We recently received an email from a reader who asked us to explain our position on Holy Yoga in light of several myths such as how Christianity was allegedly founded upon paganism, and how one's intentions are all that matters when performing yoga. Hopefully, our answers were able to clear up some misinformation about this controversial topic.SM writes: “I have been researching Holy Yoga. I have a few quick questions about the stand you take....how do you answer the following?”
#1. If holy yoga is wrong because yoga originates from Hinduism, how do you explain Christmas and Easter?
This question is founded upon an erroneous notion that Christmas and Easter were founded in paganism. These arguments are constructs of the Protestant Reformation and other anti-Catholic movements that either have no real basis in historical fact, are distortions of those facts, or both.
For instance, some folks like to claim that because the first celebrations of Easter coincided with pagan celebrations, this means Easter comes from paganism. But that’s not true at all. Nor is there any truth to the myth that Christmas was founded in paganism. As this blog explains, placing the date of Christ's birth on December 25 had nothing to do with paganism but everything to do with dates/facts gleaned from Scripture.
Many events in the early Christian church occurred in accord with the Roman calendar which was in use at the time, but that doesn’t mean every Christian celebration that happened to fall on a pagan holiday was derived from paganism In fact, as this blog explains, Christian holidays were often assigned to those days in order to replace the pagan holiday.
#2 Does God not look at the heart of a man? So when you are stretching or holding a pose if your intent is not on Hindu principals what then makes the stretch/ pose wrong?
Yes, God looks at the heart of man, and one must have intention in order to sin. Most yoga poses were designed as positions of worship to Hindu gods, but if you don’t intend to worship those gods, you’re not sinning.
However, if you understand how the occult functions, you’ll know that just because you don't intend to worship those pagan gods doesn't mean you're immune from harm from those entities. Let me explain.
We all know that pagan gods don’t exist; however, as the Doctors of the Church teach - and many exorcists will tell you - demons lurk behind those names. So when you perform the Half Moon pose, which worships Ganesh, a demon may decide to answer. Maybe you aren’t intending to bow down to Ganesh, but what about the guy or gal next to you in class? Maybe they ARE bowing to Ganesh and in doing so, call down hostile spiritual entities who couldn't care less who invited them. If you’re in the vicinity, and you’re not in a state of grace which protects you from their influence, you’re open game. This is why the bishop of Oklahoma City warned people not to attend last year’s black mass out of “curiosity” because, depending on their state of grace, they risk outright possession just by being in the room.
That’s something to consider before bowing down to these gods, whether you intend to or not.
#3 I personally stretch and did not know that a lot of the stretches come from a yoga practice but the stretch was very helpful in reducing my muscle spasms...does that make it wrong?
Again, yoga poses were never created to be stretches or exercises. They are integral to the practice of Hinduism and are meant to lead the practitioner to enlightenment and awareness of his or her inner divinity.
This means that instead of saying, “I’m just doing the stretches” when referring to yoga, it would be more accurate to say, “I’m using a Hindu spiritual practice as a stretching regime.”
That being said, as a former fitness instructor I can tell you that yoga and stretching are two different practices. As this article explains, if you're looking to improve muscular function and maintain long, lean muscles that are flexible and resist strains, joint pain, and injury, you want to stretch. It's so important that it is recommended that we stretch every day, especially as we age. Yoga, on the other hand, is a strength-building workout with an integral meditation element due to its basis in a religious practice.
#4 Many things that we do come from some sort of pagan ritual. Why is it wrong to take the benefits from those ideas and make it centered around Christ?
Again, this question is based on an erroneous assumption that Christianity comes from paganism. As for the rest of the question, it has now been made clear that yoga was never designed as exercise, but is part of the practice of Hinduism. This makes the practice of “Holy Yoga” or any kind of Christian yoga that attempts to Christianize the practice by slapping prayer over it to be in direct violation of the Lord’s admonition in Deuteronomy 12:31 that we are not to worship him the way the pagans do.
Personally, I see Christian yoga as even worse than the “I’m just doing the exercises” argument because by applying prayer, now you ARE recognizing the worship aspect of yoga and are trying to make it Christian – something that cannot be done in spite of all those fundamentalists out there who like to make the erroneous argument that we adopt other things from pagan practices so why not this?
As for Holy Yoga, Brooke Boone’s work has been widely criticized for its significant theological errors in regard to both Hinduism and Christianity so I wouldn’t consider her work to be authoritative on either. This blog will explain more.
#5 If the class was the same but named different, would you support the idea behind bringing God into your exercise?
Regardless of whether it's named Holy Yoga or Holy Exercise, if it's incorporating yoga it's a yoga class. I fully support the idea of bringing God into exercise and do so just about every day! I regularly do a variety of core workouts that have nothing to do with yoga, as well as weight lifting which remains the gold standard for improving muscle tone, increasing metabolism (for weight control) and bone health.
It's one thing to "bring God into your exercises" but it's quite another to bring God into the practice of a polytheistic religion which does not recognize the One True God that we worship and adore.
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