Narrative on Development of the Human 'I'

From Free Man Creator
This is a working copy taken from Development of the I#Discussion


STATUS: 
2025-05-12: outline mode structuring only, added chronological timeline and moved sections accordingly.. much better, but clearly no decent flow, and many aspects missing still. Not worked on text itself just moved text blocks. 
The existing text was just jotted down freely, structuring the story this way it becomes huge though more complete .. big risk of loosing one's self and reader in complexity breadth and depth .. drinking from the firehose.

Suggestion: for study of this topic, start this page in a new browser window, and right click a schema link or other to open in a new tab. That way you don't loose the storyline and can go back to the related materials in the various tabs in your browser window.

Old introduction to the narrative (not contents yet)

Although it is easy to conceptually grasp Man's bodily principles in a simple diagram, this really does not provide any insight to feel oneself into the realities it represents. Therefore this commentary is intended to provide a narrative to try and help bring the concepts to life a bit. Note the real soul work remains with the reader: the below is not to be click-read, but to be studied with contemplation, and meditated upon.

Schemas such as FMC00.472 are intended to support this narrative, as one has to bring together more angles than any single diagram can depict. Just as the other schemas, a drawing says nothing by itself, and even the topic pages talk about 'stuff' like monad, higher triad, etc .. but these remain dry and dead words if we cannot bring them to life in our soul

Just asking a simple question helps to get started (it doesn't matter so much where we get started).

How and why does Man reincarnate, what really happens, how come some human beings we see around us on Earth do not?

Do we know what really happens in terms of spiritual physiology and substance and process?

Such simple questions may test the depth of our understanding beyond the intellectual repeat-knowledge whereby we rehash what we have picked up. To find ways to approach such questions, we need to be able to depict the reality of the concepts, and this requires that we have brought to life the movie that Rudolf Steiner was describing in his many lectures.

The below may come across as over 'over one's head', and maybe even impossible to read or digest, but trust that the flow includes a didactic storyline and represents a tentative form of teaching. It is a different way then Rudolf Steiner lectured and provided us the base materials, it is a different also how eg Maximilian Rebholz tried to teach by the train of thoughts storylines developed in his essays. In this case we use the topic pages and schemas as building blocks to take a pointer and a spotlight, and point to connections and shed a light in various angles to show different perspectives. Whether one experiences this as demanding also depends on how much one 'lives with questions' and is eager to find out more for oneself.

1. Introduction - Human 'I' and individuation

What?

The human 'I' is the fourth bodily principle of Man in it's great journey of developing to the tenth spiritual hierarchy.

It is the central developmental goal of the Earth stage of planetary evolution

How? the process ... Individuation

the 'big picture' process of individuation, covered below, is illustrated with Schema FMC00.594. and a short narrative on: Unification#Individuation and differentiation.

We can imagine breaking off little pieces of a cake that crumbles, so pieces slowly detach and come loose from the group soul cloud, by which it fragments down, also as a gradual process with different levels of clustering or granularity.

This process sets the development of humanity apart from animals who also have a group soul, but who did not go through the same evolutionary journey as mankind, and therefore 'end up' with a different constitution both 'below' (physical animal) and 'above' (group soul). See eg Animal kingdom#1907-03-16-GA097

In the Lemurian and Atlantean epoch, in a first stage of the development of the human I .. (Schema FMC00.046, Schema FMC00.370) and a number of group souls developed based on their earlier development (Schema FMC00.283) and (resulting?) elemental balance of the different bodily principles, they are called the bull, lion, eagle (Schema FMC00.065, Schema FMC00.456) and these human group souls lead to the variants of the current form of Man and the human races as they imprinted from the astral on the different etheric bodily forms (Schema FMC00.363 and Schema FMC00.477).

So the beginning the soul did not take up its dwelling in each single one, but that one soul distributed itself as group soul among many. What today dwells in one, then inhabited a whole tribe. Such a group soul does not die. (1907-03-16-GA097). This is symbolized by the Phoenix (see Schema FMC00.470): current human group souls regenerate cyclically with a lifecycle of approx. 500 years (1907-12-27-GA101). As a result also, the characteristics of the physical body were much more the same between members of a tribe, see physiognomy (on Personality and Individuality#physiognomy and individuation). In the process of individuation, the I moulds the lower bodies, starting from the astral and etheric down to the physical body.

