Anthroposophical Leading Thoughts
GA 26
17. What is Revealed When One Looks Back into Former Lives Between Death and a New Birth I
[ 1 ] In our last study we followed human life as a whole by turning our attention to the successive lives on Earth. The second point of view, which can throw still more light upon what was revealed by the first, is yielded when we consider the successive lives between death and new birth.
[ 2 ] Here also we see that the content of these lives, such as they are at the present time, goes back only to a certain point of time in earthly evolution. Their content is determined by the circumstance that man carries with him through the gate of death the inward power of self-consciousness gained in earthly life. This also enables him to confront as an individual the Divine-Spiritual Beings into whose presence he comes.
[ 3 ] This was not the case in a preceding period. At that time man had not yet progressed very far in the unfolding of his self-consciousness. The power gained on Earth was insufficient to detach him from the Divine-Spiritual Beings and so give him individual existence between death and new birth. Not that man was then within the Divine-Spiritual Beings, but he was within their sphere of influence, so that his will was essentially their will, not his own.
[ 4 ] Before this period there lies another in which, as we look back, we do not meet with man in his present constitution of soul and spirit at all, but we find a world of Divine Spiritual Beings within whom man only exists germinally. These Beings are the Primal Forces, the Archai.
[ 5 ] And indeed, if we trace back the life of one human being, we find not one Divine-Spiritual Being but all the Beings that belong to this Hierarchy.
[ 6 ] In these Divine-Spiritual Beings lives the will that man shall be. The will of all these Beings plays a part in the ‘becoming’ of each single human being. The cosmic aim of their harmonious co-operation is the production of the human form; for man is still without form in the Divine-Spiritual World.
[ 7 ] It may seem strange that the whole choir of Divine Spiritual Beings should work for a single human being. But the Hierarchies of the Exusiai, Dynamis, Kyriotetes, Thrones, Cherubim and Seraphim also worked in this way at a still earlier stage throughout the Moon, Sun and Saturn evolutions, in order that man might come into being.
[ 8 ] What had previously originated as a kind of pre-human being on Saturn, Sun and Moon, had no uniform shape. Some of these pre-human beings were chiefly organised with respect to the limbs-system, others with respect to the breast system, others again with respect to the head-system. These were actual human beings; we describe them here as pre-human only in order to distinguish them from the later stage, when the union of all these systems appears in the human form. The differentiation among them goes even further, for we may speak of heart-men, lung-men, etc.
[ 9 ] The Hierarchy of the Primal Forces considered it their task to lead into the general human form all these pre-human beings, whose soul-life also corresponded to their one-sided formation. [ 10 ] They took over Man from the hands of the Exusiai. The latter had already in thought created unity out of the human multiplicity; but among the Exusiai this unity was still an ideal form, a World-thought-form. Out of this the Archai moulded the etheric form, and this form already contained the forces which made it possible for the physical shape to originate.
[ 11 ] When we observe these things a stupendous fact is revealed, viz., that man is the ideal and aim of Gods. But this vision cannot be for man the source of vanity and pride; for he may only reckon, as coming from himself, what he has with full self-consciousness made out of himself during earthly life. And, expressed in cosmic proportions, this is little as compared with that foundation for his individual being which the Gods have created out of the macrocosm which they themselves are, as the microcosm, which he is. The Divine Spiritual Beings confront one another in the Cosmos. The visible expression of this fact is the form of the starry heavens. They wished to create in a unity as Man all that they themselves are as a choir.
[ 12 ] In order really to understand what the whole choir of the Hierarchy of the Archai accomplished when they created the human form, we must remember that there is a very great difference between this form and the physical body of man. The physical body is made up of the physical and chemical processes in man. These processes take place in the present human being within the human form. But this form itself is something that is altogether spiritual. It ought to fill us with solemn feelings when, on looking at the human form, we realise that with physical senses we are perceiving in the physical world something that is spiritual. For one who is able to see spiritually it is really the case that in the human form he sees a true Imagination which has descended into the physical world. If we wish to see Imaginations we must pass from the physical world to the neighbouring spiritual world, and then we realise how the human form is related to these Imaginations.
[ 13 ] When with the inner vision of the soul man looks back over the lives between death and a new birth he finds a first period during which this human form originated. And at the same time the deeper relation that exists between man and the Hierarchy of the Archai is revealed.
