We are indebted to the kindness of the learned President of the Adi Brahmo Samaji for the following accounts of two Yogis, of whom one performed the extraordinary feats of raising his body by will power, and keeping it suspended in the air without visible support. The Yoga posture for meditation or concentration of the mind upon spiritual things is called Asana. There are various of these modes of sitting, such as Padmasan, &c. &c. Babu Rajnarain Bose translated this narrative from a very old number of the Tatwabodhini Patrika, the Calcutta organ of the Brahmo Samaj. The writer was Babu Akkhaya Kumar Dalta, then editor of the Patrika, of whom Babu Rajnarain speaks in the following high terms—"A very truth-loving and painstaking man; very fond of observing strict accuracy in the details of a description."
Sishal Yogi
A few years ago, a Deccan Yogi, named Sishal, was seen at Madras, by many Hindus and Englishmen, to raise his Asana, or seat, up into the air. The picture of the Yogi, showing his mode of seating, and other particulars connected with him, may be found in the Saturday Magazine on page 28.
His whole body seated in air, only his right hand lightly touched a deer skin, rolled up in the form of a tube, and attached to a brazen rod which was firmly stuck into a wooden board resting on four legs. In this position the Yogi used to perform his japa (mystical meditation), with his eyes half shut. At the time of his ascending to his aerial seat, and also when he descended from it, his disciples used to cover him with a blanket. The Tatwabodhini Patrika, Chaitra, 1768 Sakabda, corresponding to March 1847.
The Bhukailas Yogi
The extraordinary character of the holy man who was brought to Bhukailas, in Kidderpore, about 14 years ago, may still be remembered by many. In the month of Asar, 1754 Sakabda (1834 A.C.), he was brought to Bhukailas from Shirpur, where he was under the charge of Hari Singh, the durwan (porter) of Mr. Jones. He kept his eyes closed, and went without food and drink, for three consecutive days, after which a small quantity of milk was forcibly poured down his throat. He never took any food that was not forced upon him. He seemed always without external consciousness. To remove this condition Dr. Graham applied ammonia to his nostrils; but it only produced tremblings in the body, and did not break his Yoga state. Three days passed before he could be made to speak. He said that his name was Dulla Nabab, and when annoyed, he uttered a single word, from which it was inferred that he was a Punjabi. When he was laid up with gout Dr. Graham attended him, but he refused to take medicine, either in the form of powder or mixture. He was cured of the disease only by the application of ointments and liniments prescribed by the doctor. He died in the month of Chaitra 1755 Sakabda, of a choleric affection.*—The Tatwabodhini Patrika, Chaitra, 1768 Sakabda, corresponding to March, 1847 A.C.
———— * The above particulars of this holy man have been obtained on unexceptionable testimony.—Ed. T.B.P. ——————————
PHILOSOPHICAL
True and False Personality
The title prefixed to the following observations may well have suggested a more metaphysical treatment of the subject than can be attempted on the present occasion. The doctrine of the trinity, or trichotomy of man, which distinguishes soul from spirit, comes to us with such weighty, venerable, and even sacred authority, that we may well be content, for the moment, with confirmations that should be intelligible to all, forbearing the abstruser questions which have divided minds of the highest philosophical capacity. We will not now inquire whether the difference is one of states or of entities; whether the phenomenal or mind consciousness is merely the external condition of one indivisible Ego, or has its origin and nature in an altogether different principle; the Spirit, or immortal part of us, being of Divine birth, while the senses and understanding, with the consciousness—Ahankara—thereto appertaining, are from an Anima Mundi, or what in the Sankhya philosophy is called Prakriti. My utmost expectations will have been exceeded if it should happen that any considerations here offered should throw even a faint suggestive light upon the bearings of this great problem. It may be that the mere irreconcilability of all that is characteristic of the temporal Ego with the conditions of the superior life—if that can be made apparent—will incline you to regard the latter rather as the Redeemer, that has indeed to be born within us for our salvation and our immortality, than as the inmost, central, and inseparable principle of our phenomenal life. It may be that by the light of such reflections the sense of identity will present no insuperable difficulty to the conception of its contingency, or to the recognition that the mere consciousness which fails to attach itself to a higher principle is no guarantee of an eternal individuality.