The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Lecture XIV

[ 1 ] Today we want to talk about the human being's stay in Devachan between two incarnations.

[ 2 ] We must constantly remind ourselves that a person’s stay in Devachan is not somewhere other than where we are otherwise. For Devachan, the astral world, and the physical world are, in fact, three worlds interlocked with one another. The most accurate conception of Devachan can be formed by imagining the world of electrical forces before humans discovered electricity. Even before that, everything was already contained within the physical world; it was simply an occult world at that time. Everything that is occult will one day be discovered. The difference between life in Devachan and life in the physical world is that, in their present cycle, human beings are equipped with organs that enable them to perceive the physical world, but not with organs that enable them to perceive the phenomena of Devachan.

[ 3 ] Let us put ourselves in the shoes of a human soul that is between two incarnations. It has surrendered its physical body to the universal forces and has also returned its etheric body to the life forces. Furthermore, they have returned the part of the astral body into which they had not yet worked themselves. Then they find themselves in Devachan. They no longer possess what the gods had worked into their etheric and astral bodies; all of that has been cast off. Only what he himself has earned over the course of many lifetimes is now his possession. This also belongs to him in Devachan. Everything a person has done in the physical world serves to make him more and more conscious in Devachan.

[ 4 ] Let us consider the relationship between one person and another. It may be determined solely by nature; for example, the relationship between siblings who have simply come together through natural circumstances. However, it is only partially natural, for moral and intellectual factors continually interweave with the natural. A person is born into a particular family through their karma; yet not everything is karmically determined. We see a natural relationship without any admixture in animals. Among humans, it is always also a moral relationship shaped by karma. However, a relationship between two people can also exist without being determined by nature. For example, a close friendship between two friends—whether male or female—can develop despite external obstacles. Let us imagine such a relationship in somewhat radical terms by assuming that the friends were initially somewhat unsympathetic toward one another and then found common ground on a purely intellectual and moral basis, soul to soul. We contrast this relationship with the natural one between two siblings. In the soul-to-soul relationship, we now have a powerful means of developing devachanic organs. Nothing facilitates the development of devachanic organs more easily than such relationships. Such a relationship is, unconsciously, a devachanic one.

[ 5 ] What a person currently develops in terms of spiritual capacity through purely spiritual friendship is, in Devachan, wisdom—the ability to truly experience the spiritual. To the extent that a person immerses themselves in such relationships, they are well prepared for Devachan. If they are unable to form spiritual relationships, they are unprepared for Devachan; for just as color eludes a blind person, so too does the spiritual realm elude them. To the extent that a person cultivates purely spiritual relationships, their eyes are opened to Devachan. Thus the following holds true: Whoever moves within the life of the spirit here will perceive just as much of the spirit there as they have acquired here through their activity. Hence the infinite importance of life on the physical plane. For human evolution, there is no other means of awakening the organs for Devachan than spiritual activity on the physical plane. All of this is creative and returns to us as Devachanic sense organs for the Devachanic world. There is no better preparation than to have a purely spiritual relationship with people—a relationship that originally has no natural basis at all.

[ 6 ] That is why people should be brought together in groups to forge purely spiritual relationships. Through this, the Masters wish to pour life into the stream of humanity. What happens within the group—when the right attitude is present—means that a spiritual eye is opened in Devachan for all participants. There, one then sees everything that is on the same level as what one has established here. If one has established a spiritual relationship on the physical plane, this relationship is certainly among the things that are preserved after death. After death, it belongs just as much to the deceased as it does to the survivor. The one who is on the other side remains in the same relationships, bound by the same ties to the one who is still here. The deceased is even more strongly aware of this spiritual relationship.

[ 7 ] In this way, one prepares oneself for Devachan. After death, the deceased remains connected to their loved ones. Past relationships become causes that produce effects in Devachan. That is why the Devachanic world is called the world of effects and the physical world the world of causes. A person can never develop their higher faculties except by sowing the causes for these faculties on the physical plane. It is for this purpose that a person is placed on the physical plane. The meaning of the oft-repeated phrase “to transcend individuality” will now become clear to us. Before we descended into physical existence, we lived with a content of the astral body that was brought about by a Deva. In the past, sympathy and antipathy in human beings were stimulated by the Devas; they were not responsible for them themselves. Then, at the next stage, the human being said to himself: “Now I have entered the physical world as a being who must find his own way.” In the past, I could not even utter the word ‘I’; only now have I become a distinct being in my own right. In the past, I was indeed a distinct being, but a part of a Devachanic being. On the physical plane, I am a distinct being in my own right, an ‘I,’ because I am enclosed within the physical body.