[ 14 ] During this period there is just an indication of the difference between earthly life and the life between death and new birth. For the Hierarchy of the Archai works in rhythmical epochs at the development of the human form. In one period of their work the Archai direct the thoughts which guide their several wills more towards the Cosmos beyond the Earth; at another time they look down to the Earth. And out of the co-operation of what is aroused from the Cosmos and from the Earth the human form is developed, which is thus the expression of the fact that man is an Earth-being and at the same time an extra-earthly, cosmic being.
[ 15 ] But the human form, here described as the creation of the Hierarchy of the Archai, comprises not merely the external outline of man and the formation of the surface as it is determined by the limit of the skin, but also the formation of the forces contained in his carriage, in his power of movement, which is adapted to the conditions on the Earth, and in the capacity to use his body as a means whereby to express his inner being.
[ 16 ] It is owing to this creative work of the Hierarchy of the Archai that man is able to assume his upright position within the earthly conditions of gravity, that within these conditions he can maintain his balance while moving freely, that he can liberate his arms and hands from the force of gravity and use them freely—all this he owes to the Archai, in addition to much more that lies within him and yet has form. All this is prepared during the life which may also for this period be called the life between death and a new birth. It is here prepared in such a manner that, in the third period, at the present time, man is himself able, during his life between death and a new birth, to work at this form for his earthly existence.
(New Year, 1925)
Further Leading Thoughts issued from the Goetheanum for the Anthroposophical Society (in connection with the foregoing study: What is revealed when one looks back into former lives between death and a new birth?)
[ 17 ] 147. Man's lives between death and a new birth also show three distinct periods. In the first of these, he lived entirely within the Hierarchy of the Archai, who prepared, for the physical world, the human form and figure which he was afterwards to bear.
[ 18 ] 148. Thus the Archai prepared the human being subsequently to unfold the free Self-consciousness. For this Self-consciousness can only evolve in beings who can show it forth, in the form and figure which was here created, out of an inner impulse of the soul.
[ 19 ] 149. In this we see how qualities and powers of Mankind, becoming manifest in the present cosmic age, were laid down in germ in ages long gone by. We see how the Microcosm grows out of the Macrocosm.
Erster Teil der Betrachtung: Was offenbart sich, wenn man in die vorigen Leben zwischen Tod und neuer Geburt zurückschaut?
[ 1 ] In der vorigen Betrachtung wurde das Gesamt-Menschenleben so verfolgt, daß der Seelenblick auf die aufeinanderfolgenden Erdenleben gelenkt wurde. Der andere Gesichtspunkt, der in noch helleres Licht rücken kann, was der erste offenbart, ist der, die aufeinanderfolgenden Leben zwischen dem Tod und einer neuen Geburt zu betrachten.
[ 2 ] Auch da zeigt sich, daß der Inhalt dieser Leben, wie er in der Gegenwart ist, nur bis zu einem gewissen Zeitpunkte der Erdenentwickelung zurückgeht. Dieser Inhalt ist ja dadurch bestimmt, daß der Mensch durch die Todespforte die innerliche Kraft des Selbstbewußtseins hindurchträgt, die im Erdenleben erworben ist. Der Mensch steht dadurch auch den göttlich-geistigen Wesen, in deren Mitte er tritt, als volle Individualität gegenüber.
[ 3 ] So war es in einer vorangehenden Periode nicht. Da war der Mensch in der Entfaltung seines Selbstbewußtseins noch nicht weit. Die auf Erden erlangte Kraft reichte nicht hin, die Loslösung von der göttlich-geistigen Welt bis zum individuellen Dasein zwischen Tod und neuer Geburt zu bewirken. Der Mensch befand sich da zwar nicht in den göttlich-geistigen Wesen, wohl aber innerhalb deren Wirkungskreis so, daß sein Wollen im wesentlichen ihr Wollen, nicht seines war.
[ 4 ] Vor dieser Periode liegt eine andere, in der man beim Zurückschauen gar nicht auf den Menschen in seiner gegenwärtigen geistig-seelischen Verfassung trifft, sondern auf die Welt göttlich-geistiger Wesen, in denen der Mensch erst keimhaft ist. Es sind die Urkräfte (Archai).
[ 5 ] Und zwar trifft man, wenn man eines Menschen Leben zurückverfolgt, nicht auf ein göttlich-geistiges Wesen, sondern auf alle, die zu dieser Hierarchie gehören.
[ 6 ] In diesen göttlich-geistigen Wesen lebt der Wille, daß der Mensch werde. An dem Werden jedes einzelnen Menschen ist der Wille aller beteiligt. In ihrem chormäßigen Zusammenwirken liegt als Weltenziel die Entstehung der menschlichen Gestalt. Denn noch ungestaltet lebt der Mensch in der göttlich-geistigen Welt.
