Luciferic influence on Man

From Anthroposophy

This topic page covers the specific influences on the human being in the current Earth stage, the gifts, downsides and redemption of Lucifer by Man.

For the Luciferic principle in general terms and with a broad overall positioning: its evolutionary origin within the solar system evolution, positioning in the development of the spiritual hierarchies, the being of Lucifer and the various luciferic hosts, see Luciferic beings and their influences

Background

Lucifer and Ahrimanic influences are to be seen in a broader context of 'counterforces' or spiritual influences that are opposing or side tracking Man's development. They are two polar force-fields or influences that pull into different directions, whereas the Christ represents the balanced middle ground. See also: Christ Module 14 – the counterforces: Lucifer, Ahriman and Asuras, or more broadly Evil.

The Luciferic influence is to be seen in an evolutionary context within our solar system, originating from the Old Sun stage, when a certain class of Cherubim renounced the sacrifice of the Thrones and thereby wrestled themselves free and independant of the normal stream of evolution. This gave rise to a host of Luciferic beings. This is explained on War in heaven#.5B1.5D - Evil and hierarchies

Luciferic influence on Man

For Mankind is especially important what happened in the Lemurian epoch. At that time Luciferic beings, retarded SoF that did not fully reach their evolutionary goal on Old Moon, sneaked into the Human astral body and thereby gave Man free will but also the possibility for evil. This is called the 'Fall of Man' in the Old Testament, the seduction by the snake that 'opened Man's eyes'.

This Luciferic infection had

  • the negative effect of a corruption of the astral body (and the bodies below), whilst
  • the positive effect is that it gave Man freedom.

The Luciferic influence can be called an 'infection' because the astral body was infected with desires and urges before it had reached a state of maturity. Because this infection or 'sin' happened before the development of Man's I-consciousness, it was not personal sin but karma for the whole of humanity, therefore this is called 'original sin'. These imperfections are transferred through the principle of inheritance and the Model for hereditary physical body. The impact is that illness and death arose in the physical body as a result of the luciferic infection.

See also: Fall and redemption - original sin and grace for a balanced positioning of both the above negative and positive aspects.

A very different world

The changes due to the luciferic infection are so vast and on many fronts, that one needs to study the many facets together in order to grasp its full impact - see Aspects below for further references.

As a result of the luciferic infection, Man now has a mineral physical body (see Schema FMC00.488) versus the intended bodily constitution (and only a spiritual elemental lower body). This also brought the cycle of death (of the physical body) and rebirth. It also gave rise to the various human races. And Man's I- consciousness would have been completely different. Last, also the impact of the Christ Impulse, which would then have taken place in the middle of the Atlantean epoch, would have been quite different.

Aspects

Principle, symbol, presentation

  • the serpent is the symbol of Lucifer and the Luciferic temptation, and the Luciferic principle means 'remained behind upon the Old Moon-stage of development'. Therefore it is impossible to see Lucifer through physical eyes that only developed on earth, he can only be perceived through the inner eye. A correct (imaginative, symbolic) representation in a spiritual-scientific sense would be with "a countenance as expressive as possible, and attached to it, a serpent’s body, but one that resembles the archetypal human spine", such as in the painting by Master Bertram (1916-03-07-GA167, 1916-03-20-GA174A and Schema FMC00.488A)
  • see also Representative of humanity

Consequences of Luciferic infection for Man

Redemption of Luciferic principle

  • the need to 'redeem Lucifer' that is, to 'get over it' and re-correct what was introduced in Man. Luciferic beings will be redeemed, have caught up the development they missed on Old Moon, with the reunion of the Sun.
  • Christianity as redeeming Lucifer (1904-12-28-GA090A)
    • [WIP note - see also 6.2.3 in SpirHier]

Other

  • as a result of the Luciferic influence followed the Ahrimanic influence in the middle of the Atlantean epoch
  • influence of Lucifer in the journey between death and a new birth

Illustrations

Schema FMC00.488 is an example of a schema that provides a synthesis to two major points from an important didactic lecture.

For lecture text, see Thinking Feeling Willing#1917-10-08-GA177

The first point (right, and left text boxes) is about the twofold nature of the human being as a result of the luciferic infection in the Lemurian epoch.

The second point (upper and lower text boxes in grey) is about the true nature of thinking: 'dead' thinking whereby our head takes in and processes living astral elementals, versus 'living' thinking whereby these thoughts are coming through the spiritual world and spiritual hierarchies, flowing through the lower part of the body and filled with feeling and willing.

