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It is devoted
entirely to Yoga and has confirmed that it has been an old practice for
some time. However, it doesn't point to a specific time wherein Yoga
could have started. The central point to the Gita is that - to be alive
means to be active and in order to avoid difficulties in our lives and
in others, our actions have to benign and have to exceed our egos. Just
as the Upanishads further the Vedas, the Gita builds on and incorporates
the doctrines found in the Upanishads. In the Gita, three facets must
be brought together in our lifestyle: Bhakti or loving devotion, Jnana
which is knowledge or contemplation, and Karma which is about selfless
actions. The Gita then tried to unify Bhakti Yoga, Jnana Yoga, and
Karma Yoga and it is because of this that it has gained importance. The
Gita was a conversation between Prince Arjuna and God-man Krishna and it
basically stresses the importance of opposing evil.
The beginnings of Yoga were developed by the Indus-Sarasvati
civilization in Northern India over 5,000 years ago. The word yoga was
first mentioned in the oldest sacred texts, the Rig Veda. The Vedas were
a collection of texts contained songs and rituals used by Brahmans, the
Vedic priests. Yoga was slowly refined and developed by Vedic priests,
who documented their practices and beliefs in the Upanishads, a huge
work containing over 200 scriptures. The most renowned of these Yogic
scriptures is the Bhagavad-Gîtâ, composed around 500 B.C.E. 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).
A seal discovered during excavation of the
Mohenjo-daro archaeological site in the Indus Valley has drawn attention
as a possible representation of a "yogi" or "proto-Shiva" figure.This "Pashupati"
(Lord of Animals, Sanskrit paśupati)seal shows a seated figure, possibly
ithyphallic, surrounded by animals.Some observers describe the figure as
sitting in a traditional cross-legged yoga pose with its hands resting
on its knees. The discoverer of the seal, Sir John Marshall, and others
have claimed that this figure is a prototype of Shiva, and have
described the figure as having three faces, seated in a "yoga posture"
with the knees out and feet joined.
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