The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Third Lecture

[ 1 ] Today we shall observe the human being in his state of waking here in the physical world, in his state of sleep and in the state of so-called death. Everyone knows the state of waking from his own experience.

[ 2 ] When a person falls asleep, everything, so to speak, the astral body, the ego and what the ego has worked in the astral body, withdraws from the physical and etheric bodies. If you look at a sleeping person with clairvoyance, you have the physical and etheric bodies lying in bed. These two members remain in the same connection as they are otherwise, while the astral body draws out everything that is higher, so that one can clairvoyantly observe how, in the process of falling asleep, the astral body withdraws from the first two bodies in a certain light. If this state is to be described in even greater detail, it must be said that in the case of modern man, the astral body appears structured through manifold currents and glows of light. If one looks at these summarily, the whole thing looks like two intertwined spirals, like two intertwined numbers, one of which loses itself in the physical body, but the other extends far into the cosmos like a comet's tail. Only these two tails of the astral body soon become invisible in their further spread, so that the appearance can then be compared to the shape of an egg. When the person wakes up again, the tail that extends into the cosmos disappears, and the whole thing retracts back into the etheric and physical body.

[ 3 ] Dreaming is an intermediate state between waking and sleeping. Dreaming sleep occurs when the astral body has already completely severed its connection with the physical body, so to speak, has pulled its sensory threads out of the physical body, but is still connected to the etheric body. Then the person's field of vision is permeated by the images we call dreams. Objectively, this is an intermediate state because the astral body has completely severed its connection with the physical body, while it is still connected to the ether body to a certain extent.

[ 4 ] Thus is the sleeping human being, who lives in his astral body, outside of his physical and etheric body. That man must sink into such sleep is deeply justified in the whole of nature. You must not imagine that the astral body is inactive and has no work to do when it is outside the physical and etheric bodies during the night while you are sleeping. When the astral body is in the physical and etheric bodies during the day, it is affected by the impressions from the outside world that the human being receives through the astral body's own activity, through his sense impressions, through his activity in the physical world. Everything that the human being receives in the way of feelings and sensations, everything that affects him from the outside, is continued up to the astral body. This is the actual sensing and thinking part of the human being, and the physical body and also what is in the etheric body are only its mediators, the instruments. Everything that thinks and wills is in the astral body. While the human being is active in the outside world during the day, the astral body thus continually receives impressions from the outer world. On the other hand, however, we hold that the astral body is the actual builder of the etheric and physical bodies. Just as the physical body, in all its organs, is frozen and hardened out of the etheric body, so everything that flows and is active in the etheric body is born out of the astral body.

[5] From what is the astral body itself born? It is born out of the general astral organism that permeates our entire cosmos that belongs to us. If you would like to visualize this relationship through a simile, the relationship of the small part of astral physicality in your body to the whole mighty astral sea in which all people, animals, plants, minerals and even planets vibrate and from which they are born, if you would like to imagine this relationship of the astral body to the astral organism, then think of a drop of liquid in a vessel. Just as the drop has its entire being from the liquid in the vessel, so that which is in an astral body was once enclosed in the whole astral sea of the cosmos. It has separated itself out, and by moving into the etheric and physical body, it has set itself apart like the drop from the vessel.

[ 6 ] As long as the astral body rested in the bosom of the general astral body, it acquired its laws, its impressions, from this cosmic astral body. It lived its life within this cosmic astral body. Since this separation, during the waking hours it depends on the impressions it receives from the physical world, so that it has to divide its nature between the impressions it still has from the cosmic astral body and those it now receives from outside through the activity assigned to it from the physical world. These two aspects will result in harmony when the human being has reached the goal of his or her development on earth. Today this is not the case, these two effects do not resonate.

[ 7 ] Now the astral body builds up the etheric body and thereby indirectly – because the etheric body builds up the physical body – also the physical body. Everything that the astral body has built up piece by piece over time has been born out of the great cosmic sea of astral matter. Because only harmony and healthy laws have emerged from this astral sea, the astral body's building of the etheric and physical bodies is originally healthy and harmonious. But because of the influences that the astral body receives from the outside, from the physical world, and which impair its original harmony, all the disturbances of the physical body that are present in today's human beings come about.

