The Principle of Spiritual Economy
GA 111
28 March 1909, Rome
4. Results of Spiritual Scientific Investigations of the Evolution of Humanity: I
Tonight we will talk about sin, original sin, illness, and so on. Let us first look backwards into the past and then allow the future to pass by our spiritual eyes. We have before our modern era the time of Rome and Athens, which was preceded by the Egyptian-Chaldaic period; actual historical records are lacking for the time before then. However, for these older prehistorical epochs there are two sources that can give information; ancient religious teachings for those who know how to decipher them and retrospective images that can be perceived by clairvoyant consciousness. It is the latter we wish to discuss.
Everything on earth is subject to the laws of evolution, and that is especially true for the life of the human soul. The life of the soul in ancient times was different from what it is today. In prehistoric times, thousands of years in the past, the scope of the souls of human beings in Europe, Asia, and Africa was much wider and more comprehensive than that of human beings of our time. To be sure, they did not have the kind of mind that enables us to read or to do arithmetic, but they did possess a primitive clairvoyance and a tremendous memory of which ours cannot have the slightest notion. We shall see later why that was so.
To give you an idea of how these prehistoric people perceived the world, let me tell you, for example, that they saw everything surrounded by an aura when they awakened to their day-consciousness. A flower, for instance, appeared to them surrounded by a circle of light similar to that we see around the light of street lamps in the evening fog. And during sleep these human beings were able to perceive the soul- spiritual beings in their full reality. Human beings learned gradually to see the contours of objects more clearly, but simultaneously and in direct proportion to their ability to do so, the conscious interaction with the spiritual world and the beings in it decreased; it ceased altogether when the ego became individualized in every single being.
The earth, too, had quite a different configuration in those early ages. Human beings lived in other regions and on other continents, and our own ancestors lived on a continent that is now covered by the Atlantic Ocean. The traditional name for this continent is Atlantis, and its disappearance as well as the legend of the universal flood is related in the myths of all peoples. The Atlantean culture was magnificent, and mankind lost many important insights with its destruction, insights that now can be retrieved only with great difficulty. Just as we in our times know how to harness the forces hidden in fossil plants—coal—for trade and industry, so the ancient Atlanteans knew how to utilize the driving forces in grain as energy, for example for the purpose of propelling their air vehicles that moved just a little bit above the ground in air that was much denser than is ours.
Let us now look at the physical organism of the Atlantean individual. It had the peculiar characteristic that the etheric body was not completely identical with the physical body and that the head of the etheric body projected beyond the head of the physical body. This peculiarity is connected with the clairvoyant capabilities of the Atlanteans, also with their extraordinary memory and with their magical powers. The ether-head had a special and central point of perception.
When the ether-head in the course of evolution retracted more and more into the physical head, the profile was changed. Now we have at that point an organ, the development of which will restore the power of clairvoyance in humanity: the pineal gland. And thus, the clairvoyant power of the Atlanteans, as well as their tremendous memory and their magical powers, disappeared gradually; and in its place we developed our present ability to think and to do mathematics.
Going still farther back, we find other catastrophes. The volcanos that we have today are the last remnants of an epoch when whole parts of the earth were destroyed by fire. The continent that perished in those times is designated by the name “Lemuria” and was the area that is now largely taken up by the Pacific and Indian Oceans. The inhabitants of that continent had bodies that were quite different from human bodies in our age and by our standards would appear grotesque. The relationship of the physical to the astral body was different in those early human beings. The crown of the head was open, and rays of light penetrated this opening, so that the head was surrounded by a resplendent aura, and this gave one the appearance of having a lantern on top. The last remnant of this Lemurian head structure can be seen today when we look at the head of a newborn baby and discover the small opening on top that remains open for about a year or a little longer. The bodies of the Lemurians had gigantic dimensions and were made out of a fine, almost gelatine-like substance.
Human beings in the Lemurian age were not at all independent and could do only the things they were inspired to do by the spiritual forces within whom they were, in a manner of speaking, imbedded. Receiving everything from these forces, they acted as if driven by a soul-instinct. At this time the powerful effect of spiritual beings who had not descended into a physical incarnation made itself felt. These beings, who were not well-disposed to humanity, had such an effect on humanity that it attained the independence it had lacked heretofore. According to divine providence, mankind was certainly meant to attain this independence some day, but only through the influence of these beings did that independence come about so early. Together with the other forces, these beings slipped into the astral bodies of human beings, who had not yet entered into a close relationship with their own essence, and bestowed on them a kind of will power that would enable them to do evil since it was only astral and not guided by reason. The influence of these forces, called Luciferic forces, as we can see, may be good or bad because, on the one hand, they led mankind astray and, on the other, gave it freedom.