The mechanism that is related to this is that of blood-based love, as the group soul lives in the warmth of the blood.

We can also follow this process in the spiritual hierarchies involved .. the abnormal SoF that have worked the different main races (as related to the various planetary influences), see Human races#Spiritual scientific aspects. But the below also at level of the astral, the various folk souls.

  • A nice example is given with Dante when Rudolf Steiner describes the characteristics of important Individualities that incarnate, and says that "as a rule, a personality like Dante cannot be born of homogeneous blood. To belong to a single nation is impossible for such a soul. It needs a mysterious alchemy; various blood streams must flow together." (Folk souls#1916-12-17-GA173A)

2. The story

this section to provide a high level storyline of what follows

3. What preceded the descent in the Lemurian epoch

3.1 - Old Moon and group souls of humanity

As background: in this note we will use as a basis Schema FMC00.142 and the information on Group souls of humanity and The elementary kingdoms, namely that the human being in it's constitution is made up in its form and structure in one way (EKi), and has a consciousness also in the process of individuation (Schema FMC00.594 and explanation on Unification#Individuation and differentiation)

3.2 - Earlier epochs

  • descent of other kingdoms

4. Lemurian epoch - the Spirits of Form

4.1 - Setting the scene (I) the metaphoric image of the ocean, droplets and sponges

In the period 1906-12 to 1907-04, Rudolf Steiner used a nice metaphoric image for the start of the I-individuation, with drops or droplets (of the divine substance, the spiritual manas and budhi) separating from the water (the godhead) and being taken up by very many tiny sponges (the physical and etheric bodies below on Earth). Tthis classical image was already used in eg 1903-11-16-GA090A: "water scattered into many drops .. the drop is still the same water", or similarly " from Annie Besant: fire, bursting forth into many sparks".

This idea of the 'I' going from say 1x50 to 50x1 is explained with the Mahat principle in 1904-08-13-GA090A, and explained as the Logoic principle in a set of lectures in that volume.

Setting

Upto the middle of the Lemurian epoch, the human soul rested in the keeping of the godhead, being an inherent part of the godhead itself. Up above, in the realm of the spirit, there was the divine spirit, and down below were the fourfold human forms, which had been maturing up to this point and were now ready to receive droplets of this divine spirit. At that stage the soul did not came to dwell in every individual, but that one group soul was shared by many bodies.

Metaphoric image

Think of a glass of water, or a container holding a thousand water droplets that merge into one another, forming a single whole. Also consider a hundred or thousand tiny sponges, each able to absorb one drop. Then try gradually to take up a drop of the water with each of these sponges, so that each contains one drop. You then have a hundred drops which previously had been completely one with the water and are now distributed among one hundred small sponges. This makes them individual and independent.

Image applied

Until then the soul had rested within the great universal divine spirit like a drop in our glass of water. The lower nature was ripe at that time to receive the power into them which is our higher power of soul.

The physical human forms then acted the way small sponges do. Droplets of the spirit separated out from the universal divine substance and became individual, and as souls were like drops in those enveloping bodily forms. Those souls incarnated for the first time then and went through many incarnations, developing their human body into the form it has today.

The event which happened at that time, was that parts of the divine principle united with the lower members of human nature: tlower human nature united with the human soul at that time.

Commentary

With the human I, something of the divine nature lives in human beings, a drop of the divine spirit, which is of the same substance as the godhead, just as the ocean and the drop of water are also the same in substance. Hence something lives in every human being that may be compared to a drop from the ocean of the divine, there is something in every human being that is like God.

However when we say something in the human being is like God, this does not mean the human being in himself is equal to or like a God: a drop taken from the ocean is the same as the ocean in substance, but it is not the ocean.

And so the human I is a drop from the ocean of the divine, but it is not God, and just as the drop can unite with its own substance when you pour it into the sea, so does the soul, being a drop of divinity, unite with its God in a spiritual way during prayer or meditation.

4.2 - Setting the scene (II) Monad? what, where?

So where sits Man's monad scaffold developed in the three previous planetary stages of evolution?

It is 'carried' along by the spiritual hierarchies, and worked continuously, and only released at a certain stage of individuation. Contemplate FMC00.472 again, and with your mind draw horizontal lines: what Man calls 'his' higher bodily principles are really the refined and spiritualized parts of his lower bodies, and they also 'belong' to the higher hierarchies, but in different ways (four higher hierarchies 'carry' manas, five carry budhi).

