The Mask (1994 film) related to The Magic Consciousness Structure

[LukeJTM]

Hi Luke,

That is reconciled when we remember that ideational activity is also the source of better technology. It is the rational consciousness that can most efficiently tease apart the various components of the Whole and reconfigure those components into new relationships, while the magical-mythic consciousness simply has no interest in that so it never develops that capacity. In its infancy, however, the rational consciousness also loses sight of the Whole in the process of teasing it apart and therefore utilizes the new relationships for myopic, selfish purposes, such as weapons to dominate other groups of people. We should always understand that there is a reciprocal relationship between spiritual activity and its manifestations in the World, the latter feeding back into the former so that it can continually manifest new adaptive forms. That holds true even at the super-physical level of the etheric, astral, and so forth. I think it's generally more helpful to begin with a book like PoF (or maybe the condensed version that Scott is working on) before working through Gebser and other similar writers. The underlying principles of spiritual activity greatly illuminate the complicated details of its various manifestations throughout the ages. It is only through meditation and spiritual exercises, however, that these principles become more second nature, since the bombardment of fragmented details through our normal sensory-conceptual environment doesn't keep dragging us back to where we started when we have strengthened our I-consciousness.

Yes, that makes a lot of sense. But it is an insight I was starting to grasp intuitively, which is why I said that both sides are convincing. Yes the Spaniards won because of superior technology. But why did they have better technology? Because of their rational capabilities allowing them to turn the parts into new relationships. The argument eventually leads back to the inner life of the people.
I read the part at the end of the 1st chapter listing sources. Note 6 mentions some other battles where this same insight can be justified, such as the victory of the Swiss confederates over the Austrian Army at Mortgarten in 1315. Or the Greek victory over the Persians under Xerxes' command could have a similarity. i thought that was interesting.

The language connections you are mentioning are very interesting. The eightfoldness holds a significant occult meaning and generally symbolizes a threefold and sevenfold activity that is made Whole (the eightfoldness being the Whole). For example, the physical elements (solid, liquid, gas) and etheric elements (light, chemical, life) which are united through the element of warmth (such as the warmth of cognitive love) and are thereby made Whole. Or the threefold body and threefold spirit that are united through the link of “I”. Old Saturn, Old Sun, OId Moon and Jupiter, Venus, Vulcan that are united through Earth. Generally, the eighth element is the primal Unity that falls asleep and reawakens to itself through nested threefold and sevenfold structures (the latter being the reflection of threefoldness across a central axis, from unconscious to conscious). So the connection to wakefulness and illumination definitely makes sense. It’s really fascinating to see how these things are preserved in various languages since the latter has certainly been the most direct manifestation of our spiritual activity throughout the ages and will continue to be no matter what form it is expressed through - gestures, verbal concepts, images, etc.

Interesting, thanks for elaborating. I find it interesting also that the number 8 in written form appears as a whole shape (at least in modern Germanic languages and I think Romance languages also). Other numbers (apart from 0) have discernible ending points, whereas 8 doesn't, it is a whole shape. Perhaps that has some connection to the occult meaning, but I'm not sure.


By the way, since we're speaking about language connections, I was reading the introduction for the 7th English edition of Steiner's PoF. It is mostly about the differences between German terms Steiner used in the book, and the closest terms in English. There was a bit of information about word endings, which is interesting, and a small quote from Steiner speaking about the significance of word endings. You probably are familiar with that introduction anyway, but I will just add in the relevant part because I feel that it adds something to the discussion. I'm not sure what the original lecture is or if it's available in English, maybe you know it?

https://rsarchive.org/Books/GA004/Engli ... intro.html

FREEDOM is not an exact equivalent of the German word Freiheit, although among its wide spectrum of meanings there are some that do correspond. In certain circumstances, however, the differences are important. Steiner himself drew attention to this, for instance, in a lecture he gave at Oxford in 1922, where he said with reference to this book,

“Therefore today we need above all a view of the world based on Freiheit — one can use this word in German, but here in England one must put it differently because the word ‘freedom’ has a different meaning — one must say a view of the world based on spiritual activity, on action, on thinking and feeling that arise from the individual human spirit.” (Translated from the German.)

Steiner also drew attention to the different endings of the words; Freiheit could be rendered literally as “freehood” if such a word existed. The German ending -heit implied an inner condition or degree, while -tum, corresponding to our “-dom”, implied something granted or imposed from outside. This is only partly true in English, as a consideration of the words “manhood”, “knighthood”, “serfdom”, “earldom”, and “wisdom” will show. In any case, meanings change with time, and current usage rather than etymology is the best guide.

