The Michael Mystery
GA 26
XVI. What is seen on looking back into Man's repeated Earth-lives
[ 1 ] When it is possible to look back with the suitable spiritual organs of knowledge into a man's previous earth-lives, observation shows a number of such earth-lives in which the man was already a ‘person.’ His exterior resembled that of the present day, and he had an inner life that bore an individual stamp. Earth-lives appear, which shew signs of the existence of the Intellectual or Mind-Soul, but not yet of the Spiritual Soul; others again, in which only the Sentient Soul is as yet developed and so on.
[ 2 ] This was so in the ages of Earthly History, and has been so already for a long time before.
[ 3 ] Pursuing the observation however, one comes back to ages in which it was not yet so. There one finds Man, both in respect of inner life and outer habit, still interwoven with the world of the divine spiritual beings. Man is there an earth-man, but not yet detached from divine spiritual being, thinking and willing.
[ 4 ] In still earlier times, a detached and separate Man vanishes altogether from sight. There is nothing to be seen but divine Spirit-Beings, holding Man within their lap.
[ 5 ] These three stages of his evolution, Man has gone through during his time on earth. The transition from the first to the second lies in the late Lemurian age, from the second to the third in the Atlantean age.
[ 6 ] Just as, in his present earth-life, Man carries everything that has entered his life as a memory within him, so too he carries within him as cosmic memory everything which he has gone through in the manner above described. What is the soul-life on earth? It is the world of memories, open every moment to take in new perceptions. In this interplay of memory and new experience Man lives his inward earthly life.
[ 7 ] But this inward earthly life could never come to expression, if there were not still existing at the present time in Man, as a cosmic memory, those things that one sees when one looks back in spirit to the first stage of his growth to earth-manhood, when he was not yet detached from the divine spirit-beings.
[ 8 ] Of what then went on in the world, all that remains in living existence upon earth to-day is the process carried out in the human nerves-and-senses system. In external Nature, all the forces which were active in those times have died out, and are only to be seen in their dead forms.
[ 9 ] Thus, in the thought-world of Man, there is living as present revelation something which, to have earthly existence, must have as its basis what had been evolved in Man before ever he attained to individual life on earth.
[ 10 ] In the life between death and new birth, Man every time goes anew through this stage. Only, that into the world of divine Spirit-Beings—who now again receive him even as once they bore him within themselves—he now carries his own full individual entity, in the form it has acquired during his lives on earth. He is, between death and new birth, both in the present and at the same time in all the times through which he has traveled in recurring earth-lives and recurring lives between death and new birth.
[ 11 ] It is otherwise with what lives in the human feeling-world. This feeling-world of Man is connected with experiences which followed immediately after those in which Man as such was not yet revealed—with those experiences namely which Man lived through as Man, indeed, but not yet detached from the divine-spiritual being, thinking, willing. There would be no world of feeling for Man to disclose at the present day, if the foundations from which it springs were not laid in his rhythmic system. In this rhythmic system we possess the cosmic recollection of the second stage of Man's evolution, described above.
[ 12 ] Thus in Man's feeling-world there are working together his human soul-life of the present, and the after-effects of an olden time.
[ 13 ] In the life between death and new birth, the time of which we are here speaking, with all that fills it, is known to Man as the bounds of his cosmos. What the starlit sky is to Man in his physical life, the same part is played for him spiritually in his life between death and new birth by his existence between his complete union with the divine Spirit-world and his detachment from it. There, shining at the ‘world's bourne’ he sees not the physical heavenly bodies, but in the place of each star the collective group of divine Spirit-Beings who are in reality the star.
[ 14 ] And in connection with the will only—not with feeling nor thought—there lives on in Man whatever those earth-lives have to shew, which begin, on observation, to display Cosmos and gives Man his exterior form, remains reserved in this exterior form as a cosmic recollection. This cosmic recollection lives on as forces in the human form. These are not directly the forces of the will, but are that which gives in the human organization the groundwork for the will-forces.
[ 15 ] This is a region of Man's being which lies outside the ‘world's bourne’ in his life between death and new birth. Man there conceives of it as of something that will again be part of his human existence in his new earth-life.
[ 16 ] In his nerves-and-senses system, Man is to-day still bound up with the Cosmos in the same manner as he was when he shewed only as a first life-seed amid the divine-spiritual being.
