The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Today, in this “occult hour,” I would like to continue from where we left off last time and say something else, this time from a different perspective, about the last lecture. I would like to say something about the question of why the esoteric teachings are being revealed in our time in particular.

The theosophical movement differs from other movements in that it has made public various elementary esoteric teachings and will continue to do so in the future. It is a necessity for our time. These are esoteric teachings that were also available in the past. The teachings that we find in the “Secret Doctrine” are not new. These esoteric teachings are ancient wisdom. The way in which this wisdom has been preserved was and is still secret today and will remain secret in the future. It should only be passed on from mouth to ear, and only after a period of strict examination should it be passed on to the candidate. Because this knowledge can also be misused, so it is said. And there is some truth to this view.

If certain elementary parts of this esoteric wisdom are made public, then Theosophy has to ensure that no potentially harmful influence or even abuse arises. When elementary parts of the esoteric teachings appeared in publicly available books, there was great consternation in certain occult circles. And the Theosophists were reproached for divulging secrets that were otherwise reserved for only a few. We must therefore now ask ourselves: May some things of this knowledge be published at all?

Last time, I already referred to a secret society, namely the mysteries of the Knights Templar, which had the goal of reestablishing Christianity. The Theosophical movement has a similar goal. From an even deeper point of view than we discussed last time, I will explain today why it has become necessary to share some of the world's occult knowledge. In the past, it was considered wrong to pass on this esoteric knowledge. It was only accessible to initiates. It was kept in closed secret societies. But over the last millennia and centuries, there were always traitors who betrayed individual parts of the “secret knowledge” and carried them out of the temples. But external science also researched and found former “secrets” and thus contributed to their publication.

So today there are two schools of thought within the occultists: one says that it is not right and that it is harmful to publish even a part of the knowledge. Therefore, the question arose within the responsible occultists: How should the secret teachings be treated in the future? Secrecy or publication? What is now more correct for the future of humanity? This question also had to be answered from another side. Because the serious occultists had realized that humanity would have to morally degenerate due to its sinking into materialism if parts of the secret knowledge for the salvation of humanity were not published. Therefore, Helena P[etrowna] Blavatsk[y] set about collecting and publishing what had already been published, that is, the parts of the various secret teachings that had already been “betrayed” and published. The published teachings, which can be found, for example, in Isis Unveiled and The Secret Doctrine, were tested. In essence, the occultists had to admit that they had withstood the test. We Theosophists are on the side of occultists who believe that these publications of “Isis unveiled” and “The Secret Doctrine” are not only useful, but that it was even necessary to make them public and popular.

Human knowledge cannot be acquired all at once, nor even throughout an age. Knowledge is in a state of constant evolution. This can be observed in the astral realm. The astral realm does not always remain the same, it undergoes small changes. They are not significant, but they can still be clearly perceived. The general scenery of the astral plane was different in the time of the Atlanteans and is different in our time. It changed from year to year. Certain changes in the astral world have led to the realization that it is necessary to share some of the occult knowledge with people, and to share it publicly and popularly, not just with a few initiates. This is the deepest occult knowledge, and only part of it can ever be told.

Around the year 1900, very special signs appeared in the astral world, which prove to the knower with absolute certainty that the greatest secret, which must be expressed in our race, now shows a slightly different character than it did before. There are leading truths, and these lead up to what we call the secrets of existence. Man is not capable of assimilating the deepest truths of his time in any age. Nor is man of today capable of understanding the deepest secret of his race. He must first mature for the understanding.

The basic secret was always only in the possession of the adepts. Through the possession of the secret, they were the leaders of the respective race. We are now members of the fifth [root] race. First there were two [root] races that were organized differently. Then came the third [root] race, which was already organized similarly to ours. The Atlanteans were the fourth [root] race. After this previous human and racial development, we come as the fifth [root] race. Two further [root] races, the sixth and the seventh, will follow. Each [root] race has a great secret of existence. The realization of this great secret of existence brought access to the great truths, which are living forces. These are the great laws that are effective in the world. These great laws cannot intervene in the world in this way from the outset. They must first be in the possession of the masters and the initiated. Only through these masters do they then indirectly affect people.

In “Lucifer”, which is now being published, the subject under discussion here will be touched upon. Only at the end of the fifth [root] race will it become known and understood by a larger number of people. The earlier root races were such that these secrets could only be obtained by a few. In our root race, the ability of the intellect, the mind, has already been developed very far. But the deepest depths are closed to the intellect. But some of the secret's outer aspects can be guessed by the intellect. Before the year 1875, nothing was known about these things, or at least they were not considered. The secret of the fifth [root] race can now be passed from the intellect to the intellect without being spiritualized. The secret that has been guessed can then also be passed on to the unspiritualized mind in this way. I cannot explain what the signs in the astral are that occurred around the year 1900. But it is an indisputable fact that some pieces were actually guessed by personalities who are far removed from any occult current. This is due to the character of the fifth human race. There will soon be many who will guess some of it.

But guessing the secrets is something very dangerous. It is disadvantageous both for the person concerned and for humanity as a whole. It is dangerous for the reason that communicating the secret of the fifth root race would actually divide people into a few very good people and many others who are radically immoral. This is a paradoxical and daring statement at first. But it is true. It is not possible to communicate the central secret of the fifth root race. If someone were to communicate the secret, he would be at the mercy of the other. He would lose the opportunity to exert the beneficial effect of this secret on humanity. Besides, it is quite futile to share the secret because it could only lead to harmful effects. There is no initiate who has shared this secret. And there is no way to discover the secret to a person. Even torture would be useless. The person would go insane or die from the torture.

Theosophy is to prepare humanity so that when the secret is partially revealed, the bad effects will be paralyzed.

One fundamental difference between the secret of the fifth root race and the secrets of the earlier root races is that the secret of the fifth root race can be partially guessed by the mind. In the past, the secret was strictly in the hands of adepts, who thus had the power to lead humanity. This danger [of guessing] now exists. However, humanity could outgrow the adepts in some respects. Some must therefore be prepared when the secrets confront them from outside. Then the time will come when individuals who can guess can emerge with pieces of truth. But that would be terrible and a disaster would occur among people. There would then be a few good people, and the great mass of the others would then be lost to the good. These truths are only to be used under the premise of the theosophical basic teachings.

If the adepts had not gained influence, humanity would have been divided into three parts:

— firstly, the thoughtless masses,
— secondly, the destructive rationalists with the guessed secret, and
— thirdly, the occultists.

[People] would wage a life-and-death struggle against each other. Those who had guessed the secret would not realize why the secret must not be revealed. The clairvoyant gift could also prevent disaster.

The Theosophical Society therefore strives not for the three parts of humanity to arise, but for a core of universal brotherhood to be created. One may object: there will never be a universal brotherhood. We reply: what you say is true, but we know the foundations and we know that such a nucleus will protect humanity. This is a kind of prophecy, but it is based on objective perception in the astral world.

The [fifth] root secret is one that can be guessed to a certain extent. Therefore, the time for guessing must be prepared. We therefore know of an even deeper reason for the astral laws, which compels the person concerned to use his powers for the theosophical movement. This is because he knows where humanity is heading.

If I am to describe how devastating the divination of a piece of the [fifth] secret can be, I can only say that the person is able to divine through the aforementioned character traits. But precisely because of this, he is also unable to do anything to paralyze the harmful effects. Those personalities who have already guessed something have proved that they do not know how to handle such a secret. Anyone who has guessed or found out something is exposed to many dangers. Usually the most adventurous ideas prevail about this. Nevertheless, what is said about the dangers is absolutely true, even if it is not literally true. The man of the fifth [root] race has so-called inhibitors. His Kama-Manas has braking devices that act on the astral and mental bodies. There are a lot of forces present in the astral body that are kept in check by these devices. The morality of the fifth [root] race, as it relates to actions, is far better than the morality of the astral and mental qualities. Many often have very little morality. It is difficult to make them understand that there is a morality of feeling and of thought. The least of what is in their inner being comes to the surface. There it appears much dirtier than is usually observed.

The moment a part of the secret is revealed to man, all restraints fall away and the full power of the forces is released. The wild inner forces must be directed into the right channels by the theosophical movement. Outwardly good people, apparent angels, would become devils under the influence of the aforementioned moment [the revelation of the fifth secret].

People must therefore support each other, they must work together. All thoughts directed towards the immediate present will have a harmful effect. There are enormous masses of thought that are directed only towards the temporal. These are ideal things, certain legal demands that relate only to the temporal and not to the eternal.

I have already described how an initiation took place in the Pythagorean school. These were preliminary stages of initiation. In “Lucifer” I have already spoken publicly about higher questions of initiation. Now I would like to say something else that cannot and must not be said in a public journal.

