It is impossible to know anything in the occult sense of the present and
future of human or planetary evolution without understanding that
evolution in the past. For, that which presents itself to the occult
student’s observation when he watches the hidden events of the past,
contains at the same time everything that he can learn of the present and
future. In this book we have spoken of the Saturn, Sun, Moon and Earth
evolutions. We cannot follow the evolution of the earth, as the occultist
understands it, unless we observe the events of preceding evolutionary
periods. For what meets us today, within the bounds of our earthly globe,
comprises in a certain sense the facts of the evolution of the Moon, Sun
and Saturn. The beings and things that took part in the evolution of the
Moon have gone on developing, and all that now belongs to the earth, is
the outcome of that development.
But not all that has evolved from the Moon to the Earth is perceptible to
physical sense-consciousness. A part of what came over to us from the Moon
evolution is revealed only at a certain stage of clairvoyant
consciousness, at which knowledge of supersensible worlds is reached. When
this knowledge is gained, the fact that our earthly planet is united to a
supersensible world is recognized. The latter includes that part of lunar
existence which is not sufficiently densified to be observed by the
physical senses. In the first place it does not include it as it was at
the time of the evolution of the original Moon. If this clairvoyant
consciousness occupies itself with the perception of these things, which
it can have at present, this latter gradually separates into two images.
One presents the shape borne by the earth during the lunar evolution, the
other shows itself in such a way, that we recognize as its content a form
as yet in the germinal stage which will become a reality—in the sense in
which the earth is now a reality—but only in the future.
On further observation it is seen that the results, in a certain sense, of
that which is taking place on the earth are continually streaming into
that future form, so that in it we have before us that which our earth
will ultimately become. The effects of earthly existence will unite with
the events in the world described, and out of this the new cosmos will
arise, into which the Earth will be transformed as the Moon was
transformed into the Earth. This future form is called in occult science
the Jupiter condition. The clairvoyant observer of this Jupiter state sees
the revelation of certain events which _must_ take place in the future.
The reason for this is that in the supersensible part of the Earth which
had its origin in the Moon, beings and things are present which will
assume definite form when certain events have actually happened in the
physical world. Therefore there will be something in the Jupiter condition
which was already predetermined by the Moon evolution and it will contain
new factors, which can come into the whole evolution only in consequence
of terrestrial events. In this way clairvoyant consciousness is able to
learn something of what will happen during the Jupiter state.
The beings and facts observed in this field of consciousness have not the
nature of sense-images; they do not even appear as fine air-structures
from which effects might proceed which resemble sense-impressions. They
give purely spiritual impressions of sound, light and heat. These are
_not_ expressed through any material embodiments. They can be apprehended
only by clairvoyant consciousness. One may say, however, that these beings
which at present manifest on the psycho-spiritual plane, possess a “body.”
This body, however, appears like a sum of _condensed memories_ which they
carry within their souls.
One can distinguish within their being what they are now experiencing and
what they have experienced and now remember. This last is contained within
them like a bodily element. They are conscious of it in the same way that
an earthly human being is conscious of his body.
At a stage of clairvoyant development higher than that just described as
necessary for a knowledge of the Moon and Jupiter, the student is able to
perceive supersensible beings and things which are, in fact, the more
highly developed forms of those present during the Sun condition, but
which have now reached stages of existence so lofty as to be quite
imperceptible to a consciousness capable of observing the Moon forms only.
During meditation the picture of this world also divides in two. The one
leads to a knowledge of the Sun state of the past; the other represents a
future form of the earth existence—namely, that into which the earth will
have been transformed when the fruits of all that takes place on it and
Jupiter have merged into the forms of that future world. What can thus be
observed of this future world may be characterized in occult phraseology
as the Venus condition.
In a similar manner, to a still more highly evolved clairvoyant
consciousness, a future state of evolution is revealed, which we may call
the Vulcan state. It stands in the same relationship to the Saturn state
as the Venus condition does to that of the Sun, or the Jupiter state to
the evolution of the Moon. Therefore, when we contemplate the past,
present, and future of the earth’s evolution, we may speak of the Saturn,
Sun, Moon, Earth, Jupiter, Venus, and Vulcan evolutions.