[ 8 ] If the astral body were constantly within man, the strong influence of the physical world would soon have destroyed the entire harmony that the astral body brought with it from the cosmic sea. Very soon man would wear out through illness and fatigue. During sleep, the astral body withdraws from the impressions of the physical world, which no longer contains anything that gives harmony, and enters into the general harmony of the cosmos from which it was born. And so, in the morning, it brings with it the echoes of what it has experienced during the night in terms of renewal. During each night the astral body renews its harmony with the great cosmic astral sea, and so the clairvoyant also sees that the astral body is not inactive at all; he sees a connection between the astral sea and the comet-like tail of the astral body and can see how this part works to help remove the slackness caused by the disharmonizing world. This activity of the astral body expresses itself in the fact that one feels strengthened in the morning. However, the astral body, which has lived during the night in the great harmony, must first find its way back into the physical world. Therefore, the greatest feeling of strengthening only appears a few hours later, after the astral body has again entered the physical body.

[ 9 ] Now let us turn to the brother of sleep, to death, and realize what the state of man is after death. The dead man differs from the merely sleeping man in that the etheric body goes with the astral body in the case of the dead man, leaving only the physical body here in the physical world. This emergence of the etheric body from the physical body is never present in a person from birth to death if he does not undergo certain states of initiation.

[ 10 ] An important moment for a person who has died is the moment immediately after death. After all, it lasts for a long time, hours, even days. In this state, the entire life of the last incarnation passes before the soul of the dead person like a great tableau of memories. This is the case for every person after death. The peculiarity of this tableau is that, as long as it appears in the way it does immediately after death, all the experiences that the person has undergone subjectively during his life in the world are erased in it. In our various experiences we have always felt pleasure and pain, elation and sadness. Our outer observation was always linked with an inner life. All the joys and pains that attach themselves to the images of life are not present in this reminiscence. One faces this tableau of memories just as objectively as one would a painting. If the same painting shows a person who is sad, filled with pain, we look at him objectively. We can certainly empathize with his sadness, but we do not directly feel the pain that the person has experienced. This is how it is with the images in this tableau immediately after death: it unfolds, and we see all the details that have taken place in life in periods of time that are astonishing because they are so short.

[ 11 ] The separation of the physical body from the etheric body during life is otherwise only present in one initiate; but there are certain moments when, with a jolt, the etheric body detaches itself from the physical body. This happens when a person has particularly frightening experiences, for example in a crash or in danger of drowning. Then, through this powerful shock, a kind of detachment of the etheric body from the physical body takes place. The result of this is that at such a moment the whole of one's previous life stands before the soul of the person like a memory. Here we have an analogy for the experience after death.

[ 12 ] Partial separations of the etheric body also take place when a limb has fallen asleep. If, for example, the hand has fallen asleep, the seer can observe how the ether part that corresponds to the hand hangs out like a glove. Likewise, parts of the etheric brain hang out when a person is in a hypnotic state. Because the etheric body is spun into very small, point-like structures in the physical body, the well-known peculiar feeling of tingling arises when a limb has fallen asleep.

[ 13 ] After the time has elapsed during which the etheric body, in connection with the astral body, has detached itself from the physical body, the moment comes when the astral body, with all the higher limbs, detaches itself from the etheric body. The latter separates, the tableau of memory fades away. But something remains with the person, it is not completely lost. Although what could be called the etheric or life substance is scattered throughout the entire cosmic ether, a kind of essence remains that can never be lost to the person again in the further journey of their life. He takes it with him like an extract from the life tableau into all his future incarnations, even if he cannot remember it. What is formed from this memory extract is called the causal body in a concrete and real way. After each life, a new page is added to the book of life. This increases the life essence and, if past lives were fruitful, causes the next one to unfold in a corresponding way. This is the reason why a life is rich or poor in talents, abilities, and so on.

[ 14 ] To understand the life of the astral body after its separation from the etheric body, we have to take a look at physical conditions. In the physical life, it is the astral body that rejoices, that suffers, that satisfies its desires, instincts and wishes through the organs of the physical body. After death, these physical instruments are no longer available to him. The gourmet can no longer satisfy his desire for good things, because he lacks the tongue; it has left with the physical body. But the desire remains with the person, because it is connected with the astral body, and this results in the burning thirst of the Kamaloka period. Kama means desire, wish; loka would be the place, but in reality it is not a place but a state.

