Sahaja - Origins

Origins

The origins of the word are in Apabhramsha, a now defunct language, and Old Bengali, where its first attested literary usage occurs in the 8th century CE. The word was used in a spiritual context by the north Indian Tantric Siddha master Saraha in the 8th century CE:

So from spontaneity that's unique,
Replete with the Buddha's perfections,
Are all sentient beings born, and in it come to rest
But it is neither concrete nor abstract.

The concept of a spontaneous spirituality entered Hinduism with Nath yogis such as Gorakhnath and was often alluded to indirectly and symbolically in the Twilight Language (sandhya bhasa) that is common to sahaja traditions, as found in Charyapada, Matsyendranath and Daripada. It influenced the bhakti movement through the Sant tradition, exemplified by the Bauls of Bengal, Dnyaneshwar, Meera, Kabir and Guru Nanak, the founder of the Sikh brotherhood.

Yoga in particular had a quickening influence on the various Sahajiya traditions. The culture of the body (kāya-sādhana) through processes of Haṭha-yoga was of paramount importance in the Nāth cult and found in all sahaja schools. Whether conceived of as 'supreme bliss' (Mahā-sukha), as by the Buddhist Sahajiyās, or as 'supreme love' (as with the Vaiṣṇava Sahajiyās), strength of the body was deemed necessary to stand such a supreme realisation.

Read more about this topic:  Sahaja

Famous quotes containing the word origins:

    “The settlement of America had its origins in the unsettlement of Europe. America came into existence when the European was already so distant from the ancient ideas and ways of his birthplace that the whole span of the Atlantic did not widen the gulf.”
    —Lewis Mumford (1895–1990)

    “Compare the history of the novel to that of rock ‘n’ roll. Both started out a minority taste, became a mass taste, and then splintered into several subgenres. Both have been the typical cultural expressions of classes and epochs. Both started out aggressively fighting for their share of attention, novels attacking the drama, the tract, and the poem, rock attacking jazz and pop and rolling over classical music.”
    —W. T. Lhamon, U.S. educator, critic. “Material Differences,” Deliberate Speed: The Origins of a Cultural Style in the American 1950s, Smithsonian (1990)

    “Lucretius
    Sings his great theory of natural origins and of wise conduct; Plato
    smiling carves dreams, bright cells
    Of incorruptible wax to hive the Greek honey.”
    —Robinson Jeffers (1887–1962)