What could be not to like about an exercise programme, open to all ages and abilities, which applies and integrates into it, Eastern wisdom to the treatment of the maladies of modern Western lifestyles: stress, bad posture, existential loneliness, and alienation from the barrenness of late consumer capitalism. It has certainly spoken to a particular demographic: middle aged and middle-class women (usually white or Euro-American) seeking their own path to spiritual salvation.
However, there is a dark side to yoga or specifically the form that developed in the 20th century in the Western world– postural yoga with its emphasis on bodily perfection and purity. Like so many other modern alternative health practices, it adopted a pick and mix approach to Eastern (in this case Indian) philosophies and gurus and adapted it to the agenda of alt-capitalism – that of the grifters, con artists and charlatans of the New Age wellbeing industries who have exploited the desperation and gullibility of those seeking answers to health, relationship and professional difficulties which conventional medicine seemingly cannot or won’t address. Most alarmingly is its overlap with the ideas of the fascist movements of the past and modern far right iterations such as QAnon and the anti-vaccination movement.
A Brief History of Yoga
Yoga is an ancient spiritual and physical discipline originating in South Asia and is known today across the globe as a practice fostering well-being, mindfulness, and bodily health. The common sense of Yoga; Its association with peace, self-discovery, and holistic living appears as a polar opposite to the ideologies and practices of fascism, which are characterised by authoritarianism, exclusion, and state-imposed uniformity. However, an examination of the relationship between yoga and fascism reveals intersections that challenge easy assumptions about purity and benevolence within spiritual traditions and their uses.
Yoga’s philosophical roots lie in the ancient texts of Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism, notably in the Upanishads, the Bhagavad Gita, and the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali. Traditionally, yoga is a path towards liberation (moksha) and union between the individual and the universal. Its practices span physical postures (asanas), breath control (pranayama), meditation, and ethical precepts.
As yoga traversed through centuries and borders, it became entangled in political and cultural narratives. In colonial India, yoga was reimagined as a symbol of national pride and cultural resilience against British imperialism. Figures such as Swami Vivekananda promoted yoga to reclaim spiritual sovereignty, merging ancient practices with modern nationalist sentiment.
In early twentieth-century India, the rise of Hindu nationalism witnessed the strategic use of yoga to construct a narrative of Hindu unity and strength. Some nationalist leaders and thinkers valorised yoga as a means of cultivating physical and moral discipline, thereby preparing citizens for service to the nation-state. While this movement was not fascist in the classical European sense, it did share features such as regimented discipline, glorification of tradition, and exclusion of those deemed outside the national ideal.
The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), established in 1925, integrated physical exercises and yoga-inspired routines into its training programs. This use of yoga in service to nationalist discipline demonstrates how spiritual practices can be mobilized for political objectives, sometimes at the expense of pluralism and inclusivity.
In his takedown of yoga in his book Fascist Yoga: Grifters, Occultists, White Supremacists and the New Order in Wellness, Stewart Home, it its opening chapter, begins with a definition of the practice it interrogates:
A Brief History of Yoga
Yoga is an ancient spiritual and physical discipline originating in South Asia and is known today across the globe as a practice fostering well-being, mindfulness, and bodily health. The common sense of Yoga; Its association with peace, self-discovery, and holistic living appears as a polar opposite to the ideologies and practices of fascism, which are characterised by authoritarianism, exclusion, and state-imposed uniformity. However, an examination of the relationship between yoga and fascism reveals intersections that challenge easy assumptions about purity and benevolence within spiritual traditions and their uses.
Yoga’s philosophical roots lie in the ancient texts of Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism, notably in the Upanishads, the Bhagavad Gita, and the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali. Traditionally, yoga is a path towards liberation (moksha) and union between the individual and the universal. Its practices span physical postures (asanas), breath control (pranayama), meditation, and ethical precepts.
As yoga traversed through centuries and borders, it became entangled in political and cultural narratives. In colonial India, yoga was reimagined as a symbol of national pride and cultural resilience against British imperialism. Figures such as Swami Vivekananda promoted yoga to reclaim spiritual sovereignty, merging ancient practices with modern nationalist sentiment.
