{"corpus":"steiner","locus":"GA 133/1912-06-18/p008","lang":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"text":"The first of the three principles of the Earth-man, therefore, is his *consciousness*. In considering his whole being, however, something must be kept separate and distinct from what is known as “consciousness” *per se* in ordinary sense-existence—something that is not, in the same sense as thinking, feeling and willing, to be included in the general sphere of consciousness. What we call *memory* is distinct from these other processes. The thoughts and feelings arising from the store of memory and of remembrances, are not subject to the same laws as the consciousness of which we have here been speaking. In order that consciousness may exist at all, the physical body must be preserved in its accustomed form. In respect of its “substance” the physical body is being renewed all the time; after seven or eight years we have within us quite other physical substances than were previously there. The physical substances change, but the “form” remains. And the form must remain, for it is the instrument for the ordinary consciousness. The ordinary consciousness can unfold thinking, feeling and willing during the time the physical body retains its form. If, however, the memory and the remembrances were bound up with the “physical body,” they would not be able to survive for very long—at most for as long as the various substances of the physical body remain. This means that if the memory were bound up with the physical body, we should be able, at most, to remember back for six or seven years. The physical body is not, however, the instrument of the memory; in earthly man the instrument of the memory is the ether-body, or life-body. The ether-body is actively in operation through the whole life of man on Earth—so that what has been taken into the memory, from the first moment of consciousness to death, can remain all the time. It is this ether- or life-body which carries remembrances, memory pictures, from one period in life across to the other. The instrument for the earthly consciousness, therefore, is the physical body; the instrument for memory and remembrance is the ether-body. We should not be able to carry the remembrances of our life across the period stretching between death and a new birth if something quite definite did not take place—if, after forsaking the physical body at death we did not remain for a certain space of time in the ether- or life-body. This is the interval after death during which the past life spreads out like a great panorama, a great tableau. This “life-tableau” can only appear to us because after death we retain the ether-body for a short time. The ether-body is the instrument for acts of remembrance or recollection and if we were to lose it altogether at death or immediately afterwards, no such tableau could rise-up before us. We must be able to use the ether-body as an instrument, and something takes place while this life-tableau is before us after death. This whole life tableau is gathered into, “inscribed” as it were, into the universal life-ether permeating space. And there it remains—in the universal life-ether. What was retained at the beginning for a few days only, is now inscribed in the universal life-ether in which we live perpetually. Because it is thus inscribed it is present throughout our further existence between death and the new birth in the future. We take with us through that period an “extract” of our ether-body, so that a connection can always be established with the life-tableau that has been inscribed into the universal life-ether. This is a kind of permanent organ whereby the remembrances of the last life remain accessible.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"title":"8. Consciousness, Memory, Karma Thought Forms.","site_heading":null,"date":"1912-06-18","location":null,"word_count":609,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/133/1912-06-18/p008","alignment_confidence":"low","alignment_reason":"count_diverges","two_voice_volume":false,"translation_credit":{"scope":"unit","status":"established","translator":"Dorothy S. Osmond","identified_edition":"RSP1948","book_title":"Earthly and Cosmic Man","publisher":"Rudolf Steiner Press","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA133/English/RSP1948/19120618p01.html","evidence":"lecture_page_line","publisher_note":"The publisher is inferred from the edition code in this lecture's source URL, not stated by the source page. The translator IS verified for this lecture: its own source names the translator (evidence: the lecture's page, rsarchive's lecture list, or the cover of the book it was published in), and that page's text was matched against this unit (see match_score and source_url). Cite the translator with confidence; attribute the publisher only as probable."},"edition_coverage":{"de":["original"],"en":["English"]},"available_versions":[{"lang":"de","edition":"original","edition_basis":null,"is_original":true,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/133/1912-06-18/p008"},{"lang":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/133/1912-06-18/p008"}],"record":{"record_type":"unknown","scope":"volume","note":"How this text was taken down (shorthand transcript, listeners' notes or manuscript) is not on record here. Unknown is not an assurance of a stenogram: check the edition's own notes before resting an argument on one word.","evidence":null,"evidence_translation":null,"evidence_source":null},"witness_completeness":{"ratio":0.91,"band":"comparable","note":null,"word_count":4132,"original_word_count":4528,"may_be_abridged":false},"witness_quality":{"translator":{"scope":"unit","status":"recorded","translator":"Dorothy S. Osmond","identified_edition":"RSP1948","book_title":"Earthly and Cosmic Man","publisher":"Rudolf Steiner Press","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA133/English/RSP1948/19120618p01.html","evidence":"lecture_page_line","publisher_note":"The publisher is inferred from the edition code in this lecture's source URL, not stated by the source page. The translator IS verified for this lecture: its own source names the translator (evidence: the lecture's page, rsarchive's lecture list, or the cover of the book it was published in), and that page's text was matched against this unit (see match_score and source_url). Cite the translator with confidence; attribute the publisher only as probable."},"entity_parity":{"status":"not_checkable","note":"No verified paragraph alignment covers this passage, so its names cannot be compared with the German."},"note":"quote_safe certifies the bytes of this text. This block is about the translation as a WITNESS: who made it, and whether it carries the same names as the original. See witness_completeness for how much of the original this witness holds."}}