I would think this would run into the same sorts of issues as the state trying to declare what qualifies as kosher. Is there actually any basis to think that there is a sole set of yoga practices?

Now, if they were to use general sorts of gym inspection to make sure mats have been cleaned and so on, I think that would be okay.

In every other case I can think of, it is the established players in the business that push for regulation in order to reduce competition. If the NY Times article is right, this is a case of spontaneous regulation by government agencies.


Just based on economic history, I think the Times article is wrong on the source of the push for regulation.

Much of what passes for yoga in this country is the result of the distortion and commodification of yoga philosophy and praxis (to be sure, often aided and abetted by 'Hindus') and thus is merely what are known as asanas, physical postures and poses that are simply preliminary practices that should be in service of greater goals (and thus serve among the necessary yet not sufficient conditions for yoga qua yoga). In other words, much of it is only nominally religious and at best a species of New Age nonsense.

The word yoga comes from a verbal root which means ‘to yoke' or ‘to unite' (with God or the Self); it entails unswerving commitment and concentration as a meditative discipline that harnesses bodily and psychic energy on behalf of techniques designed to still the mind (the fluctuations of mind-stuff) and finely focus the mental powers of discrimination and concentration. It is a combination of physiological, psychological, and spiritual methods fashioned to alter routine states of consciousness or awareness. Patañjali’s Yoga system, for example, is one of the six āstika (orthodox) darśanas as elaborated in his Yoga Sūtra (3rd to 4th century CE), also known as the ‘Eight-Limbed Yoga’ (astānga-yoga), only one limb of which, the third and ‘outer member’ (āsana), is found in contemporary ‘YMCA’ and ‘classified ads’ yoga (there are all-too-few exceptions to this generalization). The long-term goal of yoga is asamprajñāta-samādhi, a non-conceptual awareness beyond all thought, attribute and description (nirvikalpa). As such a state of awareness becomes more than intermittent, it is capable of eliminating samskāras (karmic predispositions, i.e., it is karmically ‘seedless’).

Classical Yoga largely assumed or took over Sāmkhya metaphysics, sharing many of its basic philosophical presuppositions and assumptions, but most importantly, the aim of disassociating pure consciousness from the mind-body complex (the latter a product of prakrti). Unlike Sāmkhya, however, Yoga introduces a deity essential to contemplation (īśvara-pranidhāna) and a model of the yogi’s ultimate goal, for ‘The Lord is a special [kind of] puruśa, untouched by hindrances, karma, its fruition, and latent-deposits [of karmic actions]’ (Yoga Sūtra 1.24). This is a peculiar deity indeed, for the Lord does not create the universe, remaining an utterly transcendent deity never in touch with the world (thus completely set apart from the manifestations of prakrti). Yoga in a broader sense can be gleaned from the discussions in the Bhagavad Gītā of bhakti-, karma-, and jñāna-yoga.

I would think this would run into the same sorts of issues as the state trying to declare what qualifies as kosher. Is there actually any basis to think that there is a sole set of yoga practices?

Absolutely. There are three:
1. They have paid the licensing fee.
2. They have filed all the proper forms and posted the notice stating they have paid their licensing fee.
3. They have treated the inspector with the proper levels of obsequiousness and cash.

In every other case I can think of, it is the established players in the business that push for regulation in order to reduce competition. If the NY Times article is right, this is a case of spontaneous regulation by government agencies.
Just based on economic history, I think the Times article is wrong on the source of the push for regulation.

Or we’ve just gotten to the point where the presumption is that everything should be regulated.

The agencies are looking for cash.

It isn't hard to rationalize regulating the practice of medicine and law. But what pray tell are the harms that regulation of yoga instruction might prevent? What standards would the regulators impose? If yoga is something to be regulated, then what couldn't be, including truly spooky/quack stuff like reflexology and iridology, and what standards to be enforced for them?

I think numerologists should be licensed. In fact, I think they should have, at a mimimum, Masters degrees in mathematics. Just think of the harm that miscalculations could do to the unsuspecting customer.

Reasonable regulation. Perhaps we should abandon this low level intrusion into everyday life and let some things self regulate. One way or the other lawyers will still get some business.

Patrick,

That's a good description of the classical dualist Samkhya/Yoga.

I wouldn't say Yoga took over the Samkhya metaphysics. Rather both are specific formulations of a more general conceptual framework. The analogy I like to give is that the USA is a democracy and has a political party called Democrats but all "small-d" democrats are not "capital-D" Democrats. Samkhya and Yoga both took ideas from sources like the Bhagavadgita but that doesn't make the Gita a Yogic work anymore than the Constitution is a Democratic work. A long long time ago Samkhya and Yoga ceased to exist as seperate ideologies even though they are still numbered amongst the traditional astika 6. They were absorbed into Vedanta (particularly the non-dualistic Advaita kind) which also sprang from the same sources albeit interpreting them in a markedly different way. It is this reinterpreted Vedantic Yoga which we know as Yoga today.
If Samkhya is atheistic and Classical Yoga is Deist, Vedanta is theistic by any definition of the term.

But as you pointed out most of the "yoga" classes out there don't care about this stuff any way so it is difficult for me to see how they could turn around claim freedom of religion to avoid licensing. In fact I am in favor of it. Some of those yogic exercises can be physically dangerous and knowing the person who broke my bones is "cosmically aligned" is of scant comfort.

Cornellian wins the thread.

I'm waiting for professional licensing and regulation of astrology and fortune-telling.

Nick

Isn't this a bit like regulating any method of instruction? Why not regulate private school teachers? math tutors? Kaplan and Princeton Review's teacher training? the Starbucks employee who trains baristas?

I think there's a serious question whether yoga is simply a commercial fitness regimen or a religious practice. Clearly there are people who are doing both, and clearly it began as a religious practice.

Perhaps the state should give people a choice as to which way they want to go. Perhaps yoga studios connected with an ashram or operating as religious entities should be unregulated religious practice, while those which choose to disconnect themselves from yoga's religious origins and offer a purely secular product should be subject to state regulation. Perhaps ordinary yoga studios should, at the least, be required to state clearly which kind they are.

Regulation does not necessarily have to focus on whether a studio is providing a pure or correct version of yogic practice. It could be focused on things like how far apart mats are spaced, maximum room capacity, whether there are first aid supplies and the staff has had first aid training, whether staff is able to recognize and whether it checks for and addresses certain medical conditions that might be problematic and enhance risks, and similar.