Trinity

The highest divinity is threefold in its nature, consisting of what are called the three Logoi in Theosophy or Anthroposophy. In esoteric Christianity these three aspects are called the Father, Word or Son, and the Holy Ghost; in ancient Indian teachings these are called Brahma, Shiva, Vishnu, in ancient Egypt Osiris, Isis and Horus. See Schema FMC00.064.

The Trinity is to regarded as intertwined aspects of a threefold Unity from the maha paranirvana and paranirvana planes into the nirvana plane, (see Schema FMC00.062, and Planes or worlds of consciousness), where the threefoldedness gives rise to sevenfoldedness (see Schema FMC00.061) at the level of the Seven creative spirits and Monads.

This threefoldedness of divinity has been subject of much theological debate throughout the cultural ages, and certainly also in the roman catholic church. This is directly related to the nature of the human being and Man having a spirit, soul and body. Hence the stakes have been high as the human spirit was eradicated by the catholic church in the eight ecumenical council in Constantinopel in 869.

It is important to realize the limits of intellectual thinking with our contemporary Waking consciousness, whereby thinking is mostly about sensory perception and delineated, separate things within time and space. In the higher spiritual world, time and space as we know no longer exists. If one maps it to our experiential language, 'everything interpenetrates everywhere with everything at all times' (see also Cosmic fractal). Hence, the nature of spiritual realities at Planes or worlds of consciousness above the spirit world, such as nirvana plane or above, can not be grasped fully in its true nature with current Waking consciousness (see also God experience). There is a limit or 'ceiling' to how much sense it makes trying to grasp spiritual realities of higher dimensions, see also stages of clairvoyance. Initiates with intuitive clairvoyance have given tentative and symbolic descriptions, and these are about all one can expect at the current low level of intellectual thinking and consciousness. See description of this 'disclaimer' point in 1912-04-07-GA136 extract below.

More information about is to be found on the topic pages of The three Logoi, Creation by the three Logoi, Seven creative spirits, and IAO. This page focuses on the threefolded aspect of the highest divinity, and how that threefoldedness can be seen in downstream hierarchies and creation including Man.

Aspects

two spiritual currents in mankind: monotheism (or monism, from the monon) vs monadology (pluralism) with at its basis the threefolded nature of the Godhead (across history) (1910-06-12-GA121)
- monotheism - the single Godhead, an impulse that the world-principle can only be unity (see also: Unification)
  - Hebrew culture of the Semitic people and Judaism (re Moses, with the single godhead Jehovah)
  - Islam (Mohammed with the single godhead Allah)
- monadology
  - trinity
    - trinity of ancient India, later expressed as Brahma, Shiva and Vishnu
    - German mythology; there you find the trinity of Odin, Hœnir (or Hoenir), Lœdur (or Loedur) (note: on rsarchive due to character set, search for HSnir , LSdur) - see more on Ragnarok
  - " everywhere you will find a trinity and this again divided into a larger number" (1910-06-12-GA121)
    - ancient pagan gods (re 1905-03-23-GAXXX)
- historical development and disputes
  - in ancient Egypt under pharaoh Ankh-en-Aton [Note: Akhenaton is also known as Echnaton, the 10th ruler of the 18th dynasty around 1350-1330 BC]. See also Daskalos who tells the story of one of his incarnations in this period.
  - Julian the Apostate murdered because he wanted to re- Threefold Sun and (1921-11-06-GA211)
the characteristics of the threefold absolute divinity or godhead
- can be denoted by omnipotence (will pleasure), omniscience (wisdom), love. Daskalos describes these characteristics as an isometric triangle in perfect balance. Note: striving for this elemental balance is also the goal of character transformation in initiation, see IIH steps 1 and 2.
- "God is pure love, not supreme wisdom, not supreme might. .. The all-encompassing attribute of the Godhead is not omnipotence, neither is it omniscience, but it is love" (1912-12-17-GA143)
revelation of the Trinity:
- Father-Son-Spirit (mystical), Power-Effect-Being (masonic), Sulfur-Mercury-Salt (alchemical) (1909-03-03-GA266/1)
- the different fixed stars with their planetary systems are the sheaths or bodies of the all-pervading divine Trinity (1912-04-07-GA136)
- the three principles of the Trinity in Man (as a microcosm), and in the evolution of Earth and the solar system (macrocosm) (1905-06-05-GA093)
for the Christ as the second Son principle, part of the Trinity, see: Christ Module 9: Trinity and Logoi
in the book Symbol of Life, Daskalos describes the divine properties in ancient Egypt as Ankh, Mer, Ut-Ta meaning Life, Love, Power (re p 293) .. and also Maat, Khe-Te-Pe meaning Truth, Peace. Compare with Schema FMC00.410.
in Sanskrit 'AUM' expresses the Trinity (1905-09-27-GA093A)
origin of dogma, versus today
- historically, a dogma such at that of the Trinity or threefold nature of the godly Being, emerged from earlier evolutionary ages when Man had an atavistic or instinctive clairvoyance looking into the spiritual world, and this was a truth that presented a deep insight into the relationship of reality. Today such statements take a form through words used to proclaim it which no longer can be understood .. not that the dogma is false, but it is in a form trapping the truth which in today's time are obsolete and thus the dogmas no longer offer what the soul of today needs (1921-01-16-GA203)

Illustrations

Schema FMC00.410 depicts the concept of divinity as per Daskalos (left, in HTS) and Bardon (Right, in IIH step 10). These characteristics of the absolute divinity are mapped to the Trinity (left) - see also the three Logoi, and to the four elements (right).