[ 15 ] Those who outgrow the physical body within their physical life shorten their Kamaloka time. It is a real outgrowing when we are delighted by objects of beauty and harmony. They lead us out of the sensual world already here. Sensual materialistic art means a complication of the Kamaloka state, while spiritual art means a relief of the same. Every noble, spiritualized pleasure shortens Kamaloka. Therefore, we must already here unlearn those pleasures and desires that can only be satisfied through the sensual instrument. Kamaloka time means a time of getting rid of sensual pleasures and urges. This time lasts about one-third of ordinary life. There is something peculiar about living through this Kamaloka time. It happens in such a way that man really begins to live through his whole life. Immediately after death, it was a memory without pleasure or pain, but now he really lives through all pleasure and all pain again, and in reverse order, so that he must experience in himself all the pleasure and pain he has caused others. This has nothing to do with the law of karma.

[ 16 ] The reliving begins with the last experience before death and goes back to the birth with triple speed. At the moment when the person, in their recollection, reaches their birth, the part of the astral body that has been processed and transformed by the ego joins the causal body, while what the person has not yet processed falls away like a shadow. These are the astral corpses of people. Then the person has discarded the physical, the etheric and now also the astral corpse. He now experiences new states, those of Devachan. Devachan is around us as is the astral world.

[ 17 ] When a person has lived through his life back to childhood, when he has thus discarded the three corpses, the state is reached that the biblical document mysteriously suggests in the words: Unless you become like little children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven. — Devachan, spiritual world, is the kingdom of heaven in the Christian sense.

[ 18 ] We must now describe the world of Devachan itself. It is just as diverse and structured as our physical world. Just as we distinguish solid objects in our physical world, continents, and have a mass of water around the solid, then air and even finer states above it, we also have such a structure in devachan, in the spiritual realm. In analogy to the conditions on earth, the things found in devachan have been given similar names.

[ 19 ] We first have a region that can be compared to the fixed physical regions. This is the continental region in Devachan. There you will find everything that is physical here on earth as spiritual entities. Imagine, for example, a physical human being. Seen with the devachan's gaze, he appears like this: what the physical senses perceive disappears, but where there is nothing in the physical man, it begins to shine. It begins to shine and glow all around the man. In the middle, where the physical body is, there is an empty space, like a kind of negative space, like a shadow figure. Animals and humans, when viewed in this way, appear in negative form. Blood appears greenish in the complementary color. All physical entities here are somehow present up there in the archetypes.

[ 20 ] A second area, but not distinct like a second stage, is the sea, the ocean realm of Devachan. It is not water, but a peculiar substance that permeates the realm of Devachan in regular currents, in a color that can be compared to the young peach blossom in spring. This is liquid life that permeates the entire Devachan. What is distributed among the individual humans and animals down here is present up there as a kind of watery element. We have an image of this when we think of the distribution of blood in the human body.

[ 21 ] The third sphere can best be characterized by saying that everything that lives here inside the beings in terms of sensations, feelings, pleasure and suffering, joy and pain is present on the outside. A battle is being fought here, for example. Cannons, guns and so on, that is all on the physical plane. But within the beings here on the physical plane there is a feeling of mutual revenge, pain, passions. The two armies face each other with an abundance of polar passions. If you imagine the whole thing transposed into external appearances, then you have the image of what it looks like on the Devachan plan. Just as a terrible thunderstorm discharges here, you see there what takes place here on a battlefield. That is the atmosphere, the air circle of Devachan. Just as our earth is surrounded by an atmosphere, so everything that is discharged here on the physical plane in terms of feelings is spread out there like an atmosphere, whether it comes to expression here in the physical or not.

[ 22 ] The fourth region of Devachan contains the archetypes, the origins of everything that has been originally achieved here on earth. When we look around us, when we examine the events of the physical world, we find that by far the greatest number of inner processes are caused from the outside. A flower, an animal gives us joy; without the flower, without the animal, we would not feel this joy. But there are also such processes that are not caused from the outside. A new thought, a work of art, a new machine brings something into the world that was not there before. In all these areas, original creations happen. Humanity would not progress if nothing new were brought into the world. Particularly original things, which the great artists and inventors have given to the world, are only slightly higher than any other original act, even the most insignificant. What matters is that something original arises within. Even for the most insignificant original acts, models already exist in Devachan. All this is already predetermined. What is originally achieved by people is already laid down there before the person is born.

[ 23 ] Thus, in devachan, we find four areas whose counter-images on the physical plane are earth, water, air and fire: the continental area as the solid crust of devachan, in the spiritual sense, of course, then the sea region, which corresponds to our water region, the air region, the currents of the passions and so on — beautiful things, but also stormy ones, and finally, what permeates everything, the world of archetypes. Everything that is later accomplished in the physical world by beings who return to the physical world, in terms of volitional impulses and original ideas, must be experienced and interwoven by the soul in order to gather new strength there for the new life.