International Yoga Day is observed on June 21 every year. The United Nations declared it via Resolution 69/131 on December 11, 2014. Yoga originates from the Sanskrit root yuj, meaning to unite the individual soul with universal consciousness. The Bhagavad Gita describes three yogic paths: Karma, Jnana, and Bhakti. The Patanjali Yoga Sutras define yoga as the cessation of mental fluctuations (Sutra 1.2). In Sanatan Dharma, yoga’s purpose is moksha – liberation – not physical fitness.
The Sanskrit definition of yoga comes from one root word: yuj. Panini’s Ashtadhyayi, the foundational grammar of Sanskrit, records two meanings for this root. The first is yujir yoge – to join or unite. The second is yuj samadhau – to concentrate or absorb completely.
Both meanings point to the same destination. Yoga in Hinduism is the union of the individual soul (jiva) with universal consciousness (Brahman). Every school of Hindu philosophy – Advaita, Dvaita, Vishishtadvaita – accepts this definition as the foundation. What differs between schools is the method, not the goal.
But what yoga is not? The physical postures (asana) practiced globally today represent the third of Patanjali’s eight limbs. Asana was designed to prepare the body for meditation – not as a standalone practice. The Yoga Sutras dedicate only three of their 196 aphorisms to asana.
The word yoga appears 78 times across the 18 chapters of the Bhagavad Gita. Six of those chapters carry “yoga” directly in their title. Lord Krishna does not present yoga as exercise or stress relief. He presents it as a complete science of self-realization delivered on the battlefield of Kurukshetra.
The Master Definition from Bhagwat Geeta:
योगः कर्मसु कौशलम्
Yogah karmasu kaushalam
Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 2, Verse 50
Yoga is skill in action. Krishna does not define yoga by sitting still. He defines it by how one acts – without attachment, without craving for results.
The Bhagavad Gita and yoga present three distinct paths to the same liberation. Each path matches a different human temperament. None is superior to the others in the Gita’s framework.
A fourth path, Raja Yoga (the yoga of mental mastery), is addressed in Chapter 6. Krishna describes the ideal yogi in Gita 6.47: one who worships with faith and whose mind rests in the divine. This verse directly anticipates Patanjali’s system – the concentrated, inward-turned mind as the highest yogic state.
The Patanjali Yoga Sutras are 196 aphorisms compiled by the sage Patanjali. Scholars date the text between 400 BCE and 200 CE. It is the foundational text of what Patanjali calls Raja Yoga – the royal path of mental discipline.
The Core Definition Yoga Sutras:
योगश्चित्तवृत्तिनिरोधः
Yogash chitta vritti nirodhah
Patanjali Yoga Sutras, Chapter 1, Sutra 2
Yoga is the practice of calming the mind. When the mind stops its constant movement such as desire, fear, memory, fantasy… what remains is pure awareness. That awareness is the self. That recognition is yoga.
To reach that stillness, Patanjali prescribes the Ashtanga, eight successive limbs. The first two are ethical foundations. The last three are meditative absorptions. Asana (the posture most associated with modern yoga) is only the third limb.
1. Yama – Non-violence, truth, non-stealing, celibacy, non-possessiveness
2. Niyama – Cleanliness, contentment, discipline, self-study, surrender to the divine
3. Asana – Steady, comfortable seated posture for meditation
4. Pranayama – Regulation and extension of the breath
5. Pratyahara – Withdrawal of the senses from external objects
6. Dharana – Concentration – fixing the mind on a single point
7. Dhyana – Unbroken meditative flow toward the object of concentration
8. Samadhi – Complete absorption – the practitioner and the object merge into one
Samadhi, the eighth limb, is what the Gita calls union with Brahman. Patanjali and Shri Krishna describe the same destination through different maps. The Patanjali Yoga Sutras give the psychological mechanics. The Bhagavad Gita on yoga gives the philosophical and devotional framework. Both are necessary for a complete understanding.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi proposed International Yoga Day at the United Nations General Assembly on September 27, 2014. He specifically recommended June 21, the summer solstice – as the date.