[ 17 ] In his rhythmic system, Man still lives to-day in the Cosmos as he lived when he already was Man, but not yet detached from divine-spiritual being.
[ 18 ] In his metabolic and limb-system, the basis for the development of will, Man's life is such that he has working on in this system the after-effect of all that he has gone through in his personal, individual earth-lives, ever since these began, and also in the intervening lives between death and new birth.
[ 19 ] From the forces of earth, Man has that alone which lends him the consciousness of Self. The physical, bodily basis, too, of this Self-consciousness is an effect of the earth's action. Everything else in the human being is extraterrestrial and cosmic in its origin. The astral body as conveyer of sensation and thought, together with its etheric and physical basis—all the life-stir of the ether-body, and even all that is working physically and chemically in the physical body—all this has its origin beyond the earth. Strange as it may seem, the physical and chemical action which takes place within Man is not derived from the earth.
[ 20 ] That Man develops this extra-earthly, cosmic life within him, is the work of the planets and the other stars. What he develops in him by their aid, is carried by the Sun and its forces to the Earth. The Human-Cosmic is by the Sun transplanted to earthly territory. By virtue of the Sun, Man lives as heavenly being upon Earth. That property only, whereby Man exceeds the limits of his human form—the capacity to bring forth his kind—is a gift of the Moon.
[ 21 ] Of course these are not the only effects of the Sun's and the Moon's action; highly spiritual effects proceed from them also.
[ 22 ] When the Sun about Christmas-time begins to gain increasing power for the Earth, this is its action in the physical earthly sphere, exhibited rhythmically in the cycle of the year; it is an expression of the spirit in Nature. The evolution of mankind is one unique part in a so-to-speak gigantic world-year. In this world-year it is World-Christmas or ‘Holy Night’ when the Sun does not merely act on the Earth through the spirit of Nature, but when the soul of the Sun, the Christ Spirit, comes down from above into the Earth.
[ 23 ] As in each single man, that which he realizes individually in his own life is connected with a cosmic memory, so will the yearly Christmas be felt in its truth by the human soul, if the cosmic and heavenly Christ-Event is thought of as working on continually—conceived not merely as a human but as a cosmic recollection. Not Man alone at Christmas-time celebrates in remembrance the Descent of the Christ, but the Cosmos also.
Leading Thoughts
[ 24 ] On looking back into a man's repeated earth-lives, they may be distinguished into three different stages: First a very early one, in which Man is not yet existent as an individual form of being, but as a life-seed amid divine spiritual being. Looking back into this stage, one finds not as yet a Man, but only divine Spirit-Beings (the Principalities or Primeval Powers, the Archai.)
[ 25 ] Following on this comes a middle stage in which Man is already discernible as an individual form of being, but not yet detached from the thinking and willing and being of the divine-spiritual world. He has not yet, as that time, his present personality, which is involved with his appearance on earth as an entirely distinctive being, detached from the divine spiritual world.
[ 26 ] The third stage is the present one. Man realizes himself, as he stands forth in his own human form, detached from the divine spiritual world; and he realizes the world as an environment over against which he takes his place as an individual personality. This stage began in Atlantean times.
Was sich offenbart, wenn man in die wiederholten Erdenleben zurückschaut
[ 1 ] Wenn das geistgemäße Erkennen zurückschauen kann in frühere Erdenleben eines Menschen, so zeigt sich, daß es eine Anzahl solcher Erdenleben gibt, in denen der Mensch schon Person war. Sein Äußeres glich dem gegenwärtigen, und er hatte ein Innenleben, das individuelles Gepräge trug. Es treten Erdenleben auf, die offenbaren, wie die Verstandes- oder Gemütsseele da war, noch nicht die Bewußtseinsseele, und solche, in denen erst die Empfindungsseele ausgebildet war und so weiter.
[ 2 ] In den erdgeschichtlichen Zeitaltern ist das so; es war auch schon lange vorher so.
[ 3 ] Man kommt aber im Anschauen zurück zu Zeitaltern, in denen es noch nicht so war. Da findet man den Menschen noch nach Innenleben und nach der äußeren Bildung mit der Welt der göttlich-geistigen Wesen verwoben. Der Mensch ist als Erdenmensch da, aber nicht losgelöst vom göttlich-geistigen Wesen, Denken und Wollen.