Today's consciousness originated in clairvoyant consciousness, which we find increasingly more developed as we go back in human evolution. The Lemurians were able to perceive things only with their soul. They were, for example, unable to perceive the form, the color, or the external qualities of a flower. It revealed itself to them as a shining astral configuration that they perceived with a kind of inner organ. According to the divine plan, human beings were not supposed to perceive the world with external sense organs before the middle of the Atlantean period, but the Luciferic forces made this happen earlier, at a time when human instincts had not yet matured. That represents the “Fall” of mankind. Religious documents tell us that the snake opened man's eyes, but without the interference of Lucifer the human body would not have become as firm as it now is and the Atlantean humanity would have been able to see the spiritual side of all things. Instead, man fell into sin, illusion, and error, and to make things worse, toward the middle of the Atlantean period he was also subjected to the influence of Ahrimanic forces. The Luciferic forces had worked on the astral body, but the Ahrimanic forces worked on the etheric body, especially on the ether-head. By that, many human beings fell into the error of mistaking the physical world for the world of truth. The name “Ahrimanic” comes from Ahriman, the name the Persians gave to this erroneous principle. Zoroaster told his people about Ahriman, warned them about him, and exhorted them to become one with Ahura Mazdao—Ormuzd. Ahriman is identical with Mephistopheles and has nothing to do with Lucifer. Mephistopheles comes from the Hebrew word me-phis-to-pel, which means the liar, the cheater. Satan in the Bible is Ahriman too, not Lucifer.
Ancient Atlantis was gradually destroyed in the course of centuries by floods, and the inhabitants left over from the catastrophe retreated to regions that had been spared, such as Asia, Africa, and America. The first region in which Atlantean culture continued to develop was the area that later came to be called India. There the people kept a clear memory of the earlier clairvoyance and of the perception of the spiritual world. It was therefore not difficult for their teachers—the Rishis—to direct their attention to the spiritual side of the world, and initiation was easy to achieve. Clairvoyance was never completely lost; there always existed some clairvoyant people up to the time of Christ. We can recognize a remnant of this primitive form of clairvoyance in mythology, in which the central concern was with beings who had actually been alive, such as Zeus, Apollo, and so forth. Although the Ahrimanic influence began in the Atlantean epoch, as we have said, it unfolded its full strength only later in human evolution. The ancient Indians were sufficiently protected against Ahriman; for them the physical world was never anything else but maya, illusion. Only in the most ancient Persian period of Zarathustra did people begin to place value on the physical world and thereby come into the power of Ahriman. This clarifies for us Zarathustra's admonition of which we spoke earlier.
As the evolution of humanity reached the Greek period, human beings were confronted by another force that began to drive them back up to the spiritual world from which, as it were, they had been expelled since the Lemurian age. This new force was the Christ-Principle, which entered Jesus of Nazareth and permeated His three bodies—the physical, the etheric, and the astral. When the human soul is completely imbued with the Christ-Principle, the Ahrimanic and Luciferic powers will be defeated, and through this principle the course of evolution will be reversed. Christ would not have been able to influence humanity had His coming not been announced to it a long time before He actually appeared. Inwardly, however, humanity has always been led by Christ; we can deduce this from the magnificent images by which His coming was prophesied. Who else could have inspired such mighty imaginations?
