The cosmology underlying Waldorf schools is polytheistic — Rudolf Steiner described a universe teeming with gods. Many of these gods focus much if not all of their attention on us: They assist us in our spiritual evolution.

Most of the gods are themselves evolving. They are much like us, having themselves been “human” in the past — that is, they passed through a stage of development comparable to our present stage. They are more advanced than we are now, but we will proceed upward in their wake, becoming gods ourselves — and eventually we will outrank the gods who outrank us now.

Steiner's primary system for classifying gods is a variant of the traditional Biblical ninefold ranking of the angelic hosts. Steiner taught that there are nine main ranks of gods, extending from those who are just a bit above us to those who are nearest to the ultimate divine essence, the Godhead. In an even more fundamental sense, everything actually consists of the thoughts of the gods. The gods are spirits, their thoughts are spirits, and this is the essential reality. All else is maya or illusion.

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Here is what we might call the celestial mainline, ranking spiritual beings from the mysterious Godhead downward to ourselves. Thus, for instance, the Spirits of Love are the gods standing closest to the Godhead, and the Sons of Twilight — who stand only a bit above us — are the gods farthest from the Godhead. There are nine ranks of gods between the Godhead and ourselves as we exist at our present level of spiritual development.

Steiner departed from Biblical tradition in many ways. The beings in the ninefold order are, he said, not simply the attendants of God — they themselves are gods. Moreover, Steiner accepted as real various gods that, in Judeo-Christian tradition, would be considered mere idols or false gods. He assigned as many of these as he could to the nine ranks in his scheme. Gods such as Thor, he said, are real. Steiner worked from the premise of Theosophy: that all religions are essentially alike, so their teachings can be reconciled. This, for many, is one of the chief attractions of Theosophy and/or Anthroposophy.

In Steiner’s teachings, the ninefold pattern is not neatly all-encompassing. Powerful spiritual beings, who are themselves gods, may be found outside the ranks or, at a minimum, they may stand between ranks, blurring the lines of demarcation. “Abnormal” gods who ought to have a certain rank may function as members of other ranks. Moreover, there are "composite" gods who consist of spiritual essences derived from multiple ranks. (We will discuss various deviations from the ranks, below.)

In the list, above, I have used the names for the gods that Steiner himself often used. But he also sometimes used names more consistent with Biblical tradition, and his followers sometimes prefer these names. Below is a list that includes Biblical names as well as still more names given or used by Steiner from time to time. Sometimes the differences in names reflect real differences between types of spirits, but sometimes they do not. (Sometimes they simply arise from differing translations.) And sometimes similar or identical names are used for gods of differing ranks.

The nine ranks of gods can be divided into three “hierarchies.” There are three ranks of gods in each hierarchy. Thus, for instance, the "First Hierarchy" consists of Spirits of Love (the highest rank below the Godhead), Spirits of Harmony (one rank lower than Spirits of Love), and Spirits of Will (one rank lower than Spirits of Harmony.)

Note that in Anthroposophical usage, the term "hierarchy" is sometimes used to designate rank, and sometimes it is used to designate major subdivisions of the ranks, as shown in the following list. Thus, sometimes there are said to be nine hierarchies (ranks), and sometimes there are said to be three hierarchies (subdivisions of ranks). More generally, Anthroposophists also use the term “hierarchies” as a synonym for “gods.” Thus, they may speak of the celestial hierarchies, meaning all of the gods in the celestial spheres, or they may speak of the hierarchies doing this or that, when they are describing the activities of gods.

Complicating things further: Steiner sometimes taught that the gods cannot truly be ranked; they exist in a circle, as it were, with no absolute divisions marking some gods as higher than others.

In general, we may say that — according to Steiner — the distinctions, definitions, and terminology we humans use to discuss divine matters are inadequate. Things in the spirit realm flow together and constantly change or evolve — or at least so it may seem to us. And the higher we try to lift our gaze, the less adequate our comprehension becomes. Thus, when we try to discuss the Godhead, our efforts are miserably inadequate. So, you will find contradictions and inadequacies in Steiner's statements as well as, necessarily, in my paraphrasings of Steiner's statements. According to Steiner, we just have to accept such circumstances — they come with the territory.

All that having been said, still, in most Anthroposophical texts — including Steiner's work — the gods are usually considered to occupy higher and lower positions relative to one another and relative to ourselves. Faulty as the concepts may be, Anthroposophists generally speak of gods occupying nine ranks, subdivided into three hierarchies. I will generally stick with this formulation here.

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The gods, as described by Steiner,

reside beyond ordinary depiction.

Steiner said that the spirit realm

"has no spatial forms or lines, [but] it does have

color intensities, color qualities.

[It] is a soul-permeated, spirit-permeated

world of light, of color, of tone;

a world of qualities not quantities;

a world of intensities rather than extensions.”

— Rudolf Steiner, THE ARTS AND THEIR MISSION

(Anthroposophic Press, 1964), p. 23.

[R.R. sketch, 2014, approximating the wet-on-wet art

produced in Waldorf schools.

Such art suggests the spirit realm without,

of course, truly depicting it.

All art produced in the physical realm

must have lines, forms, and extensions

to some degree.]

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The following are some of Steiner's indications concerning the nine ranks of gods. This time around, we'll proceed from low to high, beginning with the gods closest to us and then proceeding to gaze, however dimly, at higher and higher ranks. (You may find Steiner's statements heavy going. I suggest that you just plow ahead, getting a feel for Steiner's language and thought patterns. Aiming to aid some clarity, I have highlighted key terms.)

Divine Rank # 9:

Gods One Step Above Man: Sons of Twilight

(Spirits of Dusk, Angels, Angeloi, Sons of Life,

Lunar Pitris, Bahishad-Pitris)

Like other, higher gods, the Sons of Twilight were active during the first incarnation of the solar system, called Old Saturn. They assisted in our evolution, when we were developing our first, preliminary condition of consciousness. (See The Brief Waldorf / Steiner Encyclopedia for explanations of various esoteric terms coined or used by Steiner.)

“Within the Saturn body [i.e., Old Saturn] something like sensations of taste begin [i.e., began] to go surging to and fro. Sweet, bitter, sour, etc. are perceived at diverse places in the interior of Saturn; while in the heavenly spaces without, all this gives the impression of sound, a kind of music. And in these processes, once more, Beings find it possible to unfold their activity on Saturn. These Beings may be called the ‘Sons of Twilight,’ or ‘Sons of Life’ (in Christian language they are the Angeloi or Angels.)” — Rudolf Steiner, OCCULT SCIENCE - AN OUTLINE (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1963), chapter 4, part 3, GA 13.

The Sons of Twilight reached their own human stage of evolutionary development (they became "human") during the third incarnation of the solar system, called Old Moon. During the fourth incarnation of the solar system, called Present Earth, they evolved to become gods (Sons of Twilight, Angels).

“These beings are the ‘Sons of Twilight,’ the ‘Spirits of Dusk.’ (In theosophical writings they are called Lunar Pitris or Barhishad-Pitris.) They attain the stage of humanity only on the Moon [i.e., during Old Moon]. On earth [i.e., during Present Earth] they, as well as their predecessors, the Sons of Fire [i.e., Archangels], have already grown beyond the stage of humanity. On earth they are higher beings which Christian esoteric teaching calls ‘Angels’ (Angeloi), while for the Sons of Fire it uses the expression 'Archangels' (Archangeloi). These Sons of Twilight develop in the ancestor of man a kind of understanding [i.e., they had this effect on us during our early development], of which however, in his dull consciousness, he himself [i.e., man] cannot yet make use.” — Rudolf Steiner, COSMIC MEMORY (Rudolf Steiner Publications, 1959), chapter 14, GA 11.

Being pure spirits, Son of Twilight or Angels are not conscious of physical reality as such.

“We will first try to form an idea of the nature of the Angels ... [T]he Angel's consciousness does not reach down to where the stones, rocks, minerals are ... Angels are...aware consciously of four kingdoms, the kingdoms of plant, animal, man and the kingdom of the Angels ... [T]hey have no physical body and therefore no organs of the physical body such as eyes, ears, and so on. Hence they do not perceive the physical world. As their lowest being they have the etheric body and hence have a certain relationship with the plants ...The Angels today are...the leaders of men, their guides, preparing them, and there exists an intimate connection between what gradually develops in man and the task of these Angel beings ... Angels in the hierarchies of evolution are the spirits which guide this task of man — the transforming of the astral body into the spirit-self [i.e., a more perfected form of individual human identity].” — Rudolf Steiner, THE INFLUENCE OF SPIRITUAL BEINGS ON MAN (Anthroposophic Press, 1982), lecture 7, GA 102.

The Sons of Twilight worked alongside higher gods to help mankind develop our various bodies. Such work was evident during the fourth phase of Old Moon.

“Starting from the middle of the fourth Moon cycle, man consists of a physical body in which the Sons of Twilight perform their labor, of an ether body in which the Spirits of Fire[Archangels] perform theirs, and finally of an astral body in which the Spirits of Personality [Archai] perform theirs.” — Rudolf Steiner, COSMIC MEMORY, chapter 16.

