What happens when we die? This is a question that is of great importance, simply because it is something we will all experience. And yet, we don't know much about it. Not really. Or is it that we don't remember?

It's easy to see evidence of what happens to our physical body. It breaks down, disintegrates, becomes unrecognisable as 'me' though we can still identify it as human. Eventually, after hundreds or thousands of years, it gradually decomposes and becomes part of the earth.

From Egyptian times, and perhaps earlier, this process started becoming important to humanity, so ancient Egyptians embalmed the body, and wrote The Egyptian Book of the Dead to guide the soul on this journey through the underworld into the heavens. This tells us that there was a belief that we are more than our visible, physical body. In other words we have a consciousness that is still there, but is different in the invisible, spiritual world compared to our waking, earth consciousness. And we can also see that these ancient people were becoming aware of what we also realise - we don't feel connected with the spiritual world, and neither do we seem to have any memory about it. We could no longer experience the spiritual world all around us, so we made images in paintings and statues. We could no longer perceive the light of the spiritual world, we could only reflect on it.

In earlier times of human development, we had a direct experience, in a state of consciousness that would seem like a dream to us nowadays, of the spiritual world and the beings who live in it. We can see this when we look at the stars and planets every night and we see points of light. For instance, we look at the Milky Way - our galaxy. Do we see a Rainbow Serpent? We can see Saturn through a telescope or in images from NASA, but we don't see the deep inner secrets of the Cosmic 'I' which beings in the realm of Saturn preserve as the Cosmic Memory. Many stars and planets have the names of Gods and Heroes of myth and legend. We named them many thousands of years ago. Today it may be difficult for us to picture Mars or Ares, the god of war and action as a being today, but we may still have an idea of the energies that are Mars-like. If we picture Venus, different energy forces come to mind.

Creation myths also tell us of this magical world that is invisible to us today. Aboriginal stories talk of the Dreamtime, and how we came from the galaxy in the starry heavens that we now call the Milky Way and will return there. So, it is recognised by most people that there is an earthly world and a spiritual world.

In Hindu mythology, we have Brahma the Creator, Vishnu the Preserver and Shiva the Destroyer. This trinity gives us many story-pictures of the workings of the Universe. In the Bible we have the trinity of the Creator-Father, Christ the Sun-Being and the Holy Spirit.

Every major religion tells us of an earthly life and a life after death. What do we know -

There seems to be a place called Heaven, Nirvana, Elysium, the Holy City, Eternal Light, Paradise, Devachan

There's also a place called Hell, Hades, Eternal Darkness, the Inferno, the Underworld

And there's a place in-between, called Purgatory, Kamaloka, the Bardo, which is a place for judgement and purification, leaving our earthly desires behind and getting a different perspective on our previous earth life.

All these places have different regions - in Islam and in the Bible you can ascend from the First to the Seventh Heaven. All the regions have different qualities and are vividly described, in many different ways, e.g. in the Bardo or Tibetan Book of the Dead. Rudolf Steiner tells us about an etheric or elemental world, an astral or soul world, and the world of the spirit. These worlds also relate to what Steiner describes as our journey through the planets and zodiac.

This invisible world also contains spiritual beings, called Angels, Devas, Boddhisatvas, the Spiritual Hierarchies such as Angels, Archangels and Primal Forces, up to the highest Seraphim and Cherubim, all the gods and their avatars, (e.g. the Hindu god Krishna) great Masters and teachers such as Buddha, Abraham, Moses, Christ - the only God who incarnated and lived as a human being - as well as monsters and demons, called Titans, Asuras, etc.

And we may also meet again with friends, relatives, ancestors, and people with whom we were connected through a common interest or destiny.

Some accounts tell of lights that vary in intensity, colours or the feeling associated with colours, e.g. red or blue, sounds - the Music of the Spheres or the angels singing, heat and cold.