When describing any kind of creative activity we speak of a “freedom of style” or “freedom of expression” in a way that indicates an inner conquest of outer restraints. This inner conquest is the theme of the book, and it is in this sense that I believe the title The Philosophy of Freedom would be understood today. When Steiner questioned the aptness of this title, he expressed the view that English people believed that they already possessed freedom, and that they needed to be shocked out of their complacency and made to realize that the freedom he meant had to be attained by hard work. While this may still be true today, the alternative he suggested is now less likely to achieve this shock than is the original. I have not found that the title “The Philosophy of Spiritual Activity” gives the newcomer any indication that the goal of the book is the attainment of inner freedom. Today it is just as likely to suggest a justification of religious practices. Throughout the book it has proved quite impossible to translate Freiheit as “spiritual activity” wherever it occurs. The word appears in the titles of the parts of the book and of some of the chapters; the book opens with the question of freedom or necessity, and the final sentence (see Consequences of Monism) is “He is free.” Undoubtedly “freedom” is the proper English word to express the main theme of the book, and should also appear in the book's title. Times have changed, and what may well have been good reasons for changing the title in 1922 are not necessarily still valid. After much thought, and taking everything into account, I have decided that the content of the book is better represented today by the title The Philosophy of Freedom. Moreover, with this title the book may be instantly identified with Die Philosophie der Freiheit, and I have already remarked that this edition is intended as a close translation of the German, rather than a new book specially written for the English.

[Federica]

Hi Luke, I’m glad you are still ‘around’ and/or reading and reflecting with us

Ashvin and Federica, are you trying to suggest that the past, present, and future can be understood as 3 perspectives which occur in the Now, Instead of merely being a flow from A to B?

Yes! To say it in other words, the Now is a thought. 'Now' is of thought nature (as everything else) so it 'extends' (better said, its nature changes) in proportion to our growing ability to grasp (really grasp!) more sense, more connections, more of the whole wave encapsulating any event, as opposed to being lost not getting why and how things happen. So, the more we keep our attention open, open to the possibility of understanding every event (big or small, starting from the events of our daily life) within the context of other larger events, open to the possibility of uncovering patterns, of noticing more correlations and more meaning, the more our Now expands.

As it expands, it comes to encompass more and more of all that is there, all that should be understood, if we were in a perfect, eternal understanding of world, if we were in the spiritual world (or, better said, if we were conscious of it, because we are in it even now, anyway). Because in the same way a blind person is indeed immersed in a world of color and form - he just can’t perceive it - so we are immersed in the eternal, revolving, ever present world of spirit even now, regardless of how much of it we can perceive. The more we evolve our level of conscious grasping of the consistency and meaningfulness of more and more 'waves’ of events - a wave of events is a series of correlated events - in their diversity of span, form, frequency, overall quality, the more we expand in parallel our own understanding of “Now”, and the more we approximate an experience of the spiritual world.

In the spiritual world there are only thoughts, which is the same as to say: there are only beings, as opposed to beings + spatial environment around the beings, as we experience in the normal, sensory world. If we try to sense that, we can also sense that, when you take away space in this way, when all reality is thought-only, then Time is felt as something very different from our normal understanding of it.

In normal understanding, a certain time is what for example allows us to move in space to a certain extent. In normal, sensory life, we feel that, if going from A to B takes a certain time, then going all the way to point C, that is further away in space, will take longer time. In other words, time is bound to space, it is enslaved to space. But now take space away. Now imagine a world made of thoughts only, where thoughts are beings, since they don’t have a physical body. What remains of time then? Then, time will become “concentrated” and all present, ever present, at once, as immediate, direct code to experience, not any longer mediated, and made linear through the intermediation of space and distance.

Maybe, when you were very young, say, at school, sitting in the class, you had the experience of being completely lost in your thoughts. Maybe the teacher was talking, but you weren’t hearing their voice anymore, not even vaguely, because you were so absorbed in your thoughts and fantasies, as in a separate world. Do you remember such an experience? Maybe you remember that you suddenly awakened to the voice of the teacher talking to you: “Luke??? Are you with us?” I believe it’s more difficult to have such experiences as adults. But if you remember that, then you have a good feel of being one with a flow of thoughts, leaving the spatial context behind, and thereby entering an “ever present now”. As Steiner describes it, in a lecture that I have found useful to grasping true Time:

If you have the feeling that this is a living thought, it draws your soul with it, your soul is bound up with the thought, and it might just as well be said that the thought is in your soul as that your soul is in the thought, then you have something in sense life similar to the way in which you get to know the beings of the higher hierarchies and the way you behave toward them. The words, “I am beside them, I am outside them,” lose all meaning. You are with them, just as your thoughts live with you. Not that you might say, “The thoughts live in me.” You have rather to say, “A thought thinks itself in me.” The beings experience themselves, and you experience the experience of the beings. You are within them; you are one with them, so that your whole being is poured out into the sphere in which they live. You share their life, all the time knowing quite well that they, too, are experiencing themselves in this.