Just as these far-reaching conditions of the evolution of our earth lie
disclosed to clairvoyant vision, the same vision is also able to cover the
nearer future. There is a picture of the future corresponding to every
picture of the past. In speaking of such things, however, one fact must be
emphasized which should be taken into strict account: that in order to
recognize facts of this kind, one must absolutely do away with the idea
that they can be fathomed through mere philosophical reflection. These
things cannot, and never should be investigated by that kind of thinking.
Anyone would be labouring under a prodigious delusion who, after becoming
acquainted with the teachings of occult science regarding the Moon state,
thinks that he could discover the future conditions of Jupiter by
comparing those of the Moon and Earth. These conditions must be
investigated only when the requisite clairvoyant consciousness has been
attained; but once communicated to others after such investigation, they
can be understood without clairvoyant consciousness.
Now the occultist finds himself in quite a different position, with regard
to observations concerning the future, from that in which he stands with
regard to those of the past. It is impossible at first for man to
contemplate future events as impartially as he does those of the past.
Future events excite human will and feeling; while the past affects us in
quite a different way. He who observes life knows how true this is of
everyday existence; but how enormously this truth is enhanced, and what an
intimate bearing it has upon the hidden facts of life, can only be
realized by one who has some knowledge of the supersensible world. That is
the reason why those who know such things are very definitely limited as
to what they are allowed to give out. Certain things bearing on the future
can, in fact, be imparted only to those who have themselves determined to
follow the path leading to the supersensible worlds. Such people by their
mental attitude have acquired something which gives them the
disinterestedness necessary for the reception of these teachings. For this
reason certain secret facts, even of the past and present, can be spoken
of only to those who are prepared for them in this way. These are facts so
closely connected with future evolution, that their effect on the human
soul is similar to that produced by communications regarding the future
itself.
This explains, also, why the information in this book concerning the
present and the future is given in the merest outline as compared with the
more detailed descriptions of the evolution of the world and of humanity
in the past. What is said here is not intended to appeal to the love of
sensation in the smallest degree; not even to awaken it. We shall only
state where the answer can be found to vital questions which naturally
present themselves to one who holds a certain definite attitude of mind.
Just as the great cosmic evolution can be portrayed in the successive
states, from the Saturn to the Vulcan period, so also is this possible for
shorter periods of time; for example, for those of the evolution of the
earth. Since that mighty upheaval which terminated the ancient Atlantean
life, successive periods of human evolution have followed one another
which have been called in this work the ancient Indian, the ancient
Persian, the Egypto-Chaldean, and the Greco-Roman. The fifth period is
that in which humanity finds itself to-day,—it is the present time. This
period gradually took its rise in the eleventh, twelfth, and thirteen
centuries A.D., after a period of preparation commencing in the fourth and
fifth centuries. The Greco-Roman period preceding it began about the
eighth century B.C. When one-third of this period had elapsed, the
Christ-event took place.
During the transition from the Egypto-Chaldean to the Greco-Roman period,
the attitude of the human mind and, indeed, all human faculties, underwent
a change. In the first of these two periods what we now know as logical
thinking, as a mere intellectual concept of the world, was still wanting.
The knowledge which a man now acquires through his intelligence, he then
gained in a manner suited to that time,—directly through an inner, in a
certain sense, clairvoyant cognition. He perceived the things around him,
and while perceiving them there arose within his soul the percept, the
image that was needed. Whenever knowledge is gained in this way, not only
pictures of the physical sense-world come to light, but from the depths of
consciousness a certain knowledge of facts and beings arises which are not
of the physical world. This was a remnant of the ancient dim clairvoyance,
once the common property of the whole of humanity.
During the Greco-Roman period an ever-increasing number of individuals
appeared without these capacities. Intelligent reflection concerning
things took their place. Mankind was more and more shut off from the
immediate perception of the psycho-spiritual world, and was more and more
restricted to forming a picture of it through intelligence and feeling.
This condition lasted more or less during the whole of the fourth division
of the post-Atlantean period. Only those individuals who had preserved the
old mental state as an inheritance could still become directly conscious
of the spiritual world. But these were stragglers from an earlier time.
