Notes from Mathilde Scholl 1904–1906

GA 91 — 25 September 1906

32. Prâna (The Life Force), Fire

Fire originates in the physical world through the friction of two different substances of varying degrees of hardness. The harder substance rubs off fine particles of the less hard substance, and through this action, heat is created first and then fire; the individual particles of the fine substance dissolve and become sparks, a flame; this flame is maintained by the influx of oxygen from the air and by a substance that burns in it. When we see fire arise in this way, it appears to us as something new that has been created by an external effect.

But this is an illusion: Man cannot bring anything into the physical world that is not already there; he can only help to bring to light what is already there. So the whole process that man undertakes when igniting a fire is only a liberation of the fire from its bondage. Fire is always there and everywhere. It is only bound and subdued by its various forms of manifestation. We have only to destroy the form so that the fire can emerge – either as warmth or as a flame. All work in the world in the physical substance creates friction and thus also a certain destruction of the substance, the detachment of substance particles, and this is how heat phenomena arise. Heat phenomena occur with every mechanical effect, with all growth.

The maintenance of fire by oxygen is the same as the maintenance of life in us by the air, as the maintenance of the spirit in us by the spirit out there in the world - kindred spirits seek each other out. Fire is liberated life, it seeks the life-giver, oxygen; it is a liberated spirit that seeks to return to the spirit of the world. We recognize, however, that fire is in everything that exists on earth, in living and non-living things. It is only bound and subdued by the forms. If we free it from the form, it emerges in various phenomena, as heat, as light, as oxidation, as some chemical transformation in the substances. Decay is also a slow combustion process, during which light phenomena can be observed. Decaying substance to shine (will-o'-the-wisps on the moor).

Decay is a slow release of fire from the bonds of form.

We do not recognize fire itself in the living, but we do recognize the effect of fire in the transformation of forms, in growth. It is the inexhaustible life force (prana) of primal life that animates and keeps alive all that is living. It is only in the living that it is so subdued that the balance between the expression of death and of life is maintained. The world of life, the world of forms, is the world in which life and death are in balance. In the spiritual world, which appears to be completely without life, only the expression of form predominates; it is the negative pole of life, which is particularly evident in the mineral world. But the positive pole is hidden behind it.

All mineral matter also contains fire, and this can be released by the mineral substances being separated from each other – a process that takes place before our eyes every day. Especially in the world where life is most tightly bound, it also occurs most powerfully when it is released. This is the natural reaction to the previously constrained state. There it then acts, when it is released, as fire, as the power that can wreak havoc and destruction when it is unleashed. Before that, it slumbered under the bonds of form, and now, when it is freed, it emerges with all its power.

Why did people rightly worship fire? Because it is life itself that becomes visible to the physical eye. This forced people to worship, for it was the life of the deity itself that they recognized, that which gave them all life, kept everything alive, but could also destroy everything. Then Moses also encountered the deity in the fiery bush. In the fire he recognized the living God. In this, Christ, who is the life of the world, is also the fire in the physical, because fire is the strongest expression of life that frees itself from physical bondage.

That is why fire was given to people to work with in the physical world, because fire is the power that overcomes substance. People who learned to overcome solid form were the sons of fire. And servants of the fire, of the life of the world, are all those who know how to cast off the fetters of all that is earthly and rise into the realm of life. Then the power that has slumbered in them from the beginning is also released and strives back to the primal power from which it emerges.

All life, all development is liberation of powers that are radiated from the one life. The one life, which manifests itself in the world in appearance, has become more and more veiled in the world of appearance, but it is always there, it is everywhere. And it is man's task to draw this life out again from everything around him. He has to draw fire out of the mineral world and, with the help of fire, to work the mineral world in such a way that the whole mineral world becomes a perfect expression of this living power. Then life will be redeemed in the mineral world and all life can pass from the mineral world into the life of the world, into the realm of the living, the plant kingdom. Just as a plant is built up through a process of combustion, just as a human being is built up through a process of combustion, so everything will be enlivened by fire as all plants are now. The way in which the plant, animal and human kingdoms are kept alive is also a kind of combustion process. The fact that all life is almost completely consumed by the mineral fire is because the negative effect of life, the shaping itself, the form, predominates there, while the positive effect, life itself, the creative power, recedes. As soon as the formative power becomes stronger than the form, what appears to us as death, dying, an increase of combustion processes, in reality the liberation of life, of the inner fire from the fetter of form, occurs. If the positive pole now retreats completely behind the form, form prevails and the world passes over into the mineral. The mineral is the predominance of the form side of life. The plant kingdom is the balance between form and the life side, as are the animal and human kingdoms.

The dissolution of form is the predominance of life, which frees itself from form. That is why Christ, as the life, was able to overcome form; he was able to live without form, without the physical body.

If we are able to liberate the life within us, which is always there and only recedes behind the form, then we can connect with life. We then grow beyond the form. All further development of man consists in a liberation of the Prana slumbering in him, the fire (Kundalini), the life force (Christ). The fire is maintained by the Janus fabric of the air; so our soul fire is maintained by inhaling divine life. Just as burning signifies a union of the hidden fire with the world fire, so too a process of combustion and thereby a purification takes place in us through the union of the life in us with the life of the world.

To the eye of the seer, life can be recognized as fire, as a flame, as a luminous phenomenon in everything in the world. Every mineral, every plant, every animal, and even the human being, are luminous phenomena for him. The further a person progresses, the brighter it shines, the more the inner fire comes to expression. The whole inner development of the human being transforms him more and more into a radiant light. This is the expression of his inner life.

The strongest life force expresses itself in fire, where it frees itself from the strongest fetters, the physical-mineral.

We must place ourselves at the service of the fire in order to bring about our own inner liberation. The path to freedom is an inner combustion and through this, the liberation of the divine life within us.

One after another, the following develop:

Life – mineral kingdom
Number – plant kingdom
Light – animal kingdom
Warmth – human kingdom.

The mineral kingdom is complete first – then life first emerges as the self, the ego. – Then it emerges in plants and as number, revelation. – Then it emerges in the animal kingdom as light, wisdom. – Then it emerges in the human kingdom itself as warmth; love.