Aura

Auric egg, drawing from GA 93a, p. 75

The aura (Greek: αύρα áura "breath, breeze, morning breeze"; Hebrew: אוֹרָה aura; related to אוֹר or resp. aur "light") of the human being gives a picture of his supersensible members as seen by the clairvoyant. The supersensible members are the etheric body, the astral body and the I. Accordingly, one can distinguish an ether aura, an astral aura and an I-aura, whereby the astral aura is usually the most prominent. In the visual arts, the full-body aura is depicted as a mandorla or aureole, the head aura as a halo. Originally, in ancient cultures, the forms and colours of the robes were also designed as a sensually visible expression of the human aura.

The perception of the aura

The astral aura of the spiritually developed man, according to C. W. Leadbeater: Man Visible and Invisible, 1902

The occult meaning of the colors of the aura after: Annie Besant, C. W. Leadbeater: Thought-Forms, 1901

The theosophical writers Annie Besant and C. W. Leadbeater, despite all the reservations one might have against them from an anthroposophical point of view, have given essentially accurate, comprehensive and richly illustrated accounts of the human aura, which largely correspond to Rudolf Steiner's descriptions. However, one must always bear in mind that these are sensualised and thus more or less symbolic representations of supersensible experiences. The "colours" and "forms" within the aura are not experienced in the same way as their counterparts in the sensual world; they can only be described comparatively in this way. For those who know them, they are only a sign that points to the actual experience, just as, for example, the written letter A points to the audible sound A, but is otherwise quite dissimilar to it. And just as the letter A must be written in order to be there at all, so the aura must also be actively produced in the consciousness of the seer through an inner "painting seeing" as imagination, although its reality is quite independent and autonomous from this - similar to how one records what is heard visibly by means of written signs true to the word.

„It must be expressly emphasised that what is here called "colours" is not seen in the same way as physical eyes see colours, but that through spiritual perception one feels something similar to what one feels when one has a physical impression of colours. To perceive "blue" spiritually is to feel or sense something similar to what one feels when the gaze of the physical eye rests on the colour "blue". This must be taken into account by anyone who really wants to gradually ascend to spiritual perceptions. Otherwise he would expect to find only a repetition of the physical in the spiritual. This would have to distract him most bitterly.“ (Lit.:GA 10, p. 64f)

„In my "Theosophy" you will find that the spiritual is seen in the form of a kind of aura. It is described in colors. Rude people, who do not go further into the things, but write books themselves, believe that the seer describes the aura, describes it by having the opinion that there is really such a mist in front of him. What the seer has before him is a spiritual experience. When he says that the aura is blue, he says that he has a mental-spiritual experience, which is as if he were seeing blue. He describes in general everything that he experiences in the spiritual world and which is analogous to what can be experienced in the sensual world in terms of colors.“ (Lit.:GA 271, p. 185)

„One will now find that those people who can make supersensible observations describe what they see in such a way that they make use of expressions which are borrowed from sensual feelings. Thus one can find the elementary body of a being of the sensory world, or a purely elementary being, described in such a way that it is said that it reveals itself as a self-contained, variously colored light body, flashing in colors, glowing or shining, and lets one notice that this color or light appearance is its life expression. What the observer is actually talking about is absolutely invisible, and he is aware of the fact that the image of light or color has nothing else to do with what he perceives than, for example, the writing in which a fact is communicated has to do with this fact itself. Nevertheless, one has not merely expressed a supersensible in an arbitrary way through sensory perceptions; rather, during the observation one has really made the experience, which is similar to a sensory impression. This comes from the fact that in the supersensible experience the liberation from the sensual body is not perfect. The latter still lives with the elementary body and brings the supersensible experience into a sensual form. The description that is given of an elementary being is then actually held in such a way that it appears like a visionary or fantastic compilation of sensory impressions. If the description is given in such a way, then it is nevertheless the true reproduction of the experienced. Because one has looked what one describes. The mistake that can be made does not lie in the fact that one describes the picture as such. There is an error only when one takes the picture for reality, and not that to which the picture, as to the reality corresponding to it, points.“ (Lit.:GA 16, p. 32f)

The aura of man during a sudden surge of affect, after C. W. Leadbeater: Man Visible and Invisible, 1902

Changes in the aura when anger suddenly erupts, after A. Besant/C. W. Leadbeater, Thought Forms

„How much of what is real is revealed to a being depends on its receptivity. Thus, man must never say that only what he can perceive is real. Many things can be real, for the perception of which he lacks the organs. - Now the soul world and the spirit world are just as real, even in a much higher sense real than the sensual world. It is true that no sensual eye can see feelings, ideas; but they are real. And as man, through his external senses, has the physical world before him as a perception, so for his spiritual organs feelings, urges, instincts, thoughts and so on become perceptions. Just as through the sensual eye, for example, spatial processes can be seen as color phenomena, so through the inner senses the aforementioned mental and spiritual phenomena can become perceptions analogous to the sensual color phenomena. However, only he who has walked on the path of knowledge to be described in the next chapter and has thus developed his inner senses can fully understand in which sense this is meant. For such a one the soul appearances become supersensibly visible in the soul world surrounding him and in the spiritual area the spiritual appearances. Feelings, which he experiences in other beings, radiate like light appearances for him from the feeling being; thoughts, to which he turns his attention, flood the spiritual space.

For him, a thought of a human being that relates to another human being is not something imperceptible, but a perceptible process. The content of a thought lives as such only in the soul of the thinker; but this content excites effects in the spirit world. These are the perceptible process for the spiritual eye. As an actual reality, the thought streams out from one human being and flows to the other. And the way in which this thought affects the other is experienced as a perceptible process in the spiritual world. Thus, for the one whose spiritual senses are developed, the physically perceptible human being is only a part of the whole human being. This physical man becomes the center of soul and spiritual outpourings. Only a hint can be given of the richly manifold world which opens up before the "seer" here. A human thought, which otherwise lives only in the thinking understanding of the listener, appears for example as a spiritually perceptible color appearance. Its color corresponds to the character of the thought. A thought arising from a sensual impulse of man has a different coloring than a thought conceived in the service of pure knowledge, noble beauty or the eternal good. In shades of red, thoughts which spring from the sensual life pervade the world of the soul. In beautiful bright yellow appears a thought through which the thinker ascends to a higher knowledge. In glorious rose-red shines a thought which comes from devoted love. And like this content of a thought, also its greater or lesser definiteness is expressed in its supersensible manifestation. The precise thought of the thinker shows itself as a structure of definite outlines; the confused idea appears as a blurred, cloudy structure.

