"Spirit Triumphant! Flame through the impotence of fettered, faltering souls! Burn up selfishness, kindle compassion, so that selflessness, the lifestream of humanity, may flow as the wellspring of spiritual rebirth!" — Rudolf Steiner
Rudolf Steiner: "The etheric body is the bearer of thoughts. What is thought within man, is etheric outside, just as what is desire within him, is astral outside. But it is only when pure thinking begins that etheric substance is radiated into the astral impulses. As long as thinking is not yet pure thinking, we have astral substance surrounding the etheric form. So thought-forms, as they are called, are made out of a kernel of etheric substance surrounded by astral substance. Along the paths of the nerves stream the so-called abstract thoughts, which however are in reality the most concrete, for they are etheric forces. As soon as man even begins to think, he is already working the ego into his etheric body. When a man dies it becomes clear that the physical body has nothing to do with the ego. Every connection between the physical body and the ego is broken off after death. Previously this connection took place indirectly through the other bodies. When these are no longer there the corpse has no further relation to the ego. Then the outer Deva forces receive it and it is again absorbed into the physical environment. The word ‘verwesen’ (decay) does not mean only a passing away, but a return to the ‘Wesen’ (being) out of which the body came forth. This is what may be said in respect of the physical body."
When the physical body is discussed, most people have a very unclear, confused idea of what it actually is. In point of fact what we have before us is not just the physical body but a combination of the physical body with higher forces. A piece of rock crystal is also physical, but in its very nature this is something quite different from the human eye or heart, which are also physical. The eye and heart are parts of the physical body, but they are intermixed with man's higher members, and through this, something is brought about which is completely different from other aspects of the physical. In water we find oxygen and hydrogen, but they look quite different from when we see them separated. Then we are aware of their difference. In water we have before us a mixture of both. What meets us in the physical body of man is also a mixture composed of the physical, etheric, and astral bodies.
The physical human eye is similar to a camera, for, as with the camera, there appears within it a picture of the surrounding world. Only when one abstracts from the physical eye everything that is not to be found in the camera does one discover what is the specific nature of the physical eye. So too one must abstract from the entire physical body everything that is not purely physical: only then does one have what in occultism is called the physical body. In itself it can neither live, think, nor feel. There then remains a very wisely ordered, extremely complicated automaton, a purely physical apparatus. This, alone, was all there was of human existence at the Old Saturn stage. At that time the eyes were present only as little cameras. What was produced as a picture of the surrounding world came to the consciousness of a Deva being. In the middle of the Saturn evolution the so-called Asuras (the Archai) were sufficiently advanced to make use of the apparatus. At that time they were at the human stage. They made use of the automata and the pictures they produced. The Asuras themselves were not within the apparatus but outside, and only made use of the pictures as we make use of photographic apparatus in order to take pictures of a landscape. Thus the physical body of man was at that time an architectural structure of a physical apparatus operated from outside. This is the first stage of human existence.
The second stage of development was the permeation of this physical apparatus with the etheric body. It then became a living organism. That also found expression in the configuration of the body. The automaton was built up out of a fairly firm undifferentiated mass, similar to what today is a jelly-like substance, like a soft crystal. In the second Round of evolution in the Old Sun existence, the physical automaton was imbued with the etheric body. In this Round the solar plexus developed. It is so called because still today only rudiments of the organ are present. It fashions a nervous system into the physical apparatus. In the case of the plant something similar is present. That is the second stage.
But these stages are not final; evolution gradually progresses. Even today the solar plexus is an active agent in certain animals which have not developed a spinal cord. All invertebrate animals are single forms from left-behind stages of what was laid down earlier. It was only on the Earth that man cast out from himself the vertebrate animals. In earlier times his organism was still somewhat similar to that of the crab at the present day. Man has progressed beyond that earlier stage, whereas the crab has remained stationary. It is an astonishing fact that the whole inner formation of the crab has a certain similarity to the human brain. There is actually a similarity between the internal formation of the crab and the human brain. Like the human brain the crab too is enclosed in a hard shell. After man had developed a spine and had metamorphosed the upper vertebrae, he cast off the hard shell. The crab has not developed further. It has adapted itself to its environment by means of a hard shell that it had to have and which serves the same purpose as does the protective covering of the whole body in man.
The third stage is that in which the whole is transformed by the astral body working within it. This organic transformation is connected with the development of the heart and the circulation of the blood. The heart of the fish has remained stationary at a halfway stage. The development of the heart is proportionate to the degree in which there is an increase in the inner warmth of the body; this signifies nothing other than a drawing of the astral into the body.
The spinal cord with the brain is the organ of the ego. This is surrounded by the threefold protective sheath of the astral, etheric, and physical bodies. After the organ of the ego (spinal cord and brain) had been prepared, the ego laid itself in the bed made ready for it, and spinal cord and brain appear as organs in the service of the ego.
The fourfold man is put together in this way. It is the Pythagorean square.
The spinal cord and brain are the organ of the ego.
The warm blood and the heart are the organ of kama (astral body).
The solar plexus is the organ of the etheric body.
The actual physical body is the complicated physical apparatus.
Thus has the fourfold being of man been constructed.
