The Planet of Love

The earth is called the Planet of Love by the Rosicrucians and the Cosmos of Love by Rudolf Steiner because we were sent down into darkness to transform it into light, to Love, and this was the hardest and most painful creation ever, as love can only be created through pain.

The Three Logoi

There are three creators, the three Logoi, the first is the Father, who goes before the main creator to prepare the creation. He is known as Brahma, Osiris, and Odin.

The second logos, the Word, is the form in which picture the created is molded. He is the Solar or Thunder god and his physical emanation is the universal hero who is known in all cultures, like Krishna/Arjuna, Yahve/Moses, Shamash/Gilgamesh, Thor/Tjálfi, Michael/Jacob, and Christ/John.

The third logos is Sophia, she follows the Word, and she completes the creation. She is the goddess of wisdom and is known everywhere too, like Radha, Sif, Zipporah, Isis, Athena, and Lakshmi.

The Father created the physical form and the earth we walk on. The second logos, which I prefer to call Michael, gave life to the creation, the etheric world, the energy that keeps all of creation alive without which everything would cease to exist.

Before Sophia descended she worked as groupsoul from above while Michael was descended into the physical world, and together they created life. When the human body was ready to receive her the androgyne life got gender, now started the long path toward love. She gave sentience through the addition of the astral body.

Darkness — Resistance against Love

The darkness of Earth consisted of three powers, the Luciferic was egoism, and (s)he was the task for Sophia, the Ahrimanic who was untruth was the task for Michael, and the Asuras who are antilife, fear of life, was the task for the Father.

When the light starts to permeate darkness it has it difficult, all the chaotic feelings and thoughts overwhelm the light, it will in the start be used by darkness and the light uses an enormous amount of time to tame the darkness. Yaldabaoth, Gilgamesh, and the Lion avatar of Visnu are examples of the second logos incarnating into darkness. They change when Sophia descends to create the two genders.

We are the Light

From conception up through life we repeat the development of Earth and all the problems we meet, all our internal fights are with the rests of the primordial darkness, we go through the same as the gods, and we are the gods.

When Christ died, the gods died in the outer world and resurrected in our inner world, from then the soul began to incarnate into the body where it before hovered above, and in that soul was a seed of the second logos’ I AM, and that is us, we are Yahve/Sophia, Christ/Magdalene, Krishna/Radha, Horus/Isis taking the darkness/karma/sin of the body on us and purifying it.

Gnosticism — Dualism

Most Gnostic traditions, except Platon’s, don’t understand that it was according to the good gods’ plan, that it couldn’t be different. They take it as a personal injustice and have created a dualistic religion full of hatred against the second logos.

A Lovestory between Michael and Sophia

The history of Earth is a love story between Michael, the solar logos, and Sophia, the lunar logos, both in the spiritual world and in our inner.

Our astral body with our feelings is our feminine side and our etheric side with our thinking is our masculine side, to love oneself is when thinking and feelings trust each other when the astral and etheric bodies fall in love, first then are we ready to love fully.

The masculine side was created back on the earlier incarnation of Earth called the old Sun, where Michael went through the human development phase. The masculine is plantlike but it made it possible for the gods to develop thinking.

Sophia went through the human development phase on the old Moon and is younger than Michael. The feminine was animal-like on the old moon, it added sentience to the human body.

On Earth, the masculine ascended from the physical while the feminine descended from the spiritual, and it’s visible in their appearance where men are more physical, just as it is in their temperaments.

Making the Feminine and Masculine Fall in Love

Women are conscious in the astral body and use the etheric as a tool while men are conscious in the etheric body and use the astral as a tool, and it explains their different ways of seeing the world and expressing themselves.

When we sleep the etheric and astral body separates after a hard day’s fight, now they need to be purified and energized. We die when there is no possibility for reconciliation, no possibility to learn more in this life.

When the two bodies learn to love each other they are knit together and when we leave the earth they are not separated only the body is left behind, and as memory is in the etheric body we keep our personality from time to time we descend.

#KimMM

I compare many creation stories from different traditions with Sophia as the starting point in the following link, and they practically tell the same story with minor differences: Sophia, Created in the Beginning

On Rudolf Steiner’s prediction of the Third World War and its Spiritual Background

‘‘Wherever love and compassion are active in life, we can perceive the magic breath of the spirit blowing through the sense world.” ~Rudolf Steiner

World History in its Making

What we are seeing now is going to change the world for all time. Materialism in the West is on the decline and the Czarism of the East is likewise going to disappear, and this last is what the current war is about. Between the East and West, we have Europe, and it has been split between these two paradigms, but now it has begun its fight for the independence of these two world views. Steiner describes the three in this way:

“The religious impulses of the particular ethnic groups will contribute in their different ways to an understanding of this tripartite division of man.

• The East and the Russian people to the understanding of the spirit;
• The West to an understanding of the body;
• Central Europe to an understanding of the soul.

But all these impulses are interwoven of course.” ~From GA 185

In the following, I will look at Steiner’s prediction of a potential WW between the USA on one side and Russia and China on the other, and on USA’s first Pluto return and its connection with the prediction, and Steiner’s description of the background on the polarity between Russia and America, and between Czarism and the Soul of the Slavs. Steiner on Czarism versus the Russian folk soul:

“Czarism and Russianism have always been strangers to each other, they never had anything in common. Those who understand the Russian nature, especially its piety, must have found the attitude to the elimination of Czarism as something self-evident when the time was ripe.” See From Symptom to Reality in Modern History.

I made a horoscope for 2020 in March that year, seen from an astrological, esoteric, and karmic historic view, and it was maybe the most impressive horoscope in 2000 years, it was about the end of American materialism. I predicted that Trump would lose, but still try to keep the power, but would fail in the attempt. Three times before the same happened in Rome, France and Germany, but this time without success: Horoscope for 2020.

I looked into the many texts on the Return of Christ and the resistance the opposition would present us with, and my conclusion was that 2020 was the crucial year where we would show if we had understood our curriculum, and we had.

Greatest Potential for Violence

As a result of the return of Christ I began looking at the three major cultures where people have difficulties becoming free on their own, where the potential for violence is greatest, and that is Russia, China, and the Islamic world, so I expected that we would see confrontations in one way or the other in the coming sunspot (See Steiner on Sunspots) period, but in a lesser scale than in the previous periods, as the potential for evil is weaker now than in many many years.

I have followed how Russia and China have increased their military involvement in recent times, especially China has increased the pressure on neighboring countries, such as India Nepal, and especially Taiwan, just as they torment their minorities, such as the Tibetans whose monasteries and shrines they destroy.

The Return of Christ

We are living under the return of Christ, it’s not just something abstract, the spiritual world is full of light. See: Steiner’s description on what happens now.

The coronavirus created a gap between the etheric and physical body, making people more perceptible to the spiritual and less inclined to act out of the physical, less inclined to create karma. Steiner has described it with Goethe and in connection with the smallpox vaccine, and I have written about it in more groups and in my 2020 astrological prediction. Many spiritual people have experienced this separation. Materialists are less motivated to manifest their will in the physical world, golf may be more interesting than winning an election. See Horoscope for 2020.

It seems that the Russian soldiers are disillusioned, that they even disobey orders when ordered to shoot at villages with civilians. Many soldiers thought it was an exercise other was told the Ukrainians welcomed them with roses, but they were stopped by civilians who stood in front of their vehicles or they were shot at in combat.

The world has become magical, it may mean that war becomes near impossible in the future when all are permeated by the etheric, with Christ. I know this sounds ridiculous, but I think we are out for some surprises. I expected some miracles in Ukraine, but the reality has surpassed my expectations, and I think everyone’s expectations.

Steiner’s Predictions

I had started looking at the horoscope for 2022 as there seemed to be something relevant for the tensions at the Ukrainian border. Under this work I was made aware that Steiner had warned about a new world war between USA On one side and Russia and China on the other side if we hadn’t solved the problem of materialism (Ahrimanic) through the twentieth century.

If the west hadn’t incorporated the spiritual in its thinking, so we could meet the east through the spiritual, we would end in a world war again. 2020 was the test, if materialism had won we would have had Trump as commander in chief for the American military forces today.

One of the biggest problems is that people react against the ruling classes, and this will be the trigger for the rulers to start the war, following Steiner, but because the underlying evil has been weakened through the twentieth century there is no will for war, humanity had learned of their pain.

Steiner on the War

“The Second World War [Third, see *1 below] which will be fought between Asia and America — along with what is between them — is absolutely necessary to happen and the reasons for this will be economic. You must be hearing the calls of the lower classes for a world revolution — the only way to obscure and hide this idea of a world revolution would be to ignite the catastrophe of another World War. It just has no alternative.” ~The Course for Speakers to Promote the Idea of Threefolding CW 338. Lecture 12, Jan 2, 1921

The main opponent will be China, even though it looks like it is Russia now. China is building silos for atomic missiles all over the country, and they create artificial islands in the Chinese Sea on other countries’ territory, where they place their military, and they move into the Indian Ocean too. They prepare for war.

Steiner on China:

“The real opposition (Gegensatz) is not between America and Russia — it is only apparently so. The real clash will be between China and America. And the question is whether it will be fought in Europe or in the Pacific. Europe can only hope that this will happen in the Pacific area.” Koberwitz in June 1924 Rudolf Steiner – I can’t find the original.

Steiner’s goal was to spread the spiritual way of thinking out to all of humanity so the world became one, as it would hinder the devastating World War, and he succeeded, he coined the phrase New Age and this is shared between all of humanity, making it possible for all of humanity to speak in a shared language. The old tribe or national cultures are destroyed everywhere through materialism, most visible in Mao’s cultural war, in the USA have Hollywood and it’s entertainment industry done the same on world scale.

Steiner on the Background and How not to End in a Devastating War:

“Let there be no mistake about it — so long as the dealings of Europeans and Americans with Asia are confined to purely economic and industrial interests, so long will there be distrust in the hearts of Asiatics. People may talk as much as they like about disarmament, about the desirability of ending wars. …A great war will break out between the East and the West, in spite of all disarmament conferences, if the people of Asia cannot perceive something that flows over to them from the Spirit of the West.

Western spirituality can spread over to Asia and if it does, Asia will be able to trust it, because with their own inherent, though somewhat decadent spirituality, the Asiatic peoples will be able to understand what it means. The peace of the world depends upon this, not upon the conversations and discussions now going on among the leaders of outer civilisation. …

Everything depends upon insight into the Spirit that is lying hidden in European and American culture — the Spirit from which men flee, which for the sake of ease they would fain avoid, but which alone can set the feet of humanity on the path of ascent.

People like to put their heads in the sand, saying that things will improve of themselves. No, they will not. The hour of a great decision has struck. Either men will resolve to bring forth the spirituality of which I have spoken, or the decline of the West is inevitable. Hopes and fatalistic longings for things to right themselves are of no avail.

Once and forever, man has passed into the epoch when he must manipulate his powers out of his own freewill. In other words: it is for men themselves to decide for or against spirituality. If the decision is positive, progress will be possible; if not, the doom of the West is sealed and in the wake of dire catastrophes the further evolution of humanity will take a course undreamed of today. Those who would strive for true insight into these matters should not, nay dare not, neglect the study of the life of soul in mankind at large, and in the different peoples, especially of East and West.” ~Cosmic Forces in Man, Lecture 1, Oslo, November 24, 1921 ga209, https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/19211124p01.html

Evil is Cyclic – or like a Pendulum

Steiner told also how the sunspots visualized the strength of evil, and all wars started at the spikes, and ended in the valleys, no exceptions in the twentieth century! See Sunspots and evil activity

In the twentieth century the amount of evil was immensely high, causing WW1 and 2 and especially the Vietnam war, but from the Vietnam War and forward evil began to dwindle, so the will to kill is little today, and our attention on war is more focused today. Humanity transformed evil to wisdom and pain to love.

Evil is cyclic, it’s like flood and ebb, and now it’s flood, but the maximal possible watermark isn’t very high. The activity of evil has been increasing toward a local maximum since 2020, so something is brewing, but it will be weaker than it was at the top at the previous maxima.

On April 12th Jupiter meets Neptune

On April 12th Jupiter meets Neptune in their home in Pisces, and the last time that took place was in 1856 when the Crimea peace was signed. It was of course at the bottom of a sunspot as wars end in valleys, and as evil is increasing now it may dampen evil or there may come a temporary peace agreement.

Added May 27: after April 12 the world began helping Ukraine with heavy weapons, and the EU began talking about starting the process for Ukraine to become a member.

I think we are at the first spike now, wars typically start at the second spike, five to eight years into the period, but we will see.

The USA out of Childhood

The other important astrological transit this year is when Pluto becomes conjunct with Pluto in the birth horoscope for the USA, and Pluto describes the ages for countries where Saturn does for humans.

This is the first time, the USA is coming out of childhood. Pluto is leaving the darkness in 2023, and although a short trip backward, the air becomes lighter when it moves into Aquarius. The USA becomes a teenager, it’s time for a love affair, and leaving the materialistic childishness behind.

On the first return on February 20-21, the problem presents itself, the annexation of the eastern territories of Ukraine was the first physical step in defining the problem.

Around July 12, Pluto goes retrograde, and as Pluto is about transformation there may come outer problems that will force inner transformation, where China may become tired of awaiting its chance. The last return will be on December 27 with a kind of result.

World History – Putin versus Ukraine

What we witness is world history, and the Ukrainian fight will stand as the most important in modern history, and their president will earn monuments. They defend Central Europe as they have done before.

The Ukrainians come from Scandinavia, then fighting with Thor now with Michael as a symbol of freedom. It is very symbolic that both Vladimir and Volodymyr come from the old Scandinavian Valdamarr, today Valdemar in Danish, meaning the Ruler of the World. I am impressed by the Ukrainian and I can recognize the Viking inheritance, although the Danes have been more spoiled by fate. I am also impressed by Volodymyr Zelenskyy, a Russian-speaking Jew whose family lost members to Holocaust. I think this is also telling about the Ukrainian people, that their trust is not dependent on language or genes. He has risen from a comedian to be the perfect world leader, this is so surprising that it should make esotericists think!

The question is what Ruling tradition do we want, czarism or a Goethean tradition of Central Europe?

Taiwan in the Chinese Sea corresponds to Ukraine, and the countries around China lie between China and USA in the same way as Europe lies between Russia and USA!

Rudolf Steiner on the Spiritual Background

The Slav Spiritual Stream versus Czarism

What we see now is a continuation of what happened many times before, that the Russian state has tried to bind the Slav Soul to the Russian state.

“The testament of Peter the Great appeared on the scene in 1813, or perhaps a little earlier, and was disseminated for good reason as though it stemmed from Peter the Great himself.

Peter the Great

This document is used to seize hold of a natural stream, such as the stream of the Slav soul, in order to guide and lead it by means of suggestion. Whither is it to be led? It is to be led into the orbit of Russianism in such a way that the ancient Slav stream should become, in a way, the bearer of the idea of a Russian state!

Because this is so, a clear distinction must be made between the spiritual Slav stream, the stream that exists as the bearer of the ancient Slav tradition, and that which strives to become an external vessel to encompass the whole of this Slav stream: Russianism. …

For Russianism wants to confine the Slav element within its own framework and use it as its tool. It wants to contain it within the confines of the testament of Peter the Great. …

Obviously, therefore, only those who understood the Slav element more deeply could understand what web was really being woven, and also that those who wanted to destroy the Slav element through Russianism had to work against more healthy endeavours.” From R. Steiner, “The Karma of Untruthfulness”, Vol. 1, GA 173, lecture 3.

Linguistic Divisions of the East Slavs

Putin have studied Peter the Great what the following article show: What Putin Learned from Peter the Great.

Russian Intelligentia and the Group Soul

Steiner says that the folk soul is revered by the Russian intelligentsia as something great and significant something they aspire toward, not understanding that they are holding the Russian people back in their development. Steiner from Preparing for the Sixth Epoch:

“What we call the group soul, out of which mankind has gradually emerged and in which the animal kingdom still lives, that is what is revered by the Russian intelligentsia as something great and significant among their people. They cannot rise to the thought that the community of the future must hover as a high ideal, an ideal that has yet to be realized.

Yes, but this life in the group soul does not in reality belong to the future at all, for it is the old form of group soul existence. If it continued it would be a Luciferic group soul, a form of life that has remained at an earlier stage, whereas the form of group soul life that is true and must be striven for, is what we try to find in spiritual science.

▪️What we should like to say to the East is this: It is our task to overcome entirely just what you are trying to preserve in an external form, namely, an old Luciferic-Ahrimanic form of community.

In a community of a Luciferic-Ahrimanic character there will be coercion of belief as rigid as that established by the Orthodox Catholic Church in Russia.

▪️Such community will not understand true freedom of thought; least of all will it be able to rise to the level where complete individuality is associated with a social life in which brotherhood prevails.”

This also explains the way they sacrifice their soldiers in war. It’s reminiscent of the Mongol horde, they send the soldiers against the enemy in endless numbers without any other strategy than spread fear and chaos and thereby tire the enemy. No other army in the world loses more soldiers than the Russian. They have in the short time of this war lost more soldiers than in their Afghanistan war, the war that crippled the USSR.

What the intelligentsia stands for is Czarism:
“Czarism and Russianism have always been strangers to each other, they never had anything in common. Those who understand the Russian nature, especially its piety, must have found the attitude to the elimination of Czarism as something self-evident when the time was ripe.” See Steiner: From Symptom to Reality in Modern History.

On Rudolf Steiner’s prediction of the Third World War and its Spiritual Background

The Goethean Central Europe as a pendulum between East and West

Europe is in the center between the Egoism symbolized by the rulers of Russia and the Heartlessness of the materialistic system of America, swaying from side to side, split in two over many years.

What we have experienced in connection with Putin’s invasion of Ukraine is that Europe and even the world have shown compassion for the victim, usually, the world is separated into two equally large blocks. Humanity are now following an inner moral where they earlier followed an outer moral.

The Founding Fathers of the Central European Culture.

Rudolf Steiner in Central Europe between East and West:

“Our souls have to tend to that which was prepared in the Central European culture especially expressing that we are put pendulum-like between two powers permeating the world and that we must find the balance.

We have to realise that, on the one side, the world strives for ahrimanic hardening, strives to get solidified in the fire of the purely material; that it strives, on the other side, to ascend egotistically to an abstract spirituality. Following the one or other side would ruin the Central European human being.

Following only the science engaged in the external senses would persuade us to tear the roses from the cross and only to look at that which solidifies. We would gain a world view gradually which would completely deflect the human being from looking at the spiritual. It would allow to only looking at that which has solidified ahrimanically. …

Therefore, the cross wound around by roses was the symbol of Goethe who positioned himself in the spirituality of the Central European culture. It must be our symbol. …

It is expressed to us in our symbol, in the rose cross, what we want to take up more and more in our souls, in our feelings when we come together in a room dedicated to our attempts. Then we can be sure that the spirits who lead the earth development in good sense exist invisible among us; that our words, that all our thoughts and feelings, while we dedicate ourselves to the spiritual-scientific attempts that all this is really supported in such a room by the spiritual powers guiding our attempts.” GA 159

Europe becoming one again

The Origin of the Eastern and Western Poles

To develop an I without egotism Europe was placed between Egotism to the East and Heartless materialism to the West. Europe became a pendulum that moved between these extremes.

Today Europe is finding their Equilibrium and is beginning to stand on their own feet, and both Russia and USA is becoming free of their curses.

From Rudolf Steiner’s “Genghis Khan and the Discovery of America”:

The East Pole — The Luciferic powers of the Mongols

“It was actually the descendants of the old Atlantean teachers who were now working from a place in Asia. A priest there had been educated to behold — to have a belated vision, as it were, of what the Atlanteans called the “Great Spirit,” and to receive his commands.

