13. Do Yogis Want to Transcend or Transform the Body?
Yoga Studies in Five Minutes - Theodora Wildcroft
Adrián Muñoz [+]
El Colegio de Mexico
Adrián Muñoz is faculty member at the Centre for Asian and African Studies, El Colegio de
México. His main areas of research are premodern religious movements and yogic
hagiography and literature. He is currently leading a collective project on the history and
practice of yoga in Latin America. Among other titles, he has co-authored Historia mínima del yoga (2019) and co-edited Yogi Heroes and Poets. Histories and Legends of the Nāths (2011). He has also contributed to The Routledge Handbook of Yoga and Meditation Studies (2021) and The Routledge Handbook of South Asian Religions (2021).
Description
Unlike other yogic schools, which sought to transcend the body, haṭhayoga has always emphasised bodily functioning and a progressive perfectioning of its potentialities. Nonetheless, the haṭhayogin seeks an eventual state of total and eternal enlightenment, in which all physical limitations have been transcended.