The second incarnation of the solar system was Old Sun. As during other evolutionary stages, the Sons of Life (Angels) worked alongside higher gods. They benefited us while also attaining beneficial effects themselves, as they evolved to higher levels.

“All that has here been described as pertaining to the middle epoch of Sun evolution [i.e., Old Sun], lasts for a certain time; and then, once more there is an interval of rest [pralaya]. After the interval, things go on for awhile in the same way as before, until a point is reached in evolution when the human etheric body is mature for a united working of the Sons of Life (The Angeloi) and the Spirits of Harmony (the Cherubim) ... The Sons of Life hereby attain the dim picture-consciousness which the Fire Spirits [Archangels] reached on Saturn [i.e., during Old Saturn]. The Spirits of Harmony (Cherubim) are their helpers in this. They behold in spirit what is now taking its course in Sun evolution [i.e., Old Sun]; but they deny themselves all the fruits of this their contemplation, all feeling of the Wisdom-filled pictures that arise there, and pour them like wondrous magic scenes into the dream-consciousness of the Sons of Life. These in turn weave the forms they behold into man's etheric body [the lowest of our invisible bodies], which rises thereby to higher and higher stages in its evolution.” — Rudolf Steiner, AN OUTLINE OF OCCULT SCIENCE (Anthroposophic Press, 1972), chapter 4, part 4, GA 13.

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Divine Rank # 8:

Gods Two Steps Above Man: Fire Spirits

(Spirits of Fire, Sons of Fire, Archangels, Archangeloi,

Agnishvattas, Solar Pitris)

We began our existence as "warmth-bodies" during the first incarnation of the solar system, Old Saturn. The Fire Spirits found, in us, an opportunity to become benevolently active. Their actions gave rise to our first, nascent sense organs.

“In the further course of Saturn evolution [Old Saturn], facts of quite another kind ensue ... A life of light begins ... The Saturn warmth-bodies [early forms of living manifestation] begin to glimmer and glisten, even to radiate light. The attainment of this stage affords once more the possibility for certain Beings to unfold their activity. These are the Beings who may be designated 'Fire Spirits' (in Christian terminology, Archangeloi, Archangels.) They have an astral body of their own ... They cannot say to themselves ‘I am,’ rather would they have to say: ‘My environment enables me to be’ ... Phantoms-of-man [human precursors], revealing as yet no other outward sign than these ‘light’ archetypes of the sense-organs, become perceptible in Saturn to the faculty of clairvoyance. Man's sense-organs are thus the fruits of the activity of the Fire Spirits.” — OCCULT SCIENCE, chapter 4, part 3.

Archangels are not conscious of plants — they are too far above the plant kingdom for that. As Angels help oversee individual human beings, Archangels oversee peoples, nations, and races. An Archangel serves, in a manner of speaking, as the "folk spirit" or "folk soul" of a people, nation, or race.

“Archangels have a consciousness that no longer reaches down to the plant kingdom but only to the animal kingdom. The plants, so to speak, do not exist for them ... These beings too have an important mission, and since they have a consciousness two stages higher than man, you can understand that the mission must be a very lofty one ... [T]he Archangels are leaders of whole peoples; what one calls the folk spirit, the common spirit of the people or folk, is in reality one of the Archangels ... [T]he highest beings of whom man can form any idea guide the course of world-evolution through such intermediate beings as we have just considered. These can be denoted as the various tasks of the Archangels.” — THE INFLUENCE OF SPIRITUAL BEINGS ON MAN, lecture 7.

Plants have no reality for Spirits of Fire, but animals exist because, in a sense, Spirits of Fire are conscious of them. (Plants and minerals likewise exist because, in a sense, other gods are conscious of them.)

“The animals exist only as states of consciousness of the Spirits of Fire, the plants as states of consciousness of the Spirits of Twilight [Angels]. The minerals have a double existence in thought. First they exist as thought germs in...human ancestors...then as thoughts in the consciousness of the Spirits of Form [Exusiai].” — COSMIC MEMORY, chapter 17.

Spirits of Fire became human (they reached their human stage of evolution) during Old Sun. (Gods one step higher than them, the Spirits of Personality, became human during the previous incarnation of the solar system, Old Saturn.) The evolution of the Spirits of Fire occurs, in part, because they benevolently work on the part of human nature that derives from Saturn.

“These Spirits of Fire rise to the human stage by allowing their forces to surge in and out of this Saturn part of the human being, just as this was performed by the Spirits of Personality on Saturn [i.e., Old Saturn]. This, too, happens at the central stage of the Sun evolution [i.e., Old Sun]. At that time the Saturn part of the human being is so far matured that with its help the Spirits of Fire — Archangels — are able to pass through their human stage.” — AN OUTLINE OF OCCULT SCIENCE, chapter 4, part 4.

Various peoples have various spiritual wisdom, including different apprehensions of various gods. These spiritual traditions or mystical streams complement each other. From the reincarnating spirit who will eventually become Buddha's successor flows the Eastern apprehension of the Agnishvattas (Sons of Fire).

“Oriental Mysticism unites with the Christian knowledge of the West to form a wonderfully beautiful unity. It is also disclosed that he who will appear three thousand years after our era as the Maitreya Buddha will have incarnated again and again on the Earth as a Bodhisattva, as the successor of Gautama Buddha. One of his incarnations was that of Jeshu ben Pandira, who lived a hundred years before the Christian era. The being who incarnated in Jeshu ben Pandira is he who will one day become the Maitreya Buddha, and who from century to century returns ever and again in a body of flesh, not yet as Buddha, but as Bodhisattva. Even now there proceeds from him who later on will be the Maitreya Buddha, the most significant teachings concerning the Christ Being and the Sons of Fire — the Agnishvattas — of Indian Mysticism.” — Rudolf Steiner, THE ETHERISATION OF THE BLOOD (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1971), a lecture, GA 130.

Various peoples have various spiritual wisdom because, as it were, they are guided by different Spirits of Fire. These spirits are the folk, national, or racial souls of the peoples, and they week to harmonize individual souls with these folk, national, or racial souls (i.e., with themselves).

“In theosophical literature the Archangels are also called Spirits of Fire ... These do not occupy themselves with separate men, with the single individual, but have a wider task; they bring single lives into harmonious order with the life of larger human groups, as, for instance, nations, races, etc. Within our earth's evolution the Archangels’ task is to bring into certain harmonious relationship each single soul with the national or race-soul.” — Rudolf Steiner, THE SPIRITUAL HIERARCHIES AND THE PHYSICAL WORLD (Anthroposophical Publishing Co., 1928), lecture 6, GA 110.

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Divine Rank # 7:

Gods Three Steps Above Man: Spirits of Personality

(Archai, First Beginnings, Principalities, Original Forces,

Spirits of an Age, Spirits of Epochs, Primeval Beginnings, Primeval Forces,

Zeitgeists, Time Spirits, Spirits of Darkness, Asuras, Spirits of Selfhood)

During the first incarnation of the solar system, Old Saturn, the Spirits of Personality poured their influence down to us, where we began developing the first warm flickers of our own character; the influence of these gods was reflected back upward to themselves as a preliminary impression of human personality.

“[N]ow at this stage in the evolution of Saturn [Old Saturn] certain Beings intervene [i.e., intervened], who again have the astral body for their lowest member, but have brought it on so far in its evolution that it works like a human I [our highest invisible body] of the present time. Through them the I looks down from the surrounding spaces on to Saturn, and communicates its nature to the single ‘live’ beings [i.e., us, in our earliest incarnation]. Hence something is sent forth from Saturn into the heavenly spaces, that resembles the impression made by human personality in our present cycle of life. The Beings who bring this about may be called ‘Spirits of Personality’ (in Christian terminology they are the Archai, First Beginnings, or Principalities.) [1] These Beings communicate to the particles of the Saturn body [i.e., ourselves as proto-humans] a semblance of the character of personality. The Spirits of Personality have their real personality in the surrounding sphere. They cause their own being to be rayed back to them from the Saturn bodies, and this very process bestows upon the Saturn bodies the fine substantiality which was described above as ‘warmth.’ Throughout the whole of Saturn there is no inwardness; but the Spirits of Personality behold and recognize the image of their own inwardness, in that it streams out to them as warmth from Saturn.” — OCCULT SCIENCE, chapter 4, part 3.

These gods, sometimes called Original Forces, are unaware of the animal kingdom; the human kingdom is the lowest level of existence they recognize. They solicitously guide the progressive development of human civilizations.

“Now we come to the rank of the ‘Original Forces.’ They are still more lofty beings whose consciousness no longer descends to the animals ... For the Original Forces man is the lowest kingdom ... [T]hey guide the progress of humanity from a very lofty height. People here and there have an inkling that something exists as a kind of ‘Spirit of the Age,’ that differs according to the different epochs ...People rise to the conception of Ages, but they do not know that behind this whole progress of the Ages, Spirits of the Epochs stand... [E]verything of human origin, the progress of civilization from beginning to end stands under the guidance of the Original Forces. They lead man in so far as he has to do with others.” — THE INFLUENCE OF SPIRITUAL BEINGS ON MAN, lecture 7.