In the various stages of initiation, the person to be initiated was first made aware of the vanity of physical existence. Secondly, the person to be initiated was introduced to a world of a very different nature from our visible world. The person being initiated was introduced to a world that is more real, more powerful and more directive, to a world that underlies our world but cannot be perceived by our senses.

Next Friday, we will discuss the events that precede the birth of a human being. For occult research, the conditions that a human being has to undergo before his birth are also important. We will also address issues related to the unification of the human ego with its prepared physical body and various other issues related to the manifestations of the times.

Today I would like to elaborate on the relationship of our Theosophical Society [to other spiritual currents]. As a Theosophical Society, we differ quite significantly from all previous endeavors. Last time we saw how the esoteric teachings were treated in the Pythagorean school, and I pointed out that in this Pythagorean school we have something that the Secret Doctrine taught in secret. In terms of doctrine, we have something in common with this Pythagorean school.

And then we have something similar to what was present in the time of [early] Christianity. The Theosophical Society is concerned with the teachings we find in Gnosticism.

The Theosophical Society is essentially different from any kind of secret society. We also meet in larger groups in the Theosophical Society as in the time of Christ, and not in small hidden circles, as was the case with the Pythagorean School. But we can show even more similarities.

I have already mentioned the Rosicrucians and the Knights Templar. They were different because they were real secret societies with a hierarchical principle of order. The Rosicrucians only addressed a few individuals. They never gathered in larger contexts. Today I would like to give you an idea of how the Rosicrucians worked. They existed in their original form until the end of the 18th century, when the most remarkable spiritual endeavors arose and the form had to be changed as a result. Christian Rosenkreutz was incarnated in Count Saint Germain at that time. From the thirteenth century until the French Revolution, the Rosicrucians only knew each other. Only those who were themselves Rosicrucians could recognize each other. It was impossible for a Rosicrucian to be recognized from the outside. Rosicrucians could be in the most unnoticed worldly positions. Many heads of the education system were in a certain position so that they could work strongly without being recognized. But they also came from the outside into the legislative and administrative branches and were therefore highly effective.

In truth, the Rosicrucian relates only to his spiritual brothers. He works solely from the spiritual sphere from which humanity is governed. It should be borne in mind here that it is not only words that have an effect. Effects from the spiritual sphere flow into human life in a variety of ways. Only those who can go to the spiritual source really know what is involved. Today, it is generally assumed that history develops from external events, but there are countless other channels that are hidden and have a strong influence on human life.

How does the Theosophical Society differ from these earlier movements? Today, the facts come from outside, which makes it necessary to communicate theosophy and the theosophical truths to the world. Little by little, humanity's secret knowledge will be made accessible in the future. Today, there are also parts of the earlier secret knowledge that have already appeared or are appearing publicly. They were found either by external natural science or, as in the case of history, in connection with some essays that appeared in the Revue Bleu, for example.

The published historical facts are roughly the following: There are records of Queen Marie-Antoinette by the Countess d'Adh&mar. These are messages from the trusted friend of Queen Marie-Antoinette of France, who lived as a lady-in-waiting close to the queen. I will just outline what is in these records. On the eve of the Revolution, a gentleman presented himself to this lady-in-waiting. It was the Comte de Saint Germain, who requested an audience with the king and asked the lady-in-waiting to arrange one for him. Maurepas was a minister and was keen to prevent such an audience with Louis XVI. So the Count Saint Germain discussed the matters that related to the royal house and the whole French nation with the queen's lady-in-waiting and asked her to report the conversation to the queen. — This is the first act of the facts.

The confidante presented the matter to Queen Marie-Antoinette. The queen granted the lady-in-waiting an audience with Count Saint Germain. So it came about that in the presence of the Countess d'Adhemar, a conversation took place between the queen and Count Saint Germain, in which he pointed out the dangerous situation in which France then found herself. He then said: “If my warnings are not heard, then I will no longer be seen for three generations.”

However, the First Minister Maurepas then made any further contact with Count Saint Germain impossible. In July 1789, the same Count Saint Germain came to Paris again to speak to the Queen's confidante at a rendezvous in a church. During this conversation, he not only told the confidante things that would happen in the next few years, but also predicted things for decades to come. “He who sows the wind shall reap the whirlwind.” He had already expressed this long before the time when Christ walked on earth. This man, who at that time appeared as Count Saint Germain, was none other than the founder of Rosicrucianism, Christian Rosenkreutz himself. We are dealing here with a man who can live entirely in the mental world, entirely in the world of thought. Thoughts live not only in the present, but also in the past, and so thoughts will be deeds in the future.

In the last occult lesson, I described how the theurgist gains insight into the depths of world events. The theurge's expanded vision offers a much deeper insight, penetrating into the intentions of world governance. Count Saint Germain was able to see the deepest driving forces within the world movement. He clearly expressed this at the time, and it can be found in the notes of Countess d'Adhemar. What he showed her was that things had to happen as the great plan of the world intended, as the great intentions were.

In the case of Count Saint Germain, we are dealing with a human individuality that had become completely intertwined with another personality that was also connected to the French Revolution: the demon of Count Cagliostro. However, all the external facts that take place before our eyes are nothing more than what happens internally. But there is something else at the root of this matter as well. It was, so to speak, a symptom of a nonsensuous history.

If we recognize the facts of life today correctly, we will see that the causes that led to the French Revolution are still at work today. Today, no attention is paid to such facts [that Christian Rosenkreutz, in his then embodiment as Count Saint Germain, said in Paris in 1775: “A century will pass before I reappear” - and] “If I am not heeded, I will not reappear before three generations have passed.” This is what the Count Saint Germain had said in mid-1789.

What then took place in France [during the French Revolution], after the Count Saint Germain had not been listened to, had been long prepared [within the secret societies].

The Revolution arose out of the call for the rights of the personality. (The four lower principles). The urge for freedom belongs to the lower Manas. The course of events thus took place according to an inner plan. But that man wanted to bring the goods, which then had to be achieved in a bloody way, to humanity in a peaceful way. The conditions at court did not allow his advice to be heeded. The outer course of events had to take the other path, that is, the bloody path. The encyclopedists, the philosophers of the Enlightenment, had a part in the revolution. Those who consider only the sensual, as happens in the “Systeme de la Nature” [by Paul Henri Thiry d'Holbach], have only Maja in their perspective. Goethe called it a hollow work, as if it had flowed out of purely physical, sensual interests. Thinking, feeling and acting have been completely materialized in this work.

We see, then, that contemporary science has already become completely materialistic in terms of natural and cultural science. It has become so out of necessity. Our feelings have also become so materialistic. When we look at materialistic historical thinking today, we see that people are so completely dependent on the prejudices of their own time. The historian is virtually compelled to project these prejudices of his own time back into earlier times. If one is able to see this in the right way, then it is downright outrageous to encounter ideas about the lives of past centuries. This being afflicted with the prejudices of one's own time makes it so that today no one can put themselves back into the feelings and desires of the thirteenth century. But in those days everything was quite different. The judgments one encounters today are made with the exclusion of all factual knowledge. They are based only on the very outermost historical basis. No consideration is given to the fact that everything changes in the course of human development.

What is regarded as “right” today will be recognized by later generations as “wrong”. This also applies to spiritual movements. What was right for the Rosicrucians of the Middle Ages would no longer be right today. People today not only demand more, they also demand something different. Today it is impossible to work in the way that the Rosicrucians worked in earlier centuries. However, those who want to help people today are the disciples of those who, in earlier centuries, demanded that the human mind should judge over everything.

If we go back even further in human development, when Christianity was founded, it was still possible to appeal to feeling. In those days, one could build on “faith”. But we could no longer appeal to such “faith” today.

Progressive history was brought to life by the Rosicrucian disciples of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. We are only paying tribute to our age when we appeal to reason today. It is very important to always keep in mind: We give, but it is always our contemporaries who demand.

It is generally assumed that a truth is easy to grasp. But is that really so? The intellect can understand everything, but otherwise it is the most powerless to really intervene in inner events. The intellect can never grasp from within. The intellect only ever understands things on the outside. What happens in research today? Animals and plants are chemically examined. We have found out how the substances interact, how digestion works. What happens in this research? It is organized with thinking and combined with the intellect. This is done by the intellect. But by approaching the facts of life in this way, the intellect has at the same time, by organizing and combining, driven life out of everything. Intellectual science has “come a long way”. It has achieved amazing things. This is, of course, fully recognized by us.

In 1875 Haeckel's students [Hertwig] Strasburger researched the connection between cells and shed light on the fertilization process. Today, external science even understands how personality is formed. The birth of personality was glimpsed in 1875. But science had to pass by the higher individuality.