These the priest communicated to a young man of remarkable energy and strength who, by virtue of this authority, received the name “The Great Ruler of the Earth” from his community. This was Genghis Khan (c. 1158–1162 – August 18, 1227). The Great Spirit, through his follower and through that priest, gave to Genghis Khan the command to summon all the powers of Asia to spread the influence that would lead the fifth post-Atlantean age back into a luciferic form. …

Genghis Khan’s generals

All the unrest and disturbance that came into the evolution of modern man through the Mongolian invasions, everything connected with them that has gone on working into the fifth post-Atlantean epoch — all this unrest, which was prepared long ago, is nothing more than the great attempt that is being made from Asia to bring about a visionary European culture.

It would cut it off from the conditions of its further evolution and lead it altogether away from the earth, just as the East has experienced again and again this feeling of being filled with vision and of wanting to be estranged from the earth. [Eighth Sphere.]

Something was needed to counterbalance this tendency. An opposite trend had to be created as a counterforce that moves in the direction of the normal evolution of mankind.

The influence of Genghis Khan’s priest was intended to bring about a kind of buoyancy and lightness in the human race that would draw man away from the earth.”

The West Pole — The Ahrimanic Powers of Taotl

“Over against this, a corresponding heaviness had to come to man from the weight of the earth; this was provided through the discovery of the western world. America, with all that it holds, was discovered and thereby earth heaviness, the desire to remain on earth, was given to man.

Europe discovers America in 1492

The discovery of America and everything connected with it, and the way man carried his life into the many new places of the earth, all this, when seen in wider connections, shows itself as a counterbalancing force to the activity of Genghis Khan.

America had to be discovered so that man might be brought to grow closer to the earth, to grow more and more materialistic. Man needed weight and heaviness to counterbalance the spiritualization that was the aim of the descendants of the “Great Spirit.” …

While it is comparatively easy to see how the luciferic [Egoistic] influence worked on Genghis Khan — we have exact knowledge of the fact that a priest was initiated by the follower of the “Great Spirit” — it is much more difficult to say how the ahrimanic spirit worked. This is because the ahrimanic [materialistic] influence is dispersed and scattered. [Materialism is a system not individuals.] …

Study the reaction of Europe to the gradual discovery and opening up of America and you will see what temptations came from that direction. Taken all in all, it is a history of temptation woven in with a history that runs a normal course.” ~GA171

It is interesting that Vladimir and Volodymyr both are of Viking heritage, Valdamarr in old Scandinavian, Valdemar in modern Danish, meaning Ruler of the World. This is the choice, the egoism of Djengis Khan or the freedom of Michael.

East, West and the Double

Man consists of body, soul and spirit, but besides that there is a foreign element called the double, containing elemental beings we fight with through our life. The double is the animal part in us, what we developed through the old Moon, together with the added karma and trauma developed on earth. This double is like a nature power influenced from the earth depending on where the person lives. In America the double is influenced by Ahrimanic powers and in Asia by Luciferic powers.

From Rudolf Steiner’s “Individual Spirit Beings and the Undivided Foundation of the World”:

“The strange thing is that this subconscious that we carry within us is taken hold of by another being under all circumstances. This means that we are not only a fusion of body, soul, and spirit, carrying within us through the world our soul, which is independent of our body; shortly before birth another being takes possession of the subconscious portions of the human being. This being is there, this subconscious being that accompanies man the entire way between birth and death. Somewhat before birth it enters man and accompanies him.

One can also characterize this being as one that permeates man in those parts that do not come into his ordinary consciousness: it is a very intelligent being and possessed of a will that is akin to the forces of nature; in its will it is much more closely related to the forces of nature than is man. …

This earth, however, not only consists of skeleton but is a living organism, and this earth sends from its center to every point on the surface, to every territory, special forces. Picture for yourself the surface of the earth (see drawing):

Ahriman, the heartless, to the West, Lucifer, egotism, to the East.

Here is the Eastern region, there the Western region, to take it only on a large scale. The forces that are transmitted from the earth are something that belong to the life organism of the earth. Depending on whether a human being lives on this or that spot on earth, his soul, this immortal soul, does not come directly in contact with these forces but only indirectly — the immortal soul of man is relatively independent of earthly conditions. The soul is only artificially dependent upon earthly conditions, as was shown today. …

It is thus this “double,” which man bears within him, upon whom the geographic and other differentiations particularly exert their influences.”

The Mythical Constant of the Universe – 137

The most mystical and mythical number in the universe, both within science and esotericism.

Esoterically it defines God and man as we are created in the picture of God. It shows God as one, as three in the Trinity or body, soul and spirit, and the seven Elohim or seven human spiritual bodies.

For physicists, it describes the universe. It’s called the fine-structure constant and is one of the key physical constants of the universe.

“This immutable number determines how stars burn, how chemistry happens, and even whether atoms exist at all,” as Michael Brooks explained in a New Scientist article.

If this value was changed just a little the universe would end in chaos that would not have been habitable, where life, as we know it, couldn’t have evolved.

From Wikipedia:

Since the early 1900s, physicists have postulated that the number could lie at the heart of a grand unified theory, relating theories of electromagnetism, quantum mechanics and, especially, gravity.

The fine-structure constant, a dimensionless physical constant, is approximately 1/137.

Lederman expounded on the significance of the number in his book The God Particle: If the Universe Is the Answer, What Is the Question?, noting that not only was it the inverse of the fine-structure constant, but was also related to the probability that an electron will emit or absorb a photon—i.e., Feynman’s conjecture.

He added that it also “contains the crux of electromagnetism (the electron), relativity (the velocity of light), and quantum theory (Planck’s constant).

It would be less unsettling if the relationship between all these important concepts turned out to be one or three or maybe a multiple of pi. But 137?

The number 137, according to Lederman, “shows up naked all over the place”, meaning that scientists on any planet in the universe using whatever units they have for charge or speed, and whatever their version of Planck’s constant may be, will all come up with 137, because it is a pure number.

Lederman recalled that Richard Feynman had even suggested that all physicists put a sign in their offices with the number 137 to remind them of just how much they do not know.

At the range of 10−15 m (1 femtometer), the strong force is approximately 137 times as strong as electromagnetism.

Feynman on 137

“Immediately you would like to know where this number for a coupling comes from: is it related to p or perhaps to the base of natural logarithms?

Nobody knows. It’s one of the greatest damn mysteries of physics: a magic number that comes to us with no understanding by man. You might say the “hand of God” wrote that number, and “we don’t know how He pushed his pencil”.

We know what kind of a dance to do experimentally to measure this number very accurately, but we don’t know what kind of dance to do on the computer to make this number come out, without putting it in secretly!” ~ R. P. Feynman, QED: The Strange Theory of Light and Matter

In Religion

The Bible says that Ishmael, Levi and Amram all lived to be 137 years old. The three appearances make it the most common lifespan of individuals in the Bible.

Kabbalah

The Hebrew word קבלה (Kabbalah) has a Gematria (numerical value) of 137.

Kabbalah is generally taken to mean “the received tradition”, which conveys the continuity of a tradition that has been passed down from generation to generation. Nevertheless, the earlier nuance of meaning is seen in the first appearances of its root in the Torah (Exodus 26:5 and 36:12), where it means “parallel” or “corresponding” rather than “receiving”.

It is used to describe the “corresponding loops”, which, when clasped together, enjoined the two sections of the Tabernacle’s ceiling. These loops were suspended directly over the veil that divided the Holy Place and the Holy of Holies.

Symbolically, this is the threshold between the physical dimension and the utterly spiritual dimension. In other words, at the boundary line of the physical world, the number 137 emerges. The wisdom of Kabbalah is to find correspondences between the mundane and spiritual levels of reality.

See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/137_(number)?wprov=sfti1

and https://science.howstuffworks.com/dictionary/physics-terms/why-is-137-most-magical-number.htm

Anthropos+Sophia.

Sophia is the astral body, Anthropos is the etheric body.

In the Bible, Cain symbolizes the masculine etheric and Abel the feminine astral body.

When they are unified through the Alchemical wedding they become Anthroposophia. This happens on Earth as in Heaven.

Women are more conscious in the astral where men are more conscious in the etheric, this is why men have descended deeper into the physical than women, what even can be seen out of their bodies.

Where we in the first Abrahamic period needed the masculine powers to descend we in this need the feminine to rise again.

The masculine, Anthropos, has ascended from the physical where the feminine, Sophia, has descended from the spiritual and in that way have they developed the lower and upper together. Now they are meeting in the soul after long time of separation.

Creation in Taoist tradition and European tradition

First the TAOist creation of the Three Logoi:

▪️ Tao gives birth to One,
▪️ One gives birth to Two,
▪️ The Two gives birth to Three,
▪️ The Three gives birth to all universal things.

All universal things shoulder the Yin and embrace the Yang.
The Yin and Yang mingle and mix with each other to beget the harmony.

The picture shows the universe in a symbolic way through the Yin-Yang symbol. The dark Yin is the not yet transformed and the Yang is the transformed Yin so we transform from left to right. The imaginary line between yin and yang is TAO, the soul, the true power of the universe.

▪️ The physical world and body (Xun) is the most difficult to transform and first in a far future can we transform it fully.
▪️ The etheric world and body (Kan) is not as hard and therefore easier to transform, but still, we will first be ready to make the transformation in the future.
▪️ The astral world and body is what we work with now, it’s here the ego with it’s karma is purified, transformed from the youngest daughter (Dui) to the youngest son (Gen), from left to right, to Manas.

The white in the soul also tells how developed each part are in the current part of the development. The soul is our central part, our sun, our heart, and it’s where we find God.

Here the creation in detail (Book of Change), how the eight Trigrams are created in the above figure representing the planetary powers working on earth and humanity:

▪️ The Creative (☰ Qian) is heaven, therefore, it is called the father.
▪️ The Receptive (☷ Kun) is the earth, therefore, it is called the mother.
▪️ In the Trigram of the Arousing (☳ Zhen,) she seeks for the first time the power of the male and receives a son. Therefore, the Arousing is called the Eldest Son. [The highest spiritual principle in man, Atma.]
▪️ In the Trigram of the Gentle (☴ Xun) the male seeks for the first time the power of the female and receives a daughter. Therefore, the Gentle is called the Eldest Daughter. [The lowest principle in man, the physical.]
▪️ In the Trigram of the Abysmal (☵ Kan) she seeks for a second time and receives a son. Therefore, it is called the Middle Son. [The second lowest principle, the etheric.]
▪️ In the Trigram of the Clinging (☲ Li) he seeks for a second time and receives a daughter. Therefore, it is called the Middle Daughter. [The second highest principle, Buddhi.]
▪️ In the Trigram of Keeping (☶ Gen) Still she seeks for a third time and receives a son. Therefore, it is called the Youngest Son. [The third highest principle, Manas.]
▪️ In the Trigram of the Joyous (☱ Dui) he seeks for a third time and receives a daughter. Therefore, it is called the Youngest Daughter. [The third lowest principle, the Astral.]

See also The Taoist Triad and the Three Logoi

Here the same described in western terminology:

▪️ First came the Father, he created the physical world out of himself, he is Atma.
▪️ Then came the Son, (s)he created the etheric world out of herself, she is Buddhi.
▪️ Last came the Holy Spirit, he created the astral world out of himself, he is Manas.

So the rows defines each Logos, where creation starts from below.

▪️ The Holy Spirit is the master over the physical world. The Son and Father works through the Holy Spirit within the physical world.
▪️ The Son is master of the Soul, central creative power of creation, as shown through the whiteness in the YinYang symbol, and therefore the leading spiritual being, who is called the Logos in Saint John’s gospel.
▪️ The Father is master of the spiritual world, but not as developed as the soul, we haven’t transformed much of the physical yet.

See eventually Sophia, Created in the Beginning

Sophia, Created in the Beginning

Sophia exists in all creation myths of Earth, directly or indirectly. The terminology or gender may vary, but the story is the same. Even within the Gnostic traditions the terminology vary wildly, and they are colored from the various religious traditions they come from.

I have here tried to show the story of Sophia in connection with other creation stories, and I have been surprised how much they are alike and how sophisticated they are.

In the Beginning

Sophia existed in the beginning, from before Chaos. When the Beginning is mentioned in religious or esoteric texts it’s always about beings known as the Beginnings, Æons, or Spirits of Time and Personality.

With Sophia started time and and a new creation. All new creation starts with the First Logos, Adam or Brahma/Atma is created within time. Through the seven æons Atma is developed to become Atman.

The dominion of Sophia is what we call soul, the soul contain our personality and understanding of time.

She came out of Pistis (faith) in the form of primeval light. Immediately her will manifested itself as a likeness of heaven, with an unimaginable magnitude.

Together with Pistis, she brought a great power into being in the first æon, who we know as the Father, Adam, Osiris or Brahma, which became like a veil between the immortals and those who came into being after them.

It means that we are Fathers too, we and the Father is one, we know everything that are within him, what there was before we don’t experience within us.

Here the same description but with Osiris as the Father:

This is our universe as it looks in the first æon:

A shadow arose out of the Father, Achamod [Achamōs, Achamōth], that gave birth to envy and wrath, and became like dark waters of immeasurable deepness. This is also symbolized through Adam being created out of the earth.

We know this darkness as the minerals of our physical world. We also know it as Lilith, Tiamat or the Asuras. Pistis appeared over it, and was disturbed at what had come into being.

In the second æon, Sophia creates the Living-Eve, Zoë, the Mother and Instructors of Life, by letting a droplet of her own light flow onto the water, onto the etheric, creating the first seed of Buddhi. It became an androgynous human, which Sophia molded as a female body who bore another androgynous being. Eva proclaims her identity with Sophia and assumes the title of Isis.

Sophia sent her emanation Eve, to awaken Adam in whom there was no soul,” so that his offspring would become vessels of the light.

Then Pistis Sophia caused a lion-like spirit to come into being out of the waters, to rule over the world of matter. She called him Yaldabaoth, Aramaic for “child of chaos”, the etheric gave life to matter. He had power, but did not know how he came to be, and was “ignorant of the power of Pistis.”

He is in reality her masculine side who we later will know as Vishnu or the Son, the I AM who enter chaos where he creates order out of chaos, this chaos is also known as the Ahrimanic, Yin.

Alexander the Great, Faraoh and a Son of Zeus, is the emanation of the transformed Yaldabaoth, the Second Logos creating order out of chaos. He is also the same as Marduk who we later will know as the Archangel Michael or Mahakal. Marduk created the solar system out of Tiamat.

The Platonic philosophy used the name Demiurge instead of Yaldabaoth. Demiurge meant originally “craftsman” or “artisan” (Cain,) then became “producer” and lastly “creator”. The Demiurge is the ‘incarnated’ God, he who forms the physical out of chaos.

Chaos was his karma, so when he incarnated he took his karma on him, and although he was good, when he took the garment of karma on him he became weighted down under its weight, and had to work with the karma as any human soul must when incarnating on Earth.

Another place Adam’s creation is described in this way: The seven archons, the elemental beings of the seven planetary hierarchies, molded a man corresponding to man’s seven layers or bodies. But he had no spirit, no I AM, so they left him. Sophia sent her breath into Adam, gave him life, gave him his I AM.

Yaldabaoth and his archons were disturbed, but rejoiced when they found that Adam was not able to rise.

They are the untransformed human layers, and the I AM couldn’t permeate these wild powers. Yaldabaoth is her not yet developed masculine side.

Sophia “withdrew up to her light.”, to Buddhi, where she is known as Eve.

The godling Yaldabaoth, who is also known as Cain or Horus, the Son of God, or as Vishnu, believed that he alone existed, unaware of the goddess who brought him into being.

The thoughts of Yaldabaoth becomes the Word and moves over the waters as a spirit, and he separates the waters and land, making heaven and earth, the etheric and the physical.

Pistis says, “You are wrong, Samael, there is an immortal light man that exists before you.” He later realizes the truth of her words when he glimpses her image on the water, sees the image of buddhi in the etheric, when he had developed buddhi himself.

Sophia creates Sabaoth in the third æon, the Third Logos, who we also know as Abel, the son of Adam and Eve, the Son of Man. But he enters first the Earth in the form of Seth, as the etheric body wasn’t ready to receive the astral body in the start, why Abel has to await his time, await Golgotha.

Cain’s murder of Abel simply symbolizes that Abel can’t enter the world development yet, the etheric body (Cain) are not developed enough to connect to the astral body (Abel). Cain can’t connect to God, God can’t see his sacrifice, but God can see the sacrifice of Abel, can communicate with Abel. When Abel enters the Earth in the form of Seth he becomes the channel between God and Cain, he brings the smaller light to humanity.

Sabaoth helped Yaldabaoth up of the darkness, also known through the legend where Shiva stopped Vishnu running wild as the Lion avatar. We also know the story in the form of Enkido incarnating to help King Gilgamesh or the incarnation of Lucifer or Seth, giving humanity the astral body, the animal body, and teaching them how to live in a civilization.

Sophia, daughter of Pistis, instructs Sabaoth about all the things that exist. He becomes the first teacher of man, Lucifer, Shiva or Seth, the first Lightbringer, the bringer of civilization. Later we know him as the Holy Spirit. The true light-bringer is the Son of God, her masculine side.

Eve worked through the Snake, Lucifer. She promised the couple that they would be able to tell good from evil.

The creation told around the Three Logoi, see The Logos Walks the Earth.

 

Kronos – Æon – Zervan

Sophia exist both in a masculine form and a feminine form, but the feminine form is the main gender. We know her masculine form as the Son or Vishnu, but also as Kronos or Chronos. The masculine form are transforming chaos to order, to Manas, Buddhi and Atma. Sophia or Kronos introduced time. 

Isis – Sophia

From Rudolf Steiner, Isis and Madonna:

“… Therefore in the true sense of spiritual science we do not speak only of one Mother but of the Mothers, realizing that what we have today as the physical Mother is the last development of the soul-spiritual figure out of the spiritual realm.

There are in fact images of Isis representing not one Mother but Mothers, three Mothers.

In front we have a figure, Isis with the Horus child at her breast, resembling the oldest representations of the Madonna.

But behind this figure in certain Egyptian representations we have another figure, an Isis, bearing on her head the two familiar cow horns and the wings of the hawk, offering the “Crux Ansata”☥ (Ankh) to the child.

We see that what is physical, human, in the foremost figure is here more spiritualized. 

Behind there is yet a third figure, bearing a lion’s head and representing the third stage of the human soul. This is how these three Isis figures appear, one behind the other. It is an actual fact that our human soul bears in it three natures — a will nature, found in the inmost depths of the being, a feeling nature and a wisdom nature. These are the three soul Mothers; we meet them in the three figures of the Egyptian Isis.”

See Esoteric Aspects of the Isis Figure.

The universe as seen in old Egypt:

The I AM of Sophia/Yaldabaoth moves through the seven bodies in seven consecutive æons.

Horus is Cain/Yaldabaoth, the Second Logos, and he is the beginning, and the middle, and the end. 

In the first part of Earth he is going through the lower three bodies, mineral, etheric and astral body, creating our body. Also called the three pre-earthly deeds of Michael or Christ.

In the middle of Earth he is in the soul of humankind, developing the three soul bodies, sentient soul, intellectual soul and consciousness soul.

In the last part of Earth he develop the three spirit bodies together with humankind, and when the Earth have become old he raises with humanity to become spirit.

Goethe and the Mothers

Rudolf Steiner on Faust and the Mothers:

“Now what does this journey to the Mothers signify for Faust? …

Mephistopheles himself cannot enter the realm where the Mothers are enthroned although he gives Faust the key. Mephistopheles is the spirit of materialism, the spirit contained in the forces and powers of man’s material existence. To him the realm of the Mothers is the realm of nothingness.

