The Nature of the Human Will: The Force of Change
In the THREEFOLD HUMAN BEING
there are presented the basic relationships between
three bodily systems – nerve-sense system, rhythmic system, metabolic-limb
system – and three kinds of soul-spiritual activities: thinking/perceiving,
feeling, and willing. "The majority of people when they speak of thinking,
feeling and willing, consider them at most mirror-pictures of external nature
which appear in man. These abstract ideas which have been adopted by modern
science did not exist for the thinkers of olden times. For the thinkers of old
never spoke of a purely abstract Will-process, of a purely abstract
thought-process, but of a 'salt-process', of a 'sulphur-process', and they meant
thereby, something that on the one hand is of the nature of soul-and-spirit and
on the other of a material-etheric nature. To them, this was a unity that
enabled them to perceive how the soul works everywhere in the bodily organism.
In olden times men did not use the abstract word 'think' to express
something that arose in the mind as a picture. When a real knower spoke
about thinking he spoke of the 'salt-process'. Nor did he speak in an
abstract way of the Will [1] but of the astral forces laying hold of the airy
element in man, of the 'sulphur-process' from which the Will is born.
Willing was a process of concrete reality and it was said that the
adjustment between the two – for they are opposite processes – was brought
about by the 'mercury-process', by that which is fluid and yet has form,
which swings to and fro from the etheric nature to the astral nature, from
the fluidic to the aeriform." [2]
Let's take a closer look at these processes. "In ancient times man knew
that within him the universe is reborn in varied forms; he experienced an
inner world. Out of his inner vital fluids the whole universe arose as an
etheric structure. Man experienced a real process, an actual happening. And
in modern man the process is there just the same, only he cannot inwardly
experience it." [3] This activity in the human being is
a 'salt-process' [4]
that set the stage for the next inner activity.
"What man has formed in his etheric body – by virtue of which he is
inwardly another cosmos, a microcosm, an etheric rebirth of the macrocosm –
what he thus possesses as an inner cosmos, he can in the element of air, by
the process of breathing, again gradually obliterate. The life-giving air
which man takes in with his breath and which then spreads through his whole
organism, over the whole of the microcosm, renders the shapes therein
indistinct. The wonderful etheric universe in miniature begins, directly the
breath contacts it, to become indefinite. That which formerly consisted of a
myriad forms, is unified, because the 'astral man' lives in the airy
element, just as the 'etheric man' lives in the fluids. The astral being of
man lives in this airy element and by the breaking up of the etheric
thoughts, by the metamorphosis of etheric thoughts into a force, the Will is
born from the working of the 'astral man' in the 'air man'. And together
with the Will, there arise the forces of growth which are connected with the
Will.
This knowledge expressed a great deal more than is suggested nowadays by
the abstract word 'Will'. It is a concrete process. The astral lays hold of
the airy element and spreads over that which is etheric and fluidic. And
thereby a real process is set up which appears in outer nature in a
different form, when something is burning. This process was conceived by the
ancients as the 'sulphur-process'. And from the 'sulphur-process' there
unfolds that which is then experienced in the soul as Will."
[5]
In its essence the 'sulphur-process' is related to the element of fire,
by help of which things in the outside world are radically transformed.
However in our organism this process becomes the spiritual-soul process
which – through the medium of human warmth – enables us to become active
participants in the world events. In this way we can change things, and
this
ability of transformation is the true nature of the human Will.
The Source of Nourishing Forces in Our Food
The nature of the forces of nourishment in our food is complex and
multilayered. Now we will look at one of the most important aspects of food
quality. Among the key tenets of the biodynamic approach to plant cultivation is
the awareness of the process of rejuvenation in the middle of the winter.
While nature is, from a physical perspective, in deep slumber, on the
spiritual level there is happening the most important activity for the new
growth of the plants – the cosmic 'salt process'. "If we turn our eyes
downward to the earthly soil, which in spring-time sends forth all the
shooting, sprouting life, we are looking at the salt process. This salt
process is indeed most important for the springing and sprouting life. For
the roots of the plants, in that they form themselves out of the seeds, are
dependent for their whole growth on the relation in which they stand to the
salts
[6] – the salt-formation in the ground of the Earth. What the ground of
the Earth contains of salts – the deposits within the Earth's surface – all
this gives substance to the roots. It is this which actually makes the root
into a root, the earthly foundation of plant life.
Thus when we approach the Earth we come to the 'salt process'. This is
what the Earth makes of itself in the depth of winter. And then the plants,
unfolding and growing, carry the salts through their leaves and blossoms
into the seeds. We find them of course in the most varied parts, these
salts; they are carried upward through the plants; the salts etherise
themselves, they enter into the ethereal, essential oils. All that is
salt-formation in the widest sense – salt-formation in the sense that it
forms itself as a physical deposit as the dissolved salt is deposited in a
glass of water – all this has the peculiarity of being transparent or
porous, as it were, to the spiritual. Where there is salt, there the
spiritual has, in a sense, a clear field. The spiritual can enter wherever
there is salt. In winter-time the inner Earth becomes truly spiritual
through the salt-content which specially consolidates there. But by means of
water the Earth is enabled in midwinter not merely to grow rigid in the
salts and permeate these stiffened salts with spirit, but to vivify the
spiritualised substances and to lead them over into life. The surface of the
Earth as a whole is alive in mid-winter. There is a tremendous intensifying
of the power of the Earth under the surface during winter to develop life,
to produce life." [7]
Here we have one example of how the outer view can be deceiving. While
the nature outwardly shows the death-like sleep, in their depths is
happening the process which enables the new yearly cycle of its growth. But
what is the nature of these spiritual forces that enables the rebirth of
nature through its entrance into the mineral layers of our planet – that is,
into the salts of the Earth from the viewpoint of alchemy? "Midwinter is the time
when the strongest formative forces, the strongest crystallizing forces can
develop in the mineral substances within the Earth. This is happening when
the inner nature of the Earth has the characteristic of being least reliant
on itself, on its mineral masses, and most under the influence of the
crystal-forming forces from the widths of the universe. Thus we can say:
During the months of November and December, there is a time when what is
beneath the surface of the Earth has a particularly strong effect on plant
growth. This force of crystallization, which is already apparent in the
crystallizing snow, reaches its peak intensity in January or February and
gets stronger and more intense the further down into the Earth one goes."
