In the 1920s and 30s, Hatha Yoga was strongly promoted in India with the work of T. This began at the 1893 Parliament of Religions in Chicago, when Swami Vivekananda wowed the attendees with his lectures on yoga and the universality of the world’s religions. In the late 1800s and early 1900s, yoga masters began to travel to the West, attracting attention and followers. This exploration of these physical-spiritual connections and body centered practices led to the creation of what we primarily think of yoga in the West: Hatha Yoga. They developed Tantra Yoga, with radical techniques to cleanse the body and mind to break the knots that bind us to our physical existence. They rejected the teachings of the ancient Vedas and embraced the physical body as the means to achieve enlightenment. Patanjali is often considered the father of yoga and his Yoga-Sûtras still strongly influence most styles of modern yoga.Ī few centuries after Patanjali, yoga masters created a system of practices designed to rejuvenate the body and prolong life. Patanjali organized the practice of yoga into an 'eight limbed path' containing the steps and stages towards obtaining Samadhi or enlightenment. Written some time in the second century, this text describes the path of RAJA YOGA, often called 'classical yoga'. The Classical period is defined by Patanjali’s Yoga-Sûtras, the first systematic presentation of yoga. In the pre-classical stage, yoga was a mishmash of various ideas, beliefs and techniques that often conflicted and contradicted each other. The Upanishads took the idea of ritual sacrifice from the Vedas and internalized it, teaching the sacrifice of the ego through self-knowledge, action ( karma yoga) and wisdom (jnana yoga). The most renowned of the Yogic scriptures is the Bhagavad-Gîtâ, composed around 500 B.C.E. Yoga was slowly refined and developed by the Brahmans and Rishis (mystic seers) who documented their practices and beliefs in the upanishads, a huge work containing over 200 scriptures.

The Vedas were a collection of texts containing songs, mantras and rituals to be used by Brahmans, the Vedic priests. The word yoga was first mentioned in the oldest sacred texts, the Rig Veda. The beginnings of Yoga were developed by the Indus-Sarasvati civilization in Northern India over 5,000 years ago. Yoga’s long rich history can be divided into four main periods of innovation, practice and development.

The development of yoga can be traced back to over 5,000 years ago, but some researchers think that yoga may be up to 10,000 years old old. The early writings on yoga were transcribed on fragile palm leaves that were easily damaged, destroyed or lost. Yoga’s history has many places of obscurity and uncertainty due to its oral transmission of sacred texts and the secretive nature of its teachings.

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