Faust, the spiritual human being, with his bent towards the spirit is able to answer: “In thy nothingness I hope to find the All.”

Then follows the highly remarkable and significant description of the realm of the Mothers, and we are told how they weave and live in a sphere out of which the forms of the visible world are fashioned; how man, if he would penetrate to the Mothers, must rise above all that lives in space and time.

Formation, transformation, this is the essence of their realm. They are mysterious Goddesses holding sway in a spiritual realm behind the reality of the senses.

Faust must penetrate to them if he is to obtain knowledge of all that transcends the sensory and physical. Only by widening his soul to this realm of the Mothers can Faust worthily unite in Helen the eternal with the temporal.

… Goethe fully understood how in this realm of the Mothers one has to do with a sphere into which man is able to penetrate when he awakens slumbering spiritual forces in his soul.

This is for him the great moment in which are revealed to him the spiritual beings and facts which are always around us, but which with the eyes of the senses we see as little as the blind man sees color and light. It is the moment when the spiritual eyes and ears are opened to a world lying behind the physical world. Entrance into this realm is portrayed by the journey to the Mothers.”

More here on Faust and the Mothers.

The Three Fates

The three aspects of Isis-Sophia is a mystery, hidden in plain sight. Who does the gods bow for, the Three Fates. They lay the plan for everything in existence, for gods and man.

The Moirai

The three are called  Clotho (spinner), Lachesis (allotter) and Atropos (unturnable). The string of fate is a concrete experience for many who can see clairvoyantly, as a string with markings of old and new karma, what we have or had to handle. When zooming in on the thread it is seen as the Akashic Chronicles.

The Norns

The Norns was the absolute powers of destiny. They took the one eye of Odin and gave him the language instead, here we have the start of Kali Yuga or End of Dreamtime, we lost the spiritual communication, dream-language and got the spoken language in its stead. This we also know from India, where Vac or Saraswati was the giver of language.

From Wikipedia:

In Norse mythology the Norns are female beings who rule the destiny of gods and men, twining the thread of life. They set up the laws and decided on the lives of the children of men. Their names were Urðr (that which became or happened) related with Wyrd, weird (fate), Verðandi (that which is happening) and Skuld (that which should become, debt, guilt).

From “Myths of the Norsemen“:

As soon as the Golden Age [dreamtime] was ended, and sin began to steal even into the heavenly homes of Asgard, the Norns made their appearance under the great ash Yggdrasil, and took up their abode near the Urdar fountain. …

These three sisters, whose names were Urd, Verdandi, and Skuld, were personifications of the past, present, and future.

Their principal occupations were to weave the web of fate; to sprinkle daily the sacred tree with water from the Urdar fountain, and to put fresh clay around its roots, that it might remain fresh and ever green.

Thence come the maids Who much do know;
Three from the hall
Beneath the tree;
One they named Was,
And Being next,
The third Shall be.
~The Voluspa (Henderson’s tr.)

Some authorities further state that the Norns kept watch over the golden apples which hung on the branches of the tree of life, experience [Buddhi], and knowledge [Etheric body], allowing none but Idun to pick the fruit, which was that with which the gods renewed their youth.

From Wikipedia:

“In Snorri Sturluson’s interpretation of the Völuspá, Urðr (Wyrd), Verðandi and Skuld, the three most important of the Norns, come out from a hall standing at the Well of Urðr or Well of Fate.

They draw water from the well and take sand that lies around it, which they pour over Yggdrasill so that its branches will not rot.

These three Norns are described as powerful maiden giantesses (Jotuns) whose arrival from Jötunheimr ended the golden age of the gods.”

Here’s two things that are especially interesting, the Norns keep Yggdrasill alive, the Tree of Life, they keep our microcosmos alive, they are Sophia.

The other thing are that they ended the Golden Age of the gods, meaning that they ended what the Australian Aboriginals calls Dreamtime, what the Indians calls Kali Yuga and connects to the death of Krishna, and the old testament connects to the Tower of Babel. Now the gods, our archetypes, where tamed.

The Ariadne Thread

The hero Theseus handled six Chtlonic demons at six gates to the underworld and the Marathonian Bull, corresponding to the seven chakras, before he was send to Crete to slay the Minotaur. He was send to Crete together with six men and seven women as sacrifices to the Minotaur, but his goal was to slay the Minotaur.

Ariadne was the Mistress of the Labyrinth, and she falls in love with him, she spins a thread he should use in the labyrint to find his way out again, and she gave him a sword to kill the Minotaur.

The Labyrinth is the physical world. The Ariadne thread is the Thread of Life, the Akashic Record, the wisdom of his life, dharma, he builds while descending into the physical world.

Theseus uses the Thread of Life to ascend from the depth again. The Minotaur is Karma, Chaos, called Sin or Ahriman by some traditions, and the Sword is the ‘I’ used to fight Karma.

Theseus was god working on Earth and Ariadne god working from the spiritual world.

See also The Strings of Fate.

Sophia in Hindu Mythology

Vāc – The Word

Vāc (eng: Vāk) is the Sanskrit word for “speech” and a Vedic goddess. In the early Rigveda vāc refers to cosmic sound, the earliest sounds, envisioned as feminine. She said the OM of creation.

She is called the “mother of the Vedas”, and she gave mankind speech, which connects her to the Norns, who gave Odin and humankind language, replacing the dream-language.

She is identified with goddess Saraswati in later Vedic literature and post-Vedic texts of Hindu traditions.

The Tantric vision of Vāk displaying her omniform manifestation (viratsvarupa)
19th century. Rajasthan. The same form as Arjuna’s cosmic vision of Krishna.

Saraswati – Goddess of wisdom

Saraswati is the goddess of knowledge and wisdom and matches Sophia nicely.

The creation myth of India are many and complicated, but they are all inspired describing what happened with different words.

Some say that Saraswati, as part of Vishnu, created Brahma, but Saraswati became unconscious after the creation, first when Brahma had created the physical did Saraswati become conscious again, and Brahma gave Birth to her into his new creation, bound Buddhi together with Atma and the etheric to the physical.

Until then, Brahma’s creation was full of chaos, but with the help of Saraswati the creation got form, the etheric formed the physical.

Brahma is Atma and the physical, Saraswati is Buddhi and the etheric world, but also the spiritual side of Vishnu.

When the creation continues, she also emanates down into Lakshmi and Parvati, the feminine side of the Trimurti, Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva.

Though Krishna recited the Gita, the credit goes to Saraswati as she resided in Vishnu’s tongue, was the wisdom of Vishnu, was Buddhi. Together they created the Gita. Thus Saraswati, who is called the mother of the Vedas, also becomes the mother of the Gita.

Brahma, the Supreme Being of Light

The first living being within the world of matter is Brahma, the highest Light being within the universe, in the topmost seventh heaven, Atma.

Brahma, is the first created being in countless universes with countless Brahmas but in each universe there is only one Brahma.

The universes themselves emanate from the absolute Individual, in Sanskrit called Vishnu, ‘the omnipresent One’, God as Creator. The emanation and dissolution of the countless universes is described as the exhaling and inhaling of Vishnu, as bubbles of space and time within the Causal Ocean of Vishnu.

Within this primordial universe Brahma appears as a ray, or ‘son’, of Vishnu. Through Brahma, hierarchical dimensions of existence are materialized, basically seven in number. It is Brahma who creates in ‘seven days’, starting with the channelling of light into the dark universe: ‘Let light come to be.’

Vishnu

“The world rests as the lotus in the palm of my hand, the cosmos revolves around my finger like a discus. I blow the music of life through my conch and wield my mace to protect all creatures.” – Krishna Upanishad

I can’t separate Sophia from Vishnu, they are one. It’s as if Sophia is the inner wisdom where Vishnu is the active wisdom, forming the universe.

Vishnu is Atman, and Atman is the soul, the developing agent of the universe.

Brahma emerges at the moment when time and universe is born, inside a lotus rooted in the navel of Hari, Vishnu. The Lotus could symbolize Sophia, wisdom, order in chaos. The beings with resurrection body, rainbow body, are said to be born out of the Lotus.

For Brahma and Shiva it seems to be opposite, it’s as if their feminine part is the physical and the astral world.

From Vishnu Sustains the Universe.

Vishnu is the All-Pervading One, derived from “vis’ in Sanskrit which means both ‘to spread’ and ‘to be present everywhere’. Even when there was Nothing, there was Vishnu, present as a nameless, formless, dormant energy. In this un-manifested (nirguna) state, even Vishnu was not aware of his own being. He just was.

In this Nothingness, when the first ripple of awareness stirred , spontaneously and of its own will, the formless energy became Vishnu, the Supreme Being, Parabrahman.

When Brahma begins the process of Creation, it is Vishnu who expands into everything and becomes part of everything. Now he is Brahman, the Cosmic Consciousness.

As if he is seeing a dream, Vishnu watches Brahma create the Universe. By the act of watching his dream, Vishnu sustains the Universe. When Vishnu wakes from his dream one cycle of Creation ends.

Vishnu who dreams up the Universe must also now protect it. To maintain the order of Creation, Vishnu becomes The Protector. He takes the form of Ishwara or God.

At times, when world descends into total chaos, Lord Vishnu comes to its rescue in the form of an Avatar, or incarnation.

The wisdom of Sophia or Saraswati was what formed the universe.

See The Symbology and Meaning of AUM.

Viśvákarma – The divine architect of the Universe

God as Creator is also known as Viśvákarma.

From The Spiritual Beings in the Heavenly Bodies and in the Kingdoms of Nature, lecture 9, April 13, 1912:

“Then came the civilisation of Zarathustra; and Zarathustra pointed again to the same being whom the Holy Rishis had called Vishvakarma, only he alluded to him in his own way as Ahura Mazdao. The Holy Rishis knew, as also did Zarathustra, that what is meant by Vishvakarma represents the Spirit of Wisdom who streams down upon the earth and encompasses wider spheres than do the individual Spirits of Motion. Zarathustra too knew that Ahura Mazdao has wider spheres than the Spirits of Motion.”

He is the Principal Universal Architect who fabricated and designed the divine architecture of the Universe, the Lord of Creation. Brahma emerges at the moment when time and universe is born, inside a lotus rooted in the navel of Hari, Vishnu. In Rig veda Viswakarma is seen as the Ultimate reality, from whose navel all the visible comes. Same imagery is seen in Yajurveda purusha sukta, where the divine smith Tvastar originating from Viswakarma. As he is Aja the unborn he is the primordial personification of the upanishadic Parabrahman.

Vishwakarma was the universal father, creator and an all seeing god who has faces, eyes and feet on every side; and who produced and gave name to all the Heavenly, Earthly and other Celestial realms and preserves them through the exercise of his arms and wings. He sacrificed himself to himself for the evolution of this visible world, thus he is Purusha, in Christian tradition, the Mystical Lamb.

Shakti

Shakti is another description of Sophia, she is both wisdom and the chaos order is created from. She is the karma that teaches the gods.

In Shrimad Devi Bhagwat Puranas 1st book and 4th chapter. Devi addressed the Trimurti as follows:

“I am Adi Parashakti. I am the owner of this universe. I am the Absolute Reality. I am dynamic in feminine form and static in masculine form. You have appeared to govern the universe through my energy. You are the masculine form of Absolute Reality, while I am the feminine form of that Reality. I am beyond form, beyond everything, and all the powers of God are contained within me. You must know that I am the Eternal limitless energy.

She then said: Brahma! You will be generator of the universe; the Goddess Sharada (Saraswati) is your consort, she will be recognized as the goddess of wisdom and the primeval sound. Lord Brahma, this goddess will be with you when you create the universe.

She continued: Lord Narayana (Krishna)! You are formless, yet you take form. I assign you to be the preserver of the universe. You will take a different incarnations in order to save this universe’s inhabitants. Oh Narayana! You have created Lord Brahma, and Brahma will further create thirty three kind of gods and goddesses. My third shakthi, goddess Mahakali, has been born from your mystic sleep. Your consort will be goddess Lakshmi. Lord Vishnu, this goddess will be with you when you rule/maintain the universe. When life evolves, you will take the form of Vishnu, the one who will perform the task of observing and preserving this universe.

At Last she instructed: “Oh Lord Rudra, the Great God, you are the personification of time, which is above all. You will perform the task of destroying and regenerating this universe. When you are formless, time stands still. It is due to my power that you become dynamic and are capable of bringing about the destruction and regeneration of this universe. Your consort is goddess Mahakali, Mahakali is myself , my full form , where Laxmi and Saraswati is just my clone, partial form but due to meditation, you will surpass all my forms. It is then that I will incarnate from your left half in my manifested form. This form will be my truest manifested form. Lord Shiva, I will perform the task of destroying evil and will incarnate as your consort”.

It is interesting that she will be the consort of Shiva (Lucifer) in the form of Mahakali, the feminine form of Mahakal, who we know as Michael. Mahakali was part of Vishnu, but when she left his body, he became conscious.

More on Krishna here: Krishna and the Holy Spirit and Krishna as Teacher of Love.

Atman

The Aitareya Upanishad mentions that only the “Atman” (the Self) existed in the beginning. The Self created the universe we know, the physical, the etheric (breath of life) and the astral (fire). He also created the speech. He then formed the Purusha from the etheric.

The beginning points to Sophia, she was a spirit of time and personality, time started with her. Creating the speech, language, also points to Sophia.

In the beginning Atman, the I AM, pointed at the physical, and was nearly unconscious. This is the same that are said about Sophia, that she was unconscious in the first period where Adam was created.

In the next period or æon, the old Sun, Atman points to and develops the etheric. In the following period, the old Moon, Atman points to and develops the astral. In our current period Atman points at and develops the soul, our soul.

Atman will in this way develop all the seven layers of the human body ending with Atma!

In Taoism

In Taoism the creation is shown through the Trigrams. The trigrams are build from below, where the lowest line represents the First Logos, the middle line the Second Logos and the top line the Third Logos. Here another representation of the development of the trigrams, and related to western symbolism.

Here’s  how the children was created (from the Book of Change). 

The Creative (☰ Qian) is Heaven, therefore, it is called the Father.
The Receptive (☷ Kun) is the Earth, therefore, it is called the Mother.

• In the Trigram of the Arousing (☳ Zhen,) she seeks for the first time the power of the male and receives a son. Therefore, the Arousing is called the Eldest Son. [The highest spiritual principle in man, Atma.]
• In the Trigram of the Gentle (☴ Xun) the male seeks for the first time the power of the female and receives a daughter. Therefore, the Gentle is called the Eldest Daughter. [The lowest principle in man, the physical.]
• In the Trigram of the Abysmal (☵ Kan) she seeks for a second time and receives a son. Therefore, it is called the Middle Son. [The second lowest principle, the etheric.]
• In the Trigram of the Clinging (☲ Li) he seeks for a second time and receives a daughter. Therefore, it is called the Middle Daughter. [The second highest principle, Buddhi.]
• In the Trigram of Keeping (☶ Gen) Still she seeks for a third time and receives a son. Therefore, it is called the Youngest Son. [The third highest principle, Manas.]
• In the Trigram of the Joyous (☱ Dui) he seeks for a third time and receives a daughter. Therefore, it is called the Youngest Daughter. [The third lowest principle, the Astral.]

Inserted into the figure of the Alchemist Mountain:

The trigrams have names from their position in the family, and the oldest son and daughter corresponds to the First Logos, the middle son and daughter corresponds to the two personalities of the Second Logos and the youngest son and daughter corresponds to the Third Logos.

See also The Taoist Triad and the Three Logoi

More on the periods, æons: Esoteric History of Man.

The Soul as Truth, Beauty and Love

🔸Truth, and goodness, and beauty, are but different faces of the same All.
— Ralph Waldo Emerson

🔸It was one of those evenings when men feel that truth, goodness and beauty are one.
— Aldous Huxley

🔸The ideals which have always shone before me and filled me with the joy of living are goodness, beauty, and truth.
— Albert Einstein

This is an extract of Rudolf Steiner’s lecture on Truth, Beauty and Goodness, and it’s an alternate way to look at the soul:

From the heading: “Rudolf Steiner stated that the primary function of education is to exercise the students’ faculties of thinking, feeling and willing. These basic human qualities manifest in civilization as the “eternal verities” of truth, beauty and goodness, and these in turn in science, art and religion.”

From Steiners Truth, Beauty and Goodness:

The True, the Beautiful, the Good — through all the ages of man’s conscious evolution these words have expressed three great ideals: ideals which have instinctively been recognized as representing the sublime nature and lofty goal of all human endeavour.

In epochs earlier than our own there was a deeper knowledge of man’s being and his connection with the universe, when Truth, Beauty and Goodness had more concrete reality than they have in our age of abstraction.

Anthroposophy, or Spiritual Science, is able once again to indicate the concrete reality of such ideals, although in so doing it does not always meet with the approval of the times.

For in our age men love to be vague and nebulous whenever it is a question of getting beyond the facts of everyday life.

Let us try to understand how Truth, Beauty and Goodness are related, as concrete realities, to the being of man…

In his pre-earthly existence man lives in a world of pure Spirit, where, in communion with higher Beings, he is engaged in building up the spiritual prototype, the spirit-form of his physical body. The physical body here on earth is but an after-copy of the spirit-germ that is elaborated, in a certain sense, by man himself in pre-earthly existence.

In earthly life the human being is conscious of his physical body, but does not know what this implies. We speak of Truth, little realizing that a feeling for truth is connected with our consciousness of the physical body.

When man is confronted by a simple fact, he may either form an idea that harmonizes strictly with it and thus is true, or, from inaccuracy, laziness or positive aversion to truth, he may evolve an idea that does not coincide with the fact.

• When he thinks the truth, he is in harmony with the feeling he has of his physical body, nay also with his sense of the connection between this physical body and pre-earthly existence.

• If out of laziness or untruthfulness he forms an idea that is not in accordance with the fact, it is as if he cut the thread that binds him to pre-earthly existence. Untruth severs this thread.

In pre-earthly existence a delicate spiritual wool is spun, and this is concentrated into an after-copy — the physical body. Many threads connect this physical body with pre-earthly existence, and they are severed by untruthfulness.

The purely intellectual consciousness that is a characteristic quality in the early stages of the epoch of the consciousness Soul does not realize that such a severance takes place. And that is why man is subject to so many illusions as to his connection with cosmic existence.

For the most part to-day, man regards his bodily health from a purely physical point of view. But when, through untruthfulness, he severs the threads that bind him with pre-earthly existence, this works right down into his physical body, and especially into the constitution of the nervous system.

The feeling he has of his physical body gives him his “spiritual sense of being” in the universe. And this spiritual sense of being depends upon maintenance of the threads proceeding from the physical body to pre-earthly existence.

If they break, man must create a substitute for his healthy sense of being — and he does so, unconsciously. He is then led, unconsciously, to ascribe to himself a sense of being “out of the common.” But even here he has fallen into an inner uncertainty that makes itself felt even in the physical body….

What is it that can strengthen man in this sense of being? In earthly existence we live in a world that is but a copy of true reality. Indeed, we only understand this physical world aright when we realize it to be this copy of reality.

It behooves us, however, to feel the true reality within us; we must be aware of our connection with the spiritual world. And this is only possible if the bond that links us with pre-earthly existence remains intact.

This bond is strengthened by a love of truth and Integrity. Nothing establishes man’s true and original sense of existence so firmly as a feeling for truth and truthfulness.

To feel himself in duty bound first to “prove all things” he utters, to set due restraint on all his words — this helps to consolidate the sense of existence that is worthy of his being.