Schema FMC00.171 starts with Unity, God, the divine Primal sea from which everything arises. See more on Force substance representation

Schema FMC00.303 is a meta schema for purposes of study and contemplation

Schema FMC00.329 is a meta study schema, for an explanatory note, see IAO.

It may be useful to also include the Cosmic fractal considerations in contemplation this schema, as well as Schema FMC00.276 on Overview of solar system evolution or the more detailed Schema FMC00.413 on Old Saturn.

Lecture coverage and references

See also lecture coverage on The three logoi

Blavatsky - Isis Unveiled

Following the Christian dogmas seriatim, if we concentrate our attention upon one which provoked the fiercest battles until its recognition, that of the Trinity, what do we find?
We meet it, as we have shown, northeast of the Indus; and tracing it to Asia Minor and Europe, recognize it among every people who had anything like an established religion.

It was taught in the oldest Chaldean, Egyptian, and Mithraitic schools. The Chaldean Sun-god, Mithra, was called 'Triple', and the trinitarian idea of the Chaldeans was a doctrine of the Akkadians, who, themselves, belonged to a race which was the first to conceive a metaphysical trinity.

and then goes on to discuss the nature of the Akkadians, and how they are often related or come up in the context of the Turanian stream

1903-11-02-GA088

discusses 'early images of God' in the third, fourth and fifth epochs.

1905-01-01-GA090B

describes the evolution from single, to dual, trinity and polytheism.

1905-03-23-GAXXX

is on the Old sagas of the Gods

1905-06-05-GA093

[Man's higher triad bodily principles, and terminology of Holy Spirit, Son and Father]
When Man is able to control the substance of fire ether, he will be able to control all that is physical. When he is able to control the physical in Man, then he will also be able to control the rest of what is physical as well. This force is designated the Father force, or simply the ‘Father’ — everything through which a being joins with our Earth, everything by which that being can control physical matter. When a person can penetrate into the physical body with such Father forces, that is called Atma; this is how Atma can be assigned to the physical.

The second member of [Man's] being is the etheric body, which corresponds to the Son principle, or the Logos, the ‘Word.’ The etheric body can be moved and inwardly shaped by Buddhi, set in vibration by the Son principle, just as the physical [body can be] by Atma.

The third member is the astral body. This we cannot at first control; only very few people at present have any significant control over their astral bodies. We say a man is endowed with Manas, to the extent that man can control his astral body from within.