[AshvinP]

Hi Luke,

That is reconciled when we remember that ideational activity is also the source of better technology. It is the rational consciousness that can most efficiently tease apart the various components of the Whole and reconfigure those components into new relationships, while the magical-mythic consciousness simply has no interest in that so it never develops that capacity. In its infancy, however, the rational consciousness also loses sight of the Whole in the process of teasing it apart and therefore utilizes the new relationships for myopic, selfish purposes, such as weapons to dominate other groups of people. We should always understand that there is a reciprocal relationship between spiritual activity and its manifestations in the World, the latter feeding back into the former so that it can continually manifest new adaptive forms. That holds true even at the super-physical level of the etheric, astral, and so forth. I think it's generally more helpful to begin with a book like PoF (or maybe the condensed version that Scott is working on) before working through Gebser and other similar writers. The underlying principles of spiritual activity greatly illuminate the complicated details of its various manifestations throughout the ages. It is only through meditation and spiritual exercises, however, that these principles become more second nature, since the bombardment of fragmented details through our normal sensory-conceptual environment doesn't keep dragging us back to where we started when we have strengthened our I-consciousness.

Yes, that makes a lot of sense. But it is an insight I was starting to grasp intuitively, which is why I said that both sides are convincing. Yes the Spaniards won because of superior technology. But why did they have better technology? Because of their rational capabilities allowing them to turn the parts into new relationships. The argument eventually leads back to the inner life of the people.
I read the part at the end of the 1st chapter listing sources. Note 6 mentions some other battles where this same insight can be justified, such as the victory of the Swiss confederates over the Austrian Army at Mortgarten in 1315. Or the Greek victory over the Persians under Xerxes' command could have a similarity. i thought that was interesting.

The language connections you are mentioning are very interesting. The eightfoldness holds a significant occult meaning and generally symbolizes a threefold and sevenfold activity that is made Whole (the eightfoldness being the Whole). For example, the physical elements (solid, liquid, gas) and etheric elements (light, chemical, life) which are united through the element of warmth (such as the warmth of cognitive love) and are thereby made Whole. Or the threefold body and threefold spirit that are united through the link of “I”. Old Saturn, Old Sun, OId Moon and Jupiter, Venus, Vulcan that are united through Earth. Generally, the eighth element is the primal Unity that falls asleep and reawakens to itself through nested threefold and sevenfold structures (the latter being the reflection of threefoldness across a central axis, from unconscious to conscious). So the connection to wakefulness and illumination definitely makes sense. It’s really fascinating to see how these things are preserved in various languages since the latter has certainly been the most direct manifestation of our spiritual activity throughout the ages and will continue to be no matter what form it is expressed through - gestures, verbal concepts, images, etc.

Interesting, thanks for elaborating. I find it interesting also that the number 8 in written form appears as a whole shape (at least in modern Germanic languages and I think Romance languages also). Other numbers (apart from 0) have discernible ending points, whereas 8 doesn't, it is a whole shape. Perhaps that has some connection to the occult meaning, but I'm not sure.

Yes, that outer should always be traced back to the inner. That is especially important to do with our modern technological developments, since we stand at the threshold where the outer (natural, cultural) needs to become more and more transparent so that the inner (spiritual, moral) is revealed. We could say that was always the case, but the ancient Greeks or the Swiss or even the Spaniards with their rational consciousness did not have the capacity to not only utilize the consciousness for technological development, but also observe that consciousness as it was being utilized, as we do now. For example, the only reason we can notice and speak of these patterns of evolving spiritual activity in human civilization is because we also have the capacity to observe spiritual activity itself. If we also understand the sensory domain as a manifestation of our particular mode of consciousness, then we see why the natural sciences that study this domain are also observing spiritual activity. It is the capacity to become conscious of this reality that allows for the outer to become more transparent and be infused with the moral qualities of the inner. That capacity is occultly referred to as the 'Christ impulse'.

The new mutation of consciousness, on the other hand, as a consequence of arationality, receives its decisive stamp from the manifest perceptual emergence of the spiritual...

Two apocryphal statements of Christian doctrine clarify in their way what is meant here: “This world is a bridge, cross it but do not make of it your dwelling place,”2 and “I have chosen you before the earth began.”3 They point to the spiritual origin prior to all spatio-temporal materialization. We may regard such materialization as a bridge that makes possible the merging or coalescence, the concrescere of origin and the present. The great church father Irenaeus presumably had these sayings in mind when he stated: “Blessed is he who was before the coming of man.”4

We have seen him; he revealed himself in space and time. In his departure he was beheld by his disciples in his transparency, a transparency appropriate only to the spiritual origin (if anything can be appropriated to it), the transparency which a time-free and ego-free person can presentiate in the most fortunate certainty of life. The grand and painful path of consciousness emergence, or, more appropriately, the unfolding and intensification of consciousness, manifests itself as an increasingly intense luminescence of the spiritual in man. Throughout the millennia the traditionalists, the “initiates,” have seen man’s previous journey as a decline, a departure from the affinity to and a distanciation from origin. Painful as this distanciation may be, it has served the requisite intensification of consciousness. Only distanciation contains the possibility for the awakening of consciousness.