But if we now look further back into the past, we see that earlier centuries still saw the core of the human being. And they also spoke of this core. Today's science, however, has completely detached the human being from his original spiritual sources. Science will only say that material feelings and desires live in the human being. Material reasons are sought in everything, which are the basis of later generations.

But if one wants to grasp the truth, the spiritual must be added today. The doctrine of reincarnation and karma, of the interconnection of fate, is part of this. The mind, descending, is completely powerless. But only when it ascends will the mind be productive again. People in the past did not just have minds. From the thoughts that arise from the doctrine of reincarnation and karma, the higher soul powers will flow.

I will soon speak to the members about what was involved in the emergence of Christianity. It will be necessary for us to become clear about the founding of Christianity. I will try to make Christianity understandable in the form it took on at that time.

I was asked a very pertinent question: When and how does the union of the ego, the actual human self, with its various bodies take place?

In answering this question, I am obliged to go back a long way. This is because I want to give the answer in line with the latest ideas of today's science in order to show the harmony of science with the theosophical wisdom.

The moment in which the soul settles in the body, that is the moment after I was asked. Let us use a comparison when answering this question. The comparison between a house and its inhabitants, that is, between body and soul. It is quite clear that the inhabitant will adapt the house according to his occupation. But the house also depends on the foundation on which it is built. It can also be destroyed by laws that have nothing to do with the occupant. For example, by the weather. It is the same with our body in relation to its soul. Body and soul are each subject to their own laws. Body and soul are related to each other like house and occupant. They only go through each other for a time. Form and design are formed according to needs, for example, according to the occupation.

From a theosophical point of view, we cannot just consider external laws. We also have to ask ourselves: How is the house prepared? When does the body become capable of being a shell? How does the soul develop up to the point in time when it takes possession of the physical house?

If we look at the theosophical literature today, it does not give us any information about the state of the soul before birth. But the research of natural science about the way the house, how the bodies are built, is in an important stage. Physical science accommodates us more and more every day. But the results of science are uncertain in many ways, and they bring many new things.

My answer is given with regard to the present state of science. It is not dogma. For science must advance from day to day.

Now let us consider the stages of the soul between two incarnations. At first it is in the realm of Arupa in Devachan. At first, the soul's state can be compared to the state of the plant germ. The whole plant is contracted for a time in the point-shaped lily germ. In the germ, invisibly to our outer eye, the whole lily is already contained. In the small germ granule, the whole plant is already contained. This can be shaped in the germ in the most diverse ways. When we look at the germ in this way, it is quite different from what the soul was before and will be afterwards. But the soul is also in a state where it is completely freed from all shells. It is part of the plan of development, it must feel free and unhindered for a while. Then it can apply the strength it has gained in this freedom to the new embodiment.

Coming down from that highest level, the soul then surrounds itself with thought material, with the mental body. Then, in turn, it surrounds itself with astral material. In the time before birth, this is an extremely mobile process. The self becomes an extremely mobile organ. The self appears in the form of a funnel and also in a certain coloration. The middle part is like a star ray. The germ that comes from Devachan is in a radiant cylinder and is radiant with golden-yellow light; it then surrounds itself with astral matter, so that the self then takes on such a funnel-shaped form. This takes place with tremendous speed. What is in the golden-yellow radiant cylinder is the mental-astral shell of the self.

Aristotle has given us a term for this: “nous poeticos”, higher soul power, “nous pateticos”, soul perceptions, powers of perception, after the soul has incarnated in the flesh.

Such a funnel shape can never come into contact with a body that does not accommodate it with its shape. And yet one funnel can be very large and the other very small, corresponding to the human germ. Only recently have scientists been able to provide information about the development of the animal-human organism.

Such research was conducted in Corsica in 1875. The researchers had progressed to the point of being able to say: Here, at this point, the human personality begins. The materialistic scientist can say: We now know the processes that lead to existence in the material plane. But if we knew nothing of these preceding states, we would only be able to study our outer personality through today's natural science.

In the same year that this new starting point for research emerged, so did theosophical wisdom. The discovery that sheds light on the development of the animal-human organism coincides with the proclamation of wisdom about the human soul by the theosophical society. Today's natural science has reached a point of view not unlike that of Aristotle.

The question may be raised: Why did sexuality arise at all within the third round? Before that, reproduction took place in an asexual way. All religions lead back to the man who was neither male nor female, to Adam-Kadmon. Now one could ask: Why does reproduction now take place in a sexual way? Mystery researchers have always known an answer to this. I will give you the answer in the form of modern science. Until now, it was believed that the whole process of fertilization was different from what it has now been revealed to be. Now this question has become the subject of serious scientific investigation. But how do the scientific results relate to the question of sexual reproduction? The sexual way of reproduction would not be necessary at all. Nature could have helped itself in a different way. That is why science no longer says: both sexes are equally necessary for reproduction. And that is correct, because for mere reproduction, the female alone would suffice. Nevertheless, nature chose a different path, namely the path of mixing the sexes, after two sexes had been created. And why do this if it could also be done without mixing? Well, nature chose the creation of two sexes and then the mixing of the sexes because it foresaw that, when the third [root] race began, the human selves would want to incarnate, and for this incarnation sexual reproduction is necessary.

That is to say, nature has also prepared this point in time from which human intelligence should reincarnate again and again into shells, into bodies. From this point in time, since human selves wanted to incarnate, reproduction should take place through the mixing of the two sexes. And why should that happen? So that with each new incarnation a mixture of qualities, a mixture of characteristics, can occur at all that was not there before. Reproduction was therefore only possible because one personality with another personality was able to simply produce another. Before that, there was an enormous similarity to his ancestors. Without the two sexes, man would suffer a small change through contact with the outside world, but basically he would always have remained similar to his ancestors, like the similarity of the lily daughter and the lily mother.

As we can see, the child not only bears the characteristics of the mother, but also those of the father. A completely different kind of new being emerges in the mixed product, and thus the individual human being becomes the result of two completely different currents. The mother's body provides everything physical and material. And the male sex is only there to change the characteristics. The male sex therefore only provides the impetus for this. The male penetrates the female and now, contrary to what was believed, a unification does not occur, but a radiating body appears here - called centrosome. Without this centrosome, there can be no reproduction. In the case of lower animals, reproduction can even be brought about by combining them with an acid. Two nuclei then appear. Reappearance with two nuclei looks something like this: one nucleus attracts the male characteristics, the other the female ones.

However, this state is not yet capable of receiving a soul germ; only new cells can be built up by it. This structure takes place according to the following law: 1, 2, 4, 8, 16 cells and so on, up to the state of the mulberry germ. As an occult researcher, you see, in addition to what I have just described, the power that is at work here. This has been passed down from our ancestors. What we call “physical prana” has a pinkish hue. It permeates the cells during their formation and multiplication. The physical prana can continue the process. The mulberry germ is then divided into two layers. With this process, a soul germ has united with the human germ. When we have these processes before us, we have arrived at the first days of the embryo's life. The cylinder of rays disappears into the funnel. It divides into two stars. These two stars form something that develops in the two layers here. Each of the stars takes hold of one of the two layers. They migrate into the embryo. These stars are what then form the basis for the two nervous systems: the sympathetic, unconscious nervous system, which takes care of vegetative activities, and the central nervous system. Then the 'astral prana' is added. The same thing happens with the germ of a higher animal. At the beginning, the germ of a higher animal cannot be distinguished from the human germ.

This thickening marks the actual appearance of the segmented spinal cord. On one side you can see five vesicles appear. One of these develops into the front one, the second into the middle one, the third into the back one, and then the hindbrain.

Now the cone of rays, which had disappeared, reappears (between the 20th and 30th day). The pranic current has already organized the brain and the spinal cord. From there it enters the prepared human brain as mental prana. So we have a “physical prana”, then a second prana under the direction of the astral, which is active in the sympathetic nervous system and builds up the brain so that the actual self can move into the prepared brain. It is not yet present, not yet externally perceptible. Every soul force forms the organs itself. From the brain, the slumbering self continues to form in order to adapt. Then the self moves into the organism as “mental prana”.

We are dealing with a threefold fertilization. Firstly on the physical plane, secondly with a double fertilization on the astral plane and thirdly with the impact of the self. There must be a single body for this. And this can only be achieved through the mixture of qualities of motherly-feminine and [fatherly-]masculine, through the dual sexuality.

Thus we have recognized the actual purpose of reproduction by the sexes. Sexual reproduction is not to be understood as a cause, but as an end.

The next question would now be about the conditions after death. Furthermore, the question: What about our ability to perceive after death, after shedding our covers.

Last time I spoke of the moment when the supermundane being of man unites with what we call the “earthly body”. This union was possible because of the coming together of two entities, an astral entity and a physical one. Together they are then subject to physical laws. Let us take the example of the house. The condition of the house does not depend on the occupant. The condition of the house may depend on the temperature, the weather and so on.

