FIRST LECTURE
In this
first lecture, after the introductory passage to which we have
already referred, Dr. Steiner goes on to speak of the difficulty our
age may experience in taking seriously the idea of real Beings who
have no immediate manifestation on the physical plane. Such Beings,
none the less, are the souls, or Spirits, of the nations.
[Dr. Steiner does not confine himself to the use of
the word ‘nation-soul’ (Volks-Seele, as in the
title of the course), but also speaks synonymously of the
‘nation-spirit’ (Volksgeist).] As
real as is the Spirit of a man — distinct from the ten fingers
which this Spirit uses as his organs — equally real is for
example the Spirit of the Swiss people, distinct from the so many
million men and women inhabiting the mountain regions of the Alps and
Jura.
It is
significant that the example of the Swiss nation is taken first, so
that we see a nation need not necessarily be characterized by what
might appear the most obvious criterion: possession of a common
language. This too would indicate that deeper insight is required, to
know when a ‘nation’ really is a nation; so that the
spiritual knowledge of the nation-souls is of importance even at this
stage, for the realities of the physical world.
Now to lead
up to some conception of such a purely spiritual Being as a
nation-soul or folk-soul, we are guided along this line of thought:
—
Man, as we
know from elementary Theosophy, consists of physical body, etheric
body, astral or sentient body and ‘I’ or Ego. Moreover
from the ‘I,’ the inmost member of his being, he is
destined in future ages to transmute the three other members. He will
transmute, in the first place, his astral or sentient body into Manas
or Spirit-Self; thereafter, at a still higher stage of his
development, he will transmute his ether-body or life-body into Budhi
or Life-Spirit; and at the highest stage — still working from
within the ‘I’ — he will transmute what to-day
appears to us as the lowest member, namely the physical body, into
the highest and most perfect entity of all: Atma or
Spirit-Man.
These
transmutations of the three bodily members into the realization of
the threefold Spirit will be the work of future epochs of
World-evolution (Jupiter, Venus and Vulcan evolutions, as we are wont
to call them). Man now is only just beginning with the first of the
three transmutations — that of the astral body into Manas or
Spirit-Self. Yet in the present, Earth-epoch of evolution there is
already a foreshadowing, a kind of preparation for the three higher
members on a less potent level, inasmuch as the ‘I’ works
through the three bodily members, learns to control them and so
develops out of them the threefold soul:
the Sentient
Soul by transformation of the astral or sentient body, —
therefore the Sentient Soul is a foreshadowing of Manas or
Spirit-Self;
the
Intellectual or Mind-Soul [‘Mind-Soul’
(Gemüts-Seele), alternative name for the Intellectual Soul,
is translated in some passages of the English version ‘Soul of the
Higher Feelings,’ a translation due either to a misunderstanding
of the word Gemüt or to a rather too cold and narrow
interpretation of our own word, mind. ‘Mind-Soul’ was
Dr. Steiner's own rendering.] by transformation of the
ether-body, — this therefore is a foreshadowing of Budhi or
Life-Spirit;
lastly the
Spiritual Soul (or Consciousness Soul) by the ‘I’ working
right down into the physical body, — a faint foreshadowing of
Âtma or Spirit Man.
It is
perhaps helpful to note that in
The Education of the Child
Dr. Steiner distinguishes the development of the three fold soul
and of the threefold Spirit in this way: whereas the latter will
eventually have to be the fully individual achievement of each
one of us, in the former work of transformation we are assisted by
the whole human race, or more particularly by the civilization-epoch,
the nation, or even the clan or family to which we belong. Thus we
shall presently understand how certain epochs of civilization
— or nations or communities within a given epoch — have
the special task of developing one or other of the three
soul-members. An individual incarnated in such a nation is quite
naturally helped and educated in the development of sentient,
intellectual or spiritual soul as the case may be; yet what is
given to him thus, as it were by powers of universal destiny and the
wise guidance of mankind, is also helping to prepare his Ego in some
future time to achieve a corresponding spiritual transformation on a
higher level, by his own strength and virtue.
This present
stage in man's evolution — wherein he has the three bodily
members and looks forward to the development of the three spiritual
members in future epochs — follows, we are now reminded, on
three former cosmic stages: ancient Saturn, when the physical body of
man was first created; Sun, when the ether-body was created; and in
the third place the old Moon, — the epoch of creation of the
astral body. Moreover in these former cosmic stages other Beings,
though not in bodies of flesh and bone, were undergoing the stage in
consciousness (self-consciousness, — objective cognition)
which man undergoes to-day. These other Beings were, in Christian
esoteric terminology: —
the Angels,
who underwent their human stage in old Moon and are therefore one
stage beyond Man;
the
Archangels, who underwent their human stage in old Sun and are
therefore two stages beyond Man;
lastly the
Archai (Principalities), the ‘First Beginnings’ or
Spirits of Personality, who underwent their human stage already in
old Saturn and are therefore three stages ahead of Man in
evolution.
