Supplements to Member Lectures

GA 246 — 9 February 1909, Stuttgart

17. Rhythms in Human Nature

The interaction between the astral body and the etheric body can be symbolized by the hands of a clock. We can recognize their effect in the fact that in the case of pneumonia, the onset and subsidence of the fever is determined by the rhythm, with the crisis occurring after seven days of fever. The etheric body initiates the fever as a healing process. After seven days the astral body stands over a quarter of the etheric body, and these quarters bring about the effect of the two bodies on each other. If the fever has not succeeded in overcoming the damage to the lungs after seven days, this is a cause of death.

The physical body goes through an even longer cycle. This cycle corresponds to the old solar year (lunar year?), the orbit of the earth (moon?) around the sun (earth?) in 280 days, in ten sidereal months, to which man is still bound today. In 10 times 4 times 7 days the physical body has completed a cycle simultaneously with the earth (moon). Man needs the period of the old length of the year both for regeneration and for doubling his body. Ten sidereal months - as science says in reminiscence of past cosmic conditions - lie between conception and birth of the human being.

The Atlantean in particular was still so bound to the rhythm of the world that conception in the womb could only take place at certain times of the year. Like the animal today, the rhythm depended on 10 times 4 times 7. Instead of the number 10, however, the number 12 should be used to express the rhythm of a man's physical body. The etheric body of the man is female, that of the woman male.

The Atlantean, who felt the rhythm so strongly within himself, also experienced a rhythmic state in his emotional life. This depended on the changing phases of the moon (full moon - new moon). The full moon awakened the feeling of love. Our moonlight poetry is a vivid reminder of this. Today, a person would be called ill if their emotional states were rhythmic.

Old farmers' calendars, such as those still often found faded and yellowed in shop windows in Switzerland, preserve important, very interesting instructions for the agricultural household based on the meaning of the seasons.

Today, we turn night into day without doing ourselves any significant harm. In ancient times, however, like the lily of the valley in May, humans could only be born at a certain time of the year. The inner rhythm has remained, but it has shifted out of the rhythm of the world bodies. After all, man is a small world of his own, a microcosm, and absolutely needs his rhythm. The fact that the rhythm has shifted has given man his freedom. It is thanks to this shift that man has become independent. Since the middle of the Atlantean period, the solar year has become longer and with it the deviation of the human and cosmic rhythms has occurred in the same proportion.

We are still far from being completely free from the cosmic rhythm, but man is destined to develop out of natural conditions. The harmony will dwindle more and more. In misjudgment of this necessary condition of development, views are emerging today that want to force man back into the cosmic rhythm. Rhythm is indeed indispensable. Without rhythm there is no life, without rhythm there is no possibility of life. If the cosmos releases man, what must arise? He must find another way to implant an inner rhythm. Where does the future rhythm come from? The numerical mystery of life is deeply meaningful!

In the middle of the nineteenth century, a particularly strong shift away from the cosmic rhythm began. This turnaround is one of the reasons why materialism emerged. The necessity for the emergence of the theosophical movement developed from the emergence of materialism, which the spiritual leaders of humanity recognized. This was also one of the signs of the times. This is where the spiritual teaching had to come in to initiate the new rhythm.

What is said today can hardly be compared with the Abe of language, for most of it cannot be said, although there is already much in the way in which Theosophy works that exerts its rhythmic effect, like the arc applied to the glass table groups the scattered sand into figures. The lecture by the Theosophical guide is arranged according to the rhythm of the future. Real truth and wisdom prevail in the arrangement of the sentences and words. Knowledge is structured according to the rhythm.

So a thought rhythm must be the starting point for the future rhythm. The rhythm of 4:7 lies in the human astral and etheric body as well as in the lecture of the theosophical teacher. The task of the ego-man lies in the rhythm of 4:7(?) of 7:4(?), which acts as the father ground. Rhythmic thinking must be cultivated in order to reveal the secret of numbers. The overcoming of matter lies in rhythm. Matter is dominated by rhythm, as the image of the sound figures gives us a mental image of it. This is part of the great task. The theosophical movement goes back to the sources of life, to the sources of all being.

Supplement:

As remedies - apart from the external - colors, sounds, thoughts, and so on will be applied in recognizing and observing the needs of the invisible members of human nature. Healing processes are initiated through the perception of certain colors. In addition to the calming effect of blue and the exciting effect of red, the astral body enters certain spiritual states through the arousal of the mental image, the sensation caused by the color. It is essential which mental images a person indulges in in relation to the outside world. If his mental images move only in photographs of external reality, this undermines mental health, while the mental images produced by the human mind bring about inner harmonious regularity, which contain the conditions of health. It depends on the guidance of interests and attentions, for he who is interested in what is right in the world cannot become ill. In this sense, spiritual science is a primordial remedy. Those who find the source of all their interests within themselves free themselves from the outside world. There is only one center of the world, and this is spiritual science.

Law: Everything that man perceives and looks at only as sensual pleasure acts on the withering forces within him. Everything that man enjoys as spiritual acts on the lasting, growing, active forces.