To be aware of the spirit within the physical body — with this, indeed, the sense of being is connected. There is, in effect, an intimate kinship between the physical body and this ideal of Truth.

We acquire the etheric body (or body of “formative forces”) only a short time before the descent from pre-earthly to earthly existence. We draw the forces of the etheric world together, as it were, to build up our own etheric body.

The sense of the reality of the etheric body is strengthened by the experience of Beauty. When truth and truthfulness enter the realm of real experience, we are, in a sense, living rightly in the physical body. A highly developed sense of beauty gives us a right relation to the etheric body of formative forces. Whereas Truth is connected with the physical body, Beauty is connected with the etheric body.

If we try either through sculpture, painting, or drama — indeed, through any art — to portray a human being, we endeavour to create a figure that is sufficient and complete in itself — one that contains a whole world, just as man contains the whole universe within himself in his etheric body. For he draws together the etheric forces from the whole universe to mould his etheric body within earthly existence.

An intense feeling for beauty — as it was then conceived — existed in earlier ages. Nothing of the same kind is present in modern civilization, Man cannot be truly man if he has no sense of beauty. It is so, indeed; for to possess a sense of beauty is to acknowledge the reality of the etheric body. To have no sense of beauty is to disregard, to disown, the etheric body.

Enthusiasm for truth and truthfulness can kindle in man — in the unconscious depths of his soul at any rate — a feeling for pre-earthly existence. …. But when this sense is highly developed, it binds man strongly to the pre-earthly past, and his more immediate experience of the earthly present must needs cause a certain sadness to arise within him.

It is a sadness that can only find consolation if the sense of beauty is awakened in the soul. Beauty gives us joy once more, even in the presence of a sadness that must always accompany great enthusiasm for truth.

In a delicate, subtle way this enthusiasm tells us: Truth, alas, is only really present in pre-earthly existence. …. Only enthusiasm for truth can help us to maintain intact our relationship with pre-earthly existence.

We ought never to undervalue the significance of beauty in education and in outer culture. A civilization that is filled with ugly machines, with chimneys and smoke, and dispenses with beauty, is a world that makes no efforts to forge a link between man and pre-earthly existence; indeed, it tears him asunder.

The world of spirit in which we live during our pre-earthly existence is always present. We have but to stretch out our arms, as it were, to this pre-earthly world of spirit.

Although it is always there, a link can only be forged in the depths of unconscious life when man glows with enthusiasm for truth and truthfulness.

And when his heart thrills with love for the beautiful, this too forms a bond with pre-earthly existence. …. To glow in response to beauty means that in his soul man must create in a picture, at least, a new link with pre-earthly spirituality.

A good man is one who can bear his own soul over into the soul of another. Upon this all true morality depends, and without morality no true social order among earthly humanity can be maintained.

When this true morality develops into momentous impulses of will which then pass to reality in moral acts, it begins to be a quickening, all-pervading impulse in the soul, inasmuch as a man can then be moved to real sympathy at the sight of care on the face of another — his own astral body feels pain at the sight of suffering in others.

Truth, then, is related to the physical body, Beauty to the etheric body, Goodness to the astral body. Here we have the concrete reality of the three abstractions of Truth, Beauty, Goodness.

These ideals show us how far man is able to fulfill his whole human nature, when, to begin with, as he lives in his physical body, he is filled with a real sense of truth instead of conventional opinions.

Again, full “humanity” is only afforded a worthy existence when a man can quicken his etheric body into life through his feeling for beauty. …. One can merely gaze at beauty or one can experience it. …. To gaze at beauty is not to experience it. The moment we experience beauty, however, the etheric body is quickened.

A man may do good because of some convention, or because punishment is in store for serious wrong-doing — or, again, because other people will respect him less if he does wrong.

He can, however, also do good from sheer love of goodness. … Such an experience of goodness will always lead to a recognition of the reality of the astral body. Indeed, only this recognition will teach man anything about the essence of goodness.

There can only be abstract knowledge of and inconsequent chatter about goodness, if loving enthusiasm for goodness in its essence does not lead to actual experience of the astral body.

▪️The sense of truth is a heritage from pre-earthly existence.

▪️The sense of beauty will create an image, at least, of pre-earthly connection with spirit.

▪️Experience of goodness is a link, leading directly to the world he enters after death.

To be true is to be rightly united with our spiritual past. To sense beauty means that in the physical world we do not disown our connection with spirit. To be good is to build a living seed for a spiritual world in the future.

Past, present, future — these three concepts, as they play their part in human life, assume far-reaching significance when we understand the concrete reality of the other three concepts — Truth, Beauty, Goodness.

The man who is untruthful denies his spiritual past; the liar severs the threads between himself and his spiritual past. He who disregards beauty is building himself an abode on earth where the sun of spirit never shines, where he wanders in spiritless shadow. The man who belies the good renounces his spiritual future; and yet he would like this future to be bestowed on him, may be by means of some outer remedy.

It was, indeed, out of a profound instinct that Truth, Beauty and Goodness were held to be the greatest ideals of human striving. Yet they have faded away into shadowy words, and it is only our present age that can bestow concrete reality upon them.”

The Taoist Triad and the Three Logoi

“The Tao produced One; One produced Two; Two produced Three.
From these three, all mankind descended.”
~Lao Tzu in Tao te King, 600BC.

All religious and esoteric traditions, philosophies and sciences try to describe the same world, and my goal was to find the shared pattern below all these. But, it’s not necessarily easy to find these patterns, the vocabularies are usually very different. The logic in Taoism seemed to be very different from the European tradition, where we had seven as key value they had eight, why? There were many questions like that. My first article on Taoism: Tao – The Equilibrium of Yin and Yang.

Especially I Ching was fascinating with their trigrams and hexagrams. It was a very stringent logical system, although the reasons was elusive. It was very different from anything else in the rest of the world. The big question was how it had been created and what the logic behind them was. Was it possible to connect it with European or Indian esotericism, with Kabbalah or astrology?

Some years ago i found out why we used seven and they used eight, it was quite easy when I first found out: Outside China we count the seven inner planetary bodies except Earth, the Chinese includes the Earth. Here we have the eight bodies to the left and the seven bodied projection to the right, where the Sun and Earth are projected into the same point.

I was fascinated by the The Book of Change, called the I Ching, that is one of the world’s oldest works of literature. In my Dark Night of the Soul I used it to solve some difficult questions and I was surprised how precise its advices was, even though it was an old old system. I was then ‘told’ that it was nearly as good as when it was created.

I studied the text and found out that it was kind of teaching or rule book for a civilization, and it was the guiding book for the development of the Chinese civilization.  I Ching was both appreciated by the Confucians and Taoists alike.

All civilizations are in danger of decadence, of the powers of Yin or Ahriman in Anthroposophic vocabulary, but I Ching is a guide for a society to keep the society in balance. This is the reason behind the longevity of the Chinese civilisation, but at the price of stasis, nothing new happened, but it was a perfect first class for new souls. As there isn’t coming many new souls into humanity any longer, they had to break the stasis, and that was what the culture revolution of Mao did. One kind of materialism is replaced by a new materialism, a cultureless materialism, where people can begin to find their own path.

The creation of the eight Pa Kua or trigrams at the root of the sixty-four principles, hexagrams, are ascribed to the legendary Fu-Xi, who ruled during the third millennium BC.

The creation:

Tao gives birth to One,
One gives birth to Two,
The Two gives birth to Three,
The Three gives birth to all universal things.
All universal things shoulder the Yin and embrace the Yang.
The Yin and Yang mingle and mix with each other to beget the harmony.

This reminds very much on the creation story around the Three Logoi. Here a drawing of the creation:

Steiner uses the following symbols for the Three Logoi (The Logos Walks the Earth):

First Logos gives the idea, Second Logos gives life and Third Logos gives the resulting form.

The trigrams are build from below, where the lowest line represents the First Logos, the middle line the Second Logos and the top line the Third Logos. Here another representation of the development of the trigrams, and related to western symbolism.

From Xìcí 繫辭 “Appended Judgments” commentary to the I Ching (tr. Wilhelm and Baynes 1967:318-9):

Therefore there is in the Changes the Great Primal Beginning.

▪️ This generates the two primary forces.
▪️ The two primary forces generate the four images.
▪️ The four images generate the eight trigrams.
▪️ The eight trigrams determine good fortune and misfortune.
▪️ Good fortune and misfortune create the great field of action.

See also Wikipedia: Taiji.

Here’s  how the children was created (from the Book of Change):

The Creative (☰ Qian) is heaven, therefore, it is called the father.
The Receptive (☷ Kun) is the earth, therefore, it is called the mother.
In the Trigram of the Arousing (☳ Zhen,) she seeks for the first time the power of the male and receives a son. Therefore, the Arousing is called the Eldest Son. [The highest spiritual principle in man, Atma.]
In the Trigram of the Gentle (☴ Xun) the male seeks for the first time the power of the female and receives a daughter. Therefore, the Gentle is called the Eldest Daughter. [The lowest principle in man, the physical.]
In the Trigram of the Abysmal (☵ Kan) she seeks for a second time and receives a son. Therefore, it is called the Middle Son. [The second lowest principle, the etheric.]
In the Trigram of the Clinging (☲ Li) he seeks for a second time and receives a daughter. Therefore, it is called the Middle Daughter. [The second highest principle, Buddhi.]
In the Trigram of Keeping (☶ Gen) Still she seeks for a third time and receives a son. Therefore, it is called the Youngest Son. [The third highest principle, Manas.]
In the Trigram of the Joyous (☱ Dui) he seeks for a third time and receives a daughter. Therefore, it is called the Youngest Daughter. [The third lowest principle, the Astral.]

The trigrams have names from their position in the family, and the oldest son and daughter corresponds to the First Logos, the middle son and daughter corresponds to the two personalities of the Second Logos and the youngest son and daughter corresponds to the Third Logos.

Buddhi is the Middle Daughter, and that is right, Buddhi is the feminine power of the trinity, Sophia or Isis.

The Father is heaven and the Mother is Earth, and the hexagrams describes the path humanity follows from Earth to Heaven, all inclusive.

In the Taijitu Shuo version of Taoist cosmology, the Two give birth to the Five Agents or Elements, whose various combinations generate the ten-thousand things.

 

The five Agents or Elements in their primary sequence: Wood (木) → Fire (火) → Earth (土) → Metal (金) → Water (水)

Elements and family members inserted into the figure of the Alchemist Mountain:

The paths from darkness to light.

From Yi-Globe.

The trigrams can also be put into a Fano Plane (for the math inclined Wikipedia). Those who know the octal number system will see that all opposing trigrams add to Qian (☰). Like ☰= ☶ + ☱.

It’s like the second and third triangle in the Kabbalah Tree of Life.

Interestingly enough the Fano Plane reminds about the Deathly Hallows  from the Harry Potter books.

The Three Pure Ones

From Wikipedia:

The Three Pure Ones … are the Taoist Trinity, the three highest Gods in the Taoist pantheon. They are regarded as pure manifestation of the Tao and the origin of all sentient beings.

First Logos:

“Heavenly King of the Chaotic Never-ending Primordial Beginning”) at a time of pre-Creation when the Universe was still null and the cosmos was in disorder; manifesting into the first of the Taoist Trinity, Yuánshǐ Tiānzūn. Yuánshǐ Tiānzūn oversees the earliest phase of Creation of the Universe, and is henceforth known as Dàobǎo (道寶) “Treasure of the Tao”.

Second Logos:

In One produces Two—Taiji produces Yin Yang, Yuanshi Tianzun manifests into Lingbao Tianzun who separated the Yang from the Yin, the clear from the murky, and classified the elements into their rightful groups. Therefore, he is also known as Jīngbǎo (經寶) “Treasure of the Law/Scripture”.

While Jīng in popular understanding means “scriptures”, in this context it also mean “passing through” [the phase of Creation] and the Laws of Nature of how things are meant to be.

Third Logos:

In the final phase of Creation, Daode Tianzun is manifested from Língbăo Tiānzūn to bring civilization and preach the Law to all living beings. Therefore, He is also known as Shībǎo (師寶) “Treasure of the Master”.

Transformation of Yin to Yang – TAO

The dark side is the universe not yet conscious in God, in Tao, where  the white is transformed darkness.

The body lies in darkness, the spirit in light, but the spirit is weak, and the body is strong. The soul permeates both body and spirit and is the driving power in the development, is TAO, the Logos.

See also Creation in Taoist tradition and European tradition

Various Sources on I Ching

The Gnostic Book of Changes is a well researched book on I Ching, usable as introduction and as reference book. It can both be read on the site or downloaded as pdf-file.

In Chapter 3 he describes the structure of the I Ching Oracle with tender care, making much of the above easier understandable.

From his book:

In the Hexagram as in the Star of David are Heaven and Earth meeting.

Café au Soul have a well made site for using the I Ching Oracle.

 

Elemental Beings, Karma & Ceremonial Magic

This text by Rudolf Steiner look at karma from a different view than normally, he looks at the underlying beings and processes behind or below karma:

“Human beings and animals differ from each other through the fact that they have their consciousness on different planes. Now there are also other beings besides minerals, plants, animals and human beings.

Elemental Beings

There are beings who have their consciousness on the physical plane and their body in the astral. Such a being is, as it were, an animal in reverse. Such beings actually exist; they are the elemental beings. In order to make their nature comprehensible let us be clear about what belongs to the physical plane.

Physical is: Firstly the solid earth, secondly water, thirdly air, fourthly ether (warmth ether, light ether, chemical ether, life ether). Let us keep to the four lower forms of our physical plane and separate the etheric world from them.

States of consciousness can lie in all four forms of the physical plane while the body of such a being lies in the astral.

We must think of the consciousness in the solid Earth, the body in the astral; or a being that has its consciousness in the water and its body in the astral; then such a being with its consciousness in the air and its body in the astral and one with its consciousness in fire and its body in the astral.

Present-day man knows but little of such beings; in our time it is only through poetry that they are known. Miners (of minerals) however know such beings very well. A gnome is only visible to someone who can see on the astral plane, but miners frequently possess such an astral vision; they know that gnomes are realities.

Thus, on our Earth there exist various forms of consciousness, and what the natural scientist today calls laws of nature are the thoughts of beings who think on the physical plane but have their bodies on the astral plane. [Like the electromagnetic bindings.]

When in physics we have to do with laws of nature we can say: these are the thoughts of a being who has its body on the astral plane. The forces of nature are creative beings and natural laws are their thoughts.

[We can say they live in our inner world and we live in their inner world!]

In the Middle Ages the alchemist tried to make use of these spirits. Goethe knew this very well; Faust wished to have fire air; this was to be produced by the salamanders which have their body on the astral plane.

Thus we have around us beings who actually have their consciousness in fire, to whom we cause pain when fire is kindled, for by so doing we actually cause a certain alteration in the body of the being in question on the astral plane.

When one kindles fire one alters this astral being. In the same way when one brings about alterations in other spheres of the elements and the forces of Nature one alters something in these astral beings.

When we do this or that we are continuously peopling the astral plane. If we think these thoughts through clearly, we have the meaning of church ritual: that is, not to make use of any kind of substances on the physical plane, except such as have meaning, whereby meaningful beings arise on the astral plane.

When for instance one kindles the smoke of incense one does something which has purpose; one burns a particular substance and creates beings of a particular kind. When one passes a sword through the air in four directions one creates a definite kind of being.

It is the same with the priest, when he makes definite movements with his hands, to accompany definite sounds o, i, u, intensified by repetition: Dominus vobiscum.

From Elementals and Natural Spirits

The sound is regular, the air is brought into definite vibrations intensified by definite movements of the hand, and a sylph is called into existence.

Sign, grip and word of the freemasons also bring about definite forms which manifest in accordance with definite laws in the physical world. Through a purposeful use of these words a link is formed from one person to another, one is enwrapped in an astral substance which is created through sign, grip and word.

Naturally man continually does all this in ordinary life, but he does it in an unsystematic way, creating contradictory beings.

Art consists in working harmoniously upwards from the physical to higher planes.

In rituals, through definite acts, the aim is to produce not contradictory but harmonious beings. At present man is not in a position to bring these things into harmony.

But for everything man creates in this way on the astral plane there are certain directing beings. So we have a world of elemental beings around us with a king.

• Among the Indians the king of the gnomes is called Kshiti, the highest of the gnomes;
• the highest being among the undines: Varuna;
• the highest being among the sylphs: Vayu,
• and everything having its consciousness in fire is directed by the king of fire: Agni.

In all activity connected with fire, water and so on we have to do with these particular Deva-beings. All the fire we have here on Earth is the substance that is woven out of the beings which belong to Agni.

Ceremonial Magic

Ceremonial magic is the lowest kind of sorcery and consists in making use of certain specially devised tricks on the physical plane in order to create definite forms and beings on the astral plane.

Schools exist today in which ceremonial magic is still exercised. Such usages cause great attraction towards the astral world and very frequently result in suicide, because then a person is almost exclusively active in the astral world and has become unaccustomed to using the physical world for its rightful purpose. He has developed a partiality for the other world and the physical body is often a hindrance.

Now you will also comprehend the connection with fire worship which has appeared in the history of religion. The followers of Zarathustra sought, through the sacrificial fire of the priests, actually to create definite forms on the astral plane.

On the Earth today everything takes place physically. But from what has been said, one can see that astral beings are continually created under the influence of our deeds. All deeds are accompanied by astral beings.

Karma

These are our Skandas which bring about our Karma. But also all physical deeds leave astral beings behind on the astral plane.

For instance Cologne cathedral corresponds to a definite being on the astral plane. Through everything that happens on the Earth, when all physical matter is worked over and the Earth has dissolved, through this the next astral Globe will arise of itself. It will simply be there as astral beings, as the effects of all the earlier physical processes. [The Earth as planet with mountains, lakes and oceans, is the result of the Angels life on the previous Earth incarnation, the old Moon. In the same way are we building the next incarnation of the Earth, the new Jupiter.]

This is why man must continually work with Karma. In his next life he must put right again the grotesque astral beings that he has bungled, otherwise they would produce meaningless creatures for the next Globe. This is Karma that he must rectify. [So handling karma is not just an ego project, it’s for the good of the karmic beings and for the whole of creation.]

What takes place on a large scale on the Earth, takes place in a small way in man. Let us think of a child. He is wrongly brought up, spoiled with sweets and so on. This not only brings about processes in the physical body but continually imparts them to the astral, so that in fact the astral body also is changed.

What one gives physically to the infant goes over into his astral body, it is present in the shape of definite forms.

What is thus worked in, is however gradually worked out again. In advanced age the sins against the child take their revenge. These sins remain throughout the whole life and have great importance particularly in the final years.

After the middle period a sort of reversal takes place; the astral then works into the physical plane.

In childhood the foundation of what man will have in old age is implanted into the astral.

When a person perceives how he has been sinned against and works upon himself with this in view, then he can eliminate the damage in the astral body, otherwise he will break down in old age under the weaknesses of his childhood.

Only what man works into it consciously has a balancing effect on the astral body. If later in life the opposite qualities are not called up consciously, one cannot rid oneself of the failings.

[In our childhood all our karma from earlier life is collected from our surroundings, if we don’t handle the karma up through life we will be confronted with it.

Old or new karma we become conscious about and handle will not become a problem, but karma we create unconsciously will be difficult to handle in the same life.

Late in life we are confronted with rest of the unhandled karma, in what’s called the Dark Night of the Soul. If we do well, we may handle it all, and ascend to the light again.]

From Foundations of Esotericism, Lecture 27.

The Holy Grail

The Holy Grail is a central symbol known up through time under different names.

The Holy Grail

The grail is symbolized with the triangle pointing down, it’s the microcosm we develop in. Its the lower three hierarchies known as angels, archangels and archai in the Christian terminology.