Their manner of gaining knowledge was no longer suitable for later
conditions. For, as a consequence of the laws of evolution, old faculties
of the soul lose something of their former significance when new faculties
appear. Human life then adapts itself to these new faculties, and can no
longer use the old ones properly.
There were individuals, however, who began in full consciousness to add to
the powers of intelligence and feeling already gained, the development of
other and higher powers, which made it possible for them once more to
penetrate into the psycho-spiritual world. To this end they were obliged
to set to work in a different way from that in which the pupils of the old
Initiates had been trained. The latter had not been obliged to take into
account those faculties of the soul which were developed only in the
fourth period. The method of occult training which has been described in
this work as that of the present age, began in its first rudiments in the
fourth period. But it was then only in its beginning, it could not attain
real maturity until the fifth period (from the twelfth and thirteenth
centuries onward). Those who sought to rise into supersensible worlds in
this manner could learn something of the higher regions of existence
through the exercise of their own imagination, inspiration, and intuition.
Those who went no further than the development of the faculties of reason
and feeling could learn only through tradition what had been known to
ancient clairvoyance. This was handed on, either by word of mouth or in
writing, from generation to generation.
Neither could those born later know anything of the real nature of the
Christ-event save by such traditions, if they did not rise to the level of
the supersensible worlds. Certainly there were such Initiates who still
possessed the natural faculties of supersensible perception and yet who,
through their development, had ascended into the higher worlds, in spite
of their disregard of the new powers of intelligence and feeling. Through
them a transition was effected from the old method of Initiation to the
new. Such persons lived in later times as well. The essential
characteristic of the fourth period is that, by the exclusion of the soul
from direct communion with the psycho-spiritual world, the human faculties
of intelligence and feeling were thereby strengthened and invigorated. The
souls whose powers of intelligence and feeling had at that time developed
to a great extent as the result of former incarnations, carried over with
them the fruits of this development into their incarnations during the
fifth period. As a compensation for this exclusion from the higher worlds,
mighty traditions of Ancient Wisdom then existed, especially those of the
Christ-event, which by the power of their content gave men confident
knowledge of the higher worlds.
But there were still certain human beings existing who had evolved the
higher powers of cognition in addition to the faculties of reason and
feeling. It devolved upon them to learn the facts of the higher worlds,
and especially of the Mystery of the Christ-event, by direct supersensible
perception. From these individuals there always flowed into the souls of
other men as much as was intelligible and good for them.
The first spreading of Christianity was to take place just at a time when
the capacities for supersensible cognition were undeveloped in a great
part of humanity. And this is why tradition at that time possessed such
mighty power. The strongest possible force was necessary to lead mankind
to a faith in a supersensible world which they themselves could not
perceive. How Christianity worked during that period has been shown in
previous pages. There were always those, however, who were able to rise
into higher worlds through imagination, inspiration, and intuition. These
men were the post-Christian successors of the old Initiates, the teachers
and members of the Mysteries. Their task was to recognize again, through
their own faculties, what man had been able to perceive through ancient
clairvoyance, and through the methods of ascent into higher worlds taught
in the old Initiations; and in addition to this, to acquire the knowledge
of the real nature of the Christ-event.
Thus there arose, among these “New Initiates,” a knowledge embracing
everything contained in the old form of Initiation; but the central point
of this teaching was the higher knowledge concerning the Mysteries of the
coming of the Christ. Such teaching could only filter through into the
general life of the world in scanty measure while the human souls of the
fourth period were further developing the faculties of intellect and
feeling; therefore, while this lasted, the doctrine was in truth secret.
Then began the dawn of the new period designated as the fifth. Its
essential characteristic lay in the progress made in the evolution of the
intellectual faculties, which were then developed to a very high degree,
and will unfold still further in the future. This process has been slowly
going on from the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, becoming ever more
rapid from the sixteenth century up to the present time.
