SAUNDARANANDA 14.19: Feeding the Love of Practice

yog'-aacaaras tath" aahaaraM
shariiraaya prayacchati
kevalaM kShud-vighaat'-aarthaM
na raageNa na bhaktaye

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14.19
So the devotee of practice

Tenders food to his body

Solely to stave off hunger,

Neither with passion nor as devotion.

DUST & FLUFF:
If the essential elements of working on the self are
(a) inhibiting one's unconscious reaction to a stimulus,
(b) coming back to the fundamental matter of maintaining one's own integrity, and
(c) going into movement, then this Canto, as I read it, centres on (c), going into movement.

The theme of Canto 14, "Stepping Out," is stepping out into action, beginning practice in earnest. That the Canto begins with a long section on eating food seems to show the importance that the Buddha attached to eating food as a foremost practical matter in itself. At the same time, the discussion of eating food seems to highlight a general paradox for a yog'aacaraH, one who is devoted to the actual conduct of practice.

Speaking from the standpoint of my own faulty sensory appreciation, the matter of eating food is perhaps one of the few things -- unlike, say, sex and money -- that I have not tended to see out of perspective. I was probably fortunate in childhood that, though we never starved, there were occasions when housekeeping money ran out and food was scarce.

What has been more of a problem, and what continues to be a problem, is the paradox for the yog'aacaraH, devotee of practice, who is mumukShu, desirous of freedom/release (14.11). To get free means getting free of parikalpa, fixing (13.49 - 53). But in the matter of the practitioner's eating of food vikalpa, freedom of choice, picking and choosing, is vaaryate, prohibited (14.9).

Wanting to be a free and independent individual comes easily to me. But with the decision to give up certain freedoms for that very purpose of being free, I struggle. Alexander work, especially with a very demanding teacher named Nelly Ben-Or, highlighted for me what a struggle this decision can be. It is a decision to be not the one who knows, to give up on a very deep level a feeling of individual autonomy which is tied up with self-importance and with fear/survival reflexes.

For my wife who is Japanese, it often seems, the struggle is more the other way.

Having lived in Japan for 13 years and been married to a Japanese for nearly 20 years I have often been struck both by the lack of the Buddha's influence in Japanese culture and by the presence of it.

The lack relates to a tendency to shun independent thinking as an individual. The presence relates to a genuine and deep devotion to work, to training, to practice.

Japanese piano students at English music colleges, I am told, are notorious for their mindlessly repetitive practice, as opposed to "the whole body being informed with thought."

The challenge for both sides, English and Japanese, is to devote ourselves to practice which is not mindless but which is imbued with thought. And that devotion has to be a kind of true love.

Yog'aacaraH in the first line suggests to me a person who has such an attitude towards practice. I think in particular of a phrase I heard spoken by a Japanese practitioner of the martial arts whom I admired. In Japanese the phrase was keiko ga tsuki, "I love practice!"


P.S.

Having translated the fourth line as
Neither with passion for food, nor for the love of body.
I had second thoughts.

Raaga , passion/colour, would seem to refer to passion for food. But should the object of bhakti, devotion/love be understood as one's own body; or, should the object of devotion be understood as hunger -- the enemy who is being warded off?

Certainly there are people, body-builders and the like, who seem to eat their protein pills as an act of self-love of their own bodies. But aren't there also people, anorexics, bulemics and the like, who seem to eat as an act of devotion to hunger?

And as I write down these second thoughts, I ask myself whether in fact my own perspective on eating food has always been so balanced!

Now I am in danger of rambling, but I never claimed this to be anything other than a work in progress. The true gold, as always, is in the bold.

EH Johnston:
So the Yoga adept tenders food to his body merely to suppress hunger, not out of gluttony or devotion to it.

Linda Covill:
likewise the practitioner of yoga gives food to his body, not because of greed or affection for his body but solely to remove hunger.

VOCABULARY:
yoga: m. the act of yoking , joining ; a means , expedient , device , way , manner , method ; exertion , endeavour ; practice of yoga, practice
aacaaraH (nom. sg.): m. conduct , manner of action , behaviour , good behaviour , good conduct ; custom , practice , usage , traditional or immemorial usage (as the foundation of law) ; (with Buddhists) agreeing with what is taught by the teacher
tathaa (correlative of yathaa): so, likewise
aahaaram (acc.): food

shariiraaya (dative): to the body
prayacchati = 3rd pers. sg. of pra-√yam: to hold out towards , stretch forth , extend; to offer , present , give

kevalam: solely
kShud: hunger
vighaata: m. a stroke ; driving back , warding off ; removal , prohibition , prevention
artham: for the purpose of

na: not
raageNa = inst. of raaga: colour , hue , tint , dye , (esp.) red colour , redness; any feeling or passion , (esp.) love , affection or sympathy for , vehement desire of , interest or joy or delight in
na: not
bhaktaye = dative of bhakti: attachment , devotion , fondness for ; trust , homage , worship , piety , faith or love or devotion (as a religious principle or means of salvation , together with karman , " works " , and jNaana , " spiritual knowledge " )