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Rudolf Steiner e.Lib
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Theosophy of the Rosicrucian
Rudolf Steiner e.Lib Document
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Theosophy of the Rosicrucian
The Ninefold Constitution of Man
Schmidt Number: S-1535
On-line since: 4th July, 2002
THE NINEFOLD CONSTITUTION OF MAN
IN THE last lecture yesterday we spoke of the kind of relationship
which Rosicrucianism adopts to the human being and to culture in
general. Although the actual data of knowledge concerning the higher
worlds can be discovered only by the seer, by more highly developed
spiritual faculties, nevertheless the Rosicrucian method is such that
the wisdom it imparts can be understood by the logical intellect. The
knowledge itself is discovered by the seer with higher faculties, but
normal human reason is capable of comprehending it. Let it not be
imagined, however, that what it is possible to say in a single lecture
can hold its ground against all criticism; this could only be so if
the statements were put to the test by all the means accessible to the
human mind. In the last lecture we spoke of yet another characteristic
of Rosicrucianism, namely, that this method aims at carrying Spiritual
Science into practical life. That is why things are put forward in
such a way that they can be made an integral part of life. Here too
you must have patience; at the beginning it will seem as though many
things are inapplicable in practical life. But when you are able to
survey the whole, you will realise that what I have said is true. The
Rosicrucian method of investigation is able to impart wisdom that can
take effect in life.
First of all we will consider the several members of man's
constitution. Only by advancing step by step and omitting nothing
shall we be able to get a view of the organic whole. We shall also
study the destiny of the human soul after death and the human being in
his waking consciousness, in sleep and in death. We shall have to
consider what is accomplished by man between death and a new birth. It
is a widespread view that man is inactive after death but this is not
the case. He has far rather to be intensely active, to create, to
perform work that is of significance in the cosmos. We shall also have
to speak of reincarnation and karma, of destiny in the evolution of
man, of how humanity developed in days of yore and of evolution in the
future. It will be my task today to give a brief description of the
constitution and nature of the human being.
We must realise that the nature and being of man appear far more
complex to spiritual perception than to ordinary sense-perception
which is permeated by intellect and can only observe a very small
portion of human nature as a whole. From the point of view of
occultism, the physical body as we see it in front of us is actually
permeated by the etheric body and the astral body. These three bodies
are united and only when the etheric and the astral bodies are removed
have we the real physical body of man before us. The physical body is
that member which the human being has in common with the whole of
physical Nature around him, in common with minerals, plants and
animals.
The only correct view of the physical human body is to say that it
corresponds with the extent of man's kinship with the mineral kingdom
around him. But you must realise that this member of man's being is
the one that can least of all be conceived of as separate from the
cosmos. The forces working in the physical body pour in from the
cosmos. Think of a rainbow. If a rainbow is to appear, there must be a
particular combination of sunlight and rain clouds. The rainbow cannot
be absent if this combination between sunlight and rain clouds
actually exists. The rainbow is therefore a consequence; a phenomenon
brought into being from without. The physical body too, is, in a way,
a pure phenomenon. You must look in the whole surrounding universe for
the forces which hold the physical body together. Where, then, are we
to find, in their true form, these forces which cause the physical
body to have the appearance it has? Here we are led into higher
worlds, for in the physical world we see the physical body as a
phenomenon only. The forces which give rise to this phenomenon lie in
a very lofty spiritual world. We must therefore give some study to
worlds which exist as truly as the physical world exists.
When the occultist speaks of higher worlds, he means worlds that are
around us all the time, only the senses for perceiving them must be
opened just as the eyes must be opened for the perception of colours.
When certain senses of the soul, senses which lie higher than the
physical senses, are opened, the world around us is pervaded by a new
revelation known as the astral world. Rosicrucian Theosophy calls this
world the Imaginative World but Imaginative here
denotes something much more real than the ordinary implication of the
word. There is a constant flowing and ebbing of pictures; the colours
that are otherwise chained to objects are involved in myriad
transformations within the astral world. In the movement that has
linked itself with Rosicrucianism this world is also called the
Elemental World. These three expressions therefore:
Imaginative world, Astral world, Elemental world, are interchangeable.
