title: The Yoga-Sutra of Patanjali: A New Translation with Commentary (Shambhala Classics)
author: Patanjali
description: The <i>Yoga-Sutra of Patanjali</i> is a classic Sanskrit treatise consisting of 195 "threads" or aphorisms describing a process of liberation through yoga. Little is known about Patanjali, although most scholars estimate that he lived in India circa 200-300 B.C., possibly as early as 500 B.C. Patanjali organized the sutras into four parts: Samadhi (absorption), Sadhana (practice), Vibhuti (supernatural powers), and Kaivalya (liberation), and it adds up to a dense, difficult text describing the workings of consciousness and explaining how, through yoga, one can obtain liberation from the suffering caused by fluctuations in the mind. Attempting a new translation and commentary is an ambitious project for a layman like Hartranft, founder of a center dedicated to integrating yoga and Buddhist traditions, and his translation is notable for his attempts to interpret the sutras from a modern American Buddhist perspective. Hartranft occasionally oversimplifies and takes some questionable liberties in his zeal to link Patanjali to the Buddha, but his translation certainly succeeds in making Patanjali's esoteric theories comprehensible to today's readers. <i>Jane Tuma</i><br /><i>Copyright  American Library Association. All rights reserved</i>
zlib_text: पत��ल योगसू� 
  The Yoga Aphorisms [Sūtras] of
  Patanjali
  ————
  AN INTERPRETATION
  BY
  WILLIAM QUAN JUDGE
  ASSISTED BY
  JAMES HENDERSON CONNELLY
  1890 Second Edition, 
  Updated and Corrected.
  
  Dedication
  THIS BOOK IS LAID UPON THE ALTAR 
  OF MASTERS’ CAUSE, 
  AND IS DEDICATED TO THEIR SERVANT 
  H. P. BLAVATSKY. 
  ALL CONCERN FOR ITS FRUITS OR RESULTS 
  IS ABANDONED: 
  THEY ARE LEFT IN CHARGE OF KARMA 
  AND THE MEMBERS OF 
  THE THEOSOPHICAL SOCIETY.
  
  CONTENTS
  ———
  ����.
  Preface
  v.
  Book I: Concentration
  1
  Book II: Means of Concentration
  20
  Book III
  37
  Book IV: The Essential Nature of Isolation
  62
  
  V
  PREFACE
  This edition of Patanjali's Yoga Aphorisms is not put forth as
  a new translation, nor as a literal rendering into English of the
  original.
  In the year 1885 an edition was printed at Bombay by Mr.
  Tookeram Tatya, a Fellow of the Theosophical Society, which
  has been since widely circulated among its members in all
  parts of the world. But it has been of use only to those who had
  enough acquaintance with th