Silence Unheard

Explores the experience of yoga in the Yogasutra of Patanjali. Silence Unheard maintains that the reality of Patañjali's Yogas?tra is a profound silence barely and variously audible to the scholars and interpreters who approach it. Even the Yogas?tra itself is an "approach," a voice articulating an other- a silent, beyond-speech yogin. Author Yohanan Grinshpon presents Patañjali as a S??khya-philosopher, who interprets silence in accordance with his own dualist metaphysics and Buddhistic sensibilities. The Yogas?tra represents an intellectual's conceptualization of utter otherness rather than the yogin's verbalization of silence. Silence Unheard focuses on the yogin's supra-normal experiences (siddhis) as well as on the classification of silences and the ultimate goal of disintegration through gu?a balance. The book provides a translation of the Yogas?tra divided into two sections: an essential text, concerning the yoga practitioner, and a secondary text, concerning the philosopher. Grinshpon also surveys the encounters of intellectuals, scholars, seekers, devotees, and outsiders with the Yogas?tra.