Michael e o Dragão. Rudolf Steiner

Michael (Arcanjo e Arqueu) não lança fortemente o dragão no inferno, mas sim nas cabeças (sistema neuro-sensorial) dos seres humanos

Rudolf Steiner

Tradução Sonia von Homrich

Trecho de uma série de Conferências GA 194

Bem, meus caros amigos, nos perguntamos sobre a origem da inteligência humana, sobre a origem do comportamento humano inteligente o que falando simplesmente, tem seu instrumento em nosso organismo da cabeça. E vimos que essa constituição inteligente de nossa alma provém daquele ato do Arcanjo Michael, comumente representado no símbolo da Queda, da expulsão do Dragão.  Este é, na verdade, um símbolo muito trivial. Pois, se realmente concebemos Michael e o Dragão, temos que visualizar, primeiro, o Ser de Michael e, em segundo lugar, o Dragão que, na realidade, consiste em tudo o que entra no que chamamos de razão, em nossa inteligência. Miguel não lança suas hostes opositoras no inferno, mas dentro das cabeças humanas; nelas esse impulso luciférico continua a viver. Caracterizei a inteligência humana como um impulso Luciférico real. Então, podemos dizer: se olharmos para trás, para a evolução da Terra, encontramos o ato-de-Michael, e a esse ato de Michael junta-se a iluminação do ser humano por sua razão. Os seres sub-humanos cujo caráter principal consiste no impulso que coincide fortemente com as forças de vontade (sistema metabólico) do ser humano, com o poder humano da vontade, agora aparece a partir do inferior, por assim dizer, enquanto as hostes de forças lançadas por Michael vieram de cima; e enquanto estas últimas tomaram posse da força de vontade humana, estas uniram-se à ela e são seres produzidos pelo reino do Ahriman.

 Influências ahrimânicas atuaram através daquelas consciências obscurecidas. Realmente, meus caros amigos, enquanto não se considerar essas forças como forças objetivamente existentes no mundo, assim como toma-se em consideração o que hoje chamamos de magnetismo, eletricidade e assim por diante, não obteremos um insight daquela natureza que, segundo o Hino (prosa) à Natureza de Goethe, consiste no ser humano. Pois a natureza, tal como é concebida na ciência natural atual, não contém o ser humano, mas apenas o self físico humano.

(Ser humano: corpo físico, corpo etérico, corpo astral, Eu)

 Rudolf Steiner. GA 194. A Missão do Arcanjo Michael. The Mission of the Archangel Michael. Conferência V. Lecture V

https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/MissMich/19191129p01.html

 V. The Michael Deed and the Michael Influence as Counter-pole of the Ahrimanic Influence

29/11/1919, Dornach

Only through a knowledge of the most important and essential laws of human evolution can man attain a real consciousness that supports his soul. He must learn to know the events of human evolution and make them part of his question of taking fully into account—I made this remark already a few days ago—that the evolution of mankind is itself an evolution of a living entity. Just as there is ordered growth in the single human individual, so is there ordered growth in the evolution of the whole human race. And since the present is the moment when we have to become conscious of certain things, and since the human being has participated, during his repeated earth lives, in the various configurations of humanity's evolutionary history, it is also necessary to develop an understanding for the different human soul moods in the various epochs of mankind's evolution. I have often stated that what we call history today is really a fable convenue, a fable agreed upon, for the reason that the abstract recounting of events and the searching for cause and effect in historical processes in an external sense does not take into account the transformations, the metamorphoses of human soul life itself. When, from this point of view, we make tests, we can easily show that it is a prejudice to believe that the soul mood of modern man prevailed also in the times to which the first historical documents reach back. This is not the case. Human beings, even the simplest, most primitive, of the ninth and tenth post-Christian centuries had a soul mood completely different from that of human beings after the middle of the fifteenth century. We can trace this right into the lower strata of the human race, but also into the upper levels. Try, for instance, to familiarize yourselves with Dante's curious work about “Monarchy.” If you read such a thing, not as an oddity, but with a certain cultural-historical sagacity, then you will notice that such a book of a representative of his time contains things which could not possibly have been spoken out of the soul of a modern human being.

In this book, which was intended as a serious treatise about the legal and political foundations of monarchy, Dante tries to show that the Romans were the most excellent people of the world, as far as it was known at that time, was the primeval right of the Romans. He tries to show that the conquest of the whole earth by the Romans constituted a right greater than for instance the right of independence of single, smaller peoples; for it was the will of God that the Romans should rule over the various smaller peoples, for the latter's own good. Dante offers many proofs, out of the spirit of his time, why the Romans were justified in ruling the earth. One of these proofs is the following: He says: The Romans descend from Aeneas. Aeneas married three times. First, Creusa; through this marriage he acquired the right, as progenitor of the race, to rule Asia. Secondly, he married Dido; through this marriage he acquired the right, as ancestor of the Romans, to rule Africa. Then he married Lavinia; through this he acquired the right for the Romans to rule Europe. Herman Grimm, who once discussed this matter, made the telling remark: How fortunate that at the time America and Australia were not yet discovered!

But this sort of conclusion was something quite self-evident for an enlightened spirit of the time of Dante, indeed, for the most outstanding spirit of that time. This was a juridical presentation at that time. Now I ask you to imagine that any lawyer of the present age would draw such conclusions. You cannot imagine it. And you can just as little imagine that the mode of thought which Dante employs in regard to other subjects could arise in the soul constitution of a man of the present age.

Thus a quite obvious fact shows that we have to take into consideration the transformation of the soul constitutions of human beings. To fail to understand these things was tolerable in a certain way up to our time. But it will no longer do in our time, and quite especially will it not do for mankind in the future, for the simple reason that mankind, right up to our time, or at least up to the end of the eighteenth century, had certain instincts; (since the French Revolution matters have gradually changed, but still, old remnants remained of the soul constitutions in question.) Out of these instincts mankind was able to develop a consciousness which supported the soul. But in the present state of the constantly changing organism of mankind these instincts no longer exist and man must consciously acquire the connection with the whole of humanity. This is, after all, the deeper significance of the social question in our present time. What people state in their party platforms are only superficial formulations. That which surges in the depths of human souls expresses itself in such formulas; mankind feels that it is necessary to acquire a conscious relationship of the individual to the whole of humanity, that is, to acquire a social impulse.

Now, we cannot do so without focusing our attention upon the law of evolution. Let us do this once more after having done so repeatedly in regard to other questions. Let us take the time from the fourth post-Christian century up to the sixteenth post-Christian century. We see how Christianity bears the character of which I spoke yesterday and on previous occasions. We find that great care is taken during this period to understand the secrets of Golgotha through human concepts and ideas as they had been transmitted by Greek culture. Then a changed form of evolution sets in. We know that it really set in at an earlier time, around the middle of the fifteenth century; but it became clearly discernible only in the sixteenth century. At that time the natural-scientifically orientated thinking began to take hold of the upper level of mankind and to spread further and further.

Let us focus our attention upon this natural-scientific thinking in regard to a certain quality. There are many qualities of natural-scientifically orientated thinking which might be mentioned, but today we want to emphasize one quality in particular. It is the following: If we are a really efficient, modern thinker in the present sense, we are unable to cope with the problem of the necessity of nature and human freedom. The natural-scientific thinking of the modern age pressed onward more and more toward conceiving of the human being as a member of the rest of nature, the latter being considered a stream of causes and effects determining one another. Certainly, there exist today many human beings who see clearly that freedom, the experience of freedom, is a fact of human consciousness. But this does not prevent them from being unable to cope with this problem as they steep themselves in the special configuration of natural-scientific thinking. If we think about the being of man in the way modern natural science demands we are unable to reconcile this thinking with the thinking about human freedom. Some people take it very easy in regard to human freedom, in regard to the sense of human responsibility. I knew a professor of criminal law who began his lectures on criminal law every time with the following remarks: Gentlemen, I have to lecture to you on criminal law. Let us begin by assuming the axiom that there is human freedom and responsibility. For, if there were no human freedom and responsibility, there could be no criminal law. However, criminal law exists, for I have to lecture on it to you; therefore, responsibility and freedom exist also.—this argumentation is somewhat simple, but it points to the difficulty that arises for human beings when they have to ask the question: How can the necessity of nature be reconciled with freedom? It shows, in other words, how the human being has been forced more and more through the evolution of the last few centuries to acknowledge a certain omnipotence of the necessity of nature. One does not express it in these words; nevertheless, a certain omnipotence of natural necessity is conceived of. What is this omnipotence of natural necessity?

