Patanjali is the yoga sage credited with forming the first written record of the aspects of yoga. It is established tradition in India for spiritual matters to be handed down through word of mouth. As long as people are alive the knowledge would be handed down. Ancient archaeology and history in India are notoriously difficult for the westerner. In ancient times written recording was not deemed necessary. With the passing of time records of the most significant things were made. Hence knowledge of the existence of the Buddha and his teachings have survived to this day as have Hinduism and the other eastern religions.

Yoga is constantly evolving. The writings of Patanjali take the form of four chapters called pada. Within these he lays out what is deemed important in the practice of yoga. To this day it remains a blueprint from which is drawn the concept or philosophy of yoga.

The sutras mention Prana the life force energy and methods and techniques to work with and understand it.. It contains how you should look after yourself and conduct yourself in your interactions with other people and other living things.

Patanjali suggests eight constituent parts of a yoga lifestyle. Written it is believed, around 2200 years ago, in the Sanskrit language, it does not read like a book, but is a series of very brief statements called aphorisms, some with as little as four words. Scholars and sages have written commentaries to accompany the original text and explore its meaning. It is important you find the right commentator for you. Some can be very academic. Try to dip into the book at a good bookshop before you make your choice.

The Bhagavad Gita forms part of the Mahabharata the longest surviving poem from ancient history. It is an important scripture in Hinduism and again is written in Sanskrit. The Eknath Easwaran translation is a beautiful read. It is a conversation between the Hindu God Krishna and the human Arjuna that takes place as Arjuna is about to embark to the battlefield, believed to be the Kurukshetra War.

Krishna imparts five 'truths' to Arjuna: Ishvara (the supreme controller), Jiva (living beings/the soul), Prakrti(matter), Karma (duty) Kala (time). He is explaining to Arjuna the true nature of all things. He gives him the wisdom of the path of yoga including devotional service, action, meditation and knowledge>


'Fundamentally, the Bhagavad Gita proposes that true enlightenment comes from growing beyond identification with the tempora lego, the 'False Self', the ephemeral world, so that one identifies with the truth of the immortal self, the absolute soul or Atman. Through detachment from the material sense of ego, the yogi, or follower of a particular path of Yoga, is able to transcend his/her illusory mortality and attachment to the material world and enter the realm of the Supreme.'
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhagavad_Gita

The Upanishads are another Hindu scripture based on the Vedanta teachings. What a person new to yoga needs to remember is that yoga itself is not a religion but evolved from ancient religious practices and beliefs. Hence the Upanishads illustrate values held to be important from the yoga perspective.

Upanishads are not one text written by one author like a novel, but are a gathering of wisdoms written ove many centuries. The earliest are believed to date from the Vedic (600BC)period.

'The Upanishads speak of a universal spirit (Brahman) and an individual soul, (Atman) and at times assert the identity of both. Brahman is the ultimate, both transcendent and immanent, the absolute infinite existence, the sum total of all that ever is, was, or shall be.'http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Upanishads


There are eleven principal Upanishads:
Aitareya
Brhadāranyaka
Taittirīya
Chāndogya
Kena
Īsa
Śvetāśvatara
Katha
Mundaka
Māndūkya

'I' is the germination of the sproat; ‘mine is a big tree trunk; home and land are its branches; children and wife are its shoots.

Wealth and gain are its big leaves. It grows more than once and merit and demerit are its blossoms and joy and sorrow its fruit.

It overshadows the path to liberation, is watered by the sexual contact between fools and is infested with the bees of desire. Lack of understanding of what should be done is the tree itself.

Those who are tired of the ways of the world and seek refuge under its shade become dependent on pleasure derived from false knowledge. How can they reach the end?

But those who fell the tree of ‘mineness’ with the axe of wisdom, sharpened on the whetstone of association with the virtuous, travel along the right path.

Reaching the absolute’s cool grove, which is free from dirt and thorns, the wise who abstain from action obtain the supreme.

MARKANDEYA-PURANA - a hindu text