Spirits of Motion

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The Spirits of Motion (SoM), also called Dynamis (Greek: δύναμις) or Dynameis, Mights, Virtues (Latin Virtutes "virtues") or, according to Indian Theosophical terminology, Mahat[1], were the actual masters of the ancient lunar evolution, during which they gave man his astral body. However, they had already been involved in the development of the human bodies and in the evolution of our planetary system since the Old Saturn. Today their dominion extends to the Mars sphere; they are the leading Mars beings. In Indian Theosophical terminology, the sum of the Spirits of Motion in their common work is called Mula-Prakriti (Lit.:GA 121, p. 139f).

The consciousness of the Spirits of Motion

The Spirits of Motion have superpsychic consciousness (→ inspiration).

„The third type of spirits with the self-aware (superpsychic) object consciousness is called " Spirits of Motion" or also of "Activity". In Christian secret science they are called Dynamis. In theosophical literature they are called "Mahat". From the middle of the second Saturnian cycle onwards they are connected with the further development of the human material body, into which they implant the ability of movement, of force-filled activity. This work reaches its end around the middle of the third Saturn cycle.“ (Lit.:GA 11, p. 164f)

The Dynamis reveal themselves in the fixed stars

The outside of the Spirits of Motion is revealed in the fixed stars, their inside is seen only by the dead.

„Just as the Exusiai, the Spirits of Form, have their macrocosmic body in the planets, which, as it were, turns the outer visible side towards us for ordinary consciousness, so the Spirits of Motion - strangely enough, but it is so - have their outer side in the fixed stars. Their inner side is seen only by the dead between death and a new birth; that is the spiritual side, seen from the other side.“ (Lit.:GA 180, p. 100)

The formation of the Old Moon

In the transition from the Old Sun to the Old Moon, the Spirits of Motion condensed the Old Sun's mass, which originally reached to Jupiter's orbit, to the limit of Mars' orbit.

„The third state of our world system is that of the Old Moon. Those who have studied the messages from the Akashic Chronicle know that the Old Moon came into being through the fact that the substance of the Sun was again further condensed until it became watery. The Moon does not yet have solid earth, but it has fire, air and water. It has incorporated the watery element. The gas or the air has condensed into the watery element. Who brought this about?The second group from this hierarchy of spiritual entities, the group we call Virtutes, brought this about. And so it was through the Virtutes that the mass of the Old Sun was compressed to the limit of the present Mars. Mars, in turn, is the boundary stone for the size of the Old Moon. If you imagine a sphere, with the Sun in the centre and the mass extended to where Mars circles today, then you have the Old Moon in its size.“ (Lit.:GA 110, p. 87f)

The "Fight in Heaven"

→ Main article: Fight in Heaven

By retarded Spirits of Motion, the so-called Fight in Heaven was triggered during the transition from the Old Sun to the Old Moon, the traces of which are still visible in the sky today in the debris field of the asteroid belt. These forces were not evil in themselves and could not have become restraining forces of their own will. But by being "commanded" to storm against normal development, thereby opening up new paths for evolution, they ultimately also became generators of evil.

„In the interim between the Jupiter and Mars evolutions, a number of beings were, if I may express myself trivially, detached from the sphere of the Dynamis; they were placed in the course of evolution in such a way that, instead of leading evolution forward, they placed obstacles in its way. This is what we have come to know as the Fight in Heaven. So the deeds of the Dynamis that had been commanded, if we may say so, were thrown into the development, for the ruling world powers of the Hierarchies had to say to themselves: That which is to come into being would never be possible if the path were to continue straight. Something greater must come into being.

Just think, you have a cart to push. By pushing it forward, your powers develop in a certain way. If you load the cart with a heavy ballast, then you have to push harder, but your strength develops more. Think of it, if the Deity had left the world evolution as it was, beyond Jupiter: certainly, human beings could have developed well; but humanity could have become even stronger if obstacles to development were placed in its way. For the good of humanity certain powers had to be detached. These powers did not become evil at first, one need not regard them as evil powers, but one can even say that they sacrificed themselves by placing themselves in the way of development. These powers can therefore be called the gods of obstacles, in the fullest sense of the word. They are the gods of hindrances, the obstacles that have been placed in the way of the path of development; and from now on the possibility was given for all that took place in the future. These powers that had been detached were not in themselves evil; on the contrary, they were the great promoters of evolution by running up a storm against normal evolution. But they were the generators of evil; for by their running up a storm, evil gradually came into being.“ (Lit.:GA 110, p. 162ff)

Harmony of the Spheres and Chemism

→ Main article: Harmony of the spheres

The Dynamis also work in the harmony of the spheres, the outward expression of which are the numerical laws according to which earthly substances dissolve and bind themselves.

