The Yoga of Jesus

There is a wonderful review of The Yoga of Jesus: Understanding the Hidden Teachings of the Gospels, by Paramahansa Yogananda in the April issue of Spirituality and Health. The review was written by Kristine Morris and Erica Lee, and here is an excerpt from this review on this glorious Easter Sunday...

Paramahansa Yogananda, spiritual leader, author, and founder of the Self-Realization Fellowship, reveals the unity between yoga and the teachings of Christ. He shows that the mission of Jesus was to awaken consciousness of the divine in each of us, and this, he believes, is what is meant by the "second coming of Christ."

In this compilation of writings, previously published as the two-volume work The Second Coming of Christ: The Resurrection of the Christ Within You, Yogananda teaches that when Christ-consciousness awakens within us through meditation, we know in our very being that God is only a heartbeat away, to be met in the silence of the soul. The author states that "India's priceless contribution to the world, discovered anciently by her rishis, is the science of religion - yoga, 'divine union' - by which God can be known, not as a theological concept, but as an actual personal experience."

Our physical body is not an impediment to such awareness but it is the medium in which it occurs, and its timing is now, not in the afterlife or at the end of a cosmic cycle. Placing Jesus in an Eastern context makes it possible to see the difference between "union" and "salvation," and Yogananda asserts that it is the former that is the essence of the mission and life of Jesus. Yogananda offers seekers their own experience of Divine bliss.

While there are those that would disagree with these views, I have read Yogananda extensively, and as a former theologian, have found myself totally satisfied with his marriage of the mystical traditions of East and West. I invite you to discover this union for yourselves by reading these books.