The Evangelical Dictionary of World Religions

YAHWEHISM. The term Yahwehism refers to two unrelated forms of worship.

In studies of the Old Testament and the history of Israel, Yahwehism refers to the worship of God under the name Yahweh, as distinguished from the worship of God under the name El, Elohim, other divine names, or the syncretistic worship of Ba’al and other deities. When the term cult or cultus occurs in these contexts, it is an academic synonym for particular ritual forms, routines, or distinguishing traits; it is not a pejorative word for social control.

The term Yahwehism is also used to designate the aspect of the Sacred Name movement that insists on frequent use of the covenant name of the God of Israel (the Tetragrammaton) or some English transliteration or pronunciation of the name, as essential to true worship. Various Sacred Name groups differ on how the name should be pronounced, but virtually all discourage the use of “God” or “Lord,” even if capitalized as GOD and LORD. It is common for Yahwehism to occur in conjunction with sabbatarianism, legalism, Jewish dietary laws, renewal of Old Testament festivals, and other aspects of the Sacred Name movement. The Hebrew Israelite movement is one manifestation of Yahwehism, but there are others as well.

See also SABBATARIANISM; TETRAGRAMMATON

Bibliography. J. R. Lewis, Cults: A Reference Handbook; J. Walker, Concise Guide to Today’s Religions and Spirituality.

E. Pement

YAWM AL-QIYAMAH. See DAY OF JUDGMENT, ISLAMIC

YIDAM. In Tibetan Buddhism, a yidam (“tutelary deity”; sometimes referred to as an ishtadevata) is an enlightened being (Buddha, bodhisattva, etc.) who, during meditation, is the focus of intense concentration on the part of his or her devotee. Each yidam possesses unique characteristics such that their devotees are able to closely identify with that particular yidam and thereby come to recognize the inherent purity of their mind and their ontological unity with the Primordial Buddha. A yidam, then, is not viewed as a dispenser of favors or a personal savior whose work takes place independently of the devotee, but is seen as a refuge from the distractions of the world of illusion and a powerful aid in the quest for enlightenment and liberation from the cycle of death and rebirth. Some devotees take yidams to be literal “deities” within the Vajrayana pantheon—tantric gods, Buddhas, or bodhisattvas—while others understand them as extensions of their own consciousness. Practitioners desiring to identify with a yidam engage in sadhana (means of accomplishment), a set of meditation rituals that facilitate the transformation of their false self-understanding into a state of awakened wisdom wherein they grasp the truth of the emptiness of all phenomena. Popular yidams include Avalokiteshvara, Cakrasamvara, Guhyasamaja, Hayagriva, Hevajra, Kalacakra, Kurukulla, Manjusri, Marici, Surata, Vajrakilaya, Vajrayogini, and Yamantaka.

Bibliography. A. T. Palmo, Reflections on a Mountain Lake: Teachings on Practical Buddhism; S. Rinpoche, The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying: A New Spiritual Classic from One of the Foremost Interpreters of Tibetan Buddhism to the West; Sangharakshita, A Guide to the Buddhist Path; B. A. Wallace, Tibetan Buddhism from the Ground Up: A Practical Approach for Modern Life.

H. W. House

YIN AND YANG. In Chinese philosophy, Yin and Yang are the impersonal, oscillating energy force that transcends time and space and permeates the entire universe. Lao Tzu, the founder of Taoism, conceived the universe to be dualistic in nature. This dualistic principle eventually became known as yin/yang. Yin represents dark, female, negative, passive, wet, earth, and the inward side. Yang represents its polar opposite: light, male, positive, active, dry, sun, and outward aspects of nature. As these two principles constantly interact with each other and saturate all that exists, one or the other may dominate. This imbalance causes chaos of all sorts, ranging from disease in the body to war among nations. For example, if there is a disproportionate amount of yin or yang within a human body, sickness results. To bring things back into balance, one may seek help from an acupuncturist who inserts needles into the skin at certain key points to disrupt the flow of yin/yang and rebalance whichever one is in excess. Another ailing person may visit a mesmerist who will use magnetism to restore balance. Others may seek help from a New Age chiropractor who will manipulate the spine to release the unwanted energy force.