Here more traditions are combined into one drawing. The ego is the old center of the body from when we were animals, here symbolized with a caterpillar. The day the ego accepts the new center, the ‘I’ of the soul, as a co-worker and not an enemy, the caterpillar dies and resurrects into a butterfly.

In the drawing we have the 4 lower bodies of man. Here the
ages the bodies typically are developed are written for each period. Each period corresponds to a chakra. After 28 we begin developing the higher bodies, the higher chakras.

The grail goes long back, the following picture is an example from a vast Cetho Temple complex  that is located on the western slopes of Lawu Mountain, precisely in Gumeng Village, Jenawi District, Karanganyar Regency, Central Java Province.

The Lingga Yoni have strong similarities with the Ankh, the Tree of Life and the Grail, all describing the same reality.

The Lingga Yoni shown in the upper pictures look very much like a chalice when seen from the bottom, but seen from the side the symbolism behind the chalice is more clear. The chalice top is the uterus from where the new universe will grow, fructified by the old spiritual world symbolized by the stalk of the chalice.

Kali is also connected to the lower triangle, the Grail is symbol for the feminine.

In the lower and middle right pictures the Lingga Yoni looks like a chalice with the Sun as the hostie.

Artemis gives prana to all living beings in the physical world, ie that have an etheric body. The Grail is the Life Force behind the created.

From Anna May Triptychon where Joseph of Arimathea fils the Grail
with the blood coming from Jesus.

Artemis symbolizes the Mother, the creator of mankind, but the mother is hidden in most religions, as it was the masculine power that was needed to get man down into the physical. In this figure Apollo, the sun god, is shown hiding the moon god Artemis, mother nature, but she is the main power behind of our development.

Here a number of forms we know the Grail, including the human soul, up left:

The Crown Chakra is also the chalice of the etheric world in which we as physical being lie, as an inverted plant.

The Etheric Sun and the Rhythm of the Day

I had worked myself down into a work depression through seven years, from 42 to 49. At 49 I began the ascent from this depression, what I later found out was called the Dark Night of the Soul. I was guided through this ascent primarily through dreams, but also other ways. I was instructed about when to sleep and when and what to eat, and much more. In this ascent I lost 50 pounds and did away with a candidiasis.

But this is about the rhythm of the day, why and when to sleep and something about sleeplessness in the Dark Night of the Soul.

I was told I should sleep between 10pm and 6am, and and I found out the best sleeping time was between 10pm and 2am (22 to 2 looks better 😊.)

I have thought much about why it was so, and I found that Ayurveda described some rules about the different periods and their meaning, but it actually didn’t explain why. But the other day I remembered that the etheric sun was diametrically opposed the physical sun, it went north when the physical sun went south, and the etheric sun must go up when the physical goes down, the physical shines on us by day and the etheric sun shines on us by night, and in that way sends energy down to us all around the clock.

So midnight is midday in the etheric world, where the ether energy is at its highest.

It also explains why it is easier to sleep between 9 and 10 pm than from 10 pm and forward, the etheric sun rays are much stronger after 10pm so the energy we receive is much more intense and makes it difficult to sleep.

And it explains why Its better to sleep at night.

When we sleep in daytime there is very little etheric energy available, so our etheric body don’t restitute correctly and it often leads to stress and depressions.

Another thing is that certain beings use the darkness in the etheric world to gain access to our lone etheric body, some taking away the energy of the etheric body and others trying to get into the body, so we wake feeling weaker.

In connection with the Dark Night of the Soul, I was told that I shouldn’t eat or drink anything later than 6:45pm, a curious time, why not 7, but my best guess is that it depends on longitude and time zone, but I haven’t looked more into it. The reason was that the physical body should disturb the etheric body with activities in the digestive system.

I should sleep at 9:45pm and I woke at 5:45am sharp every morning. And it was independent of summertime, I woke curiously enough 5:45am before and after the shift.

Later in the process I slept from 10pm (9:45) to 2am, and was awake and contemplating the rest of the night. From 10pm to 2am the etheric sun is highest and strongest, filling the etheric body with energy, and from 2am to 6am the astral body work on the etheric body, using the rest of the etheric sun rays to work by.

Danish: Døgnets rytme, søvn og søvnløshed.

Soul, Love and Heart Thinking

Love and Thinking as described by Rudolf Steiner

This is the central theme all esoteric traditions try to describe, but it’s an extremely difficult subject as thinking and soul are invisible, not possible to describe through pictures.

I have described Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj,  Adyashanti,  Chögyam Trungpa,  Eckhart Tolle, and Socrates in the same way, although in Danish, and found that they say the same, but with very different words, and I hope their different descriptions of the soul makes it easier to recognize the thinking in ourselves, understanding our soul, and beginning to understand what love really is.

I will use the following terminology in the following, Ego or sentient soul is the mind for the body where our speculative word thinking takes place based on opinions and feelings, where our ‘I‘ or intellectual soul thinks wordlessly, and the higher I or Consciousness soul interfaces the wisdom in Spirit Self or Manas.

The ego creates the illusion through it’s opinions, and the veil of illusion covers the wisdom from the souls thinking.

But it is explained more detailed below.

Wordless Thinking

Rudolf Steiner	My Comments
Thinking… is no more and no less an organ of perception than the eye or ear.Just as the eye perceives colours and the ear sounds, so thinking perceives ideas.	This is more related to hearing than seeing as we can’t see the thoughts of the soul, they are invisible, but we know the thoughts, and we may know them in three dimensions, like looking at a structure.
To truly know the world, look deeply within your own being; to truly know yourself, take real interest in the world.	when we look into ourselves we can study our lower physical organisation, astral, etheric and physical bodies. Clairvoyants even in pictures others through understanding, but we can’t see our soul, it’s invisible, we can only see it though the mirrors of other souls.
Theosophists also often tend to turn away from the outer world. But a loving interest in our surroundings is absolutely necessary if one wants to make progress. One doesn’t have to neglect what one is striving for theosophically thereby.	We shall live fully, not in the past, not in the future but here and now.
The first condition is the cultivation of absolutely clear thinking. For this purpose a man must rid himself of the will-o’-the-wisps of thought, even if only for a very short time during the day – about five minutes (the longer, the better). He must become the ruler in his world of thought. He is not the ruler if external circumstances, occupation, some tradition or other, social relationships, even membership of a particular race, the daily round of life, certain activities and so forth, determine a thought and how he works it out.	To make peace in our thoughts they should be absolutely clear, no noise from the bodily organisation, from the ego of the astral body, the sentient soul.
A person who darts from one impression of the outer world to another, who constantly seeks distraction, cannot find the way to higher knowledge. The student must not blunt himself to the outer world, but while lending himself to its impressions, he should be directed by his rich inner life.	We should be attentive on the outer world, but we should let our inner wisdom from the consciousness soul guide us.
This life of the soul in thought, which gradually widens into a life in spiritual being, is called by Gnosis, and by Spiritual Science, Meditation (contemplative reflection). This meditation is the means to supersensible knowledge. But the student in such moments must not merely indulge in feelings; he must not have indefinite sensations in his soul. That would only hinder him from reaching true spiritual knowledge. His thoughts must be clear, sharp and definite, and he will be helped in this if he does not cling blindly to the thoughts that rise within him. Rather must he permeate himself with the lofty thoughts by which men already advanced and possessed of the spirit were inspired at such moments.	The noise from the ego of the astral body should be stilled, the thoughts of the I of the soul should be come through clear and pure. We should orient our thoughts against the esoteric, and not think about practical things like food or money, as it involves the ego.
After Atlantis was destroyed by water, continued evolution resulted in our contemporary fifth race, during which deductive reasoning was a special achievement. This enabled the human race to bring art and science to a high level of development, which previously had not been possible.	Word thinking became first mandatory after Kali Yuga, when dreamtime stopped, what we know through the history of the Tower of Babel. Here we began speaking and thinking in words instead of the shared dream language.
Reality is not contained in the abstract concept; it is, however, contained in thoughtful observation, which does not one-sidedly consider either concept or percept alone, but rather the union of the two.	To live in the now is to join the physical reality with the wisdom of the soul.
We must especially acquire a sympathetic interest for the things which to us are important. Previously we developed a more mechanical memory, and the working of this mechanical memory was fully reliable for a time, even without any particular liking for the things observed; but this ceases. It will be noticed that when undergoing a theosophical or esoteric development it is easy to forget things. But only those things fly away for which one has not a sympathetic interest, which one does not particularly care for, which do not become part of one’s soul, as it were.	Our word memory will become less and less and it’s function will be taken over by the wordless thoughts of the soul, although it works a little different, as trivialities are not remembered easily.
Being thinking men, we live in light. We see the external light with physical senses; the light which becomes thought we do not see, because we live in it, because as thinking men, it is ourselves. You cannot see that which you yourselves are. If you emerge from this thought and enter upon Imagination and Inspiration, you put yourself opposite to it and can see the thought-element as light. So that in speaking of the whole world, we may say: We have the light in us; only it does not appear to us as light because we live within it, and because while we use the light, while we have it, it becomes thought within us. You control the light, as it were, you take up the light in yourself which otherwise appears outside you. You differentiate it in yourself. You work in it. This is precisely your thinking, it is a working in light. You are a light-being. You do not know it, because you live within the light. But your thinking which you unfold, is living in the light. And I you look at thought from the outside, you see, altogether, light.	We are beings of light, our soul, our thinking, is light, and as we are light we can’t see our own light. Beautiful! If we could see our own beauty we risked falling in love with our own glory, like old Lucifer, but we can mirror ourselves in others souls beauty.
In earthly existence we live in a world that is but a copy of true reality [Astral world transformed holographically through the wisdom of the Etheric world into the physical.] Indeed, we only understand this physical world aright when we realize it to be this copy of reality. It behooves us, however, to feel the true reality within us [Astral world]; we must be aware of our connection with the spiritual world. And this is only possible if the bond that links us with pre-earthly existence remains intact.	The physical world is the lower worlds outer manifestation, the astral world is it’s inner cause. The outer mirrors in practise our inner!
We nurture and sharpen the thinking especially by the development of characteristics which seem to have nothing whatever to do with thinking, with concepts. The best method of developing good thinking is by complete absorption and insight, not so much through logical exercises but by observing one thing and another, using for this purpose processes in nature, in order to penetrate into hidden mysteries. Through absorption in problems of nature and of humanity, through the endeavour to understand complex personalities, through the intensifying of attentiveness, we grow wise. Absorption means striving to unravel something by thinking, by conceiving. In this connection, we shall be able to see that such mental absorption has a wonderfully good effect in later life.	We develops our thinking through understanding, not through speculative thinking. Through observation we recognize the patterns. We should not interpret what we see, not create opinions, just registrate what we see, as we see it, keeping our observations as puzzle pieces until we find a place for them.
Love is higher than opinion. If people love one another, the most varied opinions can be reconciled. Hence it is deeply significant that in Theosophy no religion is attacked and no religion is specially singled out, but all are understood, and so there can be brotherhood because the adherents of the most varied religions understand one another. This is one of the most important tasks for mankind today and in the future: that men should learn to live together and understand one another. If this human fellowship is not achieved, all talk of occult development is empty.	Love is part of the soul, opinion is part of the astral body. The soul is part of humanity, and if we can talk soul to soul, then there will be no conflicts, we are accessing the same wisdom.
Where knowledge exists, knowledge is imparted and there is no particular desire for discussion.Where there is desire for discussion, however, there is as a rule no knowledge of the truth. Discussion begins only when there is a lack of knowledge, and it is always and everywhere the sign of a decline regarding the seriousness of a subject when it is discussed. Disintegration of a particular trend is always proclaimed by discussions. It is important that in spiritual science we come increasingly to understand that the wish for discussion may really be taken as a sign of ignorance.	True knowledge are in the soul and here is no need of discussions. The knowledge of the ego are opinions, strings of words it has heard from others and not fully understood, if it had understood it would have been transformed into wisdom in the soul. Only the ego wants to fight for it’s opinions, those who know don’t have such desires.
The Christ says in the very highest sense: ‘You will know the Truth and the Truth will make you free.’	We will know the truth, we will not learn the truth, it will not be part of us, but we will have access to it.
The evolution of language has already passed its zenith. Language has indeed become an abstract thing; and all the efforts that are being made to classify societies in accordance with the languages of peoples represent merely a wave of deepest untruthfulness now passing over the earth. For men no longer have that relationship to language which sees through the language to the human being — to the inner being of man.	When i have talked with others, soul to soul, the words were only a kind of carrier, the deeper meaning went from soul to soul, giving an immense deep thought exchange. When you sometime later look at the text it contain nothing from the deep conversion.
zxy

Loneliness and solitude are two different things.

When you are lonely, it is easy to delude yourself into believing that you are on the right path. Solitude is better for us, as it means being alone without feeling lonely.

But eventually it is the best to find a person who will be your mirror. Remember only in another person’s heart can you truly see yourself and the presence of God within you.

~ Shams Tabrizi

Rudolf Steiner on Heart thinking

In ordinary life we have the feeling that we think with the head. That of course is a pictorial expression, for we actually think with the spiritual organs underlying the brain; but it is generally accepted that we think with the head. We have a quite different feeling about the thinking that becomes possible when we have made a little progress. The feeling then is as if what had hitherto been localized in the head were now localized in the heart. This does not mean the physical heart but the spiritual organ that develops in the neighborhood of the heart, the twelve-petalled lotus-flower. This organ becomes a kind of organ of thinking in one who achieves inner development and this thinking of the heart is very different from ordinary thinking. In ordinary thinking everyone knows that reflection is necessary in order to arrive at a particular truth. The mind moves from one concept to another and after logical deliberation and reflection reaches what is called ‘knowledge’. It is different when we want to recognize the truth in connection with genuine symbols or emblems. They are before us like objects, but the thinking we apply to them cannot be confounded with ordinary brain-thinking. Whether they are true or false is directly evident without any reflection being necessary as in the case of ordinary thinking. What there is to say about the higher worlds is directly evident. As soon as the pictures are before us we know what we have to say about them to ourselves and to others. This is the characteristic of heart-thinking.

http://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA119/English/RSP1968/19100329p01.html

Soul and Love

Rudolf Steiner	My Comments
The sensory world is the school, without which the human being would never come to the spirit.	The wisdom of the soul are created through the physical world.
An advanced stage of development must have been reached before the soul can experience joy in performing deeds of love from which there is nothing to be gained for itself. The impulse for this is not strong in humanity…..	The soul should be highly developed and the soul should have been drawn down into the heart before love can work into the physical world.
Our egoism gains nothing from deeds of love – but the world all the more. Occultism says: Love is for the world what the sun is for external life. No soul could thrive if love departed from the world. Love is the “moral” sun of the world. To disseminate love over the earth in the greatest measure possible, to promote love on the earth – that and that alone is wisdom.	The soul with the I have a special connection to the physical world, it’s also why we are conscious in the physical world, why we sense the physical world. The more love we can channel down into the physical world the more the physical world come in accordance with our soul. Love is the creative power!
A Spiritual Science without love would be a danger to mankind. But love should not be a matter for preaching; love must and indeed will come into the world through the spreading of knowledge of spiritual truths.	Spirituality that don’t connect to the soul would be a catastrophe. Black magic and satanism tries to master the soul, try to keep it from gaining power through the heart.
Love mediated by way of the senses is the wellspring of creative power, of that which is coming into being. Without sense-born love, nothing material would exist in the world; without spiritual love, nothing spiritual can arise in evolution. When we practise love, cultivate love, creative forces pour into the world. Can the intellect be expected to offer reasons for this? The creative forces poured into the world before we ourselves and our intellect came into being. True, as egoists, we can deprive the future of creative forces; but we cannot obliterate the deeds of love and the creative forces of the past. We owe our existence to deeds of love wrought in the past. The strength with which we have been endowed by these deeds of love is the measure of our deep debt to the past, and whatever love we may at any time be able to bring forth is payment of debts owed for our existence. In light of this knowledge we shall be able to understand the deeds of a man who has reached a high stage of development, for he has still greater debts to pay to the past. He pays his debts through deeds of love, and herein lies his wisdom. The higher stage of development reached by a man, the more does the impulse of love in him increase in strength; WISDOM ALONE DOES NOT SUFFICE.	Love is the creative power in the universe! Through creativity love pours into the physical world. The creative hierarchies poured creative love into the universe before we became co-creators. When we pours our love into the world we help the original creators with their development, the wisdom we create becomes part of them and it will give form to the new Earth incarnation.
LOVE IS THE CREATIVE FORCE IN THE WORLD.	Love is active wisdom, wisdom transformed to creative activity.
Besides love there are two other powers in the world. How do they compare with love?The one is strength, might; the second is wisdom. In regard to strength or might we can speak of degrees: weaker, stronger, or absolute might – omnipotence. The same applies to wisdom, for there are stages on the path to omniscience. It will not do to speak in the same way of degrees of love. What is universal love, love for all beings? In the case of love we cannot speak of enhancement as we can speak of enhancement of knowledge into omniscience or of might into omnipotence, by virtue of which we attain greater perfection of our own being. Love for a few or for many beings has nothing to do with our perfecting. Love for everything that lives cannot be compared to omnipotence; the concept of magnitude, or of enhancement, cannot rightly be applied to love.	There are three powers in the universe, Strength, Wisdom and Love. Love develops in the field between strength and wisdom, Tao between Yin and Yang, the Son between the Mother and the Father, between Ahriman and Lucifer. Love is different than wisdom and strength, it’s pure being, as it is what our soul is, just as our body is physical in the physical world.
The all-encompassing attribute of the God-head is not omnipotence, neither is it omniscience, but it is LOVE – the attribute in respect of which no enhancement is possible. God is uttermost love, unalloyed love, is born as it were out of love, is the very substance and essence of love. God is pure love, not supreme wisdom, not supreme might. God has retained love for himself but has shared wisdom and might with Lucifer and Ahriman. He has shared wisdom with Lucifer and might with Ahriman, in order that man may become free, in order that under the influence of wisdom he may make progress.	God or the Son is love. Lucifer is wisdom and ahriman is strength. God has shared wisdom and strength with Lucifer/Yang and Ahriman/Yin and by that given man possibility to develop in freedom. Lucifer symbolizes the spiritual world, Ahriman the physical world and God or the Son the soul world, lover Devachan.
Let us imagine that there is a man who knows nothing of the name of Christ Jesus, nothing of what is communicated in the Gospels, but that he understands the radical difference between the nature of wisdom and might and that of love. Such a man, even though he knows nothing of the Mystery of Golgotha, is a Christian in the truest sense.	One who understands soul and love is an initiate.
To understand the nature of love – that is to be a Christian!	The initiate have love in his heart.
A good man is one who can bear his own soul over into the soul of another.	When the noise from the ego is purified, the soul can merge with another soul.
Love starts when we push aside our ego and make room for someone else.	When we have learned the ego that it’s cravings don’t make it happy, and thereby stopped it’s noise.
But let us take the Ideal; the man’s ‘I’ has voluntarily, with complete free will, allowed the Christ’s force to flow into him. When the I has progressed so far that it has filled itself with the Christ, then this Christ force irradiates the astral body also. In that same astral body, into which the Luciferic powers had formerly implanted their deeds, the Christ power is now radiating from within outwards.	This means that the soul enters the heart (chakra), and for many old souls it happens around 27-29, but sometimes we press the soul out again, giving rise to The Dark Night of the Soul around 49.
The Christ is a God whose action is such that one is not absolutely forced to follow His Impulse, one follows it only when one understands it, and in freedom. He is, therefore, the God who never seeks to hinder the free development of the I in this or that direction.	Love can only be developed in freedom.
zxy

See also Do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it – on Thinking

Love – Initiation – The Dark Night of the Soul

This is from a dialog with a friend.
When we have gone through all our karmic challenges up through life, the push from karma stops, there is nothing more to do, there is nothing worth doing any more, we have tried it all. This is called the Dark Night of the Soul after a book by John of the Cross.