In occultism what we have now described is again called a spiral (Wirbel), something that builds from outside inwards and unites with what builds up from within. Physical body, etheric body, and astral body have built up the human being. Then the ego makes itself felt, and this builds from within outwards. These are the four constituents of man. Here we find in the outer an imprint of the fourfold man. All further development is of such a nature that the human being, starting from this point of the ego, consciously experiences what previously he went through unconsciously.
Today, in order to realize that this is so, one must in the first place investigate what took place when our ego was being developed. In order to do this we must, as it were, take up our position under a certain organ. This is most aptly expressed in the Buddha legend. It says in the legend that Buddha remained seated under the Bodhi tree until he attained illumination in order to rise to higher stages, to Nirvana. For this, Buddha had to place himself under the brain, under the organ of consciousness. That means the paths he had previously traversed unconsciously he had to traverse again consciously. Under the large brain there lies, more toward the back of the head, the small, tree-shaped brain (the cerebellum). Under this brain Buddha placed himself. The cerebellum is the Bodhi tree. This shows how what is said in such profound legends is actually taken from human evolution.
Everything that is now known only by means of anatomy was at that time known in quite another way. The occult investigator made his researches with the help of the kundalini light. The pupil was prepared for this in the following way. He came to a Master. If the latter found him trustworthy he received as instruction, not actually a teaching — today it has become different, today man must find his way by means of intellect and concepts — but the Master spoke somewhat as follows: ‘Every day for about six weeks you must spend several hours in meditation and give yourself up to some sentence of eternal value, completely sinking yourself into it.’ At present man cannot do this because life in modern civilization makes too many demands on him. At that time the pupil meditated six to ten hours daily. He cannot do this nowadays without withdrawing from the whole life around him. At that time however the pupil required hardly any time for external needs. He found his nourishment in outer nature. He therefore made use of his time for meditation, perhaps uninterruptedly for ten hours. By this means he very soon progressed so far that he brought his body, which at that time was less dense, into such a condition that the kundalini light was awakened within him. This is for the inner being what sunlight is for the outer world. Actually we do not see external objects, but reflected sunlight. The moment when, with the help of the kundalini light, we can illuminate the soul, it becomes as visible as an object shone upon by the Sun. So for the yoga pupil the whole inner body gradually became illuminated. All ancient anatomies were seen from within, through inner illumination. Thus the (Indian) monks, who clothed their experiences in legends, spoke of what they had perceived through the kundalini light.
Now we must ask ourselves how the different parts of the human body are worked upon. In regard to what belongs to the brain and spinal cord, man first works consciously on the physical plane through the human ego [Gap in the text ...] He has at present no influence on anything else. He has for instance no influence on the circulation of the blood. Such things are developed by degrees. Here other beings cooperate, Deva beings, so that all creatures having a blood circulation are dependent on Deva forces for its regulation. The astral body is permeated and worked upon by different Deva forces — the lowest work on the astral body; higher forces work on the etheric body; and still higher Devas on the physical body, the most perfected body possessed by man. The astral body is strikingly less perfect than the physical body. The physical heart is indeed very clever; the stupid one is the astral body, that directs into the heart all kinds of heart poisons. The most perfect part of man is the physical body; less perfect is the etheric body; and still less perfect is the astral body. What is only in its beginnings, the ‘baby’ in man, is the ego organization. This is the fourfold man, which contains the ego as the temple contains the statue of a god.
The whole development of human culture is nothing other than the working of the ego into the astral body, the education of the astral body. Man enters into life filled with desires, impulses, and passions. Insofar as he masters these impulses, desires, and passions, he is working his ego into the astral body. When the Sixth Root-race, the Sixth Epoch, has reached its conclusion, the ego will have completely worked into the astral body. Until then the astral body will continue to be dependent on the support of the Deva forces. As long as the ego has not permeated the entire astral body, so long must the Deva forces support the work.
The second stage of development, which follows that of the cultural, is the development of the esoteric pupil. He works the ego into the etheric body. Through this the Deva forces are gradually released by the work of his own ego. Then he also gradually begins to see into himself.
We can now ask: what is the significance of the astral body, for what purpose does man have an astral body? It is to give him the possibility, by way of his desires, to do what otherwise he would not have done, and to betake himself to the physical plane. For before man can acquire objective knowledge on the physical plane he must direct to it his wishes and desires. Without these he would have been unable to develop an objective observation of the world or a sense of duty and morality. Only after a gradual transformation of his desires can these be changed into duties and ideals. Man can only pursue this path by means of the driving, organizing power of the astral body.
The etheric body is the bearer of thoughts. What is thought within man, is etheric outside, just as what is desire within him, is astral outside. But it is only when pure thinking begins that etheric substance is radiated into the astral impulses. As long as thinking is not yet pure thinking, we have astral substance surrounding the etheric form. So thought-forms, as they are called, are made out of a kernel of etheric substance surrounded by astral substance. Along the paths of the nerves stream the so-called abstract thoughts, which however are in reality the most concrete, for they are etheric forces. As soon as man even begins to think, he is already working the ego into his etheric body. When a man dies it becomes clear that the physical body has nothing to do with the ego. Every connection between the physical body and the ego is broken off after death. Previously this connection took place indirectly through the other bodies. When these are no longer there the corpse has no further relation to the ego. Then the outer Deva forces receive it and it is again absorbed into the physical environment. The word ‘verwesen’ (decay) does not mean only a passing away, but a return to the ‘Wesen’ (being) out of which the body came forth. This is what may be said in respect of the physical body. The Dutch word ‘Lichaam’ does not mean ‘Leichnam’ (corpse) but the physical body which has to be carried about.
