GA 13 - Rudolf Steiner's "Secret Science in Outline"

[Federica]

...

Thanks, Ashvin, this clarifies the thing. With what you have added, it seems to me he means that memories are not stored and picked up again at will, like books from a library shelf (by pure introspection). Rather, what is stored is an etheric-bodily mirror-image of any percept that remains available for later, as foundation for man to build up the idea anew (and here's the gesture) on the basis of that stored mirror-image, when the exterior world provides the correlation for such a recall.
The animal uses a similar mirror-image, similarly inscribed in the physical-etheric, but (as Cleric said) that impresses in an automatic way, without any thinking gesture, without awareness of having a memory. The animal simply finds itself in the behavior that has been molded by the physical-bodily memory.

In other words, I believe he is emphasizing the fact that the gesture that gives raise to the memory has to be performed anew every time, rather than the memory emerging as a finished product through introspection. So yes, the I needs to operate a conscious gesture for the experience of having a memory to manifest.

[AshvinP]

...

Thanks, Ashvin, this clarifies the thing. With what you have added, it seems to me he means that memories are not stored and picked up again at will, like books from a library shelf (by pure introspection). Rather, what is stored is an etheric-bodily mirror-image of any percept that remains available for later, as foundation for man to build up the idea anew (and here's the gesture) on the basis of that stored mirror-image, when the exterior world provides the correlation for such a recall.
The animal uses a similar mirror-image, similarly inscribed in the physical-etheric, but (as Cleric said) that impresses in an automatic way, without any thinking gesture, without awareness of having a memory. The animal simply finds itself in the behavior that has been molded by the physical-bodily memory.

In other words, I believe he is emphasizing the fact that the gesture that gives raise to the memory has to be performed anew every time, rather than the memory emerging as a finished product through introspection. So yes, the I needs to operate a conscious gesture for the experience of having a memory to manifest.

How's the reading going, Federica?

It also occurred to me the above understanding of human memory can be analogized to the manifest world at large. Our default sensory intuition is that the natural kingdoms were formed a long time ago and now they simply exist as free-floating objects, undergoing some minimal change via mechanistic laws, that we can interact with. It's difficult for default consciousness to conceive that all we experience are spiritual gestures performed anew through the hierarchical depth of reality. What we experience as the manifest world could be compared to the remembering gestures of the Gods, which are described in spiritual science as Saturn, Sun, Moon. Just as we imprint meaningful experiences into the living body, the hierarchies have imprinted them into what we now experience as the 'physical world' and 'living body' drawn from that world. The organic transformations of this world can be compared to what we do with our spiritual activity in recalling the imprinted experiences.

Steiner touches on this from a different angle in Human and Cosmic Thought:

A person who makes a little progress in occult perception can separate the two phases of his soul-activity. He can trace how it is that when he wants to think something or other, he has first not simply to grasp the thought, but to prepare his brain for it. If he has prepared it so that it reflects, then he has the thought. When one wants to investigate occultly, so that one can picture things, one always has, first, the task of carrying through the activity which prepares the picturing. It is this that is so important for us to notice. For it is only when we keep these things well in mind that we have before us the real activity of human thinking. Now for the first time we know how human thinking-activity is carried out. First, this activity lays hold of the brain, in connection somewhere with the central nervous system. It sets in motion — let us say if we wish — the atomistic portions in some way, brings them into some sort of movement; by this means they become a mirror-apparatus; the thought is reflected, and the soul becomes conscious of the thought.
...
What I have now explained happens continually to a person between waking up and going to sleep. The thinking activity is always working on the brain, and so, throughout the waking state, it makes the brain into a mirror-apparatus for the thoughts. But it is not sufficient that the only thinking-activity worked up in us should be that worked up by ourselves. For one might say it is a narrowly limited activity that is here worked up in this way by means of the psychic-spiritual. When we wake up in the morning and are awake through the day, and in the evening fall asleep again, then the psychic-spiritual activity which belongs to the thinking is working all day long upon the brain, and thereby the brain becomes a reflecting-apparatus. But the brain must first be there; then, the soul-spiritual activity can make little furrows in the brain, or, one might say, its memoranda and engravings. The main substance and form of the brain must first be there. But that is not enough for our human life.

Our brain could not be worked upon by our daily life if our whole organism were not so prepared that it provides a basis for this daily work. And this work of preparation comes from the cosmos. Thus as we work daily at the “engraving” of the brain, which makes it into a mirror-apparatus for our daily thought, so, in so far as we cannot ourselves do this engraving, this giving form, form has to be given to us from the cosmos. As our little thoughts work and make their little engravings, so must our whole organism be built up from out of the cosmos, according to the same pattern of thought-activity. For example, that which appears to us finally in the sign of Idealism is present in the spiritual cosmos as the activity producing Idealism, and it can so work upon a man that it prepares his whole organism so that he inclines to Idealism. In like manner are the other varieties of moods and signs worked in upon men from out of the spiritual cosmos.

Man is built up according to the thoughts of the cosmos. The cosmos is the “great thinker” which down to our last finger-nail engraves our form in us, just as our little thought-work makes its little imprints on our brain every day. As our brain — I am referring only to the small portions where imprints can be made — stands under the influence of the work of thinking, so does the whole man stand under the influence of cosmic thinking.