I should have to tell you about [seven] world secrets. Especially one that deals with birth and death. It is a sin to express these secrets in words. Therefore, I can only speak of them to a certain extent.

You will hear more in the fall. Then there are still some things that I want to formulate as follows: whether or not I will become aware of some secrets after death, whether or not, when our physical shell has fallen, I will receive a sum of knowledge that remains hidden to us in the physical shell. Theosophists have been reproached for treating these things as if they wanted to lead them away from the sensual and towards the supernatural, as if they were trying to distract people from the immediate, active work, as if they wanted to distract people from the physical people among whom they live. But that is not right. Because only if you take things too simply can you come to this conclusion. We must not believe that in the intermediate state man has a wealth of knowledge that he did not possess before. From embodiment to embodiment, the being progresses in development. Such progressive development of the human being was in primeval times and will also be in primeval times. But it was something different in primeval times and will be something different again in future times. It used to be something that needed to pass through the work in the cosmic worlds.

We know that the people who live here now have lived on this or another planet in previous lives. During all these passages, the inner core of the human being absorbs something. Later, when he has passed through, he has more than he had before.

To clarify this, let us take the example of learning to write. We have now forgotten the difficulties of learning. But the ability to write has remained with us. We would not have this ability if we had not gone through the effort of learning. This is how it is in the world of man, and it is the same in the cosmic world. It is the same during each incarnation. Man is in a continuous learning process. A thousand tasks and a thousand experiences are to be mastered. What remains of the laborious learning process is the result – a basic power.

That is why there was and is a symbol in all mysteries. This symbol was shown to the mystics in its full meaning when the mystic had progressed a little. He was compared to the bees. The bee is the symbol of man in general. If you understand this correctly, you will also understand immortality. The bee flies from flower to flower and carries what it needs into the hive. But honey is what gives the beehive its meaning. Man is also a bee that moves down from the spiritual world - the beehive - to the various other worlds and brings the honey from them, in order to then bring it back to the realm of the spirit, which is the home of the soul. Without what the soul has collected outside, the result of the collecting would never be in the realm of the spirit. So man is also obliged to bring the honey he has collected. If he does not gain experience, he would be like a bee that only sits on the flowers without sucking their honey.

Thus, Theosophy does not call upon people to be ignorant of the world or even to turn away from the world, but rather to grow together and work together with the physical world. A mature person from this sensual world would not forget the temporal in the eternal and the eternal in the temporal. Each in its place.

We incarnate, we then live within the embodiments. But we want to remain the beings that we are. That is why we should bring the results up into the world of the spirit! The idea of immortality in Theosophy is an idea that urges us to absorb as much as possible into ourselves. If our being did not live in a body in which it can hear, see, and touch, it could never perform works that are to be performed in the external sensual world. We need the senses to connect with the things of our earth in this way. The experiences we need can only be drawn from physical existence through our senses. I have already mentioned the relevant Greek expressions: nous aisthetikon, lower spiritual power, and nous poetikos, higher spiritual power.

Today we are incarnated. We should do as much as we can according to our abilities, so that when we incarnate again, we can do more and more for this earth. Everything that falls between two incarnations also serves his earthly development, as does what he does in this incarnation itself. We are placed in a heavenly existence in the intermediate states between two incarnations so that we can learn to fulfill our earthly existence better and better. This is based on what you can often find in theosophical books. It is often said there that nothing new occurs between two incarnations, but that only a processing occurs. We are here only created for our earthly existence.

Our ancestors, however, had very different forms from us, and our descendants will again have very different forms from those we have now. What we call physique, the physical body, did not yet exist in the lunar epoch. It will not exist in the epoch that will follow ours either. What we call the mineral kingdom was not there before the earth and will not be there after the earth either. We must therefore also be clear about the fact that what we call “mind” is only of importance within our earthly development. Our human, personal intellect is something that adheres to this earth, just as our physical body adheres to the earth. Only within such a physical structure as the earth possesses does such an intellect have any meaning. Our intellect corresponds to sensual things. It is the right instrument for these sensual things.

The whole form as you have it now is not there when your bodily senses cease and you discard the physical body. Many say that everything around them is nothing but an illusion. We form our ideas about what we have here in our senses. It may also be said that everything that is not sensual reality is not reality, that it is an illusion, that it is also an illusion to call the higher kind of reality, such as “Kamaloka” and “Devachan”, also “reality”.

By teaching this higher reality, Theosophy not only helps people to understand a reality after death. We live with the physical things on our earth. Our existence is linked to these things. First through feeling, then through knowledge, through thinking. We also feel pleasure and pain. Our soul works on things, forms ideas and concepts in the world. And in these ideas and concepts, the human being lives. If you were only pushed by things and had no memory and would forget it if you had seen a dog, every other dog would be a new object for you. Without memory, you would not be able to bridge the gap between individual experiences. So we stand in the world as feeling and thinking human beings.

We connect what evokes satisfying feelings in us to a unity, to the good, and also to everything that evokes unsatisfying feelings in us, to the bad. When we no longer have the world in sensual impressions, our sympathies and antipathies still remain. You cannot learn anything about the earthly world except when you are in the physical shell with the sensory organs.

But what develops from these sensations, the feelings and the thoughts, they are what remain. The human being then has to suck that out of the physical. Master K[oot] H[oomi] told us that a person can become immortal if he only wants to. He did not say that he is immortal under all circumstances, but that he can achieve immortality. Man does this by sucking the honey out of the world and taking it with him into the spiritual worlds.

However, we cannot fully develop what we have experienced in one incarnation. We are constantly prevented from fully developing this free power of our soul. In fact, the feeling that connects with any object of the sensory world is something much greater, much more powerful than can actually be perceived in the sensual world. The vehicle for these feelings is the astral body. However, they do not come out in their full power. For the clairvoyant, every thought is a star that sends out its rays in all directions. Within this physical world, however, this star comes into existence in a crippled state. Feelings should also develop in all directions, but they are held together by the physical shell, like a plant in a crevice of a rock.

After the physical shell has fallen away, the person then lives in the astral world, in Kamaloka. A balance must be created there between feelings that are good and those that are bad. That is the task of development. Only good feelings can advance the world, pass them on. The bad ones must be balanced in Kamaloka. Nothing new occurs there. Higher feelings are those which Plato calls “enthusiasm”. They pass over into the higher world. The lower feelings remain in Kamaloka.

Before we have been initiated into the mysteries, we cannot form any ideas about the world of feelings. What we have sown here comes to fruition in the astral world. We receive the fruit of it in the astral world. All desires that have been developed, everything of this kind that is present, becomes visible to us on the astral plane.

The myth of Tantalus, who suffers eternal hunger and thirst although food is placed before him, can teach us a lesson. The water and food disappear as soon as he reaches for them. This is the intensification and correction that occurs on the astral plane. You can find this description of the astral world everywhere in the myths of the nations. In Devachan, the harvest of what man has sown on earth takes place. In Devachan, man becomes a regular star. We then return to the new life with appropriate moral principles.

Now a few words about the connection between devachan and our present-day sensual world. In other words, we may ask: Can we look down from devachan on the souls that are embodied here? The souls look somewhat different. Only that which has already penetrated to the devachanic existence from within this physical existence can be perceived by us in the devachan. As an example of this: a mother with two children. The mother dies. The devachan world is active in all three, but it is not a real experience for all of them. There is more devachanic substance in the one who is more developed. Communication between a living person and one in devachan is possible. But it depends on us how much of the devachan can be perceived by us. Instruction regarding the higher worlds is given only in devachan. A person can rise to a master. However, nothing new can be learned in the interim between two incarnations.

Today we want to look at the question of the origin and meaning of human suffering. Why are there suffering, evil and pain in the world? That was the fundamental question for Gautama Buddha. This question is also important for every human being. Man has to deal with suffering and pain over and over again. Where do they come from, what do they mean? The answer we can give will not satisfy everyone in every moment. The answer is to be sought at great heights. I can give one thing as an assurance: for the more highly developed person, the answer to the question of the origin of pain and suffering is unsatisfactory. The chela gains insight into it. Pain and suffering pass the chela by like events that no longer concern him much. Even if we could see a larger world context than that which represents the world soul and its context, we still could not yet give an explanation of suffering. To some, my words today will sound strange, and yet they will be clear about what suffering is.

Do not believe that pain and suffering are to be found in the same degree throughout the world as in our stages of development. Nor do you believe that they have always been there. Only when man entered into our physical development, that is, since the third human race, has physical pain come into existence in the modern sense. Before the physical body was present, there was no physical pain. Pain is nothing more than a disharmony in the natural order. These disharmonies are necessary, however. Nature consists of a sum of special beings. Nature must allow a being to express itself in such a way that it may possibly harm another being.

