3.42 · Light as Cotton

Saṃyama on the relation of body and space, and coalescence with lightness like cotton, gives movement through space.

Word by word

kāya

body

ākāśayoḥ

and space (of the two)

saṃbandha

relation

saṃyamāt

from saṃyama

laghu

light

tūla

cotton

samāpatteḥ

from coalescence with

ca

and

ākāśa-gamanam

moving through space

Where it fits

A parallel to 3.41: saṃyama on the relation between body and space, with coalescence on light things like cotton (as in 1.41), gives movement through space. Vyāsa describes it in steps, from walking on water to moving through the air at will (p. 271). 3.43 takes the mind itself outside the body.

Reading

This parallels 3.41: there hearing was joined to space, here the body is. The coalescence on lightness like cotton is samāpatti, as in 1.41. Vyāsa describes a ladder: the yogin becomes light, walks on water, then on a spider's thread, then on sunbeams, then moves through the air at will. Such stories belong to the tradition and are told here as Patañjali and Vyāsa tell them. Read them alongside 3.50, which asks for non-attachment even to such powers.

Vyāsa

“…or, gaining coalescence with light things such as cotton, down to their atoms, he masters the relation and becomes light. Being light, he walks on water with his feet. Then, having walked on nothing more than a spider's thread, he walks on rays of light.”

Vyāsa's Yoga-bhāṣya, the oldest commentary. New translation from the Sanskrit, with reference to Woods (1914), p. 271.

Practice

Hold a tuft of cotton or a small feather and let it fall. Watch how slowly it drifts. Then sit and notice where your body feels heavy and where it feels light. Let one held tension go, and feel that part grow lighter.

A question to sit with

What heaviness could you set down today?

Key ideas

saṃyama (holding together), samāpatti (coalescence), siddhi (powers)