We could further say that humanity's evolution consists in performing ever-expanding spiritual gestures that recall, not only our little thought-work, but also the Cosmic thinking that imprints the physical-etheric matrix which makes that work possible. Thereby we gradually make the latter our own thought-content and spiritualize it from the inside-out, imprinting new moral intuitions into the support matrix. The Gods experience this redemptive work as the fruits of their spiritual gestures, whereby they brought/bring humanity into the signs of ideal life which awaken us to our creative participation in Cosmic thinking. We must continually remain active with our spiritual gestures in this evolutionary work, just as we remain active in our local memory recall. Our evolution is then understood as progressively remembering, in the most intimate way, what the hierarchies gestured to make that local thinking-remembering possible.

[Federica]

...

Thanks, Ashvin, this clarifies the thing. With what you have added, it seems to me he means that memories are not stored and picked up again at will, like books from a library shelf (by pure introspection). Rather, what is stored is an etheric-bodily mirror-image of any percept that remains available for later, as foundation for man to build up the idea anew (and here's the gesture) on the basis of that stored mirror-image, when the exterior world provides the correlation for such a recall.
The animal uses a similar mirror-image, similarly inscribed in the physical-etheric, but (as Cleric said) that impresses in an automatic way, without any thinking gesture, without awareness of having a memory. The animal simply finds itself in the behavior that has been molded by the physical-bodily memory.

In other words, I believe he is emphasizing the fact that the gesture that gives raise to the memory has to be performed anew every time, rather than the memory emerging as a finished product through introspection. So yes, the I needs to operate a conscious gesture for the experience of having a memory to manifest.

How's the reading going, Federica?

It also occurred to me the above understanding of human memory can be analogized to the manifest world at large. Our default sensory intuition is that the natural kingdoms were formed a long time ago and now they simply exist as free-floating objects, undergoing some minimal change via mechanistic laws, that we can interact with. It's difficult for default consciousness to conceive that all we experience are spiritual gestures performed anew through the hierarchical depth of reality. What we experience as the manifest world could be compared to the remembering gestures of the Gods, which are described in spiritual science as Saturn, Sun, Moon. Just as we imprint meaningful experiences into the living body, the hierarchies have imprinted them into what we now experience as the 'physical world' and 'living body' drawn from that world. The organic transformations of this world can be compared to what we do with our spiritual activity in recalling the imprinted experiences.

Hi Ashvin,

Reading goes slowly - I've had less free time than usual this week, been reading small bits, often having the read them again the next day. Now in the middle of Chapter III, Sleep and Death. I feel I absolutely need this reading, and feel called to come back to it every time I can, but sad to see how slowly it goes.

Thanks for the new thoughts. Indeed, it's a tough exercise to think through and maintain the recognition of the world as the memory of the gods. So our physical body is also a godly memory, actively held together by/as their collective forces. And for our part, it often seems like we do our best to dislocate it, by hardening our activity in stiff and repetitive patterns..

Steiner touches on this from a different angle in Human and Cosmic Thought:

A person who makes a little progress in occult perception can separate the two phases of his soul-activity. He can trace how it is that when he wants to think something or other, he has first not simply to grasp the thought, but to prepare his brain for it. If he has prepared it so that it reflects, then he has the thought. When one wants to investigate occultly, so that one can picture things, one always has, first, the task of carrying through the activity which prepares the picturing. It is this that is so important for us to notice. For it is only when we keep these things well in mind that we have before us the real activity of human thinking. Now for the first time we know how human thinking-activity is carried out. First, this activity lays hold of the brain, in connection somewhere with the central nervous system. It sets in motion — let us say if we wish — the atomistic portions in some way, brings them into some sort of movement; by this means they become a mirror-apparatus; the thought is reflected, and the soul becomes conscious of the thought.
...
What I have now explained happens continually to a person between waking up and going to sleep. The thinking activity is always working on the brain, and so, throughout the waking state, it makes the brain into a mirror-apparatus for the thoughts. But it is not sufficient that the only thinking-activity worked up in us should be that worked up by ourselves. For one might say it is a narrowly limited activity that is here worked up in this way by means of the psychic-spiritual. When we wake up in the morning and are awake through the day, and in the evening fall asleep again, then the psychic-spiritual activity which belongs to the thinking is working all day long upon the brain, and thereby the brain becomes a reflecting-apparatus. But the brain must first be there; then, the soul-spiritual activity can make little furrows in the brain, or, one might say, its memoranda and engravings. The main substance and form of the brain must first be there. But that is not enough for our human life.

Our brain could not be worked upon by our daily life if our whole organism were not so prepared that it provides a basis for this daily work. And this work of preparation comes from the cosmos. Thus as we work daily at the “engraving” of the brain, which makes it into a mirror-apparatus for our daily thought, so, in so far as we cannot ourselves do this engraving, this giving form, form has to be given to us from the cosmos. As our little thoughts work and make their little engravings, so must our whole organism be built up from out of the cosmos, according to the same pattern of thought-activity. For example, that which appears to us finally in the sign of Idealism is present in the spiritual cosmos as the activity producing Idealism, and it can so work upon a man that it prepares his whole organism so that he inclines to Idealism. In like manner are the other varieties of moods and signs worked in upon men from out of the spiritual cosmos.

Man is built up according to the thoughts of the cosmos. The cosmos is the “great thinker” which down to our last finger-nail engraves our form in us, just as our little thought-work makes its little imprints on our brain every day. As our brain — I am referring only to the small portions where imprints can be made — stands under the influence of the work of thinking, so does the whole man stand under the influence of cosmic thinking.

