The human brain

The human brain is part of Man's head or nerve-sense subsystem. It is part of the nervous system, worked upon by the human astral body.

As a physical organ, it structurally represents a picture of the heavens at birth (Schema FMC00.663) and floats in cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) in the head.

The human brain contains an image of the world of the stars, and through the human breathing, the inhaled air scans what can glimmer and glisten in the brain through the light, and what then forms into thoughts in the brain. The air flows back down through the spinal canal .. where expression is given to what has been experienced (1922-04-01-GA211).

The brain is the physical organ for waking consciousness of space and the thinking of the head, the logic and intellect. Thoughts are not formed in the brain, but the human brain works as a reflecting apparatus that throws back the soul-activity so this becomes visible to itself as thought.

Aspects

If this scheme were drawn, there would have to be a closed circle for the breast; for the head a circle left open, and open also for the limb system.

When perceived physically, Man's head appears to be closed above and would have to be drawn so, but perceived spiritually, it is open. The part of a Man which does not belong at all to the realm of the spirit is the bony system, which is entirely of a physical nature; and when spiritually you study the human head, its thick skull is not seen. Only the skin is visible where the hair grows.

When this is looked at spiritually, however, something else appears. Ordinary hair is not there at all, but purely spiritual hair; in other words, rays which penetrate into the human organism and are held back, to some extent, only by the physical hair.

But it is just where there is bone in the organism that the spirit can enter most easily, and this it does in the form of rays.

So, on first looking at a Man with your physical eyes, you see his physical form with the head above, and on his head—if he is not already bald—there is hair. But then, where the dome of the skull comes, spiritually you see nothing of the physical man; you see rays, sun-like rays, pouring into him from the spiritual worlds.

Thus the reason for the circle not being closed for the head is that the surrounding bony vault of the skull enables the spirit to have continual access there.

physiology

• Man is born out of the universe. The human brain is a picture of the heavens at birth, the structural organization of the brain maps to the starry heaven above one's birthplace.
  • "our brain is really a picture of the heavens, and we each have a different picture depending on where and when we were born. ... No two people have the same brain. If we could take a picture of the entire brain with all of its details visible, we would get a different picture for each person. If we photographed a person's brain at the moment of birth and took a picture of the sky directly above his or her birthplace, the two pictures would be alike. The stars in the photograph of the sky would be arranged in the same way as certain parts of the brain in the other picture. (1911-06-08-GA015) - see Astrology#1911-06-08-GA015
  • see also Schema FMC00.663
• central white matter and surrounding peripheric grey matter (1924-07-24-GA319, see also 1924-03-02-GA235 depicted on Schema FMC00.666)
  • grey matter: surrounds the white, is a substance which is far less delicately organised, much more connected with nutrition (.. and inner accumulation of substance) .. Man bears the human 'I' waking consciousness only in the outermost lobes of the brain
  • white matter: "is in a much greater degree a foundation for the spiritual" ... merges into the sense organs and basis for memory process
• brain-substance as something in which the astral body has essentially the largest share, and the etheric body only a lesser one. Brain substance is so constituted that its structure and formation could not arise if this substance had not been worked upon, not only by the etheric body, but also by an astral body. The astral body permeates and works upon the brain-substance, and there is nothing in the brain-substance or the nerve-substance upon which the astral body, in cooperation with the etheric body, does not work (1912-04-10-GA136, see Spiritual scientific physiology#1912-04-10-GA136)
• the male brain goes deeper into matter and is less pliable than the more flexible forms of the female brain (1910-03-09-GA116)

cerebrospinal fluid

• CSF is a clear, watery fluid that surrounds the brain and spinal cord, providing cushioning, removing waste, and helping to maintain stable pressure within the brain. The fluid is produced mainly in structures called the choroid plexuses within the brain's ventricles and circulates around the central nervous system.
• the brain floats in cerebral fluid (CSF) and due to its etheric functioning has a strong upwards lifting force, which is why a brain of say 1500 gram only weights about 20 gram in a living human being (1924-02-02-GA234)
• was sometimes referred in early anatomical studies by the old term 'brain dew' to describe the fluid secretion in the brain

