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Good evening and welcome to all, including those joining via webcast. Let us begin by chanting Aum. Śubhaṁ karoti kalyāṇam ārogyaṁ dhana sampadā. Satra buddhi vināśāya, Dīpa jyotir namo 'stu te. Oṁ śāntiḥ śāntiḥ... We are slowly approaching the end of our exploration, coming now to the last three of the Niyamas. There is something special about these final three. In the ślokas I provided, which treat the Yamas and Niyamas directly, something is actually missing. These three principles were already mentioned earlier in the Yoga Sūtras, not in the context of the Yamas and Niyamas, but at the very beginning of the second chapter. The first chapter speaks about the aim of yoga, samādhi, while the second chapter explains the practical path. This is where we find the start of Rāja Yoga. The Yamas and Niyamas are presented from sūtra 30 to 45. However, the very first śloka of the second chapter already deals with these three principles. Let me find it. It is very short, like all sūtras. This is the nature of a sūtra—a type of scripture that is very terse and condensed. Sūtra means thread, implying a red thread connecting different points. We must imagine that Patañjali was a saint who most probably had many disciples. He gave them lectures and instructions, teaching them sādhanā. He might have spoken about one of these Yamas or Niyamas for an hour, a day, or even longer. At the end, he would write on a board one sentence, the essence of the essence, in just a few words—a summary of all he had said. For the students who heard the whole lecture, they would immediately understand. He would tell them, "Now you learn this by heart, and through it, you will always remember what I explained." Unfortunately, the lectures themselves are lost; there was no audio or video recording. Only the red thread, this mini-summary, remains. Of course, it now needs explanation, a lecture that only saints who are in that state of consciousness can truly give. Therefore, such sūtra scriptures should always be read with the commentary of a saint. This first sūtra of the second chapter is very clear and very short, containing just four words. It mentions three things: tapas, svādhyāya, īśvara-praṇidhāna, and states that this is kriyā yoga. There are many discussions about this sūtra. The text I gave you has no explanation, and the following sūtras do not explain it either; they move forward. So the question arises: why does he mention these three principles, which are the last three Niyamas, and already call them Kriyā Yoga here? There are three different interpretations. Some simply say he mentioned them already and give the same commentary on these principles there and here, calling it a repetition. I do not think this is the right approach, because he tried to make the text as short as possible, and if he repeats something, there must be a reason. Others refer to the modern understanding of Kriyā Yoga as a highly developed meditation technique, such as what Swamiji teaches when he initiates us into a Kriya. They point to this one sūtra and say, "You see, even Patañjali mentioned Kriyā Yoga." However, one has to stretch the meaning a bit to equate it with our modern understanding; it is not really the same. In my personal opinion, the third interpretation is most likely. It always helps to look at the Sanskrit words. We have the word Kriyā Yoga. Kriyā comes from the root kṛi, but the word karma also comes from the same root, which basically means "to do, to act." From a Sanskrit meaning perspective, karma yoga and kriyā yoga can have completely identical meanings. How the word kriyā is used depends on the context. Mostly, we use it in the sense of a technique, something we do, like following a certain method. For example, the Haṭha Yoga Kriyās are physical purification techniques, such as using water; they have nothing to do with meditation techniques. If we understand Kriyā Yoga as Karma Yoga, I think we get closer to the meaning. We produce so many karmas in our life, and through Karma Yoga we try to purify ourselves from them. This purification is a preparation for our spiritual path and an important part of it, as we discussed with the principle of śauca (purity). Therefore, most commentaries explain these sūtras as Kriyā Yoga—a preliminary yoga, a preparing yoga. I think it is likely that the words here, though the same, are understood in a slightly different meaning. This is the beginning of yoga, or the preparation for the later following Rāja Yoga, and it is like a test for us. One commentary, for example, says it is a test on three levels of our being: tapas refers more to our willpower to stand through difficulties, svādhyāya (study) refers more to our intellect, and īśvara-praṇidhāna (devotion to God or bhakti) refers more to our emotions. One cannot really clarify this definitively because the sūtra is so short and has no explanation; it is open to many interpretations. I just want to make you aware that this is not the first time these points are mentioned in the Yoga Sūtras. Now, the principle we are dealing with is the eighth Niyama: Tapas. It is not easy to translate tapas. We can understand its meaning from its root, the word tap. Tapas comes from tap, which means fire or heat. What is the principle of fire? When you put something dirty into the fire, it burns. The dirt burns, and what remains is ashes. The ashes are so pure they cannot be purified any further. Therefore, what is pure is seen as holy. These ashes are respected as holy; many touch a finger into the ash and make a tilak with it. Some Śiva devotees cover their whole body in ashes. Here we get the point: fire is the principle of