We could further say that humanity's evolution consists in performing ever-expanding spiritual gestures that recall, not only our little thought-work, but also the Cosmic thinking that imprints the physical-etheric matrix which makes that work possible. Thereby we gradually make the latter our own thought-content and spiritualize it from the inside-out, imprinting new moral intuitions into the support matrix. The Gods experience this redemptive work as the fruits of their spiritual gestures, whereby they brought/bring humanity into the signs of ideal life which awaken us to our creative participation in Cosmic thinking. We must continually remain active with our spiritual gestures in this evolutionary work, just as we remain active in our local memory recall. Our evolution is then understood as progressively remembering, in the most intimate way, what the hierarchies gestured to make that local thinking-remembering possible.

[/quote]


I see (now that I've read it three times). This is also somewhat connected to what Scaligero said on the 4th of March 1978, which I have reported today, about the I progressively liberating itself from the reflections of the brain to find its true reflection in the objective thoughts of the gods.

Our physical body currently limits the capacity of our memory, making it fragmented, mixed up, and local. So remaining continually active in the evolutionary work is hindered, but I was trying to imagine how this serious limitation could be weakened in the future, for the time when man will still have a physical body. Maybe the loosening obtained in meditation could reach new levels through collective work, including in the physical? Surely meditation is alway collective, but maybe one way to harmonize and transform the layers more actively in the future could come from a more conscious effort to harmonize the intents even horizontally, within human families and communities...

[Federica]

Thanks, Ashvin, this clarifies the thing. With what you have added, it seems to me he means that memories are not stored and picked up again at will, like books from a library shelf (by pure introspection). Rather, what is stored is an etheric-bodily mirror-image of any percept that remains available for later, as foundation for man to build up the idea anew (and here's the gesture) on the basis of that stored mirror-image, when the exterior world provides the correlation for such a recall.
The animal uses a similar mirror-image, similarly inscribed in the physical-etheric, but (as Cleric said) that impresses in an automatic way, without any thinking gesture, without awareness of having a memory. The animal simply finds itself in the behavior that has been molded by the physical-bodily memory.

In other words, I believe he is emphasizing the fact that the gesture that gives raise to the memory has to be performed anew every time, rather than the memory emerging as a finished product through introspection. So yes, the I needs to operate a conscious gesture for the experience of having a memory to manifest.

How's the reading going, Federica?

It also occurred to me the above understanding of human memory can be analogized to the manifest world at large. Our default sensory intuition is that the natural kingdoms were formed a long time ago and now they simply exist as free-floating objects, undergoing some minimal change via mechanistic laws, that we can interact with. It's difficult for default consciousness to conceive that all we experience are spiritual gestures performed anew through the hierarchical depth of reality. What we experience as the manifest world could be compared to the remembering gestures of the Gods, which are described in spiritual science as Saturn, Sun, Moon. Just as we imprint meaningful experiences into the living body, the hierarchies have imprinted them into what we now experience as the 'physical world' and 'living body' drawn from that world. The organic transformations of this world can be compared to what we do with our spiritual activity in recalling the imprinted experiences.

Hi Ashvin,

Reading goes slowly - I've had less free time than usual this week, been reading small bits, often having the read them again the next day. Now in the middle of Chapter III, Sleep and Death. I feel I absolutely need this reading, and feel called to come back to it every time I can, but sad to see how slowly it goes.

Thanks for the new thoughts. Indeed, it's a tough exercise to think through and maintain the recognition of the world as the memory of the gods. So our physical body is also a godly memory, actively held together by/as their collective forces. And for our part, it often seems like we do our best to dislocate it, by hardening our activity in stiff and repetitive patterns..

Steiner touches on this from a different angle in Human and Cosmic Thought:

A person who makes a little progress in occult perception can separate the two phases of his soul-activity. He can trace how it is that when he wants to think something or other, he has first not simply to grasp the thought, but to prepare his brain for it. If he has prepared it so that it reflects, then he has the thought. When one wants to investigate occultly, so that one can picture things, one always has, first, the task of carrying through the activity which prepares the picturing. It is this that is so important for us to notice. For it is only when we keep these things well in mind that we have before us the real activity of human thinking. Now for the first time we know how human thinking-activity is carried out. First, this activity lays hold of the brain, in connection somewhere with the central nervous system. It sets in motion — let us say if we wish — the atomistic portions in some way, brings them into some sort of movement; by this means they become a mirror-apparatus; the thought is reflected, and the soul becomes conscious of the thought.
...
What I have now explained happens continually to a person between waking up and going to sleep. The thinking activity is always working on the brain, and so, throughout the waking state, it makes the brain into a mirror-apparatus for the thoughts. But it is not sufficient that the only thinking-activity worked up in us should be that worked up by ourselves. For one might say it is a narrowly limited activity that is here worked up in this way by means of the psychic-spiritual. When we wake up in the morning and are awake through the day, and in the evening fall asleep again, then the psychic-spiritual activity which belongs to the thinking is working all day long upon the brain, and thereby the brain becomes a reflecting-apparatus. But the brain must first be there; then, the soul-spiritual activity can make little furrows in the brain, or, one might say, its memoranda and engravings. The main substance and form of the brain must first be there. But that is not enough for our human life.

Our brain could not be worked upon by our daily life if our whole organism were not so prepared that it provides a basis for this daily work. And this work of preparation comes from the cosmos. Thus as we work daily at the “engraving” of the brain, which makes it into a mirror-apparatus for our daily thought, so, in so far as we cannot ourselves do this engraving, this giving form, form has to be given to us from the cosmos. As our little thoughts work and make their little engravings, so must our whole organism be built up from out of the cosmos, according to the same pattern of thought-activity. For example, that which appears to us finally in the sign of Idealism is present in the spiritual cosmos as the activity producing Idealism, and it can so work upon a man that it prepares his whole organism so that he inclines to Idealism. In like manner are the other varieties of moods and signs worked in upon men from out of the spiritual cosmos.