For further study, this relates to:

FMC00.488.jpg


Schema FMC00.488A gathers some medieval illustrations of the snake as a symbol of the temptation in paradise, as described in the Book of Genesis. The symbolic presentation of the serpent with a human head is quite common in ancient art. On the left are the copies by Bertram that Rudolf Steiner refers to in his lectures, explaining why clairvoyantly this is the correct way to depict the luciferic principle in spiritual scientific terms (see lecture references on the lower right). On the right some other illustrations. Compare also with Schema FMC00.488 - right text column.

For more info, see the paper by John K. Bonnell in the 'Further reading' section below which contains many more examples with descriptions.

FMC00.488A.jpg

Schema FMC00.018 below depicts the relationship of opposing influences between Jehovah (one of the normally developed seven Spirits of Form) and the beings that 'underdeveloped' or stayed behind on Old Moon, these 'backward' beings we call Luciferic spirits. See also Lucifer and Jehovah.

Another way to depict this in relation to Man, is Schema FMC00.238 on I-less human beings

FMC00.018.jpg

Lecture coverage and references

1904-GA011
1904-09-03-GA091
1904-12-28-GA090A

provides explanation on redeeming of Lucifer [to be worked still - in Evo]

With the Luciferic principle is meant that beings that were not able to achieve their evolutionary goal on Old Moon, joined their future development (destiny) and longing for wisdom with Man. Christinianity is about redeeming this Luciferic principle. Evil is a result from Freedom that came along with this Luciferic principle. A higher principle always thanks the lower principle that stays behind.The higher dhyan cohans had to get out of the Luciferic to get the ability to embody manas.

A good God could never create Free Man .. for this another being – left behind – was required to provide counterimpulses.

1904-12-31-GA090A

Lemurian epoch#1904-12-31-GA090A

1916-03-07-GA167

see also: Nerve-sense subsystem#1916-03-07-GA167 and Schema FMC00.488

Recently we were in Hamburg and saw a picture done in the 13th, 14th century by Master Bertram and I want to tell you something about this picture.

Let us go back to the biblical story of the fall into sin which we in spiritual science call Luciferic temptation. When a painter in our modern age paints the fall into sin, so he would paint Adam and Eve on either side of the tree and then, naturally, a serpent on the tree. According to whether he is an Impressionist, Cubist, Expressionist or any other ‘ist’, he would more or less paint this; he would paint it beautifully. But he will paint a serpent looking like any serpent which crawls in the grass; that is realism. But is it realism? Is it actually not realism? I cannot imagine any simple woman being deceived by such a serpent.

We know from spiritual science that Lucifer is a being who had remained behind at the Old Moon development. Lucifer, during the Old Moon evolution, could not be seen with physical eyes such as we have upon Earth, so the serpent could not be something which could be seen with the physical eye, not the serpent referred to in the Garden of Eden. Lucifer had to be seen inwardly.

When you study the human being more accurately, you can see in every skeleton that it consists of two portions. You have the skull and the spinal column attached to it with the brain inside the skull and the spinal fluid in the spinal column, and the rest of the human being is attached to it. You can consider the human being only as being attached to it. You have the head like a small cosmic sphere attached to the whole thing.

You can also say: Thank God that man through his own wisdom cannot contribute to this head coming into existence through his birth. It would look very strange if the anatomists and physiologists could contribute anything to produce this wonderful structure of the human head.

This human head comes into existence between death and a new birth as in a large sphere which we could compare with our blue heavenly sphere, that in which our karma is woven and is an organization which as it goes towards incarnation, becomes smaller and smaller and then unites itself with the mother. That which then becomes our head is woven through by countless beings of the hierarchies out of the whole cosmic all. It is a wisdom of the most immense magnitude, a wisdom which has embodied in it all the experiences.

Our head is an inheritance of the Old Saturn, Old Sun and Old Moon incarnations. The earth with all its forces could not have been able to produce this head. It is only possible to bring into existence that which is added to the head, not the head with all its forces.

The other part of the human being, not the head with the spinal column, but that which is attached to it actually is earth man.

Now, how would a person with inner vision try to represent Lucifer actually as an Old Moon being?

