 So yoga is an ancient practice going back thousands of years. It was originally developed as a means to create maximum physical and spiritual development through discipline, exercise, breathing techniques, and meditation. The word yoga has the meaning of unity or unification. It could also mean to bind together. And so the discipline of yoga seeks to unify the practitioner's body and soul and to unify the human consciousness with the divine. Those are the goals of yoga. Now yoga has a long association with the ancient spiritual traditions of Hinduism. And over the past decades, various forms of yoga have become increasingly popular in the West as a means to exercise physical conditioning, well-being, and health. So our question for tonight will be whether practicing yoga presents any potential problems for someone committed to the path of Judaism. Now clearly yoga was never simply an early Indian form of Pilates because yoga has meditation, chanting, worship, and other elements of Hindu spirituality. Hinduism is a spiritual path that is antithetical to the monotheism of the Torah. Hinduism has thousands of deities portrayed through images and statues that are venerated and worshipped. In Hinduism, the adherent nourishes their soul by binding with the panoply of gods found in the Hindu sacred scriptures. Today, many yoga studios have statues of Hindu deities. Students may bow to them at the beginning and the end of the class. Some of the names of the yoga postures such as sun salutation are rooted in the ancient worship of the sun, etc. Now one of the main issues that yoga presents is the biblical prohibition found in Leviticus chapter 18 verse 3 of not going in the ways of other religions. The Torah tells us not to follow in the ways of other religions and rabbinic literature extends this prohibition to a general prescription against following in the ways of non-Jewish societies. So not just that we can't follow the religious traditions of other religions but even non-Jewish practices of other societies. So I don't know what the four leaf clover is, right? I'm not sure if it has any spiritual tradition but it's certainly not a Jewish tradition to wear a four leaf clover. That could be a big problem. Now there are essentially two kinds of practices that are problematic in this general prescription against following the ways of the nations. Number one of course, anything that's associated to idol worship is clearly prohibited to a Jew. And then what is also problematic are any practices or customs of idolaters meaning that they are people that are not monotheists but they're not necessarily idolatrous practices but things that idolaters do that don't seem to have any practical obvious practical purpose like wearing a four leaf clover. So when it comes to this second category of things which we don't necessarily understand why it's there there are two ways that it can be seen. According to one interpretation, if there's no obvious practical reason for doing something then if you do it, it seems that it must be because you want to be just like the idolaters. A second approach is that if there's no obvious reason for a practice the assumption must be that at one time a long time ago it must have been rooted in idolatry. So with all of these problem areas are there any views that might permit the practice of yoga for a committed Jew? So one view that discusses the following of practices of idolaters again that are not themselves idolatry is that the problem is that if you do it, it creates the impression that you want to be just like them but no one today is going to assume that if you're doing yoga you want to be a polytheistic Hindu meaning that if you're practicing yoga the assumption is that you want to get into shape, you want to exercise, you want to become more limber you want to get more inner peace there's no one that's going to jump to the conclusion that you are trying to become you're sort of a wannabe idolater. Number two, I mentioned earlier Rabbi Moshe Feinstein the greatest authority on Jewish law in the 20th century so he maintained that yoga itself was not idolatrous worship yoga itself was not idolatry it was a way that people prepared for their idolatrous worship meaning that yoga was basically a way in which people got ready and became developed so that they could then serve their deities and so Rabbi Moshe Feinstein said if this is true then there'd be no problem in adopting these practices today because the practices in themselves are not practices of idolatry Number three, some authorities on Jewish law maintain that yoga actually predates Hinduism and Hinduism came later on and so therefore the breathing exercises and the pastures of yoga would be fine, totally okay it would only be the meditations and the mantras that are rooted in Hinduism that would be an issue Number four, when it comes to this prohibition against following the ways of the nations so we know that as long as the practice itself is not an overt form of idolatry as long as the practice is beneficial to you and there are some tangible observable benefits it's okay to do it even if that practice once originated as part of an idolatrous ritual meaning that if the roots of that practice were based on idolatry as long as it's not being done for the purpose of idolatry today it's okay as long as you're getting something out of it as long as you're benefiting from it it should be okay Now one of the leading Torah authorities in the world today is Rabbi Shlomo Miller who's based here in Toronto and he ruled a few years ago that there is no reason why yoga should not be considered permissible he ruled that there's no reason why we should assume that yoga has to be forbidden he writes as long as it's practiced in a way that is consistent with the Jewish law so what does this mean practically speaking so number one he requires that there be a proper instructor and a proper teaching method that's not steeped in Hinduism meaning if your instructor is a devout Hindu there's a very good chance that what's going to be coming through to you are some of the spiritual ideas of Hinduism so if for example your yoga teacher happens to be a religious Jew great no problem number two obviously the practice of yoga can have no statues or religious mantras that are based upon Hindu theology number three Rabbi Miller says this is sort of a tangent for us tonight but he says that for reasons of modesty usually people practicing yoga are not fully dressed so for reasons of modesty he says that men and women should practice yoga separately now Rabbi Miller requires that the traditional names of the postures not be used because these are names that come from the Sanskrit which is the Hindu language and they're often based upon the names of the postures based upon these Hindu roots and so he suggests that we not use the names of the postures themselves so for example there is a Jewish yoga teacher in New York a religious Jewish woman who instead of using the traditional Hindu names for the postures she just describes what to do so for example instead of downward dog she says raise your hips to the ceiling and that's how she describes the postures however what's interesting is that there are other authorities who say that once a practice has been divorced from its idolatrous roots the prohibitions surrounding it also fall away so for example the English names of the days of the week that we use today are rooted in paganism Sunday is based upon the idea that there's a sun god that was worshipped by the pagans but today no one of us not worshipping the sun so because the idolatrous roots basically have faded away it's become quite innocuous we're allowed to say the names of the week in English and so there are sources who maintain that if yoga practice is disconnected from idolatry then traditional names of their postures can be used because they're simply labels or designations