Karl

Baier

Carl Kellner on Yoga

Draft based on a presentation at the 6th ESSWE (European Society for the Study of Western
Esotericism) Conference: ‘Western Esotericism and Deviance’ at Erfurt, Germany, Saturday
3rd June 2017.1


Introduction

This paper deals with two texts of Carl Kellner: his essay Yoga. Eine Skizze über den psycho-
physiologischen Teil der alten indischen Yogalehre (1896) and a manuscript called
Reincarnation. The rosicrucian background of Kellner’s appreciation of haṭha yoga is
outlined. Finally, I discuss the question of yoga influenced sexual magic within Kellner’s Inner
Occult Circle and the early OTO.

In August 1896, the electro chemist Carl Kellner, an industrial magnate and theosophist, high
degree freemason and rosicrucian alchemist together with the theosophists Franz Hartmann
and Ludwig Deinhard accompanied Bheema Sena Pratapa to the 3rd International Congress
for Psychology in Munich to exhibit his yoga sleep before the scientists and to re-establish
his reputation as yogi.The twenty-nine years old Pratapa had travelled to Europe to give
public demonstrations of what he called “yoga sleep”, a state of mind in which he lost
contact with the world around him, became insensitive to pain and could not be awakened
unless certain movements of the hand were carried out close to his body. His performances
resembled the contemporary stage acts of mesmerists and hypnotists adding a mystical
twist to them. Pratapa claimed that during his sleep he would be in a state of bliss and union
with the divine spirit. Along with Gopal Krishna, a fellow yogi, he was an attraction for the
visitors of the Millennial Exposition in Budapest in 1896, where he publicly demonstrated
what his yogic sleep for an entire week while scientists measured his body temperature,
pulse and respiration.

1
For a more detailed analysis of Kellner’s worldview and the yoga reception within Viennese occultism see
Baier, K. (forthcoming).Yoga within Viennese Occultism: Carl Kellner and Co. In Baier, K.; Maas, Ph.,
Preisendanz, K. (Eds.), Yoga in Transformation. Göttingen: Vandenhoek & Ruprecht Uni Press.
A scandal arose when Pratapa was accused of coming out of his yoga sleep at night in order
to eat and drink, to have a smoke and to play cards with his fellow yogi. The public
controversy about the young yogi made its way into the Habsburgian press and probably this
was what Kellner and Hartmann made aware of him. In any case, they invited Pratapa to
Kellner’s home in Hallein where together with Ludwig Deinhard they examined his yogic
powers. Kellner and his theosophical friends soon came to the conclusion that he set himself
in the state of nirvikalpasamādhi, the highest yogic state, during their performances.2
In Munich Pratapa went into the yogic sleep throughout all three days of the
congress from 10am to 6pm (wisely enough he now took rest during the nights). The
demonstration was not part of the official programme, but many members of the Congress
came to see the yogi and tried to interrupt his otherworldly state or searched for its
pathological causes, both without success. Kellner’s essay Yoga. Eine Skizze über den psycho-
physiologischen Teil der alten indischen Yogalehre was distributed at this event. Most of the
psychologists remained sceptical about the young yogi. Kellner’s text and also an article on
the yoga sleep written by Hartmann were quoted in several newspaper articles on Pratapa’s
performances in Munich. The journalists now reported with much more respect about the
yogi. Later Kellner’s essay was praised by William James, one of the organizers of the
congress, in a footnote of his famous Varieties of Religious Experience.

Kellner’ s essay on yoga

Kellner starts his investigation with a broad definition of yoga in line with his sources,
especially the introductions of Basu and Tookaram Tatya to Śivasaṃhitā and
Haṭhapradīpikā. Yoga, he states, is the practical side of each religious system. It can be found
in every holy book and also within the traditions and symbols of certain secret societies.3
Yoga consists of “certain exercises and a life style governed by certain rules that aim at
dissolving the illusionary ego-consciousness and reaching a union with the general world-
consciousness (Atma).”4 As union with a sublime and holy object it is connected with a sense