Immediately after the mystery of Golgotha when Christ's blood ran from five wounds and His spirit permeated the lowest realms, the incarnation of Christ brought about a remarkable change in the physical, etheric, and astral bodies of humanity. Christ's etheric and astral bodies multiplied like a grain of seed, and the spiritual world was filled with these copies. For example, human beings living in the period from the fifth or sixth through the tenth centuries who had developed sufficiently received at their birth such an imprint of the Christ-Incarnation of Jesus of Nazareth. St. Augustine is the individual in whom such partaking in the etheric body of Christ is most clearly evident, and the great significance of his life must be attributed to this fact. On the other hand, Christ's astral body was incorporated into human beings from about the tenth to the sixteenth centuries, and this explains the appearance of human beings who were endowed with extraordinary humility and virtue, such as St. Francis of Assisi and the great Dominicans who reflected the wonderful astral qualities of Christ. These individuals were imbued with such a clear image of the great truths they practiced throughout their lives. By contrast, St. Augustine was never free of doubt and always experienced the conflict between theory and practice. Of the great Dominicans, St. Thomas Aquinas30St. Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) was the Italian theologian and philosopher whose philosophy was declared the official philosophy of the Catholic Church. He is generally regarded to have been the most prominent mind of scholasticism. is especially noteworthy because in him the influence of the astral body of Christ was manifest to a high degree, as we shall see later. Beginning with the sixteenth century, copies of the Christ-Ego begin to weave themselves into the egos of a few individualities, one of them being Christian Rosenkreutz,31Christian Rosenkreutz is generally regarded by most scholars as the pseudonym for the German writer Johan Valentin Andrea (1586–1654). In his works Fama fraternitatis (1614) and in Confessio rosae crucis (1615), he traced the development of the Rosicrucian Society to Arab and Oriental origins. the first Rosicrucian. This phenomenon led to the feasibility of a more intimate relationship with Christ, as is revealed by esoteric teaching.
The power of Christ will make human beings more perfect, spiritualize them, and lead them back into the spiritual world. Mankind developed its reason at the expense of clairvoyance; the power of Christ will enable human beings to learn on this earth and to ascend again with what they will have acquired on earth. Human beings descended from the Father, and the power of Christ will lead them back to the Father.
29. Einführung In Die Theosophie IV
Heute Abend werden wir von der Sünde sprechen, der Erbsünde, der Krankheit und so weiter. Schauen wir zuerst rückwärts, auf die Vergangenheit, und lassen wir danach die Zukunft vor dem geistigen Auge vorüberziehen. Vor unserer Zeit haben wir die Zeit von Rom und von Athen, der vorangegangen ist die ägyptisch-chaldäische Zeit; weiter zurück fehlen die eigentlichen historischen Urkunden. Für die noch älteren Zeitepochen haben wir zwei Quellen, aus denen wir Auskunft schöpfen können: Die alten Religionslehren, wenn man sie zu entziffern versteht, und die retrospektiven Bilder, die das hellsichtige Bewusstsein schauen kann. Von diesen Letzteren wollen wir reden. Alles auf Erden unterliegt den Gesetzen der Evolution, in ganz besonderer Weise gilt das für das menschliche Seelenleben. In alten Zeiten war das Leben der Seele verschieden von dem jetzigen Seelenleben. Die Menschen in Europa, Asien und Afrika hatten in dem vorhistorischen Zeitalter ein Seelenleben, das ganz verschieden war von der heutigen Menschenseele. Wenn wir Jahrtausende zurückschauen, finden wir, dass die Vorläufer der heutigen Menschheit einen viel umfangreicheren seelischen Gesichtskreis hatten wie den, den wir jetzt haben. Sie hatten zwar nicht den Verstand, der uns befähigt zum Lesen und Rechnen, aber sie hatten dagegen eine primitive Hellsichtigkeit und außerdem ein ungeheures Gedächtnis, von dem das unsrige nicht einmal eine blasse Ahnung geben kann. Wir werden noch sehen, wodurch das möglich war. Um Ihnen eine Ahnung zu geben davon, wie ihnen die Welt erschien, werde ich zum Beispiel sagen, dass sie, als sie in ihrem Tagesbewusstsein aufwachten, alles sahen wie von einer Aura umgeben. Eine Blume zum Beispiel erschien ihnen umgeben von einem Lichtkreis ähnlich dem, den wir um die Laternen im Abendnebel sehen. Während des Schlafes aber konnten diese Menschen seelisch-geistige Wesenheiten in Wirklichkeit wahrnehmen. Allmählich lernte der Mensch, die Umrisse der Dinge bestimmter zu sehen. Zu gleicher Zeit aber wurde der bewusste Verkehr mit der geistigen Welt und den sich in ihr befindenden Wesenheiten immer weniger, um endlich ganz aufzuhören, als das Ich sich in jedes einzelne Wesen individualisierte. Vor dieser Individualisierung waren die Menschen nicht voneinander getrennt.
