Now, the teaching of yoga.

The opening line does almost nothing except mark a beginning. Atha means "now" — now that you are ready, now that the asking has started. Anuśāsanam is not a new invention but a handing-on: Patanjali is arranging a tradition that already existed, not founding one.

Read it as a reminder that the text assumes a student who has already decided to practise. Nothing in the Sutras is addressed to the merely curious.

It is often quoted as if Patanjali invented yoga. The word he chose says the opposite — he is passing on what he received.