The Lemurian Race
A PASSAGE from the Akasha Chronicle referring to a
very distant prehistoric period in the development of mankind, will
be set forth in this chapter. This period precedes the one depicted
in the descriptions given above. We are here concerned with the
third human root race, of which it is said in theosophical
books that it inhabited the Lemurian Continent. According to these
books this continent was situated south of Asia, and extended
approximately from Ceylon to Madagascar. What is today southern Asia
and parts of Africa also belonged to it.
While all possible care has been taken in the
deciphering of the Akasha Chronicle it must be emphasized that
nowhere is a dogmatic character to be claimed for these
communications. If, to begin with, the reading of things and events
so remote from the present is not easy, the translation of what has
been seen and deciphered into the language of today presents almost
insuperable obstacles.
Dates will be given later. They will be
better understood when the whole Lemurian period and also the period
of our fifth root race up to the present, have been discussed.
The things which are communicated here are
surprising even for the occultist who reads them for the first time
— although the word “surprising” is not quite
exact. Therefore he should only communicate them after the most
careful examination.
The fourth, the Atlantean root race, was preceded
by the so-called Lemurian. During its development, events of
the very greatest importance occurred with respect to the earth and
to men. Here, however, something will first be said of the character
of this root race after these events, and only then will the
latter be discussed. By and large, memory was not yet
developed among this race. While men could have ideas of
things and events, these ideas did not remain in the memory.
Therefore they did not yet have a language in the true sense. Rather
what they could utter were natural sounds which expressed their
sensations, pleasure, joy, pain and so forth, but which did not
designate external objects.
But their ideas had a quite different strength
from those of later men. Through this strength they acted upon their
environment. Other men, animals, plants, and even lifeless objects
could feel this action and could be influenced purely by ideas. Thus
the Lemurian could communicate with his fellow-men without needing a
language. This communication consisted in a kind of “thought
reading.” The Lemurian derived the strength of his ideas
directly from the objects which surrounded him. It flowed to him from
the energy of growth of plants, from the life force of animals. In
this manner he understood plants and animals in their inner
action and life. He even understood the physical and chemical forces
of lifeless objects in the same way. When he built something he did
not first have to calculate the load-limit of a tree trunk, the
weight of a stone; he could see how much the tree trunk could bear,
where the stone in view of its weight and height would fit, where it
would not. Thus the Lemurian built without engineering knowledge on
the basis of his faculty of imagination which acted with the sureness
of a kind of instinct. Moreover, to a great extent, he had power over
his own body. When it was necessary, he could increase the strength
of his arm by a simple effort of the will. For example, he could lift
enormous loads merely by using his will. If later the Atlantean was
helped by his control of the life force, the Lemurian was helped by
his mastery of the will. He was — the expression should not be
misinterpreted — a born magician in all fields of lower human
activities.
The goal of the Lemurians was the development of
the will, of the faculty of imagination. The education of children
was wholly directed toward this. The boys were hardened in the
strongest manner. They had to learn to undergo dangers, to overcome
pain, to accomplish daring deeds. Those who could not bear tortures,
who could not undergo dangers, were not regarded as useful members of
mankind. They were left to perish under these exertions. What the
Akasha Chronicle shows with respect to this raising of children
surpasses everything contemporary man can picture to himself in his
boldest imaginings — The bearing of heat, even of a searing
fire, the piercing of the body with pointed objects, were quite
common procedures.
The raising of girls was different. While the
female child was also hardened, everything else was directed toward
her developing a strong imagination. For example, she was
exposed to the storm in order calmly to feel its dreadful beauty; she
had to witness the combats of the men fearlessly, filled only with a
feeling of appreciation of the strength and power she saw before her.
Thereby propensities for dreaming and for fantasy developed in the
girl, and these were highly valued. Because no memory existed, these
propensities could not degenerate. The dream or fantasy conceptions
in question lasted only as long as there was a corresponding external
cause. Thus they had a real basis in external things. They did not
lose themselves in bottomless depths. It was, so to speak, nature's
own fantasy and dreaming which were put into the female soul.
The Lemurians did not have dwellings in our sense,
except in their latest times. They lived where nature gave them the
opportunity to do so. The caves which they used were only altered and
extended insofar as necessary. Later they built such caves themselves
and at that time they developed great skill for such constructions.
One must not imagine, however, that they did not also execute more
artful constructions. But these did not serve as dwellings. In the
earliest times they originated in the desire to give to the things of
nature a man-made form. Hills were remodeled in such a way that the
form afforded man joy and pleasure. Stones were put together for the
same purpose, or in order to be used for certain activities. The
places where the children were hardened were surrounded with walls of
this kind.
