Patañjali

Who is Patañjali?

Patañjali is a Sanskrit proper name. Several important Sanskrit works are ascribed to one or more authors of this name, and a great deal of scholarship has been devoted over the last century or so to the issue of disambiguation.

Amongst the more important authors called Patañjali are:

The author of the Mahābhāṣya, an advanced treatise on Sanskrit grammar and linguistics framed as a commentary on Kātyāyana's vārttikas on Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī. This Patañjali's life is the only one which can be securely dated.

The compiler of the Yoga Sūtras, an important collection of aphorisms on Yoga practice.

Patanjali is one of the 18 siddhars in the Tamil siddha tradition.

The author of an unspecified work of medicine.

In some Sanskrit grammatical works, Patañjali is called "the man from Gonarda". He is held by some to have been born at the "Gonarda" situated at Thiru Kona Malai, Sri Lanka. This tradition is corroborated in Tirumular's seventh-century Tamil Tirumandhiram, which describes him as hailing from Then Kailasam, and tradition has him visiting the Thillai Nataraja Temple, Chidambaram, where he wrote the Charana Shrungarahita Stotram on Nataraja.