[ 8 ] The higher bodies flow into one another; for example, in truth, the Atma is one and the same for all of humanity, like a shared atmosphere. Yet the Atma of the individual human being can be understood as if each person were cutting out a piece for themselves from the universal Atma, so that, as it were, incisions are made in it. But we must overcome this separateness. We do this by forming human relationships of a purely spiritual nature. In this way, we transcend separateness and recognize the unity of the Atma in all. By forming such human relationships, I awaken sympathies within myself. I take on the task of selflessly integrating myself into the world’s plan. Through this, the divine awakens within the human being. That is the purpose of looking out into the world.

[ 9 ] Today we are surrounded by physical reality—the sun, the moon, and the stars. What once surrounded human beings from the outside in their ancient lunar existence now resides within them. The forces of the Moon now live within human beings themselves. Had human beings not been on the Moon, they would not possess these forces. That is why the Egyptian esoteric teachings refer to the Moon as Isis, the goddess of all fertility. Isis is the soul of the Moon, the predecessor of the Earth. All the forces that now live in plants and animals for the purpose of reproduction once lived all around it. Just as fire, chemical forces, magnetism, and so on are now all around us and surround the Earth, so too did the forces that are now reproductive forces in humans, animals, and plants once surround the Moon. The forces currently surrounding the Earth will play a distinct role in human beings in the future. What today operates between man and woman were, back then on the Moon, external physical forces—much like volcanic eruptions today. These forces surrounded human beings during their lunar existence, and they absorbed them through their lunar senses in order to evolve them now. What human beings had internalized on the Moon emerged on Earth as evolution. What human beings externalized as sexual energy after the Lemurian era is Isis, the soul of the Moon, which now lives on within human beings. This is the connection between human beings and the Moon as it is today. The Moon left its soul within human beings and has therefore itself become a remnant.

[ 10 ] As we gain experience on Earth, we gather the powers that will become our own on the next planet. What we are now experiencing in Devachan are the preparatory stages for the times to come. Just as people today look up at the Moon and say to themselves, “It has given us the powers of reproduction”—so, in the future, people will also look upon a moon that will emerge from our present physical Earth and, as a soulless remnant, will orbit the future Jupiter. On Jupiter, human beings will develop new forces that they currently receive on Earth as light and heat, and as all physical perceptions. Later, they will radiate everything they previously perceived through the senses. Whatever they have taken in through the soul will then be reality.

[ 11 ] Thus, the theosophical view does not lead us to underestimate the world of the physical plane, but rather to recognize that human beings must venture out onto the physical plane to gather experiences that they will later radiate outward again. The Earth’s warmth and the sun’s rays that stream toward us today will later radiate out from within us. Just as sexual energy now flows out from us, these new forces will then flow out.

[ 12 ] Now let us clarify what the successive stages of Devachan mean. At first, Devachan is only brief. ‘But more and more spiritual organs develop in the mental body until, finally, when the human being has grasped the wisdom of the Earth, the organs of the Devachanic body are fully developed. This will occur for all human beings when all Earth cycles have been completed. Then everything will have become human wisdom. Warmth and light will then have become wisdom. Between the Earth Manvantara and the next planet, the human being lives in a Pralaya. There is then nothing at all outside; but all the forces that the human being has drawn from the Earth are then within him. In such a phase of life, everything external turns inward. Everything is then present in a seed-like state and carries itself over into the next manvantara. On a grand scale, this is a state similar to when, in a moment of reflection, we forget everything around us and remember only our experiences in order to preserve them in our memory and apply them later. In the same way, during the Pralaya, all of humanity recalls all its experiences in order to make use of them again later.

[ 13 ] There are always such intermediate states, which represent, as it were, memories, and thus the Devachan state is also such a state of intermediateness. The initiate already sees before him those realities that a person will only gradually come to experience in the Devachan state. It is a state of intermediateness. All similar states are states of in-between-ness. The initiate describes the world as it exists in Devachan—on the other side—in this state of in-between-ness. When he moves beyond Devachan to an even higher state, he again describes an intermediate state.