purification. We have this concept in another context you all know: the three tapas. Who remembers? Say it loud. Yes, Ādhibhautika, Ādhidaivika, Ādhyātmika. Those are the three ways karmas come to us. You remember the bhajan where the three tapas are mentioned; the line is "Tinoṁ tap pāp mitā jā." "Tinoṁ tap" means the three tapas, and the next word is important: "pāp." What does "pāp" mean? It means sin, or negative karmas. So it says the sins, the negative karmas—or karmas in general—come to us in the form of the three tapas. They come as obstacles, basically, in our life and in our spiritual path. This is the normal way of life. We act, we create karma, and the motivation is mostly selfish. This karma comes back, and when it is selfish, it returns in a not-so-pleasant way: some kind of problem, suffering, or disturbance. This is what comes back through these three tapas. It is the fire of the tapas that makes us experience problems in our daily life. When we live through these, they get purified, or you could say we get purified. It is a purifying process when we live through these fires of the three tapas, but it is not pleasant. Some kind of suffering, trouble, or problem is always there. We speak all the time about the word tapas—fire—and the suffering that comes from it. This is what every normal person experiences. To experience that is not a yogic achievement. Now, the word "tapas" here comes from the root "tap," but it is slightly different. "Tapas" is actually short for "tapasyā." These two words are one and the same. Against the background of tap, we can understand that it is similar but a little different. It also means to go through something challenging, something not so easy. The difference is that you choose it. You do it voluntarily as a yoga sādhanā. Let's take an example. Someone has stolen, and as a result, it is stolen from him; he has no money and cannot buy food. He is suffering and is involuntarily fasting. That is normal karma coming back; it is normal suffering, and there is no achievement in that. Now, when we come to Swamījī, he gives us a mantra and says, "You should keep a fasting date." This has nothing to do with any karma we inflicted. He simply advises us to follow a certain discipline as a yoga sādhanā. So now we are also fasting. It looks the same, but it is quite different. Here we have free will, a free choice. We say, "OK, I do this now." I take fasting as an example because it is the most common and accepted form of spiritual tapas. Did you get the point? The difference between tap and tapas? To understand it theoretically is one thing; to get it practically is another. You know, when Swamijī sent me to India in '94 or '95, I was in a student group. Swamijī accommodated us in the White House in Jadan, which was still under construction at the time. We were about ten people, but he put us in, I think, three rooms. He said, "You go together in one room, you go together in one room, you go together in one room." The White House was quite big and had many rooms, so we protested. We said, "Swamijī, there are so many rooms; everyone could have their own room." Swamījī said, "No, I want that." We asked, "Why?" He said, "That is tapasyā." At that time, I had no idea what it meant; I had to look in the dictionary. But practically, I understood quite soon. It meant, for example, you cannot do what you want. You always have to respect the other person in the room and find some compromise or agreement. If one wants to read and needs the light on, and the other wants to sleep and needs the light off? If one wants the window open because he feels hot, and the other wants it closed because he feels cool? But not only that. There was also some logic in who was put together. I was in one room with a boy from Austria who came from the Hare Rāma, Hare Kṛṣṇa group (ISKCON) and was still quite dogmatic. He was Swamiji's disciple, but one could still feel a lot of his background. I, in my previous political time, had gone through dogmatism already and, as a result, had become dogmatically anti-dogmatic. So it was quite a challenge mutually. It was difficult for him to accept and understand me, and difficult for me to accept and understand him. But you understand? That was Guru Vakya. That was tapas, and through this you learn. You widen your horizons. Through difficulties, we grow. So tapasyā is always some kind of self-inflicted or at least accepted difficulty, and through it we grow. As I said, the root is tap, heat. I understood very soon what this means practically because in Jadan, everything was hot: the weather was hot, the food was hot, and even the temper of the people was hot. That means we got boiled up, and then I also became hot. When you boil up, everything comes up; it becomes visible, it comes out. You understand? We speak about the principle of purification. In some way, we can even refer to the story from the Purāṇas about churning the ocean. We are searching for the amṛta of immortality, but first, before we get there, all this poison comes up—all our negative qualities. It is all boiled up. This is the process of tapas, the process of purification through heat. We have this in a certain way in our yoga sādhanā. What, for example, are the heating techniques we have in yoga? Agni Sākriyā—yes, even the word is there, Agni (fire). So, Agni Sākriyā, the fire awakening technique. Yes, more? Some prāṇāyāmas are also heating, like bāstrīkā, sure. Therefore, one must in India be careful with these heating prāṇāyāmas in the hot time. Then, some special exercises are also heating. We don't need to list them one by one, but I think of another type of yoga which is all together heating: Kriya Yoga. When we