[ 4 ] In noch älteren Zeiten verschwindet der losgelöste Mensch ganz; es sind nur göttlich-geistige Wesen vorhanden, die den Menschen in ihrem Schoß tragen.
[ 5 ] Diese drei Stadien seiner Entwickelung hat der Mensch während seiner Erdenzeit durchgemacht. Der Übergang des ersten in das zweite liegt in der spätesten lemurischen, der vom zweiten in das dritte in der atlantischen Zeit.
[ 6 ] Wie nun der Mensch im gegenwärtigen Erdenleben seine Erlebnisse als Erinnerung in sich trägt, so trägt er alles, was er in der geschilderten Art durchgemacht hat, als kosmische Erinnerung in sich. Was ist das irdische Seelenleben? Die Welt der Erinnerungen, die bereit ist, in jedem Augenblicke neue Wahrnehmungen zu machen. In diesem Wechselwirken von Erinnerung und neuer Erfahrung lebt der Mensch sein innerliches Erdendasein.
[ 7 ] Aber dieses innerliche Erdendasein könnte nicht zur Entfaltung kommen, wenn nicht als kosmische Erinnerung im Menschen gegenwärtig noch vorhanden wäre, was man schaut, wenn man geistig zurückblickt in das erste Stadium seines Erden-Mensch-Werdens, in dem er von dem göttlich-geistigen Wesen noch nicht losgelöst war.
[ 8 ] Von dem, was damals in der Welt geschah, ist heute auf Erden nur noch das lebendig vorhanden, was innerhalb der menschlichen Nerven-Sinnesorganisation entwickelt wird. In der äußeren Natur sind alle die Kräfte, die damals wirksam waren, erstorben und nur in toten Formen beobachtbar.
[ 9 ] So lebt in der menschlichen Gedankenwelt als gegenwärtige Offenbarung, was, um Erdenexistenz zu haben, zur Grundlage das haben muß, was im Menschen schon entwickelt war, bevor er individuelles Erdendasein erlangte.
[ 10 ] In dem Leben zwischen Tod und neuer Geburt erlebt der Mensch jedesmal aufs neue dieses Stadium. Nur trägt er in die Welt der göttlich-geistigen Wesen, die ihn wieder aufnimmt, wie sie ihn einst in sich gehabt hat, sein volles in den Erdenleben gebildetes individuelles Dasein hinein. Er ist zwischen Tod und neuer Geburt zugleich in der Gegenwart, aber auch in aller Zeit, die er durch wiederholte Erdenleben und wiederholte Leben zwischen Tod und neuer Geburt durchgemacht hat.
[ 11 ] Anders verhält es sich mit dem, was in der Gefühlswelt des Menschen lebt. Sie steht zu den Erlebnissen in Beziehung, die unmittelbar nach denen kamen, die den Menschen noch nicht als solchen offenbaren. Zu den Erlebnissen, die der Mensch schon als Mensch, aber noch nicht losgelöst von göttlich-geistigem Wesen, Denken und Wollen durchmacht. Der Mensch könnte gegenwärtig keine Gefühlswelt entfalten, wenn diese nicht auf der Grundlage seiner rhythmischen Organisation erstehen würde. In dieser ist die kosmische Erinnerung an das geschilderte zweite Stadium der Menschheitsentwickelung vorhanden.
[ 12 ] So wirken in der Gefühlswelt zusammen die menschliche seelische Gegenwart und das, was in ihm nachwirkt aus einer alten Zeit.
[ 13 ] In dem Leben zwischen dem Tod und einer neuen Geburt erlebt der Mensch den Inhalt der Zeit, von der hier die Rede ist, wie die Grenze seines Kosmos. Was dem Menschen im physischen Erdenleben der Sternenhimmel ist, das ist geistig in dem Leben zwischen Tod und neuer Geburt sein Dasein, das zwischen seiner völligen Verbundenheit mit der göttlich-geistigen Welt und seinem Losgelöstsein liegt. Da erscheinen an der «Weltengrenze» nicht die physischen Himmelskörper, sondern an jedem Sternenort die Summe der göttlich-geistigen Wesen, die ja in Wirklichkeit der Stern sind.