Man began to work on his astral body during the middle of Lemurian times. If you could have observed a man at the stage he had attained when the Lemurian Race began, that is, when he was bisexual, you would have found that his body was built from elsewhere; but in the middle of Lemurian times, Man then began to work on his astral body himself. Everything which Man weaves into himself out of his I, which he does out of duty or by command, to overcome the unwrought appetites and passions, helps to refine the astral body; when it has become completely permeated by the work of man's own I, then we can no longer call it astral body, it has become Manas.
When the whole astral body has been transformed into Manas, man can then begin to work upon his etheric body to transform it into Buddhi. What he weaves in there is nothing else than the individualised Word; Christian esotericism calls this the ‘Son’ or ‘Logos,’ and calls the astral body, when it has become Manas, the ‘Holy Spirit,’ and the physical body that has become Atma, ‘Father.’
[At World scale – the same for Earth]
What happens here on a small scale within Man happens also on a large scale in the world at large. These world secrets were carried out in the mysteries, in initiation; thereby something was done which for most human beings would ordy happen in a distant future.
Already, in the Egyptian mysteries one could only be initiated if one had worked one's way through one's entire astral body, so that the astral body could be completely managed by the I. Now such a person would stand before the initiating priest: he had no influence on his physical body, nor yet on his etheric body; but his astral body was of his own making. Now it was indicated to him how he could act on his etheric body and on his physical body. The physical body was brought into a lethargic condition — it had to remain in this state for three nights an three days — and during this time the etheric body was raised out of it. And since the initiate had become powerful in respect of the astral body, he could therefore now gain the power to act on the etheric body. He could learn to let what he had in the astral work on the etheric body. Those were the three days of the Entombment and the Resurrection in an etheric body that was completely permeated by what one calls the Holy Spirit. Such an initiate was called a man endowed with the Logos, with the ‘Word’. This ‘Word’ is nothing else than the Wisdom, Manas, which has been worked into the astral body. This wisdom can never enter the etheric body unless the astral body has first been permeated by it.
It was just the same for the Earth. Not until the whole earth had been brought this far into the astral, could such an event occur. The condition which the neophyte in the Egyptian mysteries had to be in, corresponds to this time of the Astral Globe which I have spoken of as the immediate precursor of our earth; that is the Globe of Wisdom. All wisdom was worked into it by the cosmic powers. And this transfer of wisdom into the Earth Globe itself made it possible that after the separation of sun and moon from the earth, something could again be incorporated from above, from higher spheres [into the earth] just as this happened on a small scale in the initiation.
[Beautiful passage – Legend of Dionysus (= the astral earth)]
Seven times the Astral Globe [stage] of Earth came under the rule of the Wise, after the manner of Solomon. Then the Earth clothed itself with an etheric body, and earthly matter was crystallised or formed. The ‘Word’ was laid into that; this Word is thus, as it were, entombed in earthly matter, but it must be resurrected. This is also the beautiful meaning of the myth of the God Dionysus. The Holy Wisdom of our earth's precursor is laid into all the Earth beings of our earthly world.
Take this as deeply as you are able.
[Etheric body after death]
Take the human etheric body as every human has it. If you look at it clairvoyantly it has nearly the same form as the physical body. At death Man's physical body dissolves, and the etheric body too; the physical body dissolves in the physical world, and the etheric body in the general cosmic ether. But this etheric body has been very elaborately created for man by the wisdom which first implanted it from out of the Astral Globe. This etheric body disperses after death. Only that etheric body which has been built up from within is a living body, that stays eternally. This is the etheric body of the Chela [the candidate for initiation], and that does not dissolve after death.
If you see a modern civilised Man die, you may see the etheric body for a while, but then it dissolves. With the Chela it remains. The renunciation of the spirit world [devachan] by the Chela consists in the fact that the Chela stays on the astral plane and there makes use of his etheric body. With ordinary human beings a new etheric body has to be formed at each rebirth; the ability to create a new one is attained in the spirit world. The etheric body which the Chela has built up from within will never be lost again; whereas that which is made by cosmic wisdom from elsewhere indeed dissolves itself again.
It is the same with the etheric bodies of plants and animals. What is now etheric body still, came to be built up out of cosmic forces which flowed into it out of the Astral Globe [state] of our Earth. This wisdom which you find in the astral Earth is expressed in the legend of Dionysus.
Now in the Lemurian epoch the denser [state] had to form itself. Then the Father principle had to be worked in. That is the last [principle] to take possession of our earthly matter. What has been worked in, in this way, is deeply hidden in the physical world.

First the Holy Spirit worked itself into the astral material.

Then the Spirit allied to the astral matter - that is the Son - worked itself into the etheric substance;

and then came the Father, who controls physical density.

Thus the macrocosm was built up in a threefold progression: Spirit, Son and Father; and Man, as he progresses further upwards, goes from the Spirit, through the Son, to the Father. All of this takes place under guidance in the evolution of the earth.

1907-03-08-GA097

one of the five core lectures for study of MoG

‘Do not let your hearts be troubled! You believe in god, you also believe in me. There are many rooms in my father's house ...’
‘If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask this father and he will give you another counsellor to be with you in all eternity—the spirit of truth whom the world has not the power to receive; for it does not see him and does not recognize him. You, however, recognize him; for he remains with you and shall be in you.’
‘He who has my commandments and keeps them is the one who loves me. And someone who loves me shall be loved by my father, and I shall love him and make myself apparent to him.
Judas, not Iscariot, said to him: Lord, what has happened, that you will reveal yourself to us and not to the world? Jesus answered and said to him: Someone who loves me will keep my word; and my father shall love him, and we shall go to him and make our abode with him.'
‘Father’—that is the inmost power of soul. It is to be revealed to the close disciples. Judas asked: ‘What has happened, that you will reveal yourself to us and not to the world?’ Judas thus said openly that something was to be revealed to the close disciples.
Jesus said: ‘We shall make our abode with the father.’ This was the most important part of the pouring out of the spirit that began with the words: ‘Do not let your hearts be troubled!’ The Christ was going to prepare the abode for his close disciples: 'In my father's house there are many dwelling places.’
Let us gain insight into these words. The degree of conscious awareness which Man has gained will never be lost again. One has to get out of the habit of any other idea. ‘Giving oneself up to the cosmic mind’ often means people wallowing in this, believing this to be redemption. There is no such cosmic mind and there never will be.
The ability to say ‘I’ is now achieved by Man. The more he says ‘I’ and works out of the I to purify his three lower bodies—the astral body, ether body and physical body—the more strongly will he develop his I and develop into the future. A human being can thus become consciously selfless, because he wills it. The time will come when all human beings will have reached the summit of I-development. And yet they can selflessly take up the spirit of the community.
We are sitting in this room together, and the common spirit in it is like a point from which everything radiates out together. But this common spirit may also radiate freely from every individual heart and move through this room.
Let us remember how the godhead is reflected in the world. It has made the sacrifice and poured all its life into its mirror image. Let us now imagine that we, too, can pour our life into countless mirror images, so that each individual mirror image would say: I and my origin are one. That is how all human beings once came forth from the keeping of the godhead like mirror images of the godhead. They finally become empty ‘I’s, with astral body, ether body and physical body transformed, and they enter into the world of the spirit and utter the deepest secret of their being: ‘I and my father are one!’ The animal-humans of Lemurian times could never become spiritual by themselves, but only by taking up the divine droplets. At the end of their evolution, cleansed and purified, they will be able to say: ‘I and my father are one.’
We are gazing back into far distant times. There was still a great deal of volcanic activity on Earth in Lemurian times. The creatures that lived then were very different. That was the time when Man first received the element he was to develop as soul. Going back even further we see soul nature above and bodily nature below still as one nature. The two were united in god's keeping. Then the physical stream down below was left to itself and developed into the animal-man of Lemurian times. The upper developed in soul and spirit. The body had to be prepared first down below, so that it might receive the soul coming from above.
[recap]

The spirit that prevailed in the common origin of both souls and bodies is the father spirit; that is the father.