These experiences would be different from the way we experience these through our senses, because we are also now a spiritual being living in a spiritual world. To be more precise, we are no longer in a physical world of matter. This physical world was the result or effect of causes that originated in the worlds hidden to our senses. Hence the term 'maya' or illusion, or apppearance as opposed to reality. It's like seeing a reflection or image in a mirror.

So, we may conclude that our consciousness determines how we pass through these experiences. If we think about what happens when we go to sleep every night, we know we've been asleep and unconscious, maybe dreaming, but we don't remember what happened for approximately one-third of our earthly life when we were asleep. If we were 'awake' while we were sleeping, we may be surprised at what happens when our physical and etheric or life-body is lying on the bed and our astral body or soul, and spirit have returned to our spiritual home. Rudolf Steiner tells us

- we go through every incarnation every night

- we go through the day in retrospect and evaluate it in the light of our Higher Self

- we meet with our angel and plan the next day.

Sometimes we wake up with the answer to a problem. For most of us, we wake up knowing who we are, but we don't know where we've been.

There's another source of information about what happens when we are dead or separated from our physical body. People who have an out-of-body experience are still conscious, and aware that they still exist. Then they return to their physical body, as we do when we wake up after sleep. But they remember what happened.

There are also people who have survived near-death experiences. Their stories have common features, such as -

- going through a dark tunnel or passage and seeing a light at the end

- there may be helpers, family and friends who have passed on, who meet them along the way

- the light may be unbearably intense and their consciousness seems heightened

- the light may also be a being, such as an angel or Christ, and emanates love and warmth

- they are totally at peace and feel safe in the presence of the light

- they see a review of their life, sometimes as a panorama, and it occurs all at once, i.e. not in the sequence of time as we know it

- the review focuses on how much love and compassion we gave to the people around us

- the review may include a judgement or assessment that seems to come from us

- there are 'many mansions' in the spiritual world, e.g. places of worship, places of learning,

- the 'dead' person usually doesn't want to return but knows they have to

- when they return, they know it was more than a dream or a vision, they didn't imagine it.

It was real.

- they no longer have any fear about the moment of death and what happens after.

- they are certain - absolutely sure about what they know, and

- they usually don't want to talk about it, because people may not understand and it's difficult to find the words to express the intensity of their experience

Here's what Joe Geraci had to say in the book 'Heading Toward Omega' (author: Kenneth Ring) - an 'ideal' experience.

It was a total immersion in light; brightness, warmth, peace, security.

I did not have an out-of-body experience.

I did not see my body or anyone about me.

I just immediately went into this beautiful bright light.

It's difficult to describe; as a matter of fact, it's impossible to describe.

Verbally, it cannot be expressed.

It's something which becomes you and you become it.

I could say "I was peace, I was love." I was the brightness, it was part of me...

You just know. You're all-knowing - and everything is a part of you.

It's - it's just so beautiful.

It was eternity.

It's like I was always there and I will always be there,

and that

my existence of earth was just a brief instant.

How was he able to tell us about this experience? And what does it tell us about the physical world and the non-physical world?

In the physical world we are enclosed within our physical body. It can be called a boundary - between you and me, between me and the tree, or the chair, etc. Once we no longer have this boundary, we cross a threshold where the boundaries are not defined. So the experience was one of being... peace, love, full of light.

It's also important to note that throughout the experience, Joe still knew he existed. "I could say... I was peace... I was love... I was always there... I will always be there. This I-consciousness or Higher Self is what we also connect with. This is the consciousness that orientates us in the spiritual world. If this consciousness is attuned to the Christ Being, or the Buddha, or the Universal Wisdom, then the light will be filled with the qualities of Christ, the Buddha, or the Light-filled wisdom of the universe.

Many beliefs also include reincarnation, that we return to Earth after a period of time - to experience living as a human being in a physical body again. The reason we incarnate again is to adjust our Karma or destiny, based on choices we made when we went through our life review. It gives us an opportunity to work on our self-development and be part of human evolution.

So, there are many beliefs, some more satisfying than others. Ultimately, our experience will depend on how we see ourselves in the spiritual world. What picture do I have of my being in the spiritual world and what is in this world?