[ 14 ] Mit dem Willen allein, nicht mit Gefühl und Denken verbunden, lebt im Menschen dasjenige, was die Erdenleben aufweisen, die sich beim Beobachten schon als persönlichindividuell offenbaren. Was dem Menschen aus dem Kosmos heraus seine äußere Gestalt gibt, das erhält sich in dieser äußeren Gestalt als kosmische Erinnerung. Diese lebt in der menschlichen Gestalt als Kräfte. Es sind das nicht unmittelbar die Kräfte des Willens, sondern das, was in der menschlichen Organisation die Grundlage der Willenskräfte ist.
[ 15 ] In dem Leben zwischen Tod und neuer Geburt liegt dieses Gebiet des menschlichen Wesens außerhalb der «Weltengrenze». Der Mensch stellt es da vor als dasjenige, das ihm beim neuen Erdenleben wieder eigen sein wird.
[ 16 ] In seiner Nerven-Sinnes-Organisation ist der Mensch heute noch so mit dem Kosmos verbunden, wie er es war, als er noch innerhalb des Göttlich-Geistigen nur keimhaft sich offenbarte.
[ 17 ] In seiner rhythmischen Organisation lebt der Mensch heute noch so im Kosmos, wie er lebte, als er als Mensch schon vorhanden, aber noch nicht losgelöst vom Göttlich-Geistigen war.
[ 18 ] In seiner Stoffwechsel-Gliedmaßen-Organisation, als der Grundlage der Willens-Entfaltung, lebt der Mensch so, daß in dieser Organisation alles nachwirkt, was er seit der Zeit der persönlich-individuellen Erdenleben in diesen und in den Leben zwischen Tod und neuer Geburt durchgemacht hat.
[ 19 ] Aus den Kräften der Erde hat der Mensch nur dasjenige, was ihm das Selbstbewußtsein verleiht. Auch die physische Leibesgrundlage dieses Selbstbewußtseins stammt aus dem, was die Erde bewirkt. Alles übrige im Menschenwesen ist außerirdischen-kosmischen Ursprungs. Der empfindende und gedankentragende Astralleib und seine ätherisch-physische Grundlage, alle Lebensregsamkeit im Ätherleib, ja sogar, was im physischen Leib physisch-chemisch wirkt, ist außerirdischen Ursprungs. So befremdend dies auch sein mag: das innerhalb des Menschen wirksame Physisch-Chemische stammt nicht aus der Erde.
[ 20 ] Daß der Mensch dieses außerirdische Kosmische in sich entwickelt, ist Wirkung der Planeten und sonstiger Sterne. Was er so entwickelt, das trägt die Sonne mit ihren Kräften zur Erde. Das Menschlich-Kosmische wird durch die Sonne in den Bereich des Irdischen versetzt. Durch sie lebt der Mensch als Himmelswesen auf der Erde. Nur dasjenige, wodurch er über seine Menschenbildung hinausgeht, die Fähigkeit seinesgleichen hervorzubringen, ist eine Gabe des Mondes.
[ 21 ] Selbstverständlich sind dies nicht die einzigen Wirkungen von Sonne und Mond. Von ihnen gehen auch hochgeistige Wirkungen aus.
[ 22 ] Wenn die Sonne um die Weihnachtszeit immer mehr an Kräften für die Erde gewinnt, so ist dieses die im Physisch-Irdischen rhythmisch sich offenbarende Jahreswirkung, die ein Ausdruck des Geistes in der Natur ist. Die Menschheitsentwickelung ist ein einziges Glied in einem gewissermaßen gigantischen Weltenjahr. Das geht aus den vorangehenden Ausführungen hervor. In diesem Weltenjahr ist Welten-Weihe-Nacht da, wo die Sonne nicht bloß aus dem Geiste der Natur heraus zur Erde wirkt, sondern wo die Seele der Sonne, der Christus-Geist, auf die Erde niedersteigt.
[ 23 ] Wie im einzelnen Menschen das individuell Erlebte mit der kosmischen Erinnerung zusammenhängt, so wird die alljährliche Weihnacht von der Menschenseele richtig empfunden, wenn das himmlisch-kosmische Christus-Ereignis als fortwirkend gedacht und wie eine nicht bloß menschliche, sondern kosmische Erinnerung aufgefaßt wird. Nicht bloß der Mensch gedenkt festlich zu Weihnachten des Christus-Niederstieges, sondern auch der Kosmos.