Gebser, Jean. The Ever-Present Origin: Part One: Foundations Of The Aperspectival World . Ohio University Press. Kindle Edition.

If we turn the 8 sideways, then we get the lemniscate which certainly has occult meaning associated to this inner and outer mutational relationship. We probably know it as the symbol for infinity or eternity, but the occult meaning takes us deeper into the various continual rhythms of the eternal Spirit and its temporal manifestations that become perceptible. These are referred to as aeons, rounds, globes, and epochs in certain esoteric streams. As Federica discussed in her last post, and as Gebser indicates above, our current epoch is oriented towards bringing more and more of the eternal spiritual rhythms into our spatio-temporal consciousness in a way that is concrete-practical for our individual and collective life.

By the way, since we're speaking about language connections, I was reading the introduction for the 7th English edition of Steiner's PoF. It is mostly about the differences between German terms Steiner used in the book, and the closest terms in English. There was a bit of information about word endings, which is interesting, and a small quote from Steiner speaking about the significance of word endings. You probably are familiar with that introduction anyway, but I will just add in the relevant part because I feel that it adds something to the discussion. I'm not sure what the original lecture is or if it's available in English, maybe you know it?

https://rsarchive.org/Books/GA004/Engli ... intro.html

FREEDOM is not an exact equivalent of the German word Freiheit, although among its wide spectrum of meanings there are some that do correspond. In certain circumstances, however, the differences are important. Steiner himself drew attention to this, for instance, in a lecture he gave at Oxford in 1922, where he said with reference to this book,

“Therefore today we need above all a view of the world based on Freiheit — one can use this word in German, but here in England one must put it differently because the word ‘freedom’ has a different meaning — one must say a view of the world based on spiritual activity, on action, on thinking and feeling that arise from the individual human spirit.” (Translated from the German.)

Steiner also drew attention to the different endings of the words; Freiheit could be rendered literally as “freehood” if such a word existed. The German ending -heit implied an inner condition or degree, while -tum, corresponding to our “-dom”, implied something granted or imposed from outside. This is only partly true in English, as a consideration of the words “manhood”, “knighthood”, “serfdom”, “earldom”, and “wisdom” will show. In any case, meanings change with time, and current usage rather than etymology is the best guide.

When describing any kind of creative activity we speak of a “freedom of style” or “freedom of expression” in a way that indicates an inner conquest of outer restraints. This inner conquest is the theme of the book, and it is in this sense that I believe the title The Philosophy of Freedom would be understood today. When Steiner questioned the aptness of this title, he expressed the view that English people believed that they already possessed freedom, and that they needed to be shocked out of their complacency and made to realize that the freedom he meant had to be attained by hard work. While this may still be true today, the alternative he suggested is now less likely to achieve this shock than is the original. I have not found that the title “The Philosophy of Spiritual Activity” gives the newcomer any indication that the goal of the book is the attainment of inner freedom. Today it is just as likely to suggest a justification of religious practices. Throughout the book it has proved quite impossible to translate Freiheit as “spiritual activity” wherever it occurs. The word appears in the titles of the parts of the book and of some of the chapters; the book opens with the question of freedom or necessity, and the final sentence (see Consequences of Monism) is “He is free.” Undoubtedly “freedom” is the proper English word to express the main theme of the book, and should also appear in the book's title. Times have changed, and what may well have been good reasons for changing the title in 1922 are not necessarily still valid. After much thought, and taking everything into account, I have decided that the content of the book is better represented today by the title The Philosophy of Freedom. Moreover, with this title the book may be instantly identified with Die Philosophie der Freiheit, and I have already remarked that this edition is intended as a close translation of the German, rather than a new book specially written for the English.

Thanks for sharing this introduction. I don’t know enough about philology yet, but I can tell that it is an endlessly fascinating and illuminating topic to explore - a great tool for making the outer world of culture and nature more transparent.

It seems everyone has their preferred title for that book. I generally prefer a reference to spiritual activity, but perhaps it could be called, “The Birth of Individual Freedom Through Spiritual Activity”.

[Federica]

I'm not sure what the original lecture is or if it's available in English, maybe you know it?

The lecture is available here.

All these linguistic observations, and their spiritual connections, are so interesting. Thanks for sharing a few of them! It made me think for a second that I would include "The Ever Present Origin" in my reading list, or should I call it my reading debt

The book is freely accessible on the Internet Archive, by the way.

[LukeJTM]

Hi Luke, I’m glad you are still ‘around’ and/or reading and reflecting with us

I have been a bit busy the last few months, so I haven't had much to reply back with till recently.