When I look around me in the world it is full of wonders and marvels that I perceive with my senses. Everything is a created being and everything in our big, beautiful Universe comes into being, lives, grows and then dies away. I can create a picture of how, for example, a plant started life - came into being as a seed. That seed developed, grew into a plant, a tree - and then, having completed the cycles of its life, became... a seed again. There are many examples. And they all show how life cycles are transformations, everything changes over time, as part of the process of growth and decay.

And our physical body also belongs to this cycle. This gives us a different view of death. It now becomes a beginning, a part of the process of change and transformation, an event, not the end. And it has great meaning for us to be able to look back on this event when we are in the spiritual world.

Rudolf Steiner describes it like this:

"From this side of life, death appears as a disintegration, something of which human beings have fear and dread. From the other side, death appears as the luminous beginning of spiritual experience, as something which spreads sun-like over the whole life between death and a new birth, which warms the soul with joy and which is repeatedly looked back on with deep and warm understanding. That is the moment of death."

And this moment, the event of our birth into the spiritual world, unlike our moment of birth into our earthly life, ' is one that stands before our soul throughout our life between death and a new birth.' So it's a very important event for us, because it is 'a victory of the spirit' that has been released from the physical. Now I am becoming a spiritual being in a spiritual world.

And for this to happen, it depends on our consciousness. If we think that we lose consciousness with death, because that's what appears to happen, then as Steiner explains:

"...we have to understand: this is not true. For consciousness is exceedingly lucid after death, and only because human beings are not used to living in this extremely clear consciousness in the initial period after dying does something similar to a state of sleep occur immediately after death."

"But this state of sleep is the opposite of the one which we enter in ordinary life. In ordinary life we sleep because our level of consciousness is reduced. After death we are unconscious in a certain sense because consciousness is too strong, too overwhelming, because we live completely in the consciousness and need to accustom ourselves to this heightened state...

The Bardo or Tibetan Book of the Dead goes through the journey of the soul which takes 7x7 or 49 days, and says that if there is an 'awakening' the soul progresses though the spiritual world. If the soul is 'asleep', then it will reincarnate again immediately.

.

Why do I need a physical body?

Having a physical body is essential for our earthly incarnation. Because we have a physical body, we experience - space and time, gravity, standing upright on the earth

- we take in the outer world through our senses and sensory perception

- we use our brain for thinking

- we are able to reflect inwardly on our experiences

- it is the bearer of our individuality or 'I'consciousness.

I look in a mirror and recognise who I am. When I look at you, I can see that we are separate individualities. Each of us is enclosed in our own skin, as it were.

And then, because we have an I or Ego-consciousness, we process our experiences and give them meaning. Our I creates the connection between the outer and inner world.

So maybe, I don't fear losing my physical body as much as I fear losing what it enables me to do, which is to live fully as a human being on Earth, as an individual. It's the instrument I use to experience and reflect on my thoughts, my feelings and my actions. So, respect for my body, looking after my bodily needs and well-being helps me in earthly life.

But our physical body - the visible part, like everything else in the Universe - has an invisible part. And this invisible or spiritual part of our physical body then releases itself and returns to become part of the Universe. It's as if it was all rolled up inside us, in our skin, and then it unrolls again and fills out the Universe. So now we can say that we really exist everywhere in the world. We experience the Universe in a different way.

When we were alive, we breathed in and out in a certain rhythm, our heart- beat likewise has a pulse or rhythm. And we just take it for granted, but it is all part of the cosmic rhythm. What is the relationship between our breathing and what happens in our universe?