„Everything that causes decomposition and composition on our earth, everything that acts as chemical forces on it, is here still interwoven into the light, and this is essentially the terrain on which the Spirits of Motion are active. When man learns to perceive something of what he otherwise sees only as Maya in the effect of chemical compositions and dissolutions, then he hears these Spirits of Motion, then he perceives the Music of the Spheres of which the Pythagorean and other secret schools speak. This is also what Goethe describes when he speaks of the Sun not as the giver of light, but says: "The Sun resounds in the ancient manner in brother spheres competitive song, and its prescribed journey it completes with thundering."“ (Lit.:GA 121, p. 93)

Geodynamics

The Spirits of Motion are also responsible for the living-mobile transformation of our Earth.

„You will all remember from the descriptions in the Akashic Chronicle that the outer face of our Earth today looks different from the way it looked, for example, during the period of Earth's evolution which we call the Atlantean era. In this ancient Atlantean time, the surface of our globe, which is now flooded by the Atlantic Ocean, was covered with a mighty continent, while in the place where Europe, Asia, Africa are today, continents hardly formed at all. Thus the mass, the substance of the Earth has been transformed by inner mobility. The planet is in a perpetual state of inner mobility. Just consider, for example, that what is known today as the island of Helgoland is only a small part of what still protruded from this island of Helgoland into the sea in the ninth or tenth century. Even if the times in which rearrangements, inner changes of the face of the Earth take place are relatively great, without going much into these things, everyone can say to himself that the planet is in a perpetual inner mobility. And even if man includes in the planet not only the solid of the Earth, but also water and air, then everyday life teaches that the planet is in inner mobility. In the formation of clouds, in the formation of rain, in all the weather phenomena, in the rising and falling of water, in all the structures, the planetary substance shows its inner mobility. This is the life of the planet. Within this life of the planet works, as in the life of the individual human being, the etheric body, that which we call the Spirits of Motion. So that we can say: Outer form of the planet - spirits of form as creators. The inner vitality, it is regulated by the entities which we call the Spirits of Motion.“ (Lit.:GA 136, p. 93f)

Astral body and group soul of animals

→ Main article: Astral body and Group soul of animals

On the Old Moon, the Dynamis formed the astral body of [[[man]]. Today the group souls of the animals are descendants of the Spirits of Motion.

„This shows that these group-egos of the animals are descendants of that category of spiritual entities which I have mentioned in the course of these lectures as the spirits of the movement. So we have to understand the group-Ics of the animals as descendants of the spirits of the movement. The spirits of movement, out of their own substance, gave man his astral body during the old lunar state. To complete the matter, we can say that this earth was preceded by the lunar state, and that during this lunar state men received their astral bodies from the Spirits of Motion. In other words, when the Earth was the Moon - the Old Moon, not the present one; the present one is only a detached piece of the Earth itself, while the Old Moon is something like a previous embodiment of our Earth - while the Earth was in this old lunar state, the Spirits of Motion hovered around this Old Moon and allowed, as it were, their own substance to trickle in, to flow into what man brought over from still earlier states. So that what man received as an astral body, which was new to him, for at that time he had only a physical body and an etheric body, came from the Spirits of Motion. The Old Moon has disappeared, the Earth has been formed, the Spirits of Motion have developed offspring in addition to their own further development. These descendants of the Spirits of Motion are those entities which we call the group-I of the animals and which have now taken up their abodes not on the earth, but on the other planets, in order to work from there on the Earth in such a way that they bring forth the animal forms in the manner described.“ (Lit.:GA 136, p. 166f)

But descendants of the Dynamis also have an effect on the astral body of the plants, which, however, is not to be found in the plants, but only on the astral plan.

„In the plant kingdom we see that the astral body is already to be found on the astral plan, where the animal group ego is to be found. This in turn leads back to the real fact, which shows itself to the occult eye, that for the plants not only in the group-I, but already in the astral body of the plant forces are at work which now also work from the planetary system, from the stars. Whereas in the animal the Spirits of Motion first work in the group forces, in the forces that create the group forms, the same thing that belongs to the sphere of the Spirits of Motion already works on the astral body of the plant. Descendants of the Spirits of Motion are also such, only they differ from the other descendants in that they were formed at a somewhat different time, but they also act as descendants of the Spirits of Motion on the astral body of the plants, not merely on the I. Again, we can say that the forces which create the group forms are the same as those which belong to the sphere of the Spirits of Motion. Again we can say that the forces of the Spirits of the Motion or their descendants act on the astral body of the plants from the planets of the planetary system. In every being the astral body is that which gives the impulse to movement. On the physical plane we have the physical and etheric body of the plant. If any forces from the sphere of the Spirits of Motion acted upon the plant, these forces, because the astral body is not within the plant but washes around it, would cause the plant to move, but now not in the way that human beings and animals move, but in such a way that they take the plant, as it first comes into being, away from the Earth. When you see how the forces develop on a plant as if in spirals from leaf attachment to leaf attachment, then you have the activity of these forces which work in from the planets. And depending on the forces of the descendants of the Spirits of Motion work in from this or that planet, this peculiar line which sets the leaves becomes different.“ (Lit.:GA 136, p. 172f)

Drawing from GA 136, p. 173
Drawing from GA 136, p. 173

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. ↑ vgl. GA 11, p. 164f u. S. 175
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