Yin/Yang is called by various names in different cultures and by different religions, but all refer to the same thing. The Japanese Buddhists refer to this vital energy as ki. In Confucianism it is labeled chi. In Hinduism it is prana; Franz Mesmer called it the “heavenly tides”; the Nazis touted it as the “odic force”; Buckminster Fuller described it as “orgone”; the Kalahari Kung bushmen dub it num; Maharaji identifies it as élan vital; Czech touch therapist Zdenek Rejdak named it “bioenergy”; and New Age practitioners merely call it “life force.”

The idea of a pervasive universal energy, however identified, is the basis of a pantheistic worldview.

See also BUDDHISM; PANTHEISM; TAOISM/DAOISM

Bibliography. Robin R. Wang, Yinyang: The Way of Heaven and Earth in Chinese Thought and Culture.

R. A. Streett

YOGA. Some claim the word yoga derives from yujir, “to yoke”; others, from yuj, “to contemplate.” Broadly speaking, yoga is a system of psycho-physical exercises aimed at enabling a spiritual seeker, step-by-step, to attain eternal perfection and freedom. Although lesser goals are sometimes sought—paranormal powers, perfect health—orthodox teachers of yoga (gurus) usually direct their students’ attention toward its highest goal: liberation (mukti or moksha). The best way to understand yoga is to become familiar with its principles, basic terminology, and varied applications.

Following the orthodoxy of today, a serious yogi (also, yogin, male, or yogini, female) is instructed in certain disciplines. The yogi receives instruction on how to control nature (prakriti), especially human nature; overcome desire; and transcend the ego sense (ahamkara). Detachment from the senses and self-mastery are regarded as essential in preparing the individual soul (jiva-atman) for union with the transcendental soul (purusha, Atman, Brahma) or for identification with it, in superconscious ecstasy (nirvikalpa samadhi), according to Hinduism, but Buddhists would explain this differently. The result for the individual, say gurus, is eternal liberation from ignorance (avidya) and from the endless cycles of births and deaths (samsara). This liberated soul (jivanmukta) is said to possess self-knowledge (atmajnana or atmabodha).

The practice of yoga, however, is difficult to define precisely because of the diverse approaches within the yoga tradition. Students of “classical yoga” insist that it must be understood through the teachings of Patanjali, who compiled and systematized its principles and practices in his Yoga Aphorisms (Yoga Sutras, AD 150–200). But because Patanjali was influenced by Samkhya philosophy, one of the six main philosophical systems of Hinduism, his instructions on yoga are grounded in that system’s dualism. In Samkhya everything is either nature (prakriti) or spirit (purusha). Patanjali did not define the end of yoga as the union of the individual soul and the transcendental soul. For him yoga involves the restraining of mental modifications (chitta-vritti-nirodha) so that the yogi can attain self-mastery and liberation from prakriti. Also critical to the practice of yoga are his teachings on the eight limbs of yoga (ashtanga): an eightfold method of moral discipline (yama), self-control (niyama), steady posture (asana), breath control (pranayama), withdrawal of the senses (pratyahara), fixity of attention (dharana), unbroken meditation (dhyana), and liberation (samadhi). The first two limbs, say the best authorities, represent the ethical prerequisites for the practice of yoga.

The history of yoga further complicates the search for a definition. The word yoga appears as early as the Rig Veda (ca. 2500–600 BC). Evidence of the practice appears in the Upanishads (1500–500 BC), which declare that self-realization is the goal of life and that asceticism and meditation are the way to it. Further evidence appears in the Bhagavad Gita (ca. 500–400 BC). Describing yoga as “equanimity,” it advises seekers to make their lives a continuous yoga and to practice “control of the self by the self.” It also synthesizes three main yogas: Karma Yoga (work), Bhakti Yoga (devotion), and Jnana Yoga (knowledge). This book, as its colophon suggests, teaches brahmavidya (knowledge of God) and yoga-shastra (knowledge of yoga).