practice Kriya Yoga, something also comes up. Be sure it is always connected to different levels. When some physical heat comes up, it works on other levels too. We should never be astonished if suddenly we have effects on these other levels. You see, whatever difficulties come, or that we accept in our yogic sādhanā, we can say it is a kind of tapas. I remember very well the moment, just before I became a Swami, Swāmījī spoke to us and said, "To become a Swami means to go through the fire lifelong." That was a little before the other things I mentioned happened. At that time, I understood it more as symbolic language, but I realized it is quite strong and real, this fire. When we speak about tapas, we must also make sure we do not confuse different types. For example, during the Kumbh Melā, film teams always like to film all the sādhus there who are practicing many different types of tapas. Not every form of tapas is a positive yogic sādhanā. Some, for example, hold an arm up until it withers and has no life anymore. What is the point of that? Many do sādhanā that goes to an extreme and actually destroys, or at least harms, the body. Such a type of sādhanā is not recommended in yoga because it is against common sense. For example, remember the life story of Lord Buddha. At the beginning of his spiritual path, he joined a group of sādhus who did strong tapasyā. After some time, his body had become so weak that he realized something was going wrong. Then there is a famous short story: a girl came with a musical instrument, and he realized that the strings—like on a guitar or another string instrument—when they are too loose, they do not make a sound. But when you tighten them too much, they break. Both extremes are not good. It must be not too loose and not too tight. Then he started to declare the path of the middle. This advice is generally valid for the spiritual path: to avoid extremes. An extreme would mean, on one hand, indulging too much in māyā and not living a spiritual life, having no self-discipline. The other extreme is having too strong a sādhanā that weakens us and in the end destroys our body, which is our vehicle for liberation. Exactly the same is said in the Bhagavad Gītā. Lord Kṛṣṇa says, "Yoga is not for the one who sleeps too much or who stays awake all the time. It is not the path for the one who overeats all the time, and not the path for the one who fasts all the time." We have to find a common sense, middle path. Fortunately, here we have a great help in a certain part of the Bhagavad Gītā. In the 14th chapter, Lord Kṛṣṇa explains the three guṇas: tamas, rajas, sattva. Then, in the 17th and 18th chapters, he gives many examples. Tapasyā happens to be one of these examples. We are speaking about chapter 17, verses 14 through 19. He distinguishes between sāttvic tapasyā, rājasic tapasyā, and tāmasic tapasyā. Regarding rājasic tapasyā, he says this is austerity performed for the sake of renown, to get honor so that others would adore you, or for any other selfish interest. The main point is our motivation. Then there is a kind of tapasyā that comes out of a foolish, stubborn understanding—meaning out of one's own thoughts, not following proper teaching—and which is accompanied by a kind of self-torture. In history, you also have, for example, some Christian monks who would beat themselves. Such self-torture is not really tapasyā, or it is a kind intended to harm others. This is called tāmasic tapasyā. When he speaks about sāttvic tapasyā, he distinguishes three different types. This is very interesting for us and is applicable. He says sāttvic tapasyā can be tapasyā of the body, of the speech, or of the mind. When he speaks about sāttvic tapasyā of the body, he mentions first reverence to the gods, to the seers (the ṛṣis), to the teachers and the saints (the gurus), then straightforwardness and harmlessness. Let me say the Sanskrit words; then it is easier for you to translate. He mentions ahiṃsā, śauca, and brahmacarya. You see the connection? We are not in the Patañjali Yoga Sūtras here; we are in the Bhagavad Gītā. He says when we practice ahiṃsā (not to hurt), śauca (purity), and brahmacarya, we are already practicing tapasyā. Brahmacharya, as we discussed, if we really want to control our desires, is not a small achievement. These are called the virtues of the austerity of the body. The second is the austerity of the speech: to speak without ever causing pain to another (which is also a form of ahiṃsā), to be truthful (satya), to always say what is kind and beneficial, and to study the Holy Scriptures regularly. This practice is called austerity of the speech. Here he mentions study of the Holy Scripture, which relates to the next Niyama, svādhyāya. But to repeat, this is not the Patañjali Yoga Sūtra; it is a completely independent holy scripture, but it is the same wisdom from the same source. Now, austerity of the mind: the practice of serenity (being peaceful), sympathy, meditation upon the Ātmā, withdrawal of the mind from the sense objects, and integrity of the motivation. This is called austerity of the mind. You see, it has a very wide range, what is covered under the topic of tapasyā. When we really can follow that, we work already so much on ourselves. Wrong tapasyā can destroy our vehicle (the body), weaken us, or awaken our ego, making us proud—which is definitely not better. Do you remember from Līlā Amṛta a story about wrong tapasyā? We also have a bhajan about that. Exactly. A group of sādhus came to Mahāprabhujī who used to meditate in the middle of five burning fires when it was hot anyway. They came to him and said, "You should also do this type of sādhanā. Then you are a real sādhaka, a real