And the soul and spirit being of man appears in this way as a supersensible part in the whole human beingness.

The color effects perceptible to the "spiritual eye", which radiate around the physical man perceived in his activity and envelop him like a cloud (approximately in egg shape), are a human aura. In different people the size of this aura is different. But one can imagine - on the average - that the whole human being appears twice as long and four times as wide as the physical one.

In the aura now the most different color tones flood. And this flooding is a true picture of the inner human life. Individual color tones are as changing as this. But certain permanent qualities: talents, habits, character traits are also expressed in permanent basic color tones.“ (Lit.:GA 9, p. 158)

The astral aura of the averagely developed man, according to C. W. Leadbeater, Man Visible and Invisible, 1902.

„Personality is that which allows the three bodies - physical body, etheric body and astral body - to be irradiated by the I. This can also be unclear, shadowy - and if this is the case, the person concerned is a weak personality.

For the clairvoyant this is quite recognizable. He sees the person surrounded by a colored aura, in which his moods, passions, feelings, sensations are precisely expressed in color currents and color clouds. If we put ourselves in the time in which the three members of the being were only ready to receive the human I, we would also find an aura in this being which had not yet become completely human. But in it the yellow currents would be missing, in which the higher nature of man is expressed. Strong personalities have a strong yellow radiant aura. Now one can be a strong personality, but without activity, one can react inwardly strongly without being a doer. Then the aura shows a lot of yellow. But if one is a doer and the personality has an effect in the outer world, the yellow gradually changes into a radiant red. A radiant red aura is that of a doer; but it must radiate.

But there is a cliff when the personality urges to action. This is ambition, vanity. Strong natures can be particularly easily afflicted by it. The clairvoyant sees this in the aura. Without the ambition, the yellow changes abruptly into red. However, if a person is ambitious, he has a lot of orange in the aura. One must overcome this threshold to get to the objective act.

Weak personalities are those who are more focused on being given than on giving and doing. There you will see mainly blue colors, and when people are particularly comfortable, the indigo color. This refers more to the inner comfort than to the outer.

You see how the strong or weak personality is reflected in the aura of the person.“ (Lit.:GA 96, p. 322)

Astral form, drawing from GA 96, p. 130

Astral forms, drawing from GA 96, p. 130

„You know that the astral body, in which the inner drives, desires and passions of man live, becomes visible to the clairvoyant as a light body. In this light body the most manifold figures and colors appear [figure on the left]. Every passion, every urge has a certain color. All this, even the basic mood is formed in this light body. If you look at the body of light of a person who is very nervous, you will see that it is completely impregnated with glittering and shining points. All this shines and disappears and plays in the most different colors.

If there is a terrible affect, you will find such rays [illustration on the right]:

A person who has a restrained resentment has figures like snakes in him.

But it is difficult to draw this, because it is continuously in motion, like lightning. So inwardly there is anger or resentment or nervousness when the soul is wriggling inwardly. What the person experiences inwardly is his state of soul. Externally, this state of soul becomes visible to the clairvoyant as a light appearance.“ (Lit.:GA 96, p. 130)

„If we look today at a person in whom there is a sharply developed faculty of judgment and combination, if we look at him clairvoyantly today, we find a strong expression and reflection of it in a green glittering and shining of the astral body, the astral aura. The power of combination shows itself in green color inclusions of the aura, especially in those who have a sharp, mathematical mind. The ancient Egyptian initiates saw the god who implanted the faculty of intelligence in man, and they pictured him and painted him green because they saw his luminous astral and etheric form shimmering green. This is still today the glittering auric color when man moves in the intelligence. And much could be studied about these connections, if people really wanted to study this wonderful realism of the Egyptian god figures. By the fact that these representations of the gods' figures are so realistic and no arbitrary ones, they worked like magic means; and the one who could see deeper would see how in the colors of these ancient figures secrets are present in a high degree. One could see deeply into the gears of the development of mankind.“ (Lit.:GA 106, p. 147f)

The aura as the "eggshell" of man

„The ordinary human being is like the chicken that would think its eggshell is the real world. If the chicken could perceive inside its eggshell, it would see it not small, but very enlarged, even as big as we see our world. Like the whole world, it would look at the contents inside the shell. Thus we see our eggshell, that is, our aura, spread out around us as the blue vault of heaven. If we break through our shell, then the sun and moon are eclipsed, the stars fall to earth - in their place the spiritual world spreads out.

People live in their eggshell - their aura. The Elohim gave us our aura, and through the Fall it has become like a shell around us, and we are inside it like the chicken in the egg. The sky and the stars are our limitation, and we have to break through them by our soul power, like the chick has to break through the shell by its own power. Then we enter a new world, just as again the chick has a new world before it when it crawls out of the egg. And since all people actually have the same eggshell around them, also an astronomy could develop, as we have it, which lets the heavenly bodies move on the firmament.

The eggshell is this: Ex Deo nascimur. So that we can break through it and also take something with us into the spiritual world, we must bring with us that which penetrates into our shell from the outer world - that is, from the spiritual world - which is the common thing; that is the Christ. That is why we say: In Christo morimur and hope that when we have broken through the shells with Christ's help, we will be resurrected again: Per Spiritum Sanctum reviviscimus.“ (Lit.:GA 266c, p. 187)

Aura and sense world

The sense qualities perceived by the senses are expressions of the higher worlds. The perception of the aura arises from exactly the same causes, only the impressions are not perceived sensually, but directly psychically.