[8]
What is the essential character of these crystallising forces that are
coming from the universe? From the description of
COSMIC EVOLUTION OF SUBSTANCES
it is evident that the solid mineral substances came into
existence together with the life ether. This happened through the parallel
process of gradual crystallisation of minerals from the fluid condition of
matter, and the gradual ‘rarefaction’ of etheric substances into its finest
form – into life ether. For that reason there is a strong affinity between
minerals and life ether. This explains why minerals in the middle of the
winter can open themselves to the inflow of spiritual forces that enable the
renewal of the life of the plants. In other words, here we have the process of renewal of
plant life by the entry of cosmic ether of life, and then – as the plants
are consumed by animals and humans – also the renewal of life in higher
kingdoms. This presence of cosmic forces of life in our food is what really
nourishes us.
Metamorphosis of Nourishing Forces into the Power of Will
After we have gained a basic understanding of the
nature of the human Will and of the forces of nourishment we can look at the
processes in the human organism which enable the metamorphosis of the
nourishing forces into the power of Will. In EARTHLY NUTRITIONAL STREAM
it
is explained how the earthly substances from our food is carried from the
metabolic-limb system through the rhythmic system to the nerve-sense system.
But in food which we eat there are not just substances, food contains also
forces. These are "the plastic, formative forces of nourishment.
These nutritive forces are active in the human metabolic system. But those
forces which are otherwise active in human nutrition are passed up into the
breathing system and there they become healing
forces. And in working on further there they turn into forces for the
inward correction of illness. The healing forces within us are
metamorphoses of the nutritive forces. The forces that prevail in our
breathing system are healing forces; they are healing us continually."
[9]
This is the short summary of NUTRITION AND 'INNER HEALER'.
The next phase of transformation happens "when these breathing forces
rise into the head, the healing forces
become spiritual forces active in sense-perception
and in thinking. Thought, perception, the inner spiritual life of
man, are a higher metamorphosis of therapy, the healing process."
[10]
Through this metamorphosis the healing forces "as it were, become the
material foundation for the spiritual life of man." [11]
Here we have an additional perspective on the link between
nutrition and capacity of learning.
And this is not yet the end of metamorphoses, for we have yet the third
transformation of the original forces of nourishment, when "the
thought-forces transform into forces of Will,
so that in man they become the forces of movement – forces that come to
expression in man as movement and the power of Will, enabling him to walk
and work and take hold of things." [12] Here we have
an additional perspective on the topic treated in the nutritional principle
FOOD AS SOURCE OF ENERGY.
What is the link between spiritual development of and forces of Will? We
can say that spiritual development which focuses solely on acquiring new
knowledge is not yet an end in itself. Although the new ideas and better
understanding of the world around us is essential for any growth, it cannot
become fertile without permeation of ideas and ideals with the feelings of
enthusiasm and the forces of the Will. In this manner the question of
spiritual development becomes simultaneously the question of moral
development, because without the ability to change things we cannot improve
the world we live in. People are immoral when they do things which are
harmful for others. But this is not the only case which demonstrates the
lack of morality. We are immoral also when we don't do things we know are
good for others, for in this case we are not transforming our moral values
into the deeds. In all such cases we are not capable – for whatever reason –
to make our ideals and visions of the better world come true.
There are many reasons for lack of Will, and, as we have seen above, the
food we eat has an important role in this. The link between the food we eat
and the amount of life energy one possesses is recognised inside mainstream
science and in public. But this relationship is much more complex from the
simplified formula: food = calories = energy. It is obvious that we need
energy – that is, forces of Will – if we want to be active and change things
in the world around us, but "nutrition as it is today does not supply the
strength necessary for manifesting the spirit in physical life. A bridge can
no longer be built from thinking to Will and action. Food plants no longer
contain enough forces people need for this." [13]
This observation was expressed in 1924, in the time when the use of
artificial fertilisers
was not as widespread as it is now. The big increase of the use of
artificial fertilisers has really happened only after World War II.
Nowadays, when we are confronted with the emergence of multiple previously
unknown problems and illnesses in relation to the human ability to move –
such as chronic fatigue syndrome, Parkinson's disease, etc. – we are
witnessing the consequences of intensive use of agrochemicals in the last
decades. The use of artificial fertilisers is one of the main reasons for
the loss of vital forces in plants, because the proper renewal of life
forces via the 'salt-process' can happen only in nature in a natural way and
not in the fields which have been deprived of humus and microorganisms. The
great paradox of modern farming is the fact that the use of
artificially-made mineral fertilisers hinders or even obstructs the cosmic
'salt process'. For only when we work in harmony with all natural elements,
and when we stimulate all living processes in the earth, can we enable such
inflow of cosmic forces which provide the maximum amount of nourishing
forces that are capable to stimulate the whole human being, including his
Will.
For complementary perspectives see:
♦ FOUR SEASONS IN NUTRITION
♦ NUTRITION VERSUS MOVEMENT