Under these influences the evolution of the fifth period became an
ever-increasing endeavour to foster the powers of intellect, while, on the
contrary, the knowledge by faith of former times, and traditional wisdom,
gradually lost its hold over the human soul. On the other hand, however,
from the twelfth and thirteenth centuries on, there developed that which
may be called an ever increasing flow of cognition born of modern
clairvoyant consciousness. This “hidden knowledge” flows even though at
first quite imperceptibly, into the human concepts of that period. It is
only natural that even up to the present time the purely intellectual
forces should have maintained an antagonistic attitude toward this
knowledge. But that which must come to pass will do so in spite of all
temporary antagonism. That “hidden knowledge” which is taking possession
of humanity more and more may be called symbolically, the “wisdom of the
Holy Grail.”
For he who learns to understand this symbol in its deeper meaning, as it
is told in story and legend, will find that it symbolizes the nature of
what has been called above, the knowledge of the new Initiation, with the
Christ Mystery as its central point. Modern Initiates may therefore be
called “the Initiates of the Grail.” The preliminary stages of the path to
the supersensible worlds described in this book, leads to the “Wisdom of
the Grail.” It is a peculiarity of this wisdom that its facts can be
investigated only when the necessary means, as described in this book,
have been acquired. Once investigated, however, these facts can be
understood by means of those very soul-forces which are the result of the
evolution of the fifth period. Indeed, it will become more and more
evident that to an ever increasing extent those forces find satisfaction
through this knowledge. We are now living at a time in which this
knowledge must be absorbed by human consciousness in general to a much
fuller extent than was formerly the case. And it is from this point of
view that the teachings contained in this Christ-event will grow ever more
powerful in proportion as human evolution assimilates the Wisdom of the
Grail. The inner side of the development of Christianity will more and
more keep pace with the exoteric side. That which may be learned through
imagination, inspiration and intuition, concerning the higher worlds, in
connection with the Christ Mystery, will penetrate ever more and more
human thinking, feeling, and willing. The “hidden wisdom of the Grail”
will be revealed, and as an inner force will more and more permeate the
manifestations of human life.
Through the whole of the fifth period, knowledge concerning the
supersensible world will flow into human consciousness; and when the sixth
period begins, humanity will be able to regain on a higher level that
clairvoyance which it possessed at an earlier epoch in a dim and
indistinct manner. Yet the new acquisition will take a form quite
different from the old. What the soul knew of higher worlds in ancient
times, was not permeated by its own forces of intellect and feeling. Its
knowledge was instinctive. In the future it will not only have instincts,
but it will _understand_ them, and feel them to be the essence of its own
nature. When the soul learns a fact concerning some other being or thing,
its intellect will find this fact verified through its own nature. Or when
some fact regarding an ethical law or human conduct presents itself, the
soul will say to itself: “My feeling is only justified when I carry out
what is implied in this knowledge.” Such a condition of soul will have to
be developed by a large part of humanity in the sixth period.
In a certain manner, that which human evolution accomplished during the
third period—the Egypto-Chaldean—is repeated in the fifth. At that time
the soul could still perceive certain facts of the supersensible worlds,
but this perception was disappearing. For the intellectual faculties were
at that time beginning to develop and it was their mission to at first
exclude man from the higher worlds. In the fifth period supersensible
facts which in the third period were perceived in hazy clairvoyance, are
again becoming manifest; but they are now interpenetrated by the
intellectual and emotional life of the individual man. They are also
imbued with what may be imparted to the soul by a knowledge of the Christ
Mystery; therefore they assume a form totally different from that which
they had previously.
Whereas in ancient times impressions from the higher worlds were felt as
forces acting from out a spiritual world to which man did not properly
belong, through development in later times these impressions are felt as
those of a world into which man is growing, of which he more and more
forms a part. Let no one suppose that a repetition of the Egypto-Chaldean
civilization can take place in such a way that the soul would merely
regain what then existed, and which has been handed on from that time. The
Christ-impulse, rightly understood, impels the human soul which has
experienced it, to feel and conduct itself as a member of a spiritual
world, now recognizing it as a world to which it belongs, outside of which
it previously existed.
In the same way that the third reappears in the fifth period, in order to
become penetrated with those new qualities which the human soul gained
during the fourth, so similarly the second period will revive within the
sixth and the first, the ancient Indian, during the seventh. All the
marvelous wisdom of ancient India which the great teachers of that day
were able to proclaim, will reappear in the seventh period, as living
truth in human souls.
