Self-Knowledge and God-Knowledge II

GA 90b — 13 February 1905, Berlin

VI. The Apocalypse and Theosophical Cosmology III

We still have one question: What is the relationship between Earth and the other planets? Mars and Mercury can shed some light on this, but because erroneous ideas have been formed about them, it is a difficult subject. From the very beginning, the Masters of the Wisdom have not willingly answered questions.

Some words of a great master, which are found in the Secret Doctrine: “Do not give the great wisdom!” And so on. They express a clear warning. There are reasons why it is not allowed to talk about this until man is mature enough.

The relations of the earth to Mars and Mercury.

Before they inhabited this Earth, people lived on the moon. The moon that can be seen today is only a piece of it. Before that, they were on the sun, and before that on Saturn. Three planets in a row. The days of the week are named after them. Colorless: Saturday.

Now to Earth: a globe in metamorphosis, which it completes in seven times seven cycles.

Moon orange, then darker, then green - Earth - colored, then over to the next state darker again, so the successive states.

So after the moon – which had turned orange – had completed its 49 metamorphoses and man had developed as far as the goal set for him here on the third round, all life contracted into the germinal state in order to flourish again on earth. The earth had to go through the Saturn state in seven cycles, then the sun state, then the moon state, and is now becoming physical in its fourth round, which is where we are now in the most solid matter and have the color green, the previous phase was orange.

The moon was only astral at the beginning, then it became dense ether. The earth was first ether and then solid, then astral and so on.

We will only truly understand our Earth when we familiarize ourselves with what has happened on our Earth. The Earth goes through seven stages of development, which are the seven races.

I. The polar root race. Etheric substance. Then denser, not like our air, the
II. root race, the Hyperboreans. The
III. Race, the Lemurians, air-fire nebula, not yet dense. Up to the Lemurians, humans were bisexual, but from then on they became unisexual. IV. Race, the Atlanteans, who perished in the flood. V. The Aryan race, our present race.

Then the sixth and seventh races, whose names will be given later. From the seventh race, then, over to the next cycle. Here in this fourth round, the earth has come to its full development. In the Lemurian race, man has come to his full destiny. If man cannot reach another level, he descends from the moon, because he was in a high level of dream consciousness.

He came down from the moon because he was in a highly dream-conscious state.

The Lemurians are similar to the state of the moon people. The most mature fruit of the moon development was bisexual. When he had then gone through all the rounds of the earth to become a Lemurian (gap in the transcript).

The soul of the Lemurians was different from our present one. He also had only two senses. Hearing and touch. But it was not the sense of touch as we have it, to touch solid objects, but it was a feeling of warmth and cold, of air. Man was like a soundboard. The air was denser, the water thinner. A mass of fog was the air.

Man lived in the fire fog. Everything around him resounded, he heard as if clairaudient. He heard the air crackle like the rumble of a thunderstorm. He could then arrange his life and activities accordingly. Through the sense of touch he could feel his way to the food. There were not images that were like pictures, but like dream images, but regularly in colors, it was an inner seething and weaving. When he felt red, it was his life itself and was not directed towards external objects, but it had a magnetizing effect, for example: when he felt fear, it was ugly images. These had been brought by people from the moon. The human of the Lemurian race would not have been able to progress if the other impact had not occurred.

The facility for this further training was not available. But in addition to these average people, higher beings were already there. For example, there were beings who had already risen to such a high level on the sun; they no longer needed to go through the moon phases. These are the solar Pitris. On the sun, they had already attained this superhuman nature. This nature is also much further advanced and more perfect in its soul life. While the average human being only saw images in his surroundings, these Pitris saw true revelations in the images, a higher kind of images. This was the expression of a high spiritual entity. It was a different kind of knowledge than our present-day knowledge, it was like intuition. They did not study natural laws, but perceived nature. Such entities had to reveal themselves to people.

Before the Lemurians, man would have become a statue, a cinder – he now needed a new influence. He would not have been able to develop the life of thought. These guides were there, they had a lot of power, quite unlike the masters today. They could intervene in development – just as chemists use substances. They formed the astral-inserted human body, which was taken from somewhere else. These high guides were never connected to the earth, these solar beings could come together with other planets. The first three races - earth - were important, where that could be supplied; and that had to be studied on [other] celestial bodies. The leaders have studied it, they have brought it from Mars, which was just about to darken. Mars has different inhabitants than the earth. The earth is physical in nature, but Mars is astral, but frozen, and in this state it is in the same low sphere as our earth. Mars has two higher planets. This astral one is in the same sphere as the earth is now in the physical. Mars is astral, but the Martians have become physically tangible directly from the astral state. And this astral covering has been brought down from Mars and incorporated into the human being, thereby enabling the human being to develop further.

A second impact of the highest spirituality has become the earth through correspondence with Venus, since the ingredients are fetched, which man still needed. Through studies of the beings of Venus. These sons of Venus have come down to bring to earth what they - the sons of Venus - have studied on other planets.

A third impact was now coming. Man, who now had the spark of the spirit, had to be led further. First he had to go through fear and striving, through passion, through desires and wishes, but now he had to be led to a desireless spirituality. Mercury is in the stage of brightening, which shows a highly developed astral being, from where the manasic bodies were fetched.

The first race on our Earth had the development of Mars and Mercury. Actually, we owe our properties to the moon and the sun, but then to Mars and Mercury.