The spirit that prevailed down below in the physical realm, whilst the spiritual went its separate ways up above, is the son spirit; that is the son.

And the spirit that prevailed up above in the soul sphere until it was able to descend into the physical realm, that is the holy spirit.
[cont'd]

1909-04-14-GA110

(SWCC)

.. the Seraphim have come into the actual direct vicinity of the highest Godhead of which we can speak at all: the Trinity, the three-fold Divinity.
Beyond the Seraphim we see the Trinity, that highest threefold Divinity of which we find mention by almost all cultures and religions — as Brahma, Shiva, Vishnu, as Father, Word, and Holy Ghost.
From out [of] this highest Godhead, this most exalted Trinity, stream forth the plans for a new cosmic system.

or longer extract

The Seraphim, Cherubim and Thrones are for us the highest Hierarchy among divine Beings, because they have already passed through their solar system evolution and have risen to mighty cosmic deeds of sacrifice.
Hence it is that these Beings have come into the actual direct vicinity of the highest Godhead of which we can speak at all: the Trinity, the three-fold Divinity. Beyond the Seraphim we have to see that highest Divinity of which we find mention by almost all nations as the threefold Divinity — as Brahma, Shiva, Vishnu, as Father, Word, and Holy Ghost.
From out [of] this highest Godhead, this most exalted Trinity, stream forth the plans for a new cosmic system.
Glancing back at ancient Saturn we say to ourselves: before any of this ancient Saturn came into Being, the plan of it had grown within the divine threefold Unity. But the threefold Unity has need of Beings to execute its plan. These Beings must first prepare themselves for the task. The Beings who, are so to speak, nearest God Himself, who, as is beautifully expressed in Christian Western Esotericism, ‘bask in the light of God's countenance,’ are the Seraphim, Cherubim and Thrones. These take up the plans of a new cosmic system streaming from the divine threefold Unity. This is naturally expressed more figuratively than it really is, for we have to express in human words such sublime activities, for which, in truth, this human language has not been created. No human words exist to express such sublime activity as that, for instance, when the Seraphim, in the beginning of our solar system received the highest plans of the divine Threefold Unity containing the evolution which our solar system has to pass through, namely Saturn, Sun, Moon, Earth, Jupiter, Venus and Vulcan. Seraphim is a name which for those who understand it in its true sense, even in that of ancient Hebrew Esotericism, has always signified that the task of the Seraphim was to receive from the Trinity the highest ideas and aims for a system of worlds. The Cherubim, the next lower rank of the Hierarchies, had the task of building up in wisdom the aims and ideas which they received from the higher gods. Thus the Cherubim are spirits of highest wisdom, who understood how to transpose into workable plans, the inspirations given to them by the Seraphim. And the Thrones, the third grade of the Hierarchies, counting from above, had the task — naturally very figuratively expressed. — of putting things into action, so that what had been thought out in Wisdom — these lofty cosmic thoughts which the Seraphim had received from the Gods, and which the Cherubim had pondered over, should be transformed into active reality.

1910-06-12-GA121

There are two spiritual currents in mankind.
The one must be called, if we wish to designate it rightly, that which proceeds from plurality, which we might also say proceeds from monadology, which therefore conceives the origin and source of existence as consisting primarily of a number of beings and forces. You may look round wherever you will in the world, and you will see that, in some way or other, the peoples of the post-Atlantean epoch started from several gods.
Begin with the trinity of ancient India, which was later expressed as Brahma, Shiva and Vishnu. Look at the German mythology; there you find the trinity of Odin, HSnir, LSdur, and so on. Everywhere you will find a trinity and this again divided into a larger number.

You find this peculiarity not only where myths and teachings about the gods appear, but also in the philosophies, in which we meet with the same thing again as monadology. This is the current which, because it proceeds from a number, may assume the greatest possible variety. We might say, that in the post-Atlantean epoch, from the farthest East in India and in a wide curve through Asia across to Europe, this worship of a number,—which on the whole is expressed in our anthroposophy by our recognition of a number of different beings belonging to the various hierarchies,—has acquired its manifold representations and forms.

