There are four paths to “Brahmas” in the Hindu religion. This sets it aside from most of the other religions around today. There are four basic spiritual personality types for which Hinduism gives a distinct yoga that focuses on the type’s strong point. The point of the yoga is to reveal the underlying divinity in humans. These are the different paths to God. Joana yoga is the path to God through knowledge. This is for those who are thinkers. The Joana strive to identify with God. It is an intuition within the seeker that they eventually become what they know.
Once they grasp this point, their sense of self gets to a deeper level. There are three stages in grasping this power. There is Learning, Thinking and shifting self- identification to the abiding part. These steps lead to “convincing the thinker that she possesses more than her finite self. ” Joana yoga is said to be the shortest and “steepest path to divine realization. ” Backbit yoga is the path to God through love. It is the most popular of the four. All the basic principles of backbit are shown in Christianity. People who are more in touch with their feelings than thoughts choose backbit. In this yoga, you love God for love’s sake alone. The backlash love and symbolize God in many ways. They practice this to strengthen their affection towards God and “weaken the world’s grip. ” This yoga is where you see a lot of the different forms of God. The forms symbolize aspects of God and point to something beyond. Karma yoga is the path to God through work. In humans, “The drive to work is sociological, rather than economic. This path expresses love through activity. The work approach can be intellectually or through the spirit of love. So karma yoga, can be practiced in Joana or backbit. In Hinduism, it’s believed that every action performed upon the external world reacts on the doer. This path of working towards God, lets the worker resist impatience, laziness, excitement, or doing ten things at once. Raja yoga is the path to God through psychophysical exercises. One has to feel that “our true selves are more than we now realize.
It involves experiments on the mind practicing prescribed mental exercises and observing the effects. They feel there are four layers to a human entity. They are the body, conscious layer of our minds, individual subconscious and Being Itself, eternal. Raja’s purpose is to make valid the estimate of the human self by experimenting with “the beyond that is within. ” There are eight steps of the experiment itself. The first and second are bodily cravings and mental inquietude. The third and fourth are avoid distraction of body to mind ND breathing.
The fifth and sixth are contemplation and alone with the mind. The seventh and eighth are conscious and unconscious as one and losing self and being completely absorbed in God. The four Hindu paths to God can apply to anyone as it applies to them. They are all equal and depend solely on the person and their stage of life. The path that is most appealing to me is the Joana yoga. I’m less of a lover and/or worker. I am a thinker, and like to challenge my mind. I feel that is the category would fall under if put into one.