Auch die Erde hatte in jenen Zeiten eine ganz andere Konfiguration als jetzt. Die Menschheit lebte auf anderen Gebieten - Kontinenten —, und gerade unsere Vorfahren lebten auf einem Erdteil, der jetzt vom Atlantischen Ozean eingenommen wird. Die Tradition nennt diesen Kontinent Atlantis. Das Verschwinden dieses Erdteiles erzählen uns die Mythen von allen Völkern, und die Legende von der universellen Sintflut bezieht sich eben darauf. Die atlantische Kultur war großartig, und durch ihren Untergang verlor die Menschheit viele wichtige Erkenntnisse, die sie jetzt mühevoll wiedererobern muss. Wie wir für den Handel und die Industrie die in den fossilen Pflanzen - Kohlen - verborgenen Kräfte zu gebrauchen wissen, so verstanden es die Atlantier, die treibenden Kräfte in den Samenkörnern zu gebrauchen, um zum Beispiel ihre Luftschiffe zu bewegen, die sich etwas über dem Boden fortbewegten, in jener Luft, die viel dichter war als die unsere.
Schauen wir uns jetzt den physischen Organismus der Atlantier an. Er zeigte eine bedeutungsvolle Eigentümlichkeit, dass nämlich der Ätherleib nicht vollkommen dem physischen Leib ähnlich war und der Ätherkopf über den physischen Kopf hinausragte. Diese Eigentümlichkeit ist eben verbunden mit den hellseherischen Fähigkeiten der Atlantier, mit ihrem außerordentlichen Gedächtnis und ihren magischen Kräften. Der Ätherkopf hatte einen besonderen Wahrnehmungspunkt [...]. Im Laufe der Evolution zog sich dieser Ätherkopf immer mehr in den physischen Kopf zurück, wodurch das Profil geändert wurde. Jetzt haben wir an dem betreffenden Punkt das Organ, dessen Entwicklung der Menschheit die Hellsichtigkeit zurückgeben wird: die Zirbeldrüse. So verschwand allmählich die hellsehende Kraft der Atlantier und zugleich ihr ungeheures Gedächtnis und ihre magischen Kräfte, und es entwickelte sich unsere Denk- und Zahlenfähigkeit.
Wenn wir noch weiter zurückgehen, finden wir andere Katastrophen. Da wurden ganze Erdteile durch Feuer vernichtet. Unsere heutigen Vulkane sind die letzten Reste von jener Zeitepoche. Der Kontinent, der damals zugrunde ging, wird mit dem Namen «Lemurien» bezeichnet und war das Gebiet, das jetzt zum größten Teil von dem großen Ozean und dem Indischen Ozean eingenommen wird. Die Bewohner jenes Kontinentes hatten eine Gestalt, die sehr verschieden von der unseren war, die uns sogar für unsere Auffassungen grotesk erscheinen würde. Ihr physischer und ihr Astralleib verhielten sich anders zueinander. Der Scheitel war geöffnet, und in diese Öffnung drangen die Lichtstrahlen hinein, sodass der Kopf von einer strahlenden Aura umgeben war und die Menschen so aussahen, als ob sie oben eine Laterne hätten.
Der Leib war riesengroß und von einer feinen, beinahe gelatineartigen Substanz gebildet. Die letzte Andeutung von dem Scheitelbau
der Lemurier sehen wir an dem Kopf eines eben geborenen Kindes, und zwar die kleine Öffnung oben, die offen bleibt bis ungefähr ein Jahr. oder etwas:maehr.
Der Mensch war damals gar nicht selbstständig; er konnte nur das tun, was ihm durch die geistigen Kräfte eingegeben wurde, in deren Mitte er sozusagen eingebettet war. Alles bekam er von ihnen, und er handelte wie durch einen seelischen Instinkt getrieben. Da offenbarte sich die Kraftwirkung von geistigen Wesenheiten, die nicht zur physischen Inkarnation heruntergestiegen waren. Es waren dies Wesenheiten, die der Menschheit nicht gut gesinnt waren und die so auf sie wirkten, dass sie die ihr fehlende Unabhängigkeit erlangte. Dem göttlichen Plan gemäß sollte die Menschheit einmal diese Unabhängigkeit sicher erlangen, aber diese Wesenheiten brachten sie früher zustande. Zusammen mit den anderen Kräften schlüpften sie in den Astralleib des Menschen hinein, der noch nicht in enger Verbindung mit seinem Wesen getreten war, und gaben dem Menschen eine Art Willenskraft, die, weil sie nur astralisch war und nicht von der Vernunft geführt war, ihn fähig machte, das Böse zu tun. Diese Kräfte werden die luziferischen Kräfte genannt. Wie wir sehen, hat der Einfluss dieser Kräfte eine gute und eine böse Seite, weil sie die Menschheit verführten einerseits, ihr aber andererseits die Freiheit gaben.
