The Rudolf Steiner Archive

15. On the Use of the Etheric and Astral Bodies of Prominent Figures. The Atlantean Mysteries

[ 1 ] 1. Introduction

[ 2 ] 2. On the value of the Bible and the accuracy of what it reveals about the origin of humankind. Adam and Eve. The first human couple. They were the first human couple to have reached a certain stage of development. Scientific objections to the accuracy of the Bible. After Cain had killed Abel, he moved to another land and took a wife. At that time, there were indeed other human beings who had not yet reached the level of development of Adam and Eve.

[ 3 ] 3. So there were many people at that time, which roughly corresponds to the middle of the Lemurian race. However, the population was nowhere near as large as it is today.

[ 4 ] 4. Many souls lived on what was then a celestial body before the Sun separated from it. When the Sun then broke away, a number of souls were not yet developed enough to be able to go with the Sun. They therefore had to stay behind.

[ 5 ] 5. But when the moon’s influence became very strong and caused matter to grow increasingly close to solidification, only the strongest souls were able to incarnate and master matter. The others had to seek out other spheres of activity. Many therefore moved on to the other celestial bodies belonging to the solar system—Vulcan, Jupiter, Venus, Saturn, Mars, and Mercury—and went through a stage of their development there.

[ 6 ] 6–7. On the solidifying influence of the Moon. 8. On the state of the Moon-Earth before the Moon’s separation. At that time, the Earth was desolate and empty. Only a few beings were able to incarnate in physical bodies. Most were compelled to leave the Earth.

[ 7 ] 9. Life on Jupiter. The unique evolution they underwent there.

[ 8 ] 10. Life on Mars.

[ 9 ] 11. On the various etheric bodies that were formed as a result.

[ 10 ] 12. Once the present Moon had separated from the Earth, it became possible again for the souls on the various planets of the solar system to return to Earth. That is why, at the beginning of the Atlantean race, the most diverse types of human races were incarnated. There were people from Mercury, Mars, Jupiter, Venus, Saturn, Vulcan, and so on, incarnated on Earth—people who had thus developed their etheric bodies on very different planets.

[ 11 ] 13. Hephaestus, for example, was someone who had developed his etheric body on the volcano and was therefore exceptionally skilled in technical matters. In general, the etheric bodies developed on the volcano were particularly suited to technical work.

[ 12 ] 14–15. The Initiates of Ancient Atlantis. At that time, there were initiates dedicated to the various planetary spirits. There were: Mercury, Mars, Jupiter, Venus, and Vulcan initiates, as well as Sun and Moon initiates. Each of these groups had its own special cult and its own specific form of initiation. However, due to the abuse they committed with the secrets handed down to them by the initiates, the entire Atlantean continent perished. Thanks to their organization, the Atlanteans still had the power to extract the life forces—the seed forces—from plants and animals. They then used these to power their vehicles, with which they could fly at a low altitude above the earth. Today, we have only the power to extract the non-living elements from minerals, but not the ability to extract the seed forces. By extracting the seed forces from animals and plants, they brought these forces into relationship with air and water. They filled the air and water with the spirits thus set free, which later rebelled against them in the wind and water and brought about their downfall.

[ 13 ] 16. This can be described as a betrayal of the initiates’ secrets. For the initiates gradually became less and less fit to be initiates. The students of the esoteric schools were of increasingly poor character and did not hesitate to exploit the secrets entrusted to them for their own personal gain and benefit.

[ 14 ] 17. So those were her black magic arts.

[ 15 ] 18. Eventually, the oracles of the various planetary gods fell into increasing disarray. Only the oracle of the Christ Spirit, the Solar Spirit, remained. When the floods had spread the Atlantic Ocean across the Atlantic continent, the highest initiate of the Solar Oracle took imprints of the etheric bodies of the most eminent initiates of the various planetary oracles and, together with a few followers of the Sun-worshippers, made his way to the Indian highlands, where he lived in complete seclusion; there he chose seven people from among the populace and incorporated into them the imprints of the etheric bodies of the Atlantean initiates. Having been prepared in this way, they were particularly well-suited to receiving the influences of the spirits of the various planets, for each individual possessed a highly developed etheric body of an initiate from the Atlantean era, belonging to one of the various oracles of the planetary spirits.

[ 16 ] 19. These seven men, who outwardly appeared to be very ordinary men and were indistinguishable from the others, were thereby made fit to serve as the mouthpieces of the great planetary spirits. Through their influence, the pre-Vedic culture was established.

[ 17 ] 20. They disseminated, in a unified and harmonious manner, the teachings and wisdom of the seven planetary spirits, which were then also expressed in a harmonious way at the dawn of the Indian people’s development.

[ 18 ] 21. The technique used by the initiates to take impressions of the etheric bodies of past personalities, preserve them, and later reincorporate them into a human being.

[ 19 ] 22–23. This art has been preserved in the secret schools up to the present day. The initiates of our time are still able to preserve etheric bodies and transfer the bodies thus preserved to future personalities.

[ 20 ] 24–25. On the Peculiar Effect of the Reincarnation of Personalities. The process of reincarnation is not as simple as it is usually described. Various possibilities can arise. For it is not only the etheric body but also the astral body of a person that can be preserved and incorporated into a later individual. Through this technique employed by the initiates, it is therefore possible for the etheric body of a man who was once significant to be incorporated into a later individual, whereby the qualities of the etheric body—memory and so on—combine with a new “I” and a new astral body and often manifest in this new composition in a seemingly entirely different way. In the same way, the astral body can also be preserved and incorporated at a later time. However, true reincarnation occurs only when the “I” is reincarnated in the new body. These possibilities have given rise to many errors, both among seers—who regarded these incomplete incarnations as complete ones—and among people who remember their own incarnation but, as a result of an incorporated etheric or astral body, consider themselves to be the incarnation of the bearers of those bodies.

[ 21 ] 26. For example, the etheric body of Nicholas of Cusa (Suso) was incorporated into Copernicus, who then expressed Cusa’s great ideas in an entirely different way.

[ 22 ] 27–28. Thus, through the incorporation of his etheric body into the Russian poet Mikhail Lomonosov, Galilei has once again become active through this man via his etheric body.