The Limits of Critical Thinking

Can intellectual dissection be balanced with awe?

Several years ago, I wrote a short essay that critiqued the fixation on critique in academia. The full text is below – it was inspired in part by deciding not to study a PhD, as well as some of my encounters with scholarly luminaries.

Little did I imagine that I’d wind up teaching an M.A. course on the history of yoga a few years later – at SOAS, University of London. I’ve been sharing some reflections on what we discuss there via social media (you can find them on Instagram).

“There’s so much talk…” — Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

Someone recently disputed the relevance of these sorts of musings to a practitioner. The post in question described how ancient legal texts used yogic techniques to atone for wrongdoing, holding the breath to restore caste purity. This would confuse people, the commenter said, perhaps undermining their commitment to practice.

“It’s like going into a sushi restaurant and applying all the reasons we like spaghetti to try to enjoy the sushi,” to quote the critic’s objection, whose metaphor echoes my view in the essay on scholars. That begins by stating: “The academic study of yoga is subtly at odds with its practical objectives…”

However, there are merits to both ways of seeing. Scholars can raise awkward truths that traditional perspectives might downplay, such as the overlap of yoga with social hierarchies. This crops up in the Bhagavad Gītā, whose famous line about doing “one’s own duty” not “the duty of another” (3.35) is a word-for-word copy of a text on dharma (Manu Smṛti 10.97) that says trying to change roles leads to loss of caste status.