The etheric body is to a great extent in a similar situation to the physical body. It is taken up in the same way by the Devas and then again dissolved into general circulation. But there remains from the etheric body what the human being himself has worked into it, and this does not dissolve. It is this which later, at the time of reincarnation, forms a central point, around which what is to be added is crystallized. This small part of the etheric body remains present in the case of everyone. In the same way there remains from the astral body as much as the human being has worked into it. Only during the last third of the Sixth Root-Race will the entire astral body be retained by all people of normal development.
Thus development begins by man's working consciously on his astral body. The task of the chela, the occult pupil, consists further in the transformation of his etheric body. The stage of chelahood is completed when after death the entire etheric body remains intact. The sojourn in Devachan is necessary in order to make possible a renewal of the forces of the etheric body. The small portion of the etheric body which to begin with man carries into Devachan can grow into the complete etheric body, because the necessary conditions are created there.
This makes comprehensible the varying length of the sojourn in Devachan. When the human being stands at the beginning of his development and has transformed but very little of his etheric body, he can remain in Devachan onlyfor quite a short time. The part of the etheric body that is lacking must be replaced for him by the external Devas. When he develops further he sojourns for a progressively longer time in Devachan; thus the time that he spends there increases in proportion to his own development. People, however, who are more advanced sometimes reincarnate earlier for other reasons, for instance, because they are needed in the world.
When the chela dies, the entire etheric body is present. Thus at this stage the chela can renounce Devachan because the etheric body has been completely worked through. Then, after quite a short time, rebirth takes place. He waits at first in the astral world, as in a place of transition, until he receives a definite mission from his Master. Then he can again take possession of his etheric body in order to reincarnate once more.
Until this stage is reached, a duality is necessary for evolution, i.e. that which man is unable to develop inwardly for himself is built into him from outside. Help must be brought to him from without. Thus in Devachan the etheric body is once more made complete by external Deva powers. The Physical Plane and Devachan are polar opposites. Between them lies Kamaloka, a place of transition, a transitional stage, an intermediary condition that causes the human being to be connected with what he has worked into his astral body. The astral body leads man on to the Physical Plane, where he directs his attention outwards. Here desires are cultivated by contact with external things. When a person dies, his craving for outer objects does not immediately cease, although he no longer has organs bringing him into connection with them. The desire remains, but the organs are lacking. In Kamaloka he must break himself from this longing for the outer world. Kamaloka does not actually belong to normal development; it is only a stage where habits must be relinquished. It is because man can no longer satisfy his wishes, because he no longer has organs for the physical world, that Kamaloka comes about.
When someone commits suicide he has identified his ego with the physical body. For this reason the longing for the physical body is all the more intense. It seems to him that he is like a hollow tree, like someone who has lost his ego. He then has a continual thirst for himself.
When a man is put to death by violence he is in a similar situation. In the case of someone who meets a violent death he continues seeking for his physical body until the time when he would otherwise have died. This seeking can bring about harmful reactions. In such a case it can happen that a man who meets his end by violence is filled with a terrible rage against those who have caused his death. Then in the murdered man the blow is changed into a counter blow. Thus from the astral world, the souls of Russians executed for political reasons fought against their own countrymen on the side of the Japanese. This happened in the Russo-Japanese war; it is however not a general rule.
Swami Rama [my guru]: "Finally the ruler prince recognized that I didn't care about his status, so he changed his attitude. When he came again he politely asked, 'Sir, may I please see your master?' I took him inside the cave, where my master was sitting quietly. That prince wanted to be polite and to show his manners and Western breeding. He said,'Sir, you seem to be lonesome.' My master said, 'Yes, because you have come. Before you came I was enjoying the company of my Friend within. Now that you have come I am lonesome.'"
Swami Rama, Living with the Himalayan Masters, pp. 54-55
My dear friends! First once again will be spoken the word emerging from the spiritual font of the universe, penetrating our souls, admonishing us to self-observing knowledge of our own being:
O Man, know yourself! So sounds the word of worlds. You hear it soul-forcefully, You feel it spirit-powerfully. Who speaks so world-mightily? Who speaks so heart-inwardly? Does it work streaming through space Into your sense’s self-experiencing? Does it sound weaving through time Into your life's evolving stream? Are you the one, who yourself In sensing space, in experiencing time Creates the word, feeling yourself Estranged in space’s soul-emptiness, As you lose the power of thinking In time’s destroying stream?
Now, my dear brothers and sisters, here in the last lesson we attempted to find inner soul-words, those which can bring human beings into a connection with what emerges as a revelation from the hierarchies, which most certainly the human spiritual-soul being stands in connection with. In doing this we have placed before our souls, by means of a special deepening, what can then become of the field of thinking, and by means of this special deepening in this field of thinking we can attain a presence for ourselves in this realm, where in a certain manner live the beings of the third hierarchy, the Angels, Archangels, and the Archai.