We shall understand one another best if I remind you of something which I have mentioned frequently. Modern thinkers believe that they act—or, rather, think—without prejudice, merely as scientific researchers, when they assert that man consists of body and soul. People, all the way up to the great philosopher Wilhelm Wundt—who is great, however, merely through the graces of his publisher—people maintain: if we think without prejudice, we have to consider man as consisting of body and soul, if we ascribe any validity to the soul at all. And only timidly does the truth make its appearance, namely, that man consists of body, soul, and spirit. The philosophers who consider themselves unbiased in their belief that man consists of body and soul do not know that their concept is merely the result of a historical process which had its starting point in the eighth Oecumencial council of Constantinople when the Roman-Catholic church abolished the spirit by establishing the dogma that henceforth the orthodox Christian was to think of man as consisting of body and soul, the soul having some spiritual qualities. This was a church law; philosophers still teach it today and do not know that they are merely following a church law. They believe they carry on unprejudiced science. This is the situation today in regard to many things called “unprejudiced science.”

The matter is similar in regard to the necessity of nature. During the whole evolution between the fourth and the sixteenth centuries the concept of god took on a quite particular form. If one takes into account the more intimate aspects of the spiritual evolution of these centuries, one will become aware of the fact that a quite definite concept of God was more and more elaborated in human thinking, a concept of God which culminated in the dictum: God, the Omnipotent, the All-Mighty. Few people know that it would have had no meaning for human beings prior to the fourth post-Christian century to speak of God, the All-Mighty. My dear friends, we do not engage in catechism truths; there you will, naturally, find: God is all-mighty, all-wise, all-benevolent. All these are things which have nothing to do with realities. Prior to the fourth century, nobody would have thought of considering omnipotence as a fundamental quality of the Divine Being if he had an understanding of these matters and really lived with them. For at that time the after-effect of the Greek concepts still held sway. In thinking about the Divine Being, people would not have spoken of God, the All-Mighty, but of God, the Omniscient, the All-Wise.

God, the All-Mighty

(Previously: God the All-Wise)

fourth century sixteenth century

Wisdom was considered the fundamental attribute of the Divine Being. The concept of Omnipotence only gradually penetrated the idea of the Divine Being, from the fourth century onward. It continued to develop. The concept of personality was abandoned and the predicate was transmitted to the mere order of nature, which is conceived of more and more mechanically. And the modern concept of the necessity of nature, the omnipotence of nature, is nothing but the result of the evolution of the concept of God from the fourth to the sixteenth century. Only, the qualities of personality were abandoned and that which constituted the concept of God was taken over into the structure of thinking about nature.

Now, my dear friends, the genuine natural scientists of today would oppose such statements vigorously. Just as many philosophers believe they are thinking without prejudice about man by considering him as consisting of body and soul, whereas in truth they merely follow the eighth Oecumenical Council of Constantinople in 869,—just as these philosophers are dependent upon a historical stream, so all the Haeckeleans, Darwinists, physicists with their natural order are dependent upon the theological stream that developed in the period from St. Augustine to Calvin. These things have to be comprehended. It is the peculiar character of every evolutionary stream that it comprises evolution as well as involution or devolution. And while the concept “God the All-Mighty” developed, there existed a sub-current in the subconscious spheres of human soul life, which then became the leading upper current: the nature necessity. (See diagram, red) And since the sixteenth century there exists a new sub-current which prepares precisely in our time to become an upper current. (blue.)

It is characteristic of the Michael age that that which has been prepared in the form of a sub-current of nature-necessity must henceforth become an upper current. But if we wish to acquire a possible concept of what it is that has thus prepared itself, we must understand the inner spirit of Earth evolution.

I recently drew your attention to the fact that what takes place in the evolution of the earth and of mankind in particular moves in a descending line. Earth humanity and the evolution of the earth itself is on the path of decadence. I drew your attention to the fact that this is today a recognized geological truth, that geologists who are to be taken seriously admit that the earth crust is in a process of decay. Mankind itself, in particular, is in a process of decay through the sensuous-earthly forces. And mankind, in its evolutionary process, must receive spiritual impulses which counteract decadence. Therefore a conscious spiritual life must enter mankind. We must be clear about the fact that we have already passed beyond the pinnacle of Earth evolution. In order that it may proceed, the spiritual must be taken up more and more clearly and distinctly.

At the outset, this seems an abstract fact. But for the spiritual researcher this is not an abstract fact. You know that we can trace the evolution of the Earth through the Saturn, Sun, and Moon states right into the Earth state. This evolution may also be characterized in the following way: if we speak of present mankind, we may consider the evolution of mankind through the Saturn, Sun and Moon periods as a preparation, as a pre-state. Only upon the Earth itself did man, as he received his ego, gain his true humanhood, and he will receive further elements into his true being during the subsequent evolutionary stages of the Earth.

Now you know that the so-called Archai, the present Spirits of Personality or Time Spirits, were in the Saturn state at the stage of evolution at which the human being is today, although in quite different forms, with a completely different outer aspect. I have expressed this in my books by saying: what we designate today as Archai, as Spirits of Personality, was man during the Saturn period. The Archangeloi were man during the Sun period, the Angeloi during the Moon period. During the Earth period we are man.

Our own evolution, of course, went on alongside all this, by way of preparation. If we go back to the Moon state we must say: Here the Angeloi were human beings, human beings, to be sure, with an appearance quite different from ours, for there were quite different conditions upon the ancient Moon. But alongside these Moon men, the Angeloi, we developed in a pre-state of the Earth evolution, in a very advanced state, so that we had to be taken into consideration by the Angeloi. Especially during the descending phase of the Moon evolution did we, at times, constitute a troublesome concern for the Angeloi. The same, however, is the case with us in descending Earth evolution: since the Earth evolution has entered its descending phases, other beings make themselves felt. My dear friends, it is a significant, an important result of spiritual-scientific research which is to be taken very, very seriously, that we have already entered the period of Earth evolution when certain beings make themselves felt who upon Jupiter—the next state of Earth evolution—will have advanced to the form of man, a different form of man, to be sure, but which, nevertheless, may be compared with the being of man. For we will be different beings on Jupiter. These so-to-speak Jupiter men exist already now just as we existed upon the Moon. They exist, of course not externally visible; but I explained to you recently what it means to be externally visible, and that man is also a super-sensible being. Supersensibily these beings are very decidedly present.

I emphasize once more: it is an extremely serious truth that certain beings make themselves felt which exist in the environment of mankind. They make themselves felt more and more since the middle of the fifteenth century. These beings possess chiefly the impulse of a force which is very similar to the human force of will, that force of will of which I told you yesterday that it exists in the deeper strata of the human consciousness. These invisible beings are related to that element of which ordinary consciousness thus remains unconscious today; but they already make themselves very strongly felt in the development of present-day humanity.

For the person who takes spiritual research truly seriously this is a problem of great magnitude. I was confronted with this problem especially strongly—at the time I spoke to a number of our friends about it in one or another form—I was confronted with this problem in a demanding fashion, as it were, when, in the year 1914, this war catastrophe broke in upon us. One had to ask oneself: How did an event overtake European mankind which it is impossible to gauge as to its causes in the way that is customary in regard to previous historical events? The one who knows that not more than thirty or forty people participated in Europe in the decisive events of the year 1914, and who also knows the soul condition in which most of these people were, will be confronted by this significant problem. For most of these people, as strange as it may sound today, my dear friends, most of these people had a dulled, obscured state of consciousness. During the last few years much has occurred that was caused by a dulled human consciousness. In the decisive places of the year 1914 we see everywhere that the most important decisions of the end of July and the beginning of August were reached with an obscured consciousness; and this has continued on right into our present day. This is a problem, terrifying in its nature. If we investigate it spiritual-scientifically, then we find that these obscured consciousnesses were the gateways through which precisely these will-beings were able to take possession of the consciousness of these men; they took possession of the obscured, veiled consciousness of these human beings and acted with their consciousness. And these beings who thus took possession, who are still sub-human beings, what kind of beings are they? We have to pose this question very seriously: What kind of beings are they?

Well, my dear friends, we have asked about the origin of human intelligence, about the origin of human intelligent behavior which, stating it simply, has its instrument in our head organism. And we have seen that this intelligent constitution of our soul stems from that deed of the Archangel Michael which is commonly presented in the symbol of the fall, the casting down of the Dragon. This is actually a very trivial symbol. For, if we really conceive of Michael and the Dragon, we have to visualize, first, the Michael Being, and, secondly, the Dragon who, in reality, consists of all that which enters into our so-called reason, into our intelligence. Not into a hell does Michael cast his opposing hosts, but into the human heads; there this Luciferic impulse continues to live. I have characterized human intelligence as an actual Luciferic impulse. Thus we may say: if we look back into the evolution of the Earth, we find the Michael-deed, and to this Michael-deed is joined the illumination of man by his reason.

