"What Is Man?", Page Three

While the Sun and Earth reveal this threefold pattern (radial-spherical-rhythmical) in the interrelationship of their movements through the heavens as the structural basis for the human body, the Moon by its monthly cycle divides the gestation period of the human embryo into ten lunar periods. Fetal development is thus exposed during gestation to the forces of the heavenly bodies (both planetary and zodiacal), in segments corresponding to the ten septenaries (seven-year periods) that constitute the allotted human life of seventy years (Ps 90,10).¹⁴ But from within the solar system other patterns bear upon the human bodily structure. One can see the lemniscate pattern being modified in varying ways by the loop patterns of the planets (Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn).¹⁵ These patterns are visible to the naked eye. Examples of the loops of Mercury, Venus and Mars were drawn by Steiner (Lect. 11) in Figures 11, 12 and 13, respectively.

That these are simple illustrations is obvious when compared with the more precise ones developed by the Mathematical-Astronomical Section at the Goetheanum, as reflected in Figure 115 of Joachim Schultz's book¹⁶ showing the progressive loops of the planet Mercury as follows:

Steiner then leads us to a recognition of how these forms and figures are reflected in the human structure. Imagine yourself moving in a lemniscate figure, but assume that by variation of the constants the lemniscate form is such that the lower branch does not close but is open (Figure 14).

He assures us this is mathematically feasible. We can then see how the form can be drawn into the human form where, in Figure 15, we see the lemniscate in relationship to what passes through our limb nature and then in some way turns, goes through our head nature and then back again into the Earth. So we would be justified in saying that there is an open lemniscate of this kind in the human form. He then points out that we need only make a deeper morphological study to find the lemniscate, either in this or in some modified form, inscribed in human nature in diverse ways. Investigate, for instance, the curve that arises if you trace the middle line of a left-side rib, then go past the junction into the vertebra, then turn and go back along the right rib (Figure 16). Bear in mind that the vertebra has a very different inner structure from the ribs; both of them are intermediary between the skull bone and the long bone, but the vertebra is closer to the former and the rib to the latter. Think what it must signify that as you go along this line, rib-vertebra-rib, various inner relationships of growth must play their part, not only quantitatively but qualitatively. Then you will find in the lemniscate with its loop formation a morphological key to the whole system. Going upward from thence to the head organization, the farther you go upward the more you will find it necessary to modify the form of the lemniscate. At a certain point you must imagine it transformed—already indicated in the sternum, where the two come together. When you get up into the head there is a far-reaching metamorphosis of the lemniscatory principle.

Study the whole human figure—the contrast, above all, of the nerves and senses organization and the metabolic, and you get a lemniscate tending to open out as you go downward and to close as you go upward. You also get lemniscates, though highly modified, with the one loop extremely small, if you follow the pathway of the centripetal nerves through the nervecenter and outward again to the termination of the centrifugal nerve.

Again and again you will find this lemniscate inscribed in the human body—it above all. In the animal it is far less varied than in the human, and its planes are more parallel.

An interesting play is to take a rod in the form of a lemniscate, holding it in such manner that one loop is near a light source and the other is slanted sufficiently far away. The shadow cast upon an opposite wall will reflect this lemniscate but with one loop open and fading away, just as the human form escapes into the Earth in the above illustration.

If we develop a feeling for morphology in the higher sense, we must assign the human form and figure to the planetary system. You have to think of the total evolution of humanity upon the Earth, bearing in mind the relationship of the great sphere to the human head formation. You will realize there will be some relation between the metamorphosis of the aspect of the starry heavens, the evolution of humanity, and the soul-spiritual evolution of humanity. You have the vault of the great heavenly sphere above us that reveals only that part of the movements corresponding to the loop among the planets (Figure 17). In the movement of the fixed stars the rest of the path is omitted. We noted above this great differentiation. The planets must somehow correspond to the total human being, while the fixed stars must correspond only to what forms the human head. For instance, under the dome of the skull our twelve pairs of cranial nerves reflect the twelvefold stars of the heavens (the zodiac), the same twelve Abraham was told to number so that his descendants (the twelve tribes and the twelve apostles) would be like them (Gen 15,5); see I-20 and I-21.

