Jinamanjari 1996 04 No 13

Author(s): Jinamanjari
Publisher: Canada Bramhi Jain Society Publication

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sect of Jains and sometimes to Siva, expresses the same religious value as vatarasana, "wind-girt." In short, the Muni Hymn, although it does indeed have Saiva connections, has as many Ajivika and Jain ones.
Middle Vedic Literature - Part Two
The Artharva Veda describes another proto-yogic figure, the vratya, who stood upright for a year. The Vedic gods are presented as perplexed by this activity:
For a whole year he stood erect. The gods said unto him, "Why standest thou?" (AV XV.3)
Yet, despite the confusion of the Vedic gods, this activity is typical of the non-Aryan stream of yoga, from which the vratyas seem to have been among the first to emerge into documentary history.
The point is, that apparent remnants of this practice survive in Jainism, where one of the avasyakas, or essential duties of a monk, is "the stabilization of the body without the least motion" in "different postures...which benefit the soul and are difficult to perform."31 The most common of these positions is kayotsarga, standing motionless for long periods of time, which is probably what the vratya was doing. It is also what the tirthankaras Rishabha and Parsva were doing when they became enlightened. It was a common austerity of the Ajivikas, and it has tentatively been identified in the Indus seals. Again, the Vedic literature provides a link between the Indus Valley and the Ajivika-Jain tradition.
From Body to Mind
It is possible that some forms of meditation arose in part from the deliberate practice of immobility, which in
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