One would represent a human head and would attach something like a boned up spinal column to it, something like a serpent; and that is how Master Bertram in the 13th, 14th century presents Lucifer there on the tree between Adam and Even. In the Hamburg Museum you can see the picture represented just like that. So you see that the painter who painted this picture has the living knowledge of the configuration of Lucifer within him. You can also see that it was not so very long ago that we still had the ancient atavistic clairvoyance which has now been lost.

1916-03-20-GA174A

At the Museum of Art, in Hamburg we recently discovered a proof that may be advanced externally. It results from the following fact:

Let us bear in mind that great symbol at the beginning of the Old Testament: Adam and Eve’s Temptation, what is known to us as the Luciferic temptation. Let us think of this. When a modern painter paints this (his standpoint is quite an indifferent matter; it is all the same whether he is a realistic or an idealistic painter, an expressionist, impressionist, or futurist), he thinks that the reality can be conveyed best of all if he paints Adam and Eve in a more or less ugly way; between them, he will paint the Tree of Paradise and upon it the Serpent, with a real serpent’s head, as large as the Tree. Can this be termed realistic, in the true meaning of the word? I do not think so. Leaving aside the present assumption, it is impossible to believe that the archetypal mother Eve could have been so stupid as to be tempted by a real serpent. Imagine, a real serpent creeping through the green grass should have caught mother Eve! Even the present serpent can only be looked upon as a symbol of something else.

Let us recall the thoughts that should really be connected with the Luciferic temptation. The serpent is Lucifer. It can only symbolize Lucifer. The fact that this being remained behind upon the Old Moon-stage of development, is connected with the Luciferic principle. It is therefore impossible to see Lucifer through physical eyes, for these have only developed upon the earth. Lucifer can only be perceived through the inner eye, and so he cannot resemble an earthly serpent that can be seen through our ordinary earthly eyes. Lucifer should be imagined as spiritual science is able to represent him.

Imagine now that man carries upon him his head, as the most perfectly formed member of his body. Attached to it (it suffices if you study a skeleton) is the remaining organism; the spine is attached to the head. Everything that has, later on, developed physically, was formed in advance. If we go back into evolution, if we were to perceive Lucifer through our inner power of vision, we would see him in the form which he had upon Old Moon, when he was preparing the earthly human head, a human head that was not so dense and solid as the present one, for it was inwardly mobile, manifold in its forms, and attached to it was a human spine, a spinal cord, that may be imagined in the form of a serpent’s body. Lucifer would, therefore, have to be painted with a countenance as expressive as possible, and attached to it, a serpent’s body, but one that resembles the archetypal human spine. This would be a kind of picture of Lucifer.

At the Museum in Hamburg there is a picture by Master Bertram representing a story, of creation, and there the paradise-symbol is represented in such a way that Lucifer is portrayed as described, exactly in accordance with spiritual science. In the 13th and 14th century, Master Bertram therefore painted Lucifer correctly, in a spiritual-scientific sense. This can be seen; it is a historical fact. We have frequently spoken of the ancient atavistic clairvoyance. What Master Bertram painted, shows that up to the 13th and 14th century it was possible to paint Lucifer correctly, in accordance with an ancient spiritual science. It can therefore be proved, it can be proved externally, that the human beings have become, so abandoned by the spirit as they are now, only a few centuries ago. This can be proved, and you will be able to discover such proofs.

In other words: What the obtuse people of today consider as the everlasting human nature ... the fact that they look out into the world through their eyes and then combine the things they see through their intellect, has become a human soul-quality only a few centuries ago. Before that time, man was aware of his connection with the spiritual world. This has faded. But we can learn to know that even in the 13th and 14th century people were still able to paint in such a way that this was in keeping with the ancient spiritual science. It is important to bear in mind such a fact. It shows us that the ancient spiritual science had to vanish for the sake of the development of human freedom, for in the 5th post-atlantean epoch arose something that has often been described: namely, the, consciousness-soul had to develop and consequently the old spiritual science had to recede. But it must be brought back again.

1906-03-30-GA097
1906-04-04-GA097
1906-04-29-GA097
1906-06-13-GA094

gives a good introduction

On Old Moon certain archangels had not completed their evolution. They brought 'enthusiasm' into blood and astral body and set up the connection beteen the brain and the physical senses, hence live in the nerve branches ending in the sense organs.