In early twentieth-century India, the rise of Hindu nationalism witnessed the strategic use of yoga to construct a narrative of Hindu unity and strength. Some nationalist leaders and thinkers valorised yoga as a means of cultivating physical and moral discipline, thereby preparing citizens for service to the nation-state. While this movement was not fascist in the classical European sense, it did share features such as regimented discipline, glorification of tradition, and exclusion of those deemed outside the national ideal.
The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), established in 1925, integrated physical exercises and yoga-inspired routines into its training programs. This use of yoga in service to nationalist discipline demonstrates how spiritual practices can be mobilized for political objectives, sometimes at the expense of pluralism and inclusivity.
In his takedown of yoga in his book Fascist Yoga: Grifters, Occultists, White Supremacists and the New Order in Wellness, Stewart Home, it its opening chapter, begins with a definition of the practice it interrogates:
The term ‘yoga’ refers to both A physical culture system that is slightly more than a century old whose origins pre-date those of postural yoga, though they were reinvented in the late 19th century. Home then structures a Venn diagram after its adoption in the West. In one circle, there’s yoga, Tantra, occidental Buddhism and Hinduism, new age spirituality and basic hippiedom. In the other is sited authoritarianism, fascism, proto-fascism, white supremacy, and far-right conspiracy theory.[1]
Home’s (born Kevin Llewellyn Callan) introduction to the ‘weirdness’ of the yoga world was when he took up yoga in 2009 as part of his gym membership and subjected himself to the practice of head standing (he had previously publicly announced his intention to levitate Brighton’s Pavilion Theatre), subjecting himself to more than 1,000 classes between 2009 and 2019. He recalls a fellow student sidling up to him and proclaiming herself a “starseed” – a sort of new age angel-alien hybrid sent to humanity. He was also taken aback by the cult-like authoritarian guru-student relationship of the classes which concluded in a traditional namaste (meaning “I bow to you”) gesture of respect. His anxiety increased when he discovered that the Waffen SS also liked to do headstands.[2]
But his antennae were really turned on when one of the gym’s yoga instructors, Jen, in 2012 broke with the Anusara practice that had been the basis of her teaching. Anusara is a style of yoga invented in America by John Friend. In 2012 he was at the centre of a scandal around accusations that he had pursued affairs with his students and employees. While he did not appear to have forced himself on those who rejected his sexual advances (unlike other yogis), there were clear consent issues around his behaviour. Friend also had his employees receive packages of illegal drugs on his behalf and played fast and loose with their pension contributions. Friend was also exposed as the otherwise all-female Wiccan coven that performed nude rituals.[3]
But the fundamental contra-indicators to good healing practice are to be found in the Introduction to Friend’s Anusara Yoga Teacher Training Manual which at the end states:
throughout the Manual I have arbitrarily referred to God, the Absolute in the masculine and God, the relative or individual being of consciousness (in the form of the student) in the feminine.
In ‘Health Concerns,’ Friend recommends inversions, alongside hip-openers, for constipation. He also claims that a detached retina can [4]be rectified by engaging in a sitting-forward bend if the student is flexible enough. It is obvious that such health claims do not pass any sort of scientific evidential muster. For what yoga can do to improve one’s health hasn’t really been tested because there is no agreement about what yoga actually is.
In a nutshell that is explains the problematic nature of postural yoga and how it is paradigmatic of the entire wellness sphere.
Yoga and Fascism
In early twentieth-century India, the rise of Hindu nationalism witnessed the strategic use of yoga to construct a narrative of Hindu unity and strength. Some nationalist leaders and thinkers valorised yoga as a means of cultivating physical and moral discipline, thereby preparing citizens for service to the nation-state. While this movement was not fascist in the classical European sense, it did share features such as regimented discipline, glorification of tradition, and exclusion of those deemed outside the national ideal.
The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), established in 1925, integrated physical exercises and yoga-inspired routines into its training programs. This use of yoga in service to nationalist discipline demonstrates how spiritual practices can be mobilized for political objectives, sometimes at the expense of pluralism and inclusivity.
