Ampere said:

“Everything that has been done in physics since the work of Dr. Young on light and the discovery of M. Orsted is preparation for a new era … Explanations deduced from the effects produced by the motion of imponderable fluids will gradually replace those now accepted … I believe that we must look to the motions of fluids distributed in space for the explanation of general effects.” Ampere

Clara Jessup Moore said:

“Taking the law of assimilation as the cosmical law, together with self-manifesting power as the characteristic of being, we reach a primary classification of created objects, which corresponds with that which is known as mind and matter-or rather let us say mind and that which is not mind; for there is ground for the apprehension that mind and matter do not include all that exists; and that, along with matter, ether ought to be considered as something intimately related to matter indeed, but yet not just matter. When the elements of the ethereal medium are regarded as truly and simply material however small and light they may be, the elasticity and pressure which must be assigned to that medium in order to admit of the velocity of light, are altogether out of the harmony of things; and wholly incredible, especially when confronted with the phenomena and the theory of astronomy. Thus, to justify the velocity of light on the same principles as those of sound, in various material media, the ethereal pressure must be 122,400,000,000 times greater than that of the atmosphere – which is incredible, says Macvicar.” Bloomfield-Moore

Casy said:

Q.: Ether may be defined as the combination of a higher plane, leading us to metaphysics, to where every consideration of the atom finally leads one.

A.: This is correct – for, same as the statement of positive and negative forces as relating to gravitation that act upon the individual’s DEVELOPMENT, or individual’s application as is occupied from within itself. Hence, as is seen, there are (This may be an illustration for this same condition) certain CHARACTERS of disease that accentuates mental forces, or the metaphysical activity of a body. There are others that so DULL the senses as that they become one-sided, or only passive, not positive; yet a NORMAL, perfectly well and normal mind as of being so active as to be considered by others in its activity as of being unbalanced, but only is it considered PECULIAR.” Cayce (195-70)

“Etheronic energy is mental control.” Cayce (443-5)

“Etheronic energy is the emanation from the spirit force through the active force of that which makes for matter being held in its positive position, or in its space of activity. Hence thought as a body, whether of animal or plant, is shown as of plant receiving in its freshness of vigor influences that come from or through the etheronic energy in its activity upon the body, in the expression or upon the plant as in its expression. Hence things that are equal to the same thing are equal to each other.” Cayce (440-13) See also the entire #440 series of the Cayce readings for more information.

Q.: What is the best substance for induction, conduction, transmission of etheronic energy?

A.: “This is as raised power that would be produced from a combination of crystal. This should be rather interesting to this body, for it is very much like that used by the body in destructive forces in the Atlantean sojourn! Not that which caused the cosmic ray, or the death ray, or the healing ray – but the ray that came from setting of the prismatic influences from high heating – it may be from Arcturus or it may be from the Sun; though Arcturus would be nearer proper. The Sun may be induced to make for destructive or constructive forces, either one. It’s a combination of those forces or rays that may be gathered in certain settings or prisms. It would require a lot of detail in preparing same.” Cayce (440-3)

“A mechanical device might be constructed where a vacuum even excluding ether could be drawn and maintained, developing thereby a levitating force; this similar to that force which exerts pressure upward when air is pumped into a steel barrel while submerged below surface of a medium such as water. This levitating force will be utilized in many ways, particularly in so called heavier than air ships, with the result that air navigation will be possible without the use of wings or gas. This correct when the elements must be made so condensed in their form as to prevent the ether in its finer sense from being, or escaping through the various elements that are ordinarily used for creating such vacuums. That is, a container in which a vacuum may be made must be of such a CONDENSE element as to prevent ether from going through the atomic forces of the element itself, as is seen in that of an electric bulb – this is not a vacuum, only a portion! To the finite mind this is CONSIDERED as such, but were the same character – or these same conditions produced in a DIFFERENT way – THEN these may be made to BECOME an element that would act in that way and manner, see? As is seen at present, helium becomes the greater usage in containers that may be made; yet these THEMSELVES (This is working from the opposite side, see?) – but were those gases, or those metals used that the supply of helium itself becomes the container FOR the vacuum ITSELF, see? this condensed, see? into a metal form, THEN the vacuum ITSELF, made that would lift without being lifted, see?” Cayce (195-70)