This worship of many had to be opposed by a synthetic, all-comprising movement which proceeded strictly from the monon, monism. The actual inspirers, the impulse-givers of all monotheism and monism, of the worship of a single divinity, are the Semitic peoples. It is in their nature, and if you remember what was said in the last lecture you will know that it is in their blood, to represent the one god, the monon.
If man were however to look out into the great cosmos, he would not get very far if he were always to emphasize that there is only unity, a monon at the foundation of the world. Monism or monotheism, considered alone, can only represent a final ideal, but it would never lead to a real understanding of the world, to a comprehensive and exact view of it. Nevertheless in the post-Atlantean age the current of monotheism had also to be represented, so that the task was given to one people to introduce the impulse, the ferment for this monotheism. This task was given to the Semitic people. Hence you see how the monistic principle is represented by this people with a certain abstract severity, with an abstract relentlessness, and how all the other peoples, in so far as their different divine beings are comprised in unity, received the impulse for this from them. The monistic impulse has always come from that quarter. The other peoples have pluralistic impulses. It is extremely important that this should be borne in mind, and one who examines the continuation of the old Hebrew impulse can still see at the present day monotheism ruling in its greatest extreme among the learned Rabbis, in their learned Rabbinism. It is the task of this particular people to give as an impulse that the world-principle can only be unity.

Therefore we might say: All the other nations, peoples, and Spirits of the Age had an analytic task, the task of representing the world-principle as being composed of different beings; for example, the most extreme abstraction of the monon in India was soon divided into a trinity, as the one god of Christianity is divided into Three Persons. All the other peoples have the task of analyzing the foundations of the world and thus to fill their several parts with rich contents, to fill themselves with rich material for conceptions that may lovingly comprehend the phenomena. The Semitic people has the task of ignoring all plurality and synthetically devoting itself to the unity; hence, for example, through this very impulse, the power of speculation, the power of synthetic thought is the greatest imaginable in the Kabbalistic studies.
All that could possibly ever be spun out of the unity by the synthetic, inclusive activity of the ‘I’, has been spun out by the Semitic Spirit in the course of thousands of years. That is the great polarity between Pluralism and Monism, and that is the significance of the Semitic impulse in the world. Monism is not possible without Pluralism, and the latter is not possible without the former. Therefore we must recognize the necessity for both.
[continued, see online:]
The objective language of facts often leads to quite different knowledge from that to which the sympathies or antipathies which reign here or there lead. Therefore we must thoroughly understand the several Folk-spirits.
...

1912-04-07-GA136

Just as we look up to that which we shall only gradually attain in future earth-lives, so do these beings look up to That which towers above the nature of the hierarchies. Just as we speak of our Manas, Buddhi, Atma — or Spirit-Self, Life-Spirit and Spirit-man — so, as it were, do these beings look up from their Seraphic Principle as we out of our consciousness soul, to a Primal Spirituality. Then only have these beings something analogous to our inner spiritual life. It is extremely difficult to arouse concepts within us concerning that which exists above the hierarchies as the spiritual nature of the highest spirits themselves. Hence in course of the evolution of humanity, the various religions and world-concepts have, as we might say, forborne with a certain reverent caution to speak in concise concepts pertaining to the sense-world of what exists even above the hierarchies.
If in order to call forth such a concept as lives in the soul of the occultist when he looks up to the Seraphim, we try to grasp such means as can only be found in analogy, in considering people with a rich experience of life; we find that even in such persons nothing in their lives can in the very least help one to characterize the Trinity, which, as it were, appears above the Seraphim, as their highest being — as their Manas, Buddha and Atma.
In the course of human evolution there has unfortunately been much dispute over the cautious surmises with which the human mind has ventured to approach that which is above, in the spiritual worlds. Unfortunately, we may say; for it would be much more seemly if the human mind were not to try to describe beings of such sublimity with the concepts taken from ordinary life, nor by means of all sorts of analogies and comparisons; it would be more seemly for Man to desire in deepest reverence to learn ever more fully, so that he might be able to form more approximate concepts.
The various religions of the world have tried to give approximate concepts of what is Above, in many significant and speaking ideas; ideas which, to a certain extent do gain something special, in that they reach out beyond the individual life of man in the external sense-world. Naturally, we cannot by means of such ideas describe, even approximately, these exalted beings to whom we refer, but we can, to a certain extent, call up a conception of what is inexpressible, and should be veiled in holy mystery. For one ought not to approach these matters with mere human intellectual concepts obtained from the external world.
Hence in the successive religions and conceptions of the world it was sought to characterize these things approximately and by faint indications; they drew near to what is so far above Man and in its very nature mysterious, by an attempt at characterizing, or rather, by a giving of names.
The ancient Egyptians have, in their giving of names, made use of the concept of Child or Son — Father and Mother, as that which towers above individual man. Christianity endeavored in the succession of Father, Son and Holy Spirit, to find a name for this Trinity. We may therefore say: “In the seventh place we should have to put the Holy Spirit, in the eighth place the Son and in the ninth the Father.” If therefore we look up to a being whose highest content disappears as in a spiritual Mystery we can say symbolically — Spirit, Son, and Father. ...
[after description of heavenly bodies in language of the hierarchies]
...
Each planetary system with its fixed star, which is in a sense the Commander-in-Chief under the guidance of the Cherubim, is again related to the other planetary systems to which other fixed stars belong.
These systems mutually arrange their positions in space with due regard to the neighboring systems, just as individual persons agree together, deliberate with one another with regard to their common action. Just as men found a social system by virtue of this reciprocity, so is there also a reciprocity of the planetary systems. Mutual understanding prevails between one fixed star and another. By this means alone does the cosmos come into existence. That which, so to speak, the planetary systems discuss with one another in cosmic space in order to become a cosmos is regulated by those beings we call the Seraphim.
We have now, as it were, exhausted what we find in Man, as far as the consciousness soul. Just as in Man we ascend to his higher spirit-nature, to that which alone gives meaning to the whole system up to the consciousness soul, so if we ascend above the Seraphim we come to what we tried to describe as the Highest Trinity of Cosmic Being; we come to that which governs in the Universe as the All-pervading, Divine, Threefold Divine Life, Which creates for Itself sheaths in the different planetary systems.
Just as that which lives in Man as Spirit-Self, Life-Spirit, and Spirit-Man, (Manas, Buddhi, Atma), creates sheaths in the consciousness soul, intellectual soul, and sentient soul, astral, etheric, and physical bodies: so do the Fixed Stars of planetary systems move through space as the bodies of Divine Beings. Inasmuch as we contemplate the life of the world of Stars, we contemplate the bodies of the Gods, and finally of the Divine in general.