And so these beings either sacrifice a lowest element of their own being to provide the 'thought substance' for a lower hierarchy, or they contribute by their own thoughts and create seeds for something to come later, and so on. This interplay of different roles (or types of dynamic interaction process for each level of the hierarchy) is what is also summarized at a high conceptual level on FMC00.077A, which it is important to help one realize the 'contributing roles' of each hierarchy depending on the CoC, see Schema FMC00.048 on Twelve Conditions of Consciousness.

  • Note: This schema FMC00.077A is a simplification because it does not show the CoL and CoF that are embedded in the cosmic fractal, it just shows the overall main result at CoC level for each planetary stage of evolution. To realize that with an illustration, see example FMC00.413

In order to 'see' this picture it is essential to be able to visualize mentally as an imagination, the fact that Man also is made up of spiritual beings, that we are woven into them and their different structural or bodily principles of their constitution. And what can help with meditating on this is: Cosmic fractal#1923-05-02-GA224.

Sometimes our contemporary worldview hampers us in thinking freely about the I and the spiritual world, as we think of Man still as what is enclosed in a separate entity, often mapped even unconsciously to a body of some sorts. However the spiritual I is really beyond space and time, one cannot locate it hard and deterministically. The temporal realm is below the fourth sublayer of the spirit world, also called 'akasha'. Above that, beyond the 'abyss', time and space no longer exist. That means that all that exists in the temporal realm and spacetime-history 'collapes' into meaning, one can no longer use mundane terms and concepts to describe it appropriately and reason about intellectually. Further reading on this topic, see oa Human 'I'#Note 3 - In response to a question and Man's higher triad#Note 2 - Connecting the worlds of our 'true spiritual I' with our 'physical I'

The monad is still of a higher nature, budhi and atma really originate in worlds higher than the spirit world (the budhi and nirvana planes), and are clothed as they ripple down into the higher spiritual world (see eg Schema FMC00.128 and Schema FMC00.141A on the Monad topic page). Atma is the drop of divine substance, the building block of divinity to be found in everything downstream, and this for all kingdoms we know currently on Earth.

Note:

  • For example Rawn Clark describes this in his book (2019) 'Love letter to a dying world'. To get a feel for the reality of the group soul, see Rawn Clark from an experiential perspective in the youtube movie 'Offerings: 19 - Greater selves'. (4'30-17'30). Rawn uses terminology 'greater self' for group soul (and/or Man's higher triad), and 'individual self' for 'Individuality'. In this movie he speaks with waking consciousness to comment whilst shifting his consciousness to the spirit world and visiting the world of group souls and archetypes of all kingdoms of nature.

4.3 - 'The descent of the monads' - Jehovah and group souls

Though the story of evolution starts much earlier, in earlier planetary stages of evolution, a good place to start the film is in the middle of the Lemurian epoch.

What really happened there with the SoF and the Jehovah impulse?

It provided for higher astral substance to/that act as group souls for humanity. Imagine astral group souls of animals, well something like that, as described in the important Group souls of humanity#1908-06-01-GA102. Now this Jehovah impulse was not uniform, as many spirits came down and these provided the basis for the souls of nations and tribes. This is how to understand what is meant with 'Jehovah as group soul for humanity': Jehovah is a large class of spirits. (Group souls of humanity#1907-04-01-GA096). This granularity is important to imagine, as it has to be taken along into the ever further refinement and gradual process of individuation.

  • Notes
    • 1/ another simple perspective on the 'descent of the monads' is that it the merging of the higher (spiritual) with the lower (physical), and the blending of the astral of both - giving rise to a human astral body which got quite some surgery even beyond/after this operation (see 'cosmic fusion kitchen' below). This joining of both parts, higher and lower, is illustrated with schemas on Lemurian epoch#Merging of higher and lower: Schema FMC00.443 and Schema FMC00.278 resulting in the Schema FMC00.134 with a dual nature - hence the Centaur.
    • 2/ with monad is meant here, these higher cosmic principles, that in this case what will/have become Man's higher triad, carried by the Spirits of Form. There are different formulations. One is that the SoF sacrifice their lowest member or 'I', another is that they are 'radiating down' manas. To deepen one's imagination of what is meant with what it means if a spiritual hierarchy uses/projects its lowest member, see 1908-02-29-GA102 and Schema FMC00.483 describing of this role of the SoF on the different planetary stages. And, as a lateral though, think about how Man uses his lowest physical member on Earth. Hold this perspective for when later below we will use the FMC00.472 schema to come back to this structural view of the hierarchies.
    • we will not go into how this is carried in the blood relationships, though that is an important additional aspect of study (it is covered elsewhere on this site, for a start see eg Christ Module 4 - Mystery of the Blood)

As mentioned, the above 1908-06-01-GA102 lecture is important to read, because one really needs to grasp the gradual effect of individuation. How does Man develop his I?

