Autobiography of a Yogi

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In 1946, Paramahansa Yogananda (January 5, 1893 – March 7, 1952), published his life story, Autobiography of a Yogi, which was instrumental in introducing the ancient science of yoga and meditation to the West.

It has since been translated into eighteen languages and remains a bestseller. It includes Yogananda's and Sri Yukteswar's explanations of various verses and events of the Bible, such as the Garden of Eden story. Further, it provides descriptions of Yogananda's encounters with leading spiritual figures such as Therese Neumann, the Hindu saint Sri Anandamoyi Ma, Mohandas Gandhi, Rabindranath Tagore, Nobel Prize winning physicist Sir C. V. Raman, and noted American plant scientist Luther Burbank, to whom it is dedicated.

Amelita Galli-Curci, one of the most famous opera singers of the early twentieth century, said about the book:

"Amazing, true stories of saints and masters of India, blended with priceless superphysical information–much needed to balance the Western material efficiency with Eastern spiritual efficiency–come from the vigorous pen of Paramhansa Yogananda, whose teachings my husband and myself have had the pleasure of studying for twenty years."^[1]

Contents 1 Overview 2 Detailed description 2.1 Spiritual quest begins in childhood 2.2 Spiritual lineage and influences 2.3 The guru-disciple relationship 2.4 The science of Kriya Yoga 2.5 God, miracles, religion and science 2.6 Founding a school & going to America 3 Changes to Autobiography of a Yogi over the years 3.1 Self-Realization Fellowship's view 3.2 Critical View of Changes 4 Change in the spelling of 'Paramahansa' 5 Editions Currently Available 6 Chapter listing 7 Notes 8 See Also 9 External links

[edit] Overview

Autobiography of a Yogi is still the most well known and widely distributed of all of Yogananda’s writings. Its impact on the West regarding Western conceptions of Yoga and understanding of the religious heritage of India is considerable. It has been adopted for course use in numerous colleges and universities. In 1999, it was designated one of the "100 Most Important Spiritual Books of the 20th Century" by a panel of theologians and luminaries convened by HarperCollins publishers.^[2]

One of the remarkable aspects of Yogananda’s life story is how young he was at the time he met many of India’s greatest sages. The book Mejda: The Family and Early Life of Paramahansa Yogananda,^[3] written by his younger brother Sananda Lal Ghosh, sheds much light on the depth of his spiritual attainment well before his graduation from high school and his training with his guru, Sri Yukteswar.

Written with insightful wit and candor, Yogananda takes the reader on a personal journey most would have thought to be possible only in India's ancient past. An authoritative text on the spiritual science of yoga (not merely the Hatha Yoga postures so familiar in the West), the book is not so much a year by year chronicle of Yogananda's life, as it is a tribute to Yoga, India and all of the saints who had a profound influence on his life.

The story of Yogananda's relationship to his Guru, Sri Yukteswar, is the most compelling story in the book. The importance of the guru-disciple relationship is a thread that runs throughout the book. The chapter "Years in My Master's Hermitage" is the longest in the book. The importance that Yogananda gave to that relationship is made clear by the very first paragraph of his autobiography:

The characteristic features of Indian culture have long been a search for ultimate verities and the concomitant disciple-guru relationship. My own path led me to a Christlike sage whose beautiful life was chiseled for the ages. He was one of the great masters who are India’s sole remaining wealth. Emerging in every generation, they have bulwarked their land against the fate of Babylon and Egypt.

[edit] Detailed description

[edit] Spiritual quest begins in childhood

Yogananda writes openly about his intense desire, even in childhood, to know what lay behind all the experiences of life and death. As a child he asked, "What is behind the darkness of closed eyes?" The death of his Mother when he was 11, to whom he was deeply devoted, greatly intensified his personal search for God. He states "I loved Mother as my dearest friend on earth. Her solacing black eyes had been my refuge in the trifling tragedies of childhood." Later Yogananda states that in a spiritual vision God, in the aspect of Divine Mother, told him, "It is I who have watched over thee, life after life, in the tenderness of many mothers. See in My gaze the two black eyes, the lost beautiful eyes, thou seekest!"

