Customer Reviews

Eight Lectures on Yoga

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This book by Crowley is easy to understand. It is written for the beginning and intermediate student. Theres a chapter written for the beginner and another chapter for the intermediate. Aleister Crowley was a great yogi and magician. This book will tell you what yoga is really all about. This is a great book to start out with if you are interested in Yoga. Also Sir Crowley dismisses the misconceptions about yoga. Even if you only plann to learn the basics of yoga this is still a great book to get.

I'd like to briefly respond to gsibbery's negative review.

Gsibbery seems to have little understanding of Crowley and the law of Thelema--"Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law." Yogaic Union and the Thelema are not contradictory in the slightest. "Do what thou wilt" does not mean do whatever your foolish human body desires; it means strive to discover and achieve your True Will, which can be likened to the "voice of god" within you (in religious terms). Yogaic Union with your body and with reality is essential for discovering your True Will and your holy purpose on this planet. No contradiction there.

Beware of people speaking hatefully of the "Great Beast"--it is all too likely that they are christians or narrowminded or both. Crowley was a genius--a flawed genius, sure, but a genius all the same. And besides that, he's entertaining as hell.

I would not recommend this book to anyone seeking an introduction to yoga. The way to learn yoga is to do it. Once you get comfortable doing it and youve read a few introductory books & would like to think more deeply about the philosophy behind yoga, then go ahead & read this book. But you might not enjoy it unless you are familiar with Crowley's works. I'd recommend "Cosmic Trigger" by Robert Anton Wilson as a good introduction to mad Uncle Aleister.

In Magick Book 4, Crowley gives a clear and concise commentary on the eight limbs of Raja Yoga. Here, Crowley delivers the message in lecture form (via the printed page)in his own style. Broken into two sections, Yoga for Yahoos and Yoga for Yellowbelly's, the first covering the first 4 steps (yama, niyama, asana and pranayama), while the latter exploring the altered states of pratyahara, dhyana, dharana, and samadhi. But these later chapters are not without Crowley's own interpretation through the Tree of Life and the Kabbalah. While he may expound seemingly on the latest trends in physics and mathematical formulas of the tetragrammaton, it might be well to keep in mind the states of the higher phases of yoga as they cannot be laid out in a clear objective language. This is the same reason mythology is told in a fantasy-like manner, because it is only understood in metaphorical language. Not to mention, if it was told in out everyday vernacular, it would lose its meaning as well as effect.

Crowley has a unique approach, a refreshing departure from most of the literature I've read on yoga. He is free of the empty bubbly optimism so often found associated with the subject, and yet he also manages to steer clear of the opposite extreme: being overly obsessed with the grave importance of the subject matter, and focusing on details (language, etc.) that are hard for beginners to absorb, thus obscuring the meaning behind those details. I think he clearly presents the basic tenets of yoga in a clear, modern voice. I enjoyed his insight, his humor, his practicality, and his human voice.

I have to disagree with one of the other reviewers: I don't think Crowley was at all condescending. I think the lectures are successfully aimed at a general audience. Remember that these are transcripts of lectures given to a small, private group. Although the audience was assumed to be unfamiliar with yoga (which makes the lectures good for someone new to the subject), they also shared some knowledge, and some of the references in the lectures are lost to readers who don't share that knowledge. I don't think this obscures any of the content, I don't think you're missing any vital information because you don't know what the "Equinox" is, and I don't think Crowley was doing it to "show off" or to appear superior. He was just addressing his audience. Any lectures that are truly "lectures" will have this drawback: they were meant for a specific group, most likely not the group that will be reading those same lectures in book form. If this is a major drawback for you, consider another text on yoga. I didn't think that it detracted from the book.

Another problem is the translation of oral humor and tone to the written word. It's easy to lose the sense of the spoken word when it's written down, and I think Crowley's dry sense of humor might easily be mistaken for condescension.