[ 7 ] Es erscheint vielleicht sonderbar, daß auch schon für einen Menschen der ganze Chor göttlich-geistiger Wesen wirkt. Aber schon früher wirkten so die Hierarchien Exusiai, Dynameis, Kyriotetes, Throne, Cherubim, Seraphim durch die Monden-, Sonnen- und Saturnentwickelung, damit der Mensch werde.
[ 8 ] Was früher entstand, eine Art Vormensch, auf Saturn, Sonne und Mond, hatte nicht einheitliche Gestalt. Es gab solche Vormenschen, die mehr nach dem Gliedmaßensystem, andere, die mehr nach dem Brustsystem, wieder andere, die nach dem Kopfsystem organisiert waren. Es waren das doch wirkliche Menschen; sie werden hier nur Vormenschen genannt, um sie zu unterscheiden von dem späteren Stadium, wo der ausgeglichene Zusammenfluß aller Systeme in der menschlichen Gestalt erscheint. Die Differenzierung bei diesen Vormenschen geht noch viel weiter. Man kann von Herzmenschen, Lungenmenschen und so weiter sprechen.
[ 9 ] Die Hierarchie der Urkräfte betrachtet es als ihre Aufgabe, alle diese Vormenschen, deren Seelenleben ja auch ihrer einseitigen Gestaltung entsprochen hat, in die allgemeine menschliche Gestalt hineinzuführen.
[ 10 ] Aus der Hand der Exusiai übernehmen sie den Menschen. Diese hatten schon in Gedanken aus der menschlichen Vielheit eine Einheit geschaffen. Allein bei den Exusiai war diese Einheit noch eine Idealgestalt, eine Weltgedankengestalt. Die Archai formten die Äthergestalt daraus, aber so, daß diese Äthergestalt schon die Kräfte zur Entstehung der physischen Gestalt enthielt.
[ 11 ] Es offenbart sich ein Gewaltiges beim Hinblicken auf diese Tatbestände. Der Mensch ist Götter-Ideal und Götter-Ziel. Aber dieses Hinblicken kann nicht der Quell von Überhebung und Hochmut beim Menschen sein. Denn er darf sich ja nur, als von ihm kommend, zurechnen, was er in den Erdenleben mit Selbstbewußtsein aus sich gemacht hat. Und dies ist, in kosmischen Verhältnissen ausgedrückt, wenig gegenüber dem, was als die Grundlage seines Eigenwesens die Götter aus dem Makrokosmos, der sie selber sind, heraus als Mikrokosmos, der er ist, geschaffen haben. Die göttlich-geistigen Wesen stehen im Kosmos einander gegenüber. Der sichtbare Ausdruck dieses Gegenüberstehens ist die Gestalt des gestirnten Himmels. Sie wollten, was sie so zusammen sind, in einer Einheit als Mensch schaffen.
[ 12 ] Um recht zu verstehen, was die Hierarchie der Archai vollbrachte, als sie in ihrem Chor die menschliche Gestalt schuf, muß man bedenken, daß ein gewaltiger Unterschied ist zwischen dieser Gestalt und dem physischen Leib des Menschen. Physischer Leib ist, was sich physisch-chemisch im Menschenwesen abspielt. Das geschieht bei dem gegenwärtigen Menschen innerhalb der menschlichen Gestalt. Diese selbst aber ist ein durch und durch Geistiges. Feierlich sollte es stimmen, ein Geistiges mit physischen Sinnen in der physischen Welt als Menschengestalt wahrzunehmen. Für den, der geistig schauen kann, liegt dieses so, daß er in der Menschengestalt eine wirkliche Imagination sieht, die in die physische Welt heruntergestiegen ist. Will man Imaginationen schauen, muß man aus der physischen Welt in die nächste geistige übertreten. Dann aber wird man gewahr, wie die menschliche Gestalt diesen Imaginationen verwandt ist.
[ 13 ] Das Entstehen dieser Menschengestalt findet der rückschauende Seelenblick des Menschen als erste Periode, wenn er die Leben zwischen Tod und neuer Geburt beobachtet. Es offenbart sich dabei zugleich, welches tiefere Verhältnis besteht zwischen dem Menschen und der Hierarchie der Archai.