This was certainly not meant to be the thinking that we employ in everyday affairs, but rather the thinking that proceeds behind the thinking of everyday affairs. Such thinking we certainly are only able to bring into being by means of our entire organization, if and when we ourselves in meditating expand into the depths of certain words, such as have come to the fore here as the words that begin, “Examine the field of thinking.”
And as I certainly pointed out the last time, this thinking can also be perceived in the human organism itself over the organ of speech. While in the field of memory-thoughts it can be felt under the organ of speech. And when we say something to ourselves inwardly and full of life, either quietly or out loud, it can be sensed in the organ of speech itself. We feel the speech in us, and we can delineate the area in which we feel the speech in ourselves. We have this then as a jumping-off point, for to some extent it is the easiest way to experience this speech.
And beyond the speech at the back of one’s mind we may find the innards of thinking, by means of which we can discover the Angels. In speaking there are the Archangels. And under the speech in remembering, the Archai can be felt.
And just so the mantric saying parades before us. It most certainly courses along in this manner, as described the last time in the Class lesson.
We envision, as we speak it, that at first the far-spread cosmos speaks to us, intoned in a certain manner by the world-all itself, that then, intoned within this world-all, is what the Guardian of the Threshold says to us, what we should take note of, that we should hearken unto what the appropriate being from the ranks of the third hierarchy, of the Angels, has to say to us.
And then a second intonation presents itself, again in admonition by the Guardian of the Threshold to us, that we should attend to what belongs to us, or to the being belonging to us from the ranks of the Archangels.
And then the Guardian admonishes us again with a third pronouncement, to listen and hear the being belonging to us from the ranks of the Archai. And so we should place this mantric verse before ourselves, so that in a certain way we hear the world-all from all around, intoned, then the Guardian speaking, and then the hierarchies answering responsively.
Examine the field of thinking:
He speaks, who you the ways
From earthly life to earthly life
Will show in spirit light:
Look to your senses’ radiant nature.
He speaks, who on to souls
In realms of being material free,
Will carry you on wings of soul:
Look to your thinking’s forceful impact.
He speaks, who among spirits
In creator fields far from earth
Will give you the grounds of existence-awareness:
Look to memory’s picture-forming.
If and when, ever and again, we feel ourselves in this situation, the wide reaches of the world speaking to us, the Guardian of the Threshold speaking to us, the realms of the hierarchies speaking to us, if and when we envision this within ourselves in a fully alive fashion, as if it were actually around about us, then in conjunction with the schematic picture I drew the last time on the board, we get the feeling of the sort of thinking above the thinking in the back of our minds, through which we approach the interactions and life of the third hierarchy.
Therefore, one can say, my dear brothers and sisters, that we place ourselves in conjunction with the beings of the third hierarchy by means of these mantric verses.
In like manner, we place ourselves in conjunction with the beings of the second hierarchy by means of the second set of mantric verses, subsequently presented, and once again, similarly, we feel in a certain way that it may become perceived in spirit. We should completely refrain from the perception that we ourselves are saying it. We should totally realign ourselves situationally, as I have described.
Examine the field of feeling
He speaks, who as thought
Out of spirit sun-rays
Calls you to world existence-awareness:
Feel in your breath life stirring.
He speaks, who world existence-awareness
Out of star-life-forces
Would bestow on you in spirit realms:
Feel in your blood’s welling-weaving.
He speaks, who spirit-sense
In light-filled gods-high-realms
Will fashion for you out of will of earth:
Feel earth’s mighty counter striving.
In this way we come to the point of establishing our relationship with the Exusiai, Dynamis, and Kyriotetes. We do this by means of inwardly relating the sphere of feelings, the breath, the circulation of blood, and that place from which the will springs forth, although felt merely as the will, by relating all this in our human state of being to the beings of the second hierarchy. By this means the relationship is established.
It remains for us today, my dear brothers and sisters, to observe, to behold, to partake of the field of willing. This field of willing is certainly the one that holds dominion over human beings most powerfully, that works in human beings most powerfully, although at the same time the one that is really noticed least by human beings living through it. A human being, in fact, usually knows very little about the actual coursing of his will.
Let us take up first of all just where in the human organism the will comes to expression in order that the human organism may be engaged in movement, may be set into motion. Of course, my dear brothers and sisters, you must make this intimate imagination your own, if you wish to really open yourself up to the one who will show you the ways to the spirit, to the one who speaks through this esoteric school.
Now someone might imagine himself walking, and perhaps moving his arm. In this regard a person usually thinks that he moves his legs and that his legs carry him further along. This is certainly the most convenient imagination that a person might have. One thinks that some sort of unknown force — and of course it is an unknown force, for nobody can know anything about this force in customary awareness — that this unknown force is allowed to stream into the legs. One leg will be placed in front of the other. In such manner we carry ourselves through the world.
It is not really so. Entirely without doubt the legs simply do not have the wherewithal initially to carry us through the world. This is simply not the way it is. And we come here to a point where customary awareness shows its illusory nature at once, for it is illusion when we live with the belief that we walk forward with legs, with physical legs, that the physical legs are there, therefore, in order to walk forward.