Contemplative Lifestyle in the Dark Night of the Soul

We are just alone with ourselves, as if God has left us, we are sinking down into our own subconsciousness, or maybe we just got so much peace that we have time to look around in our soul.

We are in a depression that can have different reasons, like work or family reasons, or both.

In all cases the darkness is caused by lack of love in the heart, we haven’t loved and we haven’t been loved for some time, one reason or the other.

The darkness is the karmic residues from our life that we haven’t solved yet, and through contemplation, change of lifestyle, that often are extremely unhealthy, like:

• having made night as day,
• filled with junk food,
• too much electronic entertainment,
• addicted to chemical substances as drugs like prozac, alcohol and narcotics.

Sometimes it’s necessary to handle parasites like Candida albicans, ringworm and other skin problems, intestinal worms or polyps various places, that also infests the etherbody.

All of these things, and more, will life/fate helps us to recognize if we have it as problems and we don’t fight fate, what we often do, we don’t want to let go of all our lesser desires.

On the way out into the light

Through solving our karma, light begins coming down into our darkness, and with the light returns love to our hearts, but it may take time.

Criticism is the worst danger for love, it both kills the love in sender and receiver, so life/fate may separate pairs in a period to make room for restoring the love in their heart.

Chakras and karmic periods

We have 7 periods of about 7 years, it’s the planet Saturn’s main aspects to the birth horoscope that create these periods, and each period have to do with a chakra from the root chakra and up.

Karmic Periods and Man’s spiritual bodies

It means that in each seven year period we handle the karma connected with each chakra.

Each period also relates to the incarnations where we started working on the chakra, we meet the people we have created the karma with, so we can solve it together.

When we are in the dark night, karma have mostly stopped working on us, so the inner planets, Saturn and in, are only weak in influence, the three outer planets are the hierophants forming our initiation, especially Pluto, their transits to the birth horoscope are extremely strong, and often the same transit happens three times, forward, backward (retrograde) and forward again.

First transit starts the project, the retrograde tells when the problem is understood and the last transit that it’s hopefully solved. These transits are very precise on the day, if our birth date is precise, on these days something relevant happens, usually within but often outside too.

End of karma

When we have no karma anymore we are for the first time in danger, karma keeps us safe, now we have become free agents, but, of course, we don’t know how to behave as a free agent. So contemplate, don’t run around as a drop on a frying pan.

All people have a guardian angel up through life, it’s a discarnated person from our karmic group.

In the dark night we may have around four helpers following us, it can be necessary to influence the physical world to save our lives if we act stupidly enough, or we need guidance in various ways. I have once been told that they saved my life because I behaved erratically, what I did.

Around the fifties Pluto transits itself, this is a very strong transit, and we can feel it nearly physically. But Uranus and Neptune returns are also strong.

As I wrote above, karma is a playpen, within its fence we are protected, everything that happens have been planned, so we are not in danger, except if something magical intervene, but that is very seldom.

We are used to be in the playpen, it’s very secure, but when karma disappear, when we are let out of the playpen, when we can’t feel the fence any longer, it’s unnerving as if God have left us.

Initiation

The three main players in our consciousness

Sentient, intellectual and consciousness soul have been merged together all our lives, acting as one, with most thinking in the sentient soul, but with I consciousness in the intellectual soul.

In the dark night these three are loosened from each other, they become awake all three, and especially the sentient soul feels alone, feels as if God have left it.

The last unhandled karma blocks the life coming from the intellectual soul, from the I, so the life energy and love from the soul can’t be felt. It feels as if God have left it in utter darkness, that it is on its own.

There are no goals anymore, the intellectual soul had the grand view, had the goals, the sentient soul can’t handle decisions ranging more than 24 hours, long range decisions go invariably wrong. That’s also why we may have difficulties following our own decisions from day to day.

We, the sentient soul, shall concentrate on the now, contemplate, handle the last karma, opening up to the intellectual soul, to the I.

When karma begins to disappear light begins shining down into the sentient soul, there may also come a ray of love from the soul, where we may shed a tear of love, our heart feels vulnerable.

Synchronicity – Guidance

When our sentient soul are separated it’s very vulnerable, it don’t have the help from the intellectual soul, it need constantly help from the spiritual world to not go wild.

The soul can help by taking energy away from bad ideas and the guardian angels can manipulate fate so that phone seller’s ring in the second you are about doing something stupid or letting a light bulb explode in such a situation or other things.

If you open a book at a random place or open the TV you may find an answer to a problem, or you may use one of the many seemingly stupid aps on FB, like what is your word or how is your coming year to be, these oracles are also in synchronicity with you, you should not take them ‘on intention’ but see if the words means something about your situation, are you on right course, should you change something. Of course some will be meaningless but most will have meaning.

The Bodies of Man

When we sleep our astral body separates from the etheric body, only connected with the silver cord. When we wake again the two bodies connects again and in that short time before they are joined fully, the dreams are transferred from the astral body to volatile memory in the etherbody.

When the two bodies are rightly joined we have no spiritual access to the astral world, but for some people the two bodies don’t join fully, there is a rift between them which can be used by natural clairvoyants or there can be created a rift through drugs or other means.

This picture show this configuration of man, and the abyss show where the bodies separate.

The Bodily configuration of Man

The Bodies of the Initiate

When we go through the dark night, the spiritual death and resurrection, astral and etheric body grows together for never again to be separated, neither by sleep nor by death, and that means that the rift is closed.

Instead the chakras will give us full sight in the astral world, just as we have in the physical.

The new constitution of man will now look:

The Bodily configuration of the Initiate

Btw when we are in the dark night we also lose interest in reading and writing factual books, because it draws the focus down into the astral body where contemplation have the focus in the soul.

This is the spiritual death and resurrection, we accept the death of our ego and put everything in the hands of God, and then we become resurrected in the soul.

I AM and I AM <that>

Must we inhabit this lifeless limbo forever, you ask. If you set down and contemplate accepting to sit there forever, it will stop. If you don’t accept it and run around doing many things you have done in your old life, caused by restlessness, it will take forever, or until you reach a time limit, and forfeit the possibility.

New Age version

Nisargadatta says it thus: When you say I AM, then you are talking about your soul, the central point in your being. When you say I AM <something>, where something is beautiful, clever, hardworking, have inferiority complex, angry, horny, and so forth, you are talking about the physical around and in the ego.

The soul is the bridge between the spiritual and the physical:

Bifröst – the bridge between the physical and the spirit

The seven layered model of Man

The ego is the upgraded animal mind, the ‘I’ is the new principle of mankind’s evolution, just as the animal mind was the new principle following the plant kingdom. The I or soul is pure Wisdom, Love and Beauty. The earth is called the planet of love because this is the new principle We see ourselves from the physical world so we can’t recognize the beauty of the soul, it’s hidden behind the karma that fills our physical bodies, but when we handle the karma it becomes visible to those who can see.

I have been invited into such a soul, she were an old soul like myself and she was beauty, truth and love, we mirrored each other and I now know that it goes for all old souls, with many incarnations behind them, as it’s the result of handling their karma.

Each of these circles are both representing different bodies, but it’s also our chakra that represents these bodies.

The heart chakra is representing the soul, all of mankind we find through the heart, there we are one, the physical is the periphery of mankind, the outer layer. Living in the now means to access the shared wisdom of mankind through our soul.

Ego and I – Thinking in the Now

The ego thinks in words, the I thinks wordlessly. The ego speculate in words. The I think in large thought structures that shows when needed in the Now, they are not visible, it’s more like sound in contrast to the seeing in the astral world, it’s somewhat like sonar pictures. We see with thoughts, the thoughts come as from outside. It’s complicated to describe, but it’s easy when we first have observed it in our own thinking.

When thinking contemplatively, the ego is not taking part, a structure is shown with all we have understood earlier, but with new things added in the structure. Each time I think on a subject, new things are added to what I already know, without the need for speculation.

When I answer questions I write the answer fully, I seldom use something I have written before and I seldom answer with a quote, because each time I answer a question I become wiser, I see new details I hadn’t seen before.

Sleep

The best time to sleep is from 10pm to 2am!

The best connection to the I and higher I are from 2am to 6am in wake condition, here are much work done on the etherbody, a vital part of the initiation and the ascent from the Dark Night.

That should also be enough sleep for people in the dark night. Sleeping from 6am to 22pm are counterproductive, it tires the etherbody, it so to speak disintegrates what have been build at night, we become tired of sleeping after 6am.

Stress and depressions make day to night, I have of course been there too, have always been sleeping late and been up late, but the need for sleep becomes less when following the above rules.

Speculation and tedious work makes tired, while contemplation, living thinking, don’t. Writing books and reading, especially reading non fiction books are tiring, as it draws the mind down into the physical body.

Dream Interpretation

Dream interpretation is a very important tool to take much pain out of the Dark Night, it’s one of the major ways to get information from the spiritual world after we isolate ourselves from the spiritual.

Appendices

Methods to raise from a joylessness.

From own experiences.

Meditation – Contemplation

From own experiences.

Other articles on related subjects:

On Sleep and Daily periods.
The Etheric Sun and the Rhythm of the Day

On Dream Interpretation.
Dream Interpretation in Esoteric Work and What are Dreams

On Chakras.
The Seven Stages up the Spine,  The Marriage of Anima and Animus and The Mystery of Infatuation and the Now

On Reincarnation and Karma.
What’s about Reincarnation and Karma

Album on the Dark Night of the Soul, many examples, spiritual and psychotherapeutic sources.
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Some Results of Initiation

The following text extracts is from “Some Results of Initiation” from the book “Knowledge of the Higher Worlds and its Attainment” by Rudolf Steiner.

It’s one of the best descriptions on the subject, on what each chakra is and does in us at our development, and how our life influences the chakras.

This is not an incentive to use some of the methods that are elsewhere in the book, most readers of this have no need for these methods, fate are giving us what we need, only one method may be of interest to all, and that is contemplation, but most will intuitively use it, as a ‘remembrance’ from earlier lives.

Lotus Flowers – Chakras

The further the student advances in his inner development, the greater will be the organic differentiation introduced into his astral body. The latter is confused and undifferentiated in the case of a person of undeveloped inner life; yet the clairvoyant can perceive even the unorganized astral body as a figure standing out distinctly from its environment. It extends from the centre of the head to the middle of the physical body, and appears like an independent body possessing certain organs.

These organs, now to be considered, are apparent to the clairvoyant near the following parts of the physical body:

• the first between the eyes;
• the second near the larynx;
• the third in the region of the heart;
• the fourth in the so-called pit of the stomach;
• the fifth and sixth are situated in the abdomen.

These organs are technically known as wheels, chakrams or lotus flowers. They are so called on account of their likeness to wheels or flowers, but of course it should be clearly understood that such an expression is not to be applied more literally than when the lungs are called wings. Just as there is no question of wings in the case of lungs, so, too, in the case of the lotus flowers, the expression must be taken as a figurative comparison.

In undeveloped persons these lotus flowers are dark in colour, motionless and inert. In the clairvoyant, however, they are luminous, mobile, and of variegated colour. Something of this kind applies to the medium, though in a different way; but this question need not here be pursued.

Now when the student begins his exercises, the lotus flowers become brighter; later on they begin to revolve. When this occurs, clairvoyance begins. For these flowers are the sense organs of the soul, and their revolutions express the fact that the clairvoyant perceives supersensibly. No one can perceive the supersensible until he has developed his astral senses in this way.

Thanks to the spiritual organ situated in the vicinity of the larynx, it becomes possible to survey clairvoyantly the thoughts and mentality of other beings, and to obtain a deeper insight into the true laws of natural phenomena.

The organ situated near the heart permits of clairvoyant knowledge of the sentiments and disposition of other souls. When developed, this organ also makes it possible to observe certain deeper forces in animals and plants.

By means of the organ in the so-called pit of the stomach, knowledge is acquired of the talents and capacities of souls; by its means, too, the part played by animals, plants, stones, metals, atmospheric phenomena and so on in the household of Nature, becomes apparent.

The organ in the vicinity of the larynx has sixteen petals or spokes; the one in the region of the heart twelve, and the one in the pit of the stomach ten.

Thanks to the spiritual organ situated in the vicinity of the larynx, it becomes possible to survey clairvoyantly the thoughts and mentality of other beings, and to obtain a deeper insight into the true laws of natural phenomena.

The organ situated near the heart permits of clairvoyant knowledge of the sentiments and disposition of other souls. When developed, this organ also makes it possible to observe certain deeper forces in animals and plants.

By means of the organ in the so-called pit of the stomach, knowledge is acquired of the talents and capacities of souls; by its means, too, the part played by animals, plants, stones, metals, atmospheric phenomena and so on in the household of Nature, becomes apparent.

The organ in the vicinity of the larynx has sixteen petals or spokes; the one in the region of the heart twelve, and the one in the pit of the stomach ten.

Now certain activities of the soul are connected with the development of these organs, and anyone devoting himself to them in a certain definite way, contributes something to the development of the corresponding organs.

The Sixteen Petalled Lotus – The Throat Chakra

The 16-petalled Lotus

In the 16-petalled lotus, eight of its sixteen petals were developed during an earlier stage of human evolution, in a remote past. Man himself contributed nothing to this development; he received them as a gift from nature, at a time when his consciousness was in a dull, dreamy condition.

At that stage of human evolution, they were in active use, but the manner of their activity was only compatible with that dull state of consciousness. As consciousness became clearer and brighter, the petals became obscured and ceased their activity.

Man himself can now develop the remaining eight petals by conscious exercises, and thereby the whole lotus flower becomes luminous and mobile. The acquisition of certain faculties depends on the development of each one of the sixteen petals.

Yet, as already shown, only eight can be consciously developed; the remainder then appear of their own accord.

The development proceeds in the following manner. The student must first apply himself with care and attention to certain functions of the soul, hitherto exercised by him in a careless and inattentive manner. There are eight such functions:

– The first is the way in which ideas and conceptions are acquired. In this respect people usually allow themselves to be led by chance alone. They see or hear one thing or another and form their ideas accordingly. While this is the case, the sixteen petals of the lotus flower remain ineffective. It is only when the student begins to take his self-education in hand, in this respect, that the petals become effective. His ideas and conceptions must be guarded; each single idea should acquire significance for him; he should see in it a definite message instructing him concerning the things of the outer world, and he should derive no satisfaction from ideas devoid of such significance. He must govern his mental life so that it becomes a true mirror of the outer world, and direct his effort to the exclusion of incorrect ideas from his soul.

– The second of these functions is concerned with the control of resolutions. The student must not resolve upon even the most trifling act, without well-founded and thorough consideration. Thoughtless and meaningless actions should be foreign to his nature. He should have well-considered grounds for everything he does, and abstain from everything for which no significant motive is forthcoming.

– The third function concerns speech. The student should utter no word that is devoid of sense and meaning; all talking for the sake of talking draws him away from his path. He must avoid the usual kind of conversation, with its promiscuous discussion of indiscriminately varied topics. This does not imply his preclusion from intercourse with his fellows. It is precisely in such intercourse that his conversation should develop to significance. He is ready to converse with everyone, but he does so thoughtfully and with thorough deliberation. He never speaks without grounds for what he says. He seeks to use neither too many nor too few words.

– The fourth is the regulation of outward action. The student tries to adjust his actions in such a way that they harmonize with the actions of his fellow-men and with the events in his environment. He refrains from actions which are disturbing to others and antagonistic to his surroundings. He seeks to adjust his actions so that they combine harmoniously with his surroundings, with his position in life, etc. When an external motive causes him to act, he considers how he can best respond. When the impulse proceeds from himself he weighs with minute care the effects of his activity.

– The fifth function includes the management of the whole of life. The student endeavours to live in conformity with both Nature and spirit. Never over-hasty, he is also never indolent. Excessive activity and laziness are equally alien to him. He looks upon life as a means for work and disposes it accordingly. He regulates his habits, the care of his health, etc., in such a way that a harmonious whole is the outcome.

– The sixth is concerned with human endeavour. The student tests his capacities and proficiency, and conducts himself in the light of such self-knowledge, He attempts nothing that is beyond his powers, but seeks to omit nothing that is within their scope. On the other hand he sets before himself aims that coincide with the ideals and the great duties of a human being. He does not mechanically regard himself as a wheel in the vast machinery of mankind, but seeks to comprehend the tasks of his life, and to look out beyond the limit of the daily and trivial. He endeavours to fulfil his obligations ever better and more perfectly.

– The seventh deals with the effort to learn as much from life as possible. Nothing passes before the student without giving him occasion to accumulate experience which is of value to him for life. If he has performed anything wrongly or imperfectly, he lets this be an incentive for repeating the performance later on, but this time rightly and perfectly. When others act, he observes them with the same end in view. He tries to gather a rich store of experience, and ever to turn to it for counsel; nor indeed will he ever do anything without looking back on experiences from which he can derive help in his decisions and affairs.

– Finally, the eighth is that the student must, from time to time, glance introspectively into himself, sink back into himself, take himself carefully to task, form and test the fundamental principles of his life, run over, in his thoughts, the sum total of his knowledge, weigh his duties, reflect upon the content and aim of life and so on.

The better the student’s thoughts and speech harmonize with the processes in the outer world, the more quickly will he develop this faculty. Whoever thinks and speaks what is contrary to truth destroys something in the bud of his 16-petalled lotus. Truthfulness, uprightness and honesty are in this connection creative forces, while mendacity, deceitfulness and dishonesty are destructive forces.

The student must realize, however, that actual deeds are needed, and not merely ‘good intentions’. If I think or say anything that does not conform with reality, I kill something in my spiritual organs, even though I believe my intentions to be ever so good. It is here as with the child which needs must burn itself when it falls into the fire, even though it did so out of ignorance.

The regulation of the above activities of the soul in the manner described, causes the 16-petalled lotus to ray forth in glorious hues, and imparts to it a definite movement. Yet it must be noted that the faculty of clairvoyance cannot make its appearance before a definite degree of development has been attained. It cannot appear so long as it is irksome for the student to regulate his life in this manner. He is still unfit, so long as the activities described above are a matter of special pre-occupation for him. The first traces of clairvoyance only appear when he has reached the point of being able to live in the specified way, as a person habitually lives. These things must then no longer be irksome, but must have become a matter of course. There must be no need for him to be continually watching himself, and urging himself on to live in this way. It must all become a matter of habit.

Now this lotus flower may be made to develop in another way by following certain other instructions. But all such methods are rejected by true Spiritual Science, for they lead to the destruction of physical health and to moral ruin. They are easier to follow than those here described. The latter, though protracted and irksome, lead to the true goal and cannot but strengthen morally.

The distorted development of a lotus flower results not only in illusions and fantastic conceptions, should a certain degree of clairvoyance ensue, but also in errors and instability in ordinary life. Such a development may be the cause of timidity, envy, vanity, haughtiness, wilfulness and so on in a person who hitherto was free from these defects. It has already been explained that eight of the sixteen petals of this lotus flower were developed in a remote past, and that these will reappear of themselves, in the course of esoteric development.

Faulty training may easily result in the reappearance of the earlier petals alone, while the new petals remain stunted. This will ensue especially if too little logical, rational thinking is introduced into the instruction. It is of supreme importance that the student should be a rational and clear-thinking person, and of further importance that he should practice the greatest clarity of speech. People who begin to have some presentiment of supersensible things, are apt to wax talkative on this subject, thereby retarding their normal development. The less one talks about these matters the better. No one should speak about them until he has achieved a certain degree of clarity.

