The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Eighth Lecture

[ 1 ] Let us now consider the various incarnations of our planet in order. In doing so, we must certainly form the idea that these were incarnations of our Earth, that is, the states of the Earth when it was once Saturn, the Sun, and the Moon, and we must imagine that these incarnations were necessary for the formation of beings, especially human beings, and that human development is intimately connected with the development of the Earth. However, we will only gain a proper understanding of what happened there if we reflect on how, with regard to certain characteristics, what we recognize today as human beings—as ourselves—has changed in the course of evolution; specifically, we will first consider the changes that have taken place in human beings with regard to their states of consciousness. Everything, everything in the world has evolved, and our consciousness, too, has evolved. The consciousness that human beings possess today is not something they have always had; it has only gradually become what it is today.

[ 2 ] We call our present-day consciousness “object consciousness” or “waking daytime consciousness.” You all know it as that which is your own from the morning, when you wake up, until the evening, when you fall asleep. Let us clarify what it consists of. It consists of a person directing their senses toward the external world and perceiving objects; that is why we call it “object consciousness.” A person looks out into their surroundings and sees with their eyes certain objects in space that are outlined by colors. They listen with their ears and perceive that there are objects in space that make sounds, that emit sound. They touch the objects with their sense of touch, finding them warm or cold; they smell and taste them. Human beings reflect on what they perceive in this way through their senses. They apply their reason to comprehend these various objects, and from these facts of sensory perception and their comprehension through our intellect, the waking daytime consciousness—as human beings experience it today—is composed. Human beings have not always possessed this consciousness; it has only recently developed, and they will not always possess it in this form, but will ascend to higher states of consciousness.

[ 3 ] Using the tools provided by occultism, we can first gain an overview of seven states of consciousness, of which our present-day consciousness is the middle one. We can survey three preceding and three subsequent states. Some may be surprised that we are situated so neatly in the middle. This is because the first state is preceded by others that lie beyond our view, and the seventh is followed by others that likewise lie beyond our view. We can see just as far behind us as we can ahead. If we were to step back one state, we would see one more state behind us and one less ahead, just as when you walk out into a field and can see as far to the left as to the right.

[ 4 ] These seven states of consciousness are as follows. First, a very dull, deep state of consciousness that people today hardly know anymore. Only people with a particularly mediumistic disposition can still experience this state of consciousness today—a state that all humans once had on Saturn. Such mediumistically gifted individuals can enter a state that is also familiar to modern psychologists. Their waking daytime consciousness—as well as other states of consciousness—is dormant; they are as if dead. But then, when they sketch or describe—either from memory or even while in that state—what they have experienced there, they bring to light very peculiar experiences that do not take place in our surroundings. They produce all sorts of drawings which, though grotesque and distorted, nevertheless correspond to what we in spiritual science refer to as cosmic states. They are often not at all accurate, but they do contain something that reveals that such beings, during this drowsy state, possess a dim yet universal consciousness. They see celestial bodies and therefore draw them.

[ 5 ] Human beings once possessed this kind of consciousness—which is dull but represents omniscience within our cosmos—during the first incarnation of our Earth. It is called deep trance consciousness. There are beings in our surroundings that still possess such consciousness today; these are the minerals. If you could speak with them, these minerals would tell you what life is like on Saturn. However, this consciousness is quite dull.

[ 6 ] The second state of consciousness that we know—or rather, do not know, because we are asleep at that time—is that of ordinary sleep. This state of consciousness is not as comprehensive, but even though it is still very dim, it is nevertheless bright in comparison to the first. All human beings once had this state of sleep-consciousness continuously, when the Earth was the Sun. Back then, the human ancestor slept constantly. Even today, this state of consciousness still exists: plants possess it. They are beings that sleep unceasingly, and if they could speak, they could tell us what it is like on the Sun, because they have solar consciousness.

[ 7 ] The third state, which is still dim and vague in comparison to our waking consciousness, is that of pictorial consciousness, and we already have a clear concept of this because we experience an echo of it in dream-filled sleep—though it is only a rudimentary form of what was the consciousness of all human beings on the Moon. It will be helpful to start with dreams in order to form a picture of lunar consciousness.

[ 8 ] Although we find something confusing and chaotic in the world of dreams, upon closer observation this confusion nevertheless reveals an intimate regularity. The dream is a strange symbol. In my lectures, I have often cited the following examples, all of which are drawn from real life: You dream that you are chasing a tree frog to catch it; you feel its soft, smooth body; you wake up and find the corner of the bedsheet in your hand. Had you applied your waking consciousness, you would have seen your hand grasping the bedsheet. Dream consciousness gives you a symbol of the external action; it forms a metaphor out of what our waking consciousness perceives as fact.