Albert Einstein said:

“More careful reflection teaches us, however, that the special theory of relativity does not compel us to deny ether. We may assume the existence of an ether; only we must give up ascribing a definite state of motion to it, i.e., we must by abstraction take from it the last mechanical characteristic which Lorentz had still left it… [There] is a weighty argument to be advanced in favor of the ether hypothesis. To deny ether is ultimately to assume that empty space has no physical qualities whatever. The fundamental facts of mechanics do not harmonize with this view… According to the general theory of relativity space without ether is unthinkable; for in such space there would not only be no propagation of light, but also no possibility of existence for standards of space and time (measuring-rods and clocks), nor therefore any space-time intervals in the physical sense.” Einstein

Haeckel

Eight theses on ether by Ernst Haeckel:

1. Ether fills the whole space, in so far as it is not occupied by ponderable matter, as a continuous substance; it fully occupies the space between the atoms of ponderable matter.
2. Ether has probably no chemical quality, and is not composed of atoms. If it be supposed that it consists of minute homogeneous atoms (for instance, indivisible etheric particles of a uniform size), it must be further supposed that there is something else between these atoms, either “empty space” or a third, completely unknown medium, a purely hypothetical “inter-ether”; the question as to the nature of this brings us back to the original difficulty, and so on in infinitum.

III. As the idea of an empty space and an action at a distance is scarcely possible in the present condition of our knowledge (at least, it does not help to clear a monistic view), I postulate for ether a special structure which is not atomistic, like that of ponderable matter, and which may provisionally be called (without further determination) etheric or dynamic structure.

1. The consistency of ether is also peculiar, on our hypothesis, and different from that of ponderable matter. It is neither gaseous, as some conceive, nor solid, as others suppose; the best idea of it can be formed by comparison with an extremely attenuated, elastic, and light jelly.
2. Ether may be called imponderable matter in the sense that we have no means of determining its weight experimentally. If it really has weight, as is very probable, it must be so slight as to be far below the capacity of our most delicate balance. Some physicists have attempted to determine its weight by the energy of the light-waves, and have discvered that it is some fifteen trillion times lighter thanatmospheric air; on that hypothesis a sphere of ether of the size of our earth would weigh at least two hundred and fifty pounds.
3. The etheric consistency may probably (in accordance with the pyknotic theory) pass into the gaseous state under certain conditions by progressive condensation, just as a gas may be converted into a fluid, and ultimately into a solid, by lowering its temperature.

VII. Consequently, these three conditions of matter may be arranged (and it is a point of great importance in our monistic cosmogony) in a genetic, continuous order. We may distinguish five stages in it: (1) the etheric, (2) the gaseous, (3) the fluid, (4) the viscous (in the living protoplasm), and (5) the solid state.

VIII. Ether is boundless and immeasurable, like the space it occupies. It is in eternal motion; and this specific movement of ether (it is immaterial whether we conceive it as vibration, strain, condensation, etc.), in reciprocal action with mass-movement (or gravitation), is the ultimate cause of all phenomena. Haeckel

Hertz

Hertz in his conjectures that a knowledge of the structure of ether should unveil the essence of matter itself, and of its inherent properties, weight and inertia, is treading the path that leads to this knowledge. Professor Fitzgerald says:- “Ether must be the means by which electric and magnetic forces exist, it should explain chemical actions, and if possible gravity.” The law of sympathetic vibration explain chemical affinities a sympathetic attractive, but inherent, force; in short, as gravity. This open up too wide a territory even but to peer into in the dawning light of Keely’s system of vibratory physics. The boundary line is crossed, and the crowds of researchers in electromagnetism are full of ardor. Hertz constructed a circuit, whose period of vibration for electric currents was such that he was able to see sparks, due to the increased vibration, leaping across a small airspace in this resonant circuit; his experiments have proved and demonstrated the ethereal theory of electromagnetism: -that electromagnetic actions are due to a medium pervading all known space; while Keely’s experiments have proved that all things are due to conditions of ether.