We are led
on to the conception that these Beings, having passed through their
human stage in former cosmic epochs, have now advanced to stages of
development which Man will only reach in future epochs. They
therefore, even now, are developing those higher spiritual members of
their being which Man will only develop in Jupiter, Venus and Vulcan
evolutions.
Angels (one
stage ahead of Man) are now fulfilling their transmutation of astral
body into Manas or Spirit-Self.
Archangels
(two stages beyond Man) are engaged in transmuting their
‘ether-body’ or ‘life-body’ into Budhi or
Life-Spirit.
Lastly the
Archai or ‘First-Beginnings’ are to-day “working
from the Earth's spiritual environment upon the transmutation of the
Earth and in so doing undergoing the final phase, so to speak, in the
transmutation of their physical body into ‘Spirit-Man’ or
Atma.”
In effect
these higher Beings, in the very act of working beneficially upon the
Earth and mankind, are at the same time evolving the higher members
of their own being. The Archai work into the physical body both of
the Earth as a whole and of human beings — notably into all
those things that constitute the physical character of a
civilization-epoch, the typical arts and crafts or ways of using
material things for spiritual ends — and in so doing they for
their own evolution are developing Atma or Spirit-Man. Archangels
work into our ether-bodies and in so doing are transforming their
etheric body into Budhi. Likewise the Angels, who are engaged in
perfecting Manas or Spirit-Self, work beneficially into our astral
bodies.
This work of
the spiritual Beings is however differentiated, and in a diverse way
for each of the three ranks of Beings. The Archai are the guiding
spirits of whole periods of Time, or civilization-epochs. They
therefore are also called the Time-Spirits, or even (since they
depart and return again to such work upon the Earth in certain
periods) ‘Spirits of Cyclic Periods.’ Now in any such
epoch there is one dominant character of civilization throughout the
whole of civilized mankind. Thus in the main one such Archai-being
works for the Earth as a whole during a given epoch. Yet within the
mission of an epoch there must be many shades and colourings, many
special tasks to fulfil. This is the mission of the different
nations, and is inspired by the several Archangels. Archangels in
effect are the souls of nations, and they work paramountly into the
ether-bodies of the men and women belonging to their nations.
National character and temperament is therefore mainly
situated, not in the physical body as such, nor in the astral (the
more personal, individual soul-body), but in the subtle intermediate
member between these two: the etheric or life-body, the bearer of our
life-forces.
Lastly the
single human being, passing from incarnation to incarnation and
therewithal from epoch to epoch, nation to nation in his own
individual way of destiny, has his guiding and protecting
Angel-being; and these Angels, as we can readily understand, are in
their turn the mediators between the single human being, and the
Archangel, of the folk to whom this soul belongs in a given life on
Earth — who pours His deeper Inspirations into the
ether-body.
This is an
outline of what is given in the first lecture of the course. Yet for
a fuller understanding of it Dr. Steiner introduces one other leading
idea which we have not yet touched upon. It is to help us understand
in a more real way what is meant by the working of the Archangels for
example, into the ether-bodies of men, or by the statement that in so
doing they are transmuting their own ‘ether-body’ into
Life-Spirit, Budhi.
Dr. Steiner
here draws our attention to a very real fact of our own future
evolution, to which indeed he referred in other lectures even with
regard to a less distant future. It is that the more we evolve into
the future the more shall we acquire the faculty to direct our bodies
from outside. Let us suppose that even now we were one day to become
fully conscious in our sleep, when, as we know, with our astral body
and Ego we are outside the physical and the etheric. Suppose that
being conscious in this way we then began to direct and move our
physical and etheric bodies from outside. This then would be an
indication of a faculty we shall actually have attained in Jupiter
and, even more, in Venus evolution. This in effect will go hand in
hand with our development and perfection of the higher spiritual
members, Manas and Budhi. We in our Spirit shall direct our bodies
from outside. (Dr. Steiner here refers to the bird-kingdom, notably
the birds of passage — entities which in connection with their
group-soul have in a somewhat premature way, even on the Earth,
forestalled what Man will only reach in future epochs.)
This faculty
however belongs already now to the more highly developed Beings
— the Archangels, the souls of nations. In this way we can
understand how they work into the human beings of the nation
belonging to them.
“Try
to conceive the idea of Beings living and working as it were with
their own ‘I’ or Ego in the spiritual atmosphere of our
Earth, and with their fully developed Spirit-Self or Manas working on
to our Earth, working into the human beings, transforming our ether-
or life-body. Beings they are, who are themselves at the stage of
transmuting their ether- or life-body into Budhi or Life-Spirit. If
you imagine such Beings — at the ‘Archangel’ stage
among the spiritual Hierarchies — you will then have a true
idea of what are called the nation-spirits, the directing
nation-spirits of the Earth ... They, in directing their own ether-
or life-body, work also down into mankind and thus include mankind in
the sphere of their activity ... If we can recognise the missions of
these Beings — inspirers of the nations as they are —
then we are able to say what a nation is. A nation is a group of
human beings belonging in this way together, — inspired by one
or other of the Archangeloi, of the Archangels. ...”
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