2
Cf. Kellner 1896a: 19.
3
Ibd.: 6.
4
Ibd.: 5

2
of ineffable bliss.5 He thus defines yoga as transcultural practice that lies at the core of every
religious system.
Kellner does not want to go into the philosophical side of yoga and instead focusses
on a psycho-physiological perspective. For this purpose, he draws on the theory of Ambroise
Liébeault, the founder of the school of Nancy that in the 1890s became the leading school of
hypnosis. Suppression of the changes in attention would be “the most beautiful explanation
of the induction of the state of ‘autosuggestion’ or better ‘autohypnosis’. […] From a
European point of view, we can say the following: Yoga is the ability to produce all
phenomena of somnambulism arbitrarily through one’s own free will by steady practice and
a suitable way of life.”6
This approach to yoga made a good fit with the program of the congress. Many
papers on psycho-physiological topics as well as on hypnotism, somnambulism and
suggestion were presented and Liébeault himself gave a talk. As no speaker at the
conference treated phenomena and concepts from outside the Euro-American world,
Kellner’s sketch and Pratapa’s performance were very avant-garde.
More surprising than his recourse to somnambulism and hypnotism is the fact that
Kellner’s view of yoga includes a clear plea for haṭha yoga. I actually do not know any other
contemporary European or American author who took haṭha yoga as serious as he did. At
the end of the nineteenth century all four hegemonic institutions for the interpretation of
yoga, namely theosophy, neo-hinduism, academic orientalism and psychology, were still
clinging to a negative image of this form of yoga although since the early years of the
Theosophical Society in South Asia certain elements of it were evaluated positively. From the
1880s onwards South-Asian theosophical Sanskrit scholars started to translate, edit and
comment major works of haṭha yoga. They developed less prejudiced views and sometimes
even recommended certain haṭha practices. Kellner followed this trend. For him, haṭha yoga
is the most interesting type of yoga “from a pure physiological point of view.”7 And not only
that, he thinks that the psycho-physiological dimension ensures its superiority among the
different yogas. Haṭha yoga exercises “possess the most formidable hypnogenetic means”

5
Ibd.: 11.
6
Ibd.: 7–8.
7
Ibd.: 12.

3
and are able to create the yogic state in the simplest possible matter and faster than other
yoga techniques.8
The yoga texts he refers to in his essay are Mitra’s translation of the Yogasūtra-s and
three translations of haṭha yoga texts: Basu’s edition of the Śivasaṃhitā (most important)
and translations of the Haṭhapradīpikā and the Gheraṇḍasaṃhitā. The last two he does not
quote correctly, but in all likelihood he used the theosophical editions of T. R. Srinivasa
Iyangar and again Srichandra Basu (this time called Vasu).
Basu and Tookaram Tatya more or less identified breath-control with haṭha yoga. In
the same way Kellner defines the core discipline of this yoga as “systematized regulation of
breath.” 9 Thanks to the use of the psychological and physiological effects of controlled
breath “Hatha yoga practices have the best hypnogenetic means. Therefore they are the
easiest practices leading to the yogic state and the fastest to reach that goal.”10
In line with Tookaram Tatya, Kellner exemplifies the polysemy of yoga terms and
instructions by explaining the different layers of meaning of the name haṭha yoga. He starts
with the interpretation that “ha” means moon and “ṭha” the sun. Kellner then adds that the
union of sun and moon could be related to a certain breathing technique that unites the
breathing through the left and the right nostril in the area in-between the eyebrows in order
to attain salvation. Haṭha, the union of sun and moon could also refer to the union of prāṇa
and apāna, the downward and upward moving breath (vāyu) within the navel region. On the
philosophical level it would mean the union of jīva (moon) with the ātman (sun).
It is worth mentioning that a symbolism of the union of sun and moon was well
known to Kellner from his European occult background. The villa of the Kellner family in
Vienna was decorated with a large figure holding in one hand the sun and in the other one
the moon. Josef Dvorak interpreted this figure as a representation of Baphomet (a most
popular symbol of the union of polarities in 19th and 20th century occultism). But it actually
depicts the title vignette of Carl von Eckartshausen: Aufschlüsse zur Magie. Volume I, from
1788. The vignette shows the eternal oneness as divine creator of the cosmos holding in his
hands the primordial duality of sun and moon from which the manifold phenomena of the
created world emerge. Two chains connect sun and moon with a four-stringed lyre that
represents the tetrachord as symbol of cosmic harmony.