These gods are themselves the spirits of human epochs; they guide the whole of humanity in various ages, changing their "spiritual bodies" as needed for the task.

“Then we rise to those beings whom we designate the Spirits of Personality, primeval beginnings, primeval forces, or Archai ... [T]hey live in such a way that, on the waves of time, from epoch to epoch, they transform themselves at certain definite periods, they assume other spiritual bodies ... You have here to do with that which represents the meaning and the mission of an epoch of humanity ... This ‘Spirit of the Age’ comprises something which reaches beyond single nations, beyond single races ... That which one really calls a ‘Zeit geist’ or Spirit of an epoch is the spiritual body of the Archai or the Primeval Beginnings or Spirits of Personality.” — THE SPIRITUAL HIERARCHIES, lecture 6.

These gods became human (they reached their human stage of development) during Old Saturn. Their consciousness then was equivalent to our consciousness now; they implanted the seeds for the sensory organs we have now.

“Then follows the activity of the ‘Spirits of Darkness,’ which are also called 'Spirits of Personality’ or of 'Self-hood’ (Egoism). At this stage they have [i.e., had] a consciousness similar to the present human earthly consciousness. They inhabit the formed human material body as 'souls’ in a way similar to that in which the human soul inhabits its body today. They implant a kind of sensory organs in the body, which are the germs of the sensory organs which later develop in the human body in the course of the development of earth.” — COSMIC MEMORY, “The Life of Saturn".

Some gods do not evolve alongside their peers; they lag behind; are are abnormal. Satan (Ahriman) is one such. He should be a Power, but he has remained behind at the level of the Original Forces. He is the Unlawful Prince. The Lawful Prince is Jehovah, one of the normal Powers.

“...I have drawn your attention at various times to the fact that certain beings from each spiritual hierarchy stay behind, they have not risen as high as the others, but have stood still, so to speak, in world-evolution ... There are on earth Original Forces who are really immature Powers ... [T]here is that being whom one is right in calling ‘Satan’ [i.e., Ahriman] — Satan, the ‘Unlawful Prince of this World.’ This is a truth, however, only to those who look at things from the aspect of spiritual science. The Lawful Prince is one of the ‘Powers,’ Yahve or Jehovah.” — THE INFLUENCE OF SPIRITUAL BEINGS ON MAN, lecture 7.

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Divine Rank # 6:

Gods Four Steps Above Man: Spirits of Form

(Revelations, Exusiai, Elohim, Spirits of Light,

Powers, Authorities)

During Old Saturn, the Spirits of Form exerted their beneficence; they gave form to the formless, dividing the undifferentiated mass of Old Saturn into separable entities.

“[T]he activity of yet other Beings begins [i.e., began], whom we will call Spirits of Form. [2] Their lowest member is also an astral body ... [T]he astral body of the Spirits of Form (in Christian language Exusiai or Powers) works in such a way that it seems as though manifestations are being hurled out into cosmic space from many single beings ... The Spirits of Form divide this life of Saturn [Old Saturn] into so many separate living entities, so that eventually it appears like a conglomeration of soul-beings.” — OCCULT SCIENCE, chapter 4, part 3.

Our evolution proceeds through distinct incarnations of the solar system: Old Saturn, Old Sun, Old Moon, Present Earth, Future Jupiter, Future Venus, and Future Vulcan. Spirits of Form help us pass upward through this succession of incarnations (a succession, as it were, of forms).

“[W]hen we get beyond the Archai, we reach to those Beings...the so called Powers, — Exusiai [3], whom we also call the Spirits of Form. Here we have to do with tasks that reach beyond the earth. We differentiate in the course of human development a Saturn, Sun, Moon, Earth, Jupiter, Venus, and Vulcan evolution. We have now seen how all that happens within the earth itself is regulated by the Angels as regards the individual men, by Archangels as regards the relation between individuals and the large masses of humanity, and by the Spirits of Personality for the whole development of man, from the Lemurian period [Lemuria was a content like Atlantis] up to the period when man will again be so largely spiritualised that he will hardly belong to the earth. But something else has yet to be regulated. Humanity will have to be guided from one planetary condition to another. Spiritual Beings must also exist, whose care it is during the whole earth evolution to see that when that evolution will have come to an end, humanity may pass in the right manner through a Pralaya [rest period] and find its way to the next goal, to the Jupiter goal. These are the Powers or Spirits of Form ... The spirits whose care it is to see that the whole of humanity should be led from one planetary condition to another, are the Powers, Exusiai or Spirits of Form.” — THE SPIRITUAL HIERARCHIES, lecture 6.

Jehovah is a Spirit of Form. His six brother gods are centered in the Sun, but Jehovah departed and made the Moon his home. (Christianity is the true religion of the Sun; Judaism is the religion of the Moon.) These gods assist mankind's evolution through the Sun forces that speed us forward and the Moon forces that hinder our progress.

“We have now raised ourselves to very lofty Spirits, and we come next to the hierarchy who are called ‘Revelations,’ Exusiai ... The Spirits of Light belong to the order of the Powers or Revelations. We know that Yahve [Jehovah] had six companions who separated off the sun. Yahve himself went with the moon which reflected the sun's light to the earth, but he is a companion of the other Elohim ... The whole structure in which man is embedded, the guidance of the planet and what occurs on it is the affair of the Revelations or Powers. For the whole present evolution of humanity could not have gone on without, on the one hand, the accelerating sun forces, and, on the other, the hindering moon forces.” — THE INFLUENCE OF SPIRITUAL BEINGS ON MAN, lecture 7.

Like the other gods, and like ourselves, Spirits of Form evolve. During the fourth of seven periods in Old Sun, they developed the type of consciousness we will attain during Future Venus: perfected inspiration.

"In the middle of the fourth course of the Sun [i.e., during the fourth phase of Old Sun], these 'Spirits of Form' receive a consciousness like that which man will have on 'Venus,' the second planet on which he will appear after his earthly existence. This is a supra-psychic consciousness [perfected inspiration]. These spirits attain this as a fruit of their activity during the third and fourth course of the Sun. Thereby they acquire the capacity to transform the sensory germs developed during and after the Saturn period [Old Saturn], and which until this time were only physical instruments, into animated senses by means of the ether." — COSMIC MEMORY, "The Life of the Sun".

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Divine Rank # 5:

Gods Five Steps Above Man: Spirits of Movement

(Dynamis, Mights, Spirits of Motion, Spirits of Activity,

Mahats, Principalities, Virtues)

Likes gods of other ranks, Spirits of Movement contributed to our evolution during Old Saturn. From their astral bodies (the lowest members of their constitutions) they imbued Saturn (and us within Saturn, us) with soul forces. These made the entire sphere of Saturn seem to be alive.

“When by the working together of Will and Life a certain stage of Saturn evolution has been reached, other Beings too begin to work. They also are in the surrounding sphere of Saturn [i.e., the solar system as it was during Old Saturn]. We may call them Spirits of Movement; in Christian terminology they are Dynamis or Mights. They have no physical body and no life-body [i.e., etheric body]; their lowest member is the astral body. When the Saturn bodies [i.e., the primordial evolving proto-humans] have [i.e., had] attained the faculty of reflecting life, the life which is thus rayed back can become permeated with the properties which have their seat in the astral bodies of the Spirits of Movement. As a result, it appears as though expressions of emotion, feeling, and other soul-forces were being hurled out from Saturn into the heavenly spaces. The entire Saturn seems like a being that is ensouled, manifesting sympathies and antipathies. But these manifestations are not its own; they are but the reflection of the soul-activities of the Spirits of Movement ... The Spirits of Movement, we might say, make Saturn as a whole appear as an animate being endowed with soul.” — OCCULT SCIENCE, chapter 4, part 3.

During Old Saturn, Spirits of Movement had high clairvoyant powers of a kind we will attain only after evolving through Future Vulcan. Like gods of other ranks, they evolved higher as they contributed to our development. They implanted the powers of movement and "forceful activity" in our developing, primordial physical bodies.

“The third kind of spirits with the self-conscious (supra-psychic) object consciousness [a level of conscious we will acquire after Future Vulcan] is called ‘Spirits of Motion’ or of‘Activity.’ In Christian mystery science they are called ‘Principalities’ (Dynamis). (In theosophical literature, the expression Mahat is to be found for them.) From the middle of the second Saturn cycle [i.e., the second phase of Old Saturn] onward they combine with the progress of their own development, the further elaboration of the human material body, in which they implant the capacity of movement and of forceful activity. This task comes to a conclusion around the middle of the third Saturn cycle.” — COSMIC MEMORY, “The Life of Saturn".

During Old Saturn, there were varying ranks of gods, arranged hierarchically, much as there are today. The Spirits of Movement, back then, oversaw groups of Spirits of Personality essentially in the same way that Archangels today oversee groups of humans.

