The history of yoga in the Netherlands

The history of yoga in the Netherlands is not only in asanas, meditation, philosophy, esoteric study and disciplines. The Hare Krishna movement earns its prime place because bhakti-yoga and kirtan became visible in the Netherlands just as interest in Indian yoga and alternative spirituality was growing. It is one strand in a varied landscape.

Prins Hendrikkade 142 in Amsterdam makes a handy landmark. Fantasio opened there in March 1968 and became Meditation Centre De Kosmos in autumn 1969, with courses and lectures on yoga, meditation, mysticism and kindred subjects. A study follows the milieu from the 1960s, when it surfaced as a counterculture, to its later integration into wider society.

Simon Vinkenoog’s “Rolling Stone” “The world is round; you can keep rolling.”  ^[5]

Bhakti-yoga puts devotional service and a relationship with the divine first. In Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇavism, chanting the names of Krishna is an important practice, communal and personal alike, and Amsterdam’s Hare Krishna devotees, the city’s historical account records, made kīrtana visible in public streets and held meetings at De Kosmos. That gives the history of yoga in the Netherlands a devotional dimension—one not to be confused with modern postural yoga, nor with every form of meditation practiced in the country. ^[3]

One word, many practices. “Yoga” covers disciplines with different aims and histories: some people begin with posture and breath, others with philosophy, meditation or devotion. Research on contemporary postural yoga in Amsterdam concerns a different field from ISKCON’s devotional history. A good introduction can draw the connections and still keep the distinctions, since overlap in a city’s spiritual life does not imply one origin, identical goals or the same participants. ^[4]

“The real yoga system, the first-class yoga system, is to revive your connection with Kṛṣṇa.”

— Śrīla Prabhupāda, lecture. November 1974. ^[6]