Goetheanum, zu Neujahr 1925.
Leitsätze Nr. 144 bis 146
(11. Januar 1925)
(Mit Bezug auf die vorangehende Betrachtung: Was sich offenbart, wenn man in die wiederholten Erdenleben zurückscbaut)
[ 24 ] 144. Schaut man in die wiederholten Erdenleben eines Menschen zurück, so gliedern sich diese in drei verschiedene Stadien: ein ältestes, in dem der Mensch noch nicht individuell-wesenhaft, sondern als Keim in göttlich-geistiger Wesenheit vorhanden ist. Man findet da beim Zurückschauen noch nicht einen Menschen, sondern göttlich-geistige Wesen (die Urkräfte, Archai).
[ 25 ] 145. Daran schließt sich ein mittleres Stadium, in dem der Mensch zwar schon individuell-wesenhaft vorhanden ist, aber noch nicht losgelöst von Denken und Wollen und Wesen der göttlich-geistigen Welt. Er hat da noch nicht seine gegenwärtige Persönlichkeit, die damit zusammenhängt, daß er ein völlig eigenes Wesen in seiner Erderscheinung, losgelöst von der göttlich-geistigen Welt, ist.
[ 26 ] 146. Als drittes Stadium tritt erst das gegenwärtige auf. Der Mensch erlebt sich in seiner Menschengestalt, losgelöst von der göttlich-geistigen Welt; und er erlebt die Welt als Umgebung, der er individuell-persönlich gegenübersteht. Dieses Stadium beginnt in der atlantischen Zeit.
What is revealed when one looks back into the repeated earth lives
[ 1 ] If spiritual cognition can look back into a person's previous earthly lives, it becomes apparent that there are a number of such earthly lives in which the person was already a person. His outward appearance resembled the present one, and he had an inner life that bore an individual character. There are earth lives that reveal how the intellectual or emotional soul was there, not yet the consciousness soul, and those in which the sentient soul was first formed, and so on.
[ 2 ] This is the case in the geological ages; it was also the case long before that.
[ 3 ] But when we look back, we return to ages in which it was not yet so. There we find man still interwoven with the world of divine-spiritual beings according to his inner life and outer formation. Man is there as an earthly human being, but not detached from the divine-spiritual being, thinking and willing.
[ 4 ] In even older times, the detached human being disappears completely; there are only divine-spiritual beings who carry the human being in their womb.
[ 5 ] Man has gone through these three stages of his development during his time on earth. The transition from the first to the second lies in the latest Lemurian period, that from the second to the third in the Atlantean period.
[ 6 ] Just as man carries his experiences in the present life on earth as a memory, so he carries everything he has gone through in the manner described as a cosmic memory. What is the earthly life of the soul? The world of memories, which is ready to make new perceptions at every moment. In this interaction of memory and new experience, man lives his inner earthly existence.
[ 7 ] But this inner earthly existence could not come to fruition if there were not still present in man as a cosmic memory what one sees when one looks back spiritually to the first stage of his becoming man on earth, in which he was not yet detached from the divine-spiritual being.
[ 8 ] Of what happened in the world at that time, only that which is developed within the human nervous-sensory organization is still alive on earth today. In external nature, all the forces that were active at that time have died and can only be observed in dead forms.
[ 9 ] So there lives in the human world of thought as present revelation that which, in order to have earthly existence, must have as its basis that which was already developed in man before he attained individual earthly existence.
[ 10 ] In the life between death and new birth, man experiences this stage anew each time. Only he carries into the world of divine-spiritual beings, which receives him again as it once had him within itself, his full individual existence formed in earthly life. He is between death and new birth at the same time in the present, but also in all the time he has gone through repeated earth lives and repeated lives between death and new birth.
[ 11 ] The situation is different with what lives in the emotional world of the human being. It is related to the experiences that came immediately after those that do not yet reveal the human being as such. To the experiences that the human being already undergoes as a human being, but not yet detached from divine-spiritual being, thinking and willing. Man could not develop an emotional world at present if it did not arise on the basis of his rhythmic organization. The cosmic memory of the second stage of human development described above is present in this organization.