In the centuries after Patanjali, many commentaries on his Yoga Sutras and other adaptations of yoga appeared. In the fourth century AD appeared Vyasa’s Yoga Bhashya, the oldest extant commentary, in which Vyasa defines yoga as “ecstasy” (samadhi). Later commentaries derived new meanings from Patanjali’s aphorisms. After the seventh century, many sought to explain the practice of yoga in light of Hindu systems other than Samkhya. After the tenth century, the system known as tantra began to leave its indelible mark on yoga. It introduced elaborations on the life force (prana) and seven energy centers in the body (chakras), the latter having only been hinted at in the Yoga Sutras (3.28–33). It developed the idea of the kundalini-shakti, the “coiled serpent power” located at the base of the spine, which the yogi learns to control through yogic disciplines. Out of tantra has arisen Hatha Yoga as it is known today. By postures and breath control, the hatha yogi strives to develop an “adamantine” or divine body. He struggles to raise the kundalini-shakti up his spinal column, awakening each chakra along the way, to the last at the crown of the head (sahasrara), whereupon he achieves liberation. Thereafter he lives a long life in a body made fit to bear the force of illumination. The Buddhist tantras have similar teachings, with “psychic heat” similar to kundalini, chakras, and various postures.

In the last few centuries, yoga has become dominated by Vedanta, and especially by Advaita Vedanta (nondualism), which holds that all yogas and paths lead to God. In the West, those who follow an orthodox Indian guru tend to remain closer to the Eastern traditions. Those who do not, or who follow Western-born teachers, tend to practice less-demanding forms of yoga, ones that are more compatible with their interests in the New Age movement, modern science (e.g., quantum mechanics), holistic health, ecology, and so on.

Meanwhile, a hunger for spiritual experiences has resulted in a proliferation of yogas, some orthodox, others not. The traditionally recognized big-four yogas are Karma, Bhakti, Raja, and Jnana. Other types—one authority estimates more than forty—are Mantra Yoga (meditating on sound), Laya Yoga (intellectually dissolving the universe), Kriya Yoga (practicing asceticism, study, and devotion), and the integral yoga of Sri Aurobindo (seeking synthesis). Then there are also Kundalini Yoga, Tantric Yoga, and Maha Yoga, to name a few others. The Buddhists have such specializations as Anuyoga and Atiyoga. Despite such variety, all applications of yoga share in common an insistence on one-pointed concentration on something other than the ego-self as the one thing needful for enlightenment.

Yoga, then, is a path that requires willpower and strenuous self-exertion. Without striving to master mind and body, say gurus, seekers cannot be yogis. Nor can they expect to achieve liberation as long as they remain attached to the ego-self and its desires. According to yoga tradition, such souls remain bound by karma and ignorance, repeating endlessly the cycle of births and deaths, until they awaken and embark on the path of yoga.

Bibliography. G. Feuerstein, The Yoga Tradition: Its History, Literature, Philosophy and Practice; Swami Prabhavananda and C. Isherwood, How to Know God: The Yoga Aphorisms of Patanjali; S. Radhakrishnan and C. A. Moore, A Sourcebook in Indian Philosophy; Swami Vivekananda, Raja Yoga; Swami Yogananda, The Autobiography of a Yogi.

B. Scott

YOGANANDA, SWAMI PARAMAHANSA. Swami Paramahansa Yogananda (1893–1952) was born Mukunda Lal Ghosh in Gorakhpur, India. The name Yogananda refers to “one who has attained bliss through yoga,” and in his lifetime he taught the benefits of Kriya Yoga in India and the US. In 1920 he was the Indian delegate to the International Congress of Free Christians and Other Religious Liberals held in Boston, where he spoke on the “science of religion.” Later that year he established the Self-Realization Fellowship, based in Los Angeles. His most famous book, Autobiography of a Yogi, a perennial best seller, recounts his childhood, quest for enlightenment, and yogic practices.

