śrotrākāśayoḥ sambandha-saṁyamād divyaṁ śrotram
śrotra-ākāśayoḥ sambandha-saṁyamāt divyam śrotram

“From saṁyama on the union of the ear and space — divine hearing.”

“Where does this world lead to?”
“Space,” he replied. “Clearly, it is from space that all these beings arise, and into space that they are finally absorbed; for space indeed existed before them and in space they ultimately end.”  —Chāndogya Upaniṣad, 1.9.1, translation by Patrick Olivelle

In yoga philosophy, ākāśa (space) is considered the subtlest of the five elements (earth, water, fire, air, space), the source of what is and–as described in the above passage from the Chāndogya Upaniṣad–the end.

B.K.S. Iyengar explains the element of space to be “the emptiness between particles of matter,” which sounds rather like our modern idea of space, yet, in the yogic tradition, space is understood to conduct sound.

Space is vast, even the space in us. As Mr. Iyengar says (see quote below), the amount of matter in an atom is equivalent to a tennis ball in a cathedral. We are mostly space. And we can access this vastness through sound. The practice of chanting and listening to sound, especially the sacred syllable Om, is central to yogic practice. It opens us to the space inward. Patañjali, in sūtra I.27, declares Om to be the speech of Iśvara.

Om is not a word, per se. It is a pre-word. It holds all the words, all the sounds are in it. “The past, the present, the future–all is just Om,” says the Māṇdukya Upaniṣad. “And whatever else there is…that is also Om.” Om is a language before languages.

Today’s sūtra directs our attention to our hearing, literally, to our ear (śrotram), and how our ear “meets” or “intermingles” (sambandha) with space. What do we tune our hearing to? Can we hear the vibrations within the great spaces of our body? Can we hear the sounds from far away, past our borders, maybe on the other side of the world?

The two major influences on my understanding of yoga have been Sanskrit teacher Vyaas Houston and B.K.S. Iyengar. Both have emphasized an inner attunement and an alignment to sound and vibration.

Vyaas Houston begins his course in Sanskrit with the first letter of the Sanskrit alphabet, अ (“a”). He  asks students to feel the sound, the location at the back of the palate, to feel the easy placement of the tongue, the relaxation of the jaw. It is a first sound, guttural, almost effortless, a sound babies make. The Sanskrit alphabet is structured around the shaping of the mouth, the action of the tongue and the diaphragm, the placement of the sound along the palate. It is orderly, and as we students learned these actions, how to make all the vowel sounds and how to form the “stops” (the consonants), we learned the shape and space of the palate; vibrations resonated in the room and in ourselves.  In the words of Dr. Ramamurti Mishra, “There is no better known method to control restlessness, uneasiness, and anxiety than the practice of nādam [sound].” (The Textbook of Yoga Psychology, commentary on III.42)

Likewise, B.K.S. Iyengar taught students to create space within through āsana, to open the inner channels that support a pose, to spread the awareness and sense the vibrations that the press of the foot, the lift of the arm, and the breath moving from center, spreading through the pose, create. With the ears, we listen to the sound of our breathing. We hear ourselves. In an even more subtle way, we listen to our inner state.

In this sūtra, Patañjali says that by contemplating the ear and space, we will gain divyam śrotram, divine hearing (or, the “divine ear”). What a promise! And what might divine hearing be? Vyaas Houston describes our normal hearing as being directional–we hear a sound as it relates to us. In the practice of chanting–and in the absorption in sound as sound, especially the sound Om, which encompasses all sound, we experience moving past our individual location. We hear a broad range of sounds.

Can we listen to the universe? Can we listen around the globe?