Toward the end of this period, the buildings which
served for the cultivation of “divine wisdom and divine
art” became more and more imposing and ornate. These
institutions differed in every respect from what temples were later,
for they were educational and scientific institutions at the same
time. He who was found fit was here initiated into the science of the
universal laws and into the handling of them. If the Lemurian was a
born magician, this talent was here developed into art and insight.
Only those could be admitted who, through all kinds of discipline,
had acquired the ability to overcome themselves to the greatest
extent. For all others what went on in these institutions was the
deepest secret. Here one learned to know and to control the forces of
nature through direct contemplation of them. But the learning was
such that in man the forces of nature changed into forces of the
will. He himself could thereby execute what nature accomplishes. What
later mankind accomplished by reflection, by calculation, at that
time had the character of an instinctive activity. But here one must
not use the word “instinct” in the same sense in which
one is accustomed to apply it to the animal world. For the activities
of Lemurian humanity towered high above everything the animal world
can produce through instinct. They even stood far above what mankind
has since acquired in the way of arts and sciences through memory,
reason and imagination. If one were to use an expression for these
institutions which would facilitate an understanding of them, one
could call them “colleges of will power and of the clairvoyant
power of the imagination.”
From them emerged the men who, in every respect,
became rulers of the others. Today it is difficult to give in words a
true conception of all these conditions. For everything on earth has
changed since that time. Nature itself and all human life were
different, therefore human labor and the relationship of man to man
differed greatly from what is customary today.
The air was much thicker even than in later
Atlantean times, the water much thinner. And what forms the firm
crust of our earth today was not yet as hard as it later became. The
world of plants and animals had developed only as far as the
amphibians, the birds, and the lower mammals, and as far as vegetable
growths which resemble our palms and similar trees. However, all
forms were different from what they are today. What now exists only
all in forms was then developed to gigantic sizes. At that time our
small ferns were trees and formed mighty forests. The modern higher
mammals did not exist. On the other hand a great part of humanity was
on such a low stage of development that one cannot but designate it
as animal. What has been described here was true only of a small part
of mankind, The rest lived their life in animalism. In their external
appearance and in their way of life these animal men were quite
different from the small group. They were not especially different
from the lower mammals, which resembled them in form in certain
respects.
A few more words must be said about the
significance of the above-mentioned temple localities. What was
cultivated there was not really religion. It was “divine wisdom
and art.” Man felt that what was given to him there was a
direct gift from the spiritual universal forces. When he received
this gift he considered himself a “servant” of these
universal forces. He felt himself “sanctified” from
everything unspiritual. If one wishes to speak of religion at this
stage of the development of mankind, one could call it
“religion of the will.” The religious temper and
dedication lay in the fact that man guarded the powers granted to him
as a strict, divine “secret,” and that he led a life
through which he sanctified his power. Persons who had such powers
were regarded by others with great awe and veneration. And this awe
and veneration were not called forth by laws or something similar,
but by the immediate power which these persons exercised. The
uninitiated of course stood under the magical influence of the
initiated. It was also natural that the latter considered themselves
to be sanctified personages. For in their temples they participated
in direct contemplation of the active forces of nature. They looked
into the creative workshop of nature. They experienced a communion
with the beings which build the world itself. One can call this
communication an association with the gods. What later developed as
“initiation,” as “mystery,” emerged from this
original manner of communication of men with the gods. In subsequent
times this communication had to become different, since the human
imagination, the human spirit, took other forms.
Of special importance is something which occurred
in the course of Lemurian development by virtue of the fact that the
women lived in the manner described above. They thereby developed
special human powers. Their faculty of imagination which was in
alliance with nature, became the basis for a higher development of
the life of ideas. They took the forces of nature into themselves,
where they had an after-effect in the soul. Thus the germs of memory
were formed. With memory was also born the capacity to form the first
and simplest moral concepts.
The development of the will among the male element
at first knew nothing of this. The man followed instinctively either
the impulses of nature or the influences emanating from the
initiated.
It was from the manner of life of the women that
the first ideas of “good and evil” arose. There one began
to love some of the things which had made a special impression on the
imagination, and to abhor others. While the control which the male
element exercised was directed more toward the external action of the
powers of the will, toward the manipulation of the forces of nature,
beside it in the female element there developed an action through the
soul, through the inner, personal forces of man. The development of
mankind can only be correctly understood by the one who takes into
consideration that the first progress in the life of the imagination
was made by women. The development connected with the life of the
imagination, with the formation of memory, of customs which formed
the seeds for a life of law, for a kind of morals, came from this
side. If man had seen and exercised the forces of nature, woman
became the first interpreter of them. It was a special new
manner of living through reflection which developed here. This manner
had something much more personal than that of the men. One must
imagine this manner of the women to have been also a kind of
clairvoyance, although it differed from the magic of the will of the
men. In her soul woman was accessible to another kind of spiritual
powers. The latter spoke more to the feeling element of the soul,
less to the spiritual, to which man was subject. Thus there emanated
from men an effect which was more natural-divine, from women one
which was more soul-divine.
