Spirits of Time

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The Spirits of Time, Time spirits, Epochal spirits or Spirits of the Ages (German: Zeitgeister) belong to the hierarchy of the Archai (Primordial Angels). In the Genesis account of creation they are called Jom (Hebrew: יום "day"); gnosis calls them Aeons. They stand as exalted spiritual beings far above man and have already completed their humanity stage, i.e. the development of their I-consciousness, on Old Saturn. From the beginning of the planetary stages of world evolution they are closely connected with all temporal events. In a certain sense, they are the essential time itself.

Overview

The Spirits of Time guide the development of humanity by taking over the spiritual leadership of the different cultural epochs and regulating the relationship of the different culture-bearing peoples and their folk spirits to each other. The duration of the individual cultural epochs is determined by cosmic conditions and corresponds in each case to 1/12 of the Platonic World Year (~ 2160 years). Our present post-Atlantean age is divided into seven such cultural epochs. At present we are in the 5th post-Atlantean cultural epoch (Anglo-German culture):

  1. Old Indian culture (7227 - 5067 B.C.)
  2. Old Persian culture (5067 - 2907 B.C.)
  3. Egyptian-Chaldaic culture (2907 - 747 B.C.)
  4. Graeco-Latin culture (747 BC - 1413 AD).
  5. Anglo-German culture (1413 - 3573 AD, our present epoch)
  6. Slavic culture (3573 - 5733 AD)
  7. American culture (5733 - 7893 AD)

In a limited sense, the 7 leading Archangels also act as inspiring time spirits for certain smaller periods of time in human cultural development. These periods last about 350 years, but are not sub-periods of the cultural epochs, but follow an independent rhythm, in the succession of which the 7 most outstanding Archangels take over from each other in their regency (see → Archangel regencies). Rudolf Steiner gave the following information on this (Lit.:GA 245, p. 171):

Oriphiel (Saturn) 200 BC - 150
Anael (Venus) 150 - 500
Zachariel (Jupiter) 500 - 850
Raphael (Mercury) 850 - 1190
Samael (Mars) 1190 - 1510
Gabriel (Moon) 1510 - 1879
Michael (Sun) November 1879 - ca. 2300

The Primordial Angels acting as Spirits of the Ages

„Now we come to the order of the Primordial Forces. These are even more sublime beings whose consciousness does not even reach down to the animals. When the initiate rises to commune with the Primordial Forces, he does not communicate to them from his human consciousness what the forms of the animals on Earth are like. For they themselves only reach down with their consciousness to the human beings. Then they know the kingdom of the Angels, the kingdom of the Archangels and their own kingdom; to themselves they say "I", and it is men whom they perceive last. What the stone, the mineral kingdom, is for man, that is man for the Primordial Forces: the lowest kingdom. This already says that they guide the course of humanity from a very high level. People sense here and there that there is something like a kind of "Spirit of the Ages", which is so different according to the different epochs. People feel that there is a "Spirit of the Ages". We have often spoken here of the Spirit of the Ages. We have said, for example, that in the first culture of the post-Atlantean period, in the ancient Indian people, the spirit of the epoch consisted in the fact that people had the consciousness that they longed again for the old Atlantean times, where they perceived higher realms around them in a twilight way. This developed into the yoga system through which they wanted to ascend again to the higher worlds. Connected with this old consciousness was the fact that people thought little of the outer reality, of the physical plan. Maja, the physical plan became an illusion for people. The ancient Indian culture had, so to speak, very little interest in the physical plan. It will seem strange to you, but it is really true: if the ancient Indian culture had remained, there would never have been railways, telephones and such things that exist today on the physical plane; for it would not have seemed so important to concern oneself so much with the laws of the physical world in order to populate this physical world with all that presents itself to us today as cultural achievements.