“Yet a stage higher than...Powers are those Beings we call Mights — Spirits of Motion — Dynamis. These were related to the Spirits of Personality on ancient Saturn [i.e., during Old Saturn] in the same way as the Archangels are to us to-day ... Thus on ancient Saturn we have an ascending scale of Beings ... These were, if one may so call them, the inhabitants of ancient Saturn.” — THE SPIRITUAL HIERARCHIES, lecture 4.

Like other gods, Spirits of Movement continue to contribute to human existence today. After we die, they work on our astral bodies (the second of our three invisible bodies) in such a way as to allow us to reincarnate. Without this divine assistance, our astral bodies would become spherical and vegetative, as it were, and reincarnation would be impossible.

“[I]f nothing else were to occur, if the Beings of the higher Hierarchies would not work upon our astral body...then the astral body would appear as the whole vegetable kingdom outside in the world. Indeed, this would even take on the form of a sphere, it would follow its own elasticity. The astral body would really take on the form of a sphere; but it cannot do this because during our life between birth and death the Spirits of Form have been working upon our astral body, also the Spirits of Movement [and others] ... When we discard our etheric body, this becomes inwoven, I might say, with the universal ether of the cosmos. But what appears now, as a woof woven out of our astral body as a result of the work of the Spirits of Form, the Spirits of Movement [and others]...cooperates with our Ego [the “I”] that is passing through its time between death and a new birth and contains forces which must be active, in order that we may once more enter a new incarnation.” — Rudolf Steiner, “The Weaving and Living Activity of the Human Etheric Bodies” (Anthroposophic News Sheet no. 7-8, Feb. 18, 1940), GA 174a.

According to occult wisdom, the solar system consists of a series of concentric spheres defined by the orbits of the planets. [See "Higher Worlds".] The Saturn sphere shows the extent to which the Spirits of Will sent out their influences, the Jupiter sphere shows the extent of the influence of the Spirits of Wisdom, and the Mars sphere shows the extent of the influence of the Spirits of Motion.

“We must now make a certain disclosure about the Cosmic position of these Beings. In spiritual science, in that which it is desired to continue to-day in Anthroposophy, and which is at bottom [of] the Wisdom of the Mysteries [i.e., occult knowledge of spiritual mysteries], these different Beings of the heavenly Hierarchies have always been spoken of as we have spoken of them to-day ... [T]he present Saturn [i.e., the planet Saturn as it exists today] represents the limit up to which reached the action of the Thrones or Spirits of Will[see below]; Jupiter, the limit up to which the Dominions, Spirits of Wisdom, acted [see below]; and Mars, the boundary line up to which reached the influence of the Mights, Dynamis or Virtues, or Spirits of Motion.” — THE SPIRITUAL HIERARCHIES, lecture 6.

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Divine Rank # 4:

Gods Six Steps Above Man: Spirits of Wisdom

(Kyriotetes, Dominions, Wisdom Spirits)

In contributing to our evolution, the Spirits of Wisdom began their activities very early during OId Saturn. Like other gods, they poured their influences into Old Saturn, and in return they received the reflections of these influences. The influences of the Spirits of Wisdom conveyed life into the primitive, evolving entities of Old Saturn.

“Certain sublime Beings whose life Saturn rays back, may be called Spirits of Wisdom. (In Christian spiritual science they bear the name Kyriotetes, i.e. Dominions.) Their activity on Saturn [i.e., during Old Saturn] does not be any means begin with the middle epoch of evolution ... Indeed in a certain sense it is by then already at an end. Before they could become conscious of the reflection of their own life, proceeding from the warmth-bodies of Saturn [i.e., the primordial entities coming into existence], they had first to make these bodies capable of bringing about such a reflection. Hence their activity began soon after the commencement of Saturn evolution, at a time when the Saturn corporeality was still chaotic substance which could not have reflected anything ... The Spirits of Wisdom have in their etheric body attained the power to do more than enjoy the reflection of Life — as on Saturn; they are now able to pour Life out of themselves, endowing other beings with it.” — OCCULT SCIENCE, chapter 4, part 3.

The Spirits of Wisdom were, in a sense, the presiding deities of Old Saturn, conveying into it the influences of still higher gods who dwelt beyond Old Saturn. The Spirits of Wisdom guided the evolution of Old Saturn so that it could reincarnate as Old Sun. (Old Saturn was an immense globe; following a process of condensation, it became the smaller globe called Old Sun.)

“The Spirits of Wisdom or Kyriotetes receive from the circumference of Saturn that which comes down through the mediation of the highest Hierarchy, so that they may transform it and make it harmonise with what is in the interior of Saturn ... [T]he Dominions or Spirits of Wisdom are the directors inside Saturn... Which are the Spiritual Beings who carried over the condensation of the substance of ancient Saturn [i.e., Old Saturn] to the ancient Sun [i.e., Old Sun]? These Beings whom we call the Dominions, or Spirit of Wisdom. It is they who now press inwards from outside and who originally pressed together the mighty mass of Saturn so that it grew smaller. The Dominions brought pressure to bear upon it, until the ancient Sun became the size of a globe, the mass of which, if you place the Sun in its centre, you must imagine as reaching out to Jupiter [i.e., Old Sun was the size of the sphere defined by Jupiter's orbit today]. Thus Saturn was a gigantic world-globe, which having our Sun in its centre would have reached as far as to the present Saturn, an enormous globe, as large as our present solar system [i.e., Old Saturn was the size of the sphere define by Saturn's orbit today].” — THE SPIRITUAL HIERARCHIES, lecture 5.

During Old Saturn, the Spirits of Wisdom had a consciousness that we will attain during Future Vulcan. They contributed to the evolution of the human constitution, imparting a wise, rational structure to it.

“[T]here follow beings with a creative (spiritual) consciousness, similar to that which man will attain on Vulcan. They are called ‘Spirits of Wisdom’ ... During the second cycle of Saturn they advance their own development to some extent, and at the same time work on the human body in such a way that a ‘wise arrangement,’ a rational structure is implanted in it.” — COSMIC MEMORY, “The Life of Saturn”.

The Spirits of Wisdom contributed further to our evolution during Old Sun. They enabled our limbs to move purposefully, and — evolving higher themselves — these gods enabled us to receive the first of our invisible bodies, the etheric or life body.

“’Spirits of Wisdom’ again intervene. While in their preceding period of labor they had given a wise structure to the human body, they now bestow on the limbs, which have become mobile, the capacity to render their motion a wisdom-directed one ... [T]he human body is already [i.e., was] prepared for the reception of the ether body, because the ‘Spirits of Wisdom’ have given him the possibility of wisdom-filled motion. In the meantime however, these ‘Spirits of Wisdom’ themselves have developed further. Through the labor which they have performed, they have become capable of pouring their substance out of themselves ... The substance of the ‘Spirits of Wisdom’ is the ‘ether,’ that is, mobile and power-filled wisdom, in other words, ‘life.’ The ether or life body of man is thus an emanation of the ‘Wisdom Spirits.’” — COSMIC MEMORY, “The Life of the Sun”.

During processes of occult initiation and meditation, we renew our communion with gods of various ranks, gods who contributed to our evolution. The Thrones assisted the formation of our primordial physical bodies during Old Saturn, the Spirits of Wisdom played a similar role in the formation of our etheric bodies during Old Sun, and so on. [For an overview of our four bodies as we have them now, see "Incarnation".]

“[A] typical experience that's...seen by a pupil [i.e., a candidate for occult initiation] is that his physical body is dismembered and scattered, and seems not to belong to him anymore. Even the organs like the heart, liver and gall bladder expand. Thereby we recall that our physical body arose on Saturn [i.e., during Old Saturn] through the streaming in of Thrones' substantiality, our etheric body on old Sun through Spirits of Wisdom, our astral body on old Moon through Spirits of Movement, whereas on earth [i.e., during Present Earth] the I was given to us by Spirits of Form. We return to these spirits during meditation. Now one should not imagine that each of our organs goes back to the power who implanted them in us, but we blend into their moods; although when we feel that we belong to these powers we must remain aware of our own I.” — Rudolf Steiner, FROM THE CONTENTS OF THE ESOTERIC CLASSES (transcript, Rudolf Steiner Archive), GA 266.

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Divine Rank # 3:

Gods Seven Steps Above Man: Spirits of Will

(Thrones, Radiating Lives, Radiating Flames)

Spirits of Will enabled us to attain our consciousness during Old Saturn: It was an extremely dim consciousness, comparable to that experienced by minerals today (minerals are alive, Steiner taught).

