13.13  The unfinished human being's epoch of life begins in the animal kingdom. The unfinished human being's epoch of life occurs in this symbol from the middle of the animal kingdom to the border between this and the real, perfect human kingdom. The integral organism that is symbolised in the middle of the animal kingdom is the purely animal organism. But from this point onwards this animal organism is gradually transformed into a human organism. This is symbolised in the middle of the next plane of existence, which constitutes the real, perfect human kingdom. If we look at the integral animal organism in the symbol, we see that here the body of gravity has reached its highest capacity, just as the body of feeling also has grown. The body of instinct, on the other hand, has become smaller, but the body of intelligence has passed the latent stage that it had in the plant kingdom. The body of intuition, however, has sunk to its latent stage just as the body of memory also has lost some of its capacity, preparatory to becoming latent in the next plane of existence, which is the real, perfect human kingdom. The transition from the culminating plant organism to the culminating animal organism has of course a variety of transitional or intermediate stages in just as great a multiplicity of variations of physical organisms, each adapted to the special forms of life experience that have been determined for the special species and races to which they belong. But common to all forms of life is the changing combination of the basic energies promoted by the mother energy, and which in turn determines the beings' eternal experience of life as a continued reliving of the six successive kingdoms of the basic energies: the plant kingdom, the animal kingdom, the human kingdom, etc. Each time the being has experienced a repetition of the six kingdoms, it has passed a section of life that we have called a "spiral section". When we have called the mentioned section a "spiral section", it is because each repetition takes place in a new and higher variation. If it were not so, we would have to express these sections as circular motions. Like the circles in a spiral, the repetitions each form a link to a new cycle, so forming the spiral. The beings' eternal evolution takes place through higher and higher "spiral sections". But we will go into these in more detail in the next symbol.
      The bodies of gravity and feeling having become greater here in the animal's integral organism, this causes a much greater state of tension and so a much greater unfoldment of life force than the one that takes place in the plant being's integral organism. Since the body of intelligence has also grown in capacity in association with the development of the physical body in the animal's integral organism, this being has naturally to a corresponding degree become quite another being than it was when it was a plant being. Through these changes in the capacity of the basic energies the being has been able to develop itself right up to terrestrial man's present partly animal and partly human state. Because of this being's inhuman feeling and advanced intelligence it is no longer merely an "animal". But because it has not outgrown the animal tendencies in its consciousness and way of being, it is not a pure "human being". Accordingly, owing to its growing intelligence and more or less prominent inhuman feeling and strong energy of gravity, it exemplifies that stage in the evolution of the spiral cycle that we have called the "devil stage". So, with this special combination of capacities of the basic energies, the terrestrial human in his unfoldment of life and creation appears neither as "human being" nor as "animal", but as an over-developed "animal", in spite of his being called "human being". This factor has culminated in the unfolding of an enlarged capacity for killing with atomic and hydrogen weapons. With these weapons man has multiplied millions and millions of times, his capacity for killing, wounding and destroying. But he has not yet by a long way developed the moral capacity and cosmic knowledge that are necessary in order to rule these powers in conjunction with neighbourly love. Since his faculty of intuition is still quite latent, he is blind in all the great cosmic regions of life. He is therefore materialistic. Materialists are absolutely illiterate regarding the real cosmic analyses of life. At the same time his memory, as we see in the symbol, is decreasing or degenerating. This terrestrial human being, therefore, at worst represents darkness, which is indicated by the black ring-shaped figure around the ring-shaped coloured area, which expresses the basic energies' region of unfoldment. We see that this black figure is at its widest in the animal kingdom and the unfinished human being's region, in contrast to the white ring-shaped figure, which expresses light, and is widest or culminating on the opposite side of the symbol, here symbolising the highest kingdoms in the spiral cycle, of which we shall have more to say later.
      The animal kingdom's plane of existence, to which the unfinished human beings still more or less belong, thus constitutes the region of darkness, sufferings and unhappy fates. Consequently it is not surprising that in this plane of existence there are wars and rumours of war, murders, robberies, acts of terror and mutilation, vengeance and severe punishments. That this produces depression, illness and suicide is quite natural. That such a form of existence is identical to "hell" or so-called "evil" is also evident. Indeed, it is not so remarkable that Christ called this existence of the unfinished human beings "Doomsday". It is into this plane of existence that the "prodigal son", mentioned in Christ's parable, sank when he was said to be "eating with the swine". Here he came to realise how lovely it is to be in the home of his father, how even being one of his father's hired servants was wonderful compared to his existence in the darkness. The parable about the "prodigal son" is thus seen to be Jesus' teaching about the fate of the unfinished terrestrial human being.
      The light consequently appears to be to a great extent at its latent stage here in the animal kingdom where human beings still, like animals, hunt and kill other creatures in order to eat their organisms. But they cannot be blamed for this. They do not know that it is not a vital factor for man to kill animals in order to live. From a cosmic point of view he is no longer in the stage of the beast of prey. Therefore this beast-of-prey attitude will create unhealthiness and illness in many human beings' organisms, dependent on how advanced they are in evolution, and also reduce their protection against an unnatural death. We see in this symbol that the light increases after the culmination of the darkness in the unfinished terrestrial human being, while the darkness decreases to a corresponding degree. It must, however, be pointed out that, while the darkness is a realistic way of behaving or being within the animal kingdom and is culminating within the sphere of the unfinished terrestrial human being, and here makes the experience of pain and suffering a realistic fact, darkness does not exist outside the animal area. Here there exists only the knowledge and wisdom learned from experiences in the animal kingdom, where the epoch of darkness culminates. And it is through this knowledge and wisdom, as a culminating talent in the beings' way of acting and behaving, that sufferings and pains are totally precluded from the remaining planes of existence in the spiral cycle. In these planes there is found neither war nor unhappy destinies. Everything is radiant light, happiness and joy. But these kingdoms of light could not possibly exist if the beings in the animal kingdom, which, as we have seen, is the epoch of darkness in the spiral cycle, had not broken the habit of manifesting the darkness or so-called "evil" in their behaviour. How, indeed, would the beings become beings of light if they did not have to go through an epoch where there was the opportunity to manifest both the "evil" and the "good", and so discover that "evil" leads to pain, suffering and unhappy destinies, while that which was "good" was the road out of the darkness and the terrors of war and forwards to the spheres of light, happiness and bliss?