[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
present-day human consciousness, but they are more vivid and colorful, and, most important, they
relate to events in the outside world, while present-day dream images are mere echoes of daily life or
are otherwise unclear mirrorings of inner or outer events. The images of the Moon consciousness
corresponded completely to whatever they were related to externally.
Assume for instance that a Moon man as he has just been characterized, consisting of physical body,
ether body, and astral body, had approached another Moon being. It is true that he could not have
perceived the latter as a spatial object, for this has become possible only in the earth consciousness of
man; but within his astral body would have arisen an image which in its color and shape would have
quite exactly expressed whether the other being was well or ill disposed toward this Moon man,
whether it would be useful or dangerous to him.
As a result, the Moon man could regulate his behavior entirely in accordance with the images which
arose in his image consciousness, These images were a complete means of orientation for him. The
physical instrument which the astral body needed in order to enter into relation with the lower natural
realms was the nervous system, integrated into the physical body.
In order that the transformation of man described here could occur during the Moon period, the
assistance of a great universal event was needed. The integration of the astral body and the related
development of a nervous system in the physical body was only made possible by the fact that what
had previously been one body, the Sun, split into two into Sun and Moon. The former advanced to
the state of a fixed star, the latter remained a planet which the Sun also had been and began to
circle around the Sun, from which it had split off. Through this a significant transformation took place
in everything which lived on Sun and Moon. Here for the moment we shall follow this process of
transformation only insofar as it concerns the life of the Moon.
Man, consisting of physical body and astral body, had remained united with the Moon when it split
off from the Sun. He thereby entered into entirely new conditions of existence. For the Moon took
with it only a part of the forces contained in the Sun, and this part now acted on man from his own
heavenly body; the Sun had retained the other part of the forces within itself. This latter part is now
sent from the outside to the Moon and hence also to its inhabitant, man. If the previous relationship
had remained in existence, if all the Sun forces had continued to reach man from his own scene of
activity, that inner life which shows itself in the arising of the images of the astral body could not have
developed. The Sun force continued its activity on the physical body and ether body from the outside;
it had already acted on both of these previously. But it liberated a portion of these two bodies for
influences which emanated from the Moon, the heavenly body newly created by a splitting-off.
Thus, on the Moon man was under a two-fold influence, that of the Sun and that of the Moon. It is to
be ascribed to the influence of the Moon that out of the physical and the ether body there developed
those parts which permitted the imprinting of the astral body. An astral body can only create images
when the Sun forces reach it from outside rather than from its own planet. The Moon influences
transformed the sensory rudiments and the glandular organs in such a way that a nervous system could
be integrated into them; and the sun influences brought it about that the images for which this nervous
system was the instrument corresponded to the external Moon events in the manner described above.
The development could only progress to a certain point in this manner. Had this point been over-
stepped, the Moon man would have become hardened in his inner life of images, and thereby he
would have lost all connection with the Sun. When the time had come, the Sun again absorbed the
Moon, so that again for some time both were one body. The union lasted until man was far enough
advanced so that his hardening, which would have had to take place on the Moon, could be prevented
by a new stage of development. When this had occurred a new separation took place, but this time the
Moon took Sun forces along with itself which previously it had not received.
Through this it came about that another separation took place after some time. What had last split off
from the Sun was a heavenly body which contained all the forces and beings at present living on earth
and moon. Thus the earth still contained within itself the moon which now circles around it. If the
latter had remained within it, it could never have become the scene of any human development,
including the present one. The forces of the present moon first had to be cast off, and man had to
remain on the thus purified earthly scene and continue his development there. In this way three
heavenly bodies developed out of the old Sun. The forces of two of these heavenly bodies, the new
sun and the new moon, are sent to the earth and hence to its inhabitant from the outside.
Through this progress in the development of the heavenly bodies it became possible that into the
tripartite human nature, as it still had been on the Moon, the fourth part, the "I," integrated itself. This
integration was connected with a perfecting of the physical body, the ether body, and the astral body.
The perfecting of the physical body consisted in that the system of the heart was incorporated in it as
the preparer of warm blood. Of course, now the sensory system, the glandular system, and the nervous
system had to be transformed in such a way that in the human organism they would be compatible
with the newly added system of the warm blood.
The sensory organs were so transformed that out of the mere image consciousness of the old Moon
the object consciousness could develop, which makes possible the perception of external objects, and
which man at present possesses from the time he awakes in the morning until he falls asleep in the
evening. On the old Moon the senses were not yet open to the outside; the images of consciousness
arose from within, and just this opening of the senses to the external is the achievement of the earth
development.
It has been stated above that not all of the human bodies formed on Saturn attained the goal which
was set for them there, and that on the Sun, alongside the human realm in its form of that time, a
second natural realm developed. One must realize that at each of the subsequent stages of
development, on Sun, Moon, and earth, there were always beings which fell short of their goals and
that through this the lower natural realms came into existence.
The animal realm, which is closest to man, had already fallen behind on Saturn, but partially made up
the development under unfavorable conditions on Sun and Moon, so that while on the earth it was not
as far advanced as man, in part it still had the capacity to receive warm blood as he did. For warm
blood existed in none of the natural realms before the period of earth. The present-day cold-blooded
(or variably warm) animals and certain plants came into existence because certain beings of the lower
Sun realm again fell short of the stage which the other beings of this realm attained. The present-day
mineral realm came into existence last, in fact only during the earth period.
The fourfold man of earth receives from sun and moon the influences of those forces which have
remained connected with these heavenly bodies. From the sun those forces reach him which further
progress, growth, and becoming; from the moon come the hardening, forming forces. If man stood
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]