strive for the attainment of supernatural powers alone.
The yoga system was codified by the great scholar Patanjali in four small books which are known as The Yoga Aphorisms of Patanjali.3 The authorship of Patanjali, however, is still disputed. Actually, there were two Patanjalis, one the author of the yoga aphorisms or sutras, the other the author of a commentary upon the grammatical work of the famous Panini. Traditionally, the aphorisms are assigned to about the second century B.C., but Professor James H. Woods, on sound historical inference, dates them about the fourth to the fifth century of our era.4 There is, however, considerable evidence that yoga may be much older as a technique. Here we do not intend to prove or disprove the theories of yoga. Buddhist yoga differs from Hindu yoga in its philosophical and religious applications, although their techniques of disciplining the body and mind are often similar. But because of their different philosophical tenets, the aims and results are not the same. For example, the Buddhist view of Shunyata, the Void, is an important point of Buddhist doctrine and plays an important role in the Buddhist type of meditation.
In Tibet, yoga has been a time-honored practice since the country became Buddhist in the seventh century A.D. Tibetan tradition knows of many lamas who practiced it successfully. There are also available several accounts by Western travelers and soldiers who have witnessed Tibetan yoga practices and even undertaken to study them.
The form of yoga now known as Tibetan was introduced there by the famous teacher Padmasambhava. It is based upon the idealistic Yogachara school founded by Asanga about the third century A.D. This form of yoga teaches that the absolute truth or bodhi manifested in the Buddhas is attainable only by those who practice yoga. Tibetan yoga is a yoga of knowledge, in practice similar to that of the Hindu Jnana school. Yogachara asserts that all outward things—objects, stars, etc.—are really mental experiences and that we read into external nature what exists in our own minds (vijnana),5 This concept, incidentally, we encounter in many of Mila's poems.
Yoga disciplines are stressed in Tibet because they help in the acquisition of intuitive insight. Some Tibetan yogins believe that they can create form by thought. In other words, by projecting a mental image they create a magic appearance which they can summon up or dissolve at will.6 This is based, of course, on the assumption that all appearances in reality are mind, as formulated by the Yogachara and Shunyata doctrines. The claim that it is possible to communicate with, to know, or to identify with lower animals, demons, or inanimate objects is also a result of this doctrine. As W. Y. Evans-Wentz puts it: "When we know mind, we also know matter, for matter is mind; and there is nought else conceivable save mind, as this yoga postulates. In the One Mind is the summation of the whole of consciousness, the ineffable at-one-ment of all the One Mind's microscopic aspects. In transcending the microscopic mind of the human ego, man transcends himself; he becomes a conscious participator in the all-embracing Universal Mind, the Over-Mind, the Cosmic Consciousness."7
Some aphorisms from Padmasambhava's book, The Yoga of Self-realization, will illustrate that Tibetan yoga is a system of subjective knowledge and that certain of its mental realizations, in spite of their verbal contradictions, constitute the Tibetan form of yoga:
"The Dharma being nowhere save in the mind, there is no other place of meditation than the mind."
"There being nothing upon which to meditate, no meditation is there whatsoever."
"Without meditating, without going astray, look into the true state, wherein self-recognition, self-knowledge, self-illusion shine resplendently. These, so shining, are called 'the Bodhisattvic Mind.'"
"There being no two such things as meditation and object of meditation, there is no need to fall under the sway of deeply obscuring Ignorance; for, as the result of meditation upon the unmodified quiescence of the mind, the non-created wisdom instantaneously shines forth clearly."
"Although there is an innumerable variety of profound practices, to one's mind in its true state they are non-existent; for there are no two such things as existence and non-existence."
"Inasmuch as from eternity there is nothing whatsoever to be practised, there is no need to fall under the sway of errant propensities."
"By controlling and understanding the thought-process in one's mind, emancipation is attained automatically."
"Without mastery of the mental processes there can be no realization."8
Theoretically all the feats of yoga are plausible. It may seem surprising to Westerners to hear of Tibetan yogins who can meditate nude in the snow or who can run incredible distances at great speed while hardly touching the ground. Others can transmit messages from room to room or across miles of arid, windswept mountains.
This is "magical" only to those who do not understand either the Tibetan way of life or the religious ideals of the Tibetan people. Asceticism and the arduous practice necessary to maintain it surely train the body and the mind, for in proportion as the body is controlled, will-power will increase. The more advanced religious meditations are extremely difficult and time-consuming. They demand the most severe dedication on the part of the disciple or the monk.
MILA AS METAPHYSICIAN: In Mila's songs we find simple expositions of yoga (as in Chapter II, Song 1) along with the most profound metaphysical perfections (as in Chapter II, Song 2). Their full comprehension requires considerable background in Buddhist philosophy and yoga. The Void to which he refers several times is the essence of Mahayana metaphysics and is perhaps the most difficult for Western minds to understand. The only reality which exists is the spiritual reality. Only the spiritual is real; all else is illusion. As Mila sings in Chapter III, Song 9:
"The Yogin sees the clear light, neither comes nor goes.
The appearance of the external world is an illusion."
Even the visions the yogin experiences in some of his higher meditations must be recognized as illusions. The yogin is taught to visualize the deities of the pantheon, but ultimately those forms dissolve, and he identifies with the Absolute, which is the realm of non-form, non-activity—in other words, Shunyata, the Void. In the same song from Chapter III, Mila sings:
"Since demons are the phantoms of the mind,
If it is not understood by the Yogin that they are empty appearances,
And even if he thinks they are real, meditation is confused.
But the root of the delusion is in his own mind."
Mila becomes so deeply engaged in his doctrine that he recites in Chapter IV, Song 6:
"At times, I ate the Void for food."
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