In the spiritual world there are only thoughts, which is the same as to say: there are only beings, as opposed to beings + spatial environment around the beings, as we experience in the normal, sensory world. If we try to sense that, we can also sense that, when you take away space in this way, when all reality is thought-only, then Time is felt as something very different from our normal understanding of it.

In normal understanding, a certain time is what for example allows us to move in space to a certain extent. In normal, sensory life, we feel that, if going from A to B takes a certain time, then going all the way to point C, that is further away in space, will take longer time. In other words, time is bound to space, it is enslaved to space. But now take space away. Now imagine a world made of thoughts only, where thoughts are beings, since they don’t have a physical body. What remains of time then? Then, time will become “concentrated” and all present, ever present, at once, as immediate, direct code to experience, not any longer mediated, and made linear through the intermediation of space and distance.

Do you think that could work or function as a type of focused thinking meditation exercise?

The lecture is available here.

All these linguistic observations, and their spiritual connections, are so interesting. Thanks for sharing a few of them! It made me think for a second that I would include "The Ever Present Origin" in my reading list, or should I call it my reading debt

The book is freely accessible on the Internet Archive, by the way.

Thanks, I read through some of the lecture. It looks very informative.

I am aware Gebser's book is on Achive. But I am reading a physical version instead. I usually read a physical book if I have money to buy a book, because an online book just doesn't have the same type of feeling or connection I have with a physical book. Maybe it is the same for you?

[LukeJTM]

Anyway. Thank you Federica and Ashvin for the responses. Like usually, I don't understand everything, but it is very helpful nonetheless.

[Federica]

Hi Luke, I’m glad you are still ‘around’ and/or reading and reflecting with us

I have been a bit busy the last few months, so I haven't had much to reply back with till recently.

In the spiritual world there are only thoughts, which is the same as to say: there are only beings, as opposed to beings + spatial environment around the beings, as we experience in the normal, sensory world. If we try to sense that, we can also sense that, when you take away space in this way, when all reality is thought-only, then Time is felt as something very different from our normal understanding of it.

In normal understanding, a certain time is what for example allows us to move in space to a certain extent. In normal, sensory life, we feel that, if going from A to B takes a certain time, then going all the way to point C, that is further away in space, will take longer time. In other words, time is bound to space, it is enslaved to space. But now take space away. Now imagine a world made of thoughts only, where thoughts are beings, since they don’t have a physical body. What remains of time then? Then, time will become “concentrated” and all present, ever present, at once, as immediate, direct code to experience, not any longer mediated, and made linear through the intermediation of space and distance.

Do you think that could work or function as a type of focused thinking meditation exercise?

Well, I would think so, although I never tried. Besides, I am not in a good position to say much about meditation, given my limited experience.

I am aware Gebser's book is on Achive. But I am reading a physical version instead. I usually read a physical book if I have money to buy a book, because an online book just doesn't have the same type of feeling or connection I have with a physical book. Maybe it is the same for you?

Yes, it used to be the same for me, and it's still the case to some extent. A physical book is more engaging, and has more character. But I am also reading on screen, or Kindle. I believe it's useful to create a more ideal connection with the content, less mediated by sensory experience. It's a small 'deconditioning' step. Reading from screen is still a sensory experience but somewhat less rooted in the senses.

[Federica]

Anyway. Thank you Federica and Ashvin for the responses. Like usually, I don't understand everything, but it is very helpful nonetheless.

Luke, I can try to make my thoughts clearer.
What part is unclear, or questionable? (there could definitely be questionable parts)

[LukeJTM]

Federica, I think my confusion was cleared up when I had a re-think about what you and Ashvin said regarding the nature of time. But I will still try discussing further.

Rudolf Steiner's book Theosophy came to mind. He said in the spiritual world things are positioned together or attracted together according to their inner nature. I will put in a quote from him below.

An important difference between soul and physical processes can be expressed by saying that the reciprocal action in the processes of the soul is much more inward than in the physical. In physical space there reigns, for example, the law of impact. When an ivory ball strikes a ball at rest, the resting ball will move in a direction that can be calculated from the motion and elasticity of the first. In soul space the reciprocal action of two forms that encounter each other depends on their inner qualities. If they are in affinity they mutually interpenetrate and, as it were, grow together. They repel each other if their natures are in conflict. In physical space there are also definite laws of vision. We see distant objects perspectively diminishing. When we look down an avenue, the distant trees appear closer together than those nearby. In the soul space, on the contrary, all objects near or far appear to the clairvoyant at distances apart that are in accordance with their inner nature. This is naturally a source of the most manifold errors for those who enter the soul world and wish to be at home there with the help of the rules they bring from the physical world.

That makes sense to me. Everyone can relate that to things we experience through our life, for ex. relationships between people. We connect more easily with people who are similar to us, or we are drawn to people who are similar to us; people who aren't similar are repelled from each other. Or, when people are close in an emotional/mental sense, that is not a spatial closeness. It is the same when someone might say "we became distant over the years." The nature of those things make sense when connected with what Steiner said.

