"The Bible has been given to the Western World by the Recording Angels who give to each and all exactly what they need for their development".
— Max Heindel
Naturally, a detailed account could not be given in a few lines like the first chapter of Genesis, but the main points are there in orderly succession, very much like an algebraical formula for Creation.
The second verse proceeds: "The Earth was waste and uninhabited, and darkness rested upon the face of the deep; and the Spirits of the Elohim floated above the deep." In the beginning of manifestation that which is now the Earth was in the Saturn Period, and in exactly the condition described. It was not "without form and void," as expressed in the King James version. It was hot, and thus well-defined separate from the deep of space, which was cold. It is true that it was dark, but it could be dark and still be hot, for "dark" heat necessarily precedes glowing or visible heat. Above this dark Earth of the Saturn Period floated the creative Hierarchies. They worked upon it from the outside and molded it. The Bible refers to them as the "Spirits of Elohim."
The Sun Period is well described in the third verse, which says, "And the Elohim said. Let there be Light; and there was Light." This passage has been jeered at as the most ridiculous nonsense. The scornful query has been put, How could there be light upon the Earth when the Sun was not made until the fourth day? The Bible narrator, however, is not speaking of the Earth alone. He is speaking of the central "fire-mist," from which were formed the planets of our system, including the Earth. Thus when the nebula reached a state of glowing heat, which it did in the Sun Period, there was no necessity for an outside illuminant; the Light was within.
In the fourth verse we read: "The Elohim differentiated between the light and the darkness." Necessarily, for the outside space was dark, in contradistinction to the glowing nebula which existed during the Sun Period.
The Moon Period is described in the sixth verse, as follows: "And Elohim said, Let there be an expansion (translated "firmament" in other versions) in the waters, to divide the water from the water. "This exactly describes conditions in the Moon Period, when the heat of the glowing fire-mist and the cold of outside space had formed a body of water around the fiery core. The contact of fire and water generated steam, which is water in expansion, as our verse describes. It was different from the comparatively cool water, which constantly gravitated toward the hot, fiery core, to replace the outrushing steam. Thus there was a constant circulation of the water held in suspension, and also an expansion, as the steam, rushing outward from the fiery core, formed an atmosphere of "fire-fog" condensed by contact with outside space, returning again to the core to be reheated and perform another cycle. Thus there were two kinds of water, and a division between them, as stated in the Bible. The dense water was nearest the fiery core; the expanded water or steam was on the outside.
This also harmonizes with the scientific theory of modern times. First the dark heat; then the glowing nebula; later the outside moisture and inside heat; and, finally, incrustation.
The Earth Period is next described. Before we take up its description, however, we have to deal with the Recapitulations. The verses quoted and the descriptions given will also correspond to the recapitulatory Periods. Thus what is said of the Saturn Period describes also the condition of the System when it emerges from any of the rest Periods. The descriptions of the Saturn, Sun, and Moon Periods would therefore correspond to the first three Revolutions of our present Earth Period, and the following would correspond with conditions on Earth in the present Revolution.
In the ninth verse we read, "And Elohim said, Let the waters be divided from the dry land. . .and Elohim called the dry land Earth." This refers to the first firm incrustation. Heat and moisture had generated the solid body of our present Globe.
The Polarian Epoch: The ninth verse, which describes the Earth Period in this fourth Revolution (where the real Earth Period work commenced), also describes the formation of the mineral kingdom and the Recapitulation by man of the mineral stage in the Polarian Epoch. Each Epoch is also a Recapitulation of the previous stage. Just as there are Recapitulations of Globes, Revolutions, and Periods, so there are on each Globe, recapitulations of all that has gone before. These Recapitulations are endless. There is always a spiral within a spiral — in the atom, in the Globe, and in all other phases of evolution.
Complicated and bewildering as this may appear at first, it is really not so difficult to understand. There is an orderly method running through it all and in time one is able to perceive and follow the workings of this method, as a clue leading through a maze. Analogy is one of the best helps to an understanding of evolution.
The Hyperborean Epoch is described in verses 11 to 19 as the work of the fourth day. It is here recorded that Elohim created the plant kingdom, the Sun, the Moon, and the Stars.