What is it with this Jehovah providing a manas impulse, as Steiner draws with Schema FMC00.185? Well see FMC00.472 (above): the manas is 'radiating down' .. on Earth .. on Man. Man and will be in the process of trying to develop the threefold soul, see Schema FMC00.046, and that takes a while, see Schema FMC00.370 or also Schema FMC00.233A (all shown above). The first step is this is the development of the sentient soul as part of taking hold of the astral body.

The answer of how that took place is provided by FMC00.469: the workings of the Jehovah manas impulse happened during Man's nights in the astral world, so it was a frucification that was not happening during Man's earthly physical reality experience as we know it today. For this one should realize that the consciousness was very different in the period of the mid Lemurian to say mid Atlantean epochs, see eg Schema FMC00.475. This way Man could develop the sentient soul and seeds of manas, see also Structure of Man between death and a new birth#Causal body, the causal body being the scaffold book of lives used for incorporating experiences from earthly incarnations, thus kickstarting the individuation process and providing the first major stage of the process.

Perspective: 'the Logos drills holes'

on Schema FMC00.443 and how it relates to Schema FMC00.046

Introduction

On the one hand, Schema FMC00.472 and Schema FMC00.472A seem to show and imply that the SoF gave their higher astral body, that then merged with the lower astral body. This is also what seems to be depicted on Schema FMC00.443.

On the other hand, Schema FMC00.046 tells us that this then 'ripples through' and 'takes hold of' the lower bodily principles, which led to the development of the intellectual and consciousness soul. Indeed at first there was only sentience and the sentient soul. Then through the transformations across epochs, the human constitution changed drastically and the new developments were incorporated .. see Schema FMC00.168 on Recapitulation.

But how does one have to imagine this rippling through and taking hold? What is it that ripples through and takes hold?

Especially when we think in terms of the spiritual hierarchies as they work through the formative forces related to the spectrum of elements and ethers.

This note follows as logical step after Kundalini#Note 4 - More on kundalini and prana. To get into this note one could potentially read that first.

And thus one can ask: how do we understand Schema FMC00.046 and Schema FMC00.443 in terms of the formative forces and group soul consciousness?

The intention of this note is to come to a better appreciation of what is meant with 'the Logos drills holes' as how it relates to this 'rippling through and taking hold', in a language that includes the formative forces and higher ethers.

Commentary

It is immediately clear that the statement above of a higher astral body being given off by the SoF (as per drawing) is not the right way to see it. The SoF sacrificed their 'I'. Take Schema FMC00.472 on the side here and look at points [1] to [3] .. what does this mean .. for you? Now take Schema FMC00.483 and consider the upper box: the I is spiritual and hence what is meant is Man's higher triad .. the spirit self includes the life-spirit and spirit-man that are both higher cosmic principles of the Monad.

That is what is meant 'the Logos drills holes'. It is the Logos working in these higher principles. As is shown on Schema FMC00.141A, these two highest principles (buddhi or life-spirit or Christos, and atma or spirit-man) originate in still higher world, the buddhi and nirvana planes .. and appear clothed in the higher unformed spirit world.

4.4 - Zooming in to the process: 'cosmic fusion kitchen' or: role of the other hierarchies

What takes place in the Lemurian epoch is much more complex, and is a fusion of various influences. See Aspects on this current page, or Development of the I#1906-01-06-GA262 for a first statement - and Schema FMC00.472A is an illustration to support this. This rather complex process is described in a multitude of lectures from various angles. Only in one's soul can one put it all together by study and meditation.

As will become clear, the purpose of this text is to bring the reader to contemplate and visualize the spiritual reality as a complex concerted effort in the language of the spiritual hierarchies, who are really the substance of the whole cosmos. See Schema FMC00.305 and Cosmic fractal.

In order to do this, one needs to familiarize oneself with the structure of the spiritual beings higher than Man, ànd their evolution and the processes in the cycles of evolution.