The UN adopted Resolution 69/131 on December 11, 2014, with a record 177 co-sponsoring nations. The first International Yoga Day was observed on June 21, 2015.
The summer solstice carries significance in Vedic tradition beyond its astronomical role. In yogic lore, the solstice marks the period when Adiyogi (the first yogi, Lord Shiva) began transmitting yoga to the Saptarishis – the seven sages.
This transmission is described in the Shiva Purana and forms the mythological origin of yoga as a teachable system. June 21 therefore connects the modern global observance to its oldest Hindu source.
Yoga and stress relief Gita teachings are real, but they are a byproduct, not the goal. The Gita’s Arjuna was overcome with grief and paralysis at the start of Chapter 1. Krishna’s entire teaching was a response to that distress. By Chapter 18, Arjuna declares his delusion gone and his clarity restored. But Krishna never prescribed yoga as therapy. He prescribed it as the path to permanent freedom.
The meaning of yoga in Hinduism is inseparable from the concept of moksha. Moksha means liberation from the cycle of birth, death, and rebirth (samsara). Every yogic path in the Gita – Karma, Jnana, Bhakti – leads to this single destination. Patanjali’s Samadhi is the experiential equivalent of what the Gita calls Brahma-nirvana (Gita 2.72).
The Gita’s clearest statement on yoga’s purpose: Bhagavad Gita 6.23 defines yoga as duhkha-samyoga-viyogam – the disconnection from union with suffering. Yoga does not add peace to your life. It removes the root cause of restlessness from within.
Conclusion: Yoga did not begin in a studio. It began in scripture. The Bhagavad Gita gave yoga its purpose: freedom from the cycle of suffering through skillful action, knowledge, and devotion. Patanjali gave it a method: eight progressive steps that move the practitioner from ethical living all the way to complete meditative absorption. Both point to the same truth. The body bends, the breath steadies, the mind quiets. But the destination was never a flexible spine or a calm morning. It was always the self, recognized in its fullness. On International Yoga Day, the world rolls out a mat. Sanatan Dharma invites you to go further. Pick up the Gita. Read the Sutras. Understand what the tradition actually said before the world borrowed it. The posture is the doorway. Liberation is the room. On this International Yoga Day, may you go beyond the posture and find the stillness it was always pointing toward. |
The word yoga first appears in the Rigveda, the oldest of the four Vedas, composed between 1500 and 1200 BCE. In the Rigveda, it refers to the yoking of horses and the harnessing of energy toward a divine purpose. The Katha Upanishad, composed between the fifth and third centuries BCE, contains the first use of yoga with its modern spiritual meaning, the controlled withdrawal of the senses toward inner awareness.
In Sanatan Dharma, Lord Shiva is called Adiyogi, the first yogi. The Shiva Purana’s Vayaviya Samhita describes how Shiva transmitted the knowledge of yoga to the seven sages (Saptarishis) on the day of the summer solstice. This is why June 21 was chosen as International Yoga Day. In historical terms, the sage Patanjali systematized yoga into a teachable framework between 400 BCE and 200 CE. Patanjali did not invent yoga. He codified a tradition that already existed.
Yoga is not a religion. It is one of the six orthodox schools of Hindu philosophy (shad darshanas), alongside Samkhya, Nyaya, Vaisheshika, Mimamsa, and Vedanta. A school of philosophy is a system of inquiry, not a set of beliefs requiring conversion. People of any faith can practice yoga’s physical, mental, and ethical disciplines without converting to Hinduism. However, yoga’s philosophical roots, its texts, its deities, and its goal of moksha are inseparable from Sanatan Dharma. Separating the practice from its source does not erase the source.
Yoga appears in at least 20 of the 108 Upanishads. The Katha Upanishad (3.3-3.6) uses the chariot metaphor, the body is the chariot, the senses are the horses, the intellect is the driver, and the self is the passenger. Yoga is the act of taking the reins. The Shvetashvatara Upanishad (2.8-2.13) describes specific postures and breath regulation for meditation. The Mundaka Upanishad connects yoga directly to the realization of Brahman as the goal.