Omar El Akkad is an American journalist and novelist, born in Egypt and raised in Qatar and Canada. He has a broad international experience, and he has covered the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and the treatment of prisoners in Quantanamo. He explains in an interview what led to his most recent book. “Since the age of 5,” he says, “I have been attuned to the West….  I am familiar with this culture and am fluent in it.” In short, he is familiar with how writers and professionals and those with influence accept a compartmentalization of concerns, accept a hierarchy of value for some lives over others. The atrocity of the bombing and starvation of Palestinians in Gaza  has changed his ability to compartmentalize. He has become out of tune with the norm. He writes:

What power assumes, ultimately, is that all those who weren’t directly affected by this, who only had to bear the minor inconvenience of hearing about these deaths from afar, will move on, will forget. Tomorrow more Palestinians will die, but in the places where the bombs are built and launched it will have no bearing on mortgages, bills, employment…. In social and professional circles there will be limited tolerance for any talk about the fortunes of some exotic, dangerous-sounding people. … Tomorrow more Palestinians will die, but the unsaid thing is that it is all right because that’s what those people do, they die. Just for a moment, cease to believe that this particular group of people are human.

— Omar El Akkad, One Day, Everyone will Have Always Been Against This, p. 55

What operates in us to turn away from the roar of sound that is a massacre on the order of the assault on Gaza and the targeting of a civilian population? In what ways are we tuning in to our community’s status quo and not hearing what is outside our norms of polite conversation and consideration? Omar inquires of himself whether he is willing to disrupt, to turn toward the reality of human beings whose humanity is being denied.

To listen, to hear more, over great distance. To hold space for solidarity, not annihilation. That is my idea of divine hearing.

—–

“Normal hearing is directional. Attention is drawn to the most significant sound in the present environment. A sense of the location of the sound is established relevant to the position of the listener. … Scanning the entire range of hearing, including extremely subtle and distant sounds normally not heard, creates a common field unified by a sense of space. This can be further deepened by probing the space within all heard sounds. This eliminates directionality relevant to the specific position of the listener, the nexus of individuality.” — Vyaas Houston, Yoga Sūtras: The Practice, Part I, commentary on III.42, p. 110

“The practice of nādam [“sound, internal resonance”] is the best way leading to Cosmic Consciousness. This sound current is heard within and one should listen to it with a concentrated mind. There are innumerable varieties, such as buzzing sound, sound of lute, bells, waves, rumbling, waterfall, rainfall, chirping of birds, roaring of the ocean, stringed and percussion musical instruments, and various other musical sounds.” — Dr. Ramamurti S. Mishra, The Textbook of Yoga Psychology, commentary on III.42

“The amount of matter inside an atom is equivalent to a tennis ball inside a Cathedral, so our atoms, and therefore we, are almost entirely space. … The view that astronauts gained from outer space often left them with a unified, nonpartisan, borderless perception of the planet earth that changed their lives and led them to try to impart their experience through the pursuit of shared human goals to be achieved by peaceful cooperation. As I have said, we cannot all go into orbit, but we do have access to space, our inner space. Paradoxically, looking within has a comparable unifying effect as visiting space does for astronauts.” –B.K.S. Iyengar, Light on Life, p. 202-203

“The eyes belong to mind and fire, the ears to awareness and space. …If you let your head drop forward in meditation, the frontal brain will feel distress. But if there is harmony between the eyes and ears, the focusing of awareness becomes easy. The eyes are the window of the brain, the ears are the window of the soul. This is contrary to popular wisdom, but when the senses are withdrawn (pratyāhāra), this is the true experience. The ears are able to discern vibration. Our inner space corresponds to what we normally call Heaven.” –B.K.S. Iyengar, Light on Life, p. 205

“In everyday life, we sometimes hear without hearing, catching only part of what is said. Refusing to listen to another can even lead to partial deafness, with the attention remaining stuck on an inner discourse or on other exterior sounds. This faculty consists in hearing totally and exactly what is said.” –Bernard Bouanchaud, The Essence of Yoga, commentary on III.42

Questions:
• Does your yoga practice include sound? Do you chant, sing, make or listen to music in a regular way?
• What are obstacles to your listening well to others?
• Have you developed an ability to listen inwardly? How does alignment inform this process?
• How do you take in news? What are you tuning in to?