{"product_id":"2940015739251","title":"THE YOGA SUTRAS OF PATANJALI \"The Book of the Spiritual Man\"","description":"INTRODUCTION TO BOOK I\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe Yoga Sutras of Patanjali are in themselves exceedingly brief, less\u003cbr\u003ethan ten pages of large type in the original. Yet they contain the\u003cbr\u003eessence of practical wisdom, set forth in admirable order and detail.\u003cbr\u003eThe theme, if the present interpreter be right, is the great regeneration,\u003cbr\u003ethe birth of the spiritual from the psychical man: the same theme\u003cbr\u003ewhich Paul so wisely and eloquently set forth in writing to his disciples\u003cbr\u003ein Corinth, the theme of all mystics in all lands.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWe think of ourselves as living a purely physical life, in these material\u003cbr\u003ebodies of ours. In reality, we have gone far indeed from pure physical\u003cbr\u003elife; for ages, our life has been psychical, we have been centred and\u003cbr\u003eimmersed in the psychic nature. Some of the schools of India say that\u003cbr\u003ethe psychic nature is, as it were, a looking-glass, wherein are mirrored\u003cbr\u003ethe things seen by the physical eyes, and heard by the physical ears.\u003cbr\u003eBut this is a magic mirror; the images remain, and take a certain life\u003cbr\u003eof their own. Thus within the psychic realm of our life there grows up\u003cbr\u003ean imaged world wherein we dwell; a world of the images of things\u003cbr\u003eseen and heard, and therefore a world of memories; a world also of\u003cbr\u003ehopes and desires, of fears and regrets. Mental life grows up among\u003cbr\u003ethese images, built on a measuring and comparing, on the massing of\u003cbr\u003eimages together into general ideas; on the abstraction of new notions\u003cbr\u003eand images from these; till a new world is built up within, full of\u003cbr\u003edesires and hates, ambition, envy, longing, speculation, curiosity,\u003cbr\u003eself-will, self-interest.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe teaching of the East is, that all these are true powers overlaid by\u003cbr\u003efalse desires; that though in manifestation psychical, they are in\u003cbr\u003eessence spiritual; that the psychical man is the veil and prophecy of the\u003cbr\u003espiritual man.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe purpose of life, therefore, is the realizing of that prophecy; the\u003cbr\u003eunveiling of the immortal man; the birth of the spiritual from the\u003cbr\u003epsychical, whereby we enter our divine inheritance and come to\u003cbr\u003einhabit Eternity. This is, indeed, salvation, the purpose of all true\u003cbr\u003ereligion, in all times.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ePatanjali has in mind the spiritual man, to be born from the psychical.\u003cbr\u003eHis purpose is, to set in order the practical means for the unveiling\u003cbr\u003eand regeneration, and to indicate the fruit, the glory and the power, of\u003cbr\u003ethat new birth.","brand":"SAP","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47173080252656,"sku":"2940015739251","price":0.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940015739251","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}