Just the most imperfect senses, namely the sense of taste and smell, reach highest up into the spiritual world, but express it only very imperfectly. In the colors perceived by the sense of sight, the higher astral world is revealed, while the lower astral world, which already overlaps with the etheric world (→ Kamaloka), makes itself known through the experiences of the sense of warmth. The most perfect sense, the sense of hearing, on the other hand, has already arrived completely in the physical world. This is even more true for the sense of words.

The perfection of the sense organs is connected with their age of development. With the sense of hearing man already entered the old Saturnian development, during which then also the sense of warmth was formed. On the Old Sun man acquired the sense of sight, on the Old Moon the sense of taste and the sense of smell developed only during the actual development of the Earth (Lit.:GA 96, p. 125ff).

„The physical eye sees around itself lights, colors. As the clairvoyant perceives the aura on the astral body red, blue, yellow and green, so the physical eye sees around itself red, blue, yellow and green. In both cases the cause is exactly the same. As behind the red in the astral body lives a desire, so behind the red of the flower is a desire as the "thing in itself". A desire living in the flower is the red in the flower. What the sense of sight does when it passes this point is no different than when you turn a skirt around, turn it to the other side. While in the aura man's astral nature is expressed, behind the whole world of color and light, behind the world of the sense of sight, lives the outer astral nature. There would never be colors in the world if things were not completely permeated by astral beings. What appears in the world as colors comes from the astral beings, which manifest themselves outwardly through the color. By turning the inside out, the entity goes down from the higher to the lower plan. You can achieve the following through meditation: If you have a green surface, say a leaf, in front of you and now go out of yourself to look at the thing from the other side, you would see the astral entity which is behind the green color and which indicates itself through the green color. This is how you have to imagine: By looking out into the world and seeing this world covered with colors, you have to suppose the astral beings behind these colors. As you let appear from your inside the colors of your aura for the clairvoyant, so the color cover of the world is the expression for the cosmic aura. Everything colored in the world is a turned over aura. If you could turn your aura around like a skirt, you would see your aura physically visible on the opposite side as well. This is true of the sense of sight, and thus you see that the sense of sight is intimately related to the astral world.

If you take the sense of feeling, the sense of warmth, this again stands in a universal relationship to the lower parts of the astral world. While the sense of sight is more in relation to the higher parts of the astral world, the sense of feeling or warmth is again in the same relation to the lower parts of the astral world, more with the area in which the astral world already passes over into the etheric world. The sense of hearing is directly related to the physical world, and what you perceive as the sense of hearing are vibrations of the physical air.

Now this is something which I ask you to understand only in the most subtle way and correctly. If you want to see something, there must be an astral being behind the color you see. Also behind the warmth, which you feel, there must be an astral being. If you want to hear something, you have - because the sense of hearing is the most perfect sense - completely entered the physical world, and you can hear a physical being. Only in the word has the spiritual world properly descended to the physical world. Therefore, if we start from above, we can say: the phenomena of the sense of hearing are entirely on the physical plan, those of heat already rise higher, those of the sense of sight are on the astral plan, and the phenomena that we perceive through the most imperfect senses belong to the higher parts of the spiritual world. And that which reaches down to the physical world is only the most imperfect. Thus, that which the sense of smell can grasp, that which it brings down into the physical world, is the most imperfect. If it becomes independent, then it separates itself from the course of the world, from evolution. What manifests itself in the sense of smell, should appear today only in the intimate connection with the highest worlds. - So let us take those beings which once - just when the sense of smell had begun to develop on earth - have separated from evolution and made themselves independent. These are beings, which make themselves noticeable preferably by the sense of smell. Therefore, it is a beautiful feature of the legend that the fallen angels are perceptible to the sense of smell in an unpleasant way. Because they are split off in evolution, they are perceptible to the sense of smell.

So, if you ask yourself what actually lies beyond the skin, which encloses the human sense organs, you must say to yourself: there actually lie the various higher planes and their beings.“ (Lit.:GA 96, p. 130ff)

The transition from sensual to supersensual looking

„In such endeavors we can go even further by facing people, trying to see also the exterior of the person as illusion and maya. For example, try to perceive his face color, hair color, eye color and cheek color in the complementary colors, as well as everything that is elevation on him - nose, etc. - as deepening and vice versa. In doing so, one comes to the negative form, that which is hollowed out from the physical body and which constitutes the spiritual. (Compare "Theosophy": The Spirit Land.) This is also the beginning to live into the aura of the human being. All these experiences can only be felt and sensed. If we go at it with the intellect, one can perform this kind of exercises only up to the turning of the facts, or one experiences only a continuous reflected back of one's own thoughts, without penetrating into the spiritual reality. For example, if a person has very red cheeks, they will have to be perceived as light green in the complementary color, a sign that he is still strongly in the vegetal life. If the face is slightly flushed, a bluish glow spreads over a slightly darker green tint for clairvoyant perception. Thus the clairvoyant can discern the degree of spirituality of the one who stands before him.“ (Lit.:GA 266b, p. 234)

The colors of the aura

„Now, when one enters the spiritual world, one has experiences which are truly not ecstasy, as little ecstasy as life in the geometrical conceptions. If the experience would not be there in full waking consciousness, so that the state of the soul is exactly the same as in mathematical imagining, then one would not be on the right path. So one experiences something that is completely according to the pattern of the mathematical experience in the soul, but one experiences a real spiritual world. And by experiencing this real spiritual world, one does not experience colors at first, but those experiences which we experience inwardly in the sensual colors. Now, of course, one must be so far developed with the soul that one pays attention to these experiences at all.

You see, a certain presence of mind belongs to the spiritual experience. So one must have this inner experience, which is otherwise experienced in the color. This experience is best characterized by the fact that one remembers the color, that one really has the color before oneself. Just as, let us say, one has the triangle experience by drawing the triangle inwardly, so one has that which one experiences inwardly best before oneself, not by drawing a geometrical figure, but by painting a colored picture. This colored picture is then as adequate to the mental experience as a painted triangle with its 180 degrees and angles is identical with the triangle experience. While one must know that it is a kind of sensualization, the experience in colors, if one expresses it in Goethean terms, is incidentally also a supersensual-sensual representation of that which is experienced in reality.

