Mystical systems
Sun Salutation
Direct answer
Sun Salutation: The Sun Salutation, Surya Namaskar in Sanskrit, is a linked sequence of about twelve postures done with the breath, in which the body bows, stretches out and rises again.
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At a glance
- Also called
- surya namaskar, surya namaskara, what is surya namaskar
- Found in
- Mystical Systems
- Related
- Asana, Hatha Yoga, Vinyasa, Ashtanga Yoga
The Sun Salutation, Surya Namaskar in Sanskrit, is a linked sequence of about twelve postures done with the breath, in which the body bows, stretches out and rises again.
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How many poses are in a Sun Salutation?
Surya is the sun and namaskar is a bow of greeting. In the form most classes teach, the practitioner stands, reaches up, folds forward, steps back into a lunge and a plank, lowers to the floor, arches the chest, lifts the hips into an inverted V and then returns through the same shapes to standing. Each position is matched to a breath in or out, and the round is repeated on the other leg.
Traditional practice does it facing the rising sun, sometimes with a mantra naming the sun for each position. In modern yoga it mostly serves as a warm up and as the frame on which flowing classes are built.
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What sets Sun Salutation apart
The sequence is a loop: it ends in the standing position it began from, which is what lets it be repeated by count like a prayer on beads. Its first half lowers the body to the ground and its second half raises it again, so one round contains a full prostration. The pairing of every position with a named breath, in on the openings and out on the folds, made it the pattern for the breath-led yoga of the twentieth century.
- Sanskrit: surya, sun, and namaskara, a bow of greeting
- Positions: twelve in the common form, one breath to each
- Promoter: Bhawanrao Pant Pratinidhi, Raja of Aundh, from the 1920s
- English manual: The Ten-Point Way to Health, 1938
- Old hatha texts: the sequence is absent from the Hatha Yoga Pradipika
- Ashtanga versions: A with nine counted movements, B with seventeen
Often mistaken for something else: An asana is a single posture that is held; the Sun Salutation is a chain of postures passed through in order, none held for more than a breath in the usual practice.
The story behind Sun Salutation
Bowing to the sun at dawn is old in India, and full prostrations to Surya are an established act of devotion. The exercise sequence is far younger. The medieval hatha texts do not describe it. It was promoted in the 1920s by Bhawanrao Pant Pratinidhi, the Raja of Aundh, as a daily drill for health, and his book The Ten-Point Way to Health appeared in English in 1938. In the 1930s Krishnamacharya's school at Mysore joined such sequences to postures, and the scholar Mark Singleton traced this history in Yoga Body (2010).
Why Sun Salutation matters
Sun Salutation is the sequence most people meet first in a yoga class, and its history shows how much of modern postural yoga took shape in the twentieth century.
How to read Sun Salutation
Classes open with several rounds to warm the body; some people keep it as a whole practice, counting rounds as others count beads.
Sun Salutation in practice: an example
Someone with ten free minutes at sunrise might do six slow rounds facing the window, one breath to each position.
Where readings of Sun Salutation go wrong
The low plank and the forward folds load wrists, shoulders and lower back, so teachers offer knees-down versions and a gentle pace for beginners.
Sources and editorial method
This entry summarizes the tradition in the Almanac's own words; where no source is listed, it is an editorial summary rather than a primary text, and symbolic readings are named as the tradition's, not as fact.
- Source
- The Great Almanac Dictionary
- Category
- Mystical Systems
- Aliases
- surya namaskar, surya namaskara, sun salutation meaning, sun salutation steps, what is surya namaskar
- Last updated
- 2026-09-26
See Sun Salutation in your personal almanac
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Common questions
How many poses are in a Sun Salutation?
The common form has twelve positions, with several shapes repeated on the way back to standing. The Ashtanga tradition teaches two versions of its own, called A and B, with nine and seventeen counted movements.
Is the Sun Salutation ancient?
Honouring the sun with bows and prayers is ancient. The flowing exercise sequence is not found in the old hatha yoga texts and was spread as a health drill in western India in the 1920s and 1930s.
Does Surya Namaskar have to be done at sunrise?
Tradition favours dawn, facing east, and an empty stomach. Nothing in the sequence itself depends on the hour, and most classes use it at whatever time they meet.