If man did not also have an astral body and what we call the “desiring soul,” then man would never be able to perceive physical pain. If he only consisted of the “mental body” and the physical body, he could cut off a finger and then he would be able to look at it like at a glass of water standing next to him. But with the astral body switched on, the disharmony becomes pain. Only in the connection between the astral body and the physical body is the origin of pain to be sought. If we did not have an astral body, we would have no sense of the world. Our eye would not see the color red; our eye would be only a physical apparatus if the astral body were not present. The eye is therefore not a photographic plate. If a photographic plate could be permeated with astral matter, it would also feel the image as we do.

The effect of light at a certain intensity is pleasant. If the effect of light is too strong, it becomes painful. Every natural gift is accompanied by its opposite. But why do some people suffer particular pain? Pain is something that individuals suffer. But does the human being have the right to regard what they suffer as their own personal suffering? We have to look at the big picture in which the human being is placed. On the contrary, we must also ask: Why is the pain dumped on us? We can ask: Who causes pain to be inflicted on us? Materialism has no answer to this. The question cannot be answered even if soul and body have nothing to do with each other. If we think that the human condition does not go beyond birth and death, then we could ask: Why does one person suffer so much and why does another have so little suffering? I am not just talking about the concepts of 'karma' and 'reincarnation'. Does it not seem unjust that we do not know why we suffer? People cannot always relate the pain to past sins or see them as consequences.

If we want to find answers to these questions, then we have to take the theosophical point of view. Theosophy offers us the opportunity and shows us the way to overcome and free ourselves from suffering. It gives us the means to improve our lives. Theosophy therefore not only has an effect on the present and the past, but also has an effect on the future.

In ancient Atlantis and Lemuria, there were beings who did not suffer as we suffer on today's Earth. Suffering was also treated and healed differently back then. Even physical ailments were cured in a completely different way than they are today. We usually have very wrong ideas about earlier times. This is often not correct even for the most important and striking things. This does not only apply to times long past.

That is why hardly any doctor today can understand Paracelsus. Paracelsus healed in a completely different way than is done today. He did not heal with physical means, as is done today for the most part. Paracelsus was a soul doctor. He knew how to seek out the evil in the soul of man. Today's materialistic direction almost does not understand at all when one speaks in this way. The reason for this is that we descend with our astral body [...] into the physical nature. This is related to the answer to the question: Why are physical pains so severe? You just can't get the astral body out of the physical body. The astral body is the seat of evil. The pain can be reduced to a minimum if you know how to work on the soul of the person. The sensation of the sick person is then taken out of the sick limb. You leave the physical to the physical.

The true physician alleviates the pain in the soul. Then the soul can overcome the physical pain and heal it. We live in our age. This age has sunk the lowest into the physical. The example of the house that we used will make this clear to us. The closer we are connected to the house, the more detrimental are the damages of the house for the inhabitant.

So it can also happen that the human soul has to move into a body for which the inhabitant is not responsible, and for which the balance can only be achieved in a larger circle.

Theosophy can only ever hint at ways and means by which we can overcome this age again. Theosophy has a much greater task than some people imagine. Theosophy has the task of reawakening the language of the soul. In this respect, too, Theosophy has something to offer: the physician is once again able to heal from the soul. A martyr can walk to the stake with a smile on his lips. His smile is completely sincere and true, because he has detached himself from his physical body with his astral body. Giordano Bruno only suffered from not being able to take the works he was supposed to accomplish further.

Suffering that is not personally caused can also affect us. The present human being is far from understanding these things because he is unable to develop spiritual life. Those people who believe in re-embodiment and karma do not suffer so much from the same wounds as the modern human being. They have withdrawn their spirit.

Because an ancestor once contracted a disease, it was also inherited by his descendants. But even inheritance was never as prevalent as it is in our present age. Inherited diseases were not present in the same way, and especially not among spiritually developed tribes. Look at history. It takes the whole materialistic spirit of our time. Not because there were no newspapers in the past, not because we didn't hear anything, but because hereditary diseases didn't exist in the past.

The soul depends on what kind of spiritual stimulation it receives. The soul must absorb the spiritual environment within itself. Imagine a healthy animal being placed in an area where the air is polluted. It will become ill. In healthy, free air, where it can breathe, it will not only be able to live alone, but it will also be able to strengthen and invigorate the body.

What the external environment is for the animal, the spiritual environment is for us. In an age when there was still faith in the spirit, the spirit became stronger. In a spirit air that is materialistic, the soul can no longer develop the flight. Then the soul gasps under the burden of physical circumstances. A soul in our age is quite powerless against the physical composition of the body. A soul that lives only in the physical is subject to suffering. A soul that lives only in the spirit overcomes suffering.

But we also have a retroactive effect on the pain that has already been suffered. If you refrain from having a soothing effect on the future, then you also refrain from having a soothing effect on the past.

Theosophy must develop spiritual life again. The only reason why humanity suffers so much today is because the spiritual life within it has almost died. Perhaps someone else is personally to blame for what he has to suffer. But if we develop spiritual life again, we will overcome all this again.

Why do we suffer not only in the passive sense, but also in the active sense? If you work with the active sense, you promote the development of humanity and help in the redemption of pain and suffering. Theosophy does not give idle answers, but active answers, that is, to participate in the events of existence.

This occult lecture was inspired by the question: Do the souls of stillborn or deceased young children also reincarnate after 1500 to 1800 years? And does such a re-embodiment serve a purpose?

1500 to 1800 years is an average period. There are souls that only reincarnate after 4000 to 2000 years. However, the question asked is connected with much deeper questions. There are seven great mysteries of existence in the becoming of our earth. Of these seven great mysteries of existence, one of these secrets is handed over to people from time to time in the succession of human races. Our present race will receive the fourth. Our theosophical current is nothing more than the preparation for the communication of the fourth of the so-called unspeakable secrets. Only a small part of what the great masters learn from the fourth secret may we communicate in lectures. There are things that it is sinful to utter with words, says the Apostle Paul.

One of these things is the fourth secret. It is the secret of life and death. The theosophical current has the task of enabling us to learn about birth and death and how they are related in a lawful way. It is not yet time for the whole of the fourth secret to be revealed to us, but parts of it are being revealed little by little. We have spirits who have already anticipated the stages of development of future stages. Plato, for example, is a “fifth rounder”. Gautama Buddha anticipated what humanity will only achieve in the sixth round.

I will now try to say something about what reincarnation depends on. When a person dies, he does not discard a worthless garment. This physical incarnation really has a purpose. We bear the fruits of it into the other incarnation. Learning the art of writing may serve as an example here. You learn the steps, form letters and learn to put them together in a context. Just as you take one thing from the various individual activities, namely the ability to write, and you no longer remember your individual tasks at a later time, it is the same with rebirth. The ability to write has remained, the individual stages of learning have been forgotten.

It is the same with rebirth. The individual experiences have been forgotten, the abilities gained from them have remained. The voice of conscience, the ability to distinguish between good and evil, we have learned all this in previous incarnations. The savage who originally eats his fellow human beings gradually learns that he is not allowed to do so because it causes him to incur the hostility of his fellow human beings, because it causes enmity.

Our organs are the means of acquiring experience and skills. It is the organs that we receive in the new incarnation. If we are incarnated today and incarnate again in fifty years' time, or even immediately after our death, could we really learn something new that we could add to what we have already learned in the broader sense?

No, things on Earth don't change that quickly. What we learn up to the age of seventy is one lesson, and the following seventy years would not differ much from the previous ones. So we only incarnate again when the Earth has changed enough for us to learn something substantial again. This is related to the law that a person is reincarnated after an average of two thousand years. [...] Within two thousand four hundred or two thousand six hundred years, cosmic conditions change. So there is something new to learn again. Man must therefore wait until new constellations occur between the sun and the earth that can influence our being in a completely new way. But there are also deviations because what man has to do within the rounds is not the only thing.

At a certain stage of development, the human being will leave the earth. He will then continue to live on a new planet. However, he can only enter the scene of the new earth, or rather the new planet, when he has reached a certain level of development. The human being has to develop his ego to such an extent that he will be able to enter this new scene.

The thought that lives in you is not just what lives in your head. Every thought is a living force. Just as any air wave propagates and can still be perceived far away from its original location, so does my thought propagate. It continues to have an effect in the mental world. We have to see it as such a force. A thought is a force as strong as if you were splitting wood with an axe. You can cut and work with thoughts – and also with your drives – deep into the astral world. The changes you bring about there are much more significant than any physical events.

We have to become clear about these forces and we have to learn what changes we are causing. This is the first consecration, the experience and clarification of the inner drives, the terrible beings. We cannot think without affecting a whole host of beings. The adept is fundamentally different from other people because the adept does what others do unconsciously, consciously.