While still a student in high school, Yogananda longed to dedicate his life to God. With three friends he attempted to run away from home and find his long sought guru amid the Himalayan mountains. But it was not until after his graduation from high school, which he had promised his father he would finish, that Yogananda was to meet the great sage Swami Sri Yukteswar Giri.

[edit] Spiritual lineage and influences

Before the age of 17 when Yogananda finally met his guru, Sri Yukteswar, one person stands out as having a profound influence on his early life. That was Lahiri Mahasaya of Varanasi. Lahiri Mahasaya was the guru of Yogananda's parents and also the guru of Sri Yukteswar, Yogananda's Guru. As early as the first chapter we learn that at around the age of 8, Yogananda was instantly healed of cholera after his Mother's insistence that he pray to Lahiri Mahasaya. Beginning with chapter 31 of his autobiography, Yogananda spends the next five chapters interweaving the life of Lahiri Mahasaya with that of Lahiri Mahasaya's guru, Mahavatar Babaji. Using the stories and biographical facts collected on his return trip to India in 1935 from various disciples of Lahiri Mahasaya (including the wife of Lahiri Mahasaya) as well as Yogananda's own personal testimony, he pays tribute to the three individuals whose lives and collective influence became inseparable from his own life and teachings: Mahavatar Babaji, his chief disciple Lahiri Mahasaya, and his own guru Sri Yukteswar.

[edit] The guru-disciple relationship

Yogananda's lifelong search for his Guru ended when he met Swami Sri Yukteswar. Even though Yogananda described many saints and miracle workers in his book, his relationship with Sri Yukteswar was unique. Yogananda spent several years being trained by Sri Yukteswar for the ultimate mission of spreading the science of yoga to the west. The profound wisdom of Sri Yukteswar, and the many spiritual lessons that Yogananda learned at his Guru's feet are described in the chapter Years in My Master's Hermitage. His Guru also bestowed on Yogananda the experience of samadhi, the ultimate goal of the yogi, as described in the chapter My Experience in Cosmic Consciousness.

The most poignant moment in the book occurs when Yogananda meets Sri Yukteswar for the first time. His words describe the importance of this relationship, and the eternal bond between Guru and disciple:

Retracing my steps as though wing-shod, I reached the narrow lane. My quick glance revealed the quiet figure, steadily gazing in my direction. A few eager steps and I was at his feet.

“Gurudeva!” The divine face was none other than he of my thousand visions. These halcyon eyes, in leonine head with pointed beard and flowing locks, had oft peered through gloom of my nocturnal reveries, holding a promise I had not fully understood.

“O my own, you have come to me!” My guru uttered the words again and again in Bengali, his voice tremulous with joy. “How many years I have waited for you!”

We entered a oneness of silence; words seemed the rankest superfluities. Eloquence flowed in soundless chant from heart of master to disciple. With an antenna of irrefragable insight I sensed that my guru knew God, and would lead me to Him. The obscuration of this life disappeared in a fragile dawn of prenatal memories. Dramatic time! Past, present, and future are its cycling scenes. This was not the first sun to find me at these holy feet!

Yogananda then spent the better part of ten years under his guru's strict discipline. Excerpts from Chapter 12: Years in My Master's Hermitage:

Discipline had not been unknown to me: at home Father was strict, Ananta often severe. But Sri Yukteswar’s training cannot be described as other than drastic. A perfectionist, my guru was hypercritical of his disciples, whether in matters of moment or in the subtle nuances of behavior.

“If you don’t like my words, you are at liberty to leave at any time,” Master assured me. “I want nothing from you but your own improvement. Stay only if you feel benefited.”