“The Beings who find Their blessedness in pouring out Will at the beginning of Saturn [i.e., Old Saturn] may be called ‘Spirits of Will.’ (In Christian esoteric science they are called the Thrones.) ... Let us now direct our attention to these phantoms-of-man [human precursors: us at our earliest stages] with their semblance of life. During the period with which we have been dealing, they are of ever-changing form. Now they will resemble one shape, now another. In the further course of evolution the shapes become more definite, and sometimes even last for a while. This is due to their being now permeated by the influences of the Spirits who were at work in the very beginning of Saturn evolution, namely the Spirits of Will (the Thrones.) As a result, the phantom-of-man appears to be endowed with the simplest, darkest form of consciousness. We must conceive it as being yet more dim than that of dreamless sleep. Under present-day conditions, the minerals possess this consciousness. It brings the inner nature of the object or being into unison with the physical external world. On Saturn it is the Spirits of Will who regulate this unison.” — OCCULT SCIENCE, chapter 4, part 3.

Even such august gods as Spirits of Will once passed through the human stage of development. They began their existence long before our solar system first incarnated, and they were human during a period that long preceded our creation. Indeed, in a sense, these gods created us as we were during Old Saturn: Exerting their will, they created the germinal body that would house our dim Saturn consciousness.

“These ‘creators,’ too, once had to pass through the stages of man [i.e., they were once human]. This took place on heavenly bodies which preceded Saturn [i.e., during periods that predated Old Saturn]. However, the connection of these beings with the development of mankind lasted until the middle of the life of Saturn [i.e., the middle phase of Old Saturn]. Because of their sublime, delicate body of rays, in mystery science they are called ‘Radiating Lives’ or ‘Radiating Flames.’ Because the substance of which this body consisted had a remote resemblance to the will of man, they are also called ‘Spirits of Will.’ These spirits are the creators of the man of Saturn [i.e., ourselves as were first were, during Old Saturn]. From their bodies they pour the substance which becomes the carrier of the human Saturn consciousness. The period of development during which this takes place is called the first small Saturn cycle. (In the language of theosophy, this is the 'first round.') The material body which man receives in this way is the first rudiment of his later physical body. One can say that the germ of the physical human body is planted during the first Saturn cycle by the Spirits of Will, and that at that time this germ has the dull Saturn consciousness.” — COSMIC MEMORY, “The Life of Saturn”.

Spirits of Will, or Thrones, are members of the highest class of gods known to us, the First Hierarchy. They and their brethren had the capacity to foster the creation of our solar system because they had evolved upward through seven incarnations of a prior solar system. Today, they stand as the mighty gods who dwell within the zodiac enclosing our solar system.

“Why are the Thrones enabled to give out of their substance what [Old] Saturn needs? Because they have prepared themselves in an earlier system, through seven conditions like those our solar system is now going through. Before a system of Thrones, Cherubim, Seraphim [i.e., the First Hierarchy] can be evolved, it must have been a solar system at an earlier stage; which means, that when the Sun has got so far as to be reunited with its planets, it becomes itself a circle — a Zodiacal circle. That which we have come to know in the Zodiac, those great, sublime Beings, are the results that have come over to us from an earlier solar system. That which has formerly evolved within a solar system [could then] send down its influence out of universal space, and produce a new solar system, created out of itself. The Seraphim, Cherubim and Thrones are for us the highest Hierarchy among divine Beings, because they have already passed through their solar system evolution and have risen to mighty cosmic deeds of sacrifice.” — THE SPIRITUAL HIERARCHIES, lecture 5.

The Spirits of Will remain active in our environment today. They project their influences powerfully outward from within the Earth. (Their influences stream down from the zodiac, penetrate deeply into the Earth, then beam outward again.) When these outgoing influences meet the incoming influences of the Spirits of Motion, an illusory barrier is formed: It is what we take to be the surface of the Earth.

“The sphere of the instreaming forces meets incessantly that of the outstreaming forces; and where they come together they form as one might say a boundary, which is the surface of the earth. So that the surface one sees is only a delusion which is the result of the in and outward streaming forces, acting in such a way that they stop each other just at the surface in question. That which thus streams forth is essentially the same as what we must call the activities of the Thrones, the Spirits of Will. These Spirits radiate their forces from the earth, out in every direction; and that which comes in from universal space is essentially what we may call the radiating influx of the forces of certain Spirits of Motion, working inwards from without. Thus these two kinds of forces meet here.” — Rudolf Steiner, THE MISSION OF THE FOLK SOULS (Anthroposophical Publishing Co., 1929), lecture 5, GA 121.

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Divine Rank # 2:

Gods Eight Steps Above Man: Spirits of Harmony

(Spirits of the Harmonies, Cherubim)

During Old Saturn, the actions of the Sons of Twilight (Angels, Sons of Life) prepared the way for very high gods, Spirits of Harmony (or Spirits of the Harmonies), to become active. These high gods transmitted to the lowly Sons of Twilight a consciousness equivalent to that experienced by plants or dreamlessly sleeping humans today. The Spirits of Harmony effectively guided the activities of the nearly-unconscious Sons of Twilight.

“‘Sons of Twilight,’ or ‘Sons of Life’ (in Christian language they are the Angeloi or Angels)...bring life into the interior of Saturn; processes of nutrition and excretion begin to take place there ... And now this inner life makes it possible for yet other Beings to enter the heavenly body. Let them be called the 'Spirits of the Harmonies' (in Christian terminology called the Cherubim.) These Beings transmit to the Sons of Life a kind of dim consciousness of man today. It is like the consciousness that belongs to man in dreamless sleep, which is of such a low degree that in a manner of speaking it does not ‘come to consciousness’ at all; man remains unaware of it. Yet it is there. It differs from day-consciousness in kind as well as in degree. Our present-day plants possess this ‘dreamless sleep’ consciousness. It affords no perceptions of an outer world in the human sense of the word, but it regulates the life-processes and brings them into harmony with those in the outer Universe. At the Saturn stage with which we are here dealing, the Sons of Life cannot perceive the regulations; but the Spirits of the Harmonies perceive it. They therefore are the real regulators.” — OCCULT SCIENCE, chapter 4, part 3.

During Old Sun, the Archangels spread outward through cosmic space where they were received and ennobled by the mighty Cherubim (Spirits of Harmony). The Cherubim approached the Archangels from four sides, in forms that have been preserved as images of winged beings (lion, eagle, bull, and man). [These became the icons of the four ancient human group souls. See "Four Group Souls".]

“Those Beings who came out of spiritual space to meet the Archangels, we call Cherubim (The Spirits of Harmony). They are Beings of an exceptionally sublime nature; they have power to receive the Archangels, so to speak, with open arms. When the Archangels spread outwards, the Cherubim came to meet them, out of the Universal All [i.e., ultimately, the Godhead]. Thus, all round the globe of the ancient Sun [i.e., Old Sun], we have the approaching Cherubim. If I may use the comparison — just as our earth is surrounded by its atmosphere, so was the ancient Sun surrounded by the realm of the Cherubim, for the benefit of the Archangels. When the Archangels went out into the Universal spaces, they beheld their great helpers. In what way did those great helpers meet them, and what appearance had they? This can naturally only be stated by clairvoyant consciousness as read in the Akasha Chronicles [see "Akasha"]. These great Universal Helpers revealed themselves in quite definite etheric shapes or figures. Our forefathers who, through their traditions, were still conscious of these most important facts, represented the Cherubim as those strangely winged animals with differently formed heads — the winged Lion, winged Eagle, winged Bull, winged Man. The fact is, that the Cherubim made their approach from four sides, in forms afterwards represented in the way the Cherubim are known to us. In the schools of the first post-Atlantean Initiates, these Cherubim, approaching the Ancient Sun on four sides, were given names, which later became the names, Bull, Lion, Eagle, Man.” — THE SPIRITUAL HIERARCHIES, lecture 4.

Like other gods, both lower and higher, the Cherubim are active in human life today. Archangels, for example, exert nocturnal influences that affect our emotions and, through our emotions, our speech. But true power of speech must be activated by higher powers. The Cherubim enable the latent capacity for speech to find true expression through our vocal organs.

“In our human speech, which springs from Feeling, there lives for man as he sleeps during the night the activity of the Archangels ... [This] must be harmonized with the etheric and physical bodies ... [W]e come to the Hierarchy of Cherubim, who bring the human faculty of speech into accord with its physical basis. In all that serves speech or song in the organism, or anything similar to speech — the Cherubim bring the human life of Feeling into accord with the organs of speech.” — Rudolf Steiner, “The Cosmic World and Individual Man” (THE GOLDEN BLADE, 1951), a lecture, GA 224.

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Divine Rank # 1:

Gods Nine Steps Above Man: Spirits of Love

(Seraphim)

The highest gods of the First Hierarchy are the Spirits of Love (Seraphim). With the other members of the First Hierarchy (Spirits of Harmony and Spirits of Will) they formed enclosing "circles" around Old Saturn, essentially establishing the blessedness within which our evolution could occur. They themselves were the culmination of the same process occurring previously, the same process that continues throughout cosmic space, one solar system giving birth to the next solar system.

“Still other Beings were around ancient Saturn [i.e., Old Saturn], Beings of a degree still higher and still more sublime than the Cherubim, namely, the Seraphim (Spirits of Love) [4] ... Thus we can imagine Saturn as a giant globe of warmth, surrounded by circles of spiritual Beings who are of a supremely high, sublime nature. Christian Esotericism calls them Thrones, Cherubim, Seraphim. They are the Dhyanic Beings of the Eastern Teaching.

