Yoga – A Theological Investigation

A very large number of people have asked: can Christians practice yoga? To put it more precisely: may Christians practice yoga without betraying, undermining, or diluting their faith? Might yoga strengthen Christian belief and practice—or at least be as neutral as baseball or soccer are toward it? Although these questions could be motivated by solely commercial interests or by mere curiosity, this work is a theological investigation that emerges from the spiritual need to know whether practicing yoga would be compatible with Christian faith and practice. The book begins by establishing an Aristotelian-Boethian method of definition of systematic comparison. It spells out the investigation’s primary sources, noting the great diversity of texts, teachings, and practice that adopt the name "yoga," and the unified works in Catholicism that guide later comparison, especially the Church Fathers in relation to Greco-Roman paganism. After considering the historical development of yoga, the book asks questions such as, "Is yoga a branch of Hinduism?" and, "Is yoga a philosophy?" A great variety of yogic sources then help formulate a definition of yoga according to its material, formal, efficient, and final causes. After this, the semiology of St. Augustine and John of St. Thomas illuminates the meaning of yogic postures, and the issue of Hindu gods in relation to yoga practice. The investigation concludes by assessing the moral and spiritual issues bound up with yoga practice, including how intentionality affects yoga practice, and whether postural practices always have spiritual effects. Finally, lessons are drawn up from the adaptive missionary work of Jesuit Roberto de Nobili in sixteenth-century India, and the physical prayer postures of St. Dominic, the founder of the Order of Preachers. With fresh insights and original research throughout, this theological investigation into yoga has wide-ranging consequences for today’s Church as it faces non-Christian practices and beliefs throughout the world.