“I am hard on those who come for my training,” he admitted to me. “That is my way; take it or leave it. I will never compromise. But you will be much kinder to your disciples; that is your way. I try to purify only in the fires of severity, searing beyond the average toleration. The gentle approach of love is also transfiguring. The inflexible and the yielding methods are equally effective if applied with wisdom. You will go to foreign lands, where blunt assaults on the ego are not appreciated. A teacher could not spread India’s message in the West without an ample fund of accommodative patience and forbearance.” I refuse to state the amount of truth I later came to find in Master’s words!

In Master’s life I fully discovered the cleavage between spiritual realism and the obscure mysticism that spuriously passes as a counterpart. My guru was reluctant to discuss the superphysical realms. His only “marvelous” aura was one of perfect simplicity. In conversation he avoided startling references; in action he was freely expressive. Others talked of miracles but could manifest nothing; Sri Yukteswar seldom mentioned the subtle laws but secretly operated them at will.

[edit] The science of Kriya Yoga

Kriya Yoga is a specific technique of meditation that is referred to throughout Yogananda's autobiography. Yogananda writes in Chapter 26: "Kriya is an ancient science. Lahiri Mahasaya received it from his great guru, Babaji, who rediscovered and clarified the technique after it had been lost in the Dark Ages." In Chapter 4 Lahiri Mahasaya is quoted in regards to Kriya saying, "This technique cannot be bound, filed, and forgotten, in the manner of theoretical inspirations. Continue ceaselessly on your path to liberation through Kriya, whose power lies in practice."

Yogananda goes on to say in Chapter 26:

Kriya Yoga is a simple, psychophysiological method by which the human blood is decarbonized and recharged with oxygen. The atoms of this extra oxygen are transmuted into life current to rejuvenate the brain and spinal centers. By stopping the accumulation of venous blood, the yogi is able to lessen or prevent the decay of tissues; the advanced yogi transmutes his cells into pure energy. Elijah, Jesus, Kabir and other prophets were past masters in the use of Kriya or a similar technique, by which they caused their bodies to dematerialize at will.

Kriya is an ancient science. Lahiri Mahasaya received it from his guru, Babaji, who rediscovered and clarified the technique after it had been lost in the Dark Ages.

“The Kriya Yoga which I am giving to the world through you in this nineteenth century,” Babaji told Lahiri Mahasaya, “is a revival of the same science which Krishna gave, millenniums ago, to Arjuna, and which was later known to Patanjali, and to Christ, St. John, St. Paul, and other disciples.”

Kriya Yoga is referred to by Krishna, India’s greatest prophet, in a stanza of the Bhagavad Gita: “Offering inhaling breath into the outgoing breath, and offering the outgoing breath into the inhaling breath, the yogi neutralizes both these breaths; he thus releases the life force from the heart and brings it under his control.” The interpretation is: “The yogi arrests decay in the body by an addition of life force, and arrests the mutations of growth in the body by apan (eliminating current). Thus neutralizing decay and growth, by quieting the heart, the yogi learns life control.”

[edit] God, miracles, religion and science

The miraculous events recounted in his autobiography comprise a body of work unprecedented in Western literature. Some twenty chapters of Yogananda's autobiography are expressly written about one or more miracles. Chapter thirty entitled "The Law of Miracles" attempts to explain a "rational" understanding of the miraculous powers of saints, and the eternal relationship between God, human life, religion and science.

Referring to the natural fascination with miracles, and those who possess miraculous power, Yogananda at the end of chapter 35 quotes Lahiri Mahasaya:

In reference to miracles, Lahiri Mahasaya often said, “The operation of subtle laws which are unknown to people in general should not be publicly discussed or published without due discrimination.” If in these pages I have appeared to flout his cautionary words, it is because he has given me an inward reassurance. Also, in recording the lives of Babaji, Lahiri Mahasaya, and Sri Yukteswar, I have thought it advisable to omit many true miraculous stories, which could hardly have been included without writing, also, an explanatory volume of abstruse philosophy.