Now the changes in the earthly environment of man take place in a manner
which bears a certain relationship to his own evolution. When the seventh
period has run its course, the earth will experience an upheaval which may
be compared with the one which separated Atlantean from post-Atlantean
times. And the transformed earth will again continue its evolution in
seven divisions of time. The human souls which will then incarnate will
experience, on a more exalted level, the kinship with the higher worlds
which was possessed by the Atlanteans at a lower stage. But only those
individuals will be able to cope with the new conditions of the earth who
have built into their souls the qualities made possible by the influences
of the Greco-Roman age, and of the periods following it,—the fifth, sixth,
and seventh of the post-Atlantean evolution.
The inner nature of such souls will correspond to that which the earth has
become by that time. All other souls must then remain behind, although up
to that point they had been able to choose whether or not they would
create for themselves the conditions necessary to advance with the others.
Those souls alone will be ripe for the conditions arising after the next
great catastrophe, who at the point of transition from the fifth to the
sixth post-Atlantean period have attained the capacity for penetrating
supersensible cognition with the forces of intelligence and feeling. The
fifth and sixth are in a way the decisive periods. Those souls which have
attained the goal of the sixth period will continue to develop accordingly
in the seventh; but the others will, under the altered conditions of their
surroundings, find but little opportunity to proceed with their neglected
task. Only in a distant future will conditions again appear which will
permit of this being done.
Thus evolution proceeds from period to period. Clairvoyance observes not
only those changes in the future in which the earth alone takes part, but
those also which take place in conjunction with the heavenly bodies in its
environment. A time will come in which the terrestrial and human evolution
will be advanced so far that those forces and beings which were compelled
to detach themselves from the earth during the Lemurian period, so as to
afford to earth-beings the possibility of further progress, will be able
once more to unite with the earth. Then the moon will again be united with
the earth. This will happen because a sufficiently large number of human
souls will then possess the inner powers which will enable them to render
the Moon forces fruitful for further development. And this will occur at a
time when, side by side with the high development of a certain number of
human souls, another development, that of those who have chosen the path
of evil, will parallel it. These straggler-souls will have accumulated in
their Karma so much sin, ugliness and evil, that at first they will form a
separate community, a perverse and erring section of humanity, keenly
opposing what we understand as “good.” The “good” humanity will acquire
little by little the power of using the Moon forces, and will thereby so
transform the evil section as to enable it to keep pace with the advance
of evolution as a separate earth kingdom. Through these labours of the
good part of humanity, the earth, then reunited with the moon, will be
able, after a certain period of development, to again unite with the sun
and also with the other planets.
After an intermediate state, which will be a sojourn in a higher world,
the earth will be transformed into the Jupiter condition. That which we
now call the mineral kingdom will not exist on Jupiter; the forces of this
mineral kingdom will be transformed into plant forces and the plant
kingdom, which will have quite a new form compared with its present one,
will appear in the Jupiter state as the lowest of the kingdoms, while
above it, we find the animal kingdom, likewise transformed. Next comes a
human kingdom—the descendants of the evil earth humanity. And then will
appear the descendants of the good earth humanity, as a human kingdom on a
higher level. A great part of the work of this last human kingdom consists
in ennobling the souls which have sunk into the evil community, so that
they may still gain admittance into the true human kingdom.
The Venus condition will be of such a nature that the plant kingdom will
have disappeared also; the lowest kingdom will be the animal kingdom once
more transformed, and above that there will be three successive human
kingdoms of different degrees of perfection. The earth will remain united
with the sun during the Venus period; while during that of Jupiter it will
have happened that, at a certain point, the sun separates from Jupiter,
the latter receiving its influence from outside. Then there is again a
union between the sun and Jupiter, the transformation gradually passing
into the Venus state. During that state another planet detaches itself
from Venus, containing all kinds of beings which have opposed evolution,
an “irredeemable moon,” as it were, following a path of evolution which is
of a character impossible to describe, because it is too unlike anything
which man can experience on earth. But evolved humanity will pass on in a
fully spiritualized state of existence to the Vulcan evolution, a
description of which lies beyond the scope of this work.