The sub-human beings whose main character consists of an impulse which strongly coincides with human willing, with the human power of will, now appear from below, as it were, whereas the hosts of forces cast down by Michael came from above; and while these latter took possession of the human power of will; they unite themselves with it and are beings produced by the realm of Ahriman. Ahrimanic influences acted through those obscured consciousnesses. Indeed, my dear friends, as long as one does not take into consideration these forces as forces objectively existing in the world just as one takes into consideration what today is called magnetism, electricity, and so forth, one will not gain an insight into that nature which, according to Goethe's prose Hymn to Nature, comprises man. For nature, as it is conceived of in today's natural science does not contain man, but merely the human physical self.

At the beginning of Earth becoming we have to do with a downfall of Luciferic beings; today we have a rise of Ahrimanic beings. The former beings influence the Luciferic power of thought, the latter the human power of will; we have to recognize the arrival of these latter beings within the evolution of mankind. We have to realize that these beings arrive and that we have to reckon with a conception of nature which, to be sure, for the time being only includes man; for the animal kingdom will only be included later on in the Earth period. Upon the animal these beings have no influences as yet. We shall not comprehend the human race without taking these beings into consideration. And these beings, who are, as it were, pushed from behind, for behind them there stands the Ahrimanic power which endows them with their strong will power, which pours into them their directive forces,—these beings who as such are sub-human beings are controlled in their totality by higher Ahrimanic spirits and thus contain something which far surpasses their own nature and being. Therefore they show something in their appearance which, if it takes the human being captive, acts much more strongly, very much more strongly than that which the weak human being can control today, if he does not strengthen it through the spirit. What is the aim of this host? Well, my dear friends, just as the hosts which Michael has pushed down have aimed at human illumination, at human permeation with reason, so these hosts aim at a certain permeation of human willing. And what do they want? They burrow, as it were, in the deepest stratum of consciousness in which the human being is still asleep today in his waking state. Man does not notice how these beings enter his soul and also his body. Here they suck in, with their power of attraction, everything that has remained Luciferic, that has not become Christ-permeated. This they can reach: this they can take possession of.

My dear friends, our time raises these problems for us. We must no longer pass by these things. They are not convenient. For it has become convenient for human beings to think differently, that is, not to think at all about man, not to take him into consideration at all. And it is not without danger to speak about these things in complete truth at a time when many people do not at all love the sense for truth, quite apart from the fact that false sentimentality might find these things a psychic cruelty.

The result of the comprehension of these things, however, will be a thorough grasp of the necessity of the Christ impulse. One must recognize where the Christ impulse is lacking. Yesterday we showed that the Christ impulse takes hold of the middle stratum of consciousness; if man really permeates himself with the Christ, then these Ahrimanic powers cannot penetrate through this middle stratum, upward, and they cannot, with their spiritual forces, pull down the intellectual forces. Everything depends on that.

It is very necessary today that we recognize the nature of the influences which come to us from extra-human, sub-human beings which in turn are influenced by other beings. They are just as important as many influences which are only rooted in the world of man. A week ago I talked to you about the Michael influence. I have characterized this Michael influence for you. It is a very necessary one. For just as it is true that the Michael influence has brought about the Luciferic influencing of human intelligence, so true is it that now the counter-pole arises, namely, the appearance of certain Ahrimanic beings. And only through the constant activity of Michael is the human being armed against that which arises there. Even physiologically it is dangerous today to cling to mere nature necessity, to that kind of fatalism which is expressed in nature necessity. For education, through school and through life, in the concepts which are merely based upon nature necessity, upon the omnipotence of nature necessity, weakens the human head, and human beings become thereby so strongly passive in regard to their consciousness, that other forces are able to enter this consciousness, and human beings will fail to acquire the strength that is necessary for the reception into the human soul of the Christ impulse in its present form.

It is my duty, as it were, my dear friends, to speak at this time of the subject of which I have begun to speak today (I shall continue it tomorrow): of the appearance of certain Ahrimanic beings, which we have to take into account. Of this appearance numerous people upon earth are cognizant today. But they give it the wrong interpretation. They interpret it wrongly for the reason that they know nothing of the real triad of Christ-Lucifer-Ahriman, or do not wish to know anything about it, but jumble up Ahriman and Lucifer. Then discrimination is impossible; then it is impossible properly to recognize the true fundamental character of these Ahrimanic beings who now arise. Only if we clearly elaborate the Ahrimanic element and know the nature of the super-sensible influences which now arise as the counterpart, as it were, of Michael's casting down of the Dragon. It is like a lifting up, out of Ahrimanic depths, of certain beings. And these beings find special points of attack in the human being if the latter yields to unbridled instinctive impulses and does not strive for clarity in relation to them.

Now, there exists today a method I might call it an anti-method, of concealing the instinctive element, by putting down a concept and pushing another over it, so that it is impossible to form a proper judgment concerning it. Just think of the battle cry of the proletariat of the modern age. Behind this battle cry there stand very justified demands of mankind—I have often dealt with this. But these demands are not, to begin with, appealed to. In our idea of the three-fold social order they are appealed to for the first time. Something essentially different is appealed to: Proletarians of all countries, unite! What does this mean? It means: Foster your antipathy against the other classes, foster, as individuals, what resembles hate, and unite; that means, love one another, unite your feelings of hate, look for the love of one class, search among you for the love of the members of one class out of hate. Love one another out of hate, on the basis of hate.—There you have put down two concepts of opposing poles. This pushing back of instincts makes man's conceptions so nebulous, rendering him unable to know what he is dealing with in his own self. There actually exists a kind of anti-method, if I may use the paradoxical expression, in order to obscure, through present-day human thinking, the holding sway of an instinctive life which offers especially strong points of attack for the described Ahrimanic beings.

Reinos e Auto-conhecimento. Rudolf Steiner.

 Reinos Espirituais e Autoconhecimento Humano, Rudolf Steiner

Tradução Sonia von Homrich

Através da memória, o ser humano contempla o espiritual em sua própria alma. Mas, na consciência comum, ele não chega a uma compreensão real daquilo que contempla.

Ele olha na direção de algo; mas seu olhar não encontra a realidade. A Antroposofia, a partir do Conhecimento Imaginativo, mostra o caminho para essa realidade.

Por meio dela, somos direcionados da sombra para aquilo que cintila e brilha.

A Antroposofia faz isso ao falar do corpo etérico do ser humano. Mostra como o corpo físico é ativo nas imagens de pensamento-sombra; mas como, no cintilar e no reluzir, o corpo etérico vive.

Com o corpo físico, o ser humano está no mundo dos sentidos; com o corpo etérico, ele está no mundo etérico.

No mundo dos sentidos, ele tem seu ambiente; no mundo etérico também. E a Antroposofia fala deste último ambiente (etérico) como o primeiro dos mundos ocultos em que o homem vive. É o reino da Terceira Hierarquia.

Abordemos agora a fala da mesma forma que consideramos a memória. Ela emana de dentro do ser humano, assim como a memória. Ela o conecta a um certo estado de ser, assim como a memória o une às suas próprias experiências.

Nas palavras, também, existe um elemento de sombra. Este é mais profundo do que a sombra dos pensamentos da memória. Quando o ser humano projeta interiormente a sombra de suas experiências (vivências) como suas memórias, seu próprio self oculto está ativo em todo o processo. Ele está presente quando a luz projeta a sombra.

Na fala, também há um processo de projeção de sombras. As palavras são as sombras. O que brilha neste caso?

Algo mais forte brilha, porque as palavras são sombras mais fortes do que são os pensamentos da memória. O elemento no self humano que, no curso de uma vida terrena, produz memórias, não pode criar palavras.

O ser humano deve aprendê-las em conexão com outros seres humanos.

Algo que reside mais profundamente nele do que aquilo que projeta a sombra da memória deve participar desse processo.

Neste caso, a Antroposofia fala a partir do Conhecimento Inspirado do corpo astral, assim como, no caso da memória, fala do corpo etérico. O corpo astral é adicionado aos corpos físico e etérico como uma terceira parte do ser humano.

Esta terceira parte também possui um ambiente cósmico ao seu redor. Esta é realizada pela Segunda Hierarquia. Na linguagem humana, temos um “fantasma” desta Segunda Hierarquia. Quanto ao seu corpo astral, o homem vive dentro da esfera desta Hierarquia.

Podemos ir ainda mais longe. Na fala, uma parte do ser humano está engajada. Quando ele fala, ele põe seu ser interior em movimento.