The hope of this text is that this way of reasoning helps the reader to 'bind together' the multitude of statements about complex evolutionary processes such as the development of the human I, and can form an aid to contemplate and meditate, so as to build an imaginative picture in one's own mind.

Individuation and the third hierarchy

Back to the earlier image of breaking off little pieces of a cake that crumbles, so pieces slowly detach and come loose from the group soul cloud, by which it fragments down, also as a gradual process with different levels of clustering or granularity.

For example, Man stays connected to the Folk souls at archangelic level.

Schema FMC00.132 illustrates this from a different perspective (structure of Man between death and a new birth). The topic of the Three meetings illustrates it differently again (traction/connection with H3 during incarnate life). Other angles are the famous lecture 'the work of the angel in Man's astral body' Third Hierarchy#1918-10-09-GA182 and Third Hierarchy#Food for archai. Yet another way, see Schema FMC00.131 on Man and the spiritual hierarchies

In other words, this brings us to feel our way into the fact that the Third Hierarchy really 'carries' our higher bodily principles, Man's higher triad.

Because one can wonder about Man's higher triad, and 'the Monad that descends' in the Lemurian epoch .. what is meant by that statement Monad? And how do the Spirits of Form relate to the scaffold of the higher triad that was created in previous planetary stages of evolution? We come back to that question a bit later.

The scaffold for Man's higher triad was created in the later Conditions of Life in the planetary stages of evolution Old Saturn, Old Sun, and Old Moon. We refer to, for example the process on Old Saturn, what is happening in CoL=7 on the right of Schema FMC00.199 or better Schema FMC00.413. It's also shown, though not as clearly, it just appears, on Schema FMC00.414 and Schema FMC00.276 on Overview of solar system evolution. But so how or where, what do we have to imagine?

The role of the archai, and the consciousness soul

Now if the hierarchies carry, make up, our bodily principles (all of them woven together, see Cosmic fractal), then we also can position the I being carried in the bosom of the archai, as is described by 1925-01-11-GA026 (LT 144) - see higher on this page.

Indeed see FMC00.472 and look at the lowest dot in the structure of the Archai, that is exactly what is meant. That dot is at the height of the I of Man on the left, the Archai carried the I in their bosom, then release it during the process of individuation. It is made up of warmth substance provided originally by the Thrones on Old Saturn, but evolved since (see LT144 above), for a visual to meditate on what is meant with the fact that Man's I lives in the warmth element, see FMC00.194

And now what happens in the middle of a planetary stage of evolution - see The two halves of an evolutionary cycle, and eg what is said in The two halves of an evolutionary cycle#1912-06-20-GA133. Man is set free, as the outbreathing creation stops, and what is happening (oa creation by Man) is breathed in again (to be breathed out in the next cycle). This is what is meant with Meaning of Free Man Creator, and seeds for future worlds.

Now study Transition between 4th and 14th century .. where the hierarchies graduate, pass the baton, move up one level. This is a key event and stage also for Man's I-development. From Transition between 4th and 14th century#1923-03-16-GA283

What is really implied here? What am I trying to point out so intensely? It is the fact that human beings feel themselves more and more in their individuality. As the world of thoughts passes from the SoF to the Archai, Man increasingly senses the thoughts in his own being, because the Archai live one level nearer Man than the SoF.

That the consciousness soul is key and the true spiritual I can be sensed from FMC00.431, see the bottom part of this schema, and imagine a semi-permeable membrane that provides osmosis of the spiritual into Man's soul, see Human character - the I and threefold soul.

Or with a literal quote: "in the consciousness-soul, which is the actual I-soul, integrated the spirit-self or manas .. only in the consciousness soul do we have the first announcement of the self-conscious I. Only then does what is called the fifth part of the human being, the spirit self or manas, gradually appear in the human being." (from Group souls of humanity#1907-12-27-GA101).

Again, another way to view it's importance is with FMC00.468.

Man is only truly and fully ‘set free’ in the current epoch and current cultural age of the consciousness soul, Man's true I.

4.5 - the Luciferic 'infection' or influence

4.6 - further angles of perspectives

Perspective: 'Abel and Cain'

3/ furthermore, for a bit perspective and to show things are never simple, see Schema FMC00.652 and the explanations on Streams of Abel and Cain. This expands the story to different groups of SoF. Jehovah was one class that have rise to the adam & eve storyline (and part of the Abel-Seth stream), but there was a differentiation of less mature SoFs who came before - the Cain stream. And both led to two streams part of humanity, with a different soul nature. See also Streams of Abel and Cain#Note 3 - Commentary on Cain and Abel-Seth streams: physical and/or spiritual?

