Conditions of Form

In the course of world evolution, each of the seven Conditions of Consciousness (CoC) is divided into 7 Conditions of Life (CoL), and these in turn into 7 Conditions of Form (CoF; German: Formzustände) or Globes:

1. Arupa
2. Rupa
3. Astral
4. Physical
5. Plastic
6. Intellectual
7. Archetypal

Up to the 4th level there is a descent from the spiritual to the physical or physical-etheric reality, after which the outer existence is spiritualised again in stages.

„The inner experience of the soul must first be preceded by the creation of this life. For nothing can be experienced that has not first come into existence. If secret science calls the inner experience the soul, it calls the creative the spiritual. The [physical body] perceives through organs; the soul experiences itself inwardly; the spirit creates outwardly. Just as the seven stages of consciousness are preceded by seven experiences of the soul, so these experiences of the soul are preceded by seven kinds of creative activity. The dull experience of the substance corresponds in the realm of the creative to the bringing forth of this substance. The substance flows into the world in an indifferent way. This region is called the region of formlessness. At the next stage the substance is subdivided and its members enter into a relationship with one another. Here we have to do with different substances that combine and separate. This area is called the area of form. On the third level, substance no longer needs to relate to substance itself, but the forces emanate from the substance, the substances attract and repel each other, and so on. We are dealing with the astral realm. On the fourth level a material appears, shaped by the forces of the environment, which on the third level merely regulated the outer relations and which now work into the inner being of the beings. This is the realm of the physical. A being on this level is a mirror of its environment; the forces of the latter work on its structure. - The further progress consists in the fact that the being not only structures itself in such a way as it is in the sense of the forces in the environment, but that it also gives itself an outer physiognomy which bears the imprint of this environment. If a being of the fourth level represents a mirror of its environment, one of the fifth level expresses this environment physiognomically. This level is therefore called the physiognomic level in the secret sciences. On the sixth level, physiognomy becomes an emanation of itself. A being that stands on this level forms the things of its environment in such a way as it has first formed itself. This is the stage of shaping. And on the seventh step, forming passes over into creating. The being that has arrived there creates such forms in its environment that reproduce on a small scale what its environment is on a large scale. This is the stage of the creative.

The development of the spiritual is thus divided into the following series of stages:

1. Formlessness
2. the shaping
3. the incorporation of force
4. the shaping in the sense of the forces of the environment
5. physiognomic expressiveness
6. the formative power
7. the creative faculty.“ (Lit.:GA 89, p. 37ff)

(This classification of the 7 states of form corresponds exactly to the one given above, only this time with the corresponding English designations).

Literature

• Rudolf Steiner: Bewußtsein Leben Form. Grundprinzipien der geisteswissenschaftlichen Kosmologie., GA 89 (2001) English: rsarchive.org German: pdf pdf(2) html mobi epub archive.org

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