The culmination of everything, so to speak, will come with the completion of the conditions of consciousness. [1] Like us, the solar system is subject to the process of reincarnation. Each condition of consciousness is an incarnation of the solar system. The solar system comes into existence in a certain form, and later it reincarnates in a different form. Before it is finished, the solar system will have incarnated at least seven times. And we humans will have reincarnated with it (and within it), over and over, developing new (and, if we are good, higher) types of consciousness as we go.

[THE FUTURE OF HUMANITY AND THE EARTH AS FORESEEN BY RUDOLF STEINER, detail, p. 132.]

We must not impose on Steiner’s scheme linear coherence that is alien to it. But we also must not deny it the odd coherence it does possess. The basic idea is simple enough. There are cycles within cycles, cycles recapitulating previous cycles. Conditions of consciousness contain conditions of life, which in turn contain smaller conditions or stages, which contain still smaller ones. To get from one condition of consciousness to another, we must pass through all of the smaller conditions, which recapitulate (or sometimes anticipate) others of their sort.

Thus, we haul our history along with us, not as mere memory but as a living recurrent present, although the revisited past is reformulated in its present and future renditions as we progress. 

Thus, there is no straight line from our beginning to our end. But eventually, in a patterned evolution that requires enormous stretches of time — and encompassing the entire solar system reincarnating over and over — we will get there.

Quick Recap.

(You already know most of this.) 

Today, existing in the Earth condition of consciousness, we have already been through a few conditions of consciousness: Saturn, Sun, and Moon. The universe existed prior to Saturn, and gods who preside over us now began their own existences in those prior conditions. But we ourselves, and the other constituents of our solar system, first came into existence during the Saturn condition of consciousness. From there we evolved to the Sun and then the Moon conditions of consciousness. We are now on the planet Earth as it exists during the Earth condition of consciousness.

These are deep waters, dark, yet infused with an inglowing transcendent brilliance (as it were). Only when you attain clairvoyance and consult the Akashic Record(s) will you truly know what's going on. (It is odd that clairvoyants can't agree whether there is one Akashic Record or more than one, but these are deep waters. [See "Akasha".])

Once we finish our Present Earth condition of consciousness, we will move along to a pralaya (a period of rest) followed by Jupiter, Venus, and Vulcan. (Followed by other, secret stages that we cannot discuss.)

As everyone knows, the seven discussable conditions of consciousness are:

 1. Saturn.

2. Sun.

3. Moon.

4. Earth.

x. 5-step pralaya.

5. Jupiter.

6. Venus.

7. Vulcan.

(Yup: Vulcan.

See "Vulcan".)

Saying such things as that we once lived on Saturn, when what we mean is that we once lived through the Saturn condition of consciousness, can cause confusion. So it is generally best to use slightly different names for the conditions of consciousness. Thus, pedantically, we really ought to say that we have lived through Old Saturn, Old Sun, and Old Moon. We are currently living through Present Earth. And in the future, we will evolve through Future Jupiter, Future Venus, and Future Vulcan. If we remember to use such terms, we clarify matters, a little. But Steiner and Seddon often did not remember to use such terms, so we will have to accept a certain degree of muddiness.

End of Recap.

[R.R.]

Here are a few glimpses of what lies ahead, provided by R. Seddon:

Jupiter

◊ "The first four Conditions of Life on Jupiter recapitulate Saturn, Sun, Moon, and Earth ... Only what on Earth lives enclosed by the human skin lives over into Jupiter. In forming our body [sic] we build a temple; in doing so rightly we form Jupiter rightly." [2]

◊ "The Jupiter zodiac is [i.e., will be] formed by elemental beings [i.e., nature spirits] who, unbeknown to us [but not unbeknown to Steiner and Seddon], work today on our twelve senses; and behind the Jupiter sun stand the elemental beings who today work into our blood system." [3]

◊ "In our souls today we have the germ of the forms of Jupiter and all its forces ... The gnomes preserve what is good in the firm earthly context, and incorporate it in a kind of bony support. Ideas that lead through forms of beauty, such as good music, create good beings — and the opposite ... [A] Jupiter geologist [i.e., a geologist working during Future Jupiter] might find a twentieth-century stratum formed by materialists and racketeers." [4]

◊ "Human beings on Jupiter are no longer a mixture of good and evil, but are divided into one or the other ... [P]eople express their karma in their form and physiology ... If someone is a regular scoundrel, or has only animal instincts, this is what he looks like; if black magic is practiced, this is known." [5]

◊ "As Adam was born of earth, so newly-human beings are born of Jupiter. Their sheaths are already being prepared today in the water, etheric and astral nature or our breath ... In the forms arising today from moral actions...is the predisposition...for regular progressive existence. Immoral action instead imprints on the breath demonic forms...and consequently condemns these beings to the hosts of Lucifer as parasites." [6]

◊ "Normally progressing human beings now develop [i.e., will develop] Imaginative consciousness, the dreamy Moon consciousness fully awoken [i.e., Jupiter consciousness]." [7]

◊ "The physical body is no longer subject to gravity — having mastered physical substance we are subject to moon forces which draw us away from the earth, so we can move up steep slopes like a fly." [8]

Venus

◊ "The first five Conditions of Life on Venus recapitulate the previous planetary evolutions [i.e., Saturn, Sun, Moon, Earth, and Jupiter] ... The realities of life then cannot be grasped by the limited reason of today. The planet [i.e., Venus, i.e., all planets compressed into Venus] remains permanently united with the sun for all time, so that all beings are actually sun-beings." [9]