Kant

“The elementary system of the moving forces of matter depends upon the existence of a substance which is the basis (the primordially originating moving force) of all moving forces of matter, and of which it an be said as a postulate (not as a hypothesis): There exists a universally distributed all-penetrating matter within the space it occupies or fills through repulsion, which agitates itself uniformly in all its parts and endlessly persists in this motion.” Kant

Kelvin

(after referring to ‘the velocity which is the conductance in electrostatic measure, and the resistance in electromagnetic measure of one and the same conductor’, and stating that this velocity is ‘not very different from that of light’): “But its relationship to the velocity of light was brought out in a manner by Maxwell to make it really a part of theory which it never was before. Maxwell pointed out its application to the possible or probable explanation of electric effects by the influence of a medium, and showed that that medium – the medium whose motions constitute light – must be ether. Maxwell’s ‘electromagnetic theory of light’ marks a stage of enormous importance in electromagnetic doctrine, and I cannot doubt but that in electromagnetic practice we shall derive great benefit from a pursuing of the theoretical ideas suggested by such considerations.” Kelvin (Thomson)

“We thus have simply the undulatory theory of light, as an inevitable consequence of believing that the displacement of an elastic solid by which, in my old paper [of 1847], I gave merely a ‘representation’ of the electric currents and the corresponding magnetic forces, is a reality. But to give anything like a satisfactory material realization of Maxwell’s electromagnetic theory of light, it is necessary to show electrostatic force in relation to the force (X, Y, Z) of my formulas; to explain the generation of heat according to Ohm’s Law in virtue of the action of this force when it causes an electric current to flow through a conductor; and to show how it is that the velocity of light in ether is equal to, or perhaps we should rather say, is, the number of electrostatic units in the electromagnetic unit of electric quantity. All this essentially involves the consideration of ponderable matter permeated by, or imbedded in ether, and a tertium quid which we may call electricity, a fluid go-between, serving to transmit force between ponderable matter and ether … I see no way of suggesting properties of matter, of electricity, or of ether, by which all this, or any more than a very slight approach to it, can be done, and I think we must feel at present that the triple alliance, ether, electricity, and ponderable matter is rather a result of our want of knowledge, and of capacity to imagine beyond the limited present horizon of physical science, than a reality of nature.” Kelvin

Lorentz

“I have yet another motive to undertake these inquiries. In the memoirs in which M. Hertz treats bodies in motion, he admits that the ether they contain moves with them. Now, optical phenomena have long since demonstrated that it is not always so. I therefore wished to know the laws that govern the electrical motions in bodies that traverse the ether without entraining it; and it seemed to me difficult to attain this end without having as guide a theoretical idea. The views of Maxwell [namely, on the application of mechanical principles to the field and charges as a ‘connected mechanical system’] can serve as foundation of the desired theory.” Lorentz

“It has seemed to me useful to develop a theory of electromagnetic phenomena based on the idea of a ponderable matter perfectly permeable to the ether and able to move without communicating to the latter the least motion. Certain facts of optics may be invoked in support of this hypothesis and, although doubt is still permitted, it is certainly important to examine all the consequences of this view. Unfortunately, a quite serious difficulty presents itself from the beginning. How, in fact, is one to form a precise idea of a body which, moving in the bosom of the ether and consequently traversed by this medium, is at the same time the seat of an electric current or a dielectric phenomena? To surmount this difficulty, so far as I could, I have sought to reduce all the phenomena to a single one, the simplest of all, which is nothing else than the motion of an electrified body. One will see that, without any deeper study of the relation between ponderable matter and the ether, one can establish a system of equations suited to describe what passes in a system of such bodies. These equations accommodate very varied applications, which will be the object of the subsequent chapters.” Lorentz