Home’s book carefully maps out how the path to 20th century fascism is paved with yoga and racist interpretations of Eastern philosophy. He begins with Pierre Barnard, the pioneer of the spread in the spread of yogic practices in the Western world. Known as the “Great Oom” (the title was a mistake by the New York press, who didn’t know how to spell the “om” mantra correctly). After forming the Tantric Order in America on the West Coast in 1905, he shortly moved to New York. His disciples included the Vanderbilt heiress Margaret Stuyvesant Rutherfurd along with the British fascist Francis Yeats-Brown and a racist journalist called Hamish McLaurin. In 1910, Barnard was charged with kidnapping two teenage girls.[5]
The aforementioned disciples of The Great Oom, Yeats-Brown and McLaurin, then collaborated on a book, Eastern Philosophy for Western Minds. This unashamed example of cultural appropriation and ominous precursor to the Nazis “Master Race” theories traced “Indo-Aryan texts” to an ancient encounter between “highly developed” ancient Aryan invaders of the “purest possible white stock” and “a dark-skinned people infinitely beneath them on the evolutionary scale.” Yeats-Brown published his memoir The Lives of a Bengal Lancer in the same decade, later adapted into a film starring Gary Cooper and was reportedly a favourite of Hitler’s.[6]
Another contemporary British yogic fascist was the army officer Major General JFC Fuller, who is partially credited with inventing blitzkrieg. Fuller studied “the Vedas and the Upanishads [and] took a deep interest in the yoga philosophy.” For a while a follower of the occultist Aleister Crowley, Fuller was an honoured guest at Hitler’s 50th birthday in April 1939, months before the Fuhrer’s invasion of Poland.[7]
On the European continent, fascist devotees of yoga were legion, First up was the Italian aristocrat Gabriele D’Annunzio, often accredited as the “John the Baptist of fascism” after leading the irregular annexation in 1919 of the port of Fiume (now Rijeka in Croatia). D’Annunzio was a strange narcissist who was rumoured to have removed his lower rib so that he could literally suck his own penis and, during the occupation of Fiume, one of his proto-fascist partisan, the manic depressive and cocaine addles Guido Keller founded the “Yoga group, whose manifestos adopted the (then neutral) swastika as symbol. For Mark Thompson, a historian of early 20th century Italy, what D’Annunzio and his followers saw in Hinduism was “what they say in the mirror – bold and sensuous vitality – plus an aura of Eastern holiness. A vision which gives them “another licence for hedonism.”[8]
Heinrich Himmler, the founder of the Nazi SS, also looked to Hinduism as an Aryan religion. According to the German historian Matthias Tietke, Himmler was an avid reader of the Bhagavad Gita and later interpreted its philosophy as legitimation for the Holocaust. Tietke’s research reportedly found that SS death camp guards were officially recommended yoga and that Himmler even sought out Wewelsburg Castle near Paderborn as a centre for “yoga exercises, meditation, Bhagavad Gita readings and yogic nutrition.[9]
Other contemporary fascist yoga influencers include the Italian imperialist “super-fascist” Julius Evola and Mircea Eliade, a Romanian academic who wrote a thesis on yoga practices before fully committing himself to the fascist Iron Guard that carried out multiple assassinations and, as an Axis ally, participated in the mass murder of tens of thousands of Romanian Jews.[10]
Yoga in the Post War Era
Home writes of how characters such as Jamie Lee- Richardson (aka Desmond Dunne), Richard Hittleman and the ‘Einstein of the Occult,’ Frank Randolph Young maximised to the hilt the West’s growing interest in yogic exercise in an age of growing hucksterism. Although these figures have largely been ignored by most contemporary yoga historians, in the second half of the 20th century their yogic texts were read avidly and played a massive role in the growth of modern postural practice.[11]
Although overt fascism did not feature in the totality of beliefs of these modern yogis, Young in particular was not far distanced from such extremism, and many others pushed to the max either pseudo-scientific occult superstitions or faith-based anti-scientific worldviews. However, the prevalence of far-right insanity in the yoga world only really became obvious to the media with the rise of the QAnon movement and its deluded fantasy that Donald Trump was going to save the world from a fictitious cabal of Satanic child-abusing cannibals and its anti-masking and anti-vax feminine pastel. A prominent modern postural practice QAnon cheerleaders who spread gratuitous lies about life saving Covid preventative measures was social media influencer Krystal Tini, already known to the wellness world through her company My Soul Mat, which sold overpriced and ugly yoga accessories. Her history of depression, anxiety and borderline personality disorder led her “to the importance of affirmations and utilising them in my life” and found that focusing in [yoga] class on mantras or positive statements staring back at me… worked.”[12]
Such individualised, narcissistic, and irrational models of wellbeing were incubated by the twentieth century yogis during the Cold War year and were then birthed in the New Age era which then morphed into the contemporary Alt Right world of Deep State conspiracism, anti-science discourse and hostility to public health bureaucrats.
