to be the originator of yoga. “The Personality of the Godhead, Lord Sri Krishna, said: I instructed this imperishable science of yoga to the sun-god, Vivasvan, and Vivasvan instructed it to Manu, the father of mankind, and Manu in turn instructed it to Iksvaku. This supreme science was thus received through the chain of succession, and the saintly kings understood it in that way. But in the course of time the succession was broken, and therefore the science as it is appears to be lost.” (Bhagavad-Gita 4:1-2) Indeed, yoga is not an exercise, but a religion.
“Only those students whose own searches have taken them more deeply into the study of Eastern disciplines realize that Yoga is far more than a popular method of exercise… having heard Raja Yoga as being the most profound study of esoteric of spiritual discipline.”5)Ernest Wood, Seven Schools of Yoga: An Introduction, The Theosophy Publishing House, Wheaton Il, 1976, Foreword
The book cited above, published by the Theosophy cult, was first published in India, in 1931, under the title The Occult Training of the Hindus. Being released in America during the 70s, the named had to be disguised to The Seven Schools of Yoga, because the Western culture had not been so accepting of occult material in those days.
There is no separating yoga from Hinduism. Caryl Matrisciana who was born and raised in India, and was once a avid New Age practitioner of yoga says it all. “Yoga, a practice synonymous with Hindu philosophy, means ’to yoke.’ Its goal is to unite man with Brahman, the Hindu concept of god (or rather a consciousness called ’god-state’)… And this union is another important ingredient of New Age thinking.”6)Caryl Matrisciana, God’s of the New Age, Harvest House Publishers, 1985, p. 18 One yoga instructor confesses the purpose of yoga classes is to indoctrinate the student with Hindu philosophy.
“One of the first things I learned in my teacher’s training class was that I must talk to students about the philosophy behind Yoga, that this was just as important as the exercise. Relaxation at the end of the Yoga class is really hypnosis, where each part of the body is relaxed. So while they were in this state, I read to them about Hindu philosophy, or something from one of my guru’s books, so they got it whether they wanted it or not!”7)Prema Nayah, a former yoga teacher, cited ibid, p. 174
Now we can begin to understand why people are willing to risk the physical and mental dangers of yoga considering the Hindu philosophy that is connected, in order to be freed from the endless cycle of reincarnation, to reach enlightenment.
“Yoga was developed to escape this ‘unreal’ world of time and sense and to reach moksha, the Hindu heaven – or to return to the ‘void’ of the Buddhist. With its breathing exercises and limbering-up position, yoga is promoted in the West for enhancing health and better living – but in the far East, where it originated, it is understood to be a way of dying.”8)Dave Hunt, Yoga and The body of Christ, Berean Call, 2006, p. 8
Understand, in that the Hindu religion shows no value to human life but actually seeks death, to shed the ‘bad karma’ which is obtained through past life times. So by reaching enlightenment in the current life time, you only need to shed bad karma of your past life times by dying. By following this method for a few more cycles of reincarnation you will reach perfection and obtain heaven.
Caryl Matrisciana was born in India and saw first hand how the Hindus religious philosophy effected that culture. When she became an adult, she was involved with the New Age movement until she found salvation in Jesus Christ. Since her conversion she has been an expert on the New Age and occultism, sharing her story and the discerning truth from the masked movement spreading by means of deception.