[ 14 ] Man kann in dieser Periode schon von einer Andeutung des Unterschiedes zwischen Erdenleben und Leben zwischen Tod und neuer Geburt sprechen. Die Hierarchie der Archai schafft nämlich in rhythmischen Epochen an dem Werden der Menschengestalt. Einmal richtet sie dabei die Gedanken, die den Willen der Einzelnen lenken, mehr nach dem außerirdischen Kosmos. Das andere Mal schaut sie auf die Erde herab. Und aus dem Zusammenwirken dessen, was vom außerirdischen Kosmos und von der Erde angeregt ist, wird die menschliche Gestalt gebildet, die so der Ausdruck dafür ist, daß der Mensch zugleich Erden- und außerirdisches Kosmos-Wesen ist.
[ 15 ] Die menschliche Gestalt, wie sie hier als Schöpfung der Hierarchie der Archai geschildert ist, umfaßt aber nicht bloß die äußeren Umrisse des Menschen und die Flächengestaltung, wie sie in der Hautbegrenzung gegeben ist, sondern auch die Kräftegestaltung, die in seiner Haltung, in seiner den Erdenverhältnissen angepaßten Bewegungsfähigkeit und in der Fähigkeit liegt, seinen Körper als Ausdrucksmittel für sein Inneres zu gebrauchen.
[ 16 ] Daß sich der Mensch in die Schwereverhältnisse der Erde in aufrechter Stellung hineinfügen kann, daß er innerhalb dieser Schwereverhältnisse das Gleichgewicht in freier Bewegung bewahren kann, daß er Arme und Hände der Schwere entreißen und in Freiheit gebrauchen kann, das und noch manches andere, das zwar im Innern liegt, aber doch Gestaltung ist: all das verdankt der Mensch dieser Schöpfung der Archai-Hierarchie. All das wird da vorbereitet in dem Leben, das man auch für diese Periode das zwischen Tod und neuer Geburt nennen kann. Es wird hier so vorbereitet, daß der Mensch dann in der dritten Periode, in unserer Gegenwart, während seines Lebens zwischen Tod und neuer Geburt die Fähigkeit hat, selbst an dieser Gestaltung für sein Erdendasein zu arbeiten.
Goetheanum, um die Jahreswende 1925.
Leitsätze Nr. 147 bis 149
(18. Januar 1925)
(Mit Bezug auf die vorangebende Betrachtung: Was offenbart sich, wenn man in die wiederholten Leben zwischen Tod und neuer Geburt zurückschaut?)
[ 17 ] 147. Auch die Leben zwischen Tod und neuer Geburt zeigen drei Perioden. In einer ersten lebt der Mensch ganz in der Hierarchie der Archai. Von ihnen wird seine spätere Menschengestalt für die physische Welt vorbereitet.
[ 18 ] 148. Die Archai bereiten damit das Menschenwesen dazu vor, später das freie Selbstbewußtsein zu entfalten; denn dieses kann nur in Wesen sich entwickeln, die es durch die Gestalt, die hier geschaffen wird, aus einem innern Impuls der Seele zur Darstellung bringen können.
[ 19 ] 149. Damit zeigt sich, wie die Keime der Menschheitseigenschaften und Menschheitskräfte, die in unserem Weltenalter zur Offenbarung kommen, in längstvergangenen Weitenaltern veranlagt werden und wie der Mikrokosmos aus dem Makrokosmos herauswächst.
First part of the contemplation: What is revealed when one looks back into the previous lives between death and the new birth?
[ 1 ] In the previous consideration, the entire human life was traced in such a way that the soul's gaze was directed to the successive lives on earth. The other point of view, which can shed even brighter light on what the first reveals, is to consider the successive lives between death and a new birth.
[ 2 ] This also shows that the content of these lives, as it is in the present, only goes back to a certain point in time of the earth's development. This content is determined by the fact that man carries through the gate of death the inner power of self-consciousness acquired in life on earth. As a result, the human being also faces the divine-spiritual beings, into whose midst he enters, as a full individuality.
[ 3 ] This was not the case in a previous period. Man was not yet far advanced in the development of his self-consciousness. The power acquired on earth was not sufficient to bring about the detachment from the divine-spiritual world up to the individual existence between death and new birth. Although man was not in the divine-spiritual beings, he was within their sphere of activity in such a way that his will was essentially their will, not his.
[ 4 ] Before this period lies another, in which, looking back, one does not encounter man in his present spiritual-soul condition at all, but the world of divine-spiritual beings, in which man is only germinal. These are the elemental forces (Archai).
[ 5 ] And indeed, if one traces one's life back, one does not encounter one divine-spiritual being, but all those who belong to this hierarchy.
[ 6 ] In these divine-spiritual beings lives the will that man should become. The will of all is involved in the becoming of each individual human being. In their choral cooperation lies the world goal of the emergence of human form, for man still lives unformed in the divine-spiritual world.