Unser heutiges Bewusstsein entstammt dem hellsehenden Bewusstsein, und wir finden Letzteres immer mehr ausgebildet, je weiter wir zurückgehen in der Menschheitsevolution. Die Lemurier konnten nur seelisch wahrnehmen. Von einer Blume zum Beispiel nahmen sie weder die Form noch die Farbe wahr, noch ihre äußerlichen Eigenschaften. Es zeigte sich ihnen ein leuchtendes astralisches Gebilde, das sie mit einer Art innerlichem Organ wahrnahmen. Nach dem göttlichen Plan sollten die Menschen erst in der Mitte der atlantischen Zeit angefangen haben, mit den äußeren Sinnesorganen wahrzunehmen. Aber die luziferischen Kräfte verursachten diese Tatsache schon früher, während die menschlichen Instinkte noch rein waren. Darin besteht der «Fall der Menschheiv. Die religiösen Urkunden sagen, dass die Schlange die Augen des Menschen öffnete. Ohne die Einmischung von dem luziferischen Einfluss wäre der menschliche Körper nicht so fest geworden, wie er jetzt ist, und die atlantische Menschheit hätte die geistige Seite von allen Dingen gesehen. Stattdessen verfiel der Mensch der Sünde, der Illusion und dem Irrtum. Um die Sache noch schlimmer zu machen, kam gegen die Mitte der atlantischen Zeit der Einfluss von ahrimanischen Kräften hinzu. Die luziferischen Kräfte hatten auf den Astralleib gewirkt, die ahrimanischen Kräfte dagegen wirkten auf den Ätherleib, insbesondere auf den Ätherkopf. Dadurch verfielen die Menschen in den Irrtum, die äußere physische Welt für die wahre Welt zu halten. «Ahrimanisch» kommt von Ahriman her, von dem Namen, den die Perser diesem Prinzip gaben. Zoroaster sprach seinem Volke von ihm und sagte, es solle sich vor ihm hüten und die Vereinigung mit Ahura Mazdao — Ormuzd - anstreben. Ahriman ist derselbe wie Mephistopheles und hat nichts mit Luzifer zu tun. Mephistopheles stammt von dem hebräischen Worte: Me-phis-to-phel, das heißt «der Lügner, «der Betrüger. Auch Satan in der Bibel ist Ahriman und nicht Luzifer. Die alte Atlantis ging im Laufe von Jahrhunderten allmählich durch Fluten zugrunde, und die übrig gebliebenen Bewohner zogen sich zurück in Gebiete, die vor der Katastrophe bewahrt blieben, in Asien, in Afrika und in Amerika. Das erste Gebiet, in dem sich die atlantische Kultur weiterentwickelte, war dasjenige, das später «Indien» genannt wurde. Da behielten die Menschen eine deutliche Erinnerung an das frühere Hellsehen und von der Anschauung der geistigen Welt. Es war dadurch ihren Lehrern, den Rishis, nicht schwer, ihre Aufmerksamkeit auf die geistige Seite der Welt zu lenken, und die Einweihung war eine leichte Sache. Das Hellsehen ging nie vollständig verloren, und bis zu Christus gab es immer Hellseher. Ein Überbleibsel dieses primitiven Hellschens schen wir in der Mythologie, deren Kern sich bezieht auf Wesenheiten, die wirklich gelebt haben, wie Apollo, Zeus und so weiter. Obwohl der ahrimanische Einfluss, wie wir gesagt haben, in der atlantischen Zeitepoche seinen Anfang nahm, machte er sich erst später völlig in der Menschheit geltend. Die alten Inder waren genügend gegen ihn geschützt, und die physische Welt war für sie nie etwas anderes als Maya, Illusion. Erst in der Zeitepoche von Zarathustra, der urpersischen, fing die physische Welt an, einen Wert zu haben für die Menschen, die dadurch der Macht von Ahriman verfielen. In dieser Weise wird uns klar die Mahnung des Zarathustra, von der wir schon gesprochen haben.