consciousness and thinking

• 'Man in the mirror'
  • The brain works only as a reflecting apparatus, whereby it throws back the soul-activity and this becomes visible to itself. ... That the brain forms the thought ... is about as true as to say when one looks into a mirror that the mirror has 'made' the face. In fact, the face is outside the mirror; the mirror only reflects the face, throws it back. (1914-01-23-GA151 - see: Waking Consciousness#1914-01-23-GA151)
• it's actually more complicated, see oa
  • Human skeleton#Consciousness and thinking
  • Damming up between heart and brain
• soda and phosphorus are inside the human brain as necessary enablers for the thinking process (1923-10-20-GA351)

pineal and pituitary glands

• see Etherization of blood and oa Schema FMC00.354
• Man's new organ: a new organ developed in the period between the 16 and 19th centuries, it is a gland in the brain above the root of Man's nose, that can be used to take in and let spiritual scientific knowledge work on Man's etheric body. This organ will develop in the future to faculties of clairvoyance and memory of earlier incarnations (Past life memories). If the organ is not used by people, it will give rise to terrible epidemics and nervous diseases far worse than any yet known to Man. (1913-05-01-GA152).

• secretion of brain sand by pineal gland:
  • "the pineal gland .. secretes out of itself the so-called brain sand, minute lemon-yellow stones which lie in little heaps at one end of the pineal gland, and which are the mineral element in the human head."(1923-10-28-GA230)
  • in mental under-developed human beings, the pineal gland can be very small as these people cannot secrete the brain-sand required for normal I-consciousness development (1923-10-28-GA230)
  • 1922-08-09-GA347 (see Matter is destroyed in the brain#1922-08-09-GA347) describes the process of continuous depositing and destruction of minerals ('brain-sand', more also in 1922-09-09/16-GA347) - see also Schema FMC00.513 on Spiritual scientific physiology
  • 'brain sand' is also known as corpora arenacea or 'acervuli', refers to calcified mineral deposits (calcium, magnesium, and other mineral) in the pineal gland that accumulated and may looks like 'sand' as they are visible as small specks or grains on imaging studies like X-ray scans. The calcifications are not yet understood by medical science.
• secretions
  • The pineal gland primarily secretes melatonin following a daily rhythm, a hormone that plays a crucial role in regulating the body’s sleep-wake cycle.
  • The pituitary gland is divided into two main parts - anterior (front) and posterior (back) lobes, and each releases different hormones
    • Anterior: Growth Hormone (GH): Stimulates growth, cell repair, and metabolism; Adrenocorticotropic Hormone (ACTH): Stimulates the adrenal glands to produce cortisol, which helps respond to stress; Thyroid-Stimulating Hormone (TSH): Stimulates the thyroid gland to produce thyroid hormones, which regulate metabolism; Follicle-Stimulating Hormone (FSH) and Luteinizing Hormone (LH): Regulate the reproductive organs and are essential for processes like ovulation and sperm production.
    • Posterior Pituitary Hormones: Antidiuretic Hormone (ADH), also called vasopressin: Helps regulate water balance by acting on the kidneys; Oxytocin: Plays a role in childbirth, milk ejection during breastfeeding, and also affects emotional bonding and social interactions.
      

evolutionary

• spiritual beings underlying formation of etheric brain on Old Moon
  • in the Zarathustrian schools it was taught that the etheric part of the human brain was gradually created from out the spiritual cosmos by spiritual beings called the Amshaspands during Old Moon. These seven (or six) creative spirits worked in such a way that they ruled consecutively in time so that when one had finished his activity the next sets to work, and they send their etheric forces into the same space, thus constructing a principle as complicated as the etheric body, and especially the human brain.. Though they no longer have etheric formative forces on Earth in this way, they can still be felt by Man experientially through the seasons (see also Christ Module 17 - The experience of the year). (1913-03-23-GA145).
• the current cerebellum is a remnant of the Old Moon stage of evolution, on Old Moon the cerebrum's pineal and pituitary glands were what the lung and heart are in Man today (1914-07-14-GA266 - see Schema FMC00.123)
• the current human brain contains an image of the world of the stars, transformed from Old Moon when the head's cognitive organ contained "as it were, as many little eyes as there are stars ... out of these little eyes has grown all that lives now in the human brain. The brain is a later product of evolution of a kind of eye on Old Moon, or really of many separate eyes, as many in number as the stars shining out there in the night. (1920-05-15-GA201)

Inspirational quotes

1910-03-30-GA119

the brain is the physical organ for the thinking of the head, the logic and intellect .. ... the brain is a physical symbol for the consciousness of space

1920-05-15-GA201

up to the seventh or eighth century BC. Man felt himself to be a member of the whole Universe, taking part in the events of the whole Universe ... he felt that that which lived in his head extended into the Cosmos, and belonged to the whole starry heaven ... he felt himself in the sphere of the stars, for he felt his head in living connection with them. Thus he said to himself: ‘When the night-sky arches over me, it is really I myself, who live there in living communion of my head with the stars.’

... on Old Moon ... my whole head was a kind of eye ... looking out into the Cosmos there were within me, in my brain, as it were, as many little eyes as there are stars.

Out of these little eyes has grown all that lives now in my brain; and my sense-eyes are but later products, coordinated to the Sun as was my brain to the starry heavens.

Therefore my brain is a later product of evolution of an eye, or really of many separate eyes, as many in number as the stars shining out there in the night.

1922-04-01-GA211

In the human head, in the wonderful convolutions of the brain, we really have an image of the whole universe.

Illustrations

Schema FMC00.663: is a BBD illustration by Rudolf Steiner of how the convolutions of the human brain contain an image of the whole universe .. a metamorphosis of the cognitive organ or 'eye' on Old Moon, with "as many small separate eyes as the stars shining out there in the night."

Schema FMC00.135 shows (left) the nervous system as the instrument of the human astral body, interfacing with the blood and I-organization (right).

Schema FMC00.036, see also Chapter 6 in 'Extending practical medicine' (see references below), and schema FMC00.135 on the human astral body and on Blood and nerves to see the interrelationships. The table on the lower left is important to contemplate, as the various bodies interpenetrate so this represents a cumulative 'and' effect of the bodily principles working in the nervous system.

On this table, one can contemplate - along the amber spinal column - the astral senses (see sushumna on FMC00.096 on development of the chakras) and how that spinal column will develop in the future (see 1905-09-29-GA093A and Blavatsky quotes on Man past and future).

Compare with Schema FMC00.135 on Human astral body or Nerve-sense-subsystem. Another perspective to contemplate onto this schema is the role of the pituitary and pineal glands (see Schema FMC00.044 on the Etherization of blood) and how astral images are imprinted on the etheric.

Schema FMC00.670: illustrates Man as a threefold being in relation to the three worlds, with a picture and description used recurrently by Rudolf Steiner. The 'head' nerve-sense subsystem and 'limb' metabolic-limb subsystem are polar opposites, the first most and the latter least spiritualized, while the middle rhythmic subsystem modulates and balances the two. The influences of the different etheric formative forces are depicted with the open sphere at both ends,

On the left, focus is on the human head with the 'empty' part (see Schema FMC00.045) and connection with the spiritual. Connect this with the schemas and descriptions on etherization of blood, the human brain, and matter is destroyed in the brain to develop an imaginative insight of this point in the human brain between the pineal and pituitary glands. For another angle, see also Schema FMC00.463 and Man's new organ.

Lecture coverage and references

1909-04-19-GA264

notes from memory by Mathilde Scholl (in GA264)

Gabriel was the one who, in the 16th century, prepared the human brain through selected births so that an organ was formed therein (to be sure, not perceptible to investigation by natural science), which nevertheless makes the present-day brain appear different from that of a person of the 13th or 14th centuries.

The human brain has undergone a distinct change since the 16th century and has the purpose of enabling humanity eventually to understand Christianity in its full significance.

..

as a result of the preparation accomplished by Gabriel in the 16th century, of a new organ in the frontal globe of the human brain, it became possible during the last third of the 19th century for what we call spiritual science to be infused by the White Lodge so that the significance of the Mystery of Golgotha could be brought home to humanity in all its implications. When a person now crosses the threshold at earth it is possible for each human being to discover his or her own great Master, now available to anyone in a living physical body who seeks him.

1910-03-09-GA116

If people had even the smallest inkling of what it means to think in the spirit, to live in the spirit, using the physical body only as an instrument, — so that one does not feel firmly fastened into it, identifying oneself with it — they would sing psalms about the misery of having to use a male body in an incarnation, for of course these material effects have also filtered into the brain.

One observes that the forms of the male brain, through having been deeper into matter, are more difficult to manage than the more flexible forms of the female brain.

It is truly a more difficult matter to train a male brain for the ascent into the higher worlds, and to translate the truths into thoughts, than it is to train a female brain for the same purpose.

For this reason it is not surprising to people who think, when a new conception of the world arises such as that of spiritual science, it is more easily grasped by the more manageable female brain; for it is more difficult for the male brain, being less pliable and obedient, to free itself from certain thoughts which it has absorbed.

Hence spiritual science will not find an easy acceptance amongst the men who are today the leaders of culture and of the cultured ideas prevalent in our day. We must realise how awkward an instrument is the brain of a learned man today, not only for the acceptance of spiritual science, but also for thinking along those lines.

But we must not look at these things in a wrong way and draw our own conclusions — rather should we look upon it as all the more significant that there are so many men whose brains are so pliant that they have become intimately acquainted with spiritual science.

1910-03-30-GA119

short linking extract, full lecture extract see: D00.003 - Systemic aspects of the study process#1910-03-30-GA119

Admittedly we cannot say in the same sense that in our physical heart we have an instrument for the logic of the heart. For that is something far more spiritual than the logic of the head, and the heart is not to the same degree the physical organ for the thinking of the heart as is the brain for the thinking of the head.

...

.

Not so what belongs to the head. The several parts of the brain remain stationary, so

• the brain is in very truth a physical symbol for the consciousness of space;
• the flowing blood, the fluid of the heart is in its circulation an image of the mobility of spiritual consciousness.

...

.

the logic of the head had to be unfolded by means of the organs of the brain and spine.

...

Our brain was formed out of the higher spirit world, and our spiritualised heart of the future will be formed out of the buddhi plane as we have heard, our present heart was formed out of the lower spirit world.

1913-03-23-GA145

see also longer extract on Human etheric body#1913-03-23-GA145 that covers further in more depth

If we imagine a human being diagrammatically (in rough outline) we may think that this etheric body of which I have just spoken can be so perceived—upwards less and less perceptible losing itself in indefiniteness—that it is coincident with time. And we may even learn gradually to feel quite clearly that in this part of our etheric body certain beings were active, creative, replacing one another, as it were, in the various seasons passed through from spring to autumn; it can be observed that the seasons have worked upon this brain-portion of our etheric body, so that our etheric brain is in certain respects a complicated organ. It has been fitted together, as it were, by different spiritual beings who develop their powers in consecutive periods of time.

We now obtain an idea of a very important teaching, and gradually we learn to perceive the truth of this teaching, a teaching cultivated especially in the Zarathustrian schools. This held that the etheric part of the human brain was gradually created from out the spiritual cosmos by spiritual beings called the Amshaspands. These Amshaspands worked in such a way that they ruled, as it were, during summer: and indeed they still rule today, in succession, the first ruling in early spring, the second in spring, etc., up to the sixth and seventh. Seven—or relatively speaking, six—such spiritual beings work consecutively in time; and these are the creative spirits who—precisely by working consecutively, so that when one has finished his activity the next sets to work—construct a principle as complicated as the etheric body, and especially the human brain.

Thus into our brain six or seven spiritual beings are consecutively at work, and the physical brain of Man can only be understood when we are able to say: ‘There works a spirit who can be specially felt in spring: he sends forth his forces which are principally etheric forces; then in later spring comes a second spirit who in turn sends forth his forces.’ (See drawing.) The etheric forces of this second spirit then stream into the same space. The third spirit in turn sends in his etheric forces, and thus is this etheric part of the human brain developed; the spirits who follow one another in consecutive periods send their etheric forces into the same space.

Now we must clearly understand that we can only feel certain connections of that which in our brain is related to these spirits who today develop their etheric forces outside us; for occultism teaches us that what I have just described had taken place during the Old Moon stage; so that we must not think that perhaps these spirits who as we may say—rule the summer, are still at work today and are perhaps formative powers. The rudiments which were really rayed in by these spirits during the Old Moon stage Man brought over with him into his earthly existence; but as he thus bears them within his own etheric body, he can even today, when these spiritual beings no longer have a direct influence on the inner etheric body of our brain, still trace his relationship to them, and this he feels in summer.

1914-01-22-GA151

with illustration, see also Astrology

In that half of the brain which is found by the anatomist, and of which one may say that it is shaped like a half-hemisphere, those activities of the spiritual cosmos which proceed from the upper nuances are specially operative.

On the other hand, there is a part of the brain which is visible only when one observes the etheric body; and this is specially influenced by the lower part of the spiritual cosmos. (see Diagram 9 and Diagram 11.)

But how is it with this influencing?

Let us say of someone that with his Logicism he is placed in Sensationalism, and that with his Empiricism he is placed in Mathematism. The resulting forces then work into his brain, so that the upper part of his brain is specially active and dominates the rest.

Countless varieties of brain-activity arise from the fact that the brain swims, as it were, in the spiritual cosmos, and its forces work into the brain in the way we have been able to describe. The brains of men are as varied in kind as all the possible combinations that can spring from this spiritual cosmos.

The lower part of the spiritual cosmos does not act on the physical brain at all, but on the etheric brain.

1914-01-23-GA151

full extract see: Waking Consciousness#1914-01-23-GA151

[the Man in the mirror]

The uncompromising materialist of our day finds it suits his purpose to say that the brain forms the thought — more exactly, that the central nervous system forms the thought.

For anyone who sees through things, this is about as true as to say when one looks into a mirror that the mirror has “made” the face.

In fact, the face is outside the mirror; the mirror only reflects the face, throws it back.

The experience a Man has of his thoughts is quite similar.

(We will leave aside for the moment other aspects of the soul.) The experience of real, active thinking no more arises from the brain than the image of a face is created by the mirror. The brain, in fact, works only as a reflecting apparatus, whereby it throws back the soul-activity and this becomes visible to itself. The brain has as little to do with what a Man perceives as thoughts as a mirror has to do with your face when you see it in a glass. But there is something more than that. When someone thinks, he really perceives only the last phases of his thinking-activity, of his thinking experience.

And now, in order to make this clear, I want to take up once more the comparison with the mirror.

1914-07-14-GA266

see Schema FMC00.123

Our cerebellum is a remnant of the Old Moon stage of evolution; it sits there as a sign of the battles that the Gods fought for us. The cerebellum arose from what was thought on Old Moon. There were no errors in our thoughts then, for divine powers thought for us and guided our thoughts. Man had no freedom yet; divine beings directed him. Now that he's become independent .. he must be responsible for what he thinks.

There are also remnants of Old Moon in the cerebrum's pineal and pituitary glands; on Old Moon they were what the lung and heart are in Man today.

What a Man does now will form his cerebrum on Future Jupiter. What he thinks in connection with his cerebrum now will form his cerebellum on Future Jupiter.

1920-05-15-GA201

also on: The eye is formed by the light for the light#1920-05-15-GA201

Man did not then perceive himself as an isolated being, as he does today. Today he feels himself as a being enclosed in his skin, but up to the seventh or eighth century BC. Man felt himself to be a member of the whole Universe, taking part in the events of the whole Universe.

Grotesque as it may seem today, it is a fact that in those olden times Man did not feel his head so strongly shut off by his skull, he felt that that which lived in his head extended into the Cosmos, and belonged to the whole starry heaven. Strange as it seems today, he felt himself in the sphere of the stars, for he felt his head in living connection with them. Thus he said to himself: ‘When the night-sky arches over me, it is really I myself, who live there in living communion of my head with the stars.’

He said: ‘I follow the course of time further, when after the night the day appears. Then the stars which rose on the one side set on the other, and in their place the Sun rises. The configuration of the stars then no longer works in my head, for the Sun takes the place of the starry heavens and my eyes it is that are coordinated with the Sun.’

And because he vividly felt: ‘My eyes are coordinated with the Sun when I am busy on Earth during the day,’ he said to himself: ‘Just as now there is an earthly existence and my eyes are coordinated to the Sun, so in the existence preceding the Earth (we call it the Old Moon stage) my whole head was a kind of eye; not as now, perceiving the objects in a twofold way, but, looking out into the Cosmos there were within me, in my brain, as it were, as many little eyes as there are stars.

Out of these little eyes has grown all that lives now in my brain; and my sense-eyes are but later products, coordinated to the Sun as was my brain to the starry heavens.

Therefore my brain is a later product of evolution of an eye, or really of many separate eyes, as many in number as the stars shining out there in the night.

Thus my brain has grown out of a sense; and what is now in Earth-existence, my eye, whereby I am in communication with my Earth-environment, will be an inner organ, as is now in my brain, when the Earth has been replaced by another planet (which as you know we call the Future Jupiter stage). What is now on my outer surface will draw into my inner being. People will then look different. What they now have as corresponding with their environment will form an inner organ in future times.’

Ancient humanity felt this instinctively and said:

‘Light penetrates; through the eye of my senses, but in my inner being I preserve the light of olden times. It works in me as thought. Thought was a sense-perception before the Earth became Earth, when it was an earlier planet; and my sense-perception will be thought in the future.’

1922-04-01-GA211

see nearly full lecture extract on: Human breathing#1922-04-01-GA211

master builder .. had made what he had built in there an image of the whole universe. ... Imagine, then, that we have here an image of the universe (see drawing). In the human head, in the wonderful convolutions of the brain, we really do have an image of the whole universe.

1922-08-09-GA347

describes the process of continuous depositing and destruction of minerals

1923-10-20-GA351

If we examined the nerves which go out from the brain, then again the most important substance in these nerves is soda and phosphorus. Only that they are connected with each other in a different way than this seed is, that they are, so to speak, hardened with each other.

It is not at all wonderful that out of the human being also such a thing arises, which is thought. By taking over what otherwise lies only in the seed, Man processes soda and phosphorus in the nervous system.

Just as outside in the world there is phosphorus and hydrogen everywhere, so soda and phosphorus are inside in this human brain sphere.

But now you can see why we need the carbonic acid inside the head. It is because the soda is continually being converted. The carbonic acid separates from the sodium, and in the end we would get a hard skull from the sodium - which is a silvery metal - if the carbonic acid did not continuously tingle in us and the soda was not produced in us. So we absorb the carbonic acid into the sodium, so that the soda is correctly distributed in our head.

And from what is all around us, through the hair, through the skin, we absorb phosphorus, hydrogen.

1923-10-28-GA230

And when this mineral substance disintegrates, a power of the highest order takes hold of just these products of mineral disintegration and from them builds up new worlds. The mineral element in any particular place can become of all things the most important.

When we follow the course of Earth-stage of evolution — warmth-condition, air-condition, water-condition, mineral-earthly condition — the human head has participated in all these metamorphoses, the mineral metamorphosis being the first to work outwards in the disintegrating skeleton of the head — though it still retains a certain vitality. But this human head has participated in the earthly-mineral metamorphosis in a way which is even more apparent.

[secretion of brain sand by pineal gland]

In the centre of the human head within the structure of the brain there is an organ shaped like a pyramid, the pineal gland. This pineal gland, situated in the vicinity of the corpus quadrigemina and the optic thalamus secretes out of itself the so-called brain sand, minute lemon-yellow stones which lie in little heaps at one end of the pineal gland, and which are in fact the mineral element in the human head. If they do not lie there, if Man does not bear this brain-sand, this mineral element, within him, he becomes an idiot or a cretin. In the case of normal people the pineal gland is comparatively large. In cretins pineal glands have been found which are actually no larger than hemp seeds; these cannot secrete the brain-sand.