[ 7 ] It may seem strange that the whole choir of divine-spiritual beings is already at work for a human being. But the Exusiai, Dynameis, Kyriotetes, Thrones, Cherubim and Seraphim hierarchies had already worked in this way in the past through the development of the moon, sun and Saturn, so that the human being could come into being.
[ 8 ] What arose earlier, a kind of pre-human, on Saturn, the sun and the moon, did not have a uniform form. There were such pre-humans who were organized more according to the limb system, others who were organized more according to the chest system, still others who were organized according to the head system. These were after all real human beings; they are only called pre-humans here in order to distinguish them from the later stage where the balanced confluence of all systems appears in the human form. The differentiation in these pre-humans goes much further. One can speak of heart people, lung people and so on.
[ 9 ] The Hierarchy of Primordial Forces regards it as its task to lead all these pre-humans, whose soul life also corresponded to their one-sided form, into the general human form.
[ 10 ] From the hand of the Exusiai they take over the human being. These had already in thought created a unity out of human multiplicity. Only with the Exusiai was this unity still an ideal form, a world-thought form. The Archai formed the etheric form from it, but in such a way that this etheric form already contained the forces for the emergence of the physical form.
[ 11 ] A powerful thing is revealed when we look at these facts. Man is the ideal of the gods and the goal of the gods. But this contemplation cannot be the source of arrogance and arrogance in man. For he may only ascribe to himself, as coming from him, what he has made of himself with self-consciousness in earthly life. And this, expressed in cosmic terms, is little compared to what the gods have created as the basis of his own being out of the macrocosm, which they themselves are, as a microcosm, which he is. The divine-spiritual beings stand opposite each other in the cosmos. The visible expression of this confrontation is the form of the starry sky. They wanted to create what they are so together in a unity as man.
[ 12 ] To properly understand what the Hierarchy of the Archai accomplished when they created the human form in their choir, it must be remembered that there is a vast difference between this form and the physical body of man. The physical body is what takes place physically and chemically in the human being. This happens in the present human being within the human form. This itself, however, is spiritual through and through. It should be solemn to perceive a spiritual being with physical senses in the physical world as a human form. For those who can see spiritually, this is because they see in the human form a real imagination that has descended into the physical world. If one wants to see imaginations, one must pass from the physical world into the next spiritual world. But then one becomes aware of how the human form is related to these imaginations.
[ 13 ] The emergence of this human form is found by the retrospective view of the human soul as the first period when it observes the lives between death and new birth. At the same time, the deeper relationship between man and the hierarchy of the Archai is revealed.
[ 14 ] In this period we can already speak of an intimation of the difference between life on earth and life between death and new birth. The hierarchy of the Archai works in rhythmic epochs on the development of the human form. At one time it directs the thoughts that guide the will of the individual more towards the extraterrestrial cosmos. The other time she looks down on the earth. And from the interaction of what is inspired by the extraterrestrial cosmos and the earth, the human form is formed, which is thus the expression of the fact that man is both an earthly and an extraterrestrial cosmic being.
[ 15 ] The human form, as it is described here as the creation of the Hierarchy of the Archai, comprises not only the outer contours of man and the surface design as it is given in the boundary of the skin, but also the design of forces which lies in his posture, in his ability to move adapted to the conditions of the earth and in the ability to use his body as a means of expression for his inner being.
[ 16 ] The fact that man can fit himself into the gravitational conditions of the earth in an upright position, that he can maintain his balance within these gravitational conditions in free movement, that he can wrest his arms and hands from the heaviness and use them in freedom, this and many other things which lie within, but are nevertheless formed: all this man owes to this creation of the Archai Hierarchy. All this is prepared there in the life which can also be called for this period that between death and new birth. It is prepared here in such a way that man then has the ability in the third period, in our present, during his life between death and new birth, to work on this creation for his earthly existence himself.
Goetheanum, around the turn of the year 1925. (January 18, 1925)
(With reference to the preceding consideration: What is revealed when one looks back into the repeated lives between death and new birth?)
[ 17 ] 147. The lives between death and new birth also show three periods. In the first, man lives entirely in the hierarchy of the Archai. It is from them that his later human form is prepared for the physical world.
[ 18 ] 148 The Archai thus prepare the human being to later develop free self-consciousness; for this can only develop in beings who can bring it to expression through the form that is created here from an inner impulse of the soul.
[ 19 ] 149. This shows how the germs of human characteristics and human powers, which come to revelation in our world age, are predisposed in long-past vast ages and how the microcosm grows out of the macrocosm.