So ging die Menschheitsevolution weiter bis zur griechischen Zeit. Da kam an den Menschen heran eine andere Kraft, die anfing, ihn wieder hinaufzutreiben zu der geistigen Welt, aus der er sozusagen verjagt worden war seit der lemurischen Zeit. Die neue Kraft war das Christus-Prinzip, das sich in den Jesus von Nazareth hineinbegab, seine drei Leiber — physischen, ätherischen und astralischen Leib — durchdringend. Wenn die menschliche Seele ganz erfüllt ist von dem Christus-Prinzip, werden die ahrimanischen und die luziferischen Kräfte besiegt, und durch dieses Prinzip vollzieht sich eine Umkehr in der Evolution. Doch der Christus hätte nicht auf die Menschen einwirken können, wäre sein Erscheinen ihnen nicht schon lange Zeit vorher verkündigt worden. Er hat sie aber immer innerlich geführt; das sehen wir an den großartigen Bildern, in denen den Menschen prophezeit wurde, dass er kommen würde. Wer hätte ihnen sonst die Kraft gegeben, solche mächtigen Imaginationen zu bilden?
Eine großartige Änderung vollzieht sich im physischen, ätherischen und astralischen Leib der Menschheit durch die Inkarnation des Christus, gleich nachdem das Mysterium von Golgatha vollbracht worden ist, als das Blut aus den fünf Wunden rann und der Christus bis in die untersten Reiche hineindrang. Sein Äther- und sein Astralleib vermannigfaltigten sich wie ein Samenkorn, und die geistige Welt erfüllte sich mit diesen Abbildern. Sodass zum Beispiel im fünften, sechsten Jahrhundert bis zum zehnten Jahrhundert diejenigen Menschen, die einen genügenden Grad von Entwicklung erreicht hatten, bei der Geburt einverleibt bekamen solch ein Abbild der Christus-Inkarnation des Jesus von Nazareth. Der Mensch, in welchem am deutlichsten ein derartiges Anteilhaben am ätherischen Leib des Christus zutage tritt, ist Augustinus. Dieser Tatsache ist die große Bedeutung seines Lebens zuzuschreiben. Vom zehnten Jahrhundert bis ungefähr zum sechzehnten Jahrhundert wird der Astralleib des Christus einverleibt. Dem verdanken wir die Erscheinung von Menschen wie dem Heiligen Franz von Assisi und wie den großen Dominikanern voller Demut und Tugend, die eben die großen astralischen Eigenschaften des Christus widerspiegeln. Daher hatten sie ein so klares Bild der großen Wahrheiten in sich, die sie in ihrem Leben übten, im Gegensatz zu Augustinus, der nie frei blieb von Zweifeln und immer in Streit geriet zwischen der Theorie und der Praxis. Von den großen Dominikanern soll besonders genannt werden der Heilige Thomas, in dem der Einfluss von dem astralischen Leib des Christus sich in hohem Maße zeigte, wie wir später noch sehen werden. Mit dem sechzehnten Jahrhundert fängt die Zeit an, in der sich bereitfinden, sich in das Ich einzelner Individualitäten zu verweben, die Abbilder des Christus-Ich. Einer dieser war eben Christian Rosenkreutz, der erste Rosenkreuzer.
Dieser Tatsache verdanken wir es eben, dass eine innigere Verbindung mit dem Christus möglich wurde, wie uns das die esoterische Lehre offenbart. Die Christus-Kraft wird den Menschen immer vollkommener machen, wird ihn vergeistigen und zurückführen in die geistige Welt. Die Menschheit entwickelte ihre Vernunft auf Kosten der Hellsichtigkeit; die Christus-Kraft wird den Menschen befähigen, hier auf Erden zu lernen und wieder emporzusteigen mit dem, was er erworben haben wird. Der Mensch stammt vom Vater her und die Christus-Kraft führt ihn zum Vater zurück.