It is actually in this mineral deposit that the spirit-man is situated; and this already indicates that what is living cannot harbour the spirit, but that the human spirit needs the nonliving as its centre-point, that this is above all things necessary to it as independent living spirit.

1924-02-02-GA234

The human brain floats in cerebral fluid and due to its etheric functioning and nature has a strong upwards lifting force. This is why a brain of say 1500 gram only weights about 20 gram in a living human being, this upthrust is an example of the etheric forces.

1924-07-24-GA319

[in context of treatment of migraine]

In the head-organisation we observe, first of all, the continuations of the sense-nerves which are most wonderfully intertwined and interwoven. The nerves as they continue on into the centre of the brain from the senses, form a marvellous structure. It represents the highest point of perfection in respect of the physical organisation, for there the I of man impresses the most intense form of its activity upon the physical body. The way in which the nerves pass inwards from the senses and are linked together, bringing about something like an inner articulation within the organism, places the human organism at a much higher level than the animal. And it is possible, just because the I-organisation must take hold at this point in order to control this marvellous structure, that it may occasionally fail and then that part of the physical organisation gets left to itself. It may happen that the I-organisation is not powerful enough to permeate this so-called “white matter” of the brain or to organise it thoroughly.

Now the white matter of the brain is surrounded by the grey matter — a substance which is far less delicately organised but which is indeed regarded by ordinary physiology as being the more important of the two. This it is not, for the reason that it is connected much more with nutrition. We have a far more mobile activity in respect of nutrition — of inner accumulation of substance — in the grey brain-matter, than in the white matter which lies in the middle and which in a much greater degree is a foundation for the spiritual.

Now everything in the human organism belongs together, for every member works upon every other.

Directly, therefore, that the I begins to withdraw to some extent from the central — the white brain-substance — the grey matter becomes disordered. The astral body and the etheric body can no longer take proper hold of the grey matter; and so the whole of the interior of the head gets out of order.

The I-organisation withdraws from the central brain, the astral organisation withdraws more from the periphery of the brain; and the whole organisation of the head is dislocated.

The central brain begins to be less serviceable for the forming of concepts, more akin to the grey matter, developing a kind of digestive process which it ought not to do; the grey matter begins to unfold an excessively strong digestive process.

And then foreign bodies are absorbed; a strong excretory process permeates the brain. All this reacts upon the finer breathing processes, principally, however, upon the rhythmic processes of the blood-circulation. Thus we get, not perhaps a very deeply penetrating, but still a very significant disorder arising in the human organism and the question is:

How are we to restore the I-organisation to the system of nerves and senses?

How are we to drive the I back again to the place it has left — into the central part of the brain ?

This we can do if we administer a substance of which I spoke in the earlier lectures, namely, silicic acid. If, however, we were to give only silicic acid, we should, it is true, send back the I into the central nerves-and-senses system in the head, but we should leave the surrounding part, i.e., the grey matter of the brain, untouched.

Thus we must at the same time so regulate the digestive process of the grey matter that it no longer ' overflows,' that it incorporates itself rhythmically into the whole organisation of the human being. Therefore we must simultaneously administer iron — which is there in order to regulate these connections — so that the rhythmic organisation shall be placed once more in its right relation to the system lying at the basis of spiritual activity.

Related pages

• Nerve-sense subsystem
• Matter is destroyed in the brain
• Man's new organ
• Etherization of blood
• Damming up between heart and brain

References and further reading

• John Eccles, Daniel N. Robinson: 'The wonder of being human : our brain and our mind' (1985)
• Klaus Jensen: 'Gehirn und Denken : Beiträge zum Leib-Seele- Problem' (1995)
• Jens Heisterkam (Urs Pohlmann et al.): 'Geist und Gehirn : Beiträge zu einem monistischen Verständnis' (1999)
• Andreas Neider (Gerald Hüther et al.): 'Wer strukturiert das menschliche Gehirn? : Fragen der Hirnforschung an das Selbstverständnis des Menschen' (2006)