Perspective: 'Centaur'

see: Centaur

5. The gradual development of the I over the Lemurian and Atlantean epochs

The SoF provided substance by sacrificing their lowest member, this I-substance is able to ripple through and take hold of astral body, etheric body, and physical body .. this however is a gradual process, it takes time in the Lemurian and Atlantean epochs.

This long and gradual process is visualized with Schema FMC00.046

Perspective of races

see: Schema FMC00.456 and Schema FMC00.546 with context on human races topic page

Only at the end of the Atlantean epoch, the current waking consciousness arrives with the fifth sub-race. It is what is passed on onto the fifth epoch as the seed or basis for mankind in the current fifth epoch.

6. Current fifth epoch

Our current epoch, thus far

After the above, taking a step back:

Whereas first human beings were and are connected still to different group souls, they start the process of individuation as a gradual process at different levels of granularity, and even today this is still going on (see Phoenix).

The process of individuation starts in the Lemurian epoch, develops over the Atlantean epoch, but reaches its crowning in the current Postatlantean epoch with two key elements: the Mystery of Golgotha and the development of the consciousness soul.

This is depicted on Schema FMC00.438 (based on what I scribbled as I 'saw' that, FMC00.438A). This schema is a top-level pyramidion stone for an underlying story and explanation of the spiritual guidance of mankind by the White Lodge to prepare the constitution of the people of Europe for this (more on this on oa Two streams of development and Migrations).

That the story is quite a bit more complex is illustrated with FMC00.377A. Just as there were the pre-MoG interventions of Christ, there were also various impulses in the current epoch, see the Krishna impulse (sentient soul) the Wotan Impulse (intellectual soul)

Our current situation and fifth cultural age

Regarding this story over three epochs (or four, if we include the next Sixth epoch). The PDF file The great journey of humanity bundles a selection of Schemas from the site regarding the evolution of humanity and the Christ Impulse. It zooms into the phase of the four epochs between the third and sixth epoch on Earth, and the crucial period of the next 3000 years which is pivotal in the transition of humanity between the current fifth and sixth epochs.

All this to show why we are living in an such an exciting ànd pivotal period in the long history of mankind.

Human I experience

Now Man’s I-experiences in physical reality are soul experiences of the spiritual I using the lower bodies, astral events picked up with physical senses and the nervous system, and inscribed both in our physical memory (during sleep over a three day period, see Memory) as astrally (see The human heart#etheric heart and astral recorder and the Kamaloka journey in the astral world after death).

  • This way, Man develops its threefold soul structure, one can imagine an I-organization because it relates to the three lower bodies .. [PS: How is this structure taken along across incarnations ? Maybe as a prototype inscribed in the fourth layer of the spirit world ? Think of the streams downwards and going up again (since the Atlantean epoch).]
Reincarnation and the process of traction

This section explores why some souls may not incarnate, zooms in to where exactly the difference is made and the conditions that apply

In the process between death and a new birth, the valuable life experiences on Earth are 'processed' and incorporated to slowly develop and weave Man's spiritual structure of the higher triad (see eg FMC00.287 and FMC00.450 on Journey between death and a new birth. This is why the importance is stressed that Man, after death, finds the connection with the Third Hierarchy, and is able to pass from the soul to the spirit world.

One can imagine how this is a natural and organic process, much dependant on the nature of the soul and the life lived, and so many don't make it. This is described in the parable of the sower, see also the two lectures on meaning of life Meaning of life#1912-05-23-GA155 and 1912-05-24-GA155.

The processing of these experiences inscribes a clean manas package (in the book of lives or causal body), it is the development of the spirit-self .. and this is the key to further individuation. First this processing is done unconsciousless, but it ripens ever more consciously as the consciousness soul is spiritual and thus the good appears gradually (conscience, empathy ... selfless love) and so more 'good' makes it to the spirit world. In the current epoch, mankind is in the developmental stage of evolving the spirit-self, for a simple presentation (without CoL and CoF) see Schema FMC00.130.