[ 9 ] Another example. A student dreams that he is standing at the door of a lecture hall. There, he is “bumped into,” as they say in student slang. This leads to a challenge. He then experiences all the details until, accompanied by his second and the doctor, he goes to the duel and the first shot is fired. At that very moment, he wakes up and sees that he has knocked over the chair in front of his bed. In waking consciousness, he would have simply heard about this incident; the dream symbolizes this prosaic act for him through the drama of the duel. And you can also see that the temporal relationships are entirely different, for in the single instant that the chair fell, the entire drama flashed through his mind. Everything that was preparation took place in a single moment. The dream has shifted time backward; it does not obey the laws of the real world—it is a shaper of time.

[ 10 ] Not only external events can be symbolized in this way, but also internal bodily processes. A person dreams that he is in a cellar hole, with repulsive spiders crawling toward him. He wakes up and feels a headache. The top of the skull was symbolized by the cellar hole, and the pain by the ugly spiders.

[ 11 ] The dreams of people today symbolize events that take place both within and without. But that was not the case when this third state of consciousness was that of human beings on the Moon. At that time, human beings lived entirely in images such as those found in today’s dreams, but these images expressed realities. They represented reality just as much as the color blue represents reality today. Only, back then, the color floated freely in space; it was not attached to objects. In the consciousness of that time, a human being could not have gone out onto the street as we do today, seen a person from a distance, looked at them, or approached them; for a human being at that time could not have perceived such forms of beings that have a color on their surface—not to mention that humans back then could not walk as modern humans do. But let us suppose that a person had encountered another on the moon back then: a freely floating image of form and color would have risen before them; let us say, an ugly one—then the person would have stepped aside to avoid encountering it, or a beautiful one—then they would have approached it. The ugly image of colors would have indicated to him that the other person harbored an unfriendly feeling toward him; the beautiful one, that the other person loved him.

[ 12 ] Let’s assume there had been salt on the Moon. When there is salt on the table today, you see it as it is in space—as an object, granular, with a certain color. That would not have been the case back then. On the Moon, you would not have been able to see the salt, but an image of form and color would have emanated, floating freely, from the spot where the salt would have been, and this image would have indicated to you that the salt is something useful. Thus, the entire consciousness was filled with images, with floating colors and forms. Human beings lived in such a sea of forms and colors, but these images of color and form represented what was happening around them—above all, spiritual matters and everything related to the soul, as well as what was beneficial or harmful to them. In this way, human beings gained a proper understanding of the things around them.

[ 13 ] When the Moon incarnated on Earth, this consciousness transformed into our present-day waking consciousness, and only a remnant remains in the dream as modern humans experience it—a vestige, just as vestiges of other things have remained. You know, for example, that there are certain muscles near the ear that seem to serve no purpose today. They used to have a function. They served to move the ears at will. Today, there are only a few people who can do that.

[ 14 ] Thus, even in human beings, there are states that have remained as the last vestige of a once-meaningful structure. Although these images no longer mean anything today, at that time they represented the external world. Even today, this awareness still exists in all those animals—take good note of this! —that cannot produce a sound from within themselves. For in occultism, there is a far more accurate classification of animals than in conventional natural science, namely, those that are internally soundless and those that can produce sound from within. Of course, you will find that some lower animals produce a sound, but this occurs mechanically—through friction and the like—not from within. Even frogs do not produce sound from within. Only the higher animals, which arose at the time when human beings could express their suffering and joy through sound, only they—along with human beings—gained the ability to express their pain and pleasure through sounds and cries. All animals that do not produce sound from within still possess this kind of visual consciousness. It is not the case that lower animals perceive images within the same limitations as we do. If any lower animal—for example, a crab—perceives an image that makes a certain ugly impression, it will avoid it. It does not see the objects themselves, but it perceives the danger in a repulsive image.

[ 15 ] The fourth state of consciousness is the one that all people now experience. The images that people used to perceive in space as freely floating color images now, as it were, envelop objects. One might say they are superimposed upon them. They form the boundaries of things. They appear on objects, whereas they used to appear floating freely. In this way, they have become the expression of form. What people used to have within themselves has stepped outward and attached itself to objects. Through this process, they have arrived at their present waking, everyday consciousness.

[ 16 ] Let us now consider something else. We have already said that the human physical body was prepared on Saturn. On the Sun, the etheric or life body was added; it permeated the physical body and worked upon it. It took what the physical body had already become and further developed it. On the Moon, the astral body was added; this, in turn, altered the body’s form. On Saturn, this physical body was very simple. On the Sun, it was already much more complex, for now the etheric body was working on it and making it more perfect. On the Moon, the astral body was added, and on Earth, the ego was added, making it even more perfect. Back then, when the physical body was on Saturn, before the etheric body had yet penetrated it, all the organs that are in it today were not yet present, for blood and nerves were lacking, and there were no glands yet either. At that time, human beings possessed—albeit only in embryonic form—only those organs that are the most perfect today and that have had the time to develop into their present perfection: these are the wonderfully constructed sense organs.