Of course, this does not mean, my dear brothers and sisters, that you should now go out into the world of the philistines and cry out that it is not true that a person has legs in order to walk about. For of course at first glance people would simply not understand it. People simply don’t know how deeply true it is that in truth all that is around us, all that is dealt with in customary awareness, is maya, the grand illusion. The grand illusion encompasses not only what a person sees all around, but the grand illusion also encompasses all that a person experiences within himself concerning the world.
What this means is the following. Just imagine yourself just now totally schematically. [It was drawn.] Here are the human legs, one striding forth after the other [white]. But in between these human physical legs the etheric body is most certainly embodied [red], the part of the human etheric body corresponding to the legs. Then there is the astral embodiment [yellow] corresponding to the legs, and finally the ego-organization [violet]. We stride forth not with physical legs, not with etheric legs, not at all with astral legs, but rather we stride forth with those forces corresponding to the ego-organization. We live with these forces that correspond to the ego-organization, within the powerful forces of the earth that are out of sight [new drawing, half a circle with arrows]. The powerful forces of the earth are experienced by us with the forces of our ego-organization [short lines on the arrows]. And just what corresponds to motivation of will, of movement, plays out between the unseen ego-organization and the unseen powerful forces of earth’s gravity.
Blackboard (left side)
The ego-organization, however, depends on feeling some sort of resistance when encountering the powerful forces of earth’s gravity. For this the astral body is there in the legs, and the ether body, and rather specifically the physical body also, simply so that the ego-organization can feel itself, can perceive itself. And without this perception it cannot really step into a relationship with the earth-organization. It must step into a relationship with the earth-organization consciously. The physical organization and the other organizations are there in order that the ego-organization might keep in step with itself in full consciousness, and thereby be able to encounter the forces of earth.
Striding along, therefore, is a fully transcendental process. The sensory organization is only there for ambulation, in order that ambulation can become perceptible by human beings, for someone can only accomplish such a thing when it is apprehended. You walk just as little with physical legs, my dear brothers and sisters, as you do with your stockings that you put on your legs. You walk along with what in the legs corresponds to your ego-organization. And as you have stockings in order to keep your feet warm, just so you have the physical legs in order to provide awareness to you for your walking about.
All this that I just related must also be felt. A person must learn to feel, in walking, that walking is a transcendental process, and that all the sensory apparatus is there merely in order to provide awareness. This awareness will not be engendered perfectly during waking life on earth, due to our physical legs also being heavy, so that we come into connection not merely with the heavy forces of earth’s gravity, but also with the heavy forces of gravity active in our physical legs. Therefore, when we do not have the physical legs, as in sleep, we while away our time there in the world-all, in our ego and astral bodies, in a manner much more free-moving than when we go about in physical life. We may be in motion during our sleep, but we normally have no awareness of it, for the physical legs provide for this awareness.
What then gives us the possibility, during sleep and also during moments of clairvoyance, what give us the possibility of moving? As I said, we can move in physical existence insofar as we are aware of the movement through our physical legs. What, my dear friends, performs this function for us during sleep? It is the function of the various beings that walk along with us in sleep, for the purpose of movement. These are the Thrones, high beings of the first hierarchy. A person in a state of customary awareness, however, or even in the customary awareness of sleep, does not perceive the Thrones, and therefore cannot receive help. Quite to the contrary, when someone through intuition becomes able to perceive what is really taking place in sleep, then he will become aware that by means of the Thrones during sleep, he stands in relationship with a world known through higher awareness, just as by means of his physical legs during customary life on earth he stands in relationship with physical life.
All this must be carried over into feelings. One must learn to sense all this inwardly, aromatically. Then one also inwardly senses the interwoven and undulating spiritual world, within which one certainly dwells from this point on.
So once again, we may be properly placed in an inner feeling and experience, if we allow it to work on us while remaining in the moment, just as with the other mantras, those concerning the fields of thinking and feeling. We should remain in the moment in the following way: first the wide-open reaches press in upon us with thunderous voice, then the Guardian of the Threshold admonishes us to take note, that we should hearken unto what the Thrones have to say to us. The Thrones speak to us about what springs forth when, as we say, we are really motivated about what passes over from motives of the soul into our force of will, about being engaged in something or other in the world with our force of will. To this end, we will allow the third part of the mantra to work on us, as we once again take up and hearken to what resounds from the wide-open reaches:
Examine the field of willing.
Then the Guardian of the Threshold:
He speaks, who guides world forces, muted From earth foundations, dark and deep Into your limbs’ impulses:
Then the Thrones:
Behold in motivation your fiery essence.
That is the first. The second leads us quite a bit more into the realm of soul. When we go further in pursuit of a person’s activity of will, well, in this inner meditative performance of the soul, we come upon a great discovery. And this great discovery must sooner or later flood into a person who wishes to stride forward on the field of his own self-development.
Here I must point something out to you, my dear brothers and sisters, something that you all know, for customary awareness knows quite a bit about it, and it is this, what we call in ourselves the voice of conscience. The voice of conscience! But this voice of conscience emerges from a human being and sounds forth into awareness indistinctly. A person does not generally know with certainty what is there, what is connected to his moralistic-soulful disposition, what sounds forth from underpinnings laden with mystery, that which he refers to as his voice of conscience. A person generally does not penetrate anywhere nearly deep enough in his own being in customary awareness to reach the voice of conscience. It may show itself, but the person does not reach down to it. And so he does not observe it in soul face-to-face.