If we breathe on average 18 times a minute, then he number of breaths in a day (24 hrs) would be 18 x 60 or 25,920. It takes the Sun 25,920 years to travel through each sign of the zodiac and arrive back at the same place. At the present time, the Sun rises in Pisces on March 21 - the spring equinox in the northern hemphere. Every 2,190 years it moves into the next sign. The Sun moved into Pisces in the 15th century (1413 AD/CE) Before that it was in Aries or Ares - before that in Taurus, and so on. By this calendar, a cosmic day would be 25,920 divided by 365. Using this cosmic calendar, every day of our life on earth can be seen as one breath in and out. The number of times we breathe in a lifetime of 70 - 71 years (although we find many people living a lot longer nowadays) is - you guessed it - 25,920. This is the time it takes for the Sun to travel through the signs of the zodiac and arrive back at the same place at the spring equinox.

Now we are free from our physical body and we can feel our relationship to the great rhythms of the Universe. I experience myself in the Universe.

Do not stand at my grave and weep.

I am not there. I do not sleep.

I am a thousand winds that blow.

I am the diamond glints on snow.

I am the sunlight on ripened grain.

I am the gentle autumn rain.

When you awaken in the morning's hush

I am the swift uplifting rush

Of quiet birds on circled flight.

I am the stars that shine at night.

Do not stand at my grave and cry.

I am not there. I did not die.

But, as we mentioned before, we look back to the moment of our death, and this makes us aware again of our ego-consciousness or self. We remember who we were.

How are we able to do this? Our etheric body is the bearer of our Memory. We still have this body of life forces. Now there are different types of memory:

Factual memory is when we use our brain to remember a book or a movie.

Autobiographical memory is my memory of what I experienced, what happened to me - my life. It is my personal history and it belongs to me. It develops through my life experiences and gives me my continuity of self.

Shared memory is what I experienced with other people.

Rudolf Steiner tells us "We are true human beings only inasmuch as we have memory."

Even in the spiritual world, we still need to have this memory to start with.

When we lose our physical body, our factual or abstract memory is also lost. It's like asking people what they remember about what they learned in school. We learned the theory to pass the exam and it all flew out of our heads. Most of it made little or no impression on us.

Our autobiographical memory is different. It makes a deeper impression because I lived it. If we think about our school days, most of us remember a teacher or our best friend. This made a deeper impression and we remember our experiences together.

When I experienced the moment of death, this also made a deep impression.

So I want to look back to this moment - the moment of death - then I can start to distinguish my past earth life and realise 'that was you'. Steiner says,

"Then we experience in this wealth of consciousness the moment of which it can be said: we awaken. We might be awakened by an event which was particularly signficant in our life and which is also of significance for events after our earth life."

We then experience our etheric body dissolving and all our memories appear before us as a vivid panorama or review of our life. Everything that happened in our waking, earthly life appears in images. These images are very vivid, and nothing is forgotten. This also happens in some near-death experiences and is described in many religious texts, such as the Egyptian Book of the Dead, where the soul of the recently departed is weighed on a scale against a feather. In the Christian tradition, the Archangel Michael is depicted weighing the soul on scales, often with demons or the Dragon waiting to snatch the soul away. Rudolf Steiner calls this the meeting with the Lesser Guardian of the Threshold. This review of our life is where we see what happened from our point of view. It is everything I experienced, and it includes all our joys and sorrows When this is completed, in about 2 or 3 days, this etheric record of our life becomes part of the Universal or Cosmic Memory - the Akashic record. But we keep an extract, like a seed that holds within it the potential for growth in the future.

Then we move into a different stage of consciousness. We are now in the lowest realm of the astral world. We go through our life review again, and this happens as a retrospective, starting from the moment of death and going backwards. This review goes through the content of my sleep life. It lasts for about one-third of my earthly life - the time I was asleep. Again I go through the retrospective, again I feel the impulse to evaluate myself in the light of the spiritual world. When I experienced things with other people, I only had half of the shared memory. Now I experience the other half - how they felt.

Rudolf Steiner tells us that in the spiritual world, when spiritual beings see what we have done, they are in sympathy with our actions that showed love, compassion, warmth of heart, interest in the spiritual world. This creates light in the spiritual world.

