7 (number)

From AnthroWiki
Revision as of 12:53, 8 October 2021 by Odyssee (talk | contribs)

7 is the Number of Time and thus at the same time also the number of the etheric world and of the etheric body taken from it, for the reality of time is founded in the etheric world.

The Number of Perfection and the Number of Fulfilment

The heptagram as a symbol of the Mystic Lamb (drawing from GA 96, p. 314)

Seven is the Number of Perfection, for all development, small and great, takes place and is completed through seven stages. The triple 7-7-7 is also the Number of Fulfilment. Our whole world system develops through seven planetary stages of world evolution. Humanity passes through seven cultural epochs in post-Atlantean times, and man develops in seven-year periods during his life on earth. The critical phase of development is characterised by the Number of the Beast (666).

Seven colours comprise the rainbow and the musical scale has seven tones. However, septicity (Greek: εβδομάς Hebdomas) can also manifest spatially as the result of a living temporal process of development - the great macrocosmic example of this are the seven planetary spheres. Philon of Alexandria characterises the nature of the 7 in detail in his writing "On the Creation of the World" (Latin: De opificio mundi)[1].

The Athenian poet and statesman Solon (640 BC-559 BC) divided human life into ten hebdomads (Greek: ἑβδομάς hebdomas "sevenness") of seven years each, which he described in his famous elegy Παῖς μὲν ἄνηβος ... ("Immature knave though ...") described:[2]

A boy first is man, immature: there he casteth out his teeth.
He casts off the teeth that sprouted from the child in the seventh year.
When for the other time God closed the seven years,
Signs of manhood then sprout, the approaching.
During the third, his chin curls - still the limbs grow -
Woolly fluff, as the skin's blossom in change is faded.
Now, in the fourth, up to a high and full bloom.
Strength ripens, in it the man shows his worth.
With the fifth thrives the time for him to think freely.
And that in sons a lasting tribe may arise.
During the sixth, the spirit spreads on all sides into the right,
Never again will his courage drive him to useless deeds.
Seven years of seven and eight: in full bloom
The tongue and the spirit stand together for fourteen years.
Still in the ninth the man is fit, but show more laxity.
Against the full thriving tongue and wit henceforth.
He who has reached the tenth, completing the tenth in measure,
Hardly at the unseasonable time, the nigh of death doth him bear.

The septagram is the symbol of the Mystical Lamb, the Christ.

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. ↑ Philon of Alexandria: On the Creation, § 89-128 (English translation)
  2. ↑ German by Wolfgang Schadewaldt in: Lebenszeit und Greisenalter im frühen Griechentum. Die Antike. Zeitschrift für Kunst und Kultur des klassischen Altertums. Volume 9 (1933), p. 282. See also Baltrusch. Greek original in: Philon of Alexandria: Περί της κατά Μωυσέα κοσμοποιίας, el.wikisource (XXXV) 103 (p. 36 f. archive.org), and in: Gotthilf Heinrich von Schubert: Die Geschichte der Seele. 3rd Edition 1839, p. 353 books.google
Retrieved from "http://148.72.144.226/plesk-site-preview/en.anthro.wiki/https/148.72.144.226/index.php?title=7_(number)&oldid=7743"