Videos by James Mallinson
The Mahudi Gate was built in 1230 CE. It has over a hundred sculptures on it, including twelve Si... more The Mahudi Gate was built in 1230 CE. It has over a hundred sculptures on it, including twelve Siddhas, eight yoginīs, eight Bhairavas with the goddess, and eighty-four yogis. Some of the yogis are in complex yoga postures and these are the earliest known depictions of such postures by at least 250 years. The film shows an introduction to the gate by James Mallinson, PI of the ERC-funded Hatha Yoga Project, who first visited the site in 2016 with Daniela Bevilacqua. The images of siddhas had been noted before in a 1957 article by U.P. Shah (Shah 1957 Nāgarīpracāriṇī Patrikā varṣa 62 Nāth Siddhoṃ kī Prācīn Śilpamūrtiyāṁ) but he does not mention the yoginīs, Bhairavas or yogis. This film was made when Mallinson returned to Dabhoi with Mark Singleton in 2017 in order to try to get better photographs of the images. To see the photographs visit the project website, hyp.soas.ac.uk. 1859 views
Papers by James Mallinson
Objects, Images, Stories Simon Digby’s Historical Method, 2021
A comparison of descriptions of yogi insignia in Old Hindi Prem Kathās and their depiction in sta... more A comparison of descriptions of yogi insignia in Old Hindi Prem Kathās and their depiction in statuary and Mughal-era painting.
The Encyclopedia of Philosophy of Religion, edited by Stewart Goetz and Charles Taliaferro, Hoboken, NJ: Wiley-Blackwell, 2021
Summary of history of haṭha yoga.
Masterpieces at the Jaipur Court, 2022
A brief account of the Yogabhāskara, a haṭhayoga manual from a Vaiṣṇava bhakti tradition which wa... more A brief account of the Yogabhāskara, a haṭhayoga manual from a Vaiṣṇava bhakti tradition which was thought to be lost until a manuscript of it was found in Jaipur in 2019.
Hindu Practice, 2020
In this paper I trace the use of the term haṭhayoga from its Buddhist origins as a term for the r... more In this paper I trace the use of the term haṭhayoga from its Buddhist origins as a term for the restraint of ejaculation in Vajrayāna sexual ritual to its use in non-Buddhist Indic texts to refer to physical yoga practice broadly conceived. The paper has been published as chapter 6 (pp.177–199) in Hindu Practice, ed. Gavin Flood, pub. OUP 2020.
Wiley-Blackwell Encyclopedia of the Philosophy of Religion, 2020
The Sanskrit term haṭhayoga denotes a variety of yoga in which physical practices predominate. Th... more The Sanskrit term haṭhayoga denotes a variety of yoga in which physical practices predominate. These practices include therapeutic cleansing techniques, complex bodily postures, diverse methods of breath control, and esoteric techniques for manipulating the body's vital energies. Haṭhayoga first appears in the Indian textual and material record about 1000 years ago. By the 18th century it had become central to yoga more broadly conceived. Its methods were incorporated into many mainstream Hindu religous traditions, and they form the basis of much of the yoga practised around the world today.
Śaivism and the Tantric Traditions: Essays in Honour of Alexis G.J.S. Sanderson, 2020
This article shows that the Amṛtasiddhi, the earliest known text to teach any of the practices an... more This article shows that the Amṛtasiddhi, the earliest known text to teach any of the practices and principles distinctive of haṭhayoga, was written in a tantric Buddhist milieu.
The Idler, 2018
A piece I wrote for the Idler Magazine in early 2018 after visiting the yogi monastery at Dhinodh... more A piece I wrote for the Idler Magazine in early 2018 after visiting the yogi monastery at Dhinodhar in Kutch.
Jaina Studies - Newsletter of the Centre of Jaina Studies, 2020
The article introduces the term 'non-tīrtha' as a new analytical category to designate Jaina sacr... more The article introduces the term 'non-tīrtha' as a new analytical category to designate Jaina sacred sites that have vanished or do not yet exist, according to the cyclical Jaina conception of history. It presents new evidence on two different Digambara 'non-sites': Māmoṃ (Bhāmauna) and Tumain (Tumbavana). The Digambara temple of Māmoṃ has completely disintegrated, but is still listed as a tīrtha in Jaina pilgrimage guides, while the non-tīrtha of Tumain is not listed, despite its numerous ancient Jaina sculptures, pillars, and other historical remains. The article presents evidence for the long-sought location of a Jaina temple, and a previously unpublished 10th to 11th century Vaiṣṇava copper-plate inscription, featuring one of the oldest known epigraphic records pertaining to the history of yoga.
RISA-L, 2016
A note to the RISA email list debunking claims of antiquity for the modern practice of sūryanamas... more A note to the RISA email list debunking claims of antiquity for the modern practice of sūryanamaskāra.
Religions, 2019
In recent decades the relationship between tantric traditions of Buddhism and Śaivism has been th... more In recent decades the relationship between tantric traditions of Buddhism and Śaivism has been the subject of sustained scholarly enquiry. This article looks at a specific aspect of this relationship, that between Buddhist and Śaiva traditions of practitioners of physical yoga, which came to be categorised in Sanskrit texts as haṭhayoga. Taking as its starting point the recent identification as Buddhist of the c.11th-century Amṛtasiddhi, which is the earliest text to teach any of the methods of haṭhayoga and whose teachings are found in many subsequent non-Buddhist works, the article draws on a range of textual and material sources to identify the Konkan site of Kadri as a key location for the transition from Buddhist to Nāth Śaiva haṭhayoga traditions, and proposes that this transition may provide a model for how Buddhist teachings survived elsewhere in India after Buddhism's demise there as a formal religion.