Aquilo que envolve esse seu ser interior permanece em repouso. O movimento da fala se desprende (é espremido) do ser humano enquanto ele permanece em repouso, mas o homem integral entra em movimento quando ele põe em atividade tudo o que pertence aos seus membros.

Neste movimento, o ser humano não é menos pleno de expressão do que na memória e na fala.

A memória expressa suas experiências. A natureza da linguagem consiste em seu ser na expressão de algo. Da mesma forma, o ser humano, cujo ser inteiro está em movimento, expressa algo.

A Antroposofia aponta que esse "algo" é uma outra parte do ser humano. A partir do Conhecimento Intuitivo, isto fala do "Self real" ou "Eu".

Este também, descobre-se, tem um ambiente cósmico, a saber, a Primeira Hierarquia.

...Desta forma, então, o verdadeiro autoconhecimento pode ser cultivado.

Mas, ao fazer isso, o ser humano não apreende o seu próprio Self sozinho.

Passo a passo, ele compreende as partes do seu corpo: o corpo físico, o corpo etérico, o corpo astral e o Eu Real ou Eu (Self real).

E, ao compreender estas partes, ele também alcança, passo a passo, os mundos superiores nos quais os três reinos da Natureza, os reinos animal, vegetal e mineral, pertencem, como os três reinos espirituais, o todo Universo no qual SEU SER está SE DESENVOLVENDO.

Fonte: Rudolf Steiner. GA 26. Reinos Espirituais e Auto-Conhecimento Humano.  GA 26. Anthroposophical Leading Thoughts

https://rsarchive.org/Books/GA026/English/RSP1973/GA026_a04.html

Artigo em Desenvolvimento

 

Forças da Preparação Cármica no Cosmos. Rudolf Steiner

Forças da Preparação Cármica no Cosmos

Rudolf Steiner

Tradução Sonia von Homrich

Já descrevi muitas vezes como ocorre essa jornada de retorno à  vida. Podemos agora nos perguntar: Qual é a condição do ser humano durante o sono comum, em relação à condição em que se encontra imediatamente após a morte?

Normalmente, quando adormece, o homem, como ser dotado de alma e espírito, encontra-se apenas em seu corpo astral e em seu Eu (espírito).

Ele não tem consigo seu corpo etérico, pois este permaneceu na cama, com o corpo físico.

Portanto, seus PENSAMENTOS PERMANECEM como NÃO-VIVOS; eles não têm poder ativo, são meras imagens. Quando ele atravessa o portal da morte, inicialmente leva consigo seu corpo etérico, e o corpo etérico começa a se expandir.

Agora, o corpo etérico tem uma qualidade vivificante, não apenas para a existência física, mas também para seus próprios pensamentos.

Por esse meio, os PENSAMENTOS tornam-se VIVOS, na medida em que o ser humano leva consigo seu corpo etérico.

O corpo etérico, ao se libertar, transmite os pensamentos-vivos do ser humano aos Anjos, Arcanjos e Arqueus, que, em sua Graça Divina, os recebem.

Este, se assim posso descrevê-lo, é o primeiro Ato que se desenrola na vida entre a morte e um novo nascimento.

Além do limiar da morte, os Seres da Terceira Hierarquia se aproximam daquilo que se liberta do ser humano — que é confiado ao seu corpo etérico à medida que se dissolve.

Os Seres da Terceira Hierarquia o recebem sob Seus cuidados.

E nós, como seres humanos na Terra, proferimos uma prece simples e boa, uma prece maravilhosa e bela, quando pensamos na conexão entre a vida e a morte, ou em alguém que atravessou o portal da morte, dizendo desta forma:

 

Anjos, Arcanjos e Archai no tecer do Éter

recebam a Teia do Destino do ser humano.

 

Ao dizermos estas palavras, voltamos nossos olhos para um fato espiritual real.

Muito DEPENDE daquilo que os SERES HUMANOS (na Terra) PENSAM em fatos espirituais ou não pensam: se eles meramente acompanham os Mortos/ Falecidos com pensamentos que permanecem atrás, na Terra, ou os acompanham em seu caminho futuro com pensamentos que são a imagem verdadeira do que acontece naquele reino celestial , no além em que entraram. (O reino da vida após a vida).

Isto, meus caros amigos, parece tão infinitamente desejável para a Ciência do Iniciado: que pensamentos estejam presentes na vida terrena, que sejam uma imagem verdadeira de acontecimentos espirituais reais.

Ao meramente pensar em TEORIAS — enumerando os membros superiores do ser humano e assemelhados — não alcançamos NENHUMA UNIÃO com o mundo divino-espiritual.

Só podemos fazê-lo pensando nas realidades que ali se realizam.

Quando o corpo etérico é dissolvido, isto é, quando os pensamentos são inspirados pelos Anjos, Arcanjos e Arqueus, depois de alguns dias, ser humano entra naquele curso retrógrado da vida que descrevi a vocês.

Lá, ele vivencia seus atos, seus impulsos de vontade, suas tendências de pensamento, da maneira como atuaram em outros seres humanos, a quem fez o bem ou o mal.

Ele penetra diretamente nas mentes e sentimentos de outros homens.

Ele não vive em sua própria mente.

Com a clara consciência de que isso lhe diz respeito, ele vivencia tudo o que aconteceu nas profundezas da alma de outros seres humanos, com quem estabeleceu qualquer tipo de relacionamento cármico — a quem fez qualquer coisa, boa ou doentia/má.

E mais uma vez isto se mostra como o que o ser humano então vivencia é recebido.

Ele vivencia isso na plenitude da realidade — uma realidade que eu tive que descrever há pouco tempo atrás como a realidade mais real do que aquela dos sentidos entre o nascimento e a morte.

Ele vivencia uma realidade em meio à qual se encontra de forma muito plena, mais brilhante do que em qualquer realidade desta vida terrena aqui embaixo na terra.

Mas se olharmos para isso mais uma vez com a visão e a percepção da Iniciação do "outro lado", vemos tudo isso que é o que o ser humano vivencia, recebido na essência, na realidade e no Ser dos Kyriotetes, Dynamis e Exusiai.

Eles atraem para si, por assim dizer, o "Negativo" das ações humanas.

Este processo maravilhoso se desenrola diante da visão do Iniciado.

...As consequências das ações do homem, transformadas em retidão e justiça, são absorvidas pelos Exusiai, Dynamis e Kyriotetes.

Mais uma vez, podemos verdadeiramente pensar no que está acontecendo ali.

Devemos pensar na palavra "verwesen" alemão decair,  que é comumente usada para o processo de desvanecimento, morte, destruição, o falecer da existência — em seu verdadeiro e original significado, que é: "levar o Ser real (verdadeiro) embora". (Como quando dizemos "perdoar" ou "renunciar", o que significa, na realidade, "doar" em devoção).

Pensando, assim podemos dizer:

Em Exusiai, Dynamis e Kyriotetes, no Sentimento Astral do Cosmos, as justas, as corretas consequências da vida terrena do Ser Humano morrem no reino do Ser.

 

Fonte em Inglês online: Ciclo de Palestras sobre o Karma de Rudolf Steiner. Preparação das Forças do Carma no Cosmos. GA 237. Relacionamentos Cármicos III. 4 Julho 2024, Dornach.

 

https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA237/English/RSP1977/19240704a01.html

 

Conteúdo deste ciclo de palestras

 

1.           Introdução a estes Estudos sobre o Karma     01 de julho de 1924

Intelectualismo e o humor da alma que o precede: os seres humanos receberam os pensamentos em si mesmos do éter cósmico. Até os últimos momentos doo início da Idade Média, essa velha concepção persistiu em personalidades influenciadas por um lado pelo arabismo e por outro lado o outro pelo aristotelismo. Para a civilização da Europa, um impulso especial para o desenvolvimento da Alma Espiritual era necessário. Duas correntes espirituais em conflito: os quase-árabes filósofos e os dominicanos escolásticos que, como representantes do individualismo, lutaram contra eles. Conflitos internos intensos no tempo desta luta para que fosse possível o desenvolvimento da Alma Espiritual e para dar suporte à realidade do Pensar individual.

 

II.           Forças da Preparação Cármica no Cosmos    04 de julho de 1924

Preparação das Forças Cármicas no cosmos. As encarnações anteriores do ser humano trabalham em suas encarnações posteriores como um instinto espiritual dentro do EU (Espírito, e não dentro da Alma/Astral); após a morte, ele se torna objetivamente consciente das experiências vividas na terra.  A web/teia de relacionamentos cármicos.