8
Ibd.: 9.
9
Ibd.: 8.
10
Ibd.: 9.

4
 Kellner also mentions other forms of yoga (like mantra yoga, bhakti yoga etc.) in
passing without detailed description. Only rāja yoga stands out being characterized as
“crown of yoga.”11 Following Tookaram Tatya, he identifies it with the highest, redeeming
state of mind that is the general aim of yoga.
During the 1880s modern physical culture had come to Vienna from England and the USA. In
keeping with the times, Kellner became a passionate sportsman. He engaged a private
trainer for himself and his children. Georg Jagendorfer, then “the strongest man in town”,
owned a fitness studio in the centre of Vienna.12 Unsurprisingly, Kellner highlights that a yogi
should live according to the principle of mens sana in corpore sano. “The Yogi needs a strong
and in all of its parts totally healthy body. He has to possess perfect body control.” 13
Nevertheless, he did not recommend the āsana-s described in the haṭha yoga texts for the
purpose of physical training, because he thought they would be too difficult for Westerners.
But he is very interested the breathing exercises refered to in the haṭha yoga scriptures.
Furthermore he introduces the system of the ten vāyu-s, lists fourteen nāḍī-s and outlines
the role of both within the yogic practice of mudrā as the central haṭha yoga practice.
The yogi shifts his consciousness, condenses his attention on one of the vayus
and on a nadi and connects this imagination in a certain asana with the breath.
This combination is called mudra. There are 25 mudras (among them some very
strange ones).14

Without denying the the philosophical and religious aspects of yoga, Kellner develops a
secularized psychosomatic model of yoga and in the end, opts for the use of yoga as a
therapeutic tool without any religious or philosophical frame. This is a new strategy within
the occultist advocacy of yoga. He does not directly confront mainstream science like Helena
Blavatsky did, but defends yoga with arguments that he thought were able to draw scientific
approval.
Being evidently in a hurry when writing, Kellner’s sketch contains spelling mistakes and
errors as several commentators have observed. In his list of the ten vāyu-s he mentions a
“nāpa vayu” and correlates it with the “function of insemination”. 15 This vāyu is not
mentioned in Kellner’s primary source concerning the vāyu-s, the Gheraṇḍasaṃhitā, or any
other known Sanskrit text. It was probably only a writing error and he wrote “nāpa” instead
11
Ibd.: 11.
12
See Josef Dvorak in Weirauch 1998: 193.
13
Kellner 1896a: 12–13.
14
Ibd.: 17–18.
15
Ibd.: 17.

5
of the correct naga.16 But this does not explain Kellner’s view about the function of this
vāyu. Naga is traditionally related with burping and vomiting and not with insemination.
There is no allusion to ritual sex in Kellner’s essay. Except for the nāpa-vayu, only one
passage in his sketch refers to sexuality. “Asanas”, Kellner writes, “are supposed to influence
the circulation within the lower extremities and the sexual drive and to be a training for
willpower.”17 Although sexual practices are not directly mentioned, it is not difficult to
derive a yoga technique of dealing with “the function of insemination” from Kellner’s
description of mudrā and from the nāpa-vāyu he introduced.
Be that as it may, with regard to ritual sex, it is important to note that Kellner’s
general concept of yoga is based on asceticism. For him vairāgya, renunciation, is one of the
master keys to yoga. Only somebody who is refraining from earthly wishes and desires can
develop the inner peace that is a necessary precondition to attain the higher stages of yoga.
“Through the mastering of his thoughts and his body, the yogi becomes a virtuous man. As
he subjugates his drives and inclinations to his original will and because he focuses this will
towards the good, he becomes an ‘authentic personality’.”18

The rosicrucian background

I would like to argue that one of the reasons of the positive attitude towards haṭha yoga in
Kellner’s essay and among other Habsburgian occultists was their involvement in Alois
Mailänders rosicrucian circle. The religious practices that Mailänder taught were based on
the so called “Kerning exercises” a system of body centered meditations that was developed
by the famous German freemason Johann Baptist Krebs (1774-1851) who published under
the pen name Kerning. The indophile theosophists among the students of Mailänder
considered this system to be a kind of European yoga based on rosicrucian traditions. In his
essay Kellner writes: “Among the Christian mystics, Jakob Boehme in his discourse between
the master and his disciple [De Vita Mentali, 1622, KB] and J. Krebs […] represent the best
that has ever been written in German about yoga practices” 19 The Kerning exercises
comprised the following points:

16
Cf. Möller & Howe 1986: 139–140; Weirauch 1998: 194–196.
17
Kellner 1896a: 14.
18
Ibd.: 21.
19
Ibd.: 6.

6
 • Murmuring or silent repetition of short sentences or words
• Breathing exercises
• Concentration on different parts of the body, especially certain mystical centres
• The imaginative spelling of the repeated letters and words within these parts of the
body.
• The aim of this practice: The divine „inner word“ should permeate and transform the
human body.

Through these practices the „divine inner word“ should permeate and transform the human
body. They triggered a revision of the role of embodiment within Habsburgian occultism.
Whereas in the Theosophical Society the aim of spiritual practice was the separation of the
astral body from the physical body, astral projection now became the „worst kind of
schizophrenia“ as Gustav Meyrink said. He took this insight from Mailänder. “If the only
thing I had learnt from this man was that the body must be included in the transformation of
the person through yoga, he would have earned my lifelong gratitude for that insight
alone.”20 And Karel Weinfurter pointed out:
„Master Kerning ceaselessly points to the fact that god is present within the whole
body. Ninety-nine per cent of the occultists and theosophists believe that human
mystical development starts within the soul. This view is one of the greatest mistakes
of modern occult literature. Exactly the opposite is true. Mystical blossoming first
happens within the body, taking place in the form of body sensations that nobody
knows who has not experienced them and who did not enter the mystical path.”21

The Kerning exercises thus paved the way for conceiving yoga as a practice that uses
breathing exercises and postures to create certain proprioceptive sensations that transform
the whole human being and lead to a liberating experience of ultimate reality and
immortality. Sigmund Freud was informed about this understanding of yoga by his friend
Friedrich Eckstein and referred to it in his Civilisation and its Discontents (1930).

An example of Kellner’s yoga practice: the manuscript Reincarnation

A short undated handwritten manuscript titled [3]Reincarnation[en] provides interesting
insights into Kellner’s own practice. One can summarize this text as follows:

20
Meyrink 2010: 138.
21
Weinfurter n. d.: 222, Weinfurter’s emphases.
7

• “Asana is steady, the breaths of life are under the reigns of the mind –”
• “The azure flame appears – the ego puts itself into the flame – and looks back – far
back –”
• He sees himself as Chaldean priest, a servant of Shamaja, in “one of these amazing
starry nights on the Chaldean plains”. In Babylon he meets a woman (very probably
his wife). He feels sexually attracted to her (“Oh how beautiful! – soft glittering silk
fabrics barely veil the slim and opulent forms of your body – yes this your are –”)
• Then he is climbing up a “fire tower” in the pleasure gardens of the ruler to ritually
offer fire to the deity.
• He connects himself with the one light that enlightens everything and with the life of
all his human brothers and sisters and then pronounces a blessing .
• He returns to the still sleeping world.

The beginning of the text qualifies the described practice and experience as a form of yoga.
The term āsana is mentioned and also the mastering of the vāyu-s (the ‘breaths of life’ in
Kellner’s diction). The result of this practice is a visionary state of mind in which the
practitioner develops the power to recall previous lives.
To come into contact with his past lives Kellner uses a certain technique. After an
azure flame appeared before his inner eye, he immerses himself into the flame and looks
back in time. The motive of the blue light may be influenced by a passage of Basu’s
introduction to the Śivasaṃhitā. According to Basu the appearance of a blue light indicates
the opening of the realm of visionary experience. 22 The transition from the realm of
imagination to a region of formless pure white light mentioned by Basu, is also part of
Kellner’s meditation.
Finally, two persons appear before Kellner’s inner eye, which he identifies as “us”. He finds
himself and a woman, most probably his wife, in a town that turns out to be antique
Babylon. The sequence that follows describes an ascent from individual earthly appearances
to the universal heavenly Divine light, followed by a renewed attention to and blessing of
the multitude of individual things.
The images that appear in this part of Kellner’s vision are not referring to yoga or
Hindu symbols (except the widespread symbolisms of the sun and light). Rather, they reflect
the high esteem of Chaldea, the home of the Chaldean oracles and their theurgy within
Rosicrucianism and the Theosophical Society. As already Josef Dvorak has pointed out,