A perusal of the work and teachings of the afore mentioned yogic gurus prefigure the toxicity of the manosphere as exemplified by the activities of Andrew and Tristan Tate. James Lee-Richardson, like Alex Jones of Infowars notoriety, built a media empire peddling fake news. Both men used their publishing operations to peddle income-generating health supplements. Compiler of the 1936 Manual And Who’s Who Of Spiritualism and Psychic Research, Lee Richardson not only sold mail order yoga instruction, but flogged courses on tarot, palm reading, astrology and psychic development from his home in the south-west London suburbs. His coverage of subjects like UFOs were prone to stray into conspiracy theory.[13]
In Yoga For Everyman, Lee-Richardson describes his modern adaptation of yoga as ‘yogism,’ which he outlines as consisting of very basic relaxation, contraction, breathing and concentration (aka basic meditation) exercises. Towards the end of the book are a series of drawings and descriptions of asanas that carry the somewhat disclaimer: ‘regular practice of Deep Contraction obviates the necessity of assuming more difficult postures.' Many of the historic poses are quite unsuited to Western use. This list below is given solely for historic interest.[14]
Turning to Lee-Richardson’s mail order Insight School of Yoga, it offered the gradual revelation of occult ‘wisdom’ to those willing to commit themselves fully to the course (as well as pay handsomely for the privilege). Before commencing the course, students are subjected to occult dogma which leaves critical thinking on the subject at the door. For example, Lesson II makes the claim that the elixir in the air which the Yogis call Prana defies any mechanical measurement and that its ‘great sedative effect … makes us conscious of occult forces if we persevere in breathing it the Yogic way.”[15]
This leads seamlessly to the more dangerous pseudo-scientific claims on personal health enunciated in the next lesson:
In a nutshell that is explains the problematic nature of postural yoga and how it is paradigmatic of the entire wellness sphere.
Yoga and Fascism
In early twentieth-century India, the rise of Hindu nationalism witnessed the strategic use of yoga to construct a narrative of Hindu unity and strength. Some nationalist leaders and thinkers valorised yoga as a means of cultivating physical and moral discipline, thereby preparing citizens for service to the nation-state. While this movement was not fascist in the classical European sense, it did share features such as regimented discipline, glorification of tradition, and exclusion of those deemed outside the national ideal.
The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), established in 1925, integrated physical exercises and yoga-inspired routines into its training programs. This use of yoga in service to nationalist discipline demonstrates how spiritual practices can be mobilized for political objectives, sometimes at the expense of pluralism and inclusivity.
Home’s book carefully maps out how the path to 20th century fascism is paved with yoga and racist interpretations of Eastern philosophy. He begins with Pierre Barnard, the pioneer of the spread in the spread of yogic practices in the Western world. Known as the “Great Oom” (the title was a mistake by the New York press, who didn’t know how to spell the “om” mantra correctly). After forming the Tantric Order in America on the West Coast in 1905, he shortly moved to New York. His disciples included the Vanderbilt heiress Margaret Stuyvesant Rutherfurd along with the British fascist Francis Yeats-Brown and a racist journalist called Hamish McLaurin. In 1910, Barnard was charged with kidnapping two teenage girls.[5]
The aforementioned disciples of The Great Oom, Yeats-Brown and McLaurin, then collaborated on a book, Eastern Philosophy for Western Minds. This unashamed example of cultural appropriation and ominous precursor to the Nazis “Master Race” theories traced “Indo-Aryan texts” to an ancient encounter between “highly developed” ancient Aryan invaders of the “purest possible white stock” and “a dark-skinned people infinitely beneath them on the evolutionary scale.” Yeats-Brown published his memoir The Lives of a Bengal Lancer in the same decade, later adapted into a film starring Gary Cooper and was reportedly a favourite of Hitler’s.[6]
Another contemporary British yogic fascist was the army officer Major General JFC Fuller, who is partially credited with inventing blitzkrieg. Fuller studied “the Vedas and the Upanishads [and] took a deep interest in the yoga philosophy.” For a while a follower of the occultist Aleister Crowley, Fuller was an honoured guest at Hitler’s 50th birthday in April 1939, months before the Fuhrer’s invasion of Poland.[7]
On the European continent, fascist devotees of yoga were legion, First up was the Italian aristocrat Gabriele D’Annunzio, often accredited as the “John the Baptist of fascism” after leading the irregular annexation in 1919 of the port of Fiume (now Rijeka in Croatia). D’Annunzio was a strange narcissist who was rumoured to have removed his lower rib so that he could literally suck his own penis and, during the occupation of Fiume, one of his proto-fascist partisan, the manic depressive and cocaine addles Guido Keller founded the “Yoga group, whose manifestos adopted the (then neutral) swastika as symbol. For Mark Thompson, a historian of early 20th century Italy, what D’Annunzio and his followers saw in Hinduism was “what they say in the mirror – bold and sensuous vitality – plus an aura of Eastern holiness. A vision which gives them “another licence for hedonism.”[8]
