Introduction to the Basics of Theosophy

GA 111 — 5 March 1908, The Hague

XVI. Mysticism and esotericism (Microcosm and Macrocosm)

It cannot be my duty to promote theosophy. I believe that this does not need to be done by me in this country.

What I want to talk to you about can only have the character of a narrative, and that is about the relationship between mysticism and what is called esotericism in theosophical circles. Mysticism is the understanding of the inner life. All theosophists assume that our inner life is a drop of the divine substance. Mysticism is therefore actually an inner deepening. In a sense, esotericism is that too, but we become esotericists from mystics because a mystic is one who only looks within himself, but the esotericist also perceives the universe within himself.

Let us take an example: if we had no eyes, we would have no awareness of light, of all the colors that light contains. But we also know that we have the eye to thank for the light – once we look at it from the other side. In earlier periods of development, in a less perfect state, the [human] being had no eyes. The faculty of sight is awakened by light; light itself has brought the eye forth from the indifferent organism, has lured it out: it is created not only for, but also by, light. There are animals known that lose their sight when they are locked in underground caves, where no light reaches them.

With the eye, we carry the deeds of light within us: the eye is crystallized light.

In this way, we carry within ourselves the essence of the whole world. In this way, it has given rise to our being. As long as we look into ourselves, we only get to know the organ; and only when the organ is used as an instrument do we get to know the world. We carry within us not only the material organs. We carry within us organs in every respect, for each of our principles, and also for that which we call the God in us.

Insofar as we get to know our inner organs, we practice mysticism. Insofar as we use the inner organs to get to know the world, we practice esotericism in the fullest sense.

We see of the human being that which we call the material body, and the matter that was necessary for it, we see in nature. The etheric body is shared by humans with the plant kingdom, and the astral body with the animal kingdom. Only humans, the crown of the earth, have that which makes it possible to say “I” to oneself.

Now we must be precise: we cannot see an etheric body or an astral body with the material eye, but we must also seek the supersensible principles in the material realm.

For if we ask ourselves, “Is a mineral, a plant, an animal only what we see?” then we must answer “No”. Nothing can be understood from itself. Everything is based on something else.

Take the animal kingdom. We can only understand it imperfectly as long as we do not realize that the animal possesses something in the astral realm that is exactly the same as the ego for the human being. But the animal cannot bring the ego down to the material realm. In the astral realm, we see something completely different from the individual ego of the human being. We see the group ego, the group soul of the animal. These group souls surround the whole earth as currents. When walking along the backbone of the animal, we notice glowing lights, astral lights. These are the expressions of the astral group souls. The animal is continuously permeated by such astral glowing lights.

We must focus on two characteristics of the human spirit (soul, said the speaker): intelligence and love. Man is only human to the extent that these two have united in his being as one. This is not the case with the group soul of the animal. We do not see love in the group soul of the animal as we find it in the human individual. The animal group soul has more intelligence than the human individuality. We find love in the animal kingdom only in the material realm, in the animal individuals. Wisdom and love are united in the human individuality in the material realm; in the animal they are separate in the material realm. We can perceive them, the expressions of the intelligence of the animal group soul, by descending into the animal. But to do that, we must learn to perceive and feel. For example, if we see a beaver colony at work: how it builds a dam to divert the water in the opposite direction, and how it is built at a certain fixed angle to the water, so precisely - as later human research has shown - that no architect could have improved it. And we see the remarkable expressions of the group soul in a beehive, in the migration of birds in autumn and spring. But the element of love is not present in the animal group soul.

We find something similar in the plant kingdom. In the material realm, the plant no longer has its astral body; this is in the astral realm. The I of the plant is found even higher; in the devachanic realm, which is the lower mental realm.

Let us be clear: if the plant consisted only of physical and etheric bodies, repetition would always occur; for the principle of repetition is the principle of the etheric body. We perceive this, for example, in the spinal column of the human or animal body: the spinal column is under the particular influence of the etheric body and indeed shows the continuous repetition of vertebra upon vertebra, built one behind the other. Where the astral intervenes, as a principle of restraint, where the spinal column passes into the head, the repetition ceases. From the astral point of view, it can be clearly seen that the plant is enclosed from above by an astral sheath. This opposes the repetition of the etheric body and forms the flower and fruit from the outside. The astral currents flow from the outside into the calyxes of the flowers.