But when a person then in meditating presses on to the wider world of the Cherubim, beings full of wisdom, who are interwoven with and live throughout the world, then he comes upon the great discovery, that from the world of the Cherubim a world activity presses in upon him, within which the voice of conscience lives.
Oh, the voice of conscience is from high and ancient sources, from higher beings. It lives in actuality in the world of the Cherubim. From this world of the Cherubim, it weaves into human beings and sounds forth from the depths of these human beings, initially indistinctly. But it is a great and powerful encounter when a person is there, alive in intuition, there where he can place himself in relationship with the field of the Cherubim, which is a world well-met, an encounter with the world in which his conscience moves and has its being. It is the greatest personal discovery that a person can make. For this the Guardian of the Threshold admonishes us with the words:
He speaks, who allows spirit rays, brilliant From heavenly workshops, full of grace To course within your blood:
Then the Cherubim:
Behold in conscience the soul’s progression.
In reality it is the spirit coursing through the blood, emerging from the Cherubim’s field, that constitutes the voice of conscience. Blood, present in all parts of our physical human being, carries this voice of conscience into all parts of our human physical being, along with other things. And it weaves the undulations of Cherubic life into the soul-nature of our blood. We shall gain a greater foothold on this meditation if we envisage it in the following way:
First is spoken that which comes from the far-off reaches of the world.
Examine the field of willing.
The Guardian of the Threshold then admonishes us:
He speaks, who guides world forces, muted From earth foundations, dark and deep Into your limbs’ impulses:
Then we envisage moving clouds [drawn in blue], the moving clouds as a representation of the Thrones. And while we envisage these moving clouds, we hear the Thrones, sounding forth from the first hierarchy:
Behold in motivation your fiery essence.
Then the Guardian of the Threshold speaks further:
He speaks, who allows spirit rays, brilliant From heavenly workshops, full of grace To course within your blood:
Now we envisage, flashing through these clouds, lightning [red], for flashes of lightning are the implements of the Cherubim, the fiery swords of the Cherubim. While the lightning flashes through the clouds, we feel this flashing in the words:
Behold in conscience the soul’s progression.
Then the Guardian of the Threshold speaks:
He speaks, who brings the human being, intact
That refers to one’s prior lives on earth.
Through deaths and births, wisely and justly By breathing in the present time:
In doing this we envisage the entirety of the heavens above the lightning with interwoven warmth [The drawing was broadened in yellow.], with interwoven heat sending down the lightning. And in this interwoven heat from far-off reaches we perceive the speech of the Seraphim:
Behold in fate your spirit ordeal.
—as the destiny of one earth-life to the next, extending here into this present life on earth.
The mantra concerning willing is especially effective when it is perceived together with the picture in the following way. One prepares somewhat mysteriously in implementing the mantra, for certainly willing is the one most full of mystery. While starting to prepare by putting aside anything commonplace in the words, and feeling the beckoning, guiding, world-direction-giving nature of the picture, one uses instead of the word “Thrones” the good normal word “seat.” Even though it could easily be given too trifling a meaning, everything commonplace must be put away from it when saying here “seating” instead of “Thrones.” Also imagine, my dear brothers and sisters, that as you feel the word “seat,” [It was written on the board.] seat, cloud-seating, form the picture within yourself of clouds standing in front of you. Then you form the word “fleet,” [over “seat” was written:] fleet. Again, with the image of lightning within, fleeting flashing lightning within the clouds. Then you form the word “heating,” [over “fleet” was written:] heat, universal heating, and feel in these three words the ascent from the cloud-seating to the lightning and to the universal heating, from which the lightning comes. In this way you feel prepared for the mantra with seat, fleet, heat.
And then feel with the picture standing before you the power of the mantra.
[The mantra was now written on the board, and at the same time in the first line “willing” was underlined, and similarly the last line of each section 1, 2, and 3 was underlined.]
Examine the field of willing:
He speaks, who guides world forces, muted
From earth foundations, dark and deep
Into your limbs’ impulses:
Behold in motivation your fiery essence.
He speaks, who allows spirit rays, brilliant
From heavenly workshop, full of grace
To course within your blood:
Behold in conscience the soul’s progression.
He speaks, who brings the human being, intact
Through deaths and births, wisely and justly
By breathing in the present time:
Behold in fate your spirit ordeal.
In such meditative verses there is nothing that is a simple phrase. What is indicated here concerning the “limb’s activity,” I have illustrated as a conjoint effort of the ego-organization and the forces of the earth, wholly a supersensory occurrence. We must be aware of this in the first part of the mantra.
In the second part of the mantra, we must be aware of what moves through the entire organism in the circulation of blood, which in its pulsatile coursing contains the essence of conscience. Our basic fate, however, has been taken up by our breath, insofar as the highest part of the rhythmic system has streaming through it not only what enlivens the breath today, but rather by the breath having been formed in earlier earth-existence stop-overs.
Here [part 1] we are advised by the Guardian of the Threshold about the Thrones
Here [in part 2] about the Cherubim
Here [in part 3] about the Seraphim
[“Thrones” was written next to part 1, “Cherubim” next to part 2, and “Seraphim” next to part 3.]