Man is built up according to the thoughts of the cosmos. The cosmos is the “great thinker” which down to our last finger-nail engraves our form in us, just as our little thought-work makes its little imprints on our brain every day. As our brain — I am referring only to the small portions where imprints can be made — stands under the influence of the work of thinking, so does the whole man stand under the influence of cosmic thinking.

We could further say that humanity's evolution consists in performing ever-expanding spiritual gestures that recall, not only our little thought-work, but also the Cosmic thinking that imprints the physical-etheric matrix which makes that work possible. Thereby we gradually make the latter our own thought-content and spiritualize it from the inside-out, imprinting new moral intuitions into the support matrix. The Gods experience this redemptive work as the fruits of their spiritual gestures, whereby they brought/bring humanity into the signs of ideal life which awaken us to our creative participation in Cosmic thinking. We must continually remain active with our spiritual gestures in this evolutionary work, just as we remain active in our local memory recall. Our evolution is then understood as progressively remembering, in the most intimate way, what the hierarchies gestured to make that local thinking-remembering possible.

I see (now that I've read it three times). This is also somewhat connected to what Scaligero said on the 4th of March 1978, which I have reported today, about the I progressively liberating itself from the reflections of the brain to find its true reflection in the objective thoughts of the gods.

Our physical body currently limits the capacity of our memory, making it fragmented, mixed up, and local. So remaining continually active in the evolutionary work is hindered, but I was trying to imagine how this serious limitation could be weakened in the future, for the time when man will still have a physical body. Maybe the loosening obtained in meditation could reach new levels through collective work, including in the physical? Surely meditation is alway collective, but maybe one way to harmonize and transform the layers more actively in the future could come from a more conscious effort to harmonize intents and activities even horizontally, within human families and communities...

[AshvinP]

Hi Ashvin,

Reading goes slowly - I've had less free time than usual this week, been reading small bits, often having the read them again the next day. Now in the middle of Chapter III, Sleep and Death. I feel I absolutely need this reading, and feel called to come back to it every time I can, but sad to see how slowly it goes.

If we are going slow anyway for various reasons, it may be good opportunity to practice smooth pursuit reading and also really study-meditate the various descriptions, trying to sense how they relate to the depths of our intuitive being. I have started slowing down some of my own reading.

Thanks for the new thoughts. Indeed, it's a tough exercise to think through and maintain the recognition of the world as the memory of the gods. So our physical body is also a godly memory, actively held together by/as their collective forces. And for our part, it often seems like we do our best to dislocate it, by hardening our activity in stiff and repetitive patterns..

Steiner touches on this from a different angle in Human and Cosmic Thought:





We could further say that humanity's evolution consists in performing ever-expanding spiritual gestures that recall, not only our little thought-work, but also the Cosmic thinking that imprints the physical-etheric matrix which makes that work possible. Thereby we gradually make the latter our own thought-content and spiritualize it from the inside-out, imprinting new moral intuitions into the support matrix. The Gods experience this redemptive work as the fruits of their spiritual gestures, whereby they brought/bring humanity into the signs of ideal life which awaken us to our creative participation in Cosmic thinking. We must continually remain active with our spiritual gestures in this evolutionary work, just as we remain active in our local memory recall. Our evolution is then understood as progressively remembering, in the most intimate way, what the hierarchies gestured to make that local thinking-remembering possible.

I see (now that I've read it three times). This is also somewhat connected to what Scaligero said on the 4th of March 1978, which I have reported today, about the I progressively liberating itself from the reflections of the brain to find its true reflection in the objective thoughts of the gods.

Our physical body currently limits the capacity of our memory, making it fragmented, mixed up, and local. So remaining continually active in the evolutionary work is hindered, but I was trying to imagine how this serious limitation could be weakened in the future, for the time when man will still have a physical body. Maybe the loosening obtained in meditation could reach new levels through collective work, including in the physical? Surely meditation is alway collective, but maybe one way to harmonize and transform the layers more actively in the future could come from a more conscious effort to harmonize intents and activities even horizontally, within human families and communities...

[/quote]


It can get confusing because it is often spoken how we need to liberate thinking from the body for higher cognitive development. That is absolutely true. But the main purpose of that liberation is to draw on moral intuitions that can provide holistic insight and purify the soul body. If the latter had not fallen through the Lucifer temptation, the bodily matrix would have acted as a perfect mirror of our intuitive being, of Cosmic thought activity. But it is through the soul body's encrusted egoism that the holistic imaginative spectrum decohered into mineralized sense perception. So as we purify the soul body of its selfish tendencies, the latent potential of the physical-etheric also begins to be realized, the holistic spiritual fabric 'behind' our life of memory and sense-perception begins to shine through into waking consciousness. For example one could arrive at the panoramic life tableau experience within the etheric.

The tragedy of our times is that it's really a thin veneer of selfish soul impulses that obscures the Cosmic nature of our bodily life from our waking experience, yet most are so mired in passive and indulgent habits of thinking and being that even removing this thin veneer proves difficult. The Kingdom is truly at hand but the intellectual soul dreams that it couldn't be any further away, hence all the 'hard problems' that people stubbornly bang their heads against. I think it's safe to say that, once individuals progress enough in the purification of the soul life, then the collective work will unfold of its own accord. Which is to say, the higher forces guiding destiny will provide plenty of opportunities and inspiration for souls to come together and work as communities, but of course each individual should freely accept the opportunities and follow the inspiration.