Heinrich Himmler, the founder of the Nazi SS, also looked to Hinduism as an Aryan religion. According to the German historian Matthias Tietke, Himmler was an avid reader of the Bhagavad Gita and later interpreted its philosophy as legitimation for the Holocaust. Tietke’s research reportedly found that SS death camp guards were officially recommended yoga and that Himmler even sought out Wewelsburg Castle near Paderborn as a centre for “yoga exercises, meditation, Bhagavad Gita readings and yogic nutrition.[9]
Other contemporary fascist yoga influencers include the Italian imperialist “super-fascist” Julius Evola and Mircea Eliade, a Romanian academic who wrote a thesis on yoga practices before fully committing himself to the fascist Iron Guard that carried out multiple assassinations and, as an Axis ally, participated in the mass murder of tens of thousands of Romanian Jews.[10]
Yoga in the Post War Era
Home writes of how characters such as Jamie Lee- Richardson (aka Desmond Dunne), Richard Hittleman and the ‘Einstein of the Occult,’ Frank Randolph Young maximised to the hilt the West’s growing interest in yogic exercise in an age of growing hucksterism. Although these figures have largely been ignored by most contemporary yoga historians, in the second half of the 20th century their yogic texts were read avidly and played a massive role in the growth of modern postural practice.[11]
Although overt fascism did not feature in the totality of beliefs of these modern yogis, Young in particular was not far distanced from such extremism, and many others pushed to the max either pseudo-scientific occult superstitions or faith-based anti-scientific worldviews. However, the prevalence of far-right insanity in the yoga world only really became obvious to the media with the rise of the QAnon movement and its deluded fantasy that Donald Trump was going to save the world from a fictitious cabal of Satanic child-abusing cannibals and its anti-masking and anti-vax feminine pastel. A prominent modern postural practice QAnon cheerleaders who spread gratuitous lies about life saving Covid preventative measures was social media influencer Krystal Tini, already known to the wellness world through her company My Soul Mat, which sold overpriced and ugly yoga accessories. Her history of depression, anxiety and borderline personality disorder led her “to the importance of affirmations and utilising them in my life” and found that focusing in [yoga] class on mantras or positive statements staring back at me… worked.”[12]
Such individualised, narcissistic, and irrational models of wellbeing were incubated by the twentieth century yogis during the Cold War year and were then birthed in the New Age era which then morphed into the contemporary Alt Right world of Deep State conspiracism, anti-science discourse and hostility to public health bureaucrats.
A perusal of the work and teachings of the afore mentioned yogic gurus prefigure the toxicity of the manosphere as exemplified by the activities of Andrew and Tristan Tate. James Lee-Richardson, like Alex Jones of Infowars notoriety, built a media empire peddling fake news. Both men used their publishing operations to peddle income-generating health supplements. Compiler of the 1936 Manual And Who’s Who Of Spiritualism and Psychic Research, Lee Richardson not only sold mail order yoga instruction, but flogged courses on tarot, palm reading, astrology and psychic development from his home in the south-west London suburbs. His coverage of subjects like UFOs were prone to stray into conspiracy theory.[13]
In Yoga For Everyman, Lee-Richardson describes his modern adaptation of yoga as ‘yogism,’ which he outlines as consisting of very basic relaxation, contraction, breathing and concentration (aka basic meditation) exercises. Towards the end of the book are a series of drawings and descriptions of asanas that carry the somewhat disclaimer: ‘regular practice of Deep Contraction obviates the necessity of assuming more difficult postures.' Many of the historic poses are quite unsuited to Western use. This list below is given solely for historic interest.[14]
Turning to Lee-Richardson’s mail order Insight School of Yoga, it offered the gradual revelation of occult ‘wisdom’ to those willing to commit themselves fully to the course (as well as pay handsomely for the privilege). Before commencing the course, students are subjected to occult dogma which leaves critical thinking on the subject at the door. For example, Lesson II makes the claim that the elixir in the air which the Yogis call Prana defies any mechanical measurement and that its ‘great sedative effect … makes us conscious of occult forces if we persevere in breathing it the Yogic way.”[15]
This leads seamlessly to the more dangerous pseudo-scientific claims on personal health enunciated in the next lesson:
If you breathe in the right way, you can avoid illness. You need never have catarrh, and you can banish all dread of tuberculosis, which cannot touch you if you breathe correctly. It is even possible that such diseases as gangrene are due to defective breathing.