So the image I try to put forth here is that Man, through its functioning in all the lives in the cycle of rebirth, is really writing small bits to these higher nodes of the higher triad, first providing a seed and then an organic cluttering and developing – visualize the process of dune formation. This way Man’s soul activity organically develops the higher members, slowly, but individually. The substance is most probably there because of the group soul. The higher triad that was developed in the first three planetary incarnations may to be looked at like this, as macroscopic material at a group level, not individualized yet, and carried by the higher hierarchies.

Traction?

The way how the I develops needs to fulfill certain criteria for the whole process to go forward with traction in the right way. With traction is meant, development along the intended or designed path of balanced development.

If someone is only evil with every action, then very little is ‘written’ into manas to couple with the higher triad, it is a weak thread. With black magic it may even be this connection is completely lost, this is explained on Eighth sphere#The state of avichi.

Another way to get a feel of the importance of morality is Human breath#1915-01-03-GA275.

In short, the spiritual world does not accept what is not good, because of the moral nature of the cosmos. [certain karmic deeds are thrown back and don't go through, bounce back - see eg Karma or destiny#1911-12-31-GA134]

In terms of 'traction' along development, see also the role of the third hierarchy on Three meetings (and the gearbox image described on Schema FMC00.023A on that page) to show again the link with angels and archangels on a daily and yearly basis. This is a way to appreciate the cosmic rhythms of the spiritual hierarchies in the cosmic fractal. Other ways are 25920 (eg Schema FMC00.027) the Phoenix (500 year rhythm of current group souls), or Spiritual hierarchies and their eigenperiods.

After death, the karmic package remains in the astral world for you and is taken back in descent on process of re-birth (see Schema FMC00.498), but that does not mean you are developing your higher triad and true I.

Here also we see that the I is a really broad difficult subject in spiritual science, and the single term I is used to denote may various aspects of this complex affair.

The I needs a certain balance between the members and incorporate the learnings of each life and cultural age, so the multiplicity of experiential dimensions moulds the development. The ladder of spiritual maturity is where souls can progress or go backwards up or down the ladder. This is what is meant with the Sixteen paths of perdition.

Also in the context of these 'contexts for development', the different group souls (as in bull, lion, eagle, Man, but also folk souls) are related to the human races. Consider the race as a physical body vehicle with a certain physiology, that may be more or less suited to the stage of development needed (even if this is not absolute). See FMC00.204 and FMC00.186 (which ethers, development of subsystem and nervous system)

But so astral entities can take on a body and descend into it using etheric substance etc, can they also re-incarnate ? Re-incarnate implies that we are talking about a spiritual entity with an individual spirit-self, and individualized connection into the higher spirit world. This not all astral entities have.

So requirements are

  • that the process kamaloka (of astral rewind) has been gone through, and dipped even for the shortest period into the spirit world (even the lowest developed true human being does this)
  • that the soul is able to pass from the soul to the spirit world, and has the desire and force at midnight hour to descend again
  • does it also include the criterium that a piece of higher self triad needs to have been written already, for it to be a true I ? Steiner says the true I is the consciousness soul with a bit of manas included, so it requires at least some piece of higher astral. This also is not necessarily the case for all souls.

Many lower astral entities can thus take hold of a body. Also in the beginning of John's gospel, the author uses the term ‘I-people’ .. which implies there are also non-I-people or not-yet-I-people, or cases where the fructification by the Christ Impulse does not work. See I-less human beings#1907-06-27-GA100

  • Note: some other angles or streets we don't go into here:
    • the fall of the spirits of darkness
    • the link with initiation separating TFW or the members of the etheric body
    • Another angle to approach this is to see what it means to be an adept, how initiation changes the constitution of the human being. The purification of the lower bodies, starting with the astral down to the blood (getting under conscious control of the EKs).
Traction - revisited and recap

Regarding 'traction' and the connection of Man on Earth today, and the spiritual higher self, starting with the causal body, manas or spirit self, also consider the following:

  • souls reincarnating today no longer descend into their physical bodies with the strength fed by ancient knowledge as was the case in earlier cultural ages .. souls are rather empty and consume the bodies. If the soul is only filled with sensory percepts and/from external mineral science, destiny threatens that people in future incarnations become human automatons and their eternal core dies off (1921-01-16-GA203, see Introduction to reincarnation#1921-01-16-GA203). See also I-less human beings.

