Kundalini

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Kundalini (Sanskrit: f., कुण्डलिनी kuṇḍalinī, from kundala "coiled, wound") also Kundalini snake, serpent power or Shakti (a manifestation of the goddess Devi) and occasionally Ishvari (Sanskrit: ईश्वरी īśvarī "mistress"), is, according to Tantric teachings, the divine force in its individual incarnation in man, the dormant life force or prana in its potential, dormant form, the energy and essence of life alike, and is closely related to the (maternal) reproductive forces. It is the force in the human being that is closest to matter (derived from Latin: mater "mother"), and forms the bridge between the physical and astral substance. At the same time, it is the inwardly excited astral light that illuminates the outer soul world and makes it visible to the clairvoyant gaze.

The Kundalini Force

The Serpent Power

The Kundalini force rests at the lower end of the spine, symbolised by the snake coiled in three and a half coils, sleeping unconscious in the root chakra, the four-petalled lotus flower. Once awakened, it can become the highest power of love or pure desire heightened to the highest degree. In Goethe's fairy tale of the green serpent and the beautiful lily, this deeply unconscious power is represented by the green serpent. Note also the two serpents of the staff of Mercury, which also represent, among other things, the unconscious (black) and the conscious (white) side of the kundalini force.

Kundalini Fire and Kundalini Light

Kundalini fire is the bond that connects the physical body with the astral body throughout earthly life, the so-called silver cord. When the upper parts of the astral body are lifted out of the body during sleep, the silver cord appears to the clairvoyant as a fine silvery shining ribbon which joins the body in the spleen region. At death, this silver string of pearls breaks and the astral body can no longer return to the body.

„I have often said that at night the astral body leaves the physical body. During sleep the astral body is only connected with the physical body through an astral cord in the region of the spleen, which can be perceived by the clairvoyant. The spleen has not only a physical task, but it is also its function to mediate the connection between the physical and the spiritual part of the human being. The spleen is the point of connection of the physical body with the astral body. That is why you can read in every textbook of anatomy that nothing is really known about the spleen. The spleen is one of those organs which stand at the boundary of the physical organs. The astral body, which during sleep is only connected to the physical body through the spleen, works to remove the fatiguing substances from the physical body. To the clairvoyant, the sleeping human being appears as if enveloped in a strange cloud which is continually working on the physical body.“ (Lit.:GA 96, p. 238)

„When man is in the ordinary state of sleep, as a rule, the astral body is outside the physical body. The more highly developed the human being is, the further away the astral body can be. Complete psychic development consists in leaving the body behind and walking freely in the astral. There are other stages. The astral body can make the strangest wanderings while you are asleep, 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 conscious of the astral consciousness both in sleep and in the physical body. You can visit familiar people during the night, but you will not be able to have experiences of a similar kind as in the physical. For example, you will not know what a person in Asia is doing now - you cannot know that. But if you want to learn something from him, you can, if you take it over 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 realm and consciously take this over into his daily consciousness.

If you look at such an astral body, you have in one place the physical body with its nerve centres, which looks to the physical eye as it looks during the day, and you have somewhere the astral body with its sense organs, so that you can see: to this centre [of the astral body] belongs the optic nerve and to this the auditory nerve. Now the question arises: what is the connection between the astral body and the physical body, what chains the astral ear to the physical ear? And why does the astral body, [which is separated from the physical body during sleep], return? Interesting questions could be raised. For example, suppose a person felt terribly unhappy. Now he is in his astral body during the night. The suffering has its origin in the physical. He could now make the decision not to return [with his astral body], then what one would call an astral suicide would be carried out.

So, what connects the astral body with the physical body and its organs, and what leads it back again? There is a kind of bond, a connection that is an intermediate matter between physical and astral matter. And that is called the kundalini fire. If you have a sleeping person, you can always follow the astral body in the astral. You have a luminous streak to where the astral body is. You can always find the place. If the astral body moves away, then to the same extent the kundalini fire becomes thinner and thinner. A thinner and thinner trace it is; it becomes more and more like a thin mist. Now, if you look closely at this kundalini fire, it is not uniform. There will be certain places in it that are more luminous and denser, and these are the places that lead the astral back to the physical. The optic nerve is therefore connected with an astral nerve by a denser kundalini fire.

Leadbeater did not want to go into it [in his book "The Astral Plane"] to say whether such an astral suicide is possible. The Kundalini fire with the astral body cannot be lifted completely out of the physical body. If a man were to make up his mind not to return, the kundalini fire would continually draw him down, as if he still belonged to the physical body. It is the trace of the Kundalini fire that he follows. If the life force is not yet exhausted, it is very difficult to lift the astral body out of the physical body. It is very difficult when someone is attached to the physical body, which he can no longer use. In this respect, the fate of the suicide and that of the casualty are not to any considerable extent different from each other.

Now, in the case of the more highly developed man, on whom the chakrams move, another process takes place. He has the possibility of arbitrarily withdrawing the Kundalini fire from the organism; at the same time opposite currents open up from within: That which formerly merely flowed in from without, man can now arbitrarily regulate from within; the whole process can now be brought about arbitrarily.

Now man has attained a complete possibility of disposal over the astral body. Now I would ask you to note that this state is occurring more and more in human development. Today it is the psychically developed who have such an astral body, but man in general is hastening towards such a state. He will have the possibility of using his astral body in the sixth race. He will have a physical body and within it an astral body which he can use in this way. In the next round, however, people will not have a physical body, but only an astral body, which they can then use freely, just as we humans use the physical body today. The physical body will then no longer be there; the lowest body will then be the astral body.“ (Lit.:GA 88, p. 236ff)

As Kundalini light, Kundalini reveals itself as the astral light that comes from within and illuminates the spiritual world, thus awakening spiritual perception. In a notebook of Steiner's from 1906 it is said:

„One must distinguish in the astral body itself a second half: like the other pole in the magnet.

In man the second astral body is female; in woman the second astral body is male, that is, the astral body is hermaphroditic. The Kundalini fire is now the activity excited in the second astral body, which is first of all warmth and light.

As long as the kundalini fire is not excited, one gropes between the objects and beings of the higher world; as in the night between the physical objects. When the kundalini fire is there, one illuminates the objects oneself.“ (Lit.: Contributions 51/52, p. 21)

The fact that Kundalini reveals itself as Kundalini light and as Kundalini fire points to the polarity of light and love, which in the course of spiritual development must interpenetrate and unite into one force. This is also the main theme of Steiner's first mystery drama The Portal of Initiation. In the 11th picture, Theodosius, who represents the spirit of love, says to the Other Maria, whose archetype reveals itself in the course of the drama as the soul of love (Lit.:GA 14, p. 150f):

Close intertwined was thy destiny
With thine exalted sister's loftier life:
The light of love I could impart to her:
But not the warmth of love, so long as thou
Didst only let thy noble gift arise
From the dim feeling life within thy soul,
And didst not strive to see it clear and bold
In the full light of wisdom's certainty.
The influence of the Temple does not reach
Unto the nature of vague impulses,
E'en though such impulse wills to work for good.

Literature
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.
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