Aura

From AnthroWiki
Revision as of 12:35, 16 July 2022 by Odyssee (talk | contribs)
Auric egg, drawing from GA 93a, p. 75

The aura (Greek: αύρα áura "breath, breeze, morning breeze"[1]; 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 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)

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.

References

  1. ↑ In Greek mythology, aura is the goddess of the morning breeze.
Retrieved from "https://en.anthro.wiki/index.php?title=Aura&oldid=10815"