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I-85 The nature of human perception of the Sun,
and its Mysteries in the three pre-Christian Cultural Eras
Planetary Spheres and their
Influence on Man,
Lect. 1
For
all of the darkening that existed in the age of St. Augustine, and to
which he himself was largely subject, he nevertheless retained certain
insights from old that have been largely lost in Christendom today.
Among them was the knowledge that the Christ Spirit had descended from
the highest heavens toward its day of incarnation, staying for a significant
part of this journey in the Sun sphere. It was from this that Sun worship
properly originated, based upon the sure knowledge of the ancient initiates
that the Christ Spirit dwelt in the Sun at that time. On this, Augustine
said (CMF, Lect. 13), “What is now called the Christian religion
already existed among the ancients and was not lacking at the very beginnings
of the human race. When Christ appeared in the flesh, the true religion
already in existence received the name of Christian” (Epis. Retrac.,
Lib. I, xiii, 3).
According
to Steiner, the following three pre-Christian periods recognized, to
a diminishing extent, this Sun nature:
| Cultural
Era |
Nature
of Perception |
| Ancient
Persian |
Originally
by Zarathustra, not the Zarathustra of whom history tells, but
much more ancient. The one of history is the last of a succession
of Zarathustra’s pupils. The original Zarathustra, was, in relation
to all initiates that came after him, more lofty and more sublime.
He was also called “Zoroaster,” literally “the Radiant Star,”
for he looked upon the spiritual cosmic Sun, seeing therein the
source of all the forces that make the Earth and its inhabitants.
He had knowledge of everything that took place on the Earth because
he was able to experience the Spiritual Being of the Sun,
i.e., the One later called the Christ. It was this “Radiant Star”
(the Zarathustra spiritual Individuality) whom the Magi were able
to see in the Matthew nativity account (Mt 2,2). |
| Chaldo-Egyptian |
The
human being still looked up to the Sun, seeing it no longer as
radiant, but rather only as shining,
illuminating the Earth with its light. The human being spoke in
those times of Ra, whose representative on Earth was Osiris. Elsewhere we shall
look again at Ra in connection with the name “Israel” (Is—Isis,
widow of Osiris; ra—Ra; El—Canaanite god, e.g., a 3- fold god)
along with “Ishmael” (same as Is and El, plus ma-Maat, daughter
of Ra). |
| Greco-Roman |
The human being had lost all power of looking
into the Mysteries of the Sun and could see only the effect
of the Sun’s influence in the Earth’s environment—the ether surrounding
it—and this they (i.e., their initiates) called Zeus. |
Steiner characterizes these collectively as “the threefold sun,” representing
the three stages in the cultural evolution of humanity when something
of the Christ Spirit was recognized in regard to the Sun.
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Schematic I-84
Schematic I-86