This last statement, the case of I-less human beings, and the state of avitchi .. are all illustrations showing that the connection has to hold, from a thin thread of spiritualization that has to be maintained and developed, and can also wither .. because weaker. The idea of Man's transformation and spiritualization is that this connection develops and Man's higher triad develops, step by step, as part of the natural evolution of Man's bodily principles. However, it is clear that whereas various cohorts or segments of the population could be at different stages along the development of the threefold soul, a more harsh separation will take place whereby a whole segment of souls will not develop the 'traction' through the sequence of incarnations to develop strong enough a thread to the manas principle to then enable the connection with budhi Christ life spirit and beyond. This is described from various perspectives, see Sixth epoch with descriptions from the Book of Revelation, and some key schemas such as Schema FMC00.591 and Schema FMC00.583 that illustrate how part of humanity will 'fall away'.

  • An illustration to visualize this is the formation of a dune (there are good movie illustrations that exist to illustrate this, still to be added. See for example the below, and contemplate: the flow which is visualized here is like the random process of life experiences .. however, through many incarnations something is either formed, like a hill or dune, or not .. similarly the thread with the spiritual seed is developed and strengthened, or not. www.youtube.com/watch?v=CoF3MioTMUM

The remainder of the epoch

the importance of the next sixth cultural age

also

In the above we saw how the Jehovah impulse worked indirectly, 'at night' so to speak - see Schema FMC00.469. Now only in 2024 a new GA265A volume was published as part of GA2025, and this contains pictures (as part of questions that Rudolf Steiner asked a/his master) about the future of humanity - see Future of humanity#Key message

7. Future epochs

The story above started with group souls of humanity, and the long individuation process of the human I and currently the spirit self. We can map this to the fourth (middle) and fifth (manas) elements of Man's bodily principles. However that is not the end of Man's transformation and spiritualization. With the life-spirit and later spirit-man, Man makes divinity one's own, Man becomes a differentiated individualized drop of divinity, part of the monads. It includes developing the characteristics of the godhead, see Schema FMC00.410 on Trinity.

Future group soul of humanity

So whereas the first part of the journey described above has a dispersion of the group soul to ever greater granularity of the individual I's, the future part of the journey will see the reverse appearance of a new kind of group souls through integration as mankind spiritualizes and rises upward. This formation of new centers that then combine is described also on Christ Module 7 - Cosmic dimension (see oa Schema FMC00.187 and FMC00.188 on that topic page). This new direction of spiritualization includes the essential future of self-initiation, and is given tailwind by techniques such as described on principle of spiritual economy.

New group souls are developing based on moral ideals (see also Schema FMC00.188) as stages 'up' leading to Christ as the group soul of humanity (see Second Adam) .. and this is part of the future development of Mankind. Else one falls off this development and is left behind as an evil elemental.

Of course we are only in the very beginning of this stage, as on a cosmic scale we have only just taken the turn with the MoG. The Christ Impulse works over millenia, epochs and across Conditions of Form, Life and Consciousness .. so it's the opposite of a time lapse movie of a flower opening.

8. Conclusion and recap

Notes extracted from flow

Parenthesis

Individuation is the crucial central process of humanity on Earth: through the human 'I', Man becomes an individual spiritual being equipped with and for freedom and love.

That it is central to the developmental goal for the Earth stage is the intention of Schema FMC00.370, but one needs to put that in perspective of Earth rounds perspective (and even zoom out further), to realize how utterly exciting this phase is that we are living in.

Such contemplation helps to see the momentous importance of the divine interventions - see Schema FMC00.185 on Earth's seven epochs, and what is happening on Schema FMC00.575. Only when one realizes this, do statements by adepts of the White Lodge get a different ring to it, that we are living to a crucial stage for the development of mankind .. and that this period of the fifth and sixth cultural ages are decisive .. as the dies will be cast by the end of the Sixth epoch, and we are now deciding on what developmental cohort we are and will be in. Hence also Schema FMC00.567 - part of the foolish or the wise virgins. The fructification by the consciousness soul by the budhi spark of the Christ impulse - see also Schema FMC00.438 on Current Postatlantean epoch.

Further areas to explore

The human 'I' as the core seed of consciousness is the carrier of certain moral ideals and impulses (as per TFW like Schema FMC00.213, see seeds of future worlds).

An intriguing area is the ways how impulses of Individualities are carried forward. This is not yet developed here in textual narrative, but here are some connection points or pieces of the puzzle in the form of Schemas:

Needed perspectives
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