[edit] Founding a school & going to America

In 1915 Yogananda became a monk of the Giri branch of the swami order. In 1917 heeding the counsel of his guru, "Remember that he who rejects the usual worldly duties can justify himself only by assuming some kind of responsibility for a much larger family", Yogananda founded a boys' school in Dihika with just seven children, that was moved to Ranchi in 1918. About education he said,

"The ideal of right education for youth had always been very close to my heart. I saw clearly the arid results of ordinary instruction, aimed at the development of body and intellect only."

In chapter 37 "I Go to America", Yogananda describes a vision that occurred in which he realized "the Lord is calling me to America." He quickly assembled the faculty of the school and gave them the news that he was going to America. Within a few hours he was on a train to Calcutta.

"Tears stood in my eyes as I cast a last look at the little boys and the sunny acres of Ranchi. A definite epoch in my life had now closed, I knew; henceforth I would dwell in far lands."

When an invitation to serve as the delegate from India to a religious conference being held in Boston suddenly arrived, Yogananda sought out his guru to ask if he should go. His reply was simply, "All doors are open for you. It is now or never." Yogananda received financing for the trip from his father who said "I give you this money not in my role as a father but as a faithful disciple of Lahiri Mahasaya. Go then to that far Western land; spread there the creedless teachings of Kriya Yoga."

Yogananda was 27 years old when he left India on The City of Sparta, which docked near Boston on October 6th 1920. It was the first passenger boat to America after the close of World War I. He continued to live in the United States until briefly returning to India during a year long trip through Europe and the Holy Land in 1935-1936.

[edit] Changes to Autobiography of a Yogi over the years

Three editions of Autobiography of a Yogi were published during Yogananda's lifetime: two in 1946, and one in 1951. The later editions, beginning in 1956, four years after Yogananda died, are a point of contention. The controversy has arisen over two issues: Yogananda's signature was changed in the 1958 edition, and there were thousands of editorial changes made between 1951 and 1958.^[4] There are two prevailing views regarding the changes. The publisher, Self-Realization Fellowship, claims that Yogananda authorized the changes. Others point out that there is no written record that Yogananda approved the changes.

[edit] Self-Realization Fellowship's view

According to "Author's Revisions and Wishes for Later Editions of Autobiography of a Yogi" available at the Self Realization Fellowship website honoring the 60th year of the books publication:

"Three editions of Paramahansaji's autobiography appeared during his lifetime. In the third edition, published in 1951, he made significant changes-revising the text thoroughly, deleting material, amplifying various points, and adding a new final chapter, "The Years 1940-1951" (one of the longest in the book).Some further revisions made by him after the third edition could not be incorporated until the publication of the seventh edition, which was released in 1956."

Additionally, the following Publisher's Note was printed in the seventh edition:

"This 1956 American edition contains revisions made by Paramahansa Yogananda in 1949 for the London, England, edition; and additional revisions made by the author in 1951. In a 'Note to the London Edition,' dated October 25, 1949, Paramahansa Yogananda wrote":

"'The arrangement for a London edition of this book has given me an opportunity to revise, and slightly to enlarge, the text. Besides new material in the last chapter, I have added a number of footnotes in which I have answered questions sent me by readers of the American edition."

Also from the same Publisher's note:

"Later revisions, made by the author in 1951, were intended to appear in the fourth (1952) American edition. At that time the rights in Autobiography of a Yogi were vested in a New York publishing house. In 1946 in New York each page of the book had been made into an electrotype plate. Consequently, to add even a comma requires that the metal plate of an entire page be cut apart and resoldered with a new line containing the desired comma. Because of the expense involved in resoldering many plates, the New York publisher did not include in the fourth edition the author’s 1951 revisions."