A transmutação das ações terrenas dos seres humanos em ações celestiais das almas. Quando dois seres humanos trabalham juntos, algo acontece como (se fosse) entre os dois, transcendendo as experiências individuais de cada um. A conexão do que acontece no mundo humano na terra com o que acontece nos mundos espirituais acima é nada mais do que estabelecido para a consciência do dia a dia (comum) quando ações sagradas espirituais são trazidas ao mundo físico dos sentidos. As ações celestiais e as consequências de certos acontecimentos caem como chuva fina

nas imagens espelhadas do pensar na terra. Mas as sombras, os próprios fantasmas reais do século 19 se movem entre os seres humanos nos dias atuais e são seduzidos pela tendência Ahrimânica da era atual.

 

III.          Os Fundamentos Espirituais do imenso esforço Antroposófico. 06 Julho 1924

A conexão entre a vida humana na terra e aquela que ocorre no Cosmos. Seja o que for que passe, que aconteça aqui na terra, tem sua contraparte correspondente nos mundos espirituais. Esta contraparte se expressa na escrita das estrelas. Quais são as realidades espirituais, as realidades cósmicas subjacentes a tal comunidade como a Sociedade Antroposófica? Por qual predisposição é uma alma levada à Antroposofia? — Um anseio por Cristo acompanha muitas almas desde suas pré-vidas terrenas à sua vida atual na terra: elas lutam fortemente e novamente para conhecer Cristo como um Ser do Sol. A experiência cristã se mistura com as concepções de paganismo antigo. Em muitas almas estão presentes influências que possibilitam os seres humanos serem vítimas das tentações de Lúcifer e Ahriman.

 

IV.          A condição da alma daqueles que buscam a Antroposofia. 08 Julho 1924

Dois grupos devem ser distinguidos no Movimento Antroposófico: o grupo com uma necessidade muito interior no coração para colocar Cristo no ponto central, o outro encontrando uma ótima satisfação em conhecê-Lo do ponto de vista da cosmologia e da história terrena e humana. As origens desses grupos remontam aos tempos dos Oráculos Atlantes. Para aquelas almas que vêm à Antroposofia hoje, a encarnação que cai nos primeiros séculos depois de Cristo é particularmente importante. Algumas almas humanas tiveram muitas, outras comparativamente, poucas encarnações passadas na terra. As almas de um grupo, tomadas como um todo, receberam o cristianismo naqueles primeiros séculos principalmente através de seu intelecto; as outras receberam os impulsos primordialmente em sua vontade. Experiências na vida entre a morte e um novo nascimento das poderosas Imaginações representada como uma ação espiritual suprassensível na primeira metade do século 19.

 

V.           Condições Espirituais da Evolução que levaram ao Movimento Antroposófico               11 Julho 1924

O elemento comum na condição anímica dos dois grupos nos primeiros séculos cristãos era o sentimento, leve e delicado, mas presente, no entanto, entre o adormecer e o despertar, do trabalho espiritual e o tecer na natureza externa, e o influxo da espiritualidade nos espaços cheios de luz do cosmos. Percepção da inocência do ser da Natureza. Então os seres humanos começaram a ponderar sobre a profundidade das forças que produzem o bem e o mal na alma humana. Este humor da alma surgiu especialmente entre aqueles que receberam conhecimento e ensinamentos do Oriente.

('Búlgaros' - seres humanos que foram mais fortemente tocados por esta oposição dos poderes espirituais do bem e do mal. Hereges). Então veio o momento em que a visão da glória do arco-íris sobre as plantas, a natureza do desejo sobre os animais, desapareceu; entre adormecer e o despertar a linguagem sussurrada dos mundos espirituais ficou mais fraca, mas o spiritual ainda podia ser falado como se fosse algo conhecido pelos seres humanos; no tempo que se seguiu, o sentimento das almas em sua vida após a morte era que na terra, o crepúsculo noturno do Logos havia se estabelecido. Com isso está conectado o surgimento do catecismo; a missa em sua totalidade torna-se exotérica em vez de ser dividida, como anteriormente, em uma parte exotérico e outra esotérica. O sentimento fundamental das almas no mundo espiritual entre os séculos 7 e 20 foi: Cristo não está mais sendo reconhecido em Sua verdadeira natureza; A cerimônia sagrada não é mais compreendida. Esse sentimento intensificou seu sentido da necessidade de uma nova experiência de Cristo na terra.

 

VI A Escola de Chartres. 13 Julho 1924

Lugares superiores de conhecimento, relíquias dos antigos Mistérios, estavam presentes até o século 7 ou 8 D.C. Nesses centros, os seres humanos não falavam de leis abstratas da Natureza, mas do poder criativo da Deusa Natura. Em seguida a delicada, mas viva conexão com o mundo espiritual desvaneceu-se, mas os velhos ensinamentos foram ainda cultivados em certos centros, cujos impulsos somente chegaram ao fim no século 12 ou 13. O conhecimento sobre os quatro Elementos, o Sistema Planetário, o 'Oceano Cósmico', os segredos do 'EU', foram cultivados até a virada do Século 14-15. A Escola de Chartres e seus professores. No final do século 12, tais ensinamentos ainda eram cultivados na Universidade de Órleans. Platônicos e Aristotélicos. Brunetto Latini. No início do século 13, uma supremamente importante 'troca de idéias' ocorreu no mundo espiritual com o objetivo de trazer uma nova espiritualidade na terra. Uma maravilhosa cooperação entre almas trabalhando a partir de cima e aqueles que estavam abaixo na Terra foi o resultado. Nesta atmosfera espiritual o verdadeiro Rosacrucianismo foi capaz de derramar sua influência.

 

VII.        A Nova Era de Michael . 28Julho1924

A manipulação do intelecto pelo ser humano individual, pessoal o conduz ao livre arbítrio (liberdade da vontade). Nos primeiros séculos cristãos, até os séculos 8-9, a Inteligência Cósmica fluía, descia dos céus para a terra. Escolástica (*): uma luta da humanidade para uma compreensão clara da Inteligência que está surgindo. A Alma Espiritual, e com ela a Inteligência, começa a se tornar-se parte de humanidade. A sabedoria Rosacruz consistia nisto, naquele existia uma certa clareza da compreensão desses fatos. No domínio do Sol, Michael reuniu em torno de si as almas que então, no início do século 15, estavam unidas na Escola suprassensível. De agora em diante, o princípio de Michael seria desenvolvido através da Inteligência da alma humana em si mesma, até o início da nova Era de Michael em terra no final do século 19. A grande crise desde o início do século 15 até os nossos dias é a batalha de Ahriman contra Michael. Ahriman quer tornar a antiga Inteligência Cósmica totalmente terrena. A transferência da Inteligência Cósmica para o sistema nervoso-sensorial (a organização da cabeça) no ser humano é vivenciada do mundo espiritual como se uma tempestade cósmica estivesse seguindo seu curso. Tal evento ocorreu pela última vez no tempo da Atlântida, quando a Inteligência Cósmica, enquanto permanecesse cósmica, havia tomado posse dos corações dos seres humanos. Através da espiritualização do intelecto, o ser humano-cabeça deve agora se tornar-se novamente um ser humano-coração. O final do século.

 

VIII.       A luta de Ahriman contra o princípio de Michael. A Mensagem de Michael.01Agosto1924

O domínio anterior de Michael, sua marca cosmopolita e seu objetivo: a consciência de que, apesar da Queda, o homem pode depois de tudo ascender à Divindade. Desde o século 8-9 a Inteligência Cósmica passou das mãos de Michael para as mãos dos seres humanos. O conflito entre Escolásticos e os seguidores maometanos da aprendizagem Aristotélica. Na última era de Michael, uma atmosfera de o desânimo havia tomado conta dos antigos Mistérios; era uma época de grande testes e provação. A palavra de Michael naquela época era: O homem deve alcançar a Pan-Inteligência, ele deve se apossar do Divino sobre terra, numa forma sem pecado. Na nova era de Michael, os seres humanos tem que tomar consciência do caminho de sua salvação, realizando que eles devem se resgatar visando tomar posse da Inteligência que veio em suas mãos. Antroposofistas devem aprender a realizar que o cosmos hoje está engajado nesta batalha de Ahriman contra Michael. Reflexão terrena em “Raymond of Sabunda” (Raymond Sebond) dos ensinamentos de Michael no suprassensível. É um impulso de Michael liderar os seres humanos novamente ao ponto onde lerão no Livro da Natureza, não apenas o Livro da Revelação (Apocalipse).