The Bible agrees with the teachings of modern science that plants succeeded the mineral. The difference between the two teachings is in regard to the time when the Earth was thrown off from the central mass. Science asserts that it was before the formation of any incrustation which could be called mineral and plant. If we mean such minerals and plants as we have today, that assertion is correct. There was no dense material substance, but nevertheless the first incrustation that took place in the central Sun was mineral. The Bible narrator gives only the principal incidents. It is not recorded that the incrustation melted when it was thrown off from the central mass as a ring broke, the fragments afterward coalescing. In a body as small as our Earth, the time required for recrystallization was so comparatively short that the historian does not mention it, nor the further subsidiary fact that the melting process took place once more when the Moon was thrown off from the Earth. He probably reasons that one who is entitled to esoteric information is already in possession of such minor details as those.
The plants of the incrustation of the central fire-mist were ethereal, therefore the melting processes did not destroy them. As the lines of force along which ice crystals form are present in the water, so when the Earth crystallized, were those ethereal plant-forms in it. They were the molds which drew to themselves the dense material forming the plant-bodies of the present day and also of the plant-forms of the past, which are embedded in the geological strata of our Earth globe.
These ethereal plant-forms are aided in their formation when the heat came from outside, after the separation of the Earth from Sun and Moon. That heat gave them the vital force to draw to themselves the denser substance.
The Lemurian Epoch is described in the work of the fifth day. This Epoch, being the third, is in a sense a Recapitulation of the Moon Period, and in the Biblical narrative we find described such conditions as obtained in the Moon Period — water, fire-fog, and the first attempts at moving, breathing life.
Verses 20 and 21 tell us that "Elohim said, Let the waters bring forth life-breathing things... and fowl...; and Elohim formed the great amphibians and all life-breathing things according to their species, and all fowl with wings."
This also harmonizes with the teaching of material science that the amphibians preceded the birds.
The student is invited to not particularly that the things that were formed were not Life. It does not say that Life was created, but "things" that breath or inhale life. The Hebrew word for that which they inhaled is nephesh, and it should be carefully noted, as we shall meet it in a new dress later.
The Atlantean Epoch is dealt with in the work of the sixth day. In verse 24 the creation of mammals is mentioned, and there the work nephesh again occurs, explaining that the mammals "breathed life." "Elohim said, Let the Earth bring forth life-breathing things... mammals...;" and in verse 27, "Elohim formed man in their likeness: male and female made they (Elohim) them."
The Bible historian here omits the a-sexual and hermaphrodite human stages and comes to the two separate sexes, as we know them now. He could not do otherwise, as he is describing the Atlantean Epoch, and by the time that stage in evolution was reached there were neither sexless men nor hermaphrodites, the differentiation of sexes having taken place earlier — in the Lemurian Epoch. That which afterward became man could hardly be spoken of as man in the earlier stages of its development, as it differed but little from the animals. Therefore the Bible narrator is doing no violence to facts when he states that man was formed in the Atlantean Epoch.
In verse 28 (all versions) will be found a very small prefix, with a very great significance: "Elohim said, Be fruitful and
RE-plenish the earth."This plainly shows that the scribe who wrote it was cognizant of the esoteric teaching that the life wave had evolved here, on Globe D of the Earth Period, in previous Revolutions.
The Fifth Epoch corresponds to the seventh day of Creation, when the Elohim rested from their labors as Creators and Guides, and humanity had been launched upon an independent career.
This ends the story of the manner in which the Forms were produced. In the succeeding self-study modules the story is told from the point of view which deals a little more with the Life side.
It must not be thought that the above mentioned Periods have anything to do with the planets which move in their orbits around the Sun in company with the Earth. In fact, it cannot be too emphatically stated that there is no connection whatever between these planets and the Periods. The Periods are simply past, present, or future incarnations of our Earth, "conditions" through which it has passed, is now passing, or will pass in the future.
The three first-mentioned Periods (the Saturn, Sun, and Moon Periods) have been passed through. We are now in the fourth, or Earth Period which is divided into seven Revolutions on seven successive Globes. Our passage on the lowest of these Globes is divided into the Polarian, Hyperborean, Lemurian, Atlantean, Fifth, and two other Epochs which are unnamed. The three and one-half Periods already behind us have been spent in gaining our present vehicles and consciousness. The remaining three and one-half Periods will be devoted to perfecting these different vehicles and expanding our consciousness into something akin to omniscience.
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1. Name the Periods and Epochs of manifestation as mentioned in esoteric teachings.
2. Describe briefly the conditions existing in each, correlating with verses in Genesis.
3. What is meant by recapitulation?
4. What should we particularly note was created?
5. Explain how it is true that "man was formed in the Atlantean Epoch."
6. What is the significance of the prefix "Re" placed before "plenish"?
7. What are the characteristics of the present Fifth Epoch?
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