"In late 1953 Self-Realization Fellowship (SRF) bought from the New York publisher all rights in Autobiography of a Yogi. SRF reprinted the book in 1954 and 1955 (fifth and sixth editions); but during those two years other duties prevented the SRF editorial department from undertaking the formidable task of incorporating the author's revisions on the electrotype plates. The work, however, has been accomplished in time for the seventh edition."

[edit] Critical View of Changes

Some of the changes made over the years include: significant edits to Yogananda's poem Samadhi, the removal of two poems ("God, God, God," and "The Soundless Roar"), the addition of numerous footnotes, and the editing of countless passages, including direct quotes. Yogananda wrote a note announcing his editing changes for the 1951 edition (see above), the last published during his lifetime. There was no note from Yogananda in later editions to confirm that he wanted changes made to his Autobiography after his death.^[5]

A representative sample of changes made in Autobiography of a Yogi between the 1951 and post-1956 editions

1951 Edition (the last edition edited by Yogananda)	Editions after 1956
"Because of certain ancient yogic injunctions, I cannot give a full explanation of Kriya Yoga in the pages of a book intended for the general public. The actual technique must be learned from a Kriyaban or Kriya Yogi; here a broad reference must suffice."	"Because of certain ancient yogic injunctions, I may not give a full explanation of Kriya Yoga in a book intended for the general public. The actual technique should be learned from an authorized Kriyaban (Kriya Yogi) of Self-Realization Fellowship (Yogoda Satsanga Society of India). Here a broad reference must suffice."
In response to the question 'which is greater, a swami or a yogi?': "To fulfill one's earthly responsibilities is indeed the higher path, provided the yogi, maintaining a mental uninvolvement with egotistical desires, plays his part as a willing instrument of God."	"Fulfilling one's earthly responsibilities need not separate man from God, providing he maintains mental uninvolvement with egotistical desires and plays his part in life as a willing instrument of the Divine."
"An urgent need on this war-torn earth is the founding, on a spiritual basis, of numerous world-brotherhood colonies."	(This passage was deleted entirely)
"...Sri Yukteswar bestowed on me the further monastic title of Paramhansa."	"...Sri Yukteswar bestowed on me the further monastic title of Paramahansa."

Among the many changes made long after Yogananda's death were significant editing changes to his poem Samadhi. Yogananda told people that he originally wrote the poem while in the superconscious samadhi state. The original unedited poem can be read at Wikisource. Fourteen lines were removed for the 1956 edition, including the significant lines:

"By deeper, longer, thirsty, guru-given meditation

Comes this celestial samadhi."

[edit] Change in the spelling of 'Paramahansa'

The change in spelling of Yogananda's title from 'Paramhansa' to 'Paramahansa', with the insertion of an extra 'a' is the subject of controversy. During his lifetime, Yogananda always signed his name with the spelling 'Paramhansa', without the extra 'a'. That was the title and spelling as it was given to him by his Guru, Sri Yukteswar, in 1936. In the 1959 edition of the Autobiography of a Yogi, seven years after Yogananda died, the publishers altered the signature by copying and pasting an extra 'a' from a different part of the signature.^[6]

In Indian tradition, both spellings are widely used.^[7][8][9] This is common with Sanskrit words that have been transliterated into the more restricted Roman alphabet. In this case, opponents of the extra 'a' point out that the 'a' is not pronounced when 'Paramahansa' is spoken, and therefore 'Paramhansa' is the proper spelling. Proponents claim that the missing 'a' changes the meaning of the word. However, Sanskrit has a number of Romanization schemes, which is why there is wide acceptance of both spellings, along with yet another version, 'Paramahamsa',^[10][11][12] with an 'm' rather than 'n' near the end of the word.

Putting aside the issue of scholarship, the spelling in current editions published by Self-Realization Fellowship is not the version used by Yogananda himself. Nor is it the version given to him by his Guru, Sri Yukteswar, who was conversant in Sanskrit (his book, The Holy Science, includes English translations of Sanskrit slokas).