[Federica]

It can get confusing because it is often spoken how we need to liberate thinking from the body for higher cognitive development. That is absolutely true. But the main purpose of that liberation is to draw on moral intuitions that can provide holistic insight and purify the soul body. If the latter had not fallen through the Lucifer temptation, the bodily matrix would have acted as a perfect mirror of our intuitive being, of Cosmic thought activity. But it is through the soul body's encrusted egoism that the holistic imaginative spectrum decohered into mineralized sense perception. So as we purify the soul body of its selfish tendencies, the latent potential of the physical-etheric also begins to be realized, the holistic spiritual fabric 'behind' our life of memory and sense-perception begins to shine through into waking consciousness. For example one could arrive at the panoramic life tableau experience within the etheric.

The tragedy of our times is that it's really a thin veneer of selfish soul impulses that obscures the Cosmic nature of our bodily life from our waking experience, yet most are so mired in passive and indulgent habits of thinking and being that even removing this thin veneer proves difficult. The Kingdom is truly at hand but the intellectual soul dreams that it couldn't be any further away, hence all the 'hard problems' that people stubbornly bang their heads against. I think it's safe to say that, once individuals progress enough in the purification of the soul life, then the collective work will unfold of its own accord. Which is to say, the higher forces guiding destiny will provide plenty of opportunities and inspiration for souls to come together and work as communities, but of course each individual should freely accept the opportunities and follow the inspiration.

My understanding was that, had we not fallen through the Luciferic temptation back then, we wouldn’t have this bodily matrix at all today. In other words, there is no way that a physical body such as we have today could reflect, or could have reflected, cosmic thought perfectly, because the sensory spectrum that substantiates our bodily matrix is the Luciferic temptation. Is this correct?

[AshvinP]

It can get confusing because it is often spoken how we need to liberate thinking from the body for higher cognitive development. That is absolutely true. But the main purpose of that liberation is to draw on moral intuitions that can provide holistic insight and purify the soul body. If the latter had not fallen through the Lucifer temptation, the bodily matrix would have acted as a perfect mirror of our intuitive being, of Cosmic thought activity. But it is through the soul body's encrusted egoism that the holistic imaginative spectrum decohered into mineralized sense perception. So as we purify the soul body of its selfish tendencies, the latent potential of the physical-etheric also begins to be realized, the holistic spiritual fabric 'behind' our life of memory and sense-perception begins to shine through into waking consciousness. For example one could arrive at the panoramic life tableau experience within the etheric.

The tragedy of our times is that it's really a thin veneer of selfish soul impulses that obscures the Cosmic nature of our bodily life from our waking experience, yet most are so mired in passive and indulgent habits of thinking and being that even removing this thin veneer proves difficult. The Kingdom is truly at hand but the intellectual soul dreams that it couldn't be any further away, hence all the 'hard problems' that people stubbornly bang their heads against. I think it's safe to say that, once individuals progress enough in the purification of the soul life, then the collective work will unfold of its own accord. Which is to say, the higher forces guiding destiny will provide plenty of opportunities and inspiration for souls to come together and work as communities, but of course each individual should freely accept the opportunities and follow the inspiration.

My understanding was that, had we not fallen through the Luciferic temptation back then, we wouldn’t have this bodily matrix at all today. In other words, there is no way that a physical body such as we have today could reflect, or could have reflected, cosmic thought perfectly, because the sensory spectrum that substantiates our bodily matrix is the Luciferic temptation. Is this correct?

I would phrase it differently and say the Lucifer temptation was fundamentally a burning desire (in the soul body) to live separated from Cosmic spirituality, to cultivate an inner life that feels to be a reality-in-itself (inner life including sensations). In other words, the core spirit no longer desired for its bodily matrix to be a mere reflector of Cosmic spirituality, but to possess its own seemingly 'private' inner life. Of course all of this unfolded in stages over the epochs, not in an instant. We only reached the culmination of this whole process relatively recently even though it was seeded back in Lemurian times (or originally back on Old Moon).

The natural outcome of this desire, however, is also an increasing competition between seemingly private soul spaces to possess parts of the sensory spectrum for their own ends (Rene Girard discusses this in terms of his theory of 'mimetic desire'). Fundamentally our spirit-soul can reflect its sensory existence within the imaginative spectrum, but these cross-conflicting desires and intents decohere that spectrum and the soul is forced to reflect its existence within the temporally fragmented mineralized spectrum, which gives rise to the experience of extended space as we know it.

So what you said is not inaccurate, but I think it's important to locate the primary responsibility of the decoherence in the selfishly desirous soul body because that's also where the redemptive solution will come, through the purified soul body. The physical body as we experience it today has become a hardened shadow of its true archetypal nature, the Imago Dei, through the selfish impulses of the soul body. Yet the etheric body has maintained the link between this shadow and its reality, the intuitive spirit, through the imploding of Cosmic forces that maintain the physical body and the cultivation of the thinking faculty through images which precipitate as thoughts within the soul body. By bringing the life forces back into the mental images and concepts, and purifying the desires of selfish impulses, the bodily matrix can be restored to its originally intended purpose, but now in complete freedom and with the fruits of its separated existence, the incarnate "I" and its capacity for spiritually creative love.

[Federica]

I would phrase it differently and say the Lucifer temptation was fundamentally a burning desire (in the soul body) to live separated from Cosmic spirituality, to cultivate an inner life that feels to be a reality-in-itself (inner life including sensations). In other words, the core spirit no longer desired for its bodily matrix to be a mere reflector of Cosmic spirituality, but to possess its own seemingly 'private' inner life. Of course all of this unfolded in stages over the epochs, not in an instant. We only reached the culmination of this whole process relatively recently even though it was seeded back in Lemurian times (or originally back on Old Moon).