“Yoga… is sold to the West as the art of living. But it is really an art of dying!… The gurus would have us think that yoga teaches us to breathe in the best possible way. But it really teaches us to reduce our own breathing down to a minimum and finally to stop it – along with everything else!”9)Caryl Matrisciana, God’s of the New Age, Harvest House Publishers, 1985, p. 145
This fact of stopping the functions of the entire body as a process of killing ones self through yoga is confirmed by science, as Marilyn Ferguson explains: “Swami Rama, a yogi who became famous in the early 1970s when the Menninger Foundation and other laboratories verified his remarkable ability to control physiological processes (including virtually stopping his heart).”10)Marilyn Ferguson, Aquarian Conspiracy, p. 152
The book I mentioned earlier, which was originally published in India under the title The Occult Training of the Hindus, was loaded of such warnings about the dangers of yoga. “I must not refer to any of these Hatha Yoga practices without sounding a sever warning. Many people have brought upon themselves incurable illness and even madness by practicing without providing the proper conditions of body and mind”11)Ernest Wood, Seven Schools of Yoga, Theosophy Publishing House, 1976, p.78 Again he states, “I should like to make it clear that I am not recommending these practices, as I hold that all Hatha Yoga are extremely dangerous…”12)ibid, p. 79 These dangers are explained as “… by any mistake there arises cough, asthma, head, eye and ear pain, and many other diseases.”13)ibid, p. 78 Why haven’t the instructors in America given any warnings to students before they sign up for a yoga class? “…The four [schools of Hatha yoga, Laya yoga, Bhakli yoga, and Mantra yoga] should not be so practiced, and anyone who takes them up thoroughly does so at the immanent risk of most serious bodily disorders, disease and even madness.”14)Ernest Wood, Seven Schools of Yoga, Theosophy Publishing House, 1976, p. 12 What he means by the last warning, “even madness,” is actually demon possession.
“The average yoga instructor never mentions ( and may not even know) the many warnings in ancient texts that ‘Hatha Yoga is a dangerous tool. One can be possessed by a Hindu deity ( i.e. demon) through the altered state of consciousness induced by this practice.”’15)Dave Hunt, Yoga and The body of Christ, Berean Call, 2006, p. 13
The many different unnatural positions the body is forcibly contorted into during a yoga session are developed to invoke the many different Hindu gods. The Hindu scriptures that a yogi (yoga practitioner) would consider the Bible is called The Yoga Sutras. In it such statements are made as “The Self is the height of Self-realization [enlightenment]… he [the yoga practitioner] encounters discarnate beings [spirits with no body].”16)The Yoga Sutras of Patannjali, p. 122 “The yogin [feminine form for yogi] establishes contact with chosen deity… the yogin makes contact with that god or goddess… in the meditational experience.”17)ibid p. 89 Maharishi , founder of Transcendental Meditation admits, “We do something here according to Vedic rites: particular, specific chanting to produce an effect in some other world, to draw the attention of those higher beings or gods living there. The entire knowledge of the mantras or hymns of the Vedas is devoted to man’s connection, to man’s communication with the higher beings in different strata of creation.”18)Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, The Meditations, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, Bantam, 1968, p. 17
It is by the contact with these Hindu gods, that the practitioner receives revelation to further gain the way to enlightenment, which is being absorbed into the Supreme god of Hinduism – Brahman. “What is called renunciation you should know to be the same as yoga, or linking oneself with the Supreme…”19)Bhagavad Gita 6:2 Krishna further explains, “And of all yogis, the one with great faith who always abides in Me, thinks of Me within himself, and renders transcendental loving service to Me – he is the most intimately united with Me in yoga and is the highest of all.”20)Bhagavad Gita 6:47 So the yogi is told to think of Krishna as being “within him,” in order to “unite” with this false god.
Whitley Strieber in his book Communion tells us he was involved with meditation. “I’ve been in a very intensive period. A lot of meditation and effort….Maybe I was reaching a new state of consciousness, too.”21)Whitley Strieber, Communion: a True Story, Avon Books, 1987, p. 157 He also tells us he used imagery and meditation to conjure his alien abductors. “The [mental] image [of the alien abductor] was with me, of course. I wondered what would happen if I asked it to come to me. Humanity has a long history of conjuring and magic….They had responded to my summons.”22)ibid, p.167, 172 Strieber was able to establish contact with his chosen god or goddess, which was an alien he described as being like the “face of Ishtar” in his meditation experience. This undoubtedly proves that the alien phenomenon is none other then the age old worship of demons.