1909-03-28-GA111

(freely translated)

[Luciferic influence]

Man was not independant, could only do what the spiritual forces would tell him, in whose environment he was embedded, so to speak. Man received everything from these spiritual beings as behaved as if guided by instinct. This is how the forces of these spiritual beings worked and showed themselves, beings who did not themselves incarnate on earth. It were those beings who were not positively oriented toward humanity that worked on Man thus that the longing for this missing independance came about. The divine plan did include this independence for Mankind, but these beings made it come about much earlier. Together with other forces, they slipped in to the astral body, that was at that stage not yet fully connected with Man's being, and this have Man a sort of will-power, that was only astral though and not led by intelligence, thereby enabling error and evil. These powers are called the Luciferic powers, and they had a good and an evil side. They seduced and side-tracked humanity into error, but also gave humanity freedom.

The Lemurian Man had only a soul perception. He would see form nor colour of a flower, and no outerly appearances. The flower only showed as a lightning astral image, that was observed with an inner organ. The divine plan included Man to start perceiving with outer senses around the middle of the Atlantean epoch, but through the Luciferic influence this happened sooner, whilst Man's instincts were still pure. That is the 'fall of mankind'. Religious sources say it was the snake that openened the eyes of Man. Without this Luciferic influence, Man's body would not have become so solid as it is today, and Atlantean Man has seen the spiritual side of reality. Instead man fell into sin: illusion and error.

To make things worse: around the middle of the Atlantean epoch the influence of Ahrimanic forces was added to this. The Luciferic powers had worked on the astral body, now the Ahrimanic powers slipped in and worked on the etheric body, especially the ether head. This way Man fell into the illusion that the outer physical world is the real world.

1909-08-29-GA113

for background start reading the lectures starting from 27th

1909-08-30-GA113
1912-08-30-GA138

Let us assume that someone who has taken the first steps on the path of initiation, because his soul life has become clairvoyant by his own efforts to open the eyes of his soul, meets the figure in super-sensible worlds whom we call Lucifer. How did we describe this being yesterday? He comes before the soul as a being forever striving to make the eternal, which otherwise is in constant movement and change, into the stable, temporal and momentary, so that as something individual it can rejoice in its power to grow individually great.

If as a soul you meet Lucifer in super-sensible worlds, he then appears there as the great Light-bearer who leads, really leads, to bringing down into sensory existence all the treasures that pertain to real being in the spiritual world, and to the creation of its reflection and revelation in the world of the senses. If you follow Lucifer in this striving of his in super-sensible worlds, then you are working for the fulfilment of the primordial task of the universe; that is, to reveal the un-revealed, to commit to the moment all that is eternal and to make it possible that all that flows away into limitless eternity should be held fast in the inward greatness of the individual moment.

Now a desire exists in every human soul as an echo from the spiritual worlds to bring to fulfilment this striving to make manifest the un-revealed, to fix the eternal in the passing moment. Hence it is that when man enters super-sensible worlds, either by way of initiation or by death, it is really Lucifer who acts as his Light-bearer.

The dangers to which man is exposed when face to face with Lucifer in higher worlds are really only present when man takes with him into these worlds too great a measure of what in sensory existence constitutes his right relation to Lucifer. Lucifer is only dangerous for man's life in higher worlds if he takes with him too much of the nature and essential being of physical man.

How then do matters stand with Lucifer within the actual life of the senses, where there is always the interplay of super-sensible worlds? In the historical course of man during sensory existence and in his evolution we have to do above all with the interplay of the higher worlds, which send active impulses into physical life so that one thing may take place after another, in the way things are played out during the whole earth existence in the history of mankind.

The self-seeking strivings of every human soul that we regard as human and egoistic play into the life of the senses, and we know that the development of every soul must start from egoism. We also know that man can work his way out from egoism. Into all that souls have been able to do on earth through egoism, there comes what we may call the manifestation of the eternal in the passing moment. Luciferic forces are forever playing into what is fixed in the individual soul and also into all that the individual man can do for the whole world-order and existence through being an egoist and having the power to develop within him inward greatness that wells forth from his inner being. For what is individual greatness in the individual soul but the seed of all the greatness in the whole world evolution of man? What gave Homer, Shakespeare, Dante, Goethe, their power to affect mankind? It was their I-hood, and because within them there were whole worlds, worlds that issued forth from their inner being alone, out of their ego-hood. In this indirect way, through I-hood, the impulses of spiritual life are introduced, which are from epoch to epoch the mediators of the greatest spiritual deeds of mankind. In this we find Lucifer again. It is he who is Light-bearer, impulse and power behind all the greatness that radiates into human evolution from the mighty forces of eternity that, at certain points of time, surge up from the individual human soul.