Major revision of paper given at 2013 Yoga in Transformation conference in Vienna.
School of Oriental and African Studies, The University of London David Gordon White's wide-rangin... more School of Oriental and African Studies, The University of London David Gordon White's wide-ranging scholarship on tantra, yoga and alchemy has inspired many students and scholars to undertake research in those fields. White worked as an assistant to Mircea Eliade and his doctorate from the University of Chicago was in History of Religions. His research methodology, true to this scholastic heritage, is not as deeply rooted in textual criticism as that of the current vanguard of scholars working on tantra and yoga, whose philological studies rarely reference his work. The accessibility of his books and articles, however, together with his engaging writing style and the excitement that imbues his scholarship, mean that indologists specialising in other fields, and authors addressing non-scholarly audiences, frequently draw on his publications. White's prominence in the study of yoga and tantra requires all scholars working on those subjects to address his work.
In its classical formulation as found in Svātmārāma’s Haṭhapradīpikā, haṭhayoga is a Śaiva approp... more In its classical formulation as found in Svātmārāma’s Haṭhapradīpikā, haṭhayoga is a Śaiva appropriation of an older extra-Vedic soteriological method. But this appropriation was not accompanied by an imposition of Śaiva philosophy. In general, the texts of haṭhayoga reveal, if not a disdain for, at least an insouciance towards metaphysics. Yoga is a soteriology that works regardless of the yogin’s philosophy. But the various texts that were used to compile the Haṭhapradīpikā (a table identifying these borrowings is given at the end of the article) were not composed in metaphysical vacua. Analysis of their allusions to doctrine shows that the texts from which Svātmārāma borrowed most were products of a Vedantic milieu - bearing testament to Vedānta’s newfound interest in yoga as a complement to jñāna - but that many others were Śaiva non-dual works. Because of the lack of importance given to the niceties of philosophy in haṭhayogic works, these two non-dualities were able to combine happily and thus the Śaiva tenets incorporated within haṭhayoga survived the demise of Śaivism as part of what was to become in the medieval period the dominant soteriological method in scholarly religious discourse in India.
Smithsonian Institute website, 2013
The earliest textual descriptions of yogic techniques date to the last few centuries BCE and show... more The earliest textual descriptions of yogic techniques date to the last few centuries BCE and show their practitioners to have been ascetics who had turned their backs on ordinary society. These renouncers have been considered practitioners of yoga par excellence throughout Indian history. While ascetics, including some seated in meditative yoga postures, have been represented in Indian statuary since that early period, the first detailed depictions of Indian ascetics are not found until circa 1560 in paintings produced under the patronage of Mughal Emperor Akbar (reigned 1556-1605) and his successors. These wonderfully naturalistic and precise images illuminate not only Mughal manuscripts and albums but also our understanding of the history of yogis and their sects. Scholars have argued for these paintings' value as historical documents; their usefulness in establishing the history of Indian ascetic orders bears this out. The consistency of their depictions and the astonishing detail they reveal allow us to flesh out-and, sometimes, rewrite-the incomplete and partisan history that can be surmised from Sanskrit and vernacular texts, travelers' reports, hagiography, and ethnography.
In the first part of this paper I summarise what constituted early (11th- to 15th-century) haṭhay... more In the first part of this paper I summarise what constituted early (11th- to 15th-century) haṭhayoga. I then show how, in contemporaneous taxonomies of yoga, Śākta techniques were grouped separately from haṭhayoga, under the name laya. Next I show how in the Haṭhapradīpikā, the text which became haṭhayoga’s locus classicus, the Śākta techniques of layayoga were for the first time included under the rubric of haṭha and how the purpose of haṭhayoga was realigned to be more in keeping with that of laya. I then identify the practitioners of early haṭhayoga - who were ascetics not Śāktas - and show how they have continued to be its torchbearers. In the final part of the paper I attempt to locate these developments in their wider context.
bindu in the head; or by making the breath enter the central channel of the body, which runs from... more bindu in the head; or by making the breath enter the central channel of the body, which runs from the base of the spine to the top of the head, thereby forcing bindu upward. In later formulations of Haṭha Yoga, the Kaula system (see → Tantra) of the visualization of the serpent goddess Kuṇ ḍ alinī rising as kuṇ ḍ alinī energy through a system of cakras, usually six or seven, is overlaid onto the bindu-oriented system. The same techniques, together with some specifically kuṇ ḍ alinī-oriented ones, are said to effect kuṇ ḍ alinī's rise up the central channel (which is called the suṣ umnā in these traditions) to a store of amṛ ta (the nectar of immortality) situated in the head, with which kuṇ ḍ alinī then floods the body, rejuvenating it
Yoga in Practice, ed. David Gordon White. Princeton University Press., 2011
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Videos by James Mallinson
Papers by James Mallinson
Institut Français de Pondichéry, 2021 (ISBN 978-81-8470-242-2)
École française d’Extrême-Orient, 2021 (ISBN 978-2-85539-245-5)
https://www.tortoisemedia.com/audio/modis-warrior-pose/
Ernie Rea is joined by Jim Mallinson from SOAS, University of London, Suzanne Newcombe from the charity Inform and Ramesh Pattni from the Hindu Forum of Britain.