This, of course, points to such subtle experiences that one must not draw them into the rough, but really go into them. But then one will find that in fact a real has appeared there, by describing in colors. I have tried to bring this out very precisely in the last editions of my fundamental books. One cannot help describing what one experiences in such a way, otherwise one would become much more materialistic and would symbolically describe too strongly colors of the aura of man and colors of the supersensible world. In this way, however, one proceeds in the description in the same way as in mathematics, in that the color experience and that which is inner experience really coincide. One is always conscious of this, and there is nothing somehow of ecstasy present.“ (Lit.:GA 291a, p. 194ff)

„A thought arising from a sensual impulse of man has a different coloration than a thought conceived in the service of pure knowledge, noble beauty or the eternal good. In shades of red, thoughts which spring from sensual life pervade the world of the soul. In beautiful bright yellow appears a thought through which the thinker ascends to a higher knowledge. In glorious rose-red shines a thought which comes from devoted love. And like this content of a thought, also its greater or lesser definiteness is expressed in its supersensible manifestation. The precise thought of the thinker shows itself as a structure of definite outlines; the confused idea appears as a blurred, cloudy structure.“ (Lit.:GA 9, p. 160f)

„As the physical world appears to the physical eye as color, so the spiritual world appears to the spiritual eye in a wonderful blaze of color, only on a higher plane. This shows a tremendous mobility of color. We see man surrounded by an oval body of light in which he swims, and which does not appear to be at rest, but as flowing, streaming, which radiates out and loses itself at a certain distance from man. In the Devachan space, which appears continuously in motion, man has in himself a basic color. Permanent mood of man, also permanent character traits betray themselves in the aura by a permanent color tint, formed by clouds, which flow through it in waves. We see how wave-like currents pass through the aura from the bottom to the top, flashing through it like lightnings, how blue-red, brown-red and beautiful bluish colors pass through the aura. We see the most varied and diverse colors, which change according to the different occasions. Go to church and observe the auras of the devotees. You will find there quite different shades of color than in a meeting in which political passions or human egoism assert themselves. You will see the moods of the soul, which the daily needs bring, emanating in formations of brick-red and crimson color, sometimes you will have a darker shade of color. And if you go to a church and observe the devotees, you will see the blue, indigo, violet and rose color playing. And examine the aura of a person who lives in the thought world, contemplating scientific problems, then you will see shining within his aura the thought formations that reflect the thought in the aura that is not flashed by any passion.

When we learn what is reflected in the aura, we read, on the one hand, what moods and temperament live in man and what takes place in his consciousness; on the other hand, we see all ideas, from the most mundane to the highest, most spiritual, to the feelings of worship of God and the most sublime pity reflected in the aura. At first we cannot probe anything, but we gradually learn this and notice that in the aura there are two strictly different entities. At first there are cloud-like formations with indeterminate outlines, which flow in more from the skin periphery. We learn these cloud-like formations but from the appearances which emanate more from the heart, chest, head and which have a radiating character. These radiations always emanate from an inner center. So we learn to distinguish the cloud-like formations from those that have a radiating character. The cloud-like, which plays over from brown into dark orange, comes from the physicality, from the lower nature of man, from the passions and drives. Thus we distinguish in the aura the spiritual part from the lower, the astral part. We learn to understand the most common colors. The aura of today's Europeans has mostly green colors, which often pass into yellow. This green represents the actual mind part, the consciousness part; thus, it expresses the basic mood of the soul life of today's Europeans. In a person who is in a trance, make the strange perception that all green tones disappear from the aura. So, if you know how to perceive the aura, you will not find it difficult to distinguish a simulant from one who is really in a trance. Likewise, a doctor experimenting with hypnosis in a clinic - we consider it something non-physical, but it does happen sometimes - would be able to distinguish quite precisely whether the subject is deceiving him or whether he is really in a state of trance or hypnosis, if he can observe the disappearance of the green color in the aura. The green tones in the aura also disappear in a person who is in a state of unconsciousness, and likewise they always disappear in the aura of a sleeping person.

The ability to see the astral aura is what develops first in the seer. Relatively very soon the seer perceives this manifestation of man, and he learns to distinguish the astral aura from the mental aura. The radiant aura is from the devachan world; it is spirit and belongs to that which goes with man beyond death. It is that which comes from the true spiritual home. That which comes out of the brownish into the greenish, into greenish tones, belongs to the transient; man strips it off with the physical shell or in the Kamaloka, in order to then enter the real spiritual world. This is a higher kind of perception, a higher kind of spiritual sense, when the Devachan sense opens up to us. The devachanic world is quite different from the physical world. The physical world is immobile and dead, while the devachanic world is of a many-memberedness and an ease of movement without equal. It is a world always and ever moving in itself, which is in a perpetual activity.“ (Lit.:GA 88, p. 111ff)

„One can come to the idea, as if that what is described here as "colors" stood before the soul like a physical color stands before the eye. But such a "soul color" would be nothing but a hallucination. Spiritual science has not the least to do with impressions which are "hallucinatory". And they are at any rate not meant in the description here. One comes to a correct idea, if one keeps the following present. The soul does not only experience the sensual impression of a physical color, but it has a spiritual experience of it. This spiritual experience is different when the soul - through the eye - perceives a yellow, another when it perceives a blue surface. This experience is called the "life in yellow" or the "life in blue". The soul now, which has entered the path of knowledge, has an equal "experience in yellow" towards the active soul experiences of other beings: an "experience in blue" towards the devotional soul moods. The essential thing is not that the "seer" sees "blue" in a conception of another soul as he sees this "blue" in the physical world, but that he has an experience which entitles him to call the conception "blue," as the physical man calls a curtain "blue," for example. And further it is essential that the "seer" is conscious of standing with this his experience in a bodiless experience, so that he receives the possibility to speak of the value and meaning of the soul life in a world whose perception is not mediated by the human body. Although this sense of representation must be taken into account, it is quite natural for the "seer" to speak of "blue", "yellow", "green" and so on in the "aura".