29. Introduction to Theosophy IV
This evening we will speak about sin, original sin, illness, and so on. Let us first look back at the past, and then let the future pass before our mind's eye. Before our time, we have the period of Rome and Athens, preceded by the Egyptian-Chaldean period; further back, there are no actual historical records. For even earlier periods, we have two sources from which we can draw information: the ancient religious teachings, if one knows how to decipher them, and the retrospective images that clairvoyant consciousness can see. Let us speak of the latter. Everything on earth is subject to the laws of evolution, and this applies in a very special way to the human soul life. In ancient times, the life of the soul was different from the soul life we know today. In prehistoric times, the people of Europe, Asia, and Africa had a soul life that was completely different from that of the human soul today. If we look back thousands of years, we find that the ancestors of today's humanity had a much broader spiritual horizon than we have now. They did not have the intellect that enables us to read and calculate, but they did have a primitive clairvoyance and, in addition, a tremendous memory, of which ours cannot even give us the faintest idea. We will see later how this was possible. To give you an idea of how the world appeared to them, I will say, for example, that when they awoke in their daytime consciousness, they saw everything as if surrounded by an aura. A flower, for example, appeared to them surrounded by a circle of light similar to that which we see around lanterns in the evening mist. During sleep, however, these people were able to perceive spiritual beings in reality. Gradually, humans learned to see the outlines of things more clearly. At the same time, however, conscious communication with the spiritual world and the beings in it became less and less, until it finally ceased altogether when the ego individualized itself in each individual being. Before this individualization, human beings were not separated from one another.
The Earth also had a completely different configuration in those times than it does now. Humanity lived in other regions—continents—and our ancestors lived on a continent that is now occupied by the Atlantic Ocean. Tradition calls this continent Atlantis. The myths of all peoples tell us of the disappearance of this part of the earth, and the legend of the universal flood refers to this. The Atlantean culture was magnificent, and with its downfall, humanity lost many important insights that it must now laboriously regain. Just as we know how to use the forces hidden in fossil plants—coal—for trade and industry, the Atlanteans understood how to use the driving forces in seeds to move their airships, for example, which moved slightly above the ground in air that was much denser than ours.
Let us now look at the physical organism of the Atlanteans. It showed a significant peculiarity, namely that the etheric body was not completely similar to the physical body and that the etheric head protruded beyond the physical head. This peculiarity is connected with the clairvoyant abilities of the Atlanteans, with their extraordinary memory and their magical powers. The etheric head had a special point of perception [...]. In the course of evolution, this etheric head withdrew more and more into the physical head, changing its profile. Now, at the point in question, we have the organ whose development will restore clairvoyance to humanity: the pineal gland. Thus, the clairvoyant power of the Atlanteans gradually disappeared, along with their tremendous memory and magical powers, and our ability to think and calculate developed.
If we go back even further, we find other catastrophes. Entire continents were destroyed by fire. Our volcanoes today are the last remnants of that era. The continent that was destroyed at that time is called “Lemuria” and was the area that is now mostly occupied by the Atlantic Ocean and the Indian Ocean. The inhabitants of that continent had a form that was very different from ours, which would even seem grotesque to our perceptions. Their physical and astral bodies behaved differently in relation to each other. The top of their heads was open, and rays of light penetrated this opening, so that their heads were surrounded by a radiant aura and they looked as if they had a lantern on top of their heads.
The body was enormous and formed of a fine, almost gelatinous substance. The last hint of the crown structure
of the Lemurians can be seen on the head of a newborn child, namely the small opening at the top, which remains open until about one year of age or slightly longer.
At that time, human beings were not independent; they could only do what was dictated to them by the spiritual forces in whose midst they were, so to speak, embedded. They received everything from these forces and acted as if driven by a spiritual instinct. This revealed the power of spiritual beings that had not descended to physical incarnation. These were beings that were not well disposed toward humanity and influenced it in such a way that it gained the independence it lacked. According to the divine plan, humanity was to gain this independence at some point, but these beings brought it about earlier. Together with other forces, they slipped into the astral body of human beings, who had not yet entered into close connection with their own beings, and gave them a kind of willpower which, because it was only astral and not guided by reason, enabled them to do evil. These forces are called the Luciferic forces. As we can see, the influence of these forces has a good and an evil side, because on the one hand they seduced humanity, but on the other hand they gave it freedom.
