Philosophy Spirituality

The Seat of the Soul

Rudolf Steiner’s Seven Planetary Seals, A Biological Perspective

by Yvan Rioux Review by David Lorimer, August 2019

Published: 2019
Publisher: Temple Lodge
Format: Paperback
Pages: 227
ISBN: 9781912230235

Publisher’s description

‘There is one temple in the Universe and it is the body of Man.’ – Novalis How are the internal and external forms of the human organism shaped? How does human consciousness emerge? These are questions to which conventional science has no answers. In The Seat of the Soul, Yvan Rioux invites us to consider new concepts that can explain these phenomena. His exposition is based on the existence of external ‘formative forces’ – or morphic fields – which, he argues, create the human body or organism in conjunction with forces that resonate within us from the living solar system. The psyche – or soul – emerges progressively as an inner world of faculties that in time learns to apprehend and understand the outer world. In his previous book The Mystery of Emerging Form, Rioux explored the formative forces of the twelve zodiacal constellations. In this absorbing sequel, he investigates how such activity from the planetary spheres works within us, as ‘life stages’ or metabolic processes. Through seven chapters, he explores the impact of each of these planetary spheres on our complex organic make-up and psychic activity. The link between organs and tissues, he says, produces five specific ‘inner landscapes’ in relation to the external rhythmic environment. Rioux also gives a description of Rudolf Steiner’s seven ‘planetary seals’ from a biological perspective. According to Steiner, these seals are: ‘…occult scripts, meaning that, as hidden signatures, they show their ongoing etheric impacts on the seven stages of our metabolism’. Between Steiner’s indications concerning human physiology and the ancient Chinese view on the subject, there is a convergence of ideas – as synthesized here – that breaks through the boundaries of modern reductionist science, offering exciting perspectives for understanding the human being. ‘The seat of the soul is where the inner world and the outer world meet. Where they overlap, it is in every point of the overlap.’ – Novalis

This study is the sequel to the author's The Mystery of Emerging Form and continues his biological perspective on formative forces creating the body in conjunction with the rhythmic resonant forces from the Sun, Moon and main planets – Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Mercury and Venus. On the cover, he quotes Novalis as saying that 'the seat of the soul is where the inner world and the outer world meet', while the psyche 'emerges progressively as an inner world of faculties that in timelines to apprehend and understand the outer world.' Rhythm is critical here in terms of frequencies, pulses and vibrations, as are the cycles of expansion and contraction, also noted by Goethe. Each chapter discusses the process corresponding to the heavenly body in terms of senses, nerves, breath, circulation, metabolism, movement and reproduction. Parallels are drawn with the Chinese system of five HUA as pulsing recurring movements of days and seasons. Every chapter also has a corresponding organ, psychic influence and metal, and the author gives recommendations for the health of this particular 'landscape'. Readers come to appreciate the subtle processes involved in the organism's constant movement of self-renewal as well as the need for metabolism and digestion at every level, including the imaginative involving the psyche. The book carefully illuminates the interfaces between inner and outer in considerable detail.

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