Such ridiculous assertions have fed into the adoption of anti-vax ideologies particularly around mask wearing as a Covid pandemic safety measure by many of those involved with modern postural practice.[16]
The same lesson offers much else that is scientifically and morally dubious. For example, the claim is made that “One can never develop psychic qualities in a gross or sensual body. Nor in an unclean body, and that is why so much stress is being laid on cleanliness …”.[17] Such claims draw up and reflect a gamut of reactionary perspective on the body from the bodily purity tropes found in much of fascist yoga and which mirrors racial purity discourses to body shaming and the valorisation of thinness by the fashion industry and the time and motion body management techniques of late capitalism. They are transparently aimed to appeal to the gullible and desperate.
Lee-Richardson’s enterprises should be seen in the wider context of the role throughout the twentieth century of mail order courses in the global reception of many exercise and occult systems, with the iconic Charles Atlas body-building system as an obvious go-to model. As such he is more than a minor detail in the history of modern yoga and occultism.[18]
Richard Hittleman (1927-91) hitched the techniques of televangelism to his yoga teachings to push, in contrast to the occult pseudo-science of earlier gurus, a faith-based approach to modern postural practice. But nonetheless, this yoga televangelist was still an accomplished cod-spiritual salesperson.[19]
Hittleman became a minor television personality in the 1960s and 1970s by hosting both US and UK yoga instruction shows and also put together publications and records along similar lines, some of which he sold directly to the public. Beyond hyperbole about the efficacy of yoga, Hittleman’s Prentice Hall manuals are generally free of occult nonsense, the rationale for which is made in his later Guide To Meditation in which:
The same lesson offers much else that is scientifically and morally dubious. For example, the claim is made that “One can never develop psychic qualities in a gross or sensual body. Nor in an unclean body, and that is why so much stress is being laid on cleanliness …”.[17] Such claims draw up and reflect a gamut of reactionary perspective on the body from the bodily purity tropes found in much of fascist yoga and which mirrors racial purity discourses to body shaming and the valorisation of thinness by the fashion industry and the time and motion body management techniques of late capitalism. They are transparently aimed to appeal to the gullible and desperate.
Lee-Richardson’s enterprises should be seen in the wider context of the role throughout the twentieth century of mail order courses in the global reception of many exercise and occult systems, with the iconic Charles Atlas body-building system as an obvious go-to model. As such he is more than a minor detail in the history of modern yoga and occultism.[18]
Richard Hittleman (1927-91) hitched the techniques of televangelism to his yoga teachings to push, in contrast to the occult pseudo-science of earlier gurus, a faith-based approach to modern postural practice. But nonetheless, this yoga televangelist was still an accomplished cod-spiritual salesperson.[19]
Hittleman became a minor television personality in the 1960s and 1970s by hosting both US and UK yoga instruction shows and also put together publications and records along similar lines, some of which he sold directly to the public. Beyond hyperbole about the efficacy of yoga, Hittleman’s Prentice Hall manuals are generally free of occult nonsense, the rationale for which is made in his later Guide To Meditation in which:
… the physical properties of Yoga were stressed in this era of instruction… so that “If the student were drawn into the physical practice the health benefits would be so pronounced that he would then desire to learn more of the philosophy and to practice the meditation techniques … the entire ‘essence’ of the subject.[20]
As can be deduced from this mission statement, Hittleman’s promotion of the youthfulness and health benefits his physical culture teachings were means of persuasion of his students towards his faith-based and anti-science inner teachings. The lack of scientific evidence for his promotion of the supposed health benefits of his ‘brand’ of yoga can be seen in his first book Be Young With Yoga published in 1962 with the strap-line, ‘The Amazing 7-Week Course in Yoga that Stimulates Your Body with Fresh Vitality and the Bubbling Energy of Youth’ which justifies “the publicity given the HEAD STAND, … not as a peculiarity but as a tremendously dynamic technique that has the most marvellous effect on the brain."