22
Basu 2004: XLXII, Basu’s emphasis.

8
Kellner’s notion of being a priest and servant of the Schamaja most probably refers to
Bulwer-Lytton’s Zanoni where “the starry truths which shone on the great Shemaia of th
Chaldean Lore” are mentioned.23 In the first chapter of the first volume of Isis Unveiled
Helena Blavatsky quotes this passage and uses “Shemaia” as a synonym for the old Oriental
or universal Kabbala.24
Kellner recognizes himself as a priest of the Schamaja. His female companion is
almost naked and he praises the beauty of her body and her shining eyes within the starry
night. This erotic episode is followed by a scene, in which Kellner in his function as priest
climbs up a fire tower to perform a fire sacrifice. An atmosphere of sexual arousal and love
for his companion is the beginning of an mystical ascent. He evokes the one divine light and
life as present in everything and experiences that it connects and unifies everything
including himself and his human brothers and sisters. What started as sexual attraction ends
in a universal communion with the cosmos and especially all human beings.
After the mystical union as climax of the whole vision, Kellner returns to the
individual realities. He sees the sacrificial fire and himself pronouncing a blessing. The
surroundings of the fire tower become present, picturesque pleasure gardens with
fountains, flowers and sleeping birds that still await morning, whereas Kellner has already
touched eternal light.

The question of yoga influenced sexual magic

Kellner was the leader of an “Occult Inner Circle” that was connected with his masonic
order, the Sovereign Sanctuary. After Kellner’s death it was said that in this circle rosicrucian
and yoga exercises as well as sexual magic were taught.
Moreover, Kellner’s grandchild, Karl-Erwin Lichtenecker, narrated that his mother
Eglantine, the oldest daughter of the Kellners, told him about a usually locked room in the
Villa Hochwart which her parents retired to time and again. Eglantine was told by her
mother that they were performing a ritual there that aimed at “intimacy pushed to the
utmost limit” in order to break through to things that usually are unknown. If this narration
holds true, the question remains what kind of ritual was performed by the Kellner’s and
taught within the Occult Inner Circle.
23
See Bulwer-Lytton 1842: 123.
24
Blavatsky, H. 1977: 17.

9

Hypothesis: Kellner and the early OTO belonged to the „save-the-semen-school“ (Pat
Deveney’s term) of ritual sex. Some arguments for this view:

• In haṭha yoga texts Kellner could read that through the preservation of semen during
sexual intercourse the householder can become a fully liberated yogi.
• Kellner’s meditation includes sexual arousal followed by a sublimation of desire.
• Theodor Reuss asserts that the HB of Light was a source of the rosicrucian esoteric
teachings taught within the Inner Occult Circle. According to Pat Deveney this
Brotherhood propagated the preservation of the semen.
• Max Dotzler, a member of the Inner Occult Circle admitted in 1906 that it’s secret
practices had already been published by Bondegger, Ramacharaka and other authors.
He claims originality only with regard to the date, not with regard to the content of
these practices by asserting that Kellner was the first to teach them. The New Tought
authors Bondegger and Ramacharaka (i. e. William Walker Atkinson) both support
methods to preserve the semen and sublimate the sexual energy. These kind of
practices were very popular within the New Tought movement.
• The jubilee edition of Die Oriflamme (1912), a seminal text of the early OTO also
refers to Ramacharaka (without mentioning him as source). The description of a yoga
exercise that is mentioned there as example of „white sexual magic“ combines parts
of Kellner’s description of the vāyus and nāḍis (and especially the ominous „napa
vayu“ as life breath located within the organ of reproduction) with a paraphrase of
Atkinson/Ramacharaka‘s „transmutation of the reproductive energy“ from his book
The Hindu-Yogi Science of Breath (1904).

At the present state of research the smoking gun is lacking and perhaps it will never be
discovered. But I think that the circumstantial evidence is strong enough to support the
hypothesis that Kellner’s Occult Inner Circle as well as the early OTO did practice a yoga and
New Thought inspired form of coitus reservatus.

10