yogī." Mahāprabhujī said, "Sit down a moment and listen." Then he sang to them as an answer the bhajan "Khyātum Dhuni." He welcomed them and said, "Sit down, I will sing you one bhajan about the experience of a yogī's meditation." We have another bhajan about this fire, actually the fire of the three tapas in which we are burning. Oṁ Holī Gurujī. "Fire means Agha. Agha me bhaṅgala gana vana." You know this? Mahāprabhujī is the one who, in the middle of the burning fire, makes a wonderful garden. This burning fire means actually the sufferings of the three tapas in our life. Through spiritual guidance and the spiritual life, we are actually safe and protected from that. When we speak about tapas as a purifying technique, we must understand we have much more to purify. We mentioned purification on the physical level, but we also have to purify our karmas. Techniques that purify this are also a kind of tapasyā. What would that be? First of all, mantra. Second, kriyā. Third, prāya. Basically, all our yoga sādhanā, in some sense, can be put in the category of tapas. When we keep the discipline—because it is not so easy—it is also some kind of fire. For example, every morning to get up at a certain time, keep the discipline, and do the sādhanā applies here. The more strict we are in our sādhanā, the more this applies. Through this sādhanā, we also purify karmas. We then have special occasions when we do it in a compressed form. This is what we call anuṣṭhāna. When we have Mantra Anuṣṭhāna or Kriyā Anuṣṭhāna, that is actually a quite strong form of tapas. The problem is that, because of our present lifestyle, we are mostly not really able to do that. If we just think of the simple rule Swamijī gives us—keep a fasting day once per week and on the full moon day—who is really doing that? But if we did, we would gain so much. First, physically, it is good to eat less. Second, if everyone in the world did that, no one would be hungry. It helps us develop self-discipline and willpower. When we have challenging situations, it helps us go through them because we already know, "I can stand through something like this." In the original programs for Mantra Anuṣṭhāna and Kriyā Anuṣṭhāna, there were many more points. Somehow, one by one, Swāmījī gave up on that because he sees we cannot follow it. First, it was connected with fasting—extended fasting for a longer time, as long as we do this sādhanā. One part was usually mauna, not speaking, and that is the hardest one. Swamiji gave up on this about 20 years ago. He knows we cannot follow it. You see, it is so hard for us just to control our speaking for a limited time of a few days. That means we are missing a chance. When we always speak, we lose energy. Every teacher, politician, and lecturer knows that. Whoever has to speak a lot is quite exhausted. When we can keep this energy, our spiritual energy goes up. There are more rules connected with this, but our weakness is that we mostly try to escape from this kind of tapas. I think we are quite at the end. Yes, one important point is our motivation when we do tapas. It was already mentioned in the Bhagavad Gītā text I read. There are people who do really strong tapasyā but for a selfish interest. The problem is that it also works. Think, for example, of Hiraṇyakaśyapu, who gained a certain siddhi, or in the Rāmāyaṇa, Rāvaṇa, or Holikā. These are actually yogīs who practiced tapasyā for selfish interest. There are many stories about asuras, like negative beings, who practice tapasyā, get siddhis, and use them in a negative way. Can you imagine the karma that comes out of that? So the most important thing is that we are clear in our purity of thought, purity of motivation, and never ever do tapasyā for selfish interest. Maybe one story for the end, to make clear what a negative outcome could be. We mentioned tāmasic tapasyā, intended to harm others. Once, Swamiji told a story: a yogī practiced tapasyā and was successful. He gained a siddhi that his wishes were fulfilled. But when he developed this siddhi, he realized a strange thing: whatever he wished for and got, his neighbor, who knew nothing about it, got double. He was a poor person and wished to live in a proper house. He realized his neighbor now had two houses. OK, he said, "I will wish that my house is much nicer." He wished for a big palace. The result was his neighbor now had two big palaces. Whatever he wished, his neighbor got double. He was so annoyed and started really hating his neighbor. He thought, "How can I get out of this?" Then he had an idea—I guess the worst idea he ever had in his life. He wished to become blind in one eye. Understand what it means? Now his neighbor would become blind in both eyes. Can you imagine this karma? This is when we are not clear in our motivations. We achieve something, misuse it, and destroy our whole life. Through tapas we can achieve something, but with it always comes more responsibility. We have to be very, very careful how we use it. So, is there anything from your side, some question about the point of tapas? I guess for you it is already tapas to sit here still, huh? Because it was so much now, today, over this weekend. Yes, this is something also like an anuṣṭhāna, what we are doing. But I have really the saṅkalpa that we get through this weekend, and now we manage in every session too. Misuse of a siddhi can happen. I would say, fortunately, that you lose it then. A famous example is Holikā, who had the boon to be untouched by fire, but when she used it to actually kill her brother, she lost the siddhi and died in the fire. So somehow it is good because at least it protects us, so we cannot do more harm with that siddhi. OK. So then, adios.