Short editor note: See eg Schema FMC00.564, and contemplate H3 in relation to H2, then H2 in relation to H1. One can imagine that between every triad in the spiritual hierarchies, a new level of complexity is spawned off. So the H1 were sowing when the Thrones started with the Cherubim and Seraphim the zodiac, they were the 'central star'. See also the yellow line at CoC=8 on Schema FMC00.077A. Therefore one can imagine that many such solar systems were created, and there was not just one set of Thrones and one solar system. Rudolf Steiner explicitly mentions this multiplicity of the Cosmic fractal when describing "the fixed stars of planetary systems", and how the "different planetary systems" represents the sheaths of the divine spiritual hierarchies.

1912-12-17-GA143

from the summary commentary (not by RS):

As well as love there are two other powers: might and wisdom. To these two, the concepts of magnitude and enhancement are applicable, but not to love. The all-embracing attribute of the Godhead is therefore not omnipotence, not omniscience, but love. God is supreme love, not supreme might, not supreme wisdom. The Godhead has shared these two with Ahriman and Lucifer. Wisdom and might unfold in the world, but love is a unique, Divine Impulse. The Mystery of Golgotha was fulfilled as a counterweight to the impulses of might and of wisdom. Therefore anyone who knows the mystery of love can be a Christian. Spiritual Science must include this love — otherwise it leads to egoism. The Mystery of Golgotha is a Deed of the Gods and a concern of the Gods. This Deed cannot be understood out of wisdom but only out of love. Together with selfishness, evil came into the world. It had to be so, because without the evil, man could not lay hold of the good. But through man's conquest of himself the unfolding of love has been made possible. The darkness has enabled the light to come into our ken.

lecture title: 'Love and its meaning in the world' excerpt A:

... Love is the creative force in the world.
Besides love there are two other powers in the world. How do they compare with love?
The one is strength, might; the second is wisdom. In regard to strength or might we can speak of degrees: weaker, stronger, or absolute might — omnipotence. The same applies to wisdom, for there are stages on the path to omniscience. It will not do to speak in the same way of degrees of love.
What is universal love, love for all beings?
In the case of love we cannot speak of enhancement as we can speak of enhancement of knowledge into omniscience or of might into omnipotence, by virtue of which we attain greater perfection of our own being. Love for a few or for many beings has nothing to do with our own perfecting. Love for everything that lives cannot be compared with omnipotence; the concept of magnitude, or of enhancement, cannot rightly be applied to love. Can the attribute of omnipotence be ascribed to the Divine Being who lives and weaves through the world? Contentions born of feeling must here be silent: were God omnipotent, he would be responsible for everything that happens and there could be no human freedom. If man can be free, then certainly there can be no Divine omnipotence.
Is the Godhead omniscient? As man's highest goal is likeness to God, our striving must be in the direction of omniscience. Is omniscience, then, the supreme treasure? If it is, a vast chasm must forever yawn between man and God. At every moment man would have to be aware of this chasm if God possessed the supreme treasure of omniscience for himself and withheld it from man. The all-encompassing attribute of the Godhead is not omnipotence, neither is it omniscience, but it is love — the attribute in respect of which no enhancement is possible. God is uttermost love, unalloyed love, is born as it were out of love, is the very substance and essence of love. God is pure love, not supreme wisdom, not supreme might. God has retained love for himself but has shared wisdom and might with Lucifer and Ahriman. He has shared wisdom with Lucifer and might with Ahriman, in order that man may become free, in order that under the influence of wisdom he may make progress.
If we try to discover the source of whatever is creative we come to love; love is the ground, the foundation of everything that lives. It is by a different impulse in evolution that beings are led to become wiser and more powerful. Progress is attained through wisdom and strength. Study of the course taken by the evolution of humanity shows us how the development of wisdom and strength is subject to change: there is progressive evolution and then the Christ Impulse which once poured into mankind through the Mystery of Golgotha. Love did not, therefore, come into the world by degrees; love streamed into mankind as a gift of the Godhead, in complete, perfect wholeness. But man can receive the Impulse into himself gradually. The Divine Impulse of love as we need it in earthly life is an Impulse that came once and forever.
True love is not capable of diminution or amplification. Its nature is quite different from that of wisdom and might. Love wakens no expectations for the future; it is payment of debts incurred in the past. And such was the Mystery of Golgotha in the world's evolution.
...