Man's soul is placed between two poles that are simply the impression and reflection of all the worlds in which the soul actually stands. At the one pole the human soul hardens within itself, winds itself into the cocoon of its selfhood, and only desires what is of service to itself, what is for its self-gratification. At the other pole the human soul draws forces from its own depths that are able to radiate into the whole life of humanity. When does this ego-hood of man come to light? This happens the moment we think how necessary it is for every man to sacrifice for others what is his own, what is his most individually, what belongs most deeply to his ego-hood. But

  • in all that man can do for his fellows out of his I-hood lives Lucifer, the other pole of Lucifer;
  • in all that man can thus achieve for humanity under the influence of the Light-bearer, lies a reflection of what Lucifer really is in higher worlds, a reflection of his creative activity, which is the revealing of the unrevealed.

Can we then say that Lucifer is evil, or can we say that Lucifer is good? One can only say that if a man maintains that Lucifer is evil, and that we must flee from him, then it must also be said that we must avoid fire, because in certain circumstances it destroys life. On the path of initiation we find that the words good and evil cannot be used in this way for the description of any being of the super-sensible world order. Fire is good when it acts in good conditions, evil when it works in evil ones; in itself it is neither the one nor the other.

So it is with Lucifer.

  • He exercises a good influence on man's soul when he becomes the instigator of man's sacrifice on the altar of human evolution of all that is most individual in his soul.
  • Lucifer becomes an evil being rather, what he does becomes evil, when he arouses impulses leading only to self-gratification in the human soul.

Thus, once our attention has been drawn to these beings, we have to follow up the effect their deeds have in the world. The acts of super-sensible beings can be described as good or bad; the beings themselves, never!

Just imagine that somewhere, on some island or other, there were a human race holding the opinion that, in all circumstances, one must protect oneself from Lucifer and that he has to be kept at the greatest possible distance. That would not prove that the men of this island had better knowledge of Lucifer than anyone else, but simply, by virtue of their particular qualities that these men were only able to convert into evil what Lucifer could give them. The views about Lucifer held by the people of this island would only be characteristic of the people, not of Lucifer. I will not say whether or not this island exists. You can look for it yourselves in the evolution of the world.

We must seek the attributes of Lucifer in the being Lucifer whom we meet in the super-sensible world. The manner of his working has to be sought in how his powers take on different qualities when, for instance, they work on such an island and their effects actively ray out on such an island.

1917-12-25-GA180

.. in the times that went before the Mystery of Golgotha — the human being received quite special forces when he reached the age of 14 or 15, over and above the forces he possessed in earlier childhood. At the 14th or 15th year of life, in those olden times, man received forces which have been lost to mankind since the Mystery of Golgotha. These forces are no longer there; or they are only there in a backward, atavistic manner; — no longer as normal forces of human nature generally.

The forces which the human being thus received when he became about 14 or 15 years old were simply there in his environment inasmuch as he himself was there. Moreover, they were such as could unite with the processes of physical manipulations.

...

The forces man then received about the 14th or 15th year of life have gradually been lost. It was with the 15th century that they disappeared almost entirely. That is why many things that were written before the 15th century A.D. are no longer intelligible at all to-day, save with the help of Spiritual Science., For in these olden times, the moment a man set to work with any physical manipulations (such as are done nowadays quite commonly in our laboratories), — the moment he did so, he gave occasion for certain Luciferic elemental beings to arise at the same time. At any rate, he could give occasion for this. These Luciferic elemental beings were thoroughly effective; and, if engendered, would have played their part in the social life of men, if these things had not been kept secret.

...

Mankind to-day is not exposed to those Luciferic elemental spirits of whom we may speak in this connection. But in compensation for this, human beings are exposed all the more strongly to certain Ahrimanic elementals. Ahrimanic elemental spirits come into being to-day with a like necessity, as the aforesaid Luciferic beings did in antiquity. Only they come into being in a very different way — out of quite other forces and impulses in human nature.

Discussion


Related pages

References and further reading

  • John K. Bonnell: 'The Serpent with a Human Head in Art and in Mystery Play' (article in American Journal of Archaeology, Vol. 21, No. 3 (Jul. - Sep., 1917), pp. 255-291 (37 pages), online here and PDF downloadeable here).


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