Raja Yoga is the yoga of mental mastery. Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras are the primary text of Raja Yoga. The Bhagavad Gita addresses it in Chapter 6, where Krishna describes the practice of concentrated meditation (dhyana) with a restrained, focused mind. Raja Yoga differs from Karma, Jnana, and Bhakti in its method: where Karma Yoga works through action, Jnana through knowledge, and Bhakti through devotion, Raja Yoga works directly on the mind itself, silencing its fluctuations until pure awareness remains.
The Bhagavad Gita opens with Arjuna in acute psychological distress, grief, paralysis, and confusion on the battlefield. Krishna does not offer comfort. He offers clarity. In Gita 6.23, he defines yoga as duhkha-samyoga-viyogam, the disconnection from contact with suffering. The Gita’s teaching on stress is precise: suffering comes from identifying the self with circumstances, outcomes, and roles. Yoga breaks that identification. It does not remove difficulty. It removes the self’s dependence on difficulty for its sense of worth.
The Bhagavad Gita names four primary types: Karma Yoga (selfless action, Ch. 3), Jnana Yoga (knowledge, Ch. 4), Bhakti Yoga (devotion, Ch. 12), and Dhyana Yoga or Raja Yoga (meditation, Ch. 6). Beyond the Gita, Hindu tradition recognizes additional paths including Hatha Yoga (physical and energy-based practices, documented from the 11th century onward in texts like the Hatha Yoga Pradipika), Kundalini Yoga, Mantra Yoga, and Laya Yoga. All paths share one destination: moksha, liberation from the cycle of birth and death.
Patanjali’s Ashtanga system is primarily a psychological and meditative path. Asana in his system means a steady, comfortable seated posture for meditation, nothing more. Hatha Yoga, which emerged in texts like the Hatha Yoga Pradipika (circa 15th century CE), developed an extensive system of physical postures, breathing techniques (pranayama), and energy locks (bandhas) specifically to purify and prepare the body as a vehicle for higher awareness. Hatha Yoga is not opposed to Patanjali. It approaches the same destination through the body first.
Krishna describes the ideal yogi in Gita 6.47 with one verse: the greatest yogi is the one who worships Krishna with faith, whose mind rests in the divine. Not the yogi who holds the most difficult posture. Not the one who fasts the longest. The Gita’s ideal yogi is defined by the quality of inner attention, a mind that has found its resting place in the divine and stays there. Every other discipline is preparation for this.
Both are from Patanjali’s eight-limbed system. Dhyana is the seventh limb, unbroken meditative flow directed at a single object or concept. The meditator is still present as a separate observer. Samadhi is the eighth limb, complete absorption where the distinction between the meditator, the act of meditation, and the object of meditation dissolves entirely. In the Gita, this state is called Brahma-nirvana (2.72), the extinguishing of the individual sense of self in the experience of Brahman. Dhyana is the river. Samadhi is the ocean.
Swami Vivekananda introduced yoga philosophy to Western audiences through his address at the Parliament of the World’s Religions in Chicago in 1893. He presented Jnana Yoga, Raja Yoga, Karma Yoga, and Bhakti Yoga as a complete system of self-development applicable to all humanity. His books Raja Yoga (1896) and Karma Yoga (1896) became the first wide-circulation English-language texts on yogic philosophy. The physical yoga practiced globally today was shaped more by Tirumalai Krishnamacharya in the 20th century, who is considered the father of modern postural yoga. Both figures built on a tradition over 3,000 years old.
Yes. The physical and meditative practices of yoga function regardless of language or scriptural knowledge. Patanjali himself states in Yoga Sutras 1.20 that practice (abhyasa) and non-attachment (vairagya) are the two fundamental requirements, not textual mastery. That said, understanding the framework behind the practice deepens it significantly. Knowing that Asana is the third of eight limbs, that pranayama is the fourth, and that both are preparation for meditation rather than ends in themselves, this understanding changes the quality of practice. The tradition is generous. It does not require credentials. It does require sincerity.
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