1921-01-16-GA203

On the other hand one is disinclined to research the origins of knowledge propagated through tradition which today is offered by official representatives. Awakening fully consciously towards what actually is presented rarely happens. When it does happen it very seldom results in seeing the issue in its true light. Should we accept it offends someone if we oppose what is termed dogma within the Catholic or Protestant denomination, regarding this dogma as “nonsense,” then we are opposing it for the sake of it and at the same time rejecting traditional confession, without finding the possibility to replace it with an alternative.
An example of central dogma is for instance that of the Trinity, the threefold personality of the godly Being.
Whoever finds a dogma such as this presented through the denominations, finds it easy to some extent to oppose it according to today's scientific way of thinking. This expression can easily be revealed as “nonsense” in such a dogma.
Whoever does go back to the way such a dogma was created will find that dogmas of common confessions have for a long time been propagated within humanity and that the point of origin of these dogmas, often characterized as humanity's earlier evolutionary steps according to instinctive clairvoyance, atavistic clairvoyance, are there, by looking into the spiritual world. Out of such clairvoyance these dogmas have emerged and one can say that something like the Trinity dogma has emerged out of deep, thorough insights within the structure of world existence.
At one time this dogma of the Trinity was a deeply recognized truth. It presented a deep insight into the relationship of reality. However this was during ancient times when within the soul's abilities the powers of an instinctive clairvoyant knowledge fitted within such a dogma. This dogma then spread itself.
It no longer fits into the current teachings of human soul forces. As a rule each person who has experienced this dogma from its origins has since then gone through several earthly incarnations. Souls had various experiences during these incarnations. In the outer world this dogma has been retained, transmitted from one generation to the next. Today it has taken on a form through words used to proclaim it which no longer can be understood. Now these souls are born again and come across this dogma in church. There is no human relationship between on the one side what the confession of the human soul is met with and on the other side what the soul from within itself strives to experience and to know.

What works so badly at present is not that the dogmas are false but that the dogmas are in a form trapping the truth which in today's time are obsolete and thus the dogmas no longer offer what the soul of today needs. Thus we can say: these dogmas are preached today as if breathed by the wind. Even those who inwardly confess to them do not apply these confessions as soul truths because they don't understand them for the most part. By accepting something which is not understood, creates an inner falsehood. As a result of this inner untruth so much damage has been done through the falsehoods in the world.

1921-06-03-GA204

Now another conception too was associated with this picture of the Father God in the days of antiquity. Men said to themselves: Every' thing would be well if the earthly forces only were working upon the being of man, but this is not the case. The Moon is working in the neighbourhood of the Earth. In short, the Earth is not working alone, but together with the Moon. And with this mingling of Earth and Moon forces there was associated the idea not only of one single Godhead of the Earth but of the many subordinate gods of paganism. All the forces working upon body and blood were woven into this ancient conception of the Godhead.

1922-07-30-GA214

Note: a number of lectures in the 1922-GA214 cycle were published separately as a book 'The mystery of the Trinity'

the short extract below is just a pointer, to be read in context of the full lecture

