Is Yoga a Religion?

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Let’s identify basic characteristics common to religion and Yoga, while remembering that not all religions include all these characteristics, as this depends upon their development tendency and concentration.

I want to begin with the assertion that all humans have the capacity for an inner experience of the divine. A spontaneous and direct experience of that is possible at any moment in any place. Religious methods developed as a backup system to help humans attain awareness and cultivate their human potential. Religion, then, is a system whose methods one could use for spiritual development. Both Eastern and Western traditions have psycho-spiritual methods for comprehending God/source and to come close to it and merge with it. Among them are the Jewish and Christian mystics from medieval era who were the progenitors of great practices and wisdom.

Yoga is a spiritual discipline. It evolved over thousands of years and includes methods of spiritual attunement that are physical, mental, and ritualistic in nature. From the Sramanic stream, that of the wandering holy men, to the organized Yogasutras of Patanjali (writings from 2 nd century BCE), Yoga has been a religion with many of the religious markers familiar to all of the world’s recognized religions. The Vedas, Upanishads, and Bhagavad Gita are some of the major texts that include stories, poems, hymns, and mantras in the Yogic tradition. They express the many layers of the religion of Yoga: devotional, body-centered methods, ethical methods, and meditative methods.