Then came the spirit of the Persian epoch. Through him, man became acquainted with a resisting element in matter which he had to work on. He united with the good spirit Ormuzd against the spirit of matter, Ahriman. But the Persian was already interested in the physical plan. Then comes the spirit of that epoch, which lives itself out in the Babylonian-Assyrian-Chaldean culture on the one hand, and in the Egyptian culture on the other. Human science is founded. Geometry is used to make the Earth suitable for human beings. Astrology and astronomy were used to find out the meaning of the course of the stars, and what happened on Earth was arranged according to the course of the stars. In ancient Egypt, social life in particular was very much guided by the course of the stars. What was discovered as the secrets of the stars, that is what was followed. If the ancient Indian tried to eavesdrop on the path to the gods by diverting his attention entirely from external reality, the Egyptian studied the laws that prevailed in external reality in order to investigate how the will and the spirit of the gods were expressed in the laws of external nature. That was another epoch again. Thus you have a certain spirit for each epoch, and the development on Earth comes about through the fact that one spirit of the epochs replaces another spirit of the epochs. This is the case in detail. Men swing themselves up to the views of the ages, but they do not know that behind this whole course of the ages stand epochal spirits; and men do not know that here on Earth, in order to express the spirit of their epoch, they are, so to speak, only the instruments of these spirits of the epochs standing behind them.“ (Lit.:GA 102, p. 145f)

„And then we come up to the entities which we call Spirits of Personality, Primordial Beings, Primordial Forces, Archai. These are even higher beings, they have an even higher task in the context of humanity. They basically regulate the earthly conditions of the whole human race on Earth, and they live in such a way that they change through the waves of time from epoch to epoch in a quite definite time, taking on, so to speak, a changed spiritual body. They all know something which is a mere concept for the abstract people of our present-day education, but which is a reality for those who look into the spiritual reality: it is what one could call, in a rather ugly expression of our time, the Spirit of the Age. They have to do with what is the meaning and mission of an epoch of mankind. Just think of the fact that we can describe the meaning and the mission, for example, in the first millennia immediately after the Atlantic catastrophe. These Spirits of the Age encompass something that goes beyond the individual people, beyond the individual race. The spirit of an epoch is not confined to this or that people; it crosses the boundaries of nations. That which is in reality called the spirit of the time, the spirit of an epoch, is the spiritual body of the Archai, the Primordial Origins or Spirits of Personality. It is due to these Spirits of Personality, for example, that for certain epochs quite definite human personalities appear on our Earth. You understand that earthly tasks must first be solved by earthly personalities. In a certain epoch this or that epoch-making personality had to appear. But there would be a strange confusion in the whole development of the Earth if everything were left to chance, if Luther or Charlemagne were placed in any epoch. This must first be thought of in connection with the whole development of humanity over the Earth; the right soul must appear, so to speak, out of the sense of the whole development of the Earth in a certain epoch. This is regulated by the spirits of personality, this is regulated by the Archai or Primordial Beginnings.“ (Lit.:GA 110, p. 94f)

The Ascension of Michael to a Time Spirit

The special significance of the present Michael Age lies in the fact that Michael is ascending from the Archangel rank to the Primordial Angel rank of a "Zeitgeist" and can thereby stimulate a spiritual deepening of the whole of mankind that transcends all peoples.

„When we speak of the Hierarchy of the Archangeloi, we can say that they do indeed take turns as I have said. But the highest in rank, the supreme, as it were, is the one who begins to rule in our age, is Michael. He is one of the Archangeloi, but he is in a sense the most advanced. Now there is a development, and the development embraces all beings. All beings are in an increasing evolution, and we are living in the age when Michael, the highest of the Archangeloi nature, is passing into the Archai nature. He will gradually pass into a leading position, become a leading entity, become the spirit of the time, the leading entity for all mankind.

That is the important thing, the tremendously important thing of our age, that we understand that what was not there in all previous epochs, what was not there for the whole of humanity, can now be, must become a good for the whole of mankind. What has hitherto occurred among individual peoples - spiritual deepening - can now be something for the whole of mankind.“ (Lit.:GA 152, p. 60)

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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