Thus during the Moon evolution there are two states of consciousness to be
clearly distinguished, alternating with each other; duller during the Sun
period and clearer during the time when life is left more to its own
resources. The first state though duller, is on the other hand more
unselfish; man then lives a life more devoted to the outer world, to the
universe. It is an alternation of states of consciousness, which on one
hand may be compared with the alternation of sleeping and waking in
present day humanity, as well as with his life between birth and death, on
the other hand with the more spiritual existence between death and a new
birth. The awakening on the Moon, when the Sun period gradually ceases,
might be described as something intermediate between the awakening of
contemporary man each morning, and his being born. And in the same way the
gradual dulling of consciousness at the approach of the Sun period
resembles a condition midway between falling asleep and dying. For on the
old Moon there was not yet such a consciousness of birth and death as man
now possesses. Man gave himself up to the enjoyment of the universe in a
kind of Sun life. During this period he was carried beyond his own life;
he lived more spiritually. We can only attempt an approximate description,
by way of comparison, of what man experienced during such times. He felt
as though the forces of the universe were streaming into him, pulsing
through him. He felt as though intoxicated with the harmonies of the
universe which he thus experienced.
As such times his astral body was as though set free from the physical
body; also part of the etheric body went with it out of the physical body.
This organism, consisting of the astral and etheric bodies, was like a
delicate, wonderful musical instrument, from the strings of which the
mysteries of the universe reverberated. And the members of that part of
the human being on which consciousness had but slight influence were
shaped in accordance with the harmonies of the universe. For the
Sun-beings worked in those harmonies. Thus this part of man was given its
form by the spiritual sounds of the universe; and at the same time the
alternation between the clearer state of consciousness during the Sun
period, and the duller one, was not so abrupt as was that between the
waking state and that of absolutely dreamless sleep in contemporary man.
The picture-consciousness was not so clear as the present waking
consciousness; but on the other hand, the other consciousness was not so
dull as the dreamless sleep of the present day.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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