We affect the entire world around us. If it were only a matter of human development, we would regularly be reincarnated. However, a higher individuality may be needed for human development, in which case it must incarnate more quickly. The laws that cause an individual to reincarnate do not only apply to that person's development; the demands and laws for the entire environment also apply.

When such conditions arise, then such a personality may have died immediately beforehand or a few years before, and they incarnate again immediately. In the Theosophical Society, we have such personalities who were re-embodied almost immediately after death.

It depends on a great many circumstances after how many years an individuality has to reincarnate. A personality that has taken in a lot can take a long time to process the substances it has taken in. We know from a great personality in the development of German thought, Goethe, that he was previously incarnated in Greece at the time of Plato. And we know that he was reborn as Goethe in the eighteenth century. It was one of the most harmonious incarnations he experienced in Greece. He was a student of sculpture. The student of sculpture had absorbed so much that it took him so long to process it all. “Iphigenia in Tauris” could only be written with a great knowledge of Greek sculpture. Plato's lofty idealism flows towards us again in the profound passages of Goethe's “Faust”. The “fairytale” of the green snake and the beautiful lily contains the revelation of Goethe's harmonious development at the time of his Greek incarnation.

Bismarck could not work like Goethe.

Not all abilities need to be expressed in the embodiment. If someone who is in the devachan is able to carry out a necessary task on earth at a certain time, he will be re-embodied. He must then sacrifice himself for the sake of all humanity.

“Creare” is usually translated as “creating”. It has the same root as the Sanskrit word “kri”, which is the same as what we recognize in “karma”. It means “to will”. The body is willed by certain forces, by so-called “destiny directors”. The body is then brought into a suitable connection and mixture. Aristotle still used the word for human labor, but at that time it still meant “choosing,” “wanting.”

The physical body is an instrument for the soul, just as the piano is for a person who wants to make music. When we use the instrument, we take the fruits of our development with us. However, even the most highly developed individuals can still make mistakes when choosing a body. It may be that a person who would be capable of great achievements cannot find the body in which he can bring the forces within him to fruition. These are possibilities that must always be taken into account when doing research in this area. A student of Plato will be able to take quite different things with them into the next life.

But those who only have monotonous experiences in one incarnation will have few germinal forces to carry through. And therefore they will be able to reincarnate quickly. Savages who have little experience only spend a short time in Devachan. Chelas, on the other hand, those who have already acquired the right to the championship, can do without Devachan. They do not undergo Devachan. Therefore, they can re-incarnate immediately after death to continue serving humanity.

In childhood, the soul of the child has weak, soft powers that still need to be developed and refined. If you were unable to develop the astral body in one incarnation, it is possible that you will be reborn as a child for the sole purpose of developing the emotional body. A scholar who has a highly developed mind but no feelings will then only need a short period of tutoring as a child and will soon leave the body again.

An attempt to be born can also fail. Then a new attempt is made if the previous body was unable to express the forces. There are even examples in the Bible where re-embodiment occurs immediately after death. It is important to know that re-embodiment not only has a purpose, but that it is a necessity. (Here the example of the clock was given.) The [clock] is a product of development. It could only come into being when different sciences had reached the same level of development at the same time. It took the ability to work with metal and people who had mastered the laws of scientific mechanics. All these people combine at a certain level, and then you have the ability to make a clock in that age.

Those who look only in one direction make a mistake. Those who have developed in only one direction, like a Darwinist, for example, also make a mistake. Monism is not a unity because it has emerged from a unity, but the other way around: body and soul are one because they have connected at a certain level and thus form a unity. The wheel in the clock broke, and with it the unity. The clock is unusable. It is the same when an organism has a “bad wheel”.

The next question was whether the facts in the world are based on a plan or whether chance rules them. (The answer was:)

Development depends on temperature, on mountain air or sea air, on city or country. Let us assume that a brick fell on a person's head. Is that a coincidence or is it part of a plan? A person falls into the water, another jumps in after him, helps him, but he catches a cold and dies. Now let us take a counterpart to this: a person sees his enemy, pushes him into the water. But he also falls in and subsequently dies. These are two very different internal cases. But outwardly it seems as if they are the same cases. Both die as a result of falling into the water. The question of whether the world is governed by a plan full of wisdom or just by coincidence is something we will deal with in more detail in the near future.

Since God is perfect, it is virtually impossible for something imperfect to arise. The question of the origin of evil is as old as humanity itself and can only be answered on a theosophical basis. Christian theology has a very specific belief, a very specific view, of the origin of evil. It says that the world was created to glorify God. Evil must therefore have been admitted to a kind of glorification. But this formula only provides an inadequate solution to the problem – and it is also exoteric.

Paul says that before the law was, there was no sin; and when the law came, sin came into the world. Above all, it is important to bear in mind what I said last time. We are dealing with a linear development. The clock served as an example. Before you could make a clock, you had to be able to make the wheels, you also had to be so advanced in mathematics and physics that you knew the laws and could use them to make the whole thing. At first, mathematicians had nothing to do with physicists. But at some point the two came together so that the two insights could interact in one brain. Then the idea of the clock could also develop. So here there is a confluence of currents. Man is also a confluence of spiritual and material currents.

Actually, there are three currents that flow together in man. The Moon-pitris came over from the moon. These had only prana and kama. But what is in man today comes firstly from the moon: prana and kama; secondly from the elemental realms: the physical body; thirdly from what has been infused from the higher beings: spirit = manas, budhi, atma.

When the question of imperfection arises, I often use an example that science provides us with: there is a person who has been afflicted by a kind of mental illness. He lost his will and was sent by the doctor to the south to strengthen his nervous system. He was supposed to issue a document and sign his name to it. But it was impossible for him to write his name. He then came to Rome. There was a festival in Rome at the time, and he was completely healthy during that day. But after that day, his health was gone again. On the journey home, he also had to travel in a cab. Someone was run over next to his cab. He noticed it, jumped out and helped him. Afterwards, however, he was again unable to write his name. He could read, and could do everything else, but he could not write his name. And if he should make a decision to do something that was not quite right, so that his intelligence was not in harmony with his physical body, then the connection between the two was interrupted, as it were. We think of this process as extending to the whole world.

Jakob Böhme has already solved the problem from this point of view. He says: A person never has hands for feet or feet for hands. They match. And yet it is possible for the right hand to scratch the left.

Spirit, Kama, Manas, Prana originate from the same deity. But they flow into each other at different times, and so it happens that different states arise. Therefore, even in the great world, it is possible that although the individual is perfect, there is disharmony in the overall harmony.

One may ask: why does the Deity not take care to prevent the right hand from scratching the left? We must thoroughly grasp and comprehend that God created man in his own image, in the likeness of himself. Man is the image of the Deity; God formed the world out of free will. To create in freedom is to create according to inner motives and not according to outer reasons.

The allegory of the Fall of Man states that man gains knowledge, and through it he learns to distinguish good from evil. On the one hand, he is in the image of the deity, on the other hand, he is imperfect. He must have the reason for his actions within himself. The original, eternal being can only be perfect. This original being has poured itself out on many angelic beings. And through this, the ability to make one's own decisions also arises in man. Through the descent of the higher entities to the lunar beings, the two currents can interact. Man differs from other beings in that he has the three higher elements - manas, budhi, atma - within him. But why do they have to collide, why do they have to come into disharmony?

The animal is never evil. You cannot say that a lion is evil. Nevertheless, it wreaks great havoc, greater than the greatest criminal. And why can man be evil? Because in man, the same animal nature as in a lion is supposed to be in harmony with the higher. This discordance of the higher with the lower nature is what we call evil. When higher spirituality misuses the lower nature, evil arises. Now we understand Paul when he says: Before the law was, there was no sin.

Another rough example: can any sexual excess in animals be called evil? No, everything goes its regular course. Corruption only arises when the spirit comes into play. It is capable of misusing the physical. This is where evil arises. Mental abuse.

But where does the tendency to go astray in the spiritual nature come from? This is because the various currents were perfect at the beginning of the emanation. In the end they will be in tune again, but in the middle they do not have to be in tune. It is the same as in music, where a disharmony is also resolved again in a higher harmony at the end.

If you have developed your intellect very highly but neglected your moral side, you will have to overcome a great disharmony within you in your next incarnation.

There are beings that play a role in our development. They may have reached such a high level of development that they are beyond human development. You can't just throw yourself from a higher level of development to a lower one. But such high beings are thrown into our development. They are highly intelligent, but never satisfied with the current state of human development. Such a being will have the urge to reincarnate. They therefore want to seduce people, they want to bring people to a point of development that they are not yet ready for. There are constant insinuations. To someone who can see through this, the development of a person looks like this: caught between God and the devil. These people are the brothers of the shadow.

