History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v7.c94.343

v7.c94.343

Rājayoga holds the supreme goal to be liberation from Nature (prakṛti) or Māyā of the Advaita) and its attitude towards the world of senses and our empirical life is that of shunning these. Mukti means absorption into *brahma* for the Vedantist or Kaivalya (isolation of the individual self from the bonds of birth and death and from prakṛti according to pure Yoga). For the vast majority of men and women the path and final goal of Pātañjala Yoga or of the Advaita Vedānta are almost inaccessible and unattainable, as the Gītā itself states (XII. 5) "Those whose mind is set on the Unmanifested encounter greater difficulties (than those who worship a personal God), since the goal of the unmanifested is hard to reach by embodied beings". The path of *Karmayoga* (performing good deeds and acts prescribed by *Śāstra* without hankering for rewards) and *Bhaktiyoga* (wherein there is deep devotion to God and self-surrender) appear to be more suitable and practical for ordinary human beings. The Gītā in chap. XIII. (verses 13-17) contains one of the best descriptions of God as transcendent and immanent and verse 18 adds that the devotee of God who understands this reaches God.