The natural outcome of this desire, however, is also an increasing competition between seemingly private soul spaces to possess parts of the sensory spectrum for their own ends (Rene Girard discusses this in terms of his theory of 'mimetic desire'). Fundamentally our spirit-soul can reflect its sensory existence within the imaginative spectrum, but these cross-conflicting desires and intents decohere that spectrum and the soul is forced to reflect its existence within the temporally fragmented mineralized spectrum, which gives rise to the experience of extended space as we know it.

So what you said is not inaccurate, but I think it's important to locate the primary responsibility of the decoherence in the selfishly desirous soul body because that's also where the redemptive solution will come, through the purified soul body. The physical body as we experience it today has become a hardened shadow of its true archetypal nature, the Imago Dei, through the selfish impulses of the soul body. Yet the etheric body has maintained the link between this shadow and its reality, the intuitive spirit, through the imploding of Cosmic forces that maintain the physical body and the cultivation of the thinking faculty through images which precipitate as thoughts within the soul body. By bringing the life forces back into the mental images and concepts, and purifying the desires of selfish impulses, the bodily matrix can be restored to its originally intended purpose, but now in complete freedom and with the fruits of its separated existence, the incarnate "I" and its capacity for spiritually creative love.

Ashvin,

I have tried, but I am not able to fit what I believe you are saying in what I'm reading.

"The physical body as we experience it today has become a hardened shadow of its true archetypal nature, the Imago Dei"

Hasn’t the human physical body always been such a hardened shadow?
From what I am reading just now - Chapter III - I understand that the purification and eradication from the soul of those desires that are purely sensory (not the ones that are a reflection of the spiritual in the sensory spectrum) take decades in an after-death process of burning the desires in a spiritual fire, and this only can happen once the soul is not any longer “chained” (as RS says) to the physical body by life on Earth (because, as he says, even during sleep, the soul is still to some extent chained to the physical, it operates in the spiritual world, but with an orientation towards the physical).

But you are saying that this purification process is possible while still alive, in parallel with keeping a functioning physical body, that keeps processing sensory impressions through the senses? Are you saying that through the steps of initiation, not only does the individual become able to foresee and understand what is to be faced and worked through after death, but one comes to actually tackle and accomplish that work while still alive on Earth? If I understand you correctly, and this is indeed what you are saying, what would be the difference then between this and becoming immortal, that is, erasing the cycle of life and death from your radar?

PS. I didn't dare to read the post on René Girard, as I am trying to administrate my energies and that seems like a surely interesting but extemporaneous reading for the purposes of this point (but please correct me if I'm wrong)

[AshvinP]

I would phrase it differently and say the Lucifer temptation was fundamentally a burning desire (in the soul body) to live separated from Cosmic spirituality, to cultivate an inner life that feels to be a reality-in-itself (inner life including sensations). In other words, the core spirit no longer desired for its bodily matrix to be a mere reflector of Cosmic spirituality, but to possess its own seemingly 'private' inner life. Of course all of this unfolded in stages over the epochs, not in an instant. We only reached the culmination of this whole process relatively recently even though it was seeded back in Lemurian times (or originally back on Old Moon).

The natural outcome of this desire, however, is also an increasing competition between seemingly private soul spaces to possess parts of the sensory spectrum for their own ends (Rene Girard discusses this in terms of his theory of 'mimetic desire'). Fundamentally our spirit-soul can reflect its sensory existence within the imaginative spectrum, but these cross-conflicting desires and intents decohere that spectrum and the soul is forced to reflect its existence within the temporally fragmented mineralized spectrum, which gives rise to the experience of extended space as we know it.

So what you said is not inaccurate, but I think it's important to locate the primary responsibility of the decoherence in the selfishly desirous soul body because that's also where the redemptive solution will come, through the purified soul body. The physical body as we experience it today has become a hardened shadow of its true archetypal nature, the Imago Dei, through the selfish impulses of the soul body. Yet the etheric body has maintained the link between this shadow and its reality, the intuitive spirit, through the imploding of Cosmic forces that maintain the physical body and the cultivation of the thinking faculty through images which precipitate as thoughts within the soul body. By bringing the life forces back into the mental images and concepts, and purifying the desires of selfish impulses, the bodily matrix can be restored to its originally intended purpose, but now in complete freedom and with the fruits of its separated existence, the incarnate "I" and its capacity for spiritually creative love.

Ashvin,

I have tried, but I am not able to fit what I believe you are saying in what I'm reading.

"The physical body as we experience it today has become a hardened shadow of its true archetypal nature, the Imago Dei"

Hasn’t the human physical body always been such a hardened shadow?
From what I am reading just now - Chapter III - I understand that the purification and eradication from the soul of those desires that are purely sensory (not the ones that are a reflection of the spiritual in the sensory spectrum) take decades in an after-death process of burning the desires in a spiritual fire, and this only can happen once the soul is not any longer “chained” (as RS says) to the physical body by life on Earth (because, as he says, even during sleep, the soul is still to some extent chained to the physical, it operates in the spiritual world, but with an orientation towards the physical).

But you are saying that this purification process is possible while still alive, in parallel with keeping a functioning physical body, that keeps processing sensory impressions through the senses? Are you saying that through the steps of initiation, not only does the individual become able to foresee and understand what is to be faced and worked through after death, but one comes to actually tackle and accomplish that work while still alive on Earth? If I understand you correctly, and this is indeed what you are saying, what would be the difference then between this and becoming immortal, that is, erasing the cycle of life and death from your radar?