In order for the mantra to have the necessary inner strength and spirit-condensing quality, we choose a symbol which allows the revelation of the first hierarchy to impact us in a very lovely way: clouds, Thrones, although at the same time, that out of which the Thrones, when we gaze up to the spiritual in the clouds, that out of which the Thrones take their substance, their own essential being, that their being is drawn forth from.
[It was written on the board and “beings” was underlined.]
clouds—Thrones—beings
We gaze out upon the thunderbolts of lightning. Well, the Cherubim are definitely veiled. With the Thrones one can catch a sense of them as they interweave themselves in the clouds. The mounded-up clouds give away the substance of the Thrones. The Cherubim do not make it so easy for us to observe them. They conceal themselves more than the Thrones. They don’t show themselves in formations. They reveal themselves in their implements, in the fleeting flashes of lightning. They are behind their implements. They show us in the fleeting flashes of lightning not their essence, but only their implements. [It was written on the board, and “implements” was underlined.]
lightning—Cherubim—implements
And if we mount clear up to universal heat, there the Seraphim conceal themselves deeper yet, much deeper than the Cherubim behind the implements, behind the fleeting flashing lightning. It is merely the radiant glory, this universal heat, merely the radiant glory of the Seraphim. The Thrones reveal themselves through their being, the Cherubim reveal themselves through their implements, but the Seraphim reveal themselves through the radiant glory streaming out from them. [It was written on the board, and “radiant glory” was underlined.]
universal heat—Seraphim—radiant glory
And so do we establish a human being’s connection with the first hierarchy in the field of willing:
Examine the field of willing:
He speaks, who guides world forces, muted
From earth foundations, dark and deep
Into your limbs’ impulses:
Behold in motivation your fiery essence.
He speaks, who allows spirit rays, brilliant
From heavenly workshop, full of grace
To course within your blood:
Behold in conscience the soul’s progression.
He speaks, who brings the human being, intact
Through deaths and births, wisely and justly
By breathing in the present time:
Behold in fate your spirit ordeal.
What it comes down to, what it depends on, is that we perceive ourselves within the process as if we ourselves were simply not speaking, feeling, or willing, but rather, what it all depends on is that we forget ourselves, and in this process in a threefold manner perceive ourselves as a recipient.
Yes, my dear brothers and sisters, it is absolutely essential that one engages in such mantric inner practices with complete sincerity. Then they work effectively, as they should. Then we are brought forward onto the field, onto the threefold field of the spiritual world, onto the field of thinking, feeling, and willing. And that is of utmost importance, that we are able to penetrate into these things with complete sincerity.
For this something else is most assuredly necessary, and must be included. Someone meditating will of course often fall back, again and again, into the routine ambling stroll of customary life. Indeed, he must, for between birth and death he is an earthly human being. Customary awareness must ever and again return to him. But he may certainly continue to exist this way, for example, and I mean it here in the negative sense, when encountering some sort of continuing difficulty that becomes chronic. A person can experience this all the time, and although sometimes overlooking it, can still experience it continuously to some extent. We should also have this sort of continuity if we once understand the force of meditation. We should certainly always feel this way, so that we can say to ourselves, our customary awareness has certainly, once meditated on, it has certainly once achieved an understanding of the penetrating power of meditation. We should feel that meditating actually occurred, that we were once within it. Through meditating, we ought to have become a different person, to the extent that we can feel that meditating has made us into something else. In this way, in that we have begun with it, during our life we can no longer just forget, not even for a moment forget, my dear brothers and sisters, that we are active in meditation. And then we have the right demeanor for active meditation.
We must experience meditating thoroughly, keeping in mind of course that we should only engage in meditation for such brief periods of time that the rest of life is undisturbed. We should experience it in such reality that the feeling of actively meditating is maintained, and that if we should once forget that we actively meditate, and later realize that we have forgotten, if we realize that there have been moments in life within which we have forgotten, well, we should then allow the feeling of shame to well up within us, just as we would be ashamed, for instance, if we should somehow find ourselves naked, without clothes, running through a street packed with people. We should adopt this approach. We should so well consider the transition from not meditating at all into being active in meditation, that at no single moment are we without the awareness that we actively meditate, and the discovery of our having lapsed in this awareness should become a moment of shame. Very much may be attained in this manner.
And then we will really be able to progress in what will be said through the universal world word, with which we began:
O Man, know yourself! So sounds the word of worlds. You hear it soul-forcefully, You feel it spirit-powerfully. Who speaks so world-mightily? Who speaks so heart-inwardly? Does it work streaming through space Into your sense’s self-experiencing? Does it sound weaving through time Into your life's evolving stream? Are you the one, who yourself In sensing space, in experiencing time Creates the word, feeling yourself Estranged in space’s soul-emptiness, As you lose the power of thinking In time’s destroying stream?
But we must ever and again bring to the forefront in heart and mind, that cognition is a serious business, that the world is a great illusion, this world of maya, that cognition does not simply come to us, that we first must come to the Threshold, where the Guardian is standing, and that at the Threshold all that we carry constitutionally must first fall away, all that comprises customary sensory reality and customary thinking.
