Reappraising the construction of Yogi Bhajan’s Kundalini Yoga

ABSTRACT

This piece revisits my 2012 article for Sikh Formations titled ‘From Maharaj to Mahan Tantric,’ which gave a revised history of Yogi Bhajan’s Kundalini Yoga, and narrates its reception and influence in subsequent years, especially since 2020 with revelations of abuse by Yogi Bhajan and within 3HO institutions. It argues that ‘From Maharaj to Mahan Tantric’ played a role as both a threat to legitimacy and then a tool of crisis management for 3HO, and the reception of the article highlights the importance of Yogi Bhajan’s yoga and claimed titles during the longer history of 3HO through the present moment.

KEYWORDS:

• 3HO
• Kundalini Yoga
• Sikh Dharma
• Yogi Bhajan

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Personal communication between Tejpaul Singh Bainiwal and Baba Avtar Singh on the morning of 16 May 2023, at Gurdwara Sri Guru Hargobind Sahib Ji in French Camp, California.

2 The suspicions of many that the aim of Zabel’s paper was to undermine me as a scholar and my 2012 article in Sikh Formations were made explicit. On the online collaborative platform Basecamp, Zabel announced its release by telling fellow members that ‘if enough people visit it, it may eventually start coming up before Philip Deslippe and Trilochan Singh’s papers on google.’ Soon after on social media, he described me as ‘a former member channeling (his) anger into polemical attacks’ with ‘zero understanding of the history of either Sikhism or Modern Postural Yoga.’