On premature judgment

Suppose I hear a piece of news and thereupon immediately form an opinion. Shortly afterwards I receive some further news which does not harmonize with the previous information. I am thereby obliged to reverse my previous judgment. The result is an unfavorable influence upon my 16-petalled lotus. Quite the contrary would have been the case had I, in the first place, suspended my judgment, and remained silent both inwardly in thought and outwardly in word, concerning the whole affair, until I had acquired reliable grounds for forming my judgment.

Caution in the formation and pronouncement of judgments becomes, by degrees, the special characteristic of the student. On the other hand his receptivity for impressions and experiences increases; he lets them pass over him silently, so as to collect and have the largest possible number of facts at his disposal, when the time comes to form his opinions. Bluish-red and reddish-pink shades colour the lotus flower as the result of such circumspection, whereas, in the opposite case, dark red and orange shades appear.

See also Buddhas Eightfold Path: The Eightfold Path

The Twelve Petalled Lotus – Heart Chakra

The 12-petalled Lotus

The 12-petalled lotus situated in the region of the heart, is developed in a similar way. Half its petals, too, were already existent and in active use, in a remote stage of human evolution. Thus these six petals need not now be especially developed in esoteric training; they appear of themselves, and begin to revolve when the student sets to work on the other six. Here again he learns to promote this development by consciously controlling and directing certain inner activities in a special way.

It must be clearly understood that the perceptions of each single spiritual organ bear a different character. The 12- and 16-petalled lotus flowers transmit quite different perceptions. The latter perceives forms. The thoughts and mentality of other beings and the laws governing natural phenomena become manifest, through the 16-petalled lotus, as figures, not rigid motionless figures, but mobile forms filled with life. The clairvoyant in whom this sense is developed, can distinguish, for every mode of thought and for every law of Nature, a form bearing their impression. A revengeful thought, for example, assumes an arrow-like, pronged form, while a kindly thought is often formed like an opening flower, and so on. Clear-cut, significant thoughts are regular and symmetrical in form, while confused thoughts have wavy outlines. Quite different perceptions are received through the 12-petalled lotus. These perceptions may be in a sense likened to warmth and cold, as applied to the soul. A clairvoyant equipped with this faculty feels this warmth and cold streaming out from the forms discerned by the 16-petalled lotus.

– The 12-petalled lotus, when developed, reveals to the clairvoyant a deep understanding of the processes of Nature. From every manifestation of growth and development there issue rays of soul-warmth, while everything that is encompassed by decay, destruction, ruin, presents an impression of cold.

The development of this sense may be furthered in the following manner:

To begin with, the student applies himself to regulating his sequence of thought (control of thought). Just as the 16-petalled lotus is developed by cultivating thoughts that conform with truth and are significant, so, too, the 12-petalled lotus is developed by inwardly controlling the trains of thought. Thoughts that dart to and fro like will-o’-the-wisps, and follow each other in no logical or rational sequence, but merely by pure chance, destroy its form. The latter is developed to ever-increasing perfection, the closer thought is made to follow upon thought, and the more strictly everything of illogical nature is avoided. If the student hears illogical thoughts, he immediately lets the right thoughts pass through his mind. He should not, however, withdraw in a loveless way from what is perhaps an illogical environment, in order to further his own development. Neither should he feel himself impelled to correct all the illogical thoughts expressed around him. He should rather co-ordinate silently the thoughts as they pour in upon him, in a way conforming with logic and sense, and himself endeavour, in every case, to retain this same method in his own thinking.

– An equal supervision in his actions forms the second requirement(control of actions). All inconstancy, all disharmony of action conduces to the destruction of the lotus flower here in question. When the student performs some action, he must see to it that his succeeding action follows in logical sequence, for if he acts from day to day with variable intent, he will never develop the faculty here considered.

– The third requirement is the cultivation of endurance.(perseverance). The student is impervious to all influences which would divert him from the goal he has set himself, so long as he can regard it as the right goal. For him, obstacles contain a challenge to surmount them, but are never a reason for restraining his progress.

– The fourth requirement is forbearance (tolerance) towards persons, creatures and also circumstances. The student suppresses all superfluous criticism of everything that is imperfect, evil and bad, and seeks rather to understand everything that comes under his notice. Even as the sun does not withdraw its light from the bad and the evil, so he, too, does not refuse them an intelligent sympathy. Should some trouble befall him, he does not proceed to condemn and criticize, but accepts what necessity has brought him, and endeavours to the best of his ability, to give the matter a turn for the best. He does not consider the opinions of others merely from his own standpoint, but seeks to put himself into the other’s position.

– The fifth requirement is impartiality towards everything that life brings. In this connection we speak of faith and trust. The student encounters every human being and every creature with this trust, and lets it inspire his every action. Upon hearing some information, he never says to himself: ‘I don’t believe it; it contradicts my present opinions.’ He is far rather ready to test and rectify his views and opinions. He ever remains receptive for everything that confronts him, and he trusts in the effectiveness of his undertakings. Timidity and scepticism are banished from his being. He harbours a faith in the power of his intentions. A hundred failures cannot rob him of his faith. This is the ‘faith which can move mountains’.

– The sixth requirement is the cultivation of a certain inner balance (equanimity). The student endeavours to retain his composure in the face of joy and sorrow, and discards the tendency to fluctuate between the seventh heaven of joy and the depths of despair. Misfortune and danger, fortune and advancement alike find him ready armed.

The reader will recognize in the qualities here described, the ‘six attributes’, which the candidate for Initiation strives to acquire. The intention has been to show their connection with the spiritual organ known as the 12-petalled lotus flower. As before, special instructions can be given to bring this lotus flower to fruition, but here again, the perfect symmetry of its form depends on the development of the qualities mentioned, the neglect of which results in this organ being formed to a caricature of its proper shape. In this case, should a certain clairvoyance be attained, the qualities in question may take an evil instead of a good direction. A person may become intolerant, timid or contentious towards his environment; may, for instance, acquire some feeling for the sentiments of others, and for this reason shun them or hate them. This may even reach the point that, by reason of the inner coldness overwhelming him, he is unable to listen to repugnant opinions, or he may behave in an objectionable manner.

The Ten Petalled Lotus – The Solar Plexus Chakra

The 10-petalled Lotus

An inner training of a particularly intimate character is necessary for the development of the l0-petalled lotus flower, for it is now a question of learning consciously to control and dominate the sense-impressions themselves. This is of particular importance in the initial stages of clairvoyance, for it is only by this means that a source of countless illusions and fancies is avoided. People, as a rule, do not realize by what factors their sudden ideas and memories are dominated, and how they are produced.

Consider the following case. Someone is travelling by railway; his mind is busy with one thought; suddenly his thought diverges; he recollects an experience that befell him years ago, and interweaves it with his present thought. He did not notice that in looking through the window, he had caught sight of a person who resembled another intimately connected with the recollected experience. He remains conscious, not of what he saw, but of the effect it produced, and so believes that it all came to him ‘of its own accord’. Now much in life occurs in such a way! How great is the part played in our life by things we hear and learn, without our consciously realizing the connection! Someone, for instance, cannot bear a certain colour, but does not realize that this is due to the fact that the school-teacher who used to worry him many years ago, wore a coat of that colour. Innumerable illusions are based upon such associations.

Many things leave their mark upon the soul, while remaining outside the pale of consciousness. The following may occur. Someone reads in the paper about the death of a well-known person, and forthwith claims to have had a ‘presentiment’ of it ‘yesterday’, although he neither heard nor saw anything that might have given rise to such a thought. And indeed it is quite true that the thought occurred to him ‘yesterday’, as though of its own accord, that this particular person would die; only one thing escaped his attention: two or three hours before this thought occurred to him yesterday, he went to visit an acquaintance; a newspaper lay on the table; he did not actually read it, but his eyes unconsciously fell on the announcement of the dangerous illness of the person in question. He remained unconscious of the impression he received, and yet this impression resulted in his ‘presentiment’.

Reflection upon these matters will show how great a source of illusion and fantasy is contained in such associations. It is just this source which must be dammed up by all who seek to develop their l0-petalled lotus flower. Deeply hidden characteristics in other souls can he perceived by this organ, but their truth depends on the attainment of immunity from the above-mentioned illusions. For this purpose it is necessary that the student should control and dominate everything that seeks to influence him from outside. He should reach the point of really receiving no impressions beyond those he wishes to receive. This can only be achieved by the development of a powerful inner life; by an effort of the will he only allows such things to impress him to which his attention is directed, and he actually evades all impressions to which he does not voluntarily respond. If he sees something, it is because he wills to see it. And if he does not voluntarily take notice of something, it is actually non-existent for him. The greater the energy and inner activity devoted to this work, the more extensively will this faculty be attained.

– The student must avoid all vacuous gazing and mechanical listening. For him only those things exist to which he turns his eye or his ear. He must practise the power of hearing nothing, even in the greatest disturbance, if he does not will to hear; and he must make his eyes unimpressionable to things of which he does not particularly take notice. He must be shielded as by an inner armour against all unconscious impressions.

– In this connection, the student must devote special care to his thought-life. He singles out a particular thought and endeavours to link on to it only such other thoughts as he can himself consciously and voluntarily produce. He rejects all casual fancies, and does not connect this thought with another until he has investigated the origin of the latter.

– He goes still further. If, for instance, he feels a particular antipathy for something, he will combat it and endeavour to establish a conscious relation between himself and the thing in question. In this way the unconscious elements that intrude into his soul will become fewer and fewer. Only by such severe self-discipline can the l0-petalled lotus flower attain its proper form. The student’s inner life must become a life of attention, and he must learn really to keep away from himself everything to which he should not or does not wish to direct his attention.

If this strict self-discipline be accompanied by meditation prescribed in esoteric training, the lotus flower in the region of the pit of the stomach comes to fruition in the right way, and light and colour of a spiritual kind are now added to the form and warmth perceptible to the organs described above.

The talents and faculties of other beings are thereby revealed, also the forces and the hidden attributes of Nature. The coloured aura of living creatures then becomes visible; all that is around us manifests its spiritual attributes.

It will be admitted that the very greatest care is necessary at this stage of development, for the play of unconscious memories is here exceedingly active. If this were not the case, many people would possess this inner sense, for it comes almost immediately into evidence, when the impressions delivered by the outer senses are held so completely under control, that they become dependent on nothing save attention or inattention. This inner sense remains ineffective so long as the powerful outer senses smother it and render it insensible.

The Six Petalled Lotus – The Sacral Chakra

The 6-petalled Lotus

Still greater difficulty attends the development of the 6-petalled lotus flower situated in the centre of the body, for it can only be achieved as the result of complete mastery and control of the whole personality through consciousness of self, so that body, soul and spirit form one harmonious whole. The functions of the body, the inclinations and passions of the soul, the thoughts and ideas of the spirit, must be tuned to perfect unison. The body must be so ennobled and purified that its organs are impelled to nothing that is not in the service of the soul and spirit. The soul must not be impelled, through the body, to lusts and passions which are antagonistic to pure and noble thought. The spirit, however, must not stand as a slave-driver over the soul, dominating it with laws and commandments; the soul must rather learn to follow these laws and duties out of its own free inclination.

The student must not feel duty to be an oppressive power to which he unwillingly submits, but rather something which he performs out of love. His task is to attain an equilibrium of soul between body and spirit, and he must perfect himself in this way, to the extent of being free to abandon himself to the functions of the senses, for these should be so purified that they lose the power to drag him down to their level. He must no longer require to curb his passions, inasmuch as they of their own accord follow the good.

The Heart Organ

When esoteric development has progressed so far that the lotus flowers begin to stir, much has already been achieved by the student which can result in the formation of certain quite definite currents and movements in his etheric body.

The object of this development is the formation of a kind of centre in the region of the physical heart, from which currents and movements, in the greatest variety of colours and forms, radiate. This centre is, in reality, not a mere point, but a most complicated structure, a most wonderful organ. It glows and shimmers with every shade of colour, and displays forms of great symmetry, capable of rapid transformation. Other forms and streams of colour radiate from this organ to the other parts of the body, and beyond it, to the astral body, which they completely permeate and illumine. The most important part of these currents flows to the lotus flowers. They permeate each petal and regulate its revolutions; then streaming out at the points of the petals, they lose themselves in outer space. The greater the development of a person, the greater the circumference to which these rays extend.

The 12-petalled lotus flower has a particularly close connection with this central organ. The currents flow directly into it and through it, proceeding, on the one side, to the 16- and the 2-petalled lotus flowers, and on the other, the lower side, to the flowers of eight, six and four petals. It is for this reason that the very greatest care must be devoted to the development of the 12-petalled lotus, for an imperfection in the latter would result in the irregular formation of the whole structure.

Continued practice enables the student to determine for himself the position of his etheric body. Hitherto this position depended upon the forces proceeding from without or from within the physical body. Through further development the student is able to direct his etheric body to all sides.

This faculty is effected by currents moving approximately along both hands, and centred in the 2-petalled lotus in the region of the eyes. All that is made possible through the radiations from the larynx assuming round forms, of which a number how to the 2-petalled lotus, and thence form undulating currents along the hands. As a further development these currents branch out and ramify in the most delicate manner, and become, as it were, a kind of web, which then encompasses the entire etheric body as though with a network.

Whereas hitherto the etheric body was not closed to the outer world, so that the life currents from the universal ocean of life flowed freely in and out, it now becomes necessary that these currents should pass through this membrane. Thus the individual becomes sensitive to these external streams; they become perceptible to him. And now the time has come to give the complete system of currents and movements its centre situated in the region of the heart.

This again is effected by persevering with the exercises in concentration and meditation; and at this point also the stage is reached when the student becomes gifted with the ‘inner word.’ All things now acquire a new significance for him. They become as it were spiritually audible in their innermost self, and speak to him of their essential being. The currents described above place him in touch with the inner being of the world to which he belongs. He begins to mingle his life with the life of his environment and can let it reverberate in the movements of his lotus flowers.

At this point the spiritual world is entered. If the student has advanced so far, he acquires a new understanding for all that the great teachers of humanity have uttered. The sayings of the Buddha and the Gospels, for instance, produce a new effect on him. They pervade him with a felicity of which he had not dreamed before. For the tone of their words follows the movements and rhythms which he has himself formed within himself. He can now have positive knowledge that a Buddha or the Evangelists did not utter their own personal revelations, but those which flowed into them from the innermost Being of all things.

To separate truth from opinions

In esoteric training, there is question of four attributes which must be acquired on the socalled probationary path for the attainment of higher knowledge.

1. The first is the faculty of discrimination in thoughts between truth and mere semblance or opinion.
2. The second attribute is the correct estimation of what is inwardly true and real, as against what is merely apparent.
3. The third rests in the practice of the six qualities already mentioned in the preceding pages: [see above] thought-control, control of actions, perseverance, tolerance, faith and equanimity.
4. The fourth attribute is the love of inner freedom.

A mere intellectual understanding of what is included in these attributes is of no value. They must become so incorporated into the soul that they form the basis of inner habits. Consider, for instance, the first of these attributes: the discrimination between truth and semblance.

The student must so train himself that he quite as a matter of course distinguishes, in everything that confronts him, between the non-essential elements and those that are significant and essential.

He will only succeed in this if, in his observation of the outer world, he quietly and patiently ever and again repeats the attempt. And at the end he will naturally single out the essential and the true at a glance, whereas formerly the nonessential, too, could content him. ‘All things corruptible are but reflection’ – is a truth which becomes an unquestionable conviction of the soul. The same applies to the remaining three of the four attributes mentioned.

The Great Initiates

It will be clear from the above that the instructions given in esoteric training exert a determining influence reaching the innermost depths of human nature. Such are the instructions regarding the four qualities mentioned above. They can be found in one form or another in all the great religions.

The founders of the great religions did not give mankind these teachings from some vague feeling. They gave them for the good reason that they were great Initiates. Out of their knowledge did they shape their moral teachings. They knew how these would react upon the finer nature of men, and desired that their followers should gradually achieve the development of this finer nature.

The founders of the great religions are therefore the great Initiates. Their teaching flows into the soul of men, and thus, with humanity, the whole world moves forward. Quite consciously did they work to further this evolutionary process of humanity. Their teachings can only be understood if it be remembered that they are the product of knowledge of the innermost depths of human nature. The great Initiates knew, and it is out of their knowledge that they shaped the ideals of humanity. Yet man approaches these great leaders when he uplifts himself, in his own development, to their heights.

The Guardian of the Threshold

Were the student to obtain an insight into these higher worlds without sufficient preparation regarding their nature, he would find himself confronted by the picture of his own soul as though by an enigma. There his own desires and passions confront him in animal or, more seldom, in human forms. It is true that the animal forms of this world are never quite similar to those of the physical world, yet they possess a remote resemblance. Inexpert observers often take them to be identical.

Now upon entering this world, an entirely new method of judgment must be acquired. For apart from the fact that things actually pertaining to inner nature appear as outer world, they also hear the character of mirrored reflections of what they really are. When, for instance, a number is perceived, it must be reversed, as a picture in a mirror; 265 would mean here in reality 562. A sphere is perceived as though from its centre. This inner perception must then be translated.

The qualities of the soul appear likewise as in a mirror. A wish directed towards an outer object appears as a form moving towards the person wishing.

Passions residing in the lower part of human nature can assume animal forms or similar shapes, that hurl themselves against the individual. In reality, these passions are struggling outward; they seek satisfaction in the outer world, but this search in an outward direction appears in the mirrored reflection as an attack on the individual from whom they proceed.

If the student, before attaining insight into higher worlds, has learnt by quiet and sincere self-observation to realize the qualities and defects of his own character, he will then, at the moment when his own inner self confronts him as a mirrored image, find strength and courage to conduct himself in the right way.

People who have failed to test themselves in this way, and are insufficiently acquainted with their own inner self, will not recognize themselves in their own mirrored image, and will mistake it for a reality foreign to themselves. Or they may become alarmed at the vision, and, because they cannot endure the sight, deceive themselves into believing the whole thing is nothing but an illusion which cannot lead them anywhere. In either case the person in question, through prematurely attaining a certain stage of inner development, would himself fatally obstruct his own progress.

The Two Petalled Lotus – The Third Eye

The 2-petalled Lotus

This is the moment when the 2-petalled lotus in the region of the eyes is required. If it now begins to stir, the student finds it possible to set his higher Ego in connection with higher spiritual beings. The currents from this lotus flower flow towards the higher entities in such a way that the movements in question are fully apparent to the individual.

Just as the light renders the physical objects visible, so, too, these currents disclose spiritual beings of higher worlds.

Through inward application to the fundamental truths derived from Spiritual Science, the student learns to set in motion, and then to direct the currents proceeding from the lotus flower between the eyes.

The Higher ‘I’

It is at this stage of development especially that the value of sound judgment, and a training in clear and logical thought, is proved. The higher self which hitherto slumbered unconsciously, in an embryonic state, is now born into conscious existence. This is not a figurative, but a positive birth in the spiritual world, and the being now born, the higher self, if it is to be capable of life, must enter that world with all the necessary organs and aptitudes. Just as Nature must provide for a child being born into the world with suitable eyes and ears, so, too, the laws of self-development must provide for the necessary qualities, with which the higher self can enter existence.

These laws governing the development of the higher spiritual organs are none other than the laws of sound reason and morality of the physical world. The spiritual self matures in the physical self as a child in the mother’s womb. The constitution of the spiritual self is similarly conditioned by the laws of common intelligence and reason that govern physical life. No one can give birth to a soundly constituted higher self, whose life in thought and feeling, in the physical world, is not sound and healthy.