In addressing this issue, a clear distinction needs to be made between:

• Prudent scholarship as to what is the most correct rendering into English of paramahansa, which is a Sanskrit word.
• The meaning of param "after" or "opposite compared to parama meaning "supreme, transcendent"
• The common Bengali practice (Yogananda was Bengali) of omitting silent or near-silent a’s in spelling.
• Whether or not Yogananda ever wrote Paramahansa with an "a".
• Whether the extra "a" in the signature displayed under his picture was copied and pasted from a in Yogananda.
• Disagreement with Self Realization Fellowship over the particular timing of the change in spelling.

For further study in regards to the different English spellings of Paramahansa, see Paramahansa and Paramahamsa.

[edit] Editions Currently Available

There are three versions of Autobiography of a Yogi recently published.

1. The version published by Self-Realization Fellowship. ISBN 0-87612-079-6

2. A reprint of the first edition published by Crystal Clarity Publishers in the late '90's. ISBN 1-56589-212-7

3. An additional version published by Crystal Clarity in 2005 that includes the extra chapter added by Yogananda in 1951. ISBN 1-56589-734-X

[edit] Chapter listing

As titled in the 1997 Anniversary Edition:

1. My Parents and Early Life

2. My Mother's Death and the Mystic Amulet

3. The Saint with Two Bodies (Swami Pranabananda)

4. My Interrupted Flight Toward the Himalayas

5. A "Perfume Saint" Displays His Wonders

6. The Tiger Swami

7. The Levitating Saint (Nagendra Nath Bhaduri)

8. India's Great Scientist, J. C. Bose

9. The Blissful Devotee and his Cosmic Romance (Master Mahasaya)

10. I Meet my Master, Sri Yukteswar

11. Two Penniless Boys in Brindaban

12. Years in my Master's Hermitage

13. The Sleepless Saint (Ram Gopal Muzumdar)

14. An Experience in Cosmic Consciousness

15. The Cauliflower Robbery

16. Outwitting the Stars

17. Sasi and the Three Sapphires

18. A Mohammedan Wonder-Worker (Afzal Khan)

19. My Master, in Calcutta, Appears in Serampore

20. We Do Not Visit Kashmir

21. We Visit Kashmir

22. The Heart of a Stone Image

23. I Receive My University Degree

24. I Become a Monk of the Swami Order

25. Brother Ananta and Sister Nalini

26. The Science of Kriya Yoga

27. Founding a Yoga School in Ranchi

28. Kashi, Reborn and Discovered

29. Rabindranath Tagore and I Compare Schools

30. The Law of Miracles

31. An Interview with the Sacred Mother (Kashi Moni Lahiri)

32. Rama is Raised from the Dead

33. Babaji, Yogi-Christ of Modern India

34. Materializing a Palace in the Himalayas

35. The Christlike Life of Lahiri Mahasaya

36. Babaji's Interest in the West

37. I Go to America

38. Luther Burbank – A Saint Amid the Roses

39. Therese Neumann, the Catholic Stigmatist

40. I Return to India

41. An Idyl in South India

42. Last Days With My Guru

43. The Resurrection of Sri Yukteswar

44. With Mahatma Gandhi at Wardha

45. The Bengali "Joy-Permeated Mother" (Ananda Moyi Ma)

46. The Woman Yogi Who Never Eats (Giri Bala)

47. I Return to the West

48. At Encinitas in California

49. The Years 1940-1951

[edit] Notes

[edit] See Also

• Kriya Yoga
• Lahiri Mahasaya
• Mahavatar Babaji
• Paramahansa Yogananda
• Sri Panchanon Bhattacharya
• Sri Yukteswar
• World Brotherhood Colonies

[edit] External links

• Gutenberg site for the 1946 edition of Autobiography of a Yogi
• Free online edition of Autobiography of a Yogi
• Why Read the First Edition of Autobiography of a Yogi? A comparison of editions