We see that from the fruits of the “Wisdom of the Grail” springs the
highest ideal of human evolution conceivable for man: spiritualization
attained by him through his own efforts. For in the end this
spiritualization appears as a product of the harmony which he wrought out
in the fifth and sixth periods of the present evolution, between the
faculties of reason and emotion which he had then attained and cognition
of supersensible worlds. That which he thus achieves within his soul will
finally become in itself the outer world. The human spirit rises to the
mighty impressions of its outer world and at first divines, later
recognizes spiritual beings behind these impressions; the human heart
senses the unspeakable exaltedness of the Spirit. Man can, however, also
recognize that his inner experiences of intellect, feeling and character
are but the germs of a nascent spirit world.
He who thinks that human liberty is not compatible with a foreknowledge
and predestination of future conditions, ought to consider that man’s
freedom of action in the future depends just as little on the arrangement
of predestined things as does his liberty of action with regard to
inhabiting a house a year hence, on the plans for which he is now
settling. He will be as free as his innermost being will permit, within
the house he has built; and he will be as free on Jupiter and on Venus as
his inner life permits, even under the conditions which will arise there.
Freedom will not depend on what has been predetermined by antecedent
conditions, but on what the soul has made out of itself.
‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐
In the earth condition is contained that which has developed within the
preceding Saturn, Sun and Moon states. Earth-man finds “wisdom” in the
processes going on around him. This wisdom is there as the fruit of what
has happened in the past. The Earth is the descendant of the “old Moon”;
and the latter developed with all that belonged to it, into the “Cosmos of
Wisdom.” The Earth is now at the commencement of an evolution, which will
introduce a new force into this wisdom. It will cause man to feel himself
an independent member of a spiritual world. This will come to pass because
his ego will have been formed within him during the Earth period by the
Lords of Form, as was his physical body on Saturn by the Lords of Will,
his vital body on the Sun by the Lords of Wisdom, and his astral body on
the Moon by the Lords of Motion.
By means of the co-operation of the Lords of Will, Wisdom and Motion, that
which manifests as wisdom is brought forth. Through the labours of these
three classes of spirits, the beings and processes of earth can harmonize
in wisdom with the other beings of their world. It is the Lords of Form
who bestowed on man his independent ego. In the future this ego will
harmonize with the beings of Earth, Jupiter, Venus, and of Vulcan, by
means of the force added to the existing wisdom during the Earth period.
It is the force of love. This force must begin to arise within
earth-humanity and the Cosmos of Wisdom develop into a _Cosmos of Love_.
Everything which the ego is able to unfold within itself must give birth
to love. The all-embracing archetype of love is set forth in the
revelation of that lofty Sun-spirit indicated in the description of the
Christ Mystery. Through Him the germ of love is planted in the innermost
core of the human being; and from this starting-point it must flow through
the whole of evolution. Just as the wisdom previously formed manifests in
the forces of the earthly sense-world, in the “elementary forces” of
to-day, so love itself will manifest in the future, in all phenomena, as
the new “elementary force.”
The secret of all future development is a recognition that everything
achieved by man from a right comprehension of evolution is a sowing of
seed which must ripen into love. And the greater the amount of love-force,
so much the greater will be the creative force available for the future.
In that which will grow from love, will lie the mighty forces leading to
that culminating point of spiritualization described above. The greater
the amount of spiritual knowledge that flows into human and terrestrial
evolution, so much more living and fruitful seed will be stored up for the
future. Spiritual knowledge is transmuted _through its own nature_ into
love. The whole process which has been described, beginning with the
Greco-Roman period and extending throughout the present time, shows how
this transformation, for which the beginning has now been made for future
times, is to take place and to what end. That which has been prepared as
wisdom on Saturn, Sun and Moon, is active in the physical, etheric and
astral bodies of man; it shows itself there as the “Wisdom of the World”,
but within the “ego” it becomes intensified. The wisdom of the outer world
becomes inner wisdom in man from the Earth period onward and when it is
concentrated in him, it becomes the germ of love. Wisdom is the necessary
preliminary condition for love; love is the fruit of wisdom, reborn in the
ego.