A still loftier world, revealed to yet higher senses, is that of the
Harmonies of the Spheres. This higher world penetrates
into the world of pictures and colours. It is called
Devachan, Rupa Devachan, or also the
Mental world; in Rosicrucian terminology it is known as
the world of the Harmonies of the Spheres or the world of
Inspiration, because sound or tone is the medium of the Inspiration
when the corresponding senses have been opened. In the movement that
has linked itself with Rosicrucianism, this world has been called the
Heaven world. Lower or Rupa-Devachanic world, Devachan,
the world of Inspiration, the Heaven world these again are one
and the same.
Still another world, revealed by even higher senses, is known in
Rosicrucianism as the world of true Intuition, but
Intuition here has a much higher reality than is contained
in the word as used in everyday life. True Intuition is a
merging into other beings, so that they are known from
within themselves. In the movement that has linked itself with
Rosicrucianism, this world of Intuition has been called the
world of Reason (Vernunftwelt); it is so far above
the ordinary world that it casts a shadow-image only into the world of
men. Intellectual concepts are faint and feeble shadow-images of the
realities in this higher world. In addition to the physical world,
therefore, there are three other worlds. Behind the forces which hold
the physical world together there are forces which are to be found in
the highest world, the world of Intuition. In comparison with the
nature-forces in this highest world, everything that the
physicist discovers in the physical world is like so many faint
shadow-images. For every concept you have, say of a crystal, or of the
human eye, you would find, in this highest world, living Beings. A
concept in the physical world is the shadow-image of Beings in this
highest world. Thus the physical world is built up by forces which
manifest, in their true form in Arupa-Devachan — to use the theosophical
mode of expression.
We can form a still clearer conception if we think about the mineral
kingdom from this point of view.
The human being has ego-consciousness, I -consciousness.
We say that a mineral is without consciousness, but this is true only
in the physical plane. In the higher worlds the mineral is not without
consciousness. You will not, however, find the ego of the mineral
world in the Elemental world; the ego-consciousness of the mineral
lies in the highest of the worlds of which we have spoken. Just as
your finger has no consciousness of its own, for its consciousness
lies in your I, in your ego, so the mineral is connected
with its ego by streams that lead into the very highest realm of
world-existence. A fingernail is part of the human organism as a
whole; its consciousness is in the I. A nail is related to
the organism as the mineral is related to the highest spiritual world.
There is one I belonging to the whole living organism and
the nails, like the mineral, are an outermost manifestation of what
has hardened within this life. The human physical body has this in
common with the minerals: that the physical body, in so far as it is
purely physical has a consciousness belonging to it in the
spiritual world above. Inasmuch as the human being is endowed with
purely physical consciousness (although he does not know it), inasmuch
as he has a physical body with its consciousness in a higher world,
his constitution is such that the physical body is worked upon from
above. What fashions the physical body is not under your control. Just
as it is the I , the ego, which moves your hand, so is
your physical body worked upon from a higher world, and the
ego-consciousness belonging to the physical body gives rise to the
physical processes of the body. The Initiate who attains to Intuition
he alone has such power over his physical body that no current
passes through his nerves without his knowledge; not until man reaches
this stage can he be a citizen of those spiritual worlds which govern
and direct his physical body.
Man has his second member, the etheric or life-body, in common with
the plants and the animals. It is visible to the seer and has
approximately the same form as the physical body. It is a body of
forces. If you could think away the physical body, the etheric body
would be left as a body of forces, a body permeated with streams of
forces which have built up the physical body. The human heart could
never have assumed the form it actually bears if there were not in the
etheric body an etheric heart; this etheric heart contains certain
forces and currents and these are the builders, the architects, the
moulders of the physical, heart. Suppose you have a vessel containing
water and you cool the water until hardening, ice-formations appear in
it. The ice is water, only the water has hardened and the forms of the
ice-blocks were within the water as lines of force. Thus is the
physical heart formed out of the etheric heart; it is simply a
hardened etheric heart and the streams of force in the etheric heart
have given the physical heart its form. If you could think away the physical
body, you would see that the etheric body, especially in the upper
parts, is almost similar to the physical body. This similarity,
however, continues only as far as the middle of the body for there is
great differentiation within the etheric body; you will realise that
this is so when I tell you that the etheric body in the male is female
and in the female, male. Without this knowledge much will remain
incomprehensible in practical life. The etheric body appears like a
form of light extending everywhere, but only slightly, beyond the form
of the physical body. The human being has the etheric body in common
with the plants. It is the same with the etheric as with the physical
body: the forces which hold the etheric body together are found in the
world of Inspiration, the world of Rupa-Devachan, the Heaven-world.