[ 14 ] The first stage of initiation consists in the disciple learning to see the world from the other side through the veil of the outer world. The initiate is homeless here on Earth. He must build himself a hut on the other side. When the disciples were “on the mountain” with Jesus, they were introduced to the Devachanic world, beyond space and time; they built themselves a hut. This is the first stage of initiation.

[ 15 ] At the second stage of initiation, something similar occurs, but at a higher level. At the second stage, the initiate experiences a state of consciousness that corresponds to the interval between two states of form (globes)—a Pralaya state that occurs when everything that can be achieved in the physical state of form has been attained, and the Earth transforms into a so-called astral state of form or globe.

[ 16 ] The third state of consciousness of the initiate is the state that corresponds to the interval between two cycles, from the old Arupa globe of the preceding cycle to the new Arupa globe of the following cycle. In the Pralaya between two cycles, the initiate is, at the moment when he ascends into the third state; he is then an initiate of the third degree. Thus we can understand why Jesus was only able to place his body at the disposal of the Christ in the third stage. The Christ stands above all spirits who live in the cycles. The initiate who had risen above the cycles was able to place his body at the service of the Christ.

[ 17 ] Human self-consciousness was to be purified and sanctified through Christianity. Christ had to elevate and purify the selfish ego, which dies selflessly as soon as it attains self-awareness. He could do this only in a body that had become one with... (gap in the text.) Therefore, only the initiate of the third degree could sacrifice his body to Christ.

[ 18 ] In our time, it is extremely difficult to attain full awareness of these highly evolved states. The deeply knowledgeable Subba Row possessed his own knowledge; he describes these three states of chelaship.

[ 19 ] We regard the moon as the disembodied remnant of ourselves, and we ourselves possess within us the forces that once gave life to the moon. This is also the basis for the peculiar, sentimental feelings of the poets who sing of the moon. All poetic sensibilities are faint echoes of occult currents living deep within human beings.

[ 20 ] Now, however, a being can become intertwined with what is actually meant to remain as dross. Something must remain of the Earth that is later to become what the Moon is today. Humanity must overcome this. But if humanity is content with this, it will become bound to it. A person who is deeply intertwined with the merely sensual, the merely instinctual, becomes increasingly bound to what is meant to become dross. This will happen when the number 666 is fulfilled—the number of the beast. Then comes the moment when the Earth must withdraw from the ongoing evolution of the planets. If, by then, human beings have become too closely connected to the sensual forces that are meant to be cast out, then whatever is connected to these forces and has not found a way to transition to the next globe will go along with the dross and become inhabitants of this dross, just as such beings are now inhabitants of the present-day Moon.

[ 21 ] Here we have the concept of the eighth sphere. Human beings must pass through seven spheres. The seven planets correspond to the seven bodies:

Saturn corresponds to the physical body
The Sun corresponds to the etheric body
The Moon corresponds to the astral body
The Earth corresponds to the ego
Jupiter corresponds to Manas
Venus corresponds to Buddhi
Vulcan corresponds to Atma.

[ 22 ] In addition, there is an eighth sphere where everything that cannot keep pace with this ongoing evolution goes. The foundation for this is already laid in the Devachanic state. If a person uses life on Earth solely to accumulate what serves only himself, in order to experience nothing but the exaltation of his own selfish self, this leads to the state of Avitchi in Devachan. The person who cannot transcend his individuality ends up in Avitchi. All these Avitchi beings will one day become inhabitants of the eighth sphere. Avitchi is the preparation for the eighth sphere. The other people become inhabitants of the ongoing chain of evolution. Religions have formulated the concept of “hell” from this idea.

[ 23 ] When a person returns from Devachan, the astral, etheric, and physical forces surrounding them are organized according to twelve types of karmic forces, which are called nidanas in Indian esotericism. These are:

1. avidya = ignorance
2. samskara = the organizing tendencies
3. vijnana* = consciousness
4. nama rupa = name and form
5. shadayadana = what the mind makes of the object
6. sparsha = contact with existence
7. vedana = sensation
8. trishna = thirst for existence
9. upadana = attachment to existence
10. bhava = birth
11. jati* = what impels birth
12. jaramarana* = what liberates one from earthly existence.

[ 24 ] In the next lectures, we will examine these important aspects of karma in greater detail.

[ 25 ] * In these Sanskrit words, “j” is pronounced as “dsch”: vidschnana, dschati, dscharamarana.