“Whence do these circles of sublime Beings come? ... The course of evolution is this: a Sun, which from the beginning is included in such a system, has at first to throw off its planets, being too weak to develop further without excluding them. It grows strong, absorbs its planets again, and grows into a Vulcan. Then the whole is dissolved, and from the Vulcan globe is formed a hollow globe which is something like the circles of Thrones, Cherubim, Seraphim, etc. The Sun will thus dissolve in space, sacrifice itself, send forth its Being into the Universe, and through this will itself become a circle of Beings like the Thrones, Cherubim, Seraphim, which will then advance towards new creation.” — THE SPIRITUAL HIERARCHIES, lecture 5.

The Spirits of Love, although extremely high and, in a sense, extremely distant, nonetheless contributed to our evolution in many ways, in cooperation with lower gods.

“’Spirits of Love’...work [i.e., worked] upon the human etheric body (or life-body) in co-operation with the Spirits of Personality. The combined activity of these Beings enables [i.e., enabled[ the life-body to take a further step on its path of evolution ... Observation of the human being during the middle epoch of Sun evolution [i.e., Old Sun] reveals it to be divided into a physical body and a life-body. The latter is the scene of activity for the more advanced Spirits of Personality, in unison with the Spirits of Love. The physical body is now intermingled with a portion of the retarded Saturn nature [i.e., laggardly remnants of Old Saturn], and here the activity of the Fire Spirits is at work. In what the Fire Spirits achieve in this retarded Saturn nature, we have to recognize the forerunners of the present sense-organs of Earth man. (It will be remembered that already upon Saturn [i.e., during Old Saturn] the Fire Spirits were concerned in elaborating within the warmth-substance the seeds of the human senses.) On the other hand, in that which is accomplished by the Spirits of Personality in union with the Spirits of Love (the Seraphim,) we have to perceive the first beginnings of man's present glandular organs.” — OCCULT SCIENCE, chapter 4, part 4.

The Seraphim and their brethren of the First Hierarchy remain active in human life today.

“It is the Seraphim who bring Thinking into accord with the nerves and senses of man. Speech, and all that is connected with it, is brought into accord with Thinking and Feeling by the Cherubim.

"Thus we see, when we have threefold Man before us: —

“In the organism of nerves and senses, in the basis of Thinking, the creating Seraphim.

“In all that is the rhythmic man, which must as physical organism be brought into harmony with the faculty of speech — in all this we see the creating Cherubim.

“In all that is expressed in the movement of the human limbs, in all activities of Will, for which the inner structure of metabolism and limbs must be present in man, harmony is accomplished by the Thrones.

“From this we see how the physical human form dissolves into appearance, and behind it there stand as realities: Seraphim, Cherubim, Thrones. We are always looking into the activity of the Seraphim, Cherubim, and Thrones, when the human Ego is interwoven with its inner activity, when man in waking life moves, speaks, feels, and thinks.” — Rudolf Steiner, “The Cosmic Word and Individual Man” (THE GOLDEN BLADE, 1951), GA 224.

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Highest of All:

The Godhead

At the pinnacle of divinity is the Godhead. This is not the One and Only God of the great monotheistic faiths — Judaism, Christianity, and Islam — although Anthroposophists sometimes speak of it as if it were. Anthroposophy is polytheistic. The Godhead is neither omniscient nor omnipotent; it has no voice nor distinct identity of its own; we cannot have a personal relationship with it, although Anthroposophists sometimes suggest otherwise. It is divine nature, not a specific, definable god or God. The Godhead is divine will, divine love; it is the Ineffable informing all the gods of the three hierarchies. It is the fountainhead of divinity, the ultimate Mystery behind the gods. Its very existence is, in a sense, uncertain, because it is so profoundly unknowable. [For more on these matters, see "God", "All", and the entry for "Godhead" in the Brief Waldorf / Steiner Encyclopedia.]

Steiner indicated that if the Godhead can be conceived as a distinct creative force, it manifests as a trinity of three gods, not a single God. The Hindu conception of such a trinity is nearer the truth than the Christian conception of a triune God. (As Steiner described it, the divine trinity — Father, Son, and Holy Ghost — consists of three separate gods.)

◊ “The highest Ruler of Saturn...appears to us as the Father God, and the highest Ruler of Sun, the Sun-God, as the Christ. Similarly the Ruler of the Moon stage of Earth appears to us as the Holy Spirit” — Rudolf Steiner, ROSICRUCIAN WISDOM (Rudolf Steiner Press, 2000), p. 100.)

◊ “Beyond the Seraphim we have to see that highest Divinity of which we find mention by almost all nations as the threefold Divinity — as Brahma, Shiva, Vishnu, as Father, Word [sic], and Holy Ghost. From out [of] this highest Godhead, this most exalted Trinity, stream forth the plans for a new cosmic system. Glancing back at ancient Saturn [i.e., Old Saturn] we say to ourselves: before any of this ancient Saturn came into Being, the plan of it had grown within the divine threefold Unity. [5] But the threefold Unity has need of Beings to execute its plan. These Beings must first prepare themselves for the task. The Beings who, are so to speak, nearest God Himself, who, as is beautifully expressed in Christian Western Esotericism, ‘bask in the light of God's countenance,’ are the Seraphim, Cherubim and Thrones. These take up the plans of a new cosmic system streaming from the divine threefold Unity.” — THE SPIRITUAL HIERARCHIES, lecture 5.

The Godhead is virtually beyond our apprehension. Between it and us stand the nine ranks of gods, blocking our view, as it were. If we can "see" them, we cannot in the same sense see the Godhead beyond them. (To the degree that the Godhead is present in our lives, it is so through the presence of the gods of the Hierarchies.)

“[W]e can look up to hierarchies — as they are called in occultism — of beings set over man whose various ranks are ranged one above the other ... [B]eyond the Seraphim [is] what one calls the actual ‘Godhead.’ Genuine occultism, true spiritual science, cannot share the usual trivial notion that man can look up direct to the highest Divinity; we have the whole ladder of Beings whom we call Angels, Archangels, and so on, standing between.” — THE INFLUENCE OF SPIRITUAL BEINGS ON MAN, lecture 7.

The Godhead does not have all of the attributes usually ascribed to God, such as omnipotence and omniscience. The saying "God is love" is, on the other hand, correct. The Godhead is an indefinable, unknowable universal spirit of divine will and creativity or, in a word, love.

“Can the attribute of omnipotence be ascribed to the Divine Being who lives and weaves through the world? Contentions born of feeling must here be silent: were God omnipotent, he would be responsible for everything that happens and there could be no human freedom. If man can be free, then certainly there can be no Divine omnipotence.

“Is the Godhead omniscient? As man's highest goal is likeness to God, our striving must be in the direction of omniscience. Is omniscience, then, the supreme treasure? If it is, a vast chasm must forever yawn between man and God. At every moment man would have to be aware of this chasm if God possessed the supreme treasure of omniscience for himself and withheld it from man. The all-encompassing attribute of the Godhead is not omnipotence, neither is it omniscience, but it is love.” — Rudolf Steiner, LOVE AND ITS MEANING IN THE WORLD (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1972), GA 143.

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You might think that, having considered the highest level of divinity, the Godhead, we have completed our survey. But Steiner held a surprise in store. We human beings are evolving upward. We constitute, or will constitute, what might be called the tenth divine rank, or the "tenth hierarchy." We will become gods, and we will eventually emerge as the highest of gods. Our ultimate fulfillment will place us at the apex.

See "Tenth Hierarchy".

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As indicated earlier, the gods are arrayed in three hierarchies. In addition, they occupy various "spheres" and they have various responsibilities. Here is a very quick summary.

◊ Third Hierarchy ◊

9. The Sons of Twilight, better known as Angels, occupy the Moon sphere. [See "Higher Worlds".] They are intimately concerned with individual human beings, providing guidance and, sometimes, protection. Thus, they may be considered Guardian Angels.

8. The Spirits of Fire, or Archangels, occupy the Mercury sphere. (Like the other gods, they are able to leave their own sphere and work in other regions of the spirit realm, but the Mercury sphere is their home.) They concern themselves with groups of humans — nations, peoples, and races.

7. The Spirits of Personality, the Archai, call the Venus sphere home. They supervise epochs of human evolution. Thus they are sometimes called Time Spirits or, from the German, Zeitgeists.

◊ Second Hierarchy ◊

6. The Spirits of Form reside in the Sun sphere. They oversee the forms taken by the Earth and its surroundings as evolution progresses.

5. The Spirits of Movement live in the Mars sphere. They are sufficiently high among the ranks of the gods that their activities are difficult for us to grasp, but in general they work with the motions — the ebbs and fluxes — of spiritual energies in and around the forms of evolution.

4. The Spirits of Wisdom preside over evolution, as it were, from the Jupiter sphere. They embody the spiritual consciousness needed to guide evolution.