The plant is like the reverse of man: man has the head (the origin) at the top and the reproductive organs at the bottom; the plant has the reproductive organs at the top and the origin, the roots, at the bottom.

For the occultist, there is actually no such thing as a single plant. He knows it only as hairs on the collective organism of the earth, and this is to be thought of as concentrated at its center. The plant with its roots seeks this center. And in a sense, we can think of the whole plant world as being concentrated in the center of the earth. But then the plant world becomes something completely different for us: we then experience the whole great earth as one being with its pulse, with its joy and its pain. And we can experience this if we do not remain in barren mysticism, but turn our eye outwards and let mysticism serve esotericism.

The realization that a person attains when he first makes contact with the higher worlds can make a very confusing and disturbing impression on him, and it is therefore not advisable to do this exercise without the guidance of an experienced person. First you come through the regions of the animal group souls – a cold region, a real ice area – and then into the regions of the plant group souls, where it gets warm again. In this way we can perceive it when we not only unfold our mind but also our feelings; by philosophizing and speculating alone, you only come into a world that lies directly next to ours.

Following on from the above concept, it can be imagined that uprooting a whole plant with its roots causes pain to the plant, that is, to the earth. Plucking a flower, a plant, causes the plant to feel pleasure, which is best compared to the feeling a cow experiences when a calf sucks the excess milk from her. One can perceive whole currents of overflowing joy when the grain is mowed in the fields in late summer. Everywhere in nature one sees currents of life, joy and pain. (We then also learn to see things differently and understand them better, for example, how pain is one of the great creative forces in the world).

Finally, the ego of the stone is in the higher mental realm. When we look at the stone, we realize that its essence, its ego, is primarily a volitional impulse. When the occultly sharpened gaze sees how the workers break open the stones in the quarries, then it sees in what could be called the stone soul, whole currents of the greatest feeling of pleasure. It may sound strange to us, but it is a truth that breaking, detaching, dissolving a mineral, whether we break it with a pick or dynamite, awakens feelings of pleasure. Streams of pleasurable feelings are released when a piece of salt is thrown into a glass of lukewarm water, where it melts, that is, it is broken down into the finest possible form. When the salt crystallizes again, it is accompanied by feelings of pain.

It is interesting to look at the development of the earth from this point of view. We find higher and higher temperatures in earlier epochs, until we come to a point in time when even the minerals were dissolved like salt in water. In all these times, a cooling and crystallization process took place from the mother substance. In this process, a continuous condensation takes place, and this is accompanied by continuous pain.

We owe the fact that our form can be as it is to this preceding crystallization process, which was accompanied by pain. And when our earth will again materially diverge, then the earth will also enjoy this in bliss in the spirit realm. These are always the same two periods in every process of development: first suffering and pain, and when everything diverges again, then again joy and enjoyment. When we extract all this from occultism and then look at the old religious traditions, then much becomes clear to us.

When we become familiar with the great universe, we first see pleasure and pain in the human realm, in the individual, and specifically in the surrender and renunciation of impulses of will. Then, in the animal kingdom, we find pleasure and pain, depending on whether the impulses of the astral sparks from the group soul are encouraged or hindered. We also find pleasure and pain permeating the plant world and the mineral kingdom.

We find the human soul in all of nature. We carry the whole divine nature within us; we see how man is an extract of all that exists around him. Just as our eye was evoked from matter through sunlight, so our whole human being is evoked from matter through divine light. Thus our soul is an organ created from the world around us. So the microcosm is the organ created from the macrocosm, so that the latter would be reflected in the microcosm.

To see, we must use the eye, and so we must use our inner organ to see the creation. We must not stop in our development as mystics. We must become esotericists: we must get to know the light from which we are born. If we understand things in their concreteness, then we also understand much of what great figures have said: “Before the eye can see, it must wean itself from tears.”

That is to say, as long as the eye is there for its own sake, as long as it finds itself in pain, it is not a suitable organ to perceive the light. It is the same with the inner self.