Strieber is not the only admission of meditation being used to contact these aliens.
“Thirty feet beneath the desert’s surface the Van Tassels carved out a large room where they gathered each day to meditate and seek contact with the space messiahs. Many of the family members are advanced students of yoga, and were followers of Paramhansa Yogananda during his visit to America. At eight o’ clock every night they gathered in this lower chamber, sing hymns and concentrated until contact in established.”23)R. Alan Streett, The Invaders: A Biblical Study of UFO’s, 1975, p. 39
“Victims of [demon] possession suffer the very same medical and emotional symptoms as the UFO contactees.”24)John Keel, UFOs: Operation Trojan Horse, G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1970, p. 299 With demon possession and alien abductees experiencing the same symptoms from their experiences, it should be a logical presupposition that if yoga was conjuring Hindu deities (i.e. demons) for the purpose of making union with them, we should suspect yoga to cause similar symptoms as well. The facts remain consistent. “… people who have encountered so called aliens have been transformed emotionally and religiously as a result of an encounter with a spirit, but often it is an unpleasant experience that leaves them with a sense of being violated, depressed, and even suicidal.”25)Gary Bates, Alien Intrusion: UFOs and the Evolution Connection, Master Books, 2005, p. 271
John Keel further confirms the concept that Ernest Woods stated of yoga practitioners risking “even madness.” “Millions of people have been affected at least temporarily by UFO contact, thousands have gone insane and ended up in mental institutions after their experiences with these things began.”26)John Keel Strange Creatures from Time and Space, Fawcett Publishing 1970, p. 189
We can make another distinct connection to the “spiritual awakening” of the many different movements today. The ultimate goal of yoga is to “awaken the Kundalini.”
“Kundalini is described as a force lying in three and a half coils, like a sleeping serpent, in a cavity near the base of the spine. This is regarded as a goddess, ‘luminous as lightening,’ who, even though sleeping, maintains all living creatures. She lies there with her head blocking a fine channel which goes straight up the spine and is known as the sushumna.”27)Ernest Wood, The Seven Schools of Yoga, Theosophy Publishing House, 1976, p. 81, first published in India in 1931 under the title The Occult Training of the Hindus
This author had presented the dangers of yoga, and as I quoted him earlier, stated, “… by any mistake there arises cough, asthma, head, eye and ear pain, and many other diseases.”28)ibid, p. 78 He pronounced, “by any mistake” multiple dangers can arise. This should be a major concern seeing that there is not a single standing agreeable accuracy on how to work the kundalini, which is the major focus of yoga itself.
“In one practice he [the yoga practitioner] brings her [the kundalini] as far as he can, and, as she pierces any one of the lotuses [sitting positions], its face, which was turned downward before, turns upwards, and when the meditation is finished he leads her back to her home near the base of the spine… Some hold that once she has reached the heart chakra, that will be her permanent home, and she will not return below it. Others say that even from the beginning she was at the level of the naval.”29)ibid, p. 83
Ernest Wood does not stand alone on this opinion, but it is well understood by those in India and the gurus that teach yoga.
“This is a serious decision. Yoga is not a trifling jest if we consider that any misunderstanding in the practice of Yoga can mean death or insanity. That a misunderstood Yoga can be dangerous has been proven by many a student.”30)Hans-Ulrich Rieker, trans. By Elsy Becherer, The Yoga of Light, Hatha Yoga Pradipika – India’s Classical Handbook, Herder and Herder, 19761, p. 9
Without an agreeable understanding of this most major factor in yoga, there is inevitably going to be a mistake made, resulting in catastrophe to the individual participating. What is agreed upon among those who realize the potential of yoga, is the purpose of awakening the kundalini to release the “serpent power.” As this serpent figure “goddess” rise up the spine, it effects each chakra on the way up to the final top chakra. The top two chakras, are the third eye and the crown chakra.