Everything in the lower astral regions works on the basis of sympathy and antipathy. This can be described as having a sensitivity to what is around us. This may help to explain why this is portrayed as a time when we may suffer or experience the loss of earthly desires and pleasures. The first region is called the region of burning desire. We desire what we were most connected with on earth. If this connection was based on eating or drinking too much, on addictions to drugs or alcohol, greed for material possessions etc, we will crave this and will be unable to satisfy it. Therefore, we suffer.

In the Bardo, the book that Tibetan Buddhist monks recite to the dead to accompany them on their journey through the realms of the astral world, there are very detailed descriptions of bright and dull lights or colours. These lights correspond to different emotions, such as greed, jealousy, anger, stupidity, etc. The beings in this astral world may confront us as demons or monsters - what was our inner life is now on the outside. If we could see 'anger'as a picture, what might it look like? Would it even look human? What colour would we feel permeating through us? This is where we see how our personality went through life on earth.

We continue through these lower astral regions, and it is important to remember that this period seems to be a time of judgement, but it is an evaluation that we do in accordance with our Higher Self and the laws of the spiritual world. In near-death experiences, many people find the presence of a being of light protects and guides them through this process.

Who is this Being of Light?

Rudolf Steiner tells us that since Christ incarnated, this has not only changed the evolution of the earth and humanity, but also our experience after death. In Old Testament times, Moses was the Judge of our Karma but now it is Christ. This is why people who have experienced this part of the life review feel that the Being who guides this process is radiating love, warmth and acceptance. Before the Mystery of Golgotha, human beings who passed through the gate of death were finding it more difficult to perceive the light in the spiritual world. In ancient Greece, this reached its climax when a person felt 'it was better to be a beggar on Earth than a king in the realm of Shades' or shadows. After Christ died and descended into Hades, it was like a lightning bolt- the Light had returned to the spiritual world and souls were able to connect with the Light through Christ. With Christ, we experience a judgement that is governed by compassion, love and forgiveness. We receive Grace.

It is important to note that in the same way as the Sun shines on every one of us, Christ is now the representative for all humanity. It is also true to say that individual aspects of Christ may be seen in the names given by other religions to Higher Beings. So, it is also possible to meet Amitabha Buddha, our Guardian Angel, Krishna, etc.

As mentioned previously, as part of this life review we pass through different astral regions, where we may feel isolated or in community with other beings, where we experience other beings - or not, where we grow and develop.

Then we enter the world of the spirit. This is where my Higher Self- the Light from my I-consciousness is now free of my earth life. My physical, etheric and astral bodies, which gave me my sense of self as a human being, have now dissolved. Spiritual beings are now able to work on the seed or extract of these bodies to help me form them in accordance with my impulse to reincarnate.

Now that I have gone through a process where I can see clearly what still needs to be achieved to transform and develop in harmony with the wisdom of the Universe and humanity, I can also perceive my Higher Self. This is the 'awakening' of my true being, where the Christ light can shine through me.

I look into the darkness

In it there arises Light -

Living light.

Who is this Light in the darkness?

It is I, myself in my reality.

This reality of the I

Enters not into my earthly life;

I am but a picture of it.

But I shall find it again,

When, with good will for the Spirit

I shall have stepped through the Gate of Death.

Rudolf Steiner tells us it is a matter of growing accustomed to this different state of consciousness. This requires good will for the Spirit. Will involves action - actively seeking the Spirit. Where is it to be found?

We no longer hear the stars or the Gods speaking from the Heavens, the thunder and lightning, or from anywhere outside us. When we hear the voice of God it comes from our inner being. It speaks as the voice of my conscience. This is the Light of my inner life - 'Christ in me'. When I act as a moral human being, using love and compassion as my guide, then I create inside me the light that can meet the Light of Christ.

There is a saying that was inscribed over the portal at the temple of Delphi. It says:

Man Know Yourself

We know what Man or a human being is in earth life. But do we also see ourselves as a picture of living Spirit? How are we able to know the reality of our relationship to the spiritual world? In the life after death, we see how forces from the planets and zodiac work on our being, re-building it for the next incarnation on earth. When we incarnate, there is no part of us that does not bear a relation to the entire Universe. We can discover these relationships in the world of the stars, in our world, and in ourselves during our life on earth.