Saturn stage = Saturday
Moon stage = Monday
Mars impact = Tuesday
Mercury impact = Mercury day

So much for the present, but they point to the future. The Mercury stage is attained by our Earth in the next planet. The Earth is not designated by the days of the week because it is itself, it lies in between.

Today, man already has the beginning of the higher purest wisdom within him, on the next devachan; but will only become physical in the future.

If we observe Jupiter, we learn how people, how the beings of Jupiter become. There is a relationship with Jupiter. The beings are an example to us.

Jupiter = Zeus state. Minerva = Pallas Athene, who sprang from the head of Jupiter.

The beings are no longer connected to the Kama-Rupa, but are beings of the highest spirituality.

Then finally with Venus. This planet is so far away from us that the beings only have an indirect effect on us. These planets also have their own chains. With Venus, one speaks of Kronos - Uranus - Jupiter - Jeudi, Venus - Friday - Freya - Vendredi.

The days of the week are written down, the wise men have taken them down from the sky. We have learned a secret here, how the great leaders descended to inspire us.

That is why it is said: God Jupiter descended to marry human women.

Zeus and Dionysus. Mercury in Greek. Myth = Mercury, son of Zeus and Maya, a Hellenic nymph. But esoterically connected to Mercury.

Hellenic nymphs. Ares has descendants who have dragon teeth.

German myth Wotan = Mercury = Wednesday

Mercury connects with Erda, she is clairvoyant, she can see the future. Brunhilde was born of her - of Erda. Brunhilde = wish girl, passion.

The initiated sages therefore went to remind people of their current situation. Time had to be given a name to remind them. Thursday will now be a holiday for people because they are developing into a Jupiter being.

The Earth from Mercury and Mars.

The lower beings are abandoned and pushed back into animality to further the development of man, and with the next race the lower ones are eliminated again, so with the Lemurians the reptiles were rejected.

With the Atlanteans, the mammals were split off. Our savages today are degenerated beings.

Man has been pushed down, but the guilt will be redeemed once again. Karma has come about because man had to descend and become physical.

Such a solar being is embodied in Hermes; the hermaphroditic time. When we were on the sun, the sun was spatially another sun; so today's sun is in a different place. But the clairvoyant sees the sun in the place where it was then. The old place is still on the mental plan. The moon has also suffered a shift.

In the Middle Ages, the Ptolemaic system was still known. According to astronomical observations, the earth was at the center, and esoterically this is indeed the case.

Copernicus only showed the sky externally, physically.

The fifth race begins in the twelfth century.

Additional information from a typewritten transcription of Camilla Wandrey's notes:

The Solarpitris were superhuman beings, they had a fundamentally different disposition, especially in their spiritual life, than humans. These exalted beings took young humanity under their protection. They were able to experience revelations of higher spiritual powers and beings, they perceived the gods, they possessed a knowledge that lived into the gods through intuition, they perceived the living divine beings directly.

Man needed a new impetus to keep him from ossifying; he could not develop a spiritual and soul life of his own accord. These mighty Solarpitris had the vision that could truly connect them with other planets. They studied the other beings on the other planets in order to utilize the fruits of their studies for human beings. Thus they observed the development of beings on Mars. Mars now has the astral state, not the physical state, as its deepest. They studied the sheaths of the beings on Mars, and a kind of 'downward pulling' of the astral sheaths of the Martian beings took place. That was the impact. Through this impact from Mars, people were able to receive the passions, the desires, the sexual - KamaRupa.

The second impact, that which as spirituality, as pure, virginal spirituality, can also underlie the passionate, the covetous, the spiritual-covetous, became possible for these Solarpitris through the same study taking place in relation to Venus.

Then man received the third impact, which came a little later. Man now had the spark of the spirit on the one hand, and the passions on the other. He now had to be led further. He had to be given something so that he would not sink into the depths of the Kama-Rupa brought from Mars.

The more delicate Kama-Rupa, which serves the thought life and enables man to pacify his passions, was brought by the Solarpitris from Mercury. Thus mankind received spiritual impregnation through the Solarpitris from Mercury, Mars and Venus: the two Kama-Rupa and that which is to establish the balance between the two.

From Jupiter, the Solarpitris then brought what we now want to develop, the spiritual essence of man, which can attain wisdom, manas. Jupiter gave man the opportunity to attain wisdom, while from Venus flow the virgin heights of the spirit, which we can only sense, which are still far from our reach, even if we have the potential, the ability to accept this divine inheritance from the Solar Pitris within us.

The esoteric week, which we as true esotericists should relive again and again in our thoughts and feelings, is an earthly reflection of the effectiveness of the Solarpitris for humanity.

We have listed Saturn, Sun, Moon-day. Then comes Mars-day - Tuesday. Here Mars is thought of as identical with the first half of the earth's development. Then Mercury. Mercury or Wotanstag, Wednesday - Wednesday, Wotan is the same as Mercury. Then Donars-day. Donar is Jupiter. There should always be Jupiter Day, Thursday, the day of the future, a festival and a holy day for every esoteric and also for everyone who wants to become an esoteric. And finally, the day of Venus, of Freya. Venerdi in Italian, Vendredi in French, these words evoke the ancient knowledge of the future secret of humanity, which is commemorated by the day of Venus, Friday.