Our present consciousness originates from clairvoyant consciousness, and we find the latter increasingly developed the further back we go in human evolution. The Lemurians could only perceive with their souls. For example, they perceived neither the shape nor the color of a flower, nor its external characteristics. What appeared to them was a luminous astral structure, which they perceived with a kind of inner organ. According to the divine plan, humans were not supposed to begin perceiving with their external sense organs until the middle of the Atlantean epoch. But the Luciferic forces caused this to happen earlier, while human instincts were still pure. This is the “Fall of Humanity.” Religious documents say that the serpent opened the eyes of humans. Without the interference of the Luciferic influence, the human body would not have become as solid as it is now, and the Atlantean humanity would have seen the spiritual side of all things. Instead, man fell into sin, illusion, and error. To make matters worse, around the middle of the Atlantean period, the influence of Ahrimanic forces was added. The Luciferic forces had acted on the astral body, while the Ahrimanic forces acted on the etheric body, especially on the etheric head. As a result, people fell into the error of believing that the outer physical world was the true world. “Ahrimanic” comes from Ahriman, the name given to this principle by the Persians. Zoroaster spoke to his people about him and told them to beware of him and to strive for union with Ahura Mazdao — Ormuzd. Ahriman is the same as Mephistopheles and has nothing to do with Lucifer. Mephistopheles comes from the Hebrew words Me-phis-to-phel, which means “the liar,” “the deceiver.” Satan in the Bible is also Ahriman and not Lucifer. Over the course of centuries, ancient Atlantis was gradually destroyed by floods, and the remaining inhabitants retreated to areas that had been spared from the catastrophe, in Asia, Africa, and America. The first area in which Atlantean culture continued to develop was the one that later became known as “India.” There, people retained a clear memory of their former clairvoyance and of their perception of the spiritual world. This made it easy for their teachers, the rishis, to direct their attention to the spiritual side of the world, and initiation was a simple matter. Clairvoyance was never completely lost, and there were always clairvoyants until the time of Christ. We find remnants of this primitive clairvoyance in mythology, the core of which refers to beings who really lived, such as Apollo, Zeus, and so on. Although the Ahrimanic influence, as we have said, began in the Atlantean epoch, it did not fully assert itself in humanity until later. The ancient Indians were sufficiently protected against it, and the physical world was never anything but Maya, illusion, for them. It was not until the era of Zarathustra, the original Persian, that the physical world began to have value for people, who thereby fell under the power of Ahriman. In this way, Zarathustra's warning, which we have already mentioned, becomes clear to us.
Thus, human evolution continued until the Greek era. Then another force came upon humanity, which began to drive it back up to the spiritual world from which it had been driven out, so to speak, since the Lemurian era. The new force was the Christ principle, which entered into Jesus of Nazareth, permeating his three bodies — the physical, etheric, and astral bodies. When the human soul is completely filled with the Christ principle, the Ahrimanic and Luciferic forces are defeated, and through this principle a reversal takes place in evolution. But Christ could not have had any effect on human beings if his appearance had not been announced to them long before. However, he always guided them inwardly; we see this in the magnificent images in which it was prophesied to human beings that he would come. Who else could have given them the power to form such powerful imaginations?
A great change takes place in the physical, etheric, and astral bodies of humanity through the incarnation of Christ, immediately after the mystery of Golgotha has been accomplished, when the blood flowed from the five wounds and Christ penetrated into the lowest realms. His etheric and astral bodies multiplied like a seed, and the spiritual world was filled with these images. So, for example, in the fifth, sixth, and up to the tenth centuries, those human beings who had reached a sufficient degree of development received at birth such an image of the Christ incarnation of Jesus of Nazareth. The person in whom such a share in the etheric body of Christ is most clearly evident is Augustine. The great significance of his life is attributable to this fact. From the tenth century to about the sixteenth century, the astral body of Christ was incorporated. We owe this to the appearance of people such as St. Francis of Assisi and the great Dominicans, full of humility and virtue, who reflected the great astral qualities of Christ. That is why they had such a clear picture of the great truths that they practiced in their lives, in contrast to Augustine, who never remained free of doubts and always found himself in conflict between theory and practice. Among the great Dominicans, St. Thomas deserves special mention, in whom the influence of the astral body of Christ was highly evident, as we shall see later. The sixteenth century marks the beginning of a period in which the images of the Christ-I began to interweave themselves into the I of individual personalities. One of these was Christian Rosenkreutz, the first Rosicrucian.
It is thanks to this fact that a more intimate connection with Christ became possible, as esoteric teaching reveals to us. The power of Christ will make human beings ever more perfect, spiritualize them, and lead them back to the spiritual world. Humanity developed its reason at the expense of clairvoyance; the power of Christ will enable human beings to learn here on earth and ascend again with what they have acquired. Human beings come from the Father, and the power of Christ leads them back to the Father.