Natural, rational life is the basis of all genuine spiritual development. Just as the child when still in the maternal womb, lives in accordance with natural forces to which it has access, after its birth, through its organs of sense, so, too, the human higher self lives in accordance with the laws of the spiritual world, even during physical existence. And even as the child, out of a dim life-instinct, acquires the requisite forces, so, too, can man acquire the powers of the spiritual world before his higher self is born. Indeed he must do this if the latter is to enter the world as a fully developed being. It would be quite wrong for anyone to say: ‘I cannot accept the teachings of Spiritual Science until I myself become a seer,’ for without inward application to the results of spiritual investigation, there is no chance whatever of attaining genuine higher knowledge. It would be as though a child, during gestation, were to refuse the forces coming to it through its mother, and proposed to wait until it could create them for itself. Just as the child in its incipient feeling for life, learns to appreciate what is offered to it, so can the non-seer appreciate the truth of the teachings of Spiritual Science.

An insight into these teachings, based on a deeply rooted feeling for truth, and a clear, sound, all-round critical and reasoning faculty, is possible, even before spiritual things are actually perceived. The esoteric knowledge must first be studied, so that this study becomes a preparation for clairvoyance. A person attaining clairvoyance without such preparation would resemble a child born with eyes and ears but without a brain. The entire world of sound and colour would display itself before him, but he would be helpless in it.

• At this stage of his esoteric development, the student realizes, through personal inward experience, all that had previously appealed to his sense of truth, to his intellect and reason.
• He has now direct knowledge of his higher self.
• He learns how his higher self is connected with exalted spiritual beings, and forms with them a united whole.
• He sees how the lower self originates in a higher world, and it is revealed to him how his higher nature outlasts his lower.
• He can now distinguish the imperishable in himself from the perishable; that is, he learns, through personal insight, to understand the doctrine of the incarnation of the higher self in the lower.
• It will become plain to him that he is involved in a great spiritual complex, and that his qualities and destiny are due to this connection.
• He learns to recognize the law of his life, his Karma.
• He realizes that his lower self, constituting his present existence, is only one of the forms which his higher being can adopt.
• He discerns the possibility of working down from his higher self on to his lower self, so that he may perfect himself ever more and more.
• Now, too, he can rightly distinguish the great differences between human beings, in regard to their level of perfection.
• He becomes aware that there are others above him, who have already traversed the stages which still lie before him, and he realizes that the teachings and deeds of such men proceed from the inspiration of a higher world. He owes this knowledge to his first glimpse into this higher world. The so-called great Initiates of humanity now become vested with reality for him.

These, then, are the gifts which the student owes to his development at this stage: insight into his higher self; insight into the doctrine of the incarnation of this higher being into a lower; insight into the laws by which life in the physical world is regulated according to its spiritual connections, that is, the law of Karma; and finally, insight into the existence of the great Initiates.

From Belief to Knowledge

Thus it is said of a student who has reached this stage, that all doubt has vanished from him. His former faith, based on reason and sound thought, is now replaced by knowledge and insight which nothing can undermine. The various religious cults have presented, in their ceremonies, sacraments, and rites, externally visible pictures of the higher spiritual beings and events. None but those who have not penetrated to the depths of the great religious cults, can fail to recognize this fact. Personal insight into spiritual reality explains the great significance of these externally visible cults. Religious service, then, becomes for the seer an image of his own communion with the higher, spiritual world.

It has been shown how the student, by attaining this stage, becomes, in truth, a new being. He can now mature to still higher faculties, and, by means of the life-currents of his etheric body, control the higher and actual life-element, thus attaining independence, to a high degree, from the restrictions of the physical body.

There is more on the etheric body here: The Three Spiritual Principles of the Universe

On Alcohol, Meat and physical exercises

From From the Contents of Esoteric Classes

Although one can’t eat one’s way into the spiritual world, eating the wrong things can make spiritual development difficult or impossible.

Alcohol only arose after the Atlantean epoch to help men to become individualized. It closes man off from his higher capacities and encloses him in himself. That’s why alcohol was used in the Dionysian mysteries. But now all civilized people have reached that stage so that alcohol is an unnecessary evil today.

 Through its use one loses the ability to get along with others and to understand them. Alcohol is especially harmful for esoterics since its use changes all developed higher forces into forces of the personal ego, repeatedly locks it into itself, and tears the astral body apart through the opposing streams of the higher and lower I forces. The principle through which everyone can consciously attain his individualization was brought through the coming of Christ to the earth. That’s why Christ Jesus says: I am the true vine.

By consuming alcohol one prepares a fertile soil for hosts of spiritual beings, just as a dirty room gets filled with flies.

The meat (but not milk and eggs) that we eat is permeated by the animal’s astral body, and so our astral body has to work to digest it. This takes it away from its real task of creating pictures. Also at night it’s held fast by the etheric body so that it can’t leave it properly. This hinders it from its nightly task of restoring vital forces.

Vegetarian food that consists of physical and etheric things support the creation of large, comprehensive pictures and so gives a greater insight that lets one oversee things better without much deliberation. The greater force doesn’t exhaust us, but summons spiritual forces.

Vegetarian food is excellent for doctors and lawyers who will find it easier to see through their patients or their clients’ affairs, but it’s not the right thing for bankers, industrialists, salesmen and others who have a lot of calculating, for one loses the ability to make physical combinations.

People who inherited a body that can’t stand vegetarianism should not undertake an esoteric training.

The jogging, exercising and bathing that are often recommended are wrong for an esoteric; they pull him down into his physical body. He should try to move his limbs as little as possible.

Anima Sola – The Lonely Soul – From an Esoteric View

Anima Sola – From an Esoteric View

In the following I have some texts describing Anima Sola or Lonely Soul from Catholic lore, and Steiners description of the Homeless Souls and in relation to his description of Goethe’s distinctiveness.
From www.luckymojo.com/animasola.html

The Anima Sola or Lonely Soul is a Catholic depiction of a suffering person — almost always a woman — in chains amidst the barred prison doors and flames of Purgatory, the place where sinners go while awaiting final judgement.

It is said that those who die while wearing a blessed brown scapular, as directed by Our Lady of Mount Carmel, will not suffer long in Purgatory, but on the Saturday following their death, the Virgin of Mount Carmel will arrive bearing the Infant Jesus in her arms, accompanied by a group of angels, and at her direction, the angels will pull from the flames all those who died while wearing her scapular. Thus the Anima Sola, whose purgatorial chains are broken, is closely identified with the Carmelite devotion to Mary.

The Blessed brown scapular is the Etheric Mantle, the result of Illumination or Initiation, the background for the meeting with Christ in the Etheric. The releasing of Anima Sola of purgatory means that the person don’t die as a person, but continues living in the Etheric body. The first person known to wear the etheric mantle was Saint John, the Evangelist, and it’s reasonably to believe that it also were the case with Mary Magdalene.

From www.silvercrowcreations.com/MoreInfo.htm

The Anima Sola (Lonely Soul or Solitary Soul) has its roots in the Latin folk religions…

The woman appears penitent and reverent, and her chains have been released, so this sends quite an ambiguous message to the believer: she suffers and at the same time is released from suffering – perfectly representing Purgatory itself – a way-station for on the way to redemption to clear or burn away past sins.
…
Anima Sola is celebrated in folk religions much as a saint – and she hears the prayers of the living. She may bless and intercede on the prayer’s behalf to accelerate the conclusion of a purgatorial penance of a loved one who died in sin.
She might also be called up on to create a living purgatory for someone who has hurt the person praying to her.

The Lonely Souls becomes God’s helper. Even though some woman want to take all virtues in under the female brand, this is quite democratic, it’s distributed in pairs, one man one woman, Dual’s – Twin Spirits.

Homeless Souls

From The Homeless Souls

In contrast, there are a number of souls, particularly at present, whose interest is concentrated less on
worldly happenings as they approach a new life on earth than on the question of how they can develop maturity in the spiritual world. Their interest lies in the spiritual world right up to the moment before they find their way to earth. As a consequence, when they incarnate they arrive with a consciousness which has its origins in spiritual impulses. With their spiritual ambitions they outgrow their environment, and are thus predestined and prepared to go their own way.

Thus the souls who descend from pre-earthly to earthly existence can be divided into two groups. One group, to which the majority of people today still belong, comprises those souls who can make themselves remarkably at home on earth; who feel thoroughly comfortable in their warm nest, which so fascinated them long before they came down to earth, even if it does occasionally appear unpleasant — but that is only appearance, maya.

Other souls, who may pass patiently through childhood — appearance is not always the decisive thing — are less able to make themselves at home, are homeless souls, and grow beyond the warmth of the nest much more than they grow into it. …

The things which are being sought by these souls on the byways of life, away from the major highways, manifest themselves in many ways. If the others did not find it so agreeable to take the well-trodden paths and did not put such obstacles in the way of homeless souls, the numbers of the latter would be much more obvious to their contemporaries. But it is widely apparent today how many souls have a hint of such homelessness about them.

The tendency to such homelessness could be anticipated: the rapidly growing evidence of a longing in homeless souls for an attitude to life which was not laid out in advance; a longing for the spirit in the chaos of contemporary spiritual life.

The Sign of the Rosicrucian

A chock, an accident, or a sickness can loosen the etheric body from the physical, making it possible for the person to look at the world and himself as spectator, that he is not as immersed into the physical world as is usual. This is the sign of the Rosicrucian. It is symbolized with Jacob’s wrestling with the Angel, one who is too absorbed in the physical don’t fight with his angel, the physical world is too fascinating. Jacob is marked physically after the ‘fight’ with his angel, who symbolizes the spiritual world or his higher I, himself; he is becoming less physical.

From “The Karma of Vocation” – On Goethe

With Goethe, this force of soul became even stronger, and yet he lived to an advanced age. What enabled him to live so long? You will recall that I reminded you yesterday of a fact that intervened significantly in Goethe’s life. After he had spent some years in Leipzig as a student, he became seriously ill and stood face to face with death. He virtually looked death in the face. This illness is, to be sure, a natural phenomenon in the organism. However, we never learn to understand a man who creates out of the elemental forces of the world — indeed, we never learn really to understand any man — unless we take into consideration such events in the course of his karma. What really happened to Goethe when he became ill in Leipzig? We may describe it as a complete loosening of the etheric body in which the life forces of the soul had been active until then. It was loosened to such an extent that, after this illness, he no longer had that closely knit connection between the etheric and the physical bodies that he had formerly possessed.
The etheric body, however, is the supersensible member in us that really makes it possible to form concepts, to think. Abstract concepts such as we have in ordinary life, the only concepts that are approved by most persons who are materialistically disposed, come about through the fact that the etheric body is, as it were, closely united with the physical by a strong magnetic union. It is also through this fact that we possess a strong impulse to project our will into the physical world, that is, provided the astral body is strongly developed. In the case of Robespierre, Mirabeau and Danton, we have an etheric body strongly united with the physical but also a powerfully developed astral body. This works, in turn, upon the etheric body, which establishes these human individualities strongly in the physical world. Goethe was also organized like this, but another force now worked in him and brought about a complication. The result was that the etheric body was loosened and remained so through the illness that had brought him to the point of death. When the etheric body is no longer so intimately united with the physical body, however, it no longer thrusts its forces into the physical but retains them. This explains the transformation Goethe passed through when he returned to Frankfurt. There, during his acquaintance with Fräulein von Klettenberg, the mystic, and with various medical friends who were devoted to studies in alchemy, and through the writings of Swedenborg, he really developed a systematic spiritual world conception. It was still somewhat chaotic, but nevertheless a systematic spiritual world conception, and he was profoundly inclined to occupy himself with supersensible things.
…
Here we see how a natural event seems to enter with immense significance into the life of a human being. Undoubtedly, it points to a deeper interrelationship than the one the biographers generally wish to reveal. The significance of an illness to a man cannot be explained on the basis of hereditary tendencies but rather points to the connection between a man and the world in such a way that this relationship must be conceived spiritually. You will note also how Goethe’s life was thus complicated; such experiences determine how we take things in and what we are ourselves.
…
This event of near death appeared in Goethe at the end of the sixties in Leipzig, but its force had been prepared long before that….In anyone possessing a compact connection between the physical and etheric bodies, the external world exerts its influence and, as it makes impressions on the physical body, they pass over immediately into the etheric body; this is one and the same thing. Such a person simply lives in direct contact with the impressions of the external world. In Goethe’s case, the impressions are, of course, made upon the physical body, but the etheric body does not immediately respond because it is loosened. As a result, such a person can be more isolated, in a sense, from his environment, and a more complicated process takes place when an impression is made on his physical body. If you establish a connection between this organic structure of Goethe and the fact that, as we learn from his biography, he lays himself open even to historic events without forcing them, you have then arrived at an understanding of the peculiar functioning of his nature. I told you that he took the autobiography of Gottfried of Berlichingen and, influenced only by the dramatic impulses received from Shakespeare, did not really alter much in it. So he did not call it a drama but The History of the Iron-handed Gottfried of Berlichingen, Dramatized. You see, this soft and almost timid handling of things, as I might call it, without taking hold of them forcefully is due to his quite unusual connection between the etheric and physical bodies.
…
Through what I have explained, a sort of chasm had been created between his unusual inner nature and the external world. Just as he does not alter by force what is living in the external world but only delicately modifies its form, he also does not carry his feelings and sensations, which he can experience only in his etheric body, through the physical body to such a firm contact with the external world — something that, in others, would have led to quite definite events in life.
…
There is really a tremendous difference between Goethe’s mood up to 1775 and that after 1775, a difference that may be compared with a mighty wakefulness followed by a subdued life. The word “Dumpfheit,” an inner feeling of numbness, comes into his mind when he describes his life in Weimar, where he engages himself so much in events but responds to them more than at an earlier age, when he had rebelled against them. It is peculiar that after this dampening down for ten years there followed a period when events confronted him in a more gentle way. Just as the life of sleep is by no means a direct effect of the preceding daytime life, so also this sleep life of Goethe was not at all the result of what had gone before.
If, however, as in the special case of Goethe, the astral body is brought into a more vivid relationship with the spinal cord system and the ego with the ganglionic, because the ether body has withdrawn from the head, then far more vivid intercourse occurs with what is going on in our surroundings. But it is concealed from us in normal life because it is only while we are asleep at night that we enter into relationship with our spiritual environment.
…
He was able to sense this because what lived mysteriously in his fellow men made an impression on him such as is made by one person on another only when an especially intimate relationship, indeed when love, develops between them. In such a case of ordinary life, the connection of the ego with the ganglionic system, and of the astral body with the spinal cord system is highly active, although this is not consciously perceived as such. Something very special is activated. But what is otherwise active only in a love relationship came about in Goethe vis à vis a far larger number of people, so that he experienced a tremendous, more or less subconscious, compassion for the poor fellows — excuse the expression — who did not know what their inner natures were going through as they were driven from class to class and from examination to examination.
…
They were nothing but actual experiences that he gained from the most extensive environment because his ganglionic and spinal cord life was stimulated to more than normal wakefulness. This was the opposite from the subdued head life, but it was a potentiality in him even in his boyhood. We can see this from his description of what became active in him: not only what ordinarily engages people, say in piano lessons, became active in him but also the entire being. Goethe partook much more in the happenings of real life as a whole person than others, and we must say, therefore, that he was more wide-awake during the day than they. During the time in his youth when he was working on Faust, he was more awake during the day, and because of this he also needed what I described yesterday as the time of sleep — the ten years in Weimar. This dampening was necessary.
…
The world must be protected, so to speak, from standing still. It seems trivial to say this, but it is nevertheless a profound mystery-truth: not all people can dream in this way. The forces with which they dream must first be applied in the external world to something different so that through it a foundation may be created for a further evolution of the earth. It would come to a standstill were all men to dream as I have indicated.

An astrological session exemplifying some of the above: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ze8VwNle15I

These homeless souls don’t have as massively an impact on the physical world as those with strong physical connections, but they may have a much more subtle influence on other people, may be changing other peoples destiny by putting inspirations into words. In this way they don’t create new karma, but resolves old karma.

From “The Mission of Christian Rosenkreutz” on The Mark of Christian Rosenkreutz

Christian Rosenkreutz has always made use of the short intervals of time between his incarnations to call into his particular stream of spiritual life those souls whom he knows to be ripe; between his deaths and births he has concerned himself, as it were, with choosing out those who are ready to enter his stream. But human beings themselves, by learning to be attentive, must be able to recognise by what means Christian Rosenkreutz gives them a sign that they may count themselves among his chosen. This sign has been given in the lives of very many human beings of the present time, but they pay no heed to it. Yet among the apparently “chance” happenings in a man’s life there may be such a sign — it is to be regarded as an indication that between death and a new birth Christian Rosenkreutz has found him mature and ready; the sign is, however, given by Christian Rosenkreutz on the physical plane. This event may be called the mark of Christian Rosenkreutz. Let us suppose that a man is lying in bed … in other places I have mentioned different forms of such a happening but all of them have occurred … for some unaccountable reason he suddenly wakes up and as though guided by instinct looks at a wall otherwise quite dark; in the half-light of the room. He sees, written on the wall: “Get up now, this minute!” It all seems very strange, but he gets up and goes out of the house; hardly has he done so than the ceiling over his bed collapses; although nobody else would have been in danger of injury, he himself must inevitably have been killed. The most thorough investigation proves that no single being on the physical plane warned him to get up from the bed! If he had remained lying there, he would certainly be dead. — Such an experience may be thought to be hallucination, or something of the kind; but deeper investigation will reveal that these particular experiences — and they come to hundreds of people — are not accidental. A beckoning call has come from Christian Rosenkreutz. The karma of the one called in this way always indicates that Christian Rosenkreutz bestows the life he may claim. I say explicitly: such experiences occur in the lives of many people at the present time, and it is only a question of being alert. The occurrence does not always take such a graphic form as the example quoted, but numbers of human beings nowadays have had such experiences.

From Building Stones for an Understanding of the Mystery of Golgotha, lecture 3:

What did John the Baptist do? We are told — and this is clear from the context — that he baptized with water [the etheric,] as he himself said because the Kingdom of Heaven was nigh. He baptized with water for the remission of sins, saying “There cometh one mightier than I … I have indeed baptized you with water, he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost” (Mark I, 7 and 5). What is the difference between the baptism of John and the baptism with the Holy Ghost [the astral]?

What was the significance of baptism with water? … We know that the candidates for baptism suffered total immersion. During the immersion they experienced a kind of loosening of the etheric body, which bestowed on them a temporary clairvoyance. This is the real significance of the baptism by John and of similar baptisms.

But when John spoke of baptism with water he was referring not only to this form of baptism, but more especially to the passage in the Old Testament which says: “The Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.” What was the purpose of the baptism with water in Jordan?

It was intended that through the loosening of their etheric bodies and the experiences they underwent the candidates for baptism should feel themselves transposed into the condition of consciousness of the time before the “Fall”.

Everything that had occurred since the Fall was to be erased from their consciousness. They were to be restored to their pre-lapsarian state in order that they might experience the condition of man before the Fall.

They were made aware that through the Fall man had entered upon a wrong path and that to continue on this path would be to court disaster. He had to return to his original state of innocence, to cleanse his soul of the evil which this aberration had brought. ~Rudolf Steiner

From “From the Contents of Esoteric Classes”

Many people think that they’re working for the good of mankind from morn till eve, but this is questionable. A clairvoyant can see that efforts coming from materialistic thinking have the wrong effect, and it may lie in some people’s karma that they should wait until they can do certain things. Then a higher being can whisper such a task in his ear, so that it’s not induced by outer circumstances. Life is a destructive process for someone who only devotes himself to outer sense impressions. A meditating esoteric doesn’t let his life be determined by outer circumstances as much.