Yogis Without Borders 81
universe, from the atoms to the biggest suns, because he would control
the Prana. This is the end and aim of Pranayama. When the Yogi becomes
perfect, there will be nothing in nature not under his control. If he orders
the gods or the souls of the departed to come, they will come at his bid-
ding. All the forces of nature will obey him as slaves. When the ignorant
see these powers of the Yogi, they call them the miracles.
The Yogis say that behind this particular manifestation there is a gener-
alisation. Behind all particular ideas stands a generalised, an abstract prin-
ciple; grasp it, and you have grasped everything. The Yogi who has done
this gains perfection; no longer is he under any power. He becomes almost
almighty, almost all- knowing.^65Directly following this excerpt, Vivekananda acknowledges that Yogis are not
the only ones who have attempted to access this power. He explicitly includes
in this category the varieties of American metaphysical practitioners— mind-
healers, faith- healers, Spiritualists, Christian Scientists, and hypnotists— in whose
company he is likely to have circulated during his time in the United States. In a
universalizing move, Vivekananda argues that yogic superpowers in all their man-
ifestations, which represent a generic attempt to control material nature, rely on a
manipulation of the flow of prāṇa through the substratum of ākāśa.
Prāṇa and ākāśa are converted by Vivekananda into scientific language as
energ y and matter. In his perspective, Prāṇāyāma therefore relies on a control
of electrical (or nerve) currents as they flow through the material of the body,
which is considered identical to and coextensive with the material of the universe.
It is important to remember that Vivekananda never received formal initiation
into any traditional sādhana, or ritual lineage. He therefore spends little time
expounding on the details of yogic practice, and his teachings are generally lim-
ited to deep breathing and basic meditation exercises. Nevertheless, in the cou-
pling of breath control and will, he finds all the necessary elements to substantiate
the mechanics of his yogic science:
In the first place, from rhythmical breathing comes a tendency of all the mol-
ecules in the body to move in the same direction. When mind changes into
will, the nerve currents change into a motion similar to electricity, because
the nerves have been proved to show polarity under the action of electric cur-
rents. This shows that when the will is transformed into the nerve currents, it
is changed into something like electricity. When all the motions of the body
have become perfectly rhythmical, the body has, as it were, become a gigantic
battery of will. This tremendous will is exactly what the Yogi wants.^66