The development which woman went through during
the Lemurian period had the result that at the appearance of the next
— the Atlantean — root race on earth, an important role
devolved upon her. This appearance took place under the influence of
highly developed entities, who were familiar with the laws of the
formation of races and capable of guiding the existing forces of
human nature into such paths that a new race could come into being.
These beings will be specially mentioned further on. May it suffice
for the moment to say that they possessed superhuman wisdom and
power. They now isolated a small group out of Lemurian mankind and
designated these to be the ancestors of the coming Atlantean race.
The place where they did this was situated in the tropical zone.
Under their direction the men of this group had been trained in the
control of the natural forces. They were very strong, and knew how to
win the most diverse treasures from the earth. They could cultivate
the fields and use their fruits for their subsistence. They had
become characters of strong will through the discipline to which they
had been subjected. Their souls and hearts were developed only in
small measure. On the other hand these had been developed among the
women. Memory and fantasy and everything connected with them were to
be found among the latter.
The above-mentioned leaders caused the group to
divide itself into smaller groups. They put the women in charge of
ordering and establishing these groups. Through her memory, woman had
acquired the capacity to make the experiences and adventures of the
past useful for the future. What had proved helpful yesterday she
used today and realized that it would also be useful tomorrow. The
institutions for communal life therefore emanated from her. Under her
influence the concepts of “good and evil” developed.
Through her thoughtful life she had acquired an understanding for
nature. Out of the observation of nature, those ideas developed in
her according to which she directed the actions of men. The leaders
had arranged things in such a way that through the soul of
woman, the willful nature, the vigorous strength of man was ennobled
and refined. Of course one must represent all this to oneself as
childish beginnings. The words of our language all too easily call up
ideas which are taken from the life of the present.
By way of the awakened soul life of the women the
leaders first developed the soul life of the men. In the colony we
have described, the influence of the women was therefore very great.
One had to go to them for advice when one wanted to interpret the
signs of nature. The whole manner of their soul life however was
still dominated by the “hidden” human soul forces. One
does not describe the matter quite exactly, but fairly closely, if
one speaks of a somnambulistic contemplating among these women. In
certain higher dreams the secrets of nature were divulged to them and
they received the impulses for their actions. Everything was animated
for them and showed itself to them in soul powers and apparitions.
They abandoned themselves to the mysterious weaving of their soul
forces. That which impelled them to their actions were “inner
voices,” or what plants, animals, stones, wind and clouds, the
whispering of the trees, and so on, told them.
From this state of soul originated that which one
can call human religion. The spiritual in nature and in human life
gradually came to be venerated and worshiped. Some women attained a
special preeminence because out of special mysterious depths they
could interpret what the world contained.
Thus it could come to pass among such women that
that which lived within them could transpose itself into a kind of
natural language. For the beginning of language lies in something
which is similar to song. The energy of thought was transformed into
audible sound. The inner rhythm of nature sounded from the lips of
“wise” women. One gathered around such women and in their
songlike sentences felt the utterances of higher powers. Human
worship of the gods began with such things.
For that period there can be no question of
“sense” in that which was spoken. Sound, tone, and rhythm
were perceived. One did not imagine anything along with these, but
absorbed in the soul the power of what was heard. The whole process
was under the direction of the higher leaders. They had inspired the
“wise” priestesses with tones and rhythms in a manner
which cannot now be further discussed. Thus they could have an
ennobling effect on the souls of men. One can say that in this way
the true life of the soul first awakened.
In this realm, beautiful scenes are shown by the
Akasha Chronicle. One of these will be described. We are in a forest,
near a mighty tree. The sun has just risen in the east. The palmlike
tree, from around which the other trees have been removed, casts
mighty shadows. The priestess, her face turned to the east, ecstatic,
sits on a seat made of rare natural objects and plants. Slowly in
rhythmical sequence, a few strange, constantly repeated sounds stream
from her lips. A number of men and women are sitting in circles
around her, their faces lost in dreams, absorbing inner life from
what they hear.
Other scenes too can be seen. At a similarly
arranged place a priestess “sings” in a similar manner,
but her tones have in them something mightier, more powerful. Those
around her move in rhythmic dances. For this was the other way in
which “soul” entered into mankind. The mysterious rhythms
which one had heard from Nature were imitated by the movements of the
limbs. One thereby felt at one with nature and with the powers
acting in her.