So I suppose that is connected with the idea of Time (Great Time, 'clairvoyant time') that is being discussed here. How is time connected with what Steiner said? I.e. things or beings attracted or drawn to one another by their inner nature(s). What makes the spiritual energies or processes temporal? Why are you calling them temporal? because it seems like you are speaking about something that is beyond time (the flow or sequence of experiences and events). Does that make sense?


One of the things I don't understand as much is the different 'impulses' connected with spirits. Ashvin mentioned, above, the 'Christ impulse'. I think he was trying to say, basically, that that impulse is about bringing the spiritual into the physical realm, or learning to discern the spiritual within the physical realm. Is that an accurate brief summary?
Rudolf Steiner spoke of two other 'impulses': beings of the darkness which he called Ahriman and Lucifer. I have a very basic understanding. Ahriman, I think his impulse appears as denial of anything spiritual, and cold, mechanical logic. Whereas Lucifer seems to be connected with escapism, or possibly denial of the material world, or getting lost in fantasies, but I'm not totally sure. And I think Christ is meant to redeem the other two, to bring them into the light or good.

Can elaboration be given on Lucifer? I don't understand that one as clearly.
Are these beings a single individual, or are they more like groups or collectives of spirits under a single name or identity?

[AshvinP]

Federica, I think my confusion was cleared up when I had a re-think about what you and Ashvin said regarding the nature of time. But I will still try discussing further.

Rudolf Steiner's book Theosophy came to mind. He said in the spiritual world things are positioned together or attracted together according to their inner nature. I will put in a quote from him below.

An important difference between soul and physical processes can be expressed by saying that the reciprocal action in the processes of the soul is much more inward than in the physical. In physical space there reigns, for example, the law of impact. When an ivory ball strikes a ball at rest, the resting ball will move in a direction that can be calculated from the motion and elasticity of the first. In soul space the reciprocal action of two forms that encounter each other depends on their inner qualities. If they are in affinity they mutually interpenetrate and, as it were, grow together. They repel each other if their natures are in conflict. In physical space there are also definite laws of vision. We see distant objects perspectively diminishing. When we look down an avenue, the distant trees appear closer together than those nearby. In the soul space, on the contrary, all objects near or far appear to the clairvoyant at distances apart that are in accordance with their inner nature. This is naturally a source of the most manifold errors for those who enter the soul world and wish to be at home there with the help of the rules they bring from the physical world.

That makes sense to me. Everyone can relate that to things we experience through our life, for ex. relationships between people. We connect more easily with people who are similar to us, or we are drawn to people who are similar to us; people who aren't similar are repelled from each other. Or, when people are close in an emotional/mental sense, that is not a spatial closeness. It is the same when someone might say "we became distant over the years." The nature of those things make sense when connected with what Steiner said.

So I suppose that is connected with the idea of Time (Great Time, 'clairvoyant time') that is being discussed here. How is time connected with what Steiner said? I.e. things or beings attracted or drawn to one another by their inner nature(s). What makes the spiritual energies or processes temporal? Why are you calling them temporal? because it seems like you are speaking about something that is beyond time (the flow or sequence of experiences and events). Does that make sense?


One of the things I don't understand as much is the different 'impulses' connected with spirits. Ashvin mentioned, above, the 'Christ impulse'. I think he was trying to say, basically, that that impulse is about bringing the spiritual into the physical realm, or learning to discern the spiritual within the physical realm. Is that an accurate brief summary?
Rudolf Steiner spoke of two other 'impulses': beings of the darkness which he called Ahriman and Lucifer. I have a very basic understanding. Ahriman, I think his impulse appears as denial of anything spiritual, and cold, mechanical logic. Whereas Lucifer seems to be connected with escapism, or possibly denial of the material world, or getting lost in fantasies, but I'm not totally sure. And I think Christ is meant to redeem the other two, to bring them into the light or good.

Can elaboration be given on Lucifer? I don't understand that one as clearly.
Are these beings a single individual, or are they more like groups or collectives of spirits under a single name or identity?

Luke,

I would like to offer some additional thoughts here. At the conceptual level, I think the time-consciousness spectrum is the most helpful tool. Let’s take the example of someone we connect with at an emotional level during life. That connection is something temporally extended that unites many different physical events, such as meeting the person, getting to know them over several more meetings, working with them, living with them, or whatever the case may be depending on the relationship. If we wanted to conceptually map this out and describe perceptually every detailed event that went into this relationship, it would take a lot of time and many pages. And we experience it in our thinking as something that unfolded over many years. Yet the whole string of events is sort of embedded within the intimate emotional connection we experience when first meeting the person. It is there as a dim intuition-inspiration of latent possibilities that we cannot put into clear concepts. Our emotional soul-life lives in a much broader aperture of the past-future than our normal thought-life and sensory-life, in that sense. We should think of them all as superimposed, i.e. they are not following each other ‘in time’ but rather they exist simultaneously and the relation between them is what determines our experience of time.

