Lecture VI

Take an example of this retrograde experience: vivisection. This is closely related to the materialistic direction of current science. A doctor in the Middle Ages would have considered it very foolish to study life by cutting up living bodies and destroying life. At that time, many people, especially doctors, were still clairvoyant and could therefore see through the physical body. However, this clairvoyant power was lost, and because people could no longer see into the interior of the organism, they began to cut it up and dissect it. But those who vivisect cut into living life. After death, karma, the law of cause and effect, comes into play. The intention that leads to vivisection is less important in this context. The vivisector must experience the consequences of his actions on himself. All the individual pains he has inflicted on animals, he must now endure and go through himself in Kamaloka. The scientific intention will only be woven into his karma later.