[ 12 ] So the human spiritual present and that which continues to work in it from an ancient time work together in the emotional world.
[ 13 ] In the life between death and a new birth, man experiences the content of time, of which we are speaking here, as the boundary of his cosmos. What the starry sky is to man in his physical life on earth, that is his spiritual existence in the life between death and a new birth, which lies between his complete connection with the divine-spiritual world and his detachment. It is not the physical celestial bodies that appear at the "world boundary", but the sum of the divine-spiritual beings at each star location, which are in reality the star.
[ 14 ] With the will alone, not connected with feeling and thinking, there lives in man that which the earthly lives exhibit, which already reveal themselves as personally individual when observed. What gives man his outer form out of the cosmos is preserved in this outer form as cosmic memory. This lives in the human form as forces. These are not directly the forces of will, but that which is the basis of the forces of will in the human organization.
[ 15 ] In the life between death and new birth, this area of the human being lies outside the "world boundary". Man presents it there as that which will be his own again in the new life on earth.
[ 16 ] In his nervous-sensory organization, man today is still connected with the cosmos as he was when he was still only germinating within the divine-spiritual.
[ 17 ] In his rhythmic organization, man still lives in the cosmos today as he lived when he was already present as a human being, but not yet detached from the divine-spiritual.
[ 18 ] In his metabolic-limb organization, as the basis of the unfolding of the will, man lives in such a way that everything he has gone through since the time of his personal-individual earthly lives in these and in the lives between death and new birth continues to have an effect in this organization.
[ 19 ] From the forces of the earth man has only that which gives him self-consciousness. The physical body basis of this self-consciousness also comes from what the earth brings about. Everything else in the human being is of extraterrestrial-cosmic origin. The sentient and thought-bearing astral body and its etheric-physical basis, all vitality in the etheric body, even what works physically and chemically in the physical body, is of extraterrestrial origin. As disconcerting as this may be, the physical-chemical that is active within the human being does not originate from the earth.
[ 20 ] The fact that man develops this extraterrestrial cosmic within himself is the effect of the planets and other stars. What he develops in this way is carried to earth by the sun with its forces. The human-cosmic is brought into the realm of the earthly by the sun. Through it man lives on earth as a heavenly being. Only that by which he goes beyond his human formation, the ability to bring forth his own kind, is a gift of the moon.
[ 21 ] Of course, these are not the only effects of the sun and moon. They also have highly spiritual effects.
[ 22 ] If the sun gains more and more power for the earth around Christmas time, this is the annual effect that reveals itself rhythmically in the physical-earthly, which is an expression of the spirit in nature. The development of mankind is a single link in a gigantic world year, so to speak. This can be seen from the foregoing. In this world year, world consecration night is where the sun not only works out of the spirit of nature to the earth, but where the soul of the sun, the spirit of Christ, descends to the earth.
[ 23 ] Just as in the individual human being the individually experienced is connected with the cosmic memory, so the annual Christmas is correctly perceived by the human soul when the heavenly-cosmic Christ-event is conceived as continuing and understood as a not merely human but cosmic memory. It is not only man who commemorates the descent of Christ at Christmas, but also the cosmos.
Goetheanum, on New Year's Day 1925.
Guiding Principles No. 144 to 146
(January 11, 1925)
(With reference to the preceding consideration: What is revealed when one builds back into the repeated earth lives)
[ 24 ] 144 If one looks back into the repeated earth lives of a human being, these are divided into three different stages: the oldest, in which the human being is not yet present as an individual being, but as a germ in divine-spiritual essence. Looking back, we do not yet find a human being, but divine-spiritual beings (the elemental forces, Archai).
[ 25 ] 145 This is followed by a middle stage in which the human being is already present as an individual being, but not yet detached from the thinking and willing and beings of the divine-spiritual world. He does not yet have his present personality, which is related to the fact that he is a completely separate being in his earthly appearance, detached from the divine-spiritual world.
[ 26 ] 146 The third stage is the present one. Man experiences himself in his human form, detached from the divine-spiritual world; and he experiences the world as an environment that he faces individually and personally. This stage begins in the Atlantean period.