All the forces, which hold the etheric body together, lie one stage
lower than those which hold the physical body together. The
ego-consciousness of the plants is therefore to be found in this world
of Inspiration, of Lower Devachan, of the Harmonies of the Spheres. In
this same world too, lies the ego-consciousness that pervades the
human etheric body and lives within you without your being aware of
it.
We come now to the third member of man's being, to the astral body
the Soul Body in Rosicrucian terminology. Man has
the astral body in common only with the animals. The astral body is
the bearer of feeling, of happiness and suffering, joy and pain,
emotions and passions; wishes and desires, too, are anchored in the
astral body. The astral body must be characterised by saying that
there is within it that which is also present in the animal world. The
animal world, too, has consciousness. The astral being of man and of
the animal is held together by forces which have their seat in the
Imaginative world or the Elemental world in Rosicrucian
parlance. The forces which hold the astral body together and give it
the form it has, are to be perceived in their true form, in the astral
world. The ego-consciousness of the animal is also within this astral
world. Just as in the case of a human being we speak of an individual
soul, in the case of an animal we speak of a group-soul which is to be
found on the astral plane. We must not think here of the single animal
living on the physical plane but a whole species of animals all
lions, all tigers have an ego in common, a group-soul to be
found on the astral plane. So that the animal is really only
comprehensible when it can be followed upwards to the astral plane.
Strands, as it were, go forth from the lions, for example,
and in the astral world unite into the group-soul that is common to
the individual lions living on the earth. Just as the human being has
an individual ego, so in every astral body there lives something of a
group-ego; this animal-ego lives in the human astral body and the
human being does not become independent of this animal-ego until he
develops astral sight and becomes a companion of astral beings, when
the group-souls of the animals confront him on the astral plane as
individual animals confront him here. In the astral world there are
beings who can only come down in fragments, as it were, to the
physical plane as so-and-so many animals. When the life of these
animals comes to an end they unite in the astral world with the rest
of this astral being. A whole species of animals is a being on the
astral plane, a being with whom converse can be held as with an
individual here on earth. Although there is not exact similarity the
group-souls are not incorrectly characterised in the second seal of
the Apocalypse where they are divided into four classes: Lion, Eagle,
Bull, Man (i.e., man who has not yet descended to the physical plane).
These four Apocalyptic animals are the four classes of the group-souls
which live in the astral world by the side of the human being with his
individual soul.
And now we will think of that which man no longer has in common with
the world around him; we will think of the I , the ego.
By virtue of this fourth member of his being, man is the crown of
physical creation; he has consciousness on the physical plane. Just as
the mineral consciousness is in the world of Arupa-Devachan, the plant
consciousness in Rupa-Devachan, the animal consciousness on the astral
plane, so the ego-consciousness of the human being is in the physical
world. In his I , man has something into which no other
being or centre of consciousness intrudes.
Thus we have the fourfold human being: physical man, etheric man,
astral man, ego or I .
This does not, however, comprise the whole of man's nature. Man had
these four members in his very first incarnation on the earth and as
he passes through successive incarnations, higher development takes
place. He works, from the ego, upon the three other members. In the
remote past, during his first incarnation on the earth, man was
entirely under the sway of every emotion and desire; true, he also had
an ego, but he behaved like an animal. If we compare this wild man
with one who is a high idealist; the difference lies in the fact that
the former has not yet worked from his ego upon his astral body. The
next step in evolution is that man works upon his astral body. The
result of such work is that certain fundamental properties of the
astral body are brought under his own control. The average European
allows himself to follow certain impulses and forbids himself to yield
to others. As much of the astral body as a man has brought under the
sway of the ego-that we call Spirit-Self (Manas). Manas is a product
of the transformation of the astral body by the ego. In its
substantiality, Spirit-Self is identical with the astral body; there
is merely a different ordering of what was originally in the astral
body but has been transformed into Spirit-Self.