The aura is very different according to the different temperaments and the dispositions of the people; different also according to the degrees of spiritual development. A person who devotes himself entirely to his animal instincts has a completely different aura than one who lives much in thought. The aura of a religiously attuned nature is essentially different from that of one who is absorbed in the trivial experiences of the day. In addition, all changing moods, all inclinations, joys and pains find their expression in the aura.

One must compare the auras of the different soul experiences with each other to learn to understand the meaning of the color tones. First of all, take soul experiences which are interspersed with strongly pronounced affects. They can be divided into two different kinds but, into those in which the soul is driven to these affects primarily by the animal nature, and those which take a more refined form, which are strongly influenced, so to speak, by thought. In the former type of experiences, brown and reddish-yellow color currents of all nuances flood the aura in particular places. In those with more refined affects, tones of brighter red-yellow and green appear in the same places. One may notice that with increasing intelligence the green tones become more frequent. Very clever people, however, who are completely absorbed in the satisfaction of their animal instincts, show much green in their aura. But this green will always have a stronger or weaker tinge of brown or brown-red. Unintelligent people will show a large part of the aura suffused with fire-red or even dark-blood-red currents.

The aura is substantially different from such states of affect in the calm, deliberative, reflective mood of the soul. The brownish and reddish tones recede and various shades of green emerge. In the case of strained thinking the aura shows a pleasant green basic tone. This is the appearance of those people who can be said to know how to find their way in any situation of life.

The blue hues appear in the devotional moods of the soul. The more a person puts his self at the service of a cause, the more significant the blue shades become. Two quite different kinds of people are also encountered in this respect. There are natures which are not accustomed to unfold their thinking power, passive souls who, so to speak, have nothing to throw into the stream of world events but their "good mind." Their aura glows in beautiful blue. So does that of many devoted, religious natures. Compassionate souls and those who like to live out an existence full of good deeds have a similar aura. Moreover, if such people are intelligent, green and blue currents alternate, or the blue itself probably takes on a greenish hue. It is the peculiarity of the active souls in contrast to the passive ones that their blue is imbued with bright hues from within. Inventive natures, those who have fruitful thoughts, radiate, as it were, from an inner point, light tones of color. To the highest degree this is the case with those personalities who are called "wise", and especially with those who are filled with fruitful ideas. In general, everything that points to spiritual activity has more the shape of rays spreading from within; while everything that comes from animal life has the shape of irregular clouds flooding the aura. Depending on the fact that the ideas, which spring from the activity of the soul, place themselves in the service of their own animal instincts or in such of ideal, objective interests, the corresponding aura images show different colorings. The inventive head, which uses all its thoughts for the satisfaction of its sensual passions, shows dark blue-red nuances; the one, on the other hand, which places its thoughts selflessly in an objective interest, shows light red-blue hues. A life in the spirit, coupled with noble devotion and self-sacrifice, reveals pinkish or light purple colors.

Not only the basic condition of the soul, but also temporary affects, moods and other inner experiences show their color floods in the aura. A suddenly erupting violent anger produces red floods; offended sense of honor, which lives itself out in a sudden upsurge, can be seen appearing in dark green clouds. - But the color phenomena do not only appear in irregular cloud formations, but also in certain limited, regularly formed figures. For example, if one notices in a person a manifestation of fear, one can see it in the aura from top to bottom like wavy stripes of blue color, which have a blue-reddish glow. In the case of a person, in whom one notices how he waits with tension for a certain event, one can see continuously red-blue stripes radially running through the aura from the inside towards the outside. For an accurate spiritual perception, every sensation that the person receives from the outside is to be noticed. Persons who are strongly excited by any external impression show a continuous flaring up of small blue-reddish dots and spots in the aura. In people who do not feel lively, these spots have an orange-yellow or even a beautiful yellow coloration. So-called "absent-mindedness" of persons shows itself as bluish spots playing into greenish before more or less changing form.“ (Lit.:GA 9, p. 161ff)

The sensual-moral effect of color

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„Decisive for the understanding of the colors perceivable in the aura is also what Goethe wrote about the "sensual-moral effect of color " in his paper "Zur Farbenlehre" (On the Theory of Colours) published in 1810. Goethe shows there how every perception of color is accompanied by a quite characteristic, by no means accidental undertone of feeling, which is at first experienced only very subliminally, but can be brought more clearly into consciousness by increased attention. For this purpose, however, it must be separated from the purely personally conditioned and often much more prominent sympathy and antipathy that one feels for a certain color. This is best achieved when one exposes oneself to the pure color effect out of completely conscious willful decision and fades out all other, disturbing external and internal influences. Although this fine undertone of the externally perceived color can only be experienced subjectively inwardly by the observer, it nevertheless does not depend on his personal idiosyncrasy and in this respect has at the same time an objective character. Certain color combinations excite quite certain mental effects. Conversely, certain mental moods correspond with corresponding color qualities, with which one can describe the aura.“ (Lit.:GA 73a, p. 254ff)

Development of the aura

„The physical body is surrounded in a kind of egg shape by the so-called aura. This is always larger than the physical body itself. It is smallest in the undeveloped man, and it is larger the more developed the man is, so that the aura of a highly developed man can exceed his length sixfold. You must imagine that you would get the whole man only if you would apply his height three times upward and three times downward. In this aura we have to distinguish three things: First, the so-called astral body. This is the body which objectively contains for the seer's eye what the human being otherwise feels only in himself: his drives, desires and passions. The seer can exactly distinguish in this astral aura whether man has pure or ugly passions like greed, pity, benevolence and the like. Then, somewhat larger, the mental aura. It contains that which we subjectively feel as our intellect, as our mind power, the lower spirit power. These two auras dissolve after death, just as the physical body dissolves. The astral aura dissolves in the kamaloka, and the mental aura in the lower devachan. They are still to be counted among the transient parts of man. The permanent being of man is objectively visible in the third aura. This is the aura of the causal body, that is, the body that passes through all incarnations. The causal body is only hinted at in undeveloped people who understand little of the abiding. If you look at the auras of an undeveloped person, you will find little of the causal body. Those people who pursue deeper truths develop this causal aura. The more a person develops, the more this causal aura develops. A kind of ray system is then incorporated, so that the more highly developed man emits rays which can be noticed in his causal aura. If we have the aura of an adept, it is much larger than a house, so that the whole man appears infinitely larger than the physical man to the physical eye. The causal aura, which we can see in the highly developed, is also indicated in the undeveloped, and not as a small body, but also large, but it does not yet shine. It is a faint glowing light in the undeveloped and becomes more and more luminous the more man develops. Rays come in through the fact that man gets more and more content. The more man develops in himself what is permanent, what will reappear, the more he has luminosity in himself. It is the objectively visible of what man carries over from one incarnation to the other.