 

IX.          Entrada das Forças de Michael. Caráter decisivo dos impulsos de Michael.               03Agosto1924

Os impulsos de Michael são de um tipo que entram profunda e intensamente em todo o ser do homem, portanto, em seu carma físico. O tempo da grande crise. Os impulsos de Michael estão repletos de grandes decisões. Seres humanos que na encarnação atual recebem os impulsos de Michael através da Antroposofia estão, assim, preparando todo o seu ser de tal forma que esses impulsos de Michael entram até mesmo nas forças que de outra forma são determinadas apenas pelo conexões de raça e nação. As mais finas, mais íntimas conexões de vida devem ser observadas; elas se estendem até mesmo no reino dos Anjos. Enquanto a comunidade de Michael está em formação aqui na terra, o reino dos Anjos está sendo transformado em um reino duplo, um reino dos Anjos com uma tendência ascendente, e um com uma tendência de queda. O intelectualismo prevalecente em todos os lugares hoje é alimento espiritual para o Poderes Ahrimânicos. As possibilidades de Ahriman tomar a civilização tornaram-se cada vez maiores. A diminuição ou desvio de consciência no ser humano dá ao Ahriman a possibilidade de incorporar-se e trabalhar a partir desse ser humano. Esta era está repleta de decisões poderosas.

 

X.           Os Michaelitas: Seu Impulso Cármico em Direção à Vida Espiritual - O Trabalho de Ahriman na Inteligência Antes Cósmica e Agora Pessoal.04Agosto1924

No cármico impulso que empurra o ser humano para o Espiritual agrega-se a somatória de todas as experiências vividas da maneira descrita antes que as almas descessem à presente vida terrena. Iniciativa interior da alma é demandada do antroposofista. O enfraquecimento da iniciativa através do intelectualismo materialista que é tão difundido hoje. Medo indeterminado da vida. O materialismo é válido somente na vida física. A tragédia no carma dos seres humanos que não conseguem encontrar o caminho para a espiritualidade. Tempo virá quando em seres humanos tomados pelo Espírito nesta encarnação terrena, o Espírito se revelará em seu próprio poder para formar a fisionomia, de moldar toda a forma do ser humano. Para aqueles que estão no campo de materialismo hoje será demonstrado que o Espírito é criativo, pois eles o contemplarão na forma externa e fisionômica. Ahriman está se esforçando para destruir a Inteligência de Michael. Os espíritos Ahrimânicos não podem encarnar senão podem incorporar-se temporariamente e assim trabalhar no almas dos seres humanos. Ahriman então desta forma realmente aparece como autor. (Veja o final da próxima palestra. O Anticristo e o Ecce Homo de Nietzsche).

 

XI.          Evolução do Princípio de Michael ao longo dos tempos. A divisão na inteligência cósmica. 08Agosto1924

Batalha travada pelo Escolásticos da Ordem Dominicana para manter e defender a imortalidade pessoal do homem. Averróis declarado um herege. Hoje temos que dizer: "No sentido de que que o homem se tornou imortal, quanto à sua Alma Espiritual, ele realmente alcançou a imortalidade - a continuação da consciência da personalidade depois de passar pelo portão da morte - mas ele só alcançou isto desde quando a Alma Espiritual tomou sua morada no ser humano terreno." A Inteligência Solar de Michael e as Inteligências Planetárias. No século 9 DC, com a descida da Inteligência Cósmica nos seres humanos, a Inteligência Solar de Michael e as Inteligências Planetárias gradualmente entraram em oposição cósmica um com o outro. No Concílio Ecumênico de 869 D.C., o sinal foi dado para um esmagador evento no mundo espiritual acima: uma divisão entre os Anjos que guiam as almas humanas, levando à desordem no carma dos seres humanos. Este é o elemento caótico da história dos últimos tempos. Com a penetração de Michael na governança terrena, Michael traz o poder que traz ordem novamente ao carma daqueles que se foram com ele. A restauração da verdade no carma. A missão da Antroposofia.

 

Notas:

(*) Escolástica: Refere-se tanto o método educacional, como ao movimento filosófico que procurou reconciliar a teologia cristã com a filosofia clássica, particularmente os trabalhos de Aristóteles. Com ênfase no raciocínio dialético, uma rigorosa análise conceitual e o método explícito da disputa para solucionar contradições e ampliar o conhecimento. 

Michael: Janela no Goetheanum, Dornach

Michael: Capela de São Jorge, Westminster, UK

Graal e Leminiscata SoniavonHomrich

 Sonia Von Homrich ENGLISH BELOW

Duas imagens que traduzem em forma codificada importantes descobertas de minhas pesquisas (a partir de 1977) na Ciência Espiritual de Rudolf Steiner. O Tryptichon Graal de Anna May von Richter que pesquisei até encontrar, embora vivesse apenas em mim, até que finalmente edm 2003 o encontrei na Alemanha, num livro sobre o Graal de Ruth Haertl - Em busca da realidade do conhecimento no pensar do coração de Antropos-Sofia à luz do Santo Graal - através do qual descobri onde encontrar a gravura do quadro de Anna May. Depois de ter sido exibido no Palácio de Vidro em Munique, foi colocado numa das paredes da Escola Waldorf em Hamburgo, onde Hella Wiesberger esteve, escola destruida totalmente pelos bombardeios na II Grande Guerra. Em Dornach estive com Hella Wiesberger onde pudemos conversar sobre o Graal e consequentemente minha alegria com a pintura de Anna May, que eu já havia encontrado. Anna May fez uma cópia pequena do quadro que se encontra em Bad Boll, Alemanha.

A segunda imagem, uma leminiscata de 3 lados, em cobre, onde os lados não se cruzam, que ganhei de presente de uma professora e eurritmista na Alemanha, Frau Kühn - esta leminiscata também vivia em mim como uma viva representação do pensar, sentir e querer do ser humano ou ainda do Self-Espiritual, Vida-Espiritual e Ser-Humano-Espiritual com base na Ciência Espiritual de Rudolf Steiner.

Two images that translate into a coded form important discoveries from my research (1977 onwards) into Rudolf Steiner's Spiritual Science. Anna May von Richter's Tryptichon Grail, which I searched for until I found it, although it lived only within me, until finally in 2003 I found it in Germany, in a book about the Grail by Ruth Haertl - In search of the reality of knowledge in the thinking of the heart of Anthropos-Sofia in the light of the Holy Grail - through which I discovered where to find the engraving of Anna May's painting. After having been exhibited at the Glass Palace in Munich, it was placed on one of the walls of the Waldorf School in Hamburg, where Hella Wiesberger was, a school that was completely destroyed by bombings in World War II. In Dornach I met Hella Wiesberger where we were able to talk about the Grail and consequently my joy with Anna May's painting, which I had already found. Anna May made a small copy of the painting which is in Bad Boll, Germany. The second image, a 3-sided leminiscate (Swiss), in copper, where the sides do not intersect, which I received as a gift from a teacher and eurhythmist in Germany, Frau Kühn - this leminiscate also lived within me as a living representation of the thinking, feeling and willing of the human being or even of the Spiritual-Self, Life-Spiritual and Spiritual-Human Being based on the Spiritual Science of Rudolf Steiner.

Anna May Richter

O Estudo do Ser Humano. Rudolf Steiner

 

The Study of Man
GA 293

Lecture VIII

29 August 1919, Stuttgart

https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA293/English/RSP1966/StuMan_index.html

We saw yesterday that we can only understand memory, the power of remembering, if we connect it with sleeping and waking, which are more open to outer observation. You will see from this that it must be our constant endeavour in our pedagogy to connect the unknown with the known, even in the formation of spiritual ideas.

You may say that sleeping and waking are actually even more obscure than remembering and forgetting, and therefore will not help much towards a comprehension of remembering and forgetting. Nevertheless, anyone who can observe carefully what man loses in disturbed sleep, can form some idea of the disturbance introduced into the soul when forgetting is not in a right relation to remembering. We know how in ordinary life if we do not sleep long enough the ego-consciousness becomes weaker and weaker, it becomes hypersensitive, too much given up to all the impressions of the outer world. Even when there is a relatively slight disturbance through sleep, or rather through lack of sleep, you can see that this is the case. Let us suppose that during one night you did not sleep well. I am supposing that your lack of sleep was not because you were particularly diligent and spent the night in working; then matters are different. But let us suppose that your sleep was disturbed by some bodily condition or by mosquitoes, in short by something more outside your soul. Then you would see that perhaps even on the next day things affect you more unpleasantly than usual. It has made you to some extent susceptible in your ego.

