Sacred Letters: Sanskrit, Yoga, and Awakening the Divine [Paperback]

Offers letters of the Sanskrit alphabet as key to understanding Yoga and the Divine

These original meditations on the Sanskrit letters range from personal narratives to metaphysical and theological speculations, linguistic play, and inter-spiritual allusions to other works and traditions, all relevant to living a contemplative life in the contemporary world.

Sowder’s book is anchored in the devotional Tantrik, Śaiva-Śakta tradition, focused on the Divine Feminine, but allusions to western mystics (Christian, Jewish, Muslim) also appear frequently. No other book like this exists.

In the fascinating cosmology of bhakti-tantra-yoga—a tradition into which I was initiated in 1975—sacred sound first emanated from a Formless Cosmic Divinity or Presence, as a movement ofOM, and then as the fifty sounds of the Sanskrit alphabet, which became mantra, scripture, and in a series of further emanations, the forms of the universe. Now, human encounter with sacred sound, mantra, scripture carries us back on an inward journey to Divinity.

Longtime yoga and meditation teacherMichael David Sowderis an author, poet, and professor of poetry, religious studies, and yoga studies at Utah State University. With a PhD from the University of Michigan, Sowder is the author of two collections of spiritual poetry,The Empty BoatandHouse Under the Moon, and two chapbooks of poetry. Feminist poet Diane Wakoski choseThe Empty Boatto win the 2004 T.S. Eliot Award. His chapbook,A Calendar of Crows, won the inaugural New Michigan Press Poetry award.

Sowder’s writing explores themes of yoga, Buddhism, mystical experience and contemplative practice, wilderness, and fatherhood. He has appeared inMuseIndia,The Bombay Review,Shambhala Sun(nowLion’s Roar),American Life in Poetry,Five Points,Green Mountains Review,