See also JUDAISM

Bibliography. R. Posner, The High Holy Days; C. Roth, “Yom Kippur,” in Encyclopedia Judaica, edited by C. Roth; H. Schauss, The Jewish Festivals: History & Observance; Rabbi N. Scherman, Rabbi H. Goldwurm, and Rabbi A. Gold, Yom Kippur—Its Significance, Laws, and Prayers; I. Singer, “Yom Kippur,” in The Jewish Encyclopedia; M. Strassfeld, The Jewish Holidays: A Guide & Commentary; Y. Vainstein, The Cycle of the Jewish Year: A Study of the Festivals and of Selections from the Liturgy.

A. Fruchtenbaum

YONI. Yoni (literally, “source” or “origin” of life, thought of as a womb) in Hinduism is the depiction of the goddess as a female sexual organ and symbol of fertility. It usually has a “keyhole” or triangular shape and is frequently joined with Shiva’s cone-shaped phallus (lingam). The yoni declares that, just as the female awakens the sexual energy of the male biologically, so does the goddess activate the spiritual powers of the universe. When depicted together, the yoni and the lingam represent the symbol of awakening knowledge and the union of matter and energy.

See also HINDUISM; LINGAM; SHAKTI; SHIVA

Bibliography. U. Becker and L. W. Garmer, The Continuum Encyclopedia of Symbols.

W. Corduan

YOUNG, BRIGHAM. Nicknamed “The Lion of the Lord,” Brigham Young (1801–77) was the second president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church or Mormon Church). This dynamic leader is probably best known for leading the Mormons to the Salt Lake Valley in 1847 and then shaping much of the doctrine in the early LDS Church.

Early Life. Born in Whittingham, Vermont, Young was the ninth of eleven children. His parents were poor farmers who moved frequently throughout upstate New York. After his mother died while he was a teenager, Young—whose formal education was limited—became a carpenter and handyman at the age of fourteen. In 1824 he joined the Methodist Church. That same year, he married Miriam Works, with whom he had two daughters before she died eight years later. Young moved to Mendon, New York, in 1829, a year before LDS founder Joseph Smith Jr. published the Book of Mormon. After two years of hearing about this book, Young was baptized and ordained an elder in the LDS Church on April 14, 1832.

When Young first met Smith in November 1832, he told the Mormon prophet that he, Young, had no purpose in life until he read the Book of Mormon. That night Smith told Young to pray, and Young began to speak in tongues. Young quickly became a stalwart in the church, desiring, as he said, to “thunder and roar out the Gospel to the nations. It burned in my bones like fire pent up. . . . Nothing would satisfy me but to cry abroad in the world, what the Lord was doing in the latter days” (JD 1:313).

He married Mary Ann Angell on February 18, 1834. Young was appointed a captain of two hundred men in the Zion’s Camp expedition, a forty-eight-day trip in the spring of 1834 organized by Smith. The party traveled from Kirtland, Ohio, to Clay County, Missouri, to assist church members who were being threatened by the non-Mormon “Gentiles.” Young’s fierce loyalty to Smith in this expedition earned him the right to be ordained on February 14, 1835, as an original Mormon apostle by the Three Witnesses to the Book of Mormon.

While Joseph Smith was imprisoned in 1838, Young took on the important role of leading the Mormons out of Missouri because of problems with the state government. They traveled to a swampland off the Mississippi River known as Commerce City, Illinois (later renamed “Nauvoo” by Smith, which supposedly meant “beautiful”). Young did not stay very long to participate in the transformation of Nauvoo. Instead, he traveled overseas to England from 1839 to 1841 to supervise the dramatic growth of Mormonism there.

When he returned to Illinois, Young was introduced to the doctrine of polygamy, or plural marriage, as revealed to him by Smith. This teaching was later recorded on July 12, 1843, in section 132 of the LDS scripture Doctrine and Covenants. Although it appears that Young may have initially been reluctant to accept the teaching—he wrote, “I could hardly get over it for a long time”—he ended up embracing the principle and eventually had at least twenty-seven wives (some scholars document as many as fifty-six) and, with sixteen of them, fifty-seven children (forty-six who lived past infancy). This teaching became important to him, as he later promised that those who denied polygamy would be “damned” (JD 3:266; 11:269).