Crowley does introduce a lot of other subjects, such as astrology and physics. This is unusual, but I think it can lead to new insights. People approach yoga from many different backgrounds, and some analogies and connections work for some people, and won't work for other people. I was able to skim over the parts that didn't have meaning for me, and still take away the new aspects he revealed by other means.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. However, I bought it used, for a few dollar. It was definitely worth that.

This book is an excellent example of Crowley's two main strengtss as a writer: to get to the heart of an apparently obscure subject, and the use of humor to disarm the audience and provoke insight. The latter of these can, if the reader takes it too seriously, detract from the former. The first half of the book, "Yoga for Yahoos", is the strongest by far. Here crowley explains the practical "limbs" of yoga that are nessecary preperations for practice. The exposition is lucid. The second, "Yoga for Yellowbellies", suffers from the inability of language to describe anything which is super rational. "Yellowbellies" tends to ramble a bit, especially when the Beast begins weaving in modern physics. You have to get to the end to come to the realization that, for the most part, this synthesis is a literary joke. Yoga is beyond science and reason. Again, for those with little sense of humor, this can be frustrating. However, the final stroke, the proof that Yoga dovetails with, and perfectly justifies, the Law of Thelema, is an ecstatic literary experince you shouldn't miss. The technique of progressive visualization is very useful as well.

Recomended.

This is Crowley's attempt at describing the parctice of Yoga as he thinks it should be done. Unfortunately, one of the biggest faults with this book is Crowley's habit of trying to show off to impress other people, which gets highly annoying after a few pages. He goes into more detail than is necessary for the beginner, and retains much of the Sanskrit terminology which does not really aid one in understanding what he is talking about. Crowley practiced Yoga in the context of magick and anyone who is not familiar with "Magick", "The Book of the Law" and "The Equinox" may have trouble understanding what he means. The book is composed of two pamphlets, "Yoga for Yahoos", which goes into reasonable detail as to the actual practice of Yoga, and "Yoga For Yellowbellies" which is more a rambling discussion about nothing in particular -- mainly citing various opinions of his that have little basis in reality. Crowley, as always, is full of himself, and finds it necessary to berate anybody who does not worship him, including the established society at the time. One wonders why, if he thinks so little of his contemporary society why he just doesn't ignore it instead of beating a dead horse, but then that would not really be characteristic of him. He rambles on about science, various authors he has read and so on, without really making much of an impression on the reader. He introduces a great deal of astrological talk, which does nothing but muddy the whole discussion. The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali are better in every way for the serious student, although not in keeping with the law of Thelema. One wonders whether Yoga itself can have any real benefit to the Thelemite as well. As he says over and over again in his condescending and often insulting manner, "Yoga means union". Not union with god, however -- union with the "all" (big difference there). Also, how surrendering one's will as is necessary in Yoga can be used to back "do what thou wilt be the whole of the law" is anyone's guess. This book is in the public domain by the way, and readily available on the web, so one might want to check for it online before purchasing it. If you enjoy having your intelligence insulted by someone who is convinced that he is always right about everything and being talked down to by a self-proclaimed "master" or enjoy occult doubletalk, this book is for you. Otherwise stick to those who have the sense to say what they mean.

This is Crowley' second try at writing on Yoga, and he has expanded the information of Raja Yoga in the section entitled "Yoga for Yellowbellies" which the other reviewer wrote was about Magick. Mostly it talks about Mathematical certainties of the proof of the Yogic states wherein contradiction of the faculty of Reason is inevitable. I think that Crowley has wrote much more then those who never studied him have come to realize: his whole philosophy is concentrated into such texts as "Book 4 parts I - IV," and "The Equinox": no other books will do more then lead the seeker to false beliefs: Perseverando is an excellent display of this.

Crowley's writing is witty and incisive. This is a good book to read for its first four chapters in which he explains the first four "limbs" of Yoga. The next four, in which he attempts to explain the remaining stages of Yoga has much reference to his Magick theory. So if you are unfamiliar with Magick (as I am), the material may lose you easily. All in all, it is not worth spending $9.95 for the book if you are looking only for its Yoga content. If you have access to a good library, I would suggest you borrow it and read it first before you decide to you want to own a copy of it.