First I will consider man with his astral aura; we can observe him in three successive states. The first state would be that in which the actual imagination is still very little developed. This is the case with the third root race and in the beginning of the fourth, that is, from the middle of the Lemurian to the first half of the Atlantean period. The Lemurians and the first Atlantians did not think from ideas, but purely from memory. Only in the fourth root race the imaginative power was gradually developed; there also the aura changed. In the third root race and in the first half of the fourth, the astral aura developed in such a way that it surrounded the body of man. It was a little bigger than his skin, and it was much foggier than afterwards, it was as if pervaded by dark masses of mist, and due to the passions of man it was much more violent and stormy. Only the first beginnings of the mental aura were present then. The development continued until our present root race, so that today a certain climax has been reached. This is the second stage in which the mental aura is developed to a certain degree.

The third stage is that of an advanced man who develops the so-called astral vision. He is able to see this aura as well. He can see not only what is present in the physical world, but also what is present in the astral world. In such people the astral aura looks somewhat different. In Atlantean and post-Atlantean people, wheel-shaped figures appear within the astral aura. Such figures are in the aura of every present-day man; with the Lemurians they were still hardly noticeable. When these "wheels" are in motion in today's man, vision occurs. When they are at rest, the astral vision is suspended. These are the three states.

The physical body is permeated by the nervous system. Each nerve center is connected with an astral center, so that, for example, the optic nerve is surrounded, enveloped by an astral optic nerve, by an astral substance that belongs to the optic nerve. Now, how does vision come about? Light comes into the eye, goes through the nerve into the brain. But there one sees still nothing; it is still a movement process only of physical kind. Now the astral optic nerve comes into vibrations. These cause the image to appear that one sees. Without the astral body being set into activity, it is impossible to see. It is the same with thinking. The astral body is what is actually active. Now, if you imagine how it is with the seer, it is not impressions that come through the ear, through the eye, but it is impressions that come through his astral organization itself, without mediation of the physical brain and the nerve center. This occurs when the chakrams, the lotuses, come into motion. This means that the astral body is an organism that has sense organs.

When man is in the ordinary state of sleep, usually the astral body is outside the physical body. The more highly developed a person is, the further away the astral body can be. The complete psychic development consists in leaving the body behind and walking freely in the astral. There are other stages as well. The astral body, while one is asleep, can make the strangest wanderings, only you do not remember these nocturnal wanderings. You can have an awareness of it during the night, but not bring it with you into the day. The highest stage is when you are aware of the astral consciousness both in sleep and in the physical body. You can seek out familiar people during the night; however, you will not be able to have experiences of a similar nature as in the physical. For example, you will not learn what a person in Asia is doing now - you cannot learn that. But if you want to learn something from him, you can, if you take over this completely into your daily consciousness. The chela could not learn whether a master in Asia writes or does not write or whether and what he eats and drinks. But he can be taught in the astral space and consciously take that over into the day consciousness.“ (Lit.:GA 88, p. 234ff)

The head aura

6th-century depiction of Christ with a cross nimbus, detail from a mosaic in Sant'Apollinare Nuovo, Ravenna.

„Main“ (Lit.:GA Halo)

The halo (Latin: nimbus) is the head aura perceivable clairvoyantly in spiritually highly developed people. Thought emanations appear as a crown of rays, as found in many representations of Christ, but also, for example, of Helios or Apollo.

In every human being a stream of etherized blood rises from the heart to the head and surrounds and illuminates the pineal gland. These etheric forces, rising from the heart through the etherisation of the blood, penetrate the brain and radiate even beyond the head; if sufficiently strong, this appears to the imaginative eye as a halo.

Only through these etheric forces we are at all able to grasp thoughts which are not completely bound to the egoistic needs of the organism. Aristotle still suspected this. Since the blood of the Christ was shed on Golgotha, the Christ force can unite with this etheric current. At the same time also astral forces rise, which however cannot penetrate the skullcap, but accumulate and condense here. But they attract outer astral forces, which lay themselves over the skull like an astral cap. The inwardly rising astral forces, in which there are desires, but also tremendous wisdom, meet here with the outer astral world wisdom.

The three types of astral color appearances

In the human aura one can distinguish three kinds of astral color appearances, which correspond to the physical, mental and spiritual aspect of man:

„For a more highly developed "spiritual seeing" three types of color appearances can be distinguished within this "aura" flooding and radiating around the human being. First of all, there are those colors which more or less bear the character of opacity and dullness. However, if we compare these colors with those which our physical eye sees, then they appear fleeting and transparent in comparison with these. Within the supersensible world itself, however, they make the space they fill comparatively opaque; they fill it like misty formations. - A second kind of colors are those which are, as it were, completely light. They illuminate the space they fill. Through them, the space itself becomes a space of light. - Quite different from these two is the third kind of colored phenomena. These have a radiant, sparkling, glittering character. They do not merely illuminate the space they fill: they shine through and radiate through it. There is something active, moving in itself in these colors. The others have something resting in themselves, unglamorous. These, on the other hand, produce themselves continuously out of themselves, as it were. - Through the first two types of color, space is filled as if with a fine liquid that remains calmly in it; through the third, it is filled with an ever-fanning life, with never-resting activity.