“According to the ancient mystery cult, at the moment of body-free consciousness, which can be attained through Transcendental Meditation, a man perceives the birth of light forces within his own skeleton. His whole physical body becomes penetrated by a new force, opening a third eye, the eye of perception.”31)J.R. Church, Guardians of the Grail, Prophecy Publishing, 1991, p. 45
The third eye, also called the mind’s eye once effected by the kundalini, awakens the psychic connection , producing “magick” occult abilities (such as clairvoyance, astral projections or out-of -body experiences, and precognition, ESP, etc.).
“Yoga is the transformation of the mind complex and its activity;
The Helixform Path of Magick leading to higher spiritual levels;
To vanquish the conditioning and habits inflamed by civilization,
Restoring our original nature and magick charisma of Divinity
By the union of individual spirit with the Supreme Atman.”32)http://www.shivashakti.com/twilite.htm
The crown chakra is the spiritual connection with the universal god, the union with whom yoga was developed for. When the kundalini reaches the crown chakra, the individual has become enlightened of his god – consciousness. Dave Hunt asks the question, “Might the promise of this godlike ‘serpent power’ be the same promise with which the Serpent deceived Eve by offering her godhood? Certainly, the ‘self-realization’ of ‘oneness with the universe’ and with Brahman, which is the promise of yoga, is at least an unmistakable echo of the Serpent’s lie in the Garden.”33)Dave Hunt, Yoga and the Body of Christ, p. 124 The whole concept of yoga is tied into serpent worship, goddess worship, spiritual evolution or as some may call it “the next quantum leap” which will lead mankind into the New Age of Aquarius.
“As for the future, here’s what our Teacher [Yogi Bhajan], the Master of Kundalini Yoga, has to say: Yoga with its every system is going to prevail. By the year 2013, forty to sixty percent of the people will be practicing yoga. People will see that people who practice yoga are bright and beautiful, calm, quiet, and blissful. They will recognize that the yogic community is sincere, dependable, serving and giving. The future of yoga is bright, beautiful, bountiful, and blissful.
In the coming years, changes in technology, psychology, and sociology shall be huge. In this chaos of the information age it will be difficult for people to cope with their day to day lives. The body, mind, and spirit have to be organized to meet these challenges. The word is going to spread that ‘Yoga is the way.’ This ancient science has saved mankind before, is saving it now, and shall save it in the future.”34)http://www.kundaliniyoga.com/clients/ikyta/webshell.nsf/WebParentNavLookup/62DB48EF3856D82287256A090079DC7A?OpenDocument
The blasphemous remark that “yoga is the way…[that] saved mankind” replacing Jesus who is the only way (John 14:6) and only savior of mankind (Acts 4:12). Christians can not be linked to such practices, yet churches around the country have been adopting yoga classes, misleading and confusing innocent believers. Protestant churches have introduced “Christ centered Yoga” to their congregations as Caryl Matrisciana documents in her informative DVD entitled Yoga: Uncoiled from East to West. Even Catholic high school text books teach yoga as a way to unite with God. In a chapter entitled “Prayer, Seeking Union with God,” we find many self-professing “Christians” have no problem with borrowing rituals from pagan religions.
“Numerous Catholic retreat houses offer ’Yoga retreats’ or teach Zen meditation methods. But these techniques are totally removed from the Buddhist of Hindu faith. They are often used by Christians to help them develop a conscious faith relationship with Christ in prayer. Likewise, the Buddhist of Hindu uses these same techniques to enter into a deeper union with God as his own religion has taught him to believe in him.”35)James Finely, Michael Pennock, Your Faith and You, Ave Maria Press, 1978, p. 205
We cannot take spiritual rituals from a pagan religion and than claim that it has been removed from the religious order that originated it. This is spiritual deception which is the highest degree of danger one can put themselves in.
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If you liked this article, you may also be interested in Crept In Unawares: Mysticism by Heath Henning is available for purchase here.
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