The kind of vision that enabled the apostles, the disciples, to behold Christ even after his resurrection — that kind of vision disappeared. Christ had ascended to the heavens. But he sent to human beings that divine being who does not extinguish I consciousness. This is the being to whom the human being raises himself, not with earthly perception, but with imperceptible spirit. Christ sent humanity the Holy Spirit. So actually it is the Holy Spirit who is sent by Christ in order that man might retain his consciousness of self, of his I, while Christ himself lives in the unconsciousness of human beings. Thus, if he realizes in the full sense of the word what his being really is, the human being will say: When I look back to what the ancient initiates knew, then I see that in me lives the Father principle which fills the cosmos and which arose in these initiates and developed the I in them. That is the principle that lives within us before we come down into the physical world. Through the Father principle dwelling in them, the ancient initiates remembered, with complete clarity, the way they had lived before they descended into the physical world. They sought the divine in the realm of being that precedes birth, in the realm of preexistence: Ex deo nascimur.
After the mystery of Golgotha human beings could no longer say, “I behold the Christ.” Otherwise they could not have become good through themselves, only Christ within could have done the good. And the truth could only have been In Christo morimur. The human being could die in Christ, through the principle of death within him he could unite with Christ. But the human being's new consciousness could be awakened through the Holy Spirit, the being sent to him by Christ: Per spiritum sanctum reviviscimus.
There you have the inner connection of the Trinity. This shows you, too, something else that is definitely a part of Christianity. Even without perception of Christ within, a human being can achieve the awakening of the spirit. By sending the Holy Spirit Christ gave humanity the ability to raise itself to an understanding of the spiritual out of the life of intellect itself. Hence it should not be said that the human being cannot grasp the spiritual, the super-sensible, through his own spirit. A Man could only justify his inability to understand the spirit if he ignored the Holy Spirit, if he spoke only of the Father God and the Christ God. For those willing to see and read it is also clearly indicated — for it is a revelation in and of itself — that the human being can understand the super-sensible through the spirit dwelling within him, if he only inclines himself to Christ. It is for this reason that we are told that the Holy Spirit appeared at the baptism of Christ. And with the appearance of the Holy Spirit these words resound through the cosmos: “This is my beloved Son; this day I have begotten him.”
The Father is the unbegotten begetter who places the Son into the physical world. But at the same time the Father uses the Holy Spirit in order to tell humanity that in the spirit, the super-sensible is comprehensible, even if this spirit is itself not perceptible but only works inwardly to elevate the merely abstract intellect to the realm of the living. In the spirit the super-sensible can be understood when the corpse of thoughts that we have from our pre-birth existence is raised to life through the Christ dwelling within us. And when Christ sent the Holy Spirit to his disciples — this imparting occurred through the Christ, through the Son. For this reason it was an ancient dogma that the Father is the unbegotten begetter, that the Son is the one begotten by the Father, and that the Holy Spirit is the one imparted to humanity by the Father and the Son. This is not some kind of arbitrarily asserted dogma but rather the wisdom of initiation living in the earliest Christian centuries; only later was it covered over and buried along with the teachings concerning the Trichotomy and the Trinity.
The divine principle working as Christianity within evolving humanity cannot be understood without the Trinity. If, in the place of the Trinity, some other teaching concerning God were to enter, then basically speaking it would not be a fully Christian teaching. One must understand the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit if one would understand the teaching concerning God concretely and in a genuine way.
...
Fundamentally speaking, this challenge reaches to us from Golgotha when we rightly understand it, when we know how, after going through the mystery of Golgotha, Christ sent into humanity, in addition to this divine Father principle, the Holy Spirit. Whoever beholds the cross on Golgotha must at the same time behold the Trinity, for in reality Christ shows and makes manifest the Trinity in all the ways he is interwoven with the earthly evolution of humanity.

1924-03-19-GA353

(see Beetroot book)

1924-05-08-GA353

quote A

.. Christianity thinks of three Divinities: God the Father, living in all the phenomena of nature; God the Son, working in man's free spiritual activity; and God the Holy Spirit, who awakens in man the consciousness of having within him a spirituality that is independent of the body. Three distinct spheres are pictured. If there were not three spheres it would have to be assumed that by the same resolve this one God allows the human being to die and then wakens him to life again. If there are Three Divine Persons, death belongs to the sphere of one Godhead, passage through death and beyond to another, and the awakening in spirit to yet another. Christianity could not do otherwise than picture the spiritual Godhead in three Persons. (In three Persons: this is not understood to-day but the original meaning was that of threefoldness, the Divine manifesting in three forms.)
...
But to maintain this adherence to the one God is not as easy as it seems, for if such adherence is not strongly forced upon them, men readily become pagans. It is among the Jews that this tendency has been least of all in evidence. Christianity, on the other hand, tends easily in the direction of paganism. If you observe closely you will find many indications of this. Think, for example, of how ceremonies are revered in Christianity. I have told you that the Monstrance actually depicts the Sun and the Moon. The meaning of this is no longer known but men unenlightened in this respect actually pray to the Monstrance, they pray to something external. Men are easily inclined to pray to something external. And so in the course of the centuries Christianity has developed many pagan characteristics, whereas in Judaism the opposite has been the case.
...
The right attitude to take today is that in the times to come it will not be necessary to segregate any particular culture in order to prevent its dissipation ... but that this practice must be superseded by spiritual knowledge. The relation between the single Godhead and the multiplicity of spiritual beings will then be intelligible to men and no one people need be under the sway of subconscious impulses.

quote B

The Jews introduced what is known as Monotheism, the belief that there is but the one God.
...
Now because Judaism conceived only of this one God, it could make no image of the Godhead but could only grasp the Divine with the innermost forces of the soul, with the intellect. It is easy to understand that this led to an intensification of human egoism; for man becomes remote from what is around him if he sees the spiritual only in and through his own person.

Discussion

Note the wordings .. the Seraphim 'have come into the actual direct vicinity' .. which sketches an upstreaming upto and into. See also the explanations on Schema FMC00.329 on IAO.

Related pages

References and further reading

Lorenzo Ravagli: 'Die Trinität im Werk Rudolf Steiners' (2004) online here
Hans-Werner Schroeder: 'The Trinity' (2007 in EN, original in DE 1986 as 'Dreieinigheit und Dreifaltigkeit : Vom Geheimnis der Trinität')

Divine attributes

Various literature (not qualified)

Emanuel Swedenborg: 'Divine Love and Wisdom' (1763)
Lewis Farnell: 'The Attributes of God (1925), see chapters on beauty, wisdom, truth and power
Beinsa Douno: 'Love Wisdom Truth' (Volume 1)