◊ First Hierarchy ◊

3. The lowest rank of the First Hierarchy is composed of the Spirits of Will, who dwell in the sphere of Saturn. [6] Their task is to will the Earth to move correctly through space, following the correct laws.

2. The Spirits of the Harmonies dwell outside the solar system, in what might be considered the lower reaches of the zodiac. They harmonize the Earth with the other planets in the solar system.

1. The Spirits of Love occupy the higher reaches of the zodiac. They harmonize the solar system with the rest of the universe.

A reasonably accessible discussion of these matters can be found in Roy Wilkinson's book RUDOLF STEINER: An Introduction to His Spiritual World-View, Anthroposophy (Temple Lodge Publishing, 2001). Look particularly at chapter 9, "The Spiritual Hierarchies".

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The nine ranks of gods discussed in Anthroposophy are approximately equivalent to the ranks of angels recognized in Judeo-Christian tradition. The great difference, of course, is that Judaism and Christianity are monotheistic faiths: They recognize one God only; the angelic hosts are God's assistants, companions, and messengers. Anthroposophy, by comparison, is polytheistic: The spirits in the nine ranks are all gods, even those in the lower ranks who are sometimes referred to as angels and archangels.

Here is a description of the angelic hosts of Judeo-Christian tradition. By some accounts, there are nine ranks of angels; but other totals are also sometimes given:

"Christianity, probably influenced by the angelology of Jewish sects such as the Pharisees and the Essenes as well as of the Hellenistic world, further enhanced and developed theories and beliefs in angels and demons. In the New Testament, celestial beings were grouped into seven ranks: angels, archangels, principalities, powers, virtues, dominions, and thrones. In addition to these were added the Old Testament cherubim and seraphim, which, with the seven other ranks, comprised the nine choirs of angels in later Christian mystical theology. Various other numbers of the orders of angels have been given by early Christian writers: four, in The Sibylline Oracles (a supposedly Jewish work that shows much Christian influence); six, in the Shepherd of Hermas, a book accepted as canonical in some local early Christian churches; and seven, in the works of Clement of Alexandria and other major theologians. In both folk piety and theology the number has generally been fixed at seven. The angels receiving most attention and veneration in Christianity were the four angels mentioned in the Old Testament and the Apocrypha. [7] Michael became the favourite of many, and in the practice of his cult there was often some confusion with St. George, who was also a warrior figure." — "angel and demon." ENCYCLOPÆDIA BRITANNICA, Online, 13 Aug. 2013.

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The gods Steiner discussed and accepted as real derive from many sources other than the Bible or Judeo-Christian tradition. Two quick examples:

◊ “Krishna...is that being who has worked through centuries and centuries on the human organism, to make man capable — from the seventh and eighth centuries B.C. onward — of entering gradually the epoch of self-consciousness ... [W]e understand Krishna as the divine architect of what prepared and brought about self-consciousness in man.” — Rudolf Steiner, THE OCCULT SIGNIFICANCE OF THE BHAGAVAD GITA (Anthroposophic Press, 1968), lecture 5, GA 146.

◊ “German-Nordic man has an interest in an Angel-being who is endowed with special power, but who at the same time is closely related to the single human being ... And that Being is [the Norse god] Thor...a Being who could have risen to far higher rank had he followed the normal course of evolution, but who renounced advancement comparatively early and remained at the stage of a [sic] Angel in order that, at the time when man awoke to ego-consciousness in the course of his soul’s evolution, he [sic: Thor] could become the guiding Spirit....” — THE MISSION OF THE FOLK SOULS, lecture 8.

Note that in such passages, Steiner was not explaining what others may have mistakenly believed — he was giving the occult significance, that is, the truth, which he claimed to find by clairvoyantly penetrating to the spiritual realities behind various religions, myths, and so forth. Krishna and Thor really exist, according to Steiner.

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Here is an item from the Waldorf Watch News,

edited slightly for use here:

“The highest Ruler of Saturn, the Ego Spirit,* appears to us as the Father God, and the highest Ruler of Sun, the Sun-God, as the Christ. Similarly the Ruler of the Moon stage of Earth appears to us as the Holy Spirit with his hosts known in Christian esotericism as the Messengers of the Godhead, the angels.” — Rudolf Steiner, ROSICRUCIAN WISDOM (Rudolf Steiner Press, 2000), p. 100.

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Waldorf Watch Response:

The Waldorf belief system is polytheistic. Rudolf Steiner taught that there are many gods, some higher than others. According to Steiner, the three persons of God worshipped by Christians are not, as Christians believe, members of a single God — they are three separate gods, whose headquarters are located in various celestial globes or periods. Christ, the highest of one subset of gods, came to Earth from the Sun. The Father God rules over Saturn, while the Holy Spirit presided over the Moon phase of evolution. (Jehovah — whom Steiner identified as a middling god — rules over Jews from the Moon, whereas Lucifer calls Venus home.) All of this is made a bit more complicated by Steiner’s use of such words as “Sun” and “Moon” to refer not just to places but also to stages of evolution (Old Sun, Old Moon). Put it this way: Steiner taught that various gods preside over different portions of the cosmos, both in space and time; we live, he said, in a universe fairly swarming with gods. In such a universe, monotheism is only a distant dream.

“Monotheism or monism can only represent an ultimate ideal; it could never lead to a real understanding of the world, to a comprehensive, complete view of the world.” — Rudolf Steiner, THE MISSION OF THE FOLK SOULS (Rudolf Steiner Press, 2005), p. 115.

Steiner posited a hierarchy of gods, ranging from the Sons of Twilight (aka Angels, who are just slightly superior to humans) upward to the virtually inaccessible “Godhead.” The Godhead, in Anthroposophical belief, is not the triune Christian God nor the Hebrew God, Jehovah. The Godhead is a trinity of sorts (Brahma, Shiva, Vishnu), but more generally it is a nebulous, unified creative force standing behind the evolution of the universe. It may be perceived as “divine will”.

“[A] Christian** sees a mirror image of the Godhead, of divine will, in every single thing in the world. The universe contains the sacrificed Godhead, and this reflected image of the Godhead was called in esoteric Christianity ‘the kingdom’. What the kingdom meant to them was the divine will raying back to them multiplied a million times. The kingdom was the creative power of Atma, the living force of Buddhi in us, the creative force working in the outside world.” — Rudolf Steiner, THE LORD'S PRAYER (Rudolf Steiner Press, 2007), p. 64.

Some of that language (Atma, Buddhi — derived from Hinduism) indicates how far Steiner strayed from Christian orthodoxy.

As for the origin of everything — which Jews, Christians, Muslims, and others attribute to the Creator God — Steiner threw up his hands. This is ironic. Anthroposophists often criticize modern science for not knowing (yet, anyway) how everything began (i.e., what caused the Big Bang), but Anthroposophy suffers from the same limitation. Steiner did not offer the usual, simple answer about the beginning of all things: He did not simply say that God created everything, and that's that. Yes, he said, the Godhead was the originating force, but matters are complex and cloudy, with no firm answer available to us. Our universe was preceded by earlier universes, Steiner indicated, but we shouldn’t try to go into this question. We cannot know the beginning, he said — raising the question simply takes us into an infinite regress. X caused Y, but what caused X? Perhaps W caused X. But what caused W? And what caused that?

“In a purely intellectual way it is possible, of course, in the case of every given origin, to ask again after its origin ... [But in doing this] we only prolong questioning, as it were, mechanically ... [T]he facts themselves will put a natural end to questioning.” — Rudolf Steiner, OCCULT SCIENCE - AN OUTLINE (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1979), pp. 126-127.

The “facts” are the doctrines Steiner presented. They put an end to questioning not because they answer the big question (how did it all start?) but because facts are facts, i.e., Steiner’s doctrines are Steiner’s doctrines, i.e., things are as they are. So we are silenced. Our questioning ends when we quit the pointless, mechanical activity of asking questions.

(Steiner was not always consistent on these — or any other — of his teachings. But no more questions!)

For more on all this, see “Polytheism”, “God”, and “Everything”. (The latter isn't quite as intimidating as the title makes out.)

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* In Waldorf belief, the "ego" is the highest of our three invisible bodies. It is our spark of divinity, our ineffable, unique spiritual individuality. No one can know your ego except yourself, and it confers on you the power of self-definition. The ego incarnates on about your 21st birthday. In a manner of speaking, we were set on our path toward spiritual egohood by the god who oversaw the first stage of our evolution, the Ruler of Saturn, the Father God, who presided over Old Saturn. (We have evolved through the Saturn, Sun, and Moon stages. We are now in the Earth stage. We will proceed to Jupiter, Venus, and Vulcan. Yes, Vulcan. We will look further into our relationship to the Father in the next endnote.) We have developed egos only since arriving on Earth.

"In the present earth evolution for the first time he [i.e., man] received his ego...." — Stewart C. Easton, MAN AND WORLD IN THE LIGHT OF ANTHROPOSOPHY (Anthroposophic Press, 1989), p. 204.