[ 17 ] This marvelous structure of the human eye, this marvelous apparatus of the human ear—all of this has only now attained its perfection because it was formed from the Saturn mass, and the etheric body, the astral body, and the ego have worked on it. The same is true of the larynx. It was already present on Saturn, but human beings could not yet speak there. On the Moon, they began to emit inarticulate sounds and cries, but it was only through the long process described above that the larynx became the perfect organ it is today on Earth. On the Sun, where the etheric body was integrated, these sense organs were further developed, and all those organs were added that are primarily excretory and vital organs, serving nutrition and growth. They were first laid down during the Sun stage. Then the astral body continued its work during the Lunar stage, and the “I” during the Earth stage; thus the glands, the organs of growth, and so on matured to their present perfection. Then, on the Moon, the nervous system was first laid down through the incorporation of the astral body. That was at the time when human beings possessed pictorial consciousness. But what enabled human beings to develop an awareness of objects—and at the same time enabled them to express their joy and suffering from within—was the “I,” which was formed in human beings through their blood.

[ 18 ] Thus, the entire universe is the builder of the sense organs. Thus, everything—including the glands, reproductive organs, and digestive organs—is formed by the life body. Thus, the astral body is the builder of the nervous system, and the “I” is the integrator of the blood. There is a condition known as anemia or pallor. In this condition, the blood enters a state in which it is unable to sustain waking consciousness. Such individuals often slip into a twilight state of consciousness similar to that experienced on the Moon.

[ 19 ] Now let us consider the three states of consciousness that are yet to come. One might ask: How is it possible to know anything about them today? — It is possible through initiation. The initiate can already experience these states of consciousness today in anticipation. The next state of consciousness known to the initiate is the so-called psychic state, a state of consciousness in which one possesses both the image-consciousness and the waking daytime consciousness. In this psychic state of consciousness, you see people just as you do in waking daytime consciousness—within their boundaries and forms—but at the same time you see what lives in their souls radiating out as clouds of color and images in what we call the aura. And you will not then walk through the world like a moon-dweller in a dreamlike state, but with complete self-control, like modern humans in waking daytime consciousness. On the planet that will succeed our Earth, all of humanity will possess this psychic or soul-based consciousness—the Jupiter consciousness.

[ 20 ] There is also a sixth state of consciousness that humanity will one day attain. It will unite today’s waking daytime consciousness—which the initiate knows only as psychic consciousness—with everything that humanity currently overlooks. When living in this state of consciousness—the consciousness of inspiration—humanity will look deep, deep into the nature of beings. Humanity will not only perceive through images of color and form; it will hear the essence of others in tones and sounds. Every human individuality will have a certain tone, and all of this will blend together into a symphony. This will be human consciousness once our planet has transitioned into the state of Venus. There, humanity will experience the harmony of the spheres that Goethe describes in his prologue to Faust:

The sun resounds in the ancient way
In a contest of song among the spheres of brotherhood
And its predetermined journey
It completes with a thunderous roar.

[ 21 ] When the Earth was the Sun, humankind faintly perceived these sounds and tones, and on Venus, they will hear them sound and ring out again “in the old way.” Goethe even retained this image right down to this very phrase.

[ 22 ] The seventh state of consciousness is spiritual consciousness—which is, in fact, the highest form of consciousness—where human beings possess universal consciousness, enabling them to perceive not only what is happening on their own planet, but also what is taking place throughout the entire cosmic neighborhood; that consciousness which humans possessed on Saturn—which, though quite dim, was nonetheless a kind of universal consciousness. They will possess this consciousness in addition to all the other states of consciousness once they have arrived on Vulcan.

[ 23 ] These are the seven states of human consciousness that a person must pass through on their journey through the cosmos, and each incarnation on Earth creates the conditions that make such states of consciousness possible. It is only because the nervous system—which has evolved into the brain we have today—was laid down on the Moon that today’s waking daytime consciousness has become possible. Organs must be created through which the higher states of consciousness can also be physically experienced, just as the initiate already experiences them spiritually today.

[ 24 ] The fact that human beings can pass through these seven planetary states is the very meaning of evolution. Each planetary incarnation is connected with the development of one of the seven states of human consciousness, and through what takes place on each planet, the physical organs develop to accommodate that particular state of consciousness. On Jupiter, you will have a more highly developed organ—a psychic organ. On Venus, there will be an organ through which human beings will be able to physically develop the consciousness that the initiate currently possesses on the Devachan plane. And on Vulcan, there will be that spiritual consciousness which the initiate possesses today when he is in the higher part of Devachan, when he is in the world of reason.

[ 25 ] Tomorrow we will go through these planets one by one, for just as our Earth looked different in the past—for example, during the Atlantean and Lemurian eras—than it does today, and just as it will look different again in the future, so too have the Moon, the Sun, and Saturn undergone various states, and so will Jupiter and Venus go through various states.

[ 26 ] Today we learned about the vast, comprehensive cycles of the planets, and tomorrow we will examine the changes these planets underwent while they were the stage for human life.