Hittleman offers no scientific evidence to support this claim. While headstands may be a staple of the yoga world and fun to perform, there are many other exercises that promote health, well-being, and functional balance in a more efficient way (for example, freestanding on a Swiss ball). Nor does he provide scientific evidence for his praise of isometric exercises – in which muscles are simply flexed, with no joint movement made - in his second book Yoga For Physical Fitness, published in 1964. Despite the gentle, ‘easy-to-do’ sales pitch towards homemakers and office workers, numerous exercises in the book (and in many other yoga manuals) are not considered safe from a sports science. For example, Yoga For Physical Fitness includes full neck rolls, which put undue pressure on the cervical spine.[21]
Hittleman’s yogic philosophy is suffused with cosmic rejection of the theory of evolution in the manner reminiscent of Christian fundamentalists. In his pamphlet Yoga Philosophy & Meditation: An Interpretation, he declares:
Whereas we have been led to accept the theory that man has somehow evolved from a more primitive creature and that civilisation may be approximately 7,000 years old, the Yogi would comment on the former statement as ‘absurd’ and the as latter statement as ‘yesterday’.
This passage is repeated word-by-word in his 1969 book Guide to Yoga Meditation, which additionally provides such useful insights into ‘The 7 centres of force which are opened though the journey of the Basic Power ‘– a reference to a mythological ‘kundalini power’ that lights the equally non-existent ‘chakras’ in the human body.[22]
Hittleman’s writings are also replete with references to conspiracy theories in which ‘the true guru is the great dis-illusioner. For ‘Throughout the ages he has blown the whistle on the conspiracy; he has explained the nature of maya’. To the unenlightened, science is ‘maya’ or ‘illusion’, preventing seekers the discovering the ‘truth.’ [23] The pathway towards the conspiracist and anti-science narratives around Covid and vaccines is thus laid out here.
Hittleman was clearly a forerunner to the bogus-spiritual, wellbeing grift economy that has hoodwinked so many of the desperate, gullible and seekers of today. With his faith-based approach to grifting, he now is a templar for far-right prosperity gospel megachurches such as Awaken in San Diego, whose pastor laces his sermons with vaccine denial and QAnon-style attacks on election fraud and global cabals. His flock are expected to tithe ten per cent of their income so that the Almighty (or The Great Awakener) can bless them with health and wealth regardless of their means in order to be saved.[24]
While Richard Hittleman represents the ‘faith-based’ version of postural practice, Frank Rudolph Young (1911-2002) can be seen as the epitome of those pedalling a more pseudo-scientific, occult vision of modern yoga.[25] Like many yogis and old school strongmen, Young was steeped in New Thought, the cornerstone of which was the “positive thinking” doctrine of Norman Vincent Peale. But on top an emphasis on positive thinking and self-belief, he promotes achievement of health and physical rejuvenation through bodily realignment. Therefore, his occult beliefs are often inseparable from his yoga and physical culture teachings. As an illustration, he promised readers of his most popular occult book, Cyclomancy, that they could access a number of ‘powers’ should they follow the instructions provided. These include the power to ‘travel with your astral body,’ ‘see into the future with a crystal ball’ and ‘stay slim without starvation.’[26]