Now these three kinds of colors are not located next to each other in the human aura; they are not located exclusively in separate parts of space, but they penetrate each other in the most manifold way. In one place of the aura one can see all three types playing together, as one can see and hear a physical body, for example a bell, at the same time. Thus the aura becomes an extraordinarily complicated phenomenon, for one has to do, so to speak, with three interpenetrating auras. But one can come into the clear if one directs his attention alternately to one of these three auras. One then does something similar in the supersensible world as when one closes one's eyes in the sensual world, for example, in order to devote oneself completely to the impression of a piece of music. The "seer" has, so to speak, three kinds of organs for the three kinds of colors. And he can, in order to observe undisturbed, open one or the other kind of organs to the impressions and close the others. In a "seer" at first only one kind of organs can be developed, the one for the first kind of colors. Such a person can see only the one aura; the other two remain invisible to him. Likewise, someone can be impressionable for the first two kinds, but not for the third. - The higher stage of the "gift of sight" then consists in the fact that a person can observe all three auras and, for the purpose of study, direct attention alternately to one or the other.

The triple aura is the supersensible-visible expression for the essence of man. The three members: body, soul and spirit, are expressed in it.

The first aura is a reflection of the influence which the body exerts on the soul of man; the second marks the soul's own life, which has risen above that which is immediately sensual, but is not yet devoted to the service of the eternal; the third reflects the dominion which the eternal spirit has gained over the transient man. When descriptions of the aura are given - as has been done here - it must be emphasized that these things are not only difficult to observe, but above all difficult to describe. Therefore, no one should see in such descriptions anything but a suggestion.

For the "seer" the peculiarity of the life of the soul is expressed in the nature of the aura. If he encounters a soul life which is completely devoted to the respective sensual urges, desires and the momentary external stimuli, then he sees the first aura in the shrillest hues; the second, on the other hand, is only weakly developed. One sees in it only sparse color formations; the third, however, is hardly indicated. Here and there only a glittering sparkle of color appears, indicating that even in such a mood of the soul the eternal lives in man as a disposition, but that it is pushed back by the marked effect of the sensual. - The more man strips off his instinctual nature from himself, the more unobtrusive becomes the first part of the aura. The second part then enlarges more and more, and fills more and more completely with its luminous power the body of color within which the physical man lives. - And the more man proves himself to be a "servant of the Eternal," the wondrous third aura appears, that part which bears witness to the extent to which man is a citizen of the spiritual world. For the divine self radiates through this part of the human aura into the earthly world. In so far as people show this aura, they are flames through which the Godhead illuminates this world. Through this part of the aura they show to what extent they know how to live not for themselves but for the eternally true, the nobly beautiful and good: to what extent they have wrested from their narrow self to sacrifice themselves on the altar of the great work of the world.

Thus is expressed in the aura what man has made of himself in the course of his embodiments.“ (Lit.:GA 9, p. 165ff)

Ether aura, astral aura and I-aura

In the heart an etherisation of the blood takes place. An etheric current rises from the heart, through which the etheric body is renewed. At the same time, an astral current also goes up from here. The etheric aura part goes up to the brain and even radiates beyond the head, while the astral aura is held up in the head and only puts on a kind of astral cap from the outer astral world. This then becomes visible to the spiritual eye as a halo. The I-aura, on the other hand, is already stopped in the region of the heart and encounters here a spiritual current that comes from the macrocosm and intertwines with the I-aura rising from below.

Ether aura

The etheric body becomes visible when one can completely block out the physical body in clairvoyant perception. It then first appears as a delicate peach-blossom coloured ("incarnate") double image of the physical body.

„For the sake of completeness, reference should be made to a part of the aura that has not been discussed so far. It is the one that corresponds to the life body. It fills approximately the same space as the physical body. The clairvoyant can only observe it if he has the ability to completely imagine away the physical body. Then the life body (linga sharira) appears as a complete double image of the physical body in a colour reminiscent of that of apricot blossoms. In this life body, a continuous inflow and outflow can be observed. The life force contained in the universe flows in, is consumed by the life process and flows out again.“ (Lit.:GA 34, p. 136)

Peach blossom, however, is only the general color of the etheric body. To a closer look it shows itself, especially in its lower parts, in manifold multicolored flooding colors.

„If you take the etheric body and explore it directly with clear-sightedness, it is a marvelous structure of shimmering colors flowing into each other. What then are these colors that flood in the etheric body? Yes, these are the forces that build up the physical body, the forces that not only build up its organs, but also work in what is done during life by the organs of the physical body. But the human organs are of different importance. Let us take two such organs as the viscera and the brain. The external anatomy examines the tissues and everything that comes into consideration as equal. But things are not, they are quite different. If we look at the human brain, it is something perfect as a physical organ; this comes from the fact that those floods of colors are processed in the brain. When we look at the etheric body of the human brain, we see it in relatively pale color, because the colors have been used to produce the structure of the brain. When we look at the viscera, we find the flood of colors shimmering brightly and wonderfully into one another, for the viscera are really coarser organs, there is not yet so much of the spiritual to be used, there the forces still remain in the etheric body, there a smaller part is used only for development. That is why the etheric body of the brain is pale, but the etheric body of the intestines is beautiful, of wonderful, flowing colors.

Now think, someone comes to clairvoyance as I have described. Two things can happen: Clairvoyance can occur when the etheric body of the brain is loosened, but clairvoyance can also occur when the etheric body of the intestines is loosened. During clairvoyance man often becomes aware of his own inner self. The one who gets out the etheric body of the brain will at first have a rather pale world before him; but the one who gets out the etheric body of his viscera can wonderfully reflect floods of color into the etheric world. In order to bring the pale of the cerebral etheric body into contact with the flooded colors of the cosmos, it is necessary that we first draw the flooded colors from the whole sphere of the cosmos. In order to develop the flood colors of the etheric body of the intestines, we can radiate them out of us, and thus a quite marvelous structure can be seen on the way of clairvoyance. Certainly, it is a real clairvoyant structure, but if you examine it, what is it? It is nothing else than one's own digestive process, it is that which the etheric body does during the digestive process of man; that projects itself out into the etheric space.“ (Lit.:GA 174b, p. 72f)