Young’s devotion to Smith’s teachings gave him the right in 1841 to become the president of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles and second in authority after Smith himself. Smith and Young were alike in many ways. Both were strong leaders with firm wills. Like his predecessor, Young was deeply interested in folk magic and superstition. According to historian D. Michael Quinn, Young believed in astrology and planned his early polygamous marriages “according to the moon’s transit through the Zodiac” (77).

The Trek to Utah. Young was on the East Coast looking for new converts and raising money for the Nauvoo temple when Smith was killed by a mob on June 27, 1844. Although several others were attempting to become the new Mormon leader, Young was able to convince the majority of the Saints that he was the best choice.

With federal authorities after Young for counterfeiting money, it became apparent in 1845 that the Latter-day Saints would have to leave Illinois. In February 1846, Young led some twenty thousand Mormons westward in the “Mormon migration.” He was able to secure promises from the US government in exchange for help in fighting the Mexican War. Young sent more than five hundred of his members westward in July. (When the group, known as the “Mormon Battalion,” the only overtly religious military unit in American history, arrived in California in 1847, the war had already ended.)

In September the Mormons established winter quarters near Omaha, Nebraska. That winter, starvation and disease along with the brutally cold weather killed more than six hundred Mormons. Young continued the journey in the spring of 1847, and on July 24, the ill leader saw the Great Salt Lake Valley for the first time. He is quoted as exclaiming, “It is enough, this is the right place, drive on.” He laid claim to Utah, Nevada, and sections of Idaho, Oregon, Colorado, Wyoming, New Mexico, and much of Arizona and California, totaling more than a quarter of a million square miles of land. At the time, this represented about one-sixth of America’s geography. During the next three decades, Mormons—including emigrants from European nations—descended on Utah via covered wagons and handcarts and by railroad when that became possible in 1869.

Conflicts in the West. Utah became a US territory in 1850, and Young became the governor of this territory in 1851. The Mormon leader and the federal government were quite suspicious of each other, especially when authorities discovered in 1852 that the Mormons were openly practicing polygamy. Young was suspicious of any outsiders who did not belong to his church. For instance, alarmed at the number of “Gentiles” who were being drawn west in 1849 thanks to the discovery of gold at Sutter’s Mill, Young put together the Perpetual Emigrating Fund Company to financially help converts travel to the Utah territory.

By 1857 US president James Buchanan had sent twenty-five hundred troops to the territory to release Young and commission a new governor. The troops were dispatched because Buchanan believed that Young would not peacefully step down. This move, historically known as “Buchanan’s Blunder,” angered Young, and he declared martial law. Among other things, he had the Mormon militia, known as the Nauvoo Legion, harass the American troops by burning three supply trains. An additional three thousand US troops were then called to Utah, and Young rallied his followers by reminding them of the persecution that the Mormon people had suffered over the previous two decades. The Utah War ended in late June 1858.

The air of hostility during that time is believed to have caused the demise of the California-bound Baker-Fancher wagon train, which was made up of emigrants from Missouri and Arkansas. Young had declared martial law on August 5, 1857, forbidding anyone to travel through the Utah territory without written permission. The Mormons were also forbidden to sell food to the emigrants. On September 7, Mormons who disguised themselves as Indians, along with their local Paiute Indian accomplices, surrounded the forty-wagon train in a place called Mountain Meadows in southwestern Utah. Having run out of supplies by September 11, the emigrant leaders agreed to abandon their wagons and weapons in exchange for their freedom (they were told that the Mormons could safely rescue them from the local Indians). However, with the exception of 17 children, the entire party, estimated to be more than 120 people, was brutally massacred by their armed Mormon escorts. Although LDS leader John D. Lee became the scapegoat and was the only one executed for the murders of what is known as the “Mountain Meadows Massacre,” there has been much speculation about Young’s involvement. Mormon historian Will Bagley has stated, “Claiming that Brigham Young had nothing to do with Mountain Meadows is akin to arguing that Abraham Lincoln had nothing to do with the Civil War” (379).