Now if we were to unite with others on the basis of shared living ideals that really stir up our life of will, that really motivate not only our thoughts and emotions but also our deeds, then we are attenuated to a spiritual life that encompasses an even broader spectrum of events than our thought and soul life. These are the events that are structured by not only particular emotional relationships related to our temperament, character, etc., but entire physical destinies over a lifetime. They may relate to our family, our nation, our species, our geographical location, our climate, and so forth. All these factors bring people together and determine the overarching course of their lives – how they can physically develop, what they can experience, who they can meet, how they can move around, etc. When confronted by a person infused with such an ideal, we might say “this is that person's reason for existing [on the physical plane]” without realizing how literally that is true. Many of these factors were consciously chosen by us before incarnation.



(taken from previous post by Cleric)


The thinking, emotional, life, and physical spheres are all nested one within the other, mutually influencing each other, although the broader spheres generally structure the narrower ones in a meaningful way, while the narrower ones provide valuable feedback as to what needs to be further perfected in the structuring activity. The importance of thinking (which first manifests at the intersection of the pyramids), however, is that it is the thread that runs through all spheres. The thinking I mentioned above that is fragmented into spatial frames is only that form of thinking conditioned by the physical senses and the isolated personality (which clearly has its uses for Earthly tasks, including moral development). Thinking as such, unconditioned by the senses and lower impulses, is what allows us to become conscious of these layers of our being like we are starting to do right now on this forum and in these posts. Through our supra-sensory thinking here we are laying a foundation for a more intuitive experience that reintegrates the forces of feeling and will, freeing the soul and the body from their reflected and shadowy existence (microcosm). We are idealizing the latter so that they are experienced in their true nature as fractal images of an Earthly and Cosmic Soul and Body, i.e. a completely interconnected organism that comprises all other spiritual beings (macrocosm).

This act of becoming conscious and creatively taking hold of what otherwise takes its course and directs our destinies subconsciously is the heart of the Christ impulse. Here is another way to think about it. Normally we bounce back and forth between extreme states of being in order to balance out certain imperfections and evolve. In terms of temporal experience, we can say we are always oscillating between the past and the future, or the Earth where our physical life unfolds and the Cosmos where our spiritual life unfolds. That is the rhythm of waking and sleeping and reawakening, or birth and death and rebirth. This rhythm is so extreme that we can't normally remain conscious of the oscillation into the broader spheres of the spiritual world, but only the relatively isolated sphere of the physical context. Steiner gives a few examples here.

I might give you another example of the connection between physical and spiritual life. Let us take a concrete, individual example. Suppose we have told a lie to someone on the physical plane — I am speaking of actual cases. When we tell a lie to someone, it happens at a certain point of time and what I shall now describe as the corresponding event in the spiritual world also takes place at a certain point of time between death and rebirth. Let us suppose we have told a lie to someone at some particular time on the physical plane; then, during our sojourn in the spiritual world, be it through initiation or through death, there comes a certain time when our soul in the spiritual world is entirely filled with the truth we ought to have expressed. This truth torments us; it stands before us and torments us to the same degree in which we deviated from it when we told the lie. Thus one need only tell a lie on the physical plane in order to bring about a time in the spiritual world when we are tormented by the corresponding truth, the opposite of the lie. There the truth torments us because it lives in us and burns us, and we cannot bear it. Our suffering consists in our seeing the truth before us. But we are in such a condition that this truth gives us no satisfaction, no joy, no pleasure; it torments us. One of the peculiarities of our experience in the spiritual world is that we are tormented by what is good, by the things which we know ought to uplift us.

Take another example. In our life in the physical world we may be lazy in doing something which it is our duty to do industriously; then comes a time in the spiritual world when we are filled with the industry we lacked in the physical world. Industry most surely comes; it is alive in us when we have been lazy in the physical plane. The time comes when from inner necessity, we have to exercise this industry unconditionally. We devote ourselves to it entirely and we know that it is something which is extremely valuable; but it torments us, it makes us suffer.

What the Christ impulse allows us to do is, through our higher thinking capacity, bring more of the spiritual compensation into our waking consciousness during life on Earth. We may then be able to balance two states of being in a single incarnation that otherwise would only be balanced over the course of two incarnations. He is the 3rd factor - the true nature of our "I" - that allows us to 'triangulate' between the two extremes in a more harmonious way, so that we experience the whole process unfolding through the feelings of peace and joy and love, instead of suffering, bitterness, and resentment. He inspires us to creatively and courageously take hold of our destiny while we are on Earth. “Wherever two or three are gathered in my name, there I am in the midst of them.”