It is the same if we allow forgetting and remembering to play into our soul life in the wrong way. But when do we do this? When we cannot regulate our remembering and forgetting with our own will. There are very many people—and the disposition is seen even in early childhood—who doze through life. The outer things make an impression on them, and they give themselves up to these impressions, but they do not attend to them rightly; they allow the impressions to dart past them, as it were. They do not connect themselves properly with these impressions through their ego. And if they are not rightly given up to the outer world, then they also doze half asleep with regard to the mental pictures which rise up freely in them. They do not try of their own free will to call up the treasure of their mental pictures, when they are in need of it, in order properly to understand this or that; but they allow the thoughts, the mental pictures, which rise up from within to rise up of themselves. Sometimes this mental picture comes, sometimes that; but their own will has no special say in the matter. This is indeed the soul condition of many men, a condition which appears especially in this way in childhood.

It will help us to bring remembering and forgetting ever more under our control, if we know that in remembering and forgetting, conditions of sleeping and waking are playing into the waking life. How does remembering come about? It comes about in this way, that the will, in which we are asleep, takes hold of a mental picture down in the unconscious and raises it into consciousness. Just as the human ego and the astral body, when outside the physical and etheric bodies from the time of falling asleep until waking up, collect force in the spiritual world in order to refresh the physical and etheric bodies, so what is effected through the process of remembering comes from the force of the sleeping will. But the will is indeed “asleep.” and therefore you cannot give a child a direct training in the use of his will. For to try and make a child use his will, would be like admonishing him to be very good in his sleep, in order to bring this goodness into his life when he awakes again in the morning. Thus it is impossible to demand that this sleeping part, the sleeping will, should exert itself directly in single actions in order to regulate memory. What then can we do? Naturally we cannot demand that a person should by a single effort regulate his memory, but we can educate the whole man in such a way that he will develop habits in soul, body and spirit which conduce to such an exertion of the will on particular occasions. Let us look at this more in detail.

We will suppose that through our special treatment of the subject we awaken in the child a vivid interest in the animal kingdom. We shall naturally not be able to do this in a day. We must so plan our lessons that the interest we arouse for the animal world becomes greater and greater. The greater the interest such lessons arouse the more they affect the child's will; so that, when mental pictures of animals and ideas about them are required by the normally regulated memory, the will has the capacity to bring them forth from the subconscious, from the region of forgetting. Only by working through the force of habit and custom in man can you give order to his will and therewith also to his memory. In other words, you must understand how everything that awakens an intense interest in the child also contributes to a very great extent towards making his memory strong and efficient. For the power of the memory must be derived from the feeling and will and not from mere intellectual memory exercises.

But you will have seen from what I have explained that everything in the world, especially in the human world, is in a certain sense separated into different parts, and yet these parts work together. We cannot understand the human being with regard to his soul life if we do not divide the soul into thinking, or thinking-cognition, feeling and willing. But neither pure thinking-cognition, nor pure feeling, nor pure willing is ever present alone; the three always work together, weave together into a unity. And this is true of the whole human being even in the physical body.

I have pointed out to you that the human being is principally head in the head region, but that he is really all head: he is principally chest as a chest being, but he is all chest or breast-man, for the head too partakes of the chest nature, and so does the limb-man. The limb-man is principally limb-man, but really the whole human being is limb-man: for the limbs partake of the head nature and also of the chest nature: they take part, for example, in the breathing through the skin and if we want to come near to reality, especially the reality of human nature, we must be clear that all separation proceeds from unity: if we were only to recognise an abstract unity then we should learn to know nothing whatever. If we never differentiated, the whole world would remain vague, just as all cats are grey at night. Hence people who want to grasp everything in terms of abstract unities see the world grey in grey. On the other hand if we only differentiated, if we only separated, keeping everything apart, we should never come to a real knowledge: for then we should only understand the different parts, and knowledge would elude us.

Thus everything in man is partly of a knowing nature, partly of a feeling nature and partly of a willing nature. The knowing is principally knowing, but also of a feeling and willing nature; the feeling is principally feeling, but also of a knowing and willing nature: and the same is true of willing. We are now in a position to apply this to what we characterised yesterday as the sphere of the senses. In striving to understand what I am now going to bring before you, you must really lay aside all pedantry, otherwise you may perhaps find the most glaring contradiction to what I said before. But reality consists in contradictions. We do not understand reality unless we see the contradictions in the world.

The human being has altogether twelve senses. The reason that only five, six or seven senses are recognised in ordinary science, is that these five, six or seven senses are the most conspicuous, and the others which complete the twelve less conspicuous. I have often spoken of these twelve senses of the human being; we will call them to mind once more to-day. Usually people speak of the senses of hearing, warmth, sight, taste, smell, touch—and it even happens that the senses of warmth and touch are considered as one, which, in the realm of external objects would be something like regarding “smoke” and “dust” as one because they have the same-external appearance. It ought not to be necessary now to say that the senses of warmth and touch are two completely different ways in which a human being can relate himself to the world. But these are the senses differentiated by present-day psychologists with possibly the addition of the “sense of balance.” Some add yet another sense, but even so a complete physiology and psychology of the senses is not reached, because people do not observe that when a man perceives the ego of another human being he has a relationship to his environment similar to that which he has in the perception of a colour by the sense of sight.

In the present day people are inclined to mix everything up. When a man thinks of his conception of the ego, he thinks at once of his own soul-being and that usually satisfies him. Psychologists do almost the same thing. They do not consider in the least that it is one thing if I describe as “I” all that I experience as myself, the sum indeed of this experience, and that it is a completely different thing when I meet a man and through the kind of relationship I have with him describe him as an ego, an “I.” These are two quite different activities of the soul and spirit. In the first instance when I sum up the activities of my life in the comprehensive synthesis “I,” I have something purely inward; in the second instance when I meet another man and through my relationship to him discover that he too is something of the same kind as my ego, I have an activity before me which takes place in the interplay between me and the other man. Hence I must realise that the perception of my own ego within me is something different from the recognition of another man as an ego. The perception of the other ego depends upon the ego-sense just as the perception of colour depends upon the sense of sight, and the perception of sound upon the sense of hearing. The organ of seeing is open to our sight, but nature does not make it so easy for a man to see the organ which perceives the ego. But we might well use the word “to ego” (German: ichen) for the perception of other “I's” or egos as we use the word “to see” for the perception of colour. The organ for the perception of colour is external to man; the organ for the perception of egos is spread out over the whole human being and consists of a very fine substantiality, and on this account people do not talk about this “organ for perceiving the ego.” And this “organ for perceiving the ego” is a different thing from that whereby I experience my own ego. There is indeed a vast difference between the experience of my own ego and the perception of the ego in another. For the perception of the ego of another is essentially a process of knowledge, at least a process which is similar to knowledge, whereas the experience of a man's own ego is a process of will.

We have now come to the point where a pedant might feel very pleased. He might say: yesterday you said that the activities of all the senses were pre-eminently activities of the will: now you construe the ego sense and say that it is principally a sense of knowledge. But if you characterise the ego sense as I have tried to do in the new edition of my Philosophy of Freedom you will realise that this ego sense really works in a very complicated way. On what does the perception of the ego of the other man really depend? The theorists of the present day say things that are quite extraordinary. They say: you see the form of the outward man, you hear his voice, and moreover you know that you look human yourself like the other man, and that you have within you a being who thinks and feels and wills, who is thus also a man of soul and spirit. So you conclude by analogy: as there is in me a thinking, feeling and willing being, so is there also in the other man. A conclusion is drawn by analogy from myself to the other. This conclusion by analogy is simply foolishness. The inter-relationship between the one man and the other contains something quite different. When you confront another man something like the following happens. You perceive a man for a short time; he makes an impression on you. This impression disturbs you inwardly; you feel that the man, who is really a similar being to yourself, makes an impression on you like an attack. The result is that you “defend” yourself in your inner being, that you oppose yourself to this attack, that you become inwardly aggressive towards him. This feeling abates and your aggression ceases; hence he can now make another impression upon you. Then your aggressive force has time to rise again, and again you have an aggressive feeling. Once more it abates and the other makes a fresh impression upon you and so on. That is the relationship which exists when one man meets another and perceives his ego: giving yourself up to the other human being—inwardly warding him off; giving yourself up again—warding him off; sympathy—antipathy; sympathy—antipathy. I am not now speaking of the feeling life, but of what takes place in perception when you confront a man. The soul vibrates: sympathy—antipathy; sympathy—antipathy: they vibrate too. (You can read this in the new edition of Philosophy of Freedom.)