A man whose development progresses acquires the faculty not only of
working upon his astral body but also of working from the ego upon his
etheric body. Let us be clear about the difference between working
upon the astral body and working upon the etheric body. Think of what
we knew at the age, say, of eight, and of what we have learnt since
then. Obviously we have learnt a great deal. Everyone has assimilated
a vast number of concepts and ideas which cause him no longer to
follow his emotions and passions blindly. But if one remembers having
had a violent temper as a child and then thinks of how far this
violent temper has been conquered, it will be found that it is still
apt to break out. Again, it is seldom that a man who once had a bad
memory succeeds in fundamentally improving it or in enhancing the
strength or getting rid of the weakness of his conscience. I have
often compared the changes that a man brings about in his temperament
and the like, with the slow progress of the hour hand of a clock. The
essential characteristic of the pupil's Initiation is this: Learning
is regarded as a mere preparation; much more is done for Initiation
when the temperament itself is transformed. If a feeble memory has
been changed into a strong one, if violence has been changed into
gentleness, a melancholic temperament into serenity, more has been
accomplished than the acquisition of great learning. Here lies the
source of inner, occult powers, for this indicates that the ego is
working upon the etheric body, not only upon the astral body.
In so far as they express themselves, these qualities are to be found
in the astral body but if they are to be transformed, this must happen
in the etheric body. What the ego has transformed in the etheric body
is present in a man as Life-Spirit, in contrast to Life-Body. In
theosophical literature, Life-Spirit is called Budhi. The
substantiality of Budhi is nothing else than that part of the etheric
body which has been transformed by the ego.
When the ego becomes so strong that it is able not only to transform
the etheric body, but also the physical body the densest of the
principles in man and the forces of which extend into the very highest
world we say that a man is developing the very highest member
of his being: Spirit-Man, or Atma. The forces for the transformation
of the physical body lie in the highest world of all. The
transformation of the physical body begins with the transformation of
the breathing process, for Atma is Atmen breath. This
transformation causes changes in the constitution of the blood which
works upon the physical body; man is here functioning in the very
highest worlds.
Transformation can proceed in two ways and to be precise we must speak
of an unconscious and a conscious transformation. In reality, every
European, from out of his ego, has unconsciously transformed the lower
members of his being. In the present phase of evolution he works
consciously only in respect of the development of Spirit-Self (Manas)
and he must be an initiate if he is to learn to work consciously at
the transformation of his etheric body.
Thus even the most primitive human being in the very earliest stage of
evolution has the three original members and within them the ego. Then
begins the process of transformation. For long ages it proceeded
unconsciously; humanity is now beginning consciously to transform the
astral body. The Initiates are now consciously transforming the
etheric body and in the future all human beings will consciously
transform the etheric body and the physical body.
The three primeval members of man's nature are: physical body, etheric
body, astral body and then the I , the ego. The
ego first transforms these three members. The process which has caused
Manas, Budhi and Atma (Spirit-Self, Life-Spirit, Spirit-Man) to arise
as unconscious, germinal realities of being, lies in the past so far
as present-day humanity is concerned.
Rosicrucian Theosophy makes the following differentiation: Sentient
Soul, Intellectual or Mind Soul, Consciousness Soul (Spiritual Soul).
The conscious process of transformation lights up for the first time
in the Consciousness or Spiritual Soul. Here the ego begins
consciously to work at the transformation. Spirit-Self is developed in
the Consciousness Soul, Life-Spirit in the Mind Soul, Spirit-Man in
the Sentient Soul. Thus we have, in all, nine members of man's nature.
Outwardly regarded, two of these members Sentient Soul and
Soul-Body interpenetrate, like a sword in its sheath; the Sentient
Soul is within the Soul-Body, so that they appear as one. So is it too
with Spirit-Self and Consciousness Soul. These nine members are thus
reduced to seven:
2. Etheric (or Life-) body.
3. Astral body within which is the Sentient Soul.
5. Spirit-Self (Manas) together with the Consciousness or
Spiritual Soul.
Such is the inner constitution of man's nature which has, in reality,
nine members, two and two of which coincide. Therefore the Rosicrucian
method speaks of three times three members = nine, which is reduced to
seven. We must, however, recognise the nine within the seven;
otherwise we shall reach only a theoretical conception.
The transition from theory to reality can only be made by a study of
man's essential nature.
The I lights up in the souls and then begins the work on
the bodies.
The indications given today will be a guide to us to-morrow when we
shall study the human being in sleep, in waking consciousness and in
death.
Last Modified: 02-Nov-2024
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