What appears to us in projection on the vault of the heavens we relate to the movements we ourselves are making with the Earth. For as we move with the Earth, we must project this backward in time to the embryonic period of life. During that period the heavenly pattern above folds into the fetus the etheric force patterns that manifest during the respective seven-year segments of its earthly life. We have yet to develop adequate studies in embryology giving effect to these realities.¹⁷

Before leaving our discussion of the lemniscatory form, let us note a further point. Recognizing in the planetary loops the very same principles outside us that are formative within us, let us now follow this loop-forming principle in greater detail. Note that Mercury and Venus form their loops when they are in inferior conjunction, that is, when they are between Earth and Sun. In other words, their loop occurs when the Sun is, so to speak, enhanced by them. As against this, look at Mars, Jupiter and Saturn, whose loops occur when they are in opposition to the Sun. This contrast of oppositions and conjunctions corresponds to a contrast in the human being's building forces.¹⁸ Therefore, in the loop formation of the inner planets something is engaged that bears more indirectly (by virtue of the Sun's greater influence) upon the human form, while the influence engaged by the loops of the outer planets bears more directly (less influenced by the Sun) upon such form.

Thus, it is in connection with the larger loop formation of the outer planets that the sphere-forming process comes into evidence, namely, the forming of the human head. In contrast, their polar opposite is reflected in the movements of the inner planets which, more influenced by the Sun's direct relationship to Earth, deal more with the radial formation. In the outer planets, which make their loop in opposition, it is the loop that matters (and thus it is exaggerated), while with the inner planets, which make their loop in conjunction, their influence is by virtue of what is not in the loop, namely, the more radial open portion of the lemniscate. We see this from ancient times in the assignment of the planets to the human astral organs (see Figure 13 in the "hermetic man" chart, I-21).

Early in this volume we considered the hermetic law "As Above, So Below." Later, we saw in the "Fire" and "Light" essays how the bordering regions of the elements picture, or are pictured by, their neighboring elements. We also saw there the fractal nature of creation, how each stage is a picture of prior stages and is pictured by subsequent ones. Only the totally unimaginative soul could fail to detect in these observations a relationship to the cry of the Spirits of Form, the Elohim, in Gen 1,26-27, "Let us make the human being in our image, after our likeness. . . . So they created the human being in their own image. . . ." Instead of understanding this passage rightly, classic theology has looked downward instead of upward. It has anthropomorphized the Elohim. That is, it has attributed the human shape to the gods rather than seeking the human from the nature and character of the gods. Our task in ages to come is to reverse this process and see in the human being the reflection of the higher spiritual nature. We must start by placing the human within the larger context of the created heavens if we are to extrapolate from there to the creating Elohim and on to the Christ "I Am," the creative Word itself—for the Elohim reflected the higher light of the Christ. We shall not find that character by telescope, microscope, spaceship or particle smasher, however much these uses might serve other purposes.

There is a remarkable resemblance between the human female sex cell, the egg, and the Earth. And then true to their fractal nature, there is a further remarkable resemblance between the Earth and the far larger Moon. We've lost the meaning of the Moon today. Copernican thinking destroyed it. The Ptolemaic system comprehended it. Let us look briefly at these relationships.

Like the Earth, the unfertilized egg cell has two poles, a so-called animal pole and a vegetal pole, the former being more active and containing the tiny cell nucleus while the latter is less active and contains most of the yolk.¹⁹ After fertilization, when the cell first divides it does so vertically along its axis. Eighty-five percent of the Earth's landmass during the post-Atlantean Epoch is in the northern hemisphere which, by all observation, is clearly the more active hemisphere from a human standpoint, while the oceans lie in the south. When fertilized by the blood of Christ, the Earth also divided along its axis, from a human standpoint, into East and West.