The place on earth in which this stock of a coming
race of men was developed was especially suited for this purpose. It
was one where the then still turbulent earth had become fairly calm.
For Lemuria was turbulent. After all, the earth at that time did not
yet have its later density. The thin ground was everywhere undermined
by volcanic forces which broke forth in smaller or larger streams.
Mighty volcanos existed almost everywhere and developed a continuous
destructive activity. Men were accustomed to reckoning with this
fiery activity in everything they did. They also used this fire in
their labors and contrivances. Their occupations were often such that
the fire of nature served as a basis for them in the same way as
artificial fire does in human labor today.
It was through the activity of this volcanic fire
that the destruction of the Lemurian land came about. While the part
of Lemuria from which the parent race of the Atlanteans was to
develop had a hot climate, it was by and large free of volcanic
activity.
Human nature could unfold more calmly and
peacefully here than in the other regions of the earth. The more
nomadic life of former times was abandoned, and fixed settlements
became more and more numerous.
One must represent to oneself that at that time
the human body still had very malleable and pliant qualities. This
body still changed form whenever the inner life changed. Not long
before, men had still been quite diverse as regards their external
form. At that time the external influence of region and climate were
still decisive in respect to their form. Only in the colony described
did the body of man increasingly become an expression of his inner
soul life. Moreover, this colony had an advanced externally more
nobly formed race of men. One must say that through the things which
they had done, the leaders had really first created what is the true
human form. This occurred quite slowly and gradually. It happened in
such a way that the soul life of man was first developed and that the
still soft and malleable body adapted itself to this. It is a law in
the development of mankind that, as progress continues, man has less
and less of a molding influence on his physical body. This physical
human body in fact received a fairly unchanging form only with the
development of the faculty of reason and with the hardening of the
rock, mineral, and metal formations of earth connected with this
development. For in the Lemurian and even in the Atlantean period,
stones and metals were much softer than later.
This is not contradicted by the fact that there
exist descendants of the last Lemurians and Atlanteans who today
exhibit forms as fixed as the human races which were formed later.
These remnants had to adapt themselves to the changed environmental
conditions of earth and thus became more rigid. Just this is the
reason for their decline. They did not transform themselves from
within; instead, their less developed interior was forced into
rigidity from the outside and thus compelled to stagnation. This
stagnation is really a regression, for the inner life, too, has
degenerated because it could not fulfill itself within the rigid
external bodily structure.
Animal life was subject to even greater
changeability. We shall speak further about the animal species
existing at the time of the development of man and about their
origin, as well as about the development of new animal forms after
man already existed. Here we shall say only that the existing animal
species continually transformed themselves and that new ones were
developing. This transformation was of course a gradual one. The
reasons for the transformation lay in part in a change of habitat and
of the manner of life. The animals had a capacity of extraordinarily
rapid adaptation to new conditions. The malleable body changed its
organs comparatively rapidly, so that after a more or less brief
period the descendants of a particular animal species resembled their
ancestors only slightly. The same was the case in even greater
measure for the plants. The greatest influence on the transformation
of men and animals was exercised by man himself. This was true
whether he instinctively brought organisms into such an environment
that they assumed certain forms, or whether he achieved this by
experiments in breeding. The transforming influence of man on nature
was immeasurably great at that time, compared with the conditions of
today. This was especially the case in the colony we have described.
For there the leaders directed this transformation in a way of which
men were not conscious. This was the case to such a degree that when
men left the colony in order to found the different Atlantean races,
they could take with them a highly developed knowledge of the
breeding of animals and plants. The labor of cultivation in Atlantis
was then essentially a consequence of the knowledge thus brought
along. But here again it must be emphasized that this knowledge had
an instinctive character. In this state essentially it remained among
the first Atlantean races.
The preeminence of the feminine soul, which has
been described, was especially strong in the last Lemurian period and
continued into the Atlantean times, during which the fourth subrace
was preparing itself. But one must not imagine that this was the case
among all of mankind. It was true, however, for that part of the
population of earth from which the truly advanced races later
emerged. This influence exercised the strongest effect upon all that
which in man is “unconscious.” The development of certain
constant gestures, the refinements of sensory perception, the feeling
for beauty, a good part of the general life of sensations and
feelings which is common to all men — all this originally
emanated from the spiritual influence of woman. It is not an
over-statement if one interprets the reports in such a way as to
affirm, “The civilized nations have a bodily form and
expression, as well as certain bases of physical-soul life, which
were imprinted upon them by woman.”
In the next chapter we shall go back to earlier
periods of the development of mankind, during which the population of
earth still belonged to only one sex. The development of the two
sexes will then be described.
|