There is no doubt that Young lacked tolerance for those who were unfaithful to him and his leadership. He had at his disposal a group of men called the Danites who would perform bloody deeds. One of the most notorious Danites was a man named “Wild” Bill Hickman, who wrote in his book Brigham’s Destroying Angel about thirteen murders, many of which he claimed Young ordered.

Clearly, Young was a skilled businessman and leader who had a take-charge attitude. He had barely discovered the Salt Lake Valley when he was already mapping out the structure of the city streets. On April 6, 1853, Young laid the cornerstone for the Salt Lake temple (which opened forty years later); he later dedicated three other Utah temple sites. Among his business ventures were supervising the establishment of Zion’s Cooperative Mercantile Institution (ZCMI); establishing businesses involving wagon express, ferryboats, and railroads; manufacturing lumber, wool, and iron; processing sugar beets; and even operating a distillery.

Although his members were not allowed to own their land, Young had numerous real estate holdings, including two spacious homes located a block away from the Salt Lake City temple. The Beehive House (built in 1854) served as the executive mansion that Young used as territorial governor, while the Lion House (built in 1856) was home to a dozen of Young’s wives. By the time he died, Young was worth at least $600,000, an unheard-of sum in those days.

Young also attempted to create an alphabet. In 1854 George D. Watt of the University of Deseret (the predecessor to the University of Utah) established the Deseret Alphabet, which was made up of thirty-eight symbols utilizing the basic sounds in English. Young pushed the exclusive alphabet on his less-than-excited followers in the hopes that this would further separate Mormons from the rest of the American society and help immigrants in their language abilities. The Book of Mormon and sections of the 1859 LDS Church–owned Deseret News were printed using this alphabet. However, it soon proved to be a dismal failure.

Doctrinal Teachings. Young and other LDS general authorities gave numerous sermons that were recorded from 1852 until his death and were compiled in the twenty-six-volume work called Journal of Discourses. Young was most prolific in his teaching, speaking with authority and even declaring, “I have never yet preached a sermon and sent it out to the children of men, that they may not call scripture. Let me have the privilege of correcting a sermon, and it is as good Scripture as they deserve. The people have the oracles of God continually” (JD 13:95). He also declared, “I have never given counsel that is wrong” (JD 16:161).

Some of his interesting doctrines as recorded in the Journal of Discourses include the following:

• Adam was God the Father, and Jesus was begotten not by the Holy Ghost but rather by Adam (1:50–51; 4:218; 8:115).

• God the Father was once a mortal child (1:123).

• God the Father progresses in his knowledge (6:120) and can attain greater heights of perfection (1:93).

• Blacks are inferior to whites (2:172; 7:290; 10:110).

• A person’s shed blood can atone for his or her sins (3:247; 4:53–54, 219–20).

• A person who hopes to make it to the highest level of heaven needs Joseph Smith’s approval (7:289).

Conclusion. Brigham Young kept an active schedule as late as June 1877. However, on August 23, he suddenly began to experience nausea, vomiting, and a high temperature. He died six days later in Salt Lake City at the age of seventy-six, reportedly with the words “Joseph, Joseph, Joseph” on his lips. A total of twenty-three of his wives survived him, with seventeen receiving a share of his estate. Today most of the world only knows the name Brigham Young because the LDS Church operates the well-respected Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah, and Rexburg, Idaho. Yet there can be little doubt that, with the exception of Mormon founder Joseph Smith Jr., nobody has had as great an influence on the Mormon religion as Brigham Young.

Bibliography. R. Abanes, One Nation under Gods: A History of the Mormon Church; L. Arrington, Brigham Young: American Moses; W. Bagley, Blood of the Prophets: Brigham Young and the Massacre at Mountain Meadows; F. Brodie, No Man Knows My History; The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Teachings of the Prophet Brigham Young; W. A. Hickman, Brigham’s Destroying Angel: D. M. Quinn, Early Mormonism and the Magic World View.

E. Johnson