The Rudolf Steiner Archive

32. Reincarnation and Karma

[ 1 ] When tracing individual development, one must not limit oneself to human beings, because their development is only a special case within the whole of nature. Development is the alternation of day and night, everything that unfolds over time, the ebb and flow of the tides—everywhere in inanimate nature, something similar takes place: changes in temporal events. What remains [in this ever-changing process] is the law. In spring, the sun stands in a certain constellation, that of Aries—on March 21. It was the symbol of the Logos—the ram or the lamb is therefore the sign of the re-appeared Solar Logos: the Lamb of God. The Greek legend of the Argonauts: the return of the ram, the sun god. The sun follows the same law. What changes is the manifestation, and what allows the manifestation to repeat itself in the same rhythmic cycle is the law.

[ 2 ] But in a certain sense, the law also changes. Eight hundred years before Christ, the sun began to rise in Aries; previously, it had risen in Taurus; it is moving on very slowly. That is why the Egyptians had the sacred bull “Apis,” as did the Persians. As long as the sun moved through the sign of Taurus, it was worshipped in this way.

[ 3 ] Previously, the sun rose in Gemini, and among ancient peoples we hear of its worship by the Persians, as well as by the Proto-Germans. Approximately every two thousand years, the sun moves forward very slowly. Relatively speaking, therefore, the law is constant, but it also undergoes a process of development. The law is that which is constant, [gap in the transcript] while the phenomena are that which is eternally changing.

[ 4 ] Let us now turn from inanimate nature to living nature. The individual plant is constantly dying; the species is perpetuated through the seed. Just as in inanimate nature phenomena pass away and the law remains, so in living nature the species is preserved, and individual beings pass away. This applies to both the plant and animal worlds.

[ 5 ] But here, too, the species remains the same while at the same time changing over time: the rock pigeon has evolved into the domesticated city pigeon. The essence of the species remains, but it changes somewhat. What caused the species to undergo this evolution? The external living conditions into which the species are placed. The effect of external factors on the internal alters the species. Everything that previously acted upon a being as an external condition subsequently becomes a process of further development within the being itself. The caves of Kentucky rob the animal of its sight; the animal absorbs the darkness.

[ 6 ] The sun would remain in place if other powerful celestial bodies did not pull it along. Every being absorbs and develops itself accordingly. Every process of development is therefore an interaction. Animals evolve in such a way that they ensure the survival of the next generation.

[ 7 ] Let us turn our attention to the personality. It is capable of imagination and can therefore enter into a new kind of life situation and absorb spiritual impressions. It finds itself in a new, spiritual environment. Just as in the species, the process of further development is shaped within the personality by these new spiritual conditions. The personality passes away like phenomena and individual beings, and like the law and the species, individuality remains. If it were otherwise, it would be a violation of the law, and this is how we understand reincarnation. Just as living conditions affect the species, the spiritual aspect is absorbed from within by the personality and continues to develop. This is the harmony between the law of reincarnation and the laws of the preservation of the species and of nature.

[ 8 ] When we trace the evolution of a species, we observe its adaptation to external living conditions, which is then passed on to its offspring. Adaptation and inheritance are the great laws that govern the living world. All inheritance is the transmission of acquired characteristics to offspring. When I look at the tumid-necked pigeon, I can only understand it by tracing it back to its ancestors and seeking the causes that gave rise to its organs. The present forms must be sought in the activities of times past. What was once an activity later becomes an organ. The same thing happens, in a spiritual sense, with individuality. It adapts and bequeaths to the successor of the personality whatever it has acquired in the spiritual realm. What has been absorbed through experience is carried forward in the process of development.

[ 9 ] Take the bean, for example: it develops into a sprout; everything else falls away, only a small part remains—and even that dies off—so that only life itself, along with the species, is passed on to the next generation of plants. Only the species remains, but the bean species itself, when it became a seedling, was still surrounded by a portion of plant matter that must also fall away. The fully formed plant is no longer the species, but it retains something of the husks that the seedling must carry over. Only when everything has fallen away can it arise anew. It is a new incarnation. Just as in the individual soul, which is surrounded by all its sheaths and can only incarnate once all remnants have fallen away. The human being has even more sheaths; these must return to where they came from. Then his germ is free and unencumbered, in the world where alone it can develop—into a new existence. Human beings belong to the Earth; without it, they would be inconceivable. They can exist only under this atmospheric pressure; this also applies to spiritual conditions. This is because they have evolved into this Earth, into its physical, astral, and mental spheres, which are intertwined. Human beings, as earthly beings, are composed of these three spheres. Individuality itself resides only in the higher mental realm; this is not bound to the Earth but belongs to the solar sphere. Within it rest the Earth with its three spheres, as well as the Sun and all the other planets. Thus, we still consist of a substance that does not change—the blank page onto which experiences are inscribed.

[ 10 ] We call the mental sphere, insofar as it belongs to the Earth, “Rupa,” or “formed”; the other, which extends outward, “Arup,” or “mental.” [Individuality] belongs here. In a certain sense, we are children of the Sun; that is why we also call our teachers “children of the Sun.”

[ 11 ] Just as a plant slowly releases all the substances it has absorbed to build itself up and retains only what is essential to its nature, so too does the human being—individuality—retain only what is arupa, or mental, in order to reincarnate. Arupa is the realm that leads out from the earth into the universal. Then it is the liberated butterfly that can spread its wings freely in the Arupa-mental realm; then [gap in the transcript] it must return to experience anew.

[ 12 ] Once a person has shed his physical body, he must also return to the astral realm whatever served to build him up from there; then he lives in Kamaloka.

[ 13 ] What he learns in this life becomes a seed; in Arupa it must develop, and then it will reach its full potential. Human beings are not merely citizens of Earth, but children of the Sun through their affiliation with that sphere. In the third race, the spark was kindled. Where did this spark come from, which the Manasaputras brought? The first knowledge was not given on Earth, but was brought over from an earlier state; it is something that transcends the sphere of action; thus, it remains when these effects cease. Only because human beings are capable of passing through Arupa do they become enduring; otherwise, they would be shattered. But likewise, the progressive development of the spiritual is a law that applies to the individual.

[ 14 ] The external becomes the internal; what is experienced externally becomes an inner principle of progress. What approaches individuality becomes an inner law. The current of the macrocosm flows into the individual being and thereby becomes the microcosm. Dispositions are the results of past experience: our conscience is past experience. Just as in the natural sciences, we must explain it; this is the law of karma: causality across various incarnations. You must seek the cause of a present disposition in past actions.

[ 15 ] Vedanta: What you think today is what you will be [tomorrow].

[ 16 ] Reincarnation means: the preservation of the spiritual within the physical.

[ 17 ] Karma means: What begins as an action later becomes a formation or a quality.