Elemental Beings

The Elemental beings - another of the topics which does not bolster the reputation of Biodynamics within the scientific community. But I may as well be hung for a sheep as a goat and have a go at demystifying that one. If you can get your head around the spiel on Supersensible research that will help as a primer here.

One of the basic assertions from supersensible research is that there is a much more accurate way of describing things which are alive than by pursuing the assumption that organisms are incredibly complex mechanisms. We are so saturated in the assumption (beavering away below the educational radar as something just 'obvious') that we are 'ultimately', in the last analysis, just our material body. Our brain thinks, our legs move, our heart pumps. If we lose a leg strap on another, if we don't think right we are lacking some chemicals or hard wiring. Something is missing if we are out of kilter and we just need to add it.

The contrary assertion is that matter does not have the field to itself when it is part of an organism. Matter is not the sovereign power here, but it becomes a partner with a principle called the 'etheric'. This etheric principle, when working with matter is called the 'etheric body'. In the same way that life is not just a special form of matter, consciousness is not a special form of life, and self-awareness and self-determination are not an especially convoluted form of any of the above. (incidentally, there are higher and more comprehensive principles: humans are not the top of the tree!) All these principles work together in ways that are extensively described by Steiner and others.

It is complex but there is an ABC of it all; please do not mistake this simplified description as a full guide. Nature is not tamed by this outlook, but given the possibility of Her due respect.

Inorganic stuff has no etheric body - eg a rock. All plants have an etheric body, all animals a soul body, and humans have potential for self awareness.

We can all try on this idea, at least as a hypothesis. A little harder for most is to imagine a state of being in which, for instance, the etheric and soul bodies interpenetrate but nothing physical is involved; what would that be?

Elemental beings are creatures whose being is of the nature of soul, and whose activity is Etheric. Some people are born able to 'see' these beings as part of their daily reality, others only in states of illness. (One of the challenges is not to lose oneself when working with these beings.) Others have developed the capacity to communicate and perceive them and even to work with them, cooperating in their role in nature. Hugo Erbe was one such person. There are many traditions which educate people in this development. Anthroposophy is just one.

It's your call;- is this a development of a clear mind - or madness? Mysticism ("starts in the mist, ends in schism"), or science?