◊ "There are no mineral or plant kingdoms ... All substance, including the bodies, consist only of air and warmth ... [H]uman beings dispense with what corresponds to the head ... The knee-cap of today gives rise to a complete skull-like enclosure that contains the organ of consciousness." [10]

◊ "Through the spoken word, creative feelings give rise to actual forms in the surrounding air, so that we are surrounded by creations of our own speech — if we utter an evil word, something like a repulsive organism comes into existence." [11]

◊ "Social life on Venus resembles a beehive, which is built of carbon created out of its own being, has a consciousness at the Imaginative level, and where work is the main concern." [12]

◊ "When the sixth (intellectual) stage of form is reached during the sixth Condition of Life on Venus (the sixth planet) — 666 — then for those who have persistently rejected the forces of Christ...comes the last, unalterable separation. A separate celestial body is detached, an 'irreclaimable moon', which includes all [such] beings ... This no words can portray." [13]

Vulcan

◊ "The first six Conditions of Life [on Vulcan] recapitulate previous evolutions ... The human being does not incarnate, but by means of the word builds out of his own being a body of warmth substance like a soft diamond ... The heart replaces the brain ... The lower part of the body and the right side, which came from the past, must disappear ... Esoteric knowledge of today becomes physical as blood." [14]

◊ "The capacity of Intuition [i.e., Vulcan consciousness]...is called upon to become both cosmic and powerful ... It is the full awakening of the trance-consciousness of Saturn, which reaches to the fixed stars." [15]

◊ "At the end of Vulcan, mankind has the form of an archetype in Higher Spiritland. This is a fully purified condition of godliness or divine bliss, the highest stage accessible to humanity, into which the fruits of all planetary evolutions are gathered. The one can truly say, 'I am the Alpha and the Omega' ... Subsequently mankind becomes a hollow ... Something streams out from mankind in the realm of duration, eternity. It becomes a new zodiac, a creative god, and will built a planet and bring forth suns." [16]

And Beyond

"Mankind ascends to yet higher stages — the inner eye of the initiate sees five beyond Vulcan, making twelve in all...but they cannot be described in human language." [17]

Here is a more concise forecast, provided in the words of R. Steiner himself:

Jupiter, Venus, Vulcan

"After a cosmic interval — a sojourn in a higher world — the Earth will then be transmuted into the Jupiter condition. In Jupiter what we now call the mineral kingdom will exist no longer; the forces of this kingdom will have been changed into plant-like forces. Thus upon Jupiter the vegetable kingdom, though in a very different form, will be the lowest. Above it will be the animal kingdom, likewise considerably altered, and then a human kingdom, recognizable as the spiritual descendants of the bad humanity originating upon Earth. Lastly, the descendants of the good humanity will constitute a human kingdom on a higher level. This is the human kingdom proper, and a great part of its work will be to influence and ennoble the souls who have fallen into the other group, so that they may yet gain entrance to it.

"In the Venus stage of evolution the plant kingdom too will have disappeared. The lowest will then be the animal kingdom, metamorphosed a second time. Above it will be three human kingdoms, differing in degrees of perfection. During the Venus stage the Earth will remain united with the Sun. In Jupiter evolution, on the other hand, there will come a time when the Sun will separate again and Jupiter will be receiving the Solar influences from without. Then, after Sun and Jupiter have again become united, the transition to the Venus state will gradually be accomplished. From Venus, at a certain stage, a separate celestial body becomes detached. This — as it were, an “irreclaimable Moon” — includes all the beings who have persisted in withstanding the true course of evolution. It enters now upon a line of development such as no words can portray, so utterly unlike is it to anything within the range of man's experience on Earth. The evolved humanity on the other hand, in a form of existence utterly spiritualized, goes forward into Vulcan evolution, any description of which would be beyond the compass of this book." [18]

So there you have it.

— Roger Rawlings

Here is Steiner speaking about the "I", the highest of our three invisible bodies. We get the true "I" from seven planets, which include Vulcan. 

"[T]he 'I' entered into the human being. Yet this 'I' was, so to speak, only like a small little skin, a little pocket that sank down into the human being. And the true 'I,' which was spread out through the planets from Saturn to Vulcan, radiated into it. The best symbol is: this little pocket like a mirror into which the true 'I' streams from this string of planets." — Rudolf Steiner, ESOTERIC LESSONS 1904-1909 (Steiner Books, 2007), p. 339. 

[R.R. sketch, 2009, based on b&w image on that page.]

The "planets" depicted are, left to right, Saturn, the Sun, the Moon, Earth, Jupiter, Venus, and Vulcan.

The End Notes

[1] THE FUTURE OF HUMANITY AND THE EARTH AS FORESEEN BY RUDOLF STEINER, pp. 112-128.

[2] Ibid., pp. 114-115.

[3] Ibid., p. 115.

[4] Ibid., p. 115.

[5] Ibid., pp. 116-117.

[6] Ibid., pp. 118-119.

[7] Ibid., p. 119.

[8] Ibid., p. 121.

[9] Ibid., p. 123.

[10] Ibid., pp. 123-124.

[11] Ibid., p. 124.

[12] Ibid., p. 125.

[13] Ibid., p. 125.

[14] Ibid., p. 126.

[15] Ibid., pp. 126-127.

[16] Ibid., pp. 127-128.

[17] Ibid., p. 128.

[18] Rudolf Steiner, OCCULT SCIENCE - AN OUTLINE (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1969), pp. 309-310.

Most of what Steiner posited is invisible.

This is either because he saw profound realities

or because he didn't.

[R.R.]