We are able to take all this to heart, for out of the self-same far-off reaches, out of which the comprehensive universal word has come to us, that which even so has been spoken, additionally there sounds forth to us:
First come to know the earnest Guardian, Who stands before the gates of spirit-land, Denying entry to your sensory force And to your intellect’s might, For in weaving of sense And in forming of thought Out of space’s absence of being,1 Out of time’s illusory powers The truth of your own self You must first forcefully master.
When we have heard such a thing, we can then speak out the devotional answer from depths of soul.
I walked within this world of sense,2 Thinking’s heritage3 guiding me, A god’s power having ushered me in.4 Death, it stands at journey’s end. I will feel Christ’s presence.5 In matter’s death spirit-birth wakes, So in spirit I’ll find the world And in world-becoming know myself.6
Blackboard (right side)
Blackboard Text for the Thirteenth Lesson
III. Vernimm des Willens Feld:
Hüter: Es spricht, der die Weltenkräfte, die dumpfen Aus den Erden-Untergründen, den finstren In deiner Glieder Regsamkeiten lenket:
Throne: Blick’ auf deiner Triebe Feuer-Wesen.
Hüter: Es spricht, der die Giestesstrahlen, die hellen Aus Gottes-Wirkensfeldern, gnadevoll In deinem Blute kreisen läßt:
Cherubine: Blick’ auf des Gewissens Seelen-Führung.
Hüter: Es spricht, der das Menschensein, das vollbrachte Durch Tode und Geburten, singerecht Zum Atmen bringt in gegenwärt’ger Zeit:
Seraphine: Blick’ auf denies Schicksales Geistes-Prüfung.
III. Examine the field of willing:
Guardian: He speaks, who guides world forces, muted From earth foundations, dark and deep Into your limbs’ impulses:
Thrones: Behold in motivation your fiery essence.
Guardian: He speaks, who allows spirit rays, brilliant From heavenly workshops, full of grace To course within your blood:
Cherubim: Behold in conscience the soul’s progression.
Guardian: He speaks, who brings the human being, intact Through deaths and births, wisely and justly By breathing in the present time:
Rudolf Steiner: "Intuition is a result of will exercises. In that way man learns to see into what is otherwise always concealed in waking life; he learns to look into the mysteries of the human will. The human will is a mystery even for waking life; it is revealed partly by inspiration, but only intuition finally unveils it. Paradoxical as it may sound, once man has succeeded in perceiving the true nature of his own will he also has insight into the divine spiritual world. In the head organization the spiritual world is contained only in physical metamorphosis; not much of the spiritual world as such can be discovered there. The human head is actually the least spiritual part of man. But the remaining physical organization contains the unchanged soul life the way it was when man dwelt in pre-earthly life without physical and etheric bodies. In this soul life that lives concealed in the will, man is wholly spirit even between birth and death. Through intuition one can now discern the nature of this spirit.The spirit that is unveiled to intuition as the element that underlies the will appears to this perception as the reservoir for everything a person has undergone during earth life in the form of intellectual activities of the mind and soul-initiatives, as moral inclinations and impulses in the soul. As I have already indicated from another standpoint, this is revealed as the younger part of the soul, the part that remains in an embryonic state in our present earth life and is at the beginning of its development. If we look at this part of the soul, we behold something in man's inner being that heads toward death in order to be actually born only at death, just as the soul in pre-earthly existence approaches earth life in order to be born into it through conception and birth. Beneath our will lives the soul embryo which reveals its embryonic life when intuitive perception beholds its true nature. We can tell by its nature how it is born to a new spiritual life at death, just as we can tell by the appearance of the human soul in pre-earthly life that it enters earthly existence through birth.In order to gain insight into physical existence, it is therefore our concern to become acquainted — to begin with in supersensible existence — with the soul being that underlies the will."
O, for a muse of fire that would ascend The brightest heaven of invention! —Shakespeare
The Song of Wandering Aengus
By William Butler Yeats
I went out to the hazel wood,
Because a fire was in my head,
And cut and peeled a hazel wand,
And hooked a berry to a thread;
And when white moths were on the wing,
And moth-like stars were flickering out,
I dropped the berry in a stream
And caught a little silver trout.
When I had laid it on the floor
I went to blow the fire a-flame,
But something rustled on the floor,
And someone called me by my name:
It had become a glimmering girl
With apple blossom in her hair
Who called me by my name and ran
And faded through the brightening air.
Though I am old with wandering
Through hollow lands and hilly lands,
I will find out where she has gone,
And kiss her lips and take her hands;
And walk among long dappled grass,
And pluck till time and times are done,
The silver apples of the moon,
The golden apples of the sun.
"She wasn't doing a thing that I could see, except standing there, leaning on the balcony railing, holding the universe together." — J. D. Salinger
"Every beloved object is the center of Paradise." — Novalis
Anandamayi Ma
"It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing." — John 6:63
Washed in the Blood of the Lamb are We Awash in a Sonburst Sea You—Love—and I—Love—and Love Divine: We are the Trinity
You—Love—and I—We are One-Two-Three Twining Eternally Two—Yes—and One—Yes—and also Three: One Dual Trinity Radiant Calvary Ultimate Mystery
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"Whosover drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life." ~John 4:14
In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink. He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. ~John 7:37-38
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