Microsoft Word - Taimni - The Science of Yoga.doc

beneath the apparently unconnected ideas very often provides the clue to the meaning
of many Sutras. It should be remembered that this method of exposition was prevalent
at a time when printing was unknown and most of the important treatises had to be
memorized by the student. Hence the necessity of condensation to the utmost limit.
Nothing essential was, of course, left out but everything with which the student was
expected to be familiar or which he could easily infer from the context was ruthlessly
cut out.
The student will find on careful study what a tremendous amount of theoretical
and practical knowledge the author has managed to incorporate in this very small trea-
tise. Everything necessary for the proper understanding of the subject has been given
at one place or another in a skeleton form. But the body of the requisite knowledge has
to be dug out, prepared properly, chewed and digested before the subject can be under-
stood thoroughly in its entirety. The Sutra method of exposition may appear to the
modern student needlessly obscure and difficult but if he goes through the labour re-
quired for the mastery of the subject he will realize its superiority to the all too easy
modern methods of presentation. The necessity of struggling with the words and ideas
and digging out their hidden meanings ensures a very thorough assimilation of knowl-
edge and develops simultaneously the powers and faculties of the mind, especially that
important and indispensable capacity of digging out of one's own mind the knowledge
which lies buried in its deeper recesses.
But while this method of exposition is very effective it has its drawbacks also.
The chief disadvantage is the difficulty which the ordinary student who is not thor-
oughly conversant with the subject has in finding the correct meaning. Not only is he
likely to find many Sutras difficult to understand on account of their brevity but he
may completely misunderstand some of them and be led astray in a hopeless manner.
We have to remember that in a treatise like the Yoga-Sutras, behind many a word there
is a whole pattern of thought of which the word is a mere symbol. To understand the
true significance of the Sutras we must be thoroughly familiar with these patterns. The
difficulty is increased still further when the words have to be translated into another
language which does not contain exactly equivalent words.
Those who wrote these treatises were master-minds, masters of the subject and
language they dealt with. There could be no fault in their method of presentation. But
in the course of time fundamental changes can sometimes be brought about in the
meaning of words and the thought patterns of those who study these treatises. And this