There are no fetters like those of illusion (maya),
no strength like that which comes from discipline (yoga),
there is no friend higher than knowledge (jnana),
and no greater enemy than egoism (ahankara).
Gheranda Samhita (IAST: gheraṇḍasaṁhitā, घेरण्डसंहिता, meaning “Gheranda's collection”) is a Sanskrit text ofYoga inHinduism. It is one of the three classic texts ofhatha yoga (the other two being theHatha Yoga Pradipika and theShiva Samhita), and one of the most encyclopedic treatises in yoga.[3][4][5] Fourteen manuscripts of the text are known, which were discovered in a region stretching fromBengal toRajasthan. The firstcritical edition was published in 1933 by Adyar Library, and the second critical edition was published in 1978 by Digambarji and Ghote.[6] Some of the Sanskrit manuscripts contain ungrammatical and incoherent verses, and some cite older Sanskrit texts.[6]
It is likely a late 17th-century text, probably from northeast India, structured as a teaching manual based on a dialogue between Gheranda and Chanda.[7][8][9] The text is organized into seven chapters and contains 351shlokas (verses).[8]
TheGheranda Samhita calls itself a book onghatastha yoga, which literally means "vessel yoga", wherein the body and mind are depicted as vessels that carry and serve the soul (Ātman (Hinduism),purusha).[8][3] It is generally considered aHatha yoga text.[3][10][11] The text teaches a seven-limbed yoga, in contrast to the eight-limbed yoga of Patanjali'sYogasutras, the six-limbed yoga of theGoraksha Samhita, and the four-limbed yoga in theHatha Yoga Pradipika.[3] It declares its goal to be the perfection of an individual's body, mind and soul through a seven step lifelong continuous self-development. The means of this goal include self purification, thirty twoasanas it details for building body strength, twenty five mudras to perfect body steadiness, five means topratyahara, lessons on propernutrition and lifestyle, ten types of breathing exercises, three stages of meditation and six types ofsamadhi.[12]
The text reverentially invokes Hindu godShiva as well asVishnu, with verses such as 5.77 and 7.4 suggesting that the writer was also inspired byAdvaita Vedanta ideas such as "I amBrahman [Supreme Soul] alone, and nothing else; my form is truth, consciousness and bliss (satcitananda); I am eternally free".[13]
Gheranda Samhita is a step by step detailedmanual ofyoga taught by sage Gheranda to student Chanda.[14] Unlike other hatha yoga texts, theGheranda Samhita speaks of a sevenfold yoga:[15][16]
The text itself follows this division in seven chapters, and has a focus upon theṣaṭkarmas (shatkarma), thus this text is sometimes said to describeghatastha yoga. For instance, theYoga Sūtras of Patañjali describes an eightfold path (yama andniyama instead of shatkarma and mudra, and addition ofdharana). The closing stanzas on samadhi teach different methods than those described by Patanjali.
The earliest translation of the text into English was by Srisa Chandra Vasu.[4][17]
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