The questions are:

- Whether a planned connection can be seen in the external world phenomena?

— Whether one can assume a planned connection?

— Whether the events of the phenomena are in a planned context?

— Whether wisdom or chance rules in the world?

(The questions are) reminiscent of war, earthquakes, a brick falling on a passer-by's head, and so on.

Sometimes things in the world seem to be arranged quite wisely. Man will have to educate himself about the plan of the whole. The world order seems to be a mixture of harmony and disharmony. [Last time I chose an example:] On the bank of a river stands a man. He is full of compassion and benevolence, sees a drowning man in the river, jumps into the water and saves him, but [later] perishes due to a cold. A second case: out of a sense of revenge, a person pushes another into the water [and falls into the water himself]. He also catches a cold and dies [as a result]. We can reflect on the great and mighty plan, but the philosopher Baumann cannot bring himself to embrace the theosophical worldview.

Just think, could we find wisdom in the world if it were not [already] in it? The laws of mathematics can be studied [by a person] in a room, purely by himself, away from the world. We find there [in mathematical study] that the world bodies move according to the laws of the ellipse, which we have explored in the room.

From the world of animal and plant life, we move up to the world of man. But then it seems as if everyone has to go their own way, without any plan. So the world seems to be a mixture of wisdom-filled order and chaos. But even in chaos, we can find such wonderful wisdom that we stand amazed. Take a look at a beaver's lodge. It is designed with tremendous skill. An engineer could not do better. Above its dwelling, the beaver builds dams. They are not always the same, they always follow the course of the river. As a whole, it appears to be chaos, but in detail it is wisdom; the dams are built according to law.

What is a law? Statistics teaches us a very specific regularity in the external world: there are six hundred and fifty Frenchmen for every criminal, a specific number of people die after ten years. Life insurance bases its calculations on the lawfulness of deaths. Such order should seem oppressive. But although an order can be perceived as a whole, the individual is not subject to that law. Therefore, it is not a fatalistic view.

This is an important secret of existence. What I have indicated here also relates to the fifth world secret [of which I have already spoken in outline].

Is there perhaps wisdom in apparent unknowingness? It is perhaps only absent because we have not yet seen through it. Man should never assume that he has reached a conclusion. It is an eternal development. What we do not yet understand today, we may understand tomorrow.

Why do we easily find the law in the external inanimate nature? It is a nature that has not yet developed to the diversity in human life. The further the development has progressed, the deeper is the law and the more difficult it is to understand. I have shown you examples of planned laws. I showed you this at the beaver lodge. Beavers do not have human minds. But animals also have an effective reason. If you examine the animal body, you will not find a soul as in humans. You will not find such a single soul in animals. You have to look for the animal soul in the non-physical. The relationship is similar to that between the hand and the brain. There is no soul reason in the hand, but there is in the brain. It is the same with animals.

What lives in man in man, in the soul, is behind the same in the animal. A scholar said: If I found a nervous system in the worlds and stars, I would believe in a soul, but not otherwise. That is precisely the difference: in man, the soul can live in the nerves; otherwise, the soul lives above the physical world. Therefore, it is not possible for physical observation to perceive the connection everywhere.

It also includes the fact that vindictiveness and compassion have the same consequences in a certain respect. However, the causes lie in the higher spiritual spheres. If the causes from the higher worlds were to fall into the physical world, they would have to appear to us as a wise thing. Whoever works in the world must listen to the One who looks deeper into the world than he does. There are levels. (A genuine hierarchy is naturally established.)

We can only recognize and understand a law as far as we are developed. That world wisdom exists is clear from today's reflection. But if this is there, then we must strive to do everything that lies in the sense of this world wisdom. This is not intended to imply a specific approach, but rather free decision. What divine wisdom has reserved for itself with animals, namely to direct them, it has given up with regard to human beings. This is the descent of the tongues of fire, the descent of the spirit into every human being: The Feast of Pentecost. Each tongue directs an animal order. The animal need only surrender to the wisdom that guides it. Man must express his wisdom by consulting with the worldly powers.

We must listen [to the wise world powers]. We are not here to brood over the divine plan for the world [or to] simply believe, but we are here to work in a wise manner ourselves, to absorb the hidden wisdom within us and to penetrate it. Through human development, the hidden wisdom becomes apparent: through the actions of man, through his work.

Everything we call evil has a different form in another cosmos. We can only speak of evil in a particular cosmos. In the lunar epoch, evil would have had a completely different form than it does today. We can therefore only speak of our earthly evil.

The fact that evil is possible is connected with the position of the earth in the cosmos. Our earth has a very specific task. Our cosmos is called the cosmos of love. The preceding, the lunarian cosmos, is called the cosmos of wisdom. It is called the cosmos of wisdom because what we have before us as fruits in our cosmos has been prepared.

The task of earthly development is essentially this: [the human being] has to incorporate Kama-Manas into the nervous system in the form in which [he/she] has come over from the lunar epoch. (A description of the lunar epoch follows here.)

In those days, people had everything except our intellect. The people of the lunarian epoch did not have the intellect. But they thought and did not present as we do. They participated in a much more universal spirituality. This more universal spirituality surrounded them as a spiritual power. It can be compared to a swarm of bees, which has a common soul. In the lunatic era, not every human being had an intellect of his or her own. They were driven to their actions by a wisdom that lived in the lunatic cosmos. This is similar to the instinct of animals.

What I have in my nervous system and what I have in my Kama-Manas has been prepared by the lunar wisdom. The lunar wisdom sought to develop the organs with wisdom. It had to prepare the human physical personality. This wisdom aimed to make the body physiologically and physically perfect.

The human soul arises through the influence of Kama-Manas. Universal wisdom descends like a drop into the individual personality. It is as if the individual bee had brought down within itself the wisdom of bees and did out of itself, out of its own decision, what it [otherwise] does instinctively. The wisdom is absorbed into the form, presents itself in the form. Now this wisdom must be used as a means to achieve love.

All those who have undergone regular development in the Lemurian epoch enter the earthly epoch, sacrificing physical, pranic, and kamic life.

But there are also beings who are unable to make this sacrifice. These have not undergone a completely regular development. They have descended too deeply into the physical-pranic-camic of the Lemurian epoch. Their attention was too strongly attracted. An intimate brotherhood arose from this. These entities have undergone too extensive a development. They have delved too deeply into the physical sphere. Therefore, in the earthly epoch, they do not have the ability to start where they need to start in order to undergo regular earthly development. They have drawn down too much of the physical-pranic. Therefore, on the one hand, they have too much of the wisdom principle, but on the other hand, they have too much affinity with the physical-pranic.

So there were beings in the earthly epoch who had too much intelligence to go through earthly development. They have to choose a higher physicality. Such a being is incapable of incarnating in our bodies. In the human body, such a being would be constrained on all sides. Such a being seeks incarnation in a different way, not descending into humanity, but seeking material from the manas bodies to embody the entity. They attract, as it were, the intellectual matter of human beings in order to embody themselves. This is a constant danger for earthly humanity. Exoteric wisdom describes this danger as the evil principle.

Because hyperintelligences have come over from the lunar epoch and push people aside from the regular path, we have evil. That is the origin of evil. Evil arises from the fact that hyperintelligences are present that push people out of the ordinary path. In Christian esotericism, these hyperintelligences are summarized under the name of “Lucifer”. This is also the principle of wisdom, but on a level that is not right.

The principle of kamic in a criminal nature clearly shows that people are thereby guided in the wrong way by the intellectual principle. Evil is thus a straying from the actual task of our cosmos, a straying from love. Love consists in sacrificing the individual physical-pranic for the higher purpose. Every predominant selfish urge stems from the fact that the person concerned feels more related to the physical than is right. There has been too deep an affinity with the physical. The point of equilibrium between the physical and the physiological is love. Misguided, it is driven into hyper-egoism.

The piano as an example. It is made with hammer and saw. If you work on it any further after it is finished, it misses the point and the instrument perishes. Earthly selfishness is nothing more than a charitable principle in the lunar epoch. It is something bad in the earthly epoch. There is actually no evil. Evil is good - just in the wrong place. Evil arises from the fact that a cosmic principle of development appears in the wrong context. Evil only appears evil to us as long as we look at it in a limited way. But it brings about something good in another place, which balances it out. For every evil in the world, there is a corresponding good that restores balance. This is also the meaning of the saying: “Only the Father in heaven is perfect; why do you call me perfect?”

Today we want to start from the question: Do only the beings of the physical plane that are close to human beings have consciousness? Or how does the consciousness of human beings relate to the other beings on the physical plane, to the consciousness of animals, of plants, and of so-called dead stone? Can we also speak of a consciousness of the other kingdoms of nature?