From the early 1950s onwards, Young authored a stream of mail order works on self-improvement through physical culture, as well as the related areas of self-defence, diet, occult ‘development’, ‘correct’ thinking and mental ‘efficiency’. By the time Young acquired a publishing contract with the mainstream operator Parker in the mid-1960s, he already had a trove of material from his portfolio of self-development pamphlets, courses and books to extract and build on; granted that much of this writing had been largely recycled in different publications. But behind the vibes of positive affirmation and nursing of the self, a darker tone emerges in Young’s corpus of work. The 1953 publication X-Ray Mind: A Krishnara Course – written under the pen name Maravedi El Krishnar – has sections on ‘Dangerous Power: Develop a Yoga Like Mind’ with exercises such as ‘The Unconquerable Eye’: ‘This eye fits best a king, dictator, commander, executive and others with authority over others: Stare in the mirror into your own eyes and think of yourself as possessing incomparable mental power.” The malignant narcissism and megalomania conveyed by these words suggest a blatant throwback to the attitudes of the pre-Second World War fascist yogis.[27]
The spectre of the latter-day pick up artists appears when he offers techniques such as ‘the call of Svengali’ and when he counsels that ‘The Aloof Eye’ “… enables you to engage in silent conversation with the object of your interest and stir up her emotions… for “Few women are thrilled by the man who does not arouse in them feelings of danger. Not brutal danger, but danger of their ruin.”[28]
In Yoga For Men Only (1969), Young offers men a yoga course to help them overturn the ‘four horsemen of the mastabah’, the substitution of the biblical term with one denoting a type of ancient Egyptian tomb, which he flags as the down pull of gravity, faulty posture, weight-bearing and ground resistance. The ‘case studies’ of lives transformed by Young’s yoga system not so subtly betray his sexism. In the example of ‘Harry’:
In less than two weeks Harry had tightened up his loose waist noticeably … Harry tackled Ava again on the extravagance question … his new manly aggressiveness and driving capacity caught her unawares. Within a couple of weeks Harry was the much-cherished master of his home!
Young and hucksters like him were the precursors to the incels and pick-up artists who form major constituents of today’s alt-right. The toxic masculinity spread by manosphere influencers like the proud misogynist and indicted sex trafficker Andrew Tate had its imprint in Young’s mail order courses in the 1950s. Tate’s Hustler University – offering get rich quick schemes based on crypto currency, copywriting and e-commerce, alongside advice to men on how to handle women is a 21st century version of the ‘secret knowledge’ trafficked by Fuller, Yeats-Brown and Rudolph-Young in the last century to their vulnerable and impressionable customers. The conspirituality-industrial complex given such a boon by the Covid pandemic is largely the product of the transmission down generations of the falsehoods of the discipline of postural yoga.
References
[1] Miles Ellingham Why do fascists love yoga? The Observer Essay 27th July 2025 pp 11-13
[2] Ibid, pp.11-12
[3] Stewart Home (2025) Fascist Yoga. Grifters, Occultists, White Supremacists, and the New Order in Wellness. London: Pluto Press p.3
[4] Ibid
[5] The Observer, p.12
[6] Ibid
[7] Ibid
[8] Ibid
[9] Ibid
[10] Ibid
[11] Home, p.88
[12] Ibid, p.89
[13] Ibid, pp.116-17
[14] Ibid, pp.117-18
[15] Ibid, p.120
[16] Ibid, pp.120-21
[17] Ibid, p.121
[18] Ibid, pp.127-28
[19] Ibid, p.129
[20] Ibid, p.132
[21] Ibid, p.133
[22] Ibid, pp. 133-34
[23] Ibid, p.135
[24] Ibid, pp.136-37
[25] Ibid, p.138
[26] Ibid, p.140
[27] Ibid, pp.141-42
[28] Ibid, pp.142
[2] Ibid, pp.11-12
[3] Stewart Home (2025) Fascist Yoga. Grifters, Occultists, White Supremacists, and the New Order in Wellness. London: Pluto Press p.3
[4] Ibid
[5] The Observer, p.12
[6] Ibid
[7] Ibid
[8] Ibid
[9] Ibid
[10] Ibid
[11] Home, p.88
[12] Ibid, p.89
[13] Ibid, pp.116-17
[14] Ibid, pp.117-18
[15] Ibid, p.120
[16] Ibid, pp.120-21
[17] Ibid, p.121
[18] Ibid, pp.127-28
[19] Ibid, p.129
[20] Ibid, p.132
[21] Ibid, p.133
[22] Ibid, pp. 133-34
[23] Ibid, p.135
[24] Ibid, pp.136-37
[25] Ibid, p.138
[26] Ibid, p.140
[27] Ibid, pp.141-42
[28] Ibid, pp.142
⏩Barry Gilheany is a freelance writer, qualified counsellor and aspirant artist resident in Colchester where he took his PhD at the University of Essex. He is also a lifelong Leeds United supporter.
Think this is the first we have had about Yoga.
ReplyDeleteA lot of work went into that Barry.
Good stuff.