To build the World in the I,

To behold the I in the World,

Is breathing of the soul.

To sense the Universal All

In feeling of one's inner self

Is Wisdom's pulse.

To trace the paths of the Spirit

In one's own aims of life

Is inner speech of Truth.

So let the soul's breath penetrate

Into the pulse of Wisdom, calling forth

From inmost depths

The speech of Truth

Through all the rhythms of the years of life.

(Meditation given by Rudolf Steiner to Marie von Sievers, later Steiner, in 1911)

Notes for a talk given by Jessie Phelps on 18 August 2009

at Rudolf Steiner House, 307 Sussex St., Sydney.

Reading List: Books and Lectures by Rudolf Steiner

"The Ego-consciousness of the So-called Dead" GA 168. Lecture 3 from "The Relation between the Living and the Dead". This lecture is also known as : The Moment of Death and the Period Thereafter. It can be found on the Rudolf Steiner Archive, www.rsarchive.org

"Death as Metamorphosis of Life" Vol 182 in the Collected Works (CW) of Rudolf Steiner, published by SteinerBooks, 2008. www.steinerbooks.org

"Between Death and Rebirth" Rudolf Steiner Press, London, 1975. rudolfsteinerpress.com

"Occult Science - An Outline" Rudolf Steiner Press, London, 1979.

"Planetary Spheres and their Influence on Man's Life on Earth and in the Spiritual World" Rudolf Steiner Press, London, 1982.

Additional Reading:

Margarete van den Brink and Hans Stolp "A Christian Book of the Dead" Hawthorn Press, UK, 2004. www.hawthornpress.com

Calvert Roszell "The Near-Death Experience" Anthroposophic Press, NY, 1992 .

Stanley Drake "Though You Die" Floris Books, Edinburgh, 4th ed. 2002.

Carol Neiman and Emily Goldman "Afterlife" Labyrinth Publishing (UK) Ltd., 1994.

Anton Grosz, Ph.D. "Letters to a Dying Friend" Theosophical Publishing House, 1997.

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

Supplementary notes:

We can try and learn to understand, firstly through thoughts and concepts, how we are an image of the Creative forces. We can open our mind to understanding the Spiritual forces behind Creation.

When we look at the stars we can start to get a feeling that there live spiritual beings - from the Zodiac came the physical form of our body, starting with Aries for the head right down to Pisces for the feet.

When we feel the rhythms and pulses of the Universe in ourselves in our pulse and breathing.

When we open our heart to see what is Spirit in another being. When we feel empathy and compassion with the suffering and failings of others, in the light of our own shortcomings. When we ask 'How are you?' and mean it.

Today, we hear our Will speak through our inner voice - the voice that is 'God in me' - my conscience. This is the Light in my inner life. When we act out of love, we are creating inside us the Light of Christ. "To preach morality is easy... Schopenhauer's words show true insight, because we all have an inkling of what is right. What is needed is to have an inner attitude that spiritual knowledge - the seed of Wisdom, works in the world through loving actions for the benefit of all humanity.

Tibetan Buddhists have a saying : 'Tomorrow or the next life - whichever comes first'. This keeps them attentive to living. This is what we are supposed to do. This is where we can develop our understanding and love. By bringing consciousness into our soul life. Our life on earth gives us this opportunity.

We have looked at how we can meditate on the reality of the physical world, which is that everything comes into being, lives and dies away. We can take an interest in the proper working of the sense world and follow the process with interest.

For the etheric world, where everything is constantly in transformation, we need to develop a sense of wonder at the beauty and rhythm contained in all this - the Wisdom of the Created World. This is something we can experience whenever we are open to the natural world. When a beautiful sunrise fills us with a sense of wonder and we sense the Universe is breathing in us...