„He who has reached a certain level of clairvoyance has also acquired the ability, the strong power, to control his mind in such a way that he is able in a much higher degree to direct his attention to something or to divert it from it. If you ask the ordinary man to divert his attention in such a way that he can, so to speak, deny himself the physical form, he will be able to do so only extremely rarely; the clairvoyant, however, is quite capable of doing so. The space, in which otherwise the physical body is, is then filled for the clairvoyant, shone through by this etheric body or life body. It has approximately the human form of head, trunk and shoulders. The more it runs downward, the less similar it is to the human form. In animals, the etheric body is very different from the physical body. In the horse, for example, as you know, the etheric head projects far out. And if you could observe the etheric body of the elephant clairvoyantly, you would be astonished what a huge structure it has. The more we come down in the human form, the more the etheric body changes in relation to the physical form. Otherwise, however, left and right in the physical and in the etheric body correspond in a certain respect. Somewhat to the left lies the physical heart; the corresponding organ in the etheric body is the etheric heart, which lies on the right side. But the greatest difference between the physical and etheric bodies is that the etheric body of the man is female and that of the woman is male. This fact is very important, and many riddles of human nature can be explained on the basis of this occult research. Thus, in man there is a kind of correspondence, in the animal a great difference between this second member of the human being and the first.“ (Lit.:GA 109, p. 181f)

Literature

• Annie Besant, C. W. Leadbeater: Thought Forms
• C. W. Leadbeater: Man Visible and Invisible, The Theosophical Publishing House, London 1902
• Walter Benjamin: Das Kunstwerk im Zeitalter seiner technischen Reproduzierbarkeit, Suhrkamp Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1991, ISBN 3-518-28531-9
• Rudolf Steiner: Theosophie. Einführung in übersinnliche Welterkenntnis und Menschenbestimmung, GA 9 (1904), Kapitel VI. Von den Gedankenformen und der menschlichen Aura) English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org
• Rudolf Steiner: Wie erlangt man Erkenntnisse der höheren Welten?, GA 10 (1993), ISBN 3-7274-0100-1 English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org
• Rudolf Steiner: Die geistige Führung des Menschen und der Menschheit, GA 15 (1987), ISBN 3-7274-0150-8 English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org
• Rudolf Steiner: Ein Weg zur Selbsterkenntnis des Menschen, GA 16 (2004), ISBN 3-7274-0160-5 English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org
• Rudolf Steiner: Ursprung und Ziel des Menschen, GA 53 (1981), ISBN 3-7274-0532-5 English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org
• Rudolf Steiner: Fachwissenschaften und Anthroposophie, GA 73a (2005), ISBN 3-7274-0735-2 English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org
• Rudolf Steiner: Über die astrale Welt und das Devachan, GA 88 (1999), ISBN 3-7274-0880-4 English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org
• Rudolf Steiner: Vor dem Tore der Theosophie, GA 95 (1990), ISBN 3-7274-0952-5 English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org
• Rudolf Steiner: Ursprungsimpulse der Geisteswissenschaft, GA 96 (1989), Berlin, Zwanzig Vorträge vom 29. Januar 1906 bis 12. Juni 1907 English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org
• Rudolf Steiner: Ägyptische Mythen und Mysterien, GA 106 (1992), ISBN 3-7274-1060-4 English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org
• Rudolf Steiner: Das Prinzip der spirituellen Ökonomie im Zusammenhang mit Wiederverkörperungsfragen, GA 109 (2000), ISBN 3-7274-1090-6 English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org
• Rudolf Steiner: Makrokosmos und Mikrokosmos, GA 119 (1988), ISBN 3-7274-1192-9 English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org
• Rudolf Steiner: Die Geheimnisse der biblischen Schöpfungsgeschichte, GA 122 (1984), ISBN 3-7274-1220-8 English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org
• Rudolf Steiner: Weltenwunder, Seelenprüfungen und Geistesoffenbarungen, GA 129 (1977) English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org
• Rudolf Steiner: Das Leben zwischen dem Tode und der neuen Geburt im Verhältnis zu den kosmischen Tatsachen, GA 141 (1997), ISBN 3-7274-1410-3 English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org
• Rudolf Steiner: Die geistigen Hintergründe des Ersten Weltkrieges, GA 174b (1994), ISBN 3-7274-1742-0 English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org
• Rudolf Steiner: Erdensterben und Weltenleben. Anthroposophische Lebensgaben. Bewußtseins-Notwendigkeiten für Gegenwart und Zukunft, GA 181 (1991), ISBN 3-7274-1810-9 English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org
• Rudolf Steiner: Aus den Inhalten der esoterischen Stunden, Band II: 1910 – 1912, GA 266/2 (1996), ISBN 3-7274-2662-4 English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org
• Rudolf Steiner: Aus den Inhalten der esoterischen Stunden, Band III: 1913 und 1914; 1920 – 1923, GA 266/3 (1998), ISBN 3-7274-2663-2 English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org
• Rudolf Steiner: Kunst und Kunsterkenntnis, GA 271 (1985), ISBN 3-7274-2712-4 English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org
• Rudolf Steiner: Geisteswissenschaftliche Erläuterungen zu Goethes «Faust», Band I: Faust, der strebende Mensch , GA 272 (1981), ISBN 3-7274-2720-5 English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org
• Rudolf Steiner: Farbenerkenntnis, GA 291a (1990), ISBN 3-7274-2915-1 English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org
• Rudolf Steiner: Die Aura des Menschen. In: Diane von Weltzien (Hrsg): Das große Praxisbuch der Aura- und Chakra-Arbeit, Goldmann TB, München 1993, S. 109 - 123

References to the work of Rudolf Steiner follow Rudolf Steiner's Collected Works (CW or GA), Rudolf Steiner Verlag, Dornach/Switzerland, unless otherwise stated. Email: verlag@steinerverlag.com URL: www.steinerverlag.com. Index to the Complete Works of Rudolf Steiner - Aelzina Books A complete list by Volume Number and a full list of known English translations you may also find at Rudolf Steiner's Collected Works Rudolf Steiner Archive - The largest online collection of Rudolf Steiner's books, lectures and articles in English. Rudolf Steiner Audio - Recorded and Read by Dale Brunsvold steinerbooks.org - Anthroposophic Press Inc. (USA) Rudolf Steiner Handbook - Christian Karl's proven standard work for orientation in Rudolf Steiner's Collected Works for free download as PDF.