Federica,

So this is another situation where he is describing the average condition of humanity today, the pre-initiatory condition as it were. In general, the whole aim of modern initiation is to experience and accomplish what normally unfolds after death, while still alive. That is, to spiral incarnate existence together with the holistic and creative spiritual processes across the threshold. These are essentially the same spiritual processes described as unfolding on Saturn, Sun, and Moon. In a sense, we become the beings who artistically weaved our lower psycho-physical form and therefore the manifest world as we now know it. It reminds me of the old time travel paradox where a person somehow becomes their own father. Reality is quite strange in that way! 

This is how greater continuity of consciousness unfolds as our "I" expands its loving interests, knowledge, and deeds back to Cosmic scale. It is indeed a process of gradually immortalizing the astral, etheric, and physical bodies, which of course means they (and we) will not remain in their present condition, but will be transfigured into Manas, Buddhi, and Atma. They will become perfect reflectors of the corresponding constellations of Cosmic intents. The 'phase gap' between spiritual activity and its reflection in soul, life, and sensory processes will be progressively closed and this will manifest as the next 3 planetary incarnations (which fulfill the intents of the first 3). Although the fullness of this redemption will be attained at the end of Solar evolution, some essential characteristics of the later stages will already be prefigured during the remainder of Earth evolution. 


https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA175/En ... 12p01.html

I pointed out in my previous lecture that physical man, as at present constituted, does not answer to his inherent potentialities; his physical body was originally destined for immortality. This idea has further implications. Not only has physical man who was destined for immortality forfeited his claim to immortality, but also the other living beings, the ligneous plants and the warm-blooded animals bear the seeds of death in them.... The question then is: how are we to account for this deterioration? Virtually the whole of nature around us, even when investigated scientifically, is not such as it was intended to be. Who is responsible for this? The blame lies with man because he succumbed to the Luciferic temptation, to what is called in the opening chapter of Genesis, the “Fall”, or original sin. To Spiritual Science this is a real and genuine drama in which man was not only involved, but which was first played out in the soul of man. At that time man was still so powerful that he involved the whole of nature in his fall.

...But in addition, man was also designed for a particular tone; he was endowed with his own specific tone in the whole Harmony of the Spheres, and also with an original vitality, so that it would always have been possible for the etheric body, if it had retained its original vitality, to have preserved the immortality of the physical body. And man would have been spared the consequences. For had the etheric body preserved its original form man would have continued to dwell in those higher realms from which he has fallen. He would not have succumbed to the Luciferic temptation, for in those higher realms totally different conditions would have prevailed. And in former times those conditions really did exist.

...Thus the Christ Impulse was implanted in the whole of Earth evolution. I doubt if there is a single person who imagines that the Christ Impulse loses anything of its majesty or sublimity when it is incorporated in this way in the whole world order; when, in other words, it is restored to its cosmic rank, and when men really acknowledge that at the beginning of Earth evolution there existed, and at the end of Earth evolution there will exist, an order different from the present natural order, and a moral order that transcends the physical. The Christ Impulse was necessary in order that the end of Earth evolution should be worthy of the beginning. 

The reason why, normally, we cannot purify the astral while chained to the physical body is because our soul life is so conditioned to react to sensory events in selfish ways. Any incremental progress we make in taming some lower passions through the intellect is almost immediately and entirely negated by that conditioning as we continue to navigate the sensory entanglement. For example, maybe we make some progress in dealing with unhealthy (selfish) eating habits by carefully working out a dietary plan, but then we are constantly confronted with the whole production, marketing, etc. complex of fast foods, which trigger encrusted patterns of feeling and will that the intellect is powerless to resist. What is needed here is something equally or more potent to replace (or transmute) those old habits, and that we don't find in normal sensory life.

But on the initiatory path, the spiritual within the sensory gradually begins to shine through. There are growing points of contact between the purely ideal life and the sensory life. Sensory events begin to remind us more of ideal streams of destiny, such as those outlined in Occult Science. In that way, the events can lend their energy and yield to new ideal habits instead of triggering the old selfish ways of being. Basically, we have penetrated surrounding cultural and natural events with more holistic spiritual insight, coming to intimately perceive their overarching significance in our streams of destiny. This new insight helps us resist the siren song of the old selfish soul patterns in reaction to sensory events. Such a path of development is already shortening the time that would be needed in kamaloca to purify the soul impurities before ascending to purely ideal worlds and creatively working on the curvatures of destiny. 

We should remember that is the purpose of the purification - it gives us an opportunity to creatively plan the archetypal streamlines of our next incarnation so that we can compensate for past karma and advance toward the fully human (Christ) ideal. Even once we go through kamaloca, the impurities of the soul body that are purged during that time don't simply disappear - we have to clothe our spirit in them again as we return to our next incarnation and form a new soul body. In that sense, only those parts of the astral body can be immortalized that we work on purifying consciously and freely during incarnate existence. The work is always accomplished as a rhythmic bouncing between the two poles of existence - the purely ideal pole providing holistic insight into how the psycho-physical curvatures should 'bend' such that we are given the best opportunities to accomplish the work of inner perfection within the pole of manifest existence. 

PS. I didn't dare to read the post on René Girard, as I am trying to administrate my energies and that seems like a surely interesting but extemporaneous reading for the purposes of this point (but please correct me if I'm wrong)

Yes, the Girard post is not at all necessary, just an interesting side note on how others have intellectually reached some of these truths of Cosmic evolution.  