“Next come Aether and Chaos, Spirit-Matter, the Bound and Infinity of Plato (Proc., Tim., ii. 117), the Purusha-Prakriti of the S’nkhya. Orpheus calls this Aether the Mighty Whirlpool (Simplicius, Ausc., iv.123); called Magna Vorago by Syrianus (Metaph., ii.33a). And Proclus (Tim., ii.117), speaking of Chaos, says: ‘The last Infinity, by which also Matter is circumscribed–is the Container, the field and plane of ideas. About her is “neither limit, nor foundation, nor seat, but excessive darkness”.’ This is the MÅ¡laprakriti or Root-Matter of the Ved’ntins, and Aether is the so-called first Logos, Aether-Chaos being the second. ‘And dusky Night comprehended and hid all below the Ether; [Orpheus thus] signifying that Night came first.’ (Malela, iv.31; Cedrenus, i.57, 84.) Then comes the Dawn of the First Creation. In the Unaging Time, Chaos, impregnated by the whirling of Aether, formed itself into  THE COSMIC EGG Apion (Clement, Homil., VI.iv.671) writes that: ‘Orpheus likened Chaos to an egg, in which the primal “elements” were all mingled together. . . . This egg was generated from the infinitude of primal matter as follows. [The first two principles were] primal matter innate with life, and a certain vortex in perpetual flux and unordered motion–from these there arose an orderly flux and interblending of essences, and thus from each, that which was most suitable to the production of life flowed to the centre of the universe, while the surrounding spirit was drawn within, as a bubble in water. Thus a spherical receptacle was formed. Then, impregnated in itself by the divine spirit which seized upon it, it revolved itself into manifestation–with the appearance of the periphery of an egg.” [Meade, G.R.S., AeTHER, CHAOS AND NIGHT]

Miller

The history of science records the 1887 ether-drift experiment of Albert Michelson and Edward Morley as a pivotal turning point, where the energetic ether of space was discarded by mainstream physics. Thereafter, the postulate of “empty space” was embraced, along with related concepts which demanded constancy in light-speed, such as Albert Einstein’s relativity theory. The now famous Michelson-Morley experiment is widely cited, in nearly every physics textbook, for its claimed “null” or “negative” results. Less known, however, is the far more significant and detailed work of Dayton Miller.

Dayton Miller’s 1933 paper in Reviews of Modern Physics details the positive results from over 20 years of experimental research into the question of ether-drift, and remains the most definitive body of work on the subject of light-beam interferometry. Other positive ether-detection experiments have been undertaken, such as the work of Sagnac (1913) and Michelson and Gale (1925), documenting the existence in light-speed variations (c+v > c-v), but these were not adequately constructed for detection of a larger cosmological ether-drift, of the Earth and Solar System moving through the background of space. Dayton Miller’s work on ether-drift was so constructed, however, and yielded consistently positive results.

Miller’s work, which ran from 1906 through the mid-1930s, most strongly supports the idea of an ether-drift, of the Earth moving through a cosmological medium, with calculations made of the actual direction and magnitude of drift. By 1933, Miller concluded that the Earth was drifting at a speed of 208 km/sec. towards an apex in the Southern Celestial Hemisphere, towards Dorado, the swordfish, right ascension 4 hrs 54 min., declination of -70Æ’ 33′, in the middle of the Great Magellanic Cloud and 7Æ’ from the southern pole of the ecliptic. (Miller 1933, p.234) This is based upon a measured displacement of around 10 km/sec. at the interferometer, and assuming the Earth was pushing through a stationary, but Earth-entrained ether in that particular direction, which lowered the velocity of the ether from around 200 to 10 km/sec. at the Earth’s surface. Today, however, Miller’s work is hardly known or mentioned, as is the case with nearly all the experiments which produced positive results for an ether in space. Modern physics today points instead to the much earlier and less significant 1887 work of Michelson-Morley, as having “proved the ether did not exist”.

Newton