Friends Event: How New is Modern Yoga?

A talk by Dr Jason Birch of the OCHS

Modern yoga is generally believed to be an ancient discipline. However, many of the postures (āsana) of modern yoga are not mentioned in mediaeval yoga texts, such as the Haṭhapradīpikā. This has led to claims that most of the postures we see today are the invention of twentieth-century Indian gurus. This talk will provide a general history of yogic postures and assess the antiquity of modern postures in light of three late mediaeval manuscripts which contain new information.