[Federica]

Federica,

So this is another situation where he is describing the average condition of humanity today, the pre-initiatory condition as it were. In general, the whole aim of modern initiation is to experience and accomplish what normally unfolds after death, while still alive. That is, to spiral incarnate existence together with the holistic and creative spiritual processes across the threshold. These are essentially the same spiritual processes described as unfolding on Saturn, Sun, and Moon. In a sense, we become the beings who artistically weaved our lower psycho-physical form and therefore the manifest world as we now know it. It reminds me of the old time travel paradox where a person somehow becomes their own father. Reality is quite strange in that way! 

This is how greater continuity of consciousness unfolds as our "I" expands its loving interests, knowledge, and deeds back to Cosmic scale. It is indeed a process of gradually immortalizing the astral, etheric, and physical bodies, which of course means they (and we) will not remain in their present condition, but will be transfigured into Manas, Buddhi, and Atma. They will become perfect reflectors of the corresponding constellations of Cosmic intents. The 'phase gap' between spiritual activity and its reflection in soul, life, and sensory processes will be progressively closed and this will manifest as the next 3 planetary incarnations (which fulfill the intents of the first 3). Although the fullness of this redemption will be attained at the end of Solar evolution, some essential characteristics of the later stages will already be prefigured during the remainder of Earth evolution. 


https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA175/En ... 12p01.html

I pointed out in my previous lecture that physical man, as at present constituted, does not answer to his inherent potentialities; his physical body was originally destined for immortality. This idea has further implications. Not only has physical man who was destined for immortality forfeited his claim to immortality, but also the other living beings, the ligneous plants and the warm-blooded animals bear the seeds of death in them.... The question then is: how are we to account for this deterioration? Virtually the whole of nature around us, even when investigated scientifically, is not such as it was intended to be. Who is responsible for this? The blame lies with man because he succumbed to the Luciferic temptation, to what is called in the opening chapter of Genesis, the “Fall”, or original sin. To Spiritual Science this is a real and genuine drama in which man was not only involved, but which was first played out in the soul of man. At that time man was still so powerful that he involved the whole of nature in his fall.

...But in addition, man was also designed for a particular tone; he was endowed with his own specific tone in the whole Harmony of the Spheres, and also with an original vitality, so that it would always have been possible for the etheric body, if it had retained its original vitality, to have preserved the immortality of the physical body. And man would have been spared the consequences. For had the etheric body preserved its original form man would have continued to dwell in those higher realms from which he has fallen. He would not have succumbed to the Luciferic temptation, for in those higher realms totally different conditions would have prevailed. And in former times those conditions really did exist.

...Thus the Christ Impulse was implanted in the whole of Earth evolution. I doubt if there is a single person who imagines that the Christ Impulse loses anything of its majesty or sublimity when it is incorporated in this way in the whole world order; when, in other words, it is restored to its cosmic rank, and when men really acknowledge that at the beginning of Earth evolution there existed, and at the end of Earth evolution there will exist, an order different from the present natural order, and a moral order that transcends the physical. The Christ Impulse was necessary in order that the end of Earth evolution should be worthy of the beginning. 

The reason why, normally, we cannot purify the astral while chained to the physical body is because our soul life is so conditioned to react to sensory events in selfish ways. Any incremental progress we make in taming some lower passions through the intellect is almost immediately and entirely negated by that conditioning as we continue to navigate the sensory entanglement. For example, maybe we make some progress in dealing with unhealthy (selfish) eating habits by carefully working out a dietary plan, but then we are constantly confronted with the whole production, marketing, etc. complex of fast foods, which trigger encrusted patterns of feeling and will that the intellect is powerless to resist. What is needed here is something equally or more potent to replace (or transmute) those old habits, and that we don't find in normal sensory life.

But on the initiatory path, the spiritual within the sensory gradually begins to shine through. There are growing points of contact between the purely ideal life and the sensory life. Sensory events begin to remind us more of ideal streams of destiny, such as those outlined in Occult Science. In that way, the events can lend their energy and yield to new ideal habits instead of triggering the old selfish ways of being. Basically, we have penetrated surrounding cultural and natural events with more holistic spiritual insight, coming to intimately perceive their overarching significance in our streams of destiny. This new insight helps us resist the siren song of the old selfish soul patterns in reaction to sensory events. Such a path of development is already shortening the time that would be needed in kamaloca to purify the soul impurities before ascending to purely ideal worlds and creatively working on the curvatures of destiny. 

We should remember that is the purpose of the purification - it gives us an opportunity to creatively plan the archetypal streamlines of our next incarnation so that we can compensate for past karma and advance toward the fully human (Christ) ideal. Even once we go through kamaloca, the impurities of the soul body that are purged during that time don't simply disappear - we have to clothe our spirit in them again as we return to our next incarnation and form a new soul body. In that sense, only those parts of the astral body can be immortalized that we work on purifying consciously and freely during incarnate existence. The work is always accomplished as a rhythmic bouncing between the two poles of existence - the purely ideal pole providing holistic insight into how the psycho-physical curvatures should 'bend' such that we are given the best opportunities to accomplish the work of inner perfection within the pole of manifest existence. 

Ok, I understand in broad outlines. From your initial post I had received the impression that this work was achievable here and now (the Kingdom is at hand). But In the context of the whole solar evolution, it's less difficult to picture this progressive work. I am still not clear what the physical and etheric human body would have been like without the Fall, and what is left of ideal life once cycles and polarities are progressively streamlined (since the whole universe seems to be founded on the workings of cycles and polarities). But as I said, I am following the broad lines. It's probably enough for now. Thank you.