Imagine a small creature that could only see something of a person, for example, a finger moving. [That is all this little creature would see; but it cannot] form a concept of what underlies this movement. This little creature would also have no idea of the human soul and would only see and describe the expressions of his strength. But it could also be the same for a person in relation to other entities. The materialist sees the things, but does not speak of the actual soul of the earth. Could it not be the same for him as for the little creature, which walks around the human being and only sees and describes the details? The little creature itself has no soul consciousness and therefore cannot speak of the soul of the human being. Just like that little creature, the materialist also lacks the soul, therefore he does not recognize the soul of the earth.

The soul of the earth is higher than the human soul. All beings of the physical plane have consciousness. But the consciousness of man differs from that of the other beings in that he lives here on the physical plane with his consciousness.

But during sleep, the human consciousness is also on other planes. In so-called dreamless sleep, the human consciousness lives on the devachan plane, where plant consciousness is always at home. The animal's consciousness lies somewhere between humans and plants on the astral plane. The human being is the being that has its consciousness on the physical plane.

The animal has its consciousness on the astral plane. The plant has its consciousness on the devachan plane. Consciousness on the astral and devachan planes differs significantly from consciousness on the physical plane. For consciousness on the physical plane can only receive ideas and thoughts through the physical organs. Consciousness on the devachan and astral planes only perceives through images and imagination, as was the case with people in prehistoric times.

The conscious astral being has yet another peculiarity: It is not separate from other beings in the same way as the being that has consciousness on the physical plane is separate, but it lives much more behind and within other beings. For the being that has consciousness on the physical plane, it is necessary that everything be conveyed to it through the senses. If its consciousness of an object were astral, the eye would not convey the things; one would perceive nothing at all of an object. On the other hand, an image would arise from which one could deduce from its colors and configuration whether the object is pleasant or unpleasant. The images that previously arose from the objects and hovered in the soul are now completely obscured in today's people, because the physical consciousness is drawn over the objects directly. This is how sense consciousness arises.

Consciousness on the physical plane is a strictly defined circle, something solid that the other beings cannot enter. Consciousness on the astral plane is a cloudy, spiritual thing. Just as liquid, like water, differs from solid, so on the astral plane there is a flowing together of the different contents of consciousness.

Man has formed his physical body himself. Before that, an ancient animal kingdom existed. If one were to see these creatures, they would appear to today's humans like caricatures. The original astral body was able to transform those animals, to refine and develop them into humans. This earlier human being first had an astral consciousness. This first formed and shaped the physical body.

What was the purpose of this next evolution in the physical? Without passing through the physical, that earth creature with the dull consciousness would never have learned to say “I” to itself. The God who dwells in man today, the divine germ, could not enter the astral body other than by condensing it into the physical human body. Before that, the spirit of God was still completely outside the astral body; the “I” was the spirit of the deity. The astral consciousness was similar to water: “The spirit of God hovered over the face of the waters”. The “I” spirit hovered over the original waters of consciousness, over the astral bodies.

The nature kingdoms differ in the occult sense in the way the outer physical body relates to consciousness. Man has brought down consciousness to the physical plane, the animal to the astral plane and the plant to the devachan plane.

The plant becomes an animal when it has brought down consciousness to the astral plane, the animal becomes a human being when it carries consciousness down to the physical plane. The consciousness of the rock is on the higher parts of the devachan plan, namely on the fourth level. The Akashic Records are also located there on the border. The beyond is the plane of silence, a completely different form of existence than the Arupa region of devachan. In this realm lies the consciousness of the entire mineral world. In order to engage with the occult truths in a way that is not only constructive, it is necessary to get a sense of what the mineral actually is. The mineral is essentially different from all other creatures around man. And with mere manasic knowledge, one cannot come to a deeper understanding of the mineral world.

One must gain a moral relationship to the mineral world. To this end, the Rosicrucian schools drew people's attention to the chastity of the mineral world. Through its chastity, the mineral world is a model for man. Man is still flooded with desires and passions.

But imagine a human being so purified that his inner nature is as chaste, as unassuming and as self-contained as the mineral. One cannot say that the mineral kingdom is on a lower level than man. Man here on the physical plane only knows the skin of the mineral kingdom, which is related to the real mineral as the skin of man is to man himself. The mineral is a human being who lives only on the higher parts of the devachanic plane.

One cannot deny consciousness to the series of physical beings, but one must ascribe different forms of consciousness to them: there is a consciousness

— which manifests itself in form three levels lower down: today mineral,

— a consciousness that manifests itself in its forms two levels lower: today plants,

— a consciousness that manifests itself in its forms one level lower: today animals,

— a consciousness that manifests itself at the same level as the being [: today man].

This is the descending line of evolution. In ancient times, man once stood at the level where he is at the level of today's mineral. At that time, he had to be guided by other beings. The purpose of man's development is to emancipate himself from all such entities on the higher planes and to become such an entity on the higher planes himself.

The first stage of consciousness that man has undergone can be called “deepest trance consciousness”. The second stage of consciousness that man has undergone is still found in plants, the “deep sleep consciousness”. The third stage of consciousness that man has undergone is the “dream-filled sleep consciousness”. This “dream-filled sleep consciousness” is still found today in the animal kingdom, but actually only in those animals that have not developed warm blood. The animals that came into being later already have a slightly different consciousness; for example, the apes have a consciousness similar to that of humans. From the consciousness of dream-filled sleep, from the images of this consciousness, a higher animal kingdom develops. The fourth stage of consciousness, which man has reached today, is “object or subject consciousness”.

Today, man has hardly any connection with the first stage of consciousness. But he experiences the second stage, the deep sleep consciousness, during the night; it is an atavistic remnant from the time when he was completely in the sleep consciousness. The third consciousness has remained atavistically present in the chaotic world of dreams. The fourth stage, the normal consciousness, is today's everyday consciousness. The further course of human development consists in the fact that he develops himself up to an even higher consciousness. The fifth stage, which every human being will reach in the future, is where the astral consciousness joins the object consciousness again, where the human being will move fully consciously between the images.

A being with only astral consciousness cannot see the human form, but it can see what is going on inside the human being, every pain, every suffering and so on, it perceives all this, expressed in colors and forms. If object consciousness were to develop in this being, the images would gradually take on fixed boundaries and be superimposed over an object; this would emerge and everything that previously appeared as pleasure and pain would disappear.

Then [in addition to mere astral consciousness] there would come an even higher stage, [something would be added that goes beyond everything that happens in pleasure and pain in the human being]. The medium must extinguish the consciousness of the day and thereby loses the certainty of control. The clairvoyant, however, does not extinguish the physical consciousness, he retains the physical mind and all his physical abilities and in addition develops the consciousness of images. Thus the fifth stage is the conscious consciousness, which in reality encompasses approximately that part of the world that extends to the boundary of the devachan world.

The sixth stage is the state where sleep consciousness becomes a conscious state and delivers not images but sounds. This consciousness occurs in the higher degree of clairvoyance; it is the “otherworldly sound consciousness”. The reality of this is the Pythagorean music of the spheres. This otherworldly sound consciousness arises when sleep becomes not only dreamless but consciously aware in sounds. The awakening of the inner word corresponds to this. This is not a symbol, but true inner reality, the moment when things express themselves as they are. Man lives on the physical plane because he has the power to express his being himself in the I. But at this level of clairvoyance, all beings tell him their name. The whole world takes on the character of flowing sound, and each being in the world of flowing sound is a note that is different from all other beings.

About the even higher seventh state of consciousness, one can only say that it is there. To understand this, a region of the soul must be separable from the physical consciousness.

A human being goes through these seven states of consciousness in his evolution and is now in the middle of the development, at the fourth state. If we were at the fifth, we would also be in the middle again, if we were at a previous level of consciousness, one of the later ones would have disappeared and on the other hand another one would have appeared. So there are always seven levels that can be observed.

In the past, people went through a completely different state of life. Every state of consciousness must pass through seven states of life and every state of life through seven states of form. Seven states of form thus always form a state of life, and seven states of life make up an entire planetary development.

In the first life state, consciousness is three levels higher. In the second life state, consciousness is two levels higher. In the third life state, consciousness is one level higher.

The seven life states are called the “seven realms”. These are the three elemental realms: the mineral, animal and plant kingdoms. The three elemental realms precede the present state of life; human beings had to pass through them before they could emerge from the mineral realm into the fourth state of life, in which they now find themselves.

The process of passing through such a state of life has been called a “round” so far, and this includes seven form metamorphoses. So, in each state of consciousness, one passes through seven states of life and in each state of life, seven states of form. A total of seven times seven times seven metamorphoses of form. In occultism, it is written: 343. A great deal depends on the ability to read this number 7x 7x7 =343. All form states are what is understood by the third logos. The forty-nine life states are the second logos. The seven states of consciousness are the first logos.