This however is not all. In that sympathy is active you sleep into the other human being; in that antipathy is active you wake up again, and so on. There is this quick alternation in vibrations between waking and sleeping when we meet another man. We owe this alternation to the organ of the ego sense. Thus this organ for the perception of the ego is organised in such a way that it apprehends the ego of another in a sleeping, not in a waking will and then quickly carries over this apprehension accomplished in sleep, to the region of knowledge, i.e., to the nervous system. Thus when we view the matter truly, the principal thing in the perception of another man is after all the will, but essentially a will which acts in a state of sleep, not waking. For we are constantly weaving moments of sleep into the act of perception of another ego. What lies between them is indeed knowledge that is immediately carried over into the domain of the nervous system. So that I can really call the perception of another a process of knowledge, but I must know that this process of knowledge is only a metamorphosis of a sleeping process of the will. Thus this sense process is really a process of the will, only we do not recognise it as such. We do not experience in conscious life all the knowledge which we experience in sleep.

As the next sense, but separated from the ego sense and from all other senses, we have to consider what I call the thought sense. The thought sense is not the sense for the perception of one's own thoughts, but for the perception of the thoughts of other men. Here too psychologists evolve most grotesque ideas. Above all, people are so very much influenced by the ideas of the connection of thought and speech that they believe that thought is always conveyed by means of speech. This is an absurdity. For with your thought sense you could perceive thoughts in external spatial gestures, just as easily as in spoken speech. Speech only mediates for the thoughts. You must perceive the thoughts in themselves through a special sense. And when the Eurythmy signs for all sounds are fully developed you need only see them done in Eurythmy to read the thoughts from the eurythmic movements, just as you take them in through hearing when they are spoken. In short, the thought sense is different from what is at work in the sense of sound for speech-sound. For next we have the sense of speech proper.

Then come the sense of hearing, the sense of warmth, the sense of sight, the sense of taste, the sense of smell and the sense of balance. We have, indeed, a sense-like consciousness that we live in balance. Through a certain inward sense like perception we relate ourselves to right and left, to forward and backward, we hold ourselves in balance so that we do not fall over. If the organ of our sense of balance is destroyed, we do fall over; we cannot then balance ourselves, any more than we can gain a contact with colour if the eye is destroyed. But not only have we a sense for the perception of balance, we have further a sense for our own movement, whereby we can tell whether we are at rest or in movement, whether our muscles are flexed or not. Thus besides the sense of balance we have the sense of movement and further still we have the sense of life, for the perception of the well-being of the body in the widest sense. Many people are indeed very dependent on this sense of life. They perceive if they have eaten too much or too little, and feel comfortable or uncomfortable accordingly, or they perceive whether they are tired or not, and again feel comfortable or uncomfortable as the case may be. In short the perception of the conditions of one's body is reflected in the sense of life.

Thus we get the table of the senses as twelve senses. The human being actually has twelve senses.

Now that we have disposed of the possibility of making pedantic objections to the knowledge character of some of the senses by recognising that this knowledge character rests in a subtle way upon the will, we can differentiate the senses yet further. First we have four senses; the sense of touch, sense of life, of movement and of balance. These senses are mainly penetrated by will activity. In the perception of movements by means of these senses the will works in. Feel how the will works into the perception of your movements, even when you carry out these movements while you are standing.

The will at rest also works into the perception of your balance. It works very strongly into the sense of life and it also works into the sense of touch, for when you touch anything it is really something taking place between your will and the environment. In short, you can say that the sense of balance, the sense of movement, the sense of life and the sense of touch are, in a limited aspect, senses of will. In the sense of touch a man sees externally that, for instance, he moves his hand when he touches anything, hence it is apparent to him that he has this sense. But it is not so apparent that he possesses the senses of life, of movement, and of balance. For since they are in special sense “will senses,” man is asleep with regard to these senses because he is asleep in his will. Indeed in most books on psychology you do not find these senses cited at all, because science itself is contentedly asleep to many things.

The next senses—sense of smell, sense of taste, sense of sight, sense of warmth—are chiefly feeling senses. It seems quite evident to ordinary consciousness that smelling and tasting are connected with feeling. This is not felt in the case of sight and warmth, and for a special reason. People do not perceive that the sense of warmth is very closely related to feeling rather they confuse it with the sense of touch. Things are wrongly confounded and wrongly differentiated. In reality the sense of touch belongs much more to the realm of will, whereas the sense of warmth is in the realm of feeling only. If people do not recognise the sense of sight as a feeling sense, it is because they have not carried out observations such as those for example, described in Goethe's Theory of Colour. There you have clearly set forth all that relates colour to feeling, and leads finally even to impulses of will. But how is it that people overlook the fact that in the sense of sight we have chiefly to do with feeling?

Actually we see things in the following way: in presenting an arrangement of colours to us, they show also the boundaries of these colours—lines and forms. But we do not usually attend to the way we actually perceive. If a man perceives a coloured circle he simply says: I see the colour, I see also the curve of the circle, the form of the circle. But there we have two completely different things looked upon as one. What you immediately perceive through the real activity of the eye apart from the other senses, is only the colour. You see the form of the circle by making use of the sense of movement in your sub-consciousness, and you make the form of the circle unconsciously in your etheric body, in your astral body, and then you raise it into knowledge. It is because the circle which you have taken in by means of your sense of movement comes up into knowledge, that what you have recognised as a circle connects itself with the colour which you perceive. Thus you call forth the form from your whole body by appealing to the sense of movement, which extends throughout your body. This matches what I have already explained to you: the human being actually executes geometrical forms in the cosmos and then raises them into knowledge.

Official science of the present day does not rise to an observation so fine as to distinguish between the seeing of colour and the perception of form with the help of the sense of movement, rather it mixes everything up. But in the future it will be impossible to educate through such confusion. For how is it possible to educate a child to use his sense of sight without knowing that the whole human being pours himself into the act of seeing by way of the sense of movement? This leads us on to another point: You are dealing with the act of seeing when you perceive coloured forms. This act of seeing, this perception of coloured forms is a complicated act. But since you are a unity you can re-unite in yourself what you have perceived in the two ways, through the eye and through the sense of movement. You would look at a red circle in a dull and blank way if you could not perceive the red in one way and the form of the circle in quite a different way. But you do not look upon it in a blank way because you look at it from two sides, the colour through the eye and the form with the help of the sense of movement, and life compels you to join the two together inwardly. There you form a judgment. And now you understand judgment as a living process in your own body, which comes about through the fact that the senses bring the world to you analysed into members. The world brings you what you experience divided into twelve separate members, and in your judgment you join the things together again because the separate parts do not want to continue as separate parts. The form of the circle is not content to remain mere form as it is to the sense of movement, neither is colour content to remain mere colour as it is perceived by the eye. The things compel you to combine them inwardly and you declare yourself to be inwardly ready to combine them. Thus the function of judgment becomes an expression of your whole being.

Now you see into the deep meaning of our connection with the world. If we had not twelve senses we should look at our environment like dullards, we should not be able to experience an inward judgment. But since we have twelve senses we have a fair number of possibilities of uniting what is separate. What the ego sense experiences we can connect with the other eleven senses, and that is true of each sense. In this way we get a large number of permutations in the combinations of the senses. Besides that, we have a great many possibilities through the fact that we can connect the ego sense for example with the thought sense and the speech sense and so on. There we see in what a mysterious way the human being is connected with the world. Through his twelve senses things are separated into their component parts, and the human being must attain the power to re-unite these component parts. In this way he participates in the inner life of the things. From this you will understand how infinitely important it is that man should be so educated that one sense should be developed with the same care as another, for then the connections between the senses, between the perceptions, will be sought quite consciously and systematically.

I have yet to add that the ego sense, thought sense, sense of hearing, and sense of speech are predominantly knowledge senses because the will in them is really sleeping will, the true sleeping will, in whose manifestations there vibrates also a cognitive activity. Thus willing, feeling and knowing are to be found even in the ego zone of man, and they live there with the help of waking and sleeping.

Let us be quite clear about this; to know the human being you must contemplate him from three points of view. When you are considering the spirit it is not enough to say, “Spirit! Spirit! Spirit!” Most people speak of spirit perpetually and are at a loss to handle what is given from the spirit. You can only handle it rightly if you treat it as conditions of consciousness. The spirit must be grasped by means of conditions of consciousness such as waking, sleeping and dreaming. The soul in man is grasped by means of sympathy and antipathy that is by means of conditions of life. These hold sway continuously in the unconscious. Actually the soul is in the astral body, life is in the etheric body, and within us there is always a correspondence between the two, so that of itself the soul comes to expression in the life conditions of the etheric body. And the body is perceived through conditions of form. Yesterday. (i.e., in another series of lectures published under the title Practical Course for Teachers) I used the spherical form for the head, the moon form for the breast and the linear form for the limbs; and we shall have more to say about the true morphology of the human body.

But we can only speak truly of the spirit if we describe how it finds expression in conditions of consciousness. We can only speak truly of the soul if we show how it lives between sympathy and antipathy, and of the body if we conceive of it in actual forms.