Let us suppose that a certain kind of illness attacks someone who has taken up Spiritual Science in the way described and it is in his karma that he may be cured. Naturally, it may be in his karma that the disease cannot be cured; but, when considering an illness, karma never under any circumstance says that it must run a certain course in a fatalistic sense, it can be cured or it cannot be cured. Now, anyone who has earnestly taken up Spiritual Science acquires an instinctive feeling which helps him to oppose the illness and its weakening effect with the proper remedy. That which in the ordinary way is experienced as the result of the illness in the spiritual world works back into the soul, and, in so far as one is still in the physical body, it acts as instinct. One either succumbs to the illness or finds within oneself the way to the forces of healing. When the clairvoyant consciousness finds the right remedy for an illness, it happens in the following way: such a clairvoyant is able to call up before him the picture of the illness. Let us suppose that he has the picture before him of the illness which approaches a person in such or such a way and has a weakening effect on him. Owing to his clairvoyant consciousness there appears to him the counterpart of the illness, namely, the corresponding feeling of health, and the strengthening which springs from this feeling. That which can now happen to man in the spiritual world as the corresponding cure for that from which he is suffering in the physical world, is perceived by the clairvoyant. Through this the clairvoyant is enabled to advise the man for his good. Indeed, one need not even be a fully developed clairvoyant, but this may appear to one instinctively from seeing the picture of the illness. But the cause of that which to clairvoyant consciousness appears as compensation in the spiritual world, belongs to the picture of the illness as much as the swing of a pendulum to one side belongs to the swing to the other side.

From this example you will see how the physical plane is related to the spiritual world and how fruitful for the guidance of our life here the knowledge of the spiritual world may be.

Now we also come to the question of Lucifer who, in our times, is a danger on the spiritual path because we must lean into his influence for the sort of consciousness mentioned above. Whereas Christ opens the portal to the spiritual so that we may heal our fellow humans and the Earth, Lucifer entices us to abandon the latter and focus only on ourselves. We should understand these beings as more overarching spirits in whom our soul-life is nested. For example, Steiner gives a helpful image of Lucifer’s reality when speaking of the "being of philosophy". Our own development at a collective level is an image of his individual development, which again helps us approach the true nature of Time-experience – it is the relation between different layers of our being. The reason that came about is generally because certain Angels did not complete their evolution on the previous incarnation of Earth – Old Moon - and therefore they must unite with the soul-life of humanity to evolve further (in contrast, Ahriman was an archangel who did not complete his evolution on Old Sun and in that sense has fallen even further behind his proper course of evolution).

You see from this that very many impulses of transformation as regards the spiritual life are coming forward in our time. For here we see something evolving that is like a human being except that it has a longer duration of life than an individual man. The individual man lives on the physical plane: for seven years he develops the physical body, for seven years the etheric body, for seven years the sentient body etc. The Being which evolves as philosophy (we call it by the abstract name ‘philosophy’) lives for 700 years in the etheric body, 700 – 800 years in the sentient body (the time is only approximate), 700 – 800 years in the sentient soul, 700 – 800 years in the intellectual or mind-soul and again 700 – 800 years in the consciousness soul. A Being evolves upwards of whom we can say: if we look at the very first beginnings of Grecian philosophy this Being has then just reached the stage of development which corresponds in mankind to puberty; as Being it is like man when he has reached the 14th – 16th year. Then it lives upwards to the time when a human being experiences the events between the 14th and 21st year; that is the age of Greek philosophy, Greek thought. Then comes the next 7 years, what man experiences from the age of 21 to 28; the Christ Impulse enters the development of philosophy. Then comes the period from Scotus Erigena up to the new age. This Being develops in the following 700 – 800 years what man develops between the ages of 28 and 35 years. And now we are living in the development of what man experiences in his consciousness soul: we are experiencing the consciousness soul of philosophy, of philosophical thought.

In the spiritual world after death, we become permeated with the wisdom of Lucifer and would be enticed to simply remain there with all our moral imperfections if it were not also for the progressive spirits led by Christ who show us that our full potential can only be reached through sacrificial activity for the advancement of all Earthly beings, including Lucifer and Ahriman. It is then left in our complete freedom to decide whether we will act on that knowledge of our full potential. In that sense, all of us who are incarnate now have already chosen to follow the Christ impulse and help realize the full potential of Earth's evolution, but that reality is simply obscured by our day-waking consciousness. That obscurity has been necessary for us to focus on our Earthly tasks and complete them in freedom, without being completely overwhelmed by the bright light of spiritual reality - its overflowing wisdom - and also the darker impulses that live in our souls. The modern intellect is like an Ark in that way, shielding us from realities that would either inflate our ego in a limitless way or obliterate our ego when confronted with its lower nature, and carrying us through the complexities of the modern age. But now we can also gradually allow some of the spiritual light to filter into our waking consciousness and purify those lower impulses, which then creates a positive feedback that allows for us to take more and more creative and moral responsibility over our own destiny.