In the astral world, we can observe and take hold of our emotions, our sympathies and antipathies and develop a broader view that allows both possibilities to exist, as well as holding the balance in the middle. We can develop social competence by taking an interest in the other person, having compassion for the suffering of others, and through love, which transcends sympathy and antipathy.

Our ego-consciousness has developed at the expense of our connection to the spiritual world. Stars once spoke to humanity... They are now silent. But the beings who live in the starry realm are listening and waiting to hear what I... the Ego of humanity has to say - to speak to the stars. How does this ego have the strength of will to stand in the world of the senses and the world of the spirit? Through moral deeds, by listening to the inner voice that we call 'conscience'.

In previous epochs, the spiritual world was a reality for us. We were living in the Golden Age or Krita Yuga. But our consciousness was different. We were not Ego or I conscious, we lived in a dreamy, clairvoyant group-soul consciousness and we saw the gods, where now we see the planets - Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Venus, etc.

In the Ancient Indian epoch (7227 BC), we maintained this Unity with the spiritual world through our breathing and developing our etheric or life forces. We no longer beheld the gods themselves, but we could still see what happened in the spiritual world and spiritual beings like Devas or Angels. We knew the earthy world as 'maya' - we saw the spiritual workings of the created world as reality. This was called the Silver Age or Trita Yuga.

In the next epoch, the Ancient Persian (5067 BC), we recognised the Duality of Darkness and Light as part of our connection with the spiritual world, developing our astral forces to become more conscious of our surroundings in earthly life. If we think about the Bronze Age or Dvapara Yuga, we can see that humanity was now becoming much more an earth-man, but we were still familiar with the spiritual world. The movements of the sun and moon, the stars and planets, the seasons, growth and decay were all important to us and we had a relationship to the Universe that was not based on scientific thinking.

Now we come to the Ancient Egyptian-Chaldean-Babylonian epoch (2907 BC) and this concides with another significant time - the start of Kali Yuga (3101 BC) or the Dark Age. We were still developing astral or soul forces through our spinal cord and nervous system and we were much more incarnated in the physical world. We have only to look at the remnants of Egyptian and Babylonian civilisation to see that now we were making our mark on earth. The doors to the spiritual world were closing and realising this, we now needed to enter through a physical door and find the gods in a physical space - the temple became the dwelling place of the Gods. We experienced the physical world and we could only reflect on the spiritual world.

In the next age, the Graeco-Roman epoch (747BC) we have temples and sculpture still reflecting divine spiritual principles, and a growing sense of individuality. In other words, ego-consciousness is now emerging and being established through the forces of the blood . We are starting to use thinking forces and have come to realise - It is better to be a beggar on Earth than a King in the realm of the shadows. Life on earth becomes important and life after death is feared.

In the Fifth post-Atlantean epoch, the one we live in now, which started in the 15th century (1413 AD) we have to use this ego consciousness to experience the reality of the spiritual world. In other words, the spiritual world - the Macrocosm - is within me - the Microcosm and I can experience this with my ego-consciousness.

We have some help.

1.The spiritual world is still all around us, even if we are not aware of it. And the spiritual world will help us, if we are open to it. When we recognise and acknowledge spiritual beings, our thoughts, feelings and actions nourish them when they are motivated by spiritual truth.

2. In 1899 AD, because of events in the spiritual world, Kali Yuga or the Dark Age ended and we are now in the Age of Light. Since then, the Time Spirit who guides humanity is the Archangel Micha-el. It's interesting to note that Micha-el is depicted in pictures as holding the scales or balance for weighing souls as well as conquering the Dragon.

3. In the last age, we experienced a one-off event - which is Christ incarnating. But it is also important to remember that the effect of this deed is still active and continues to work for humanity and the earth. We were no longer able to make the connection from the physical to the spiritual world, so a Divine Being came into the physical world. When we look at what this Being did in the physical world we then have the possibility to find - reconnect with the spiritual world.

4. We can connect our Higher Self to the being of Christ by our deeds of love. Christ said: "I Am the Way, the Truth and the Life" and this can help us find our way to Him.