By this account, we receive the ego from the Spirits of Form, gods four levels above man (these gods are also referred to as Revelations, Exusiai, Elohim, Spirits of Light, and/or Powers). The timing of the development of the ego was altered, for reasons that need not detain us here.

"The ego would have come to its full fruition about the middle of the earth evolution, and this had been the intention of the Spirits of Form or Elohim who endowed man with his ego." — Ibid.

("Elohim," as used in the Bible, is a single noun referring to God — Jehovah or Yahweh (YHWH). In Anthroposophy, it is a plural noun.)

** Steiner's use of the term "Christian" can be confusing. Sometimes he distinguished between Anthroposophy and Christianity, but more often he indicated that Anthroposophy embodies the truest form of Christianity (complete with numerous extra- or supra-Christian concepts such as polytheism, karma, and reincarnation). In most cases, Steiner "explained" Christianity in terms that mainstream Christians (Catholics, Lutherans, Baptists, Methodists...) would recoil from. Here Steiner separates himself from Christianity (he speaks of what the Christian sees, not what "we" see; he tells what the esoteric Christians "called" things, not what he calls things), but he also redefines Christianity to suit himself, seeing in it what most Christians have never consciously seen ("the creative power of Atma, the living force of Buddhi"). Thus, reworking Christianity to fit his über-religion, Anthroposophy, Steiner endorses gnostic Christianity and its perceptions. For Steiner and his followers, the "Godhead" is both the beginning and, in a sense, the end of things. The Godhead gave an original impetus to evolution, and It stands at the end of our evolution — It sent us on our way and It is the ultimate goal we seek.

"Adam was a son of the very Godhead. This means that he belonged to a time when humanity had just made the transition from a spiritual to a physical state." — Rudolf Steiner, ISIS MARY SOPHIA (SteinerBooks, 2003), p. 77.

Here, the Godhead is nearly indistinguishable from the Father God, the Elohim of Saturn; the Godhead starts us along the path that descends into physical existence and later will rise again toward perfected spirituality. There is no One and Only God, according to Waldorf belief, but such a God may emerge eventually if the "ultimate ideal" of monotheism is realized. In our higher and higher future stages of evolution, as we approach ultimate divinity, we and the Godhead will converge.

"[W]e shall draw ever nearer to the Godhead, and the Godhead will come ever closer to us." — Rudolf Steiner, THE SPIRITUAL HIERARCHIES AND THEIR REFLECTION IN THE PHYSICAL WORLD (Anthroposophic Press, 1970) p. 126.

We will, in a sense, realize or clothe the Godhead. Quoting Goethe, Steiner said

"'I work to make/ The living garment of the divine.' The Godhead will wear this immortal garment when the Earth [i.e., evolution] has reached its completion. And it is on their upward path through their many incarnations, in passing through births and deaths, that each individual human being will have woven their share of the fabric of this garment." — Rudolf Steiner, THE LORD'S PRAYER, p. 60.

And eventually we will, in a sense, become the Godhead — "the Father" lies ahead of us but He also has been inherent in us from the start.

“[W]e shall have gradually achieved the transformation of our own being into what is called in Christianity ‘the Father.’ What lies hidden in the human soul, the highest goal that lies ahead of us, is 'the Father in heaven.'” — Ibid., p. 17.

Here, "the Father" is not a mere Spirit of Form, such as the Ruler of Saturn; here, "the Father" is the fulfillment of the Godhead. He is what we shall become. This is the grand vision of Anthroposophy. For orthodox Christians, it is heresy.

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As for gods who blur the distinctions between ranks or even, in a sense, operate outside the ranks: Steiner said that there are normal and abnormal gods, and he also distinguished between good and evil gods. "Normal" gods have evolved in the proper way, and they thus occupy their proper slots in the nine-step order of deities. But some gods (such as Thor) choose to remain behind, at lower levels of evolution than they normally would have attained. And some gods may fail to evolve properly, for various reasons, whatever their intentions may have been. And then there are gods who fight against proper evolution: "evil" gods such as Ahriman and Lucifer. "Sin," in Anthroposophy, generally means failing to evolve or otherwise violating the good gods' evolutionary plans. Whether "evil" really exists or is, actually, a variant of goodness (i.e., the acts of the "evil" gods ultimately contribute to universal well-being) is a murky subject. Sometimes Steiner seemed to give one indication, sometimes another. In any event, there is a wide spectrum of gods that can be characterized in various ways, and although there is a series of divine ranks corresponding to levels of spiritual consciousness, some gods are not easily located — they operate, or seem to operate, outside the normal bounds. [For more on such matters, see, e.g., "Abnormal", "Evil Ones", "Sin", and "Evolution, Anyone?"]

We also should recognize another important, qualifying set of teachings. There are some powerful and important spirits who can be understood chiefly through their connection to various planets. Some of these spirits stand apart from the nine divine ranks, and some transcend the ranks because they consist of constituents derived from multiple ranks. Thus, all planets have “Planetary Spirits,” and below such essences stand “Spirits of the Rotation of Time.” [8] Both these types of spirits, who have broad responsibilities concerning the evolution of the planets and their residents, are the offspring of other, higher gods. Planetary Spirits may be considered the spiritual egos of their planets, and Spirits of the Rotation of Time may be considered the astral bodies of their planets. [9] Spirits of the Rotation of Time are offspring of the First Hierarchy, while Planetary Spirits are offspring of special, majestic gods who draw upon the powers of six different divine ranks. These special gods may be called composite deities. Here is one description:

"After Rudolf Steiner has described the influence wrought by the nine hierarchies [sic], he mentions completely different kinds of hierarchic beings [10] who have a far greater creative potential than even the spirits of the First Hierarchy. These are essences [11] composed of several beings and, hence, are of a higher standing … [The] beings who include both the spirit of the Earth and also similar spirits of other planets among their offspring are these composite beings [12] … [B]ehind each planet of our solar system there stands an ascending sequence of hierarchies [sic] beginning with the Spirits of Form and reaching up to the Seraphim. [13] All these six-membered beings have their abode on the Sun [14] … Thus the body of the Earth is enlivened and guided by the spirit of the Earth, who has its origin in one of these special beings inhabiting the Sun." — Sergei O. Prokofieff, THE MYSTERY OF THE RESURRECTION IN THE LIGHT OF ANTHROPOSOPHY (Temple Lodge Publishing, 2010), pp. 126-127.

Not all Anthroposophists would agree with Prokofieff's interpretations of all these matters. Disputation is common within the ranks of Anthroposophy. Still, Prokofieff is generally regarded as highly authoritative if not absolutely infallible.

— Compilation and commentary by Roger Rawlings

[R.R.]

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ENDNOTES

[1] Steiner sometimes ranked Principalities as Spirits of Movement.

[2] Steiner sometimes referred to Spirits of Form as Spirits of Love, but usually he did not.

[3] Steiner put Authorities at the same level as Exusiai, which he normally located four steps above humanity. But on occasion he seemed to locate Authorities and Exusiai five steps above humanity. [See the listing for "Authorities" in the Brief Waldorf / Steiner Encyclopedia.]

Although Steiner claimed that his teachings on such matters resulted from his use of exact clairvoyance, in fact they seem to derive from passages having debatable meaning found in the Bible and other texts. E.g.,

"Who is gone into heaven, and is on the right hand of God; angels and authorities and powers being made subject unto him." — 1 Peter 3:22.

[4] Steiner sometimes referred to Spirits of Form as Spirits of Love, but usually he did not.

[5] The divine Unity is Brahman, sometimes called the ground of being. If the Unity is considered as a tripartite entity, Brahman is the god Brahma.

[6] Steiner taught that Saturn is the outermost planet in the solar system. Hence, the Spirits of Will dwell in the outermost portion of the solar system. Higher gods are based in regions beyond the solar system.

[7]

"Two archangels are mentioned in the canonical Old Testament: Michael, the warrior leader of the heavenly hosts, and Gabriel, the heavenly messenger. Two are mentioned in the apocryphal Old Testament: Raphael, God’s healer or helper (in the book of Tobit), and Uriel (Fire of God), the watcher over the world and the lowest part of hell (in II Esdras). Though these are the only four named, seven archangels are noted in Tob. 12:15. Besides the archangels, there were also other orders of angels, the cherubim and seraphim...." — "angel and demon." ENCYCLOPÆDIA BRITANNICA.

[8] See the entries for “Planetary Spirits” and “Spirits of the Rotation of Time” in The Brief Waldorf / Steiner Encyclopedia. Also see "Planetary Spirits".

[9] See the entries for “ego”, “I”, and “astral body" in The Brief Waldorf / Steiner Encyclopedia.

[10] I.e., gods.

[11] I.e., spirits, gods.

[12] I.e., these composite gods produce the planetary spirits (they are, in a sense, the parents of the planetary spirits).

[13] I.e., the composite deities have six members, corresponding to gods of the upper six ranks.

[14] As inhabitants of the Sun, the composite deities are within the aegis of Christ, the Sun God. [See “Sun God”.]