Yoga and Buddha: What's the relationship?

Yoga scholars often differ in characterizing the exact relationship between Patañjali’s Yoga Sutras and Buddhism. Karen O’Brien finds the text weaving Buddhist strands into a Sankhya textile with the Buddhist terminology paralleling the Sankhya metaphysics. Pradeep Gokhale believes Sankhya and Buddhism to be the text’s primary influences with the Yoga Sutras fitting Buddhist psychology into a Sankhya framework. He sees Patañjali learning from Buddhists as Gautama learned from Brahmanists and hears echoes of the Buddhist Dhammapada rustling through Patañjali’s eight limbs.

Sacred Yoga Texts III: The Yoga Sutras

Between the Bhagavad Gita’s spiritual yoga and the Hatha Pradipika’s physical yoga lies the Yoga Sutras text. The wisdom of the Yoga Sutras was passed down by sages from early times then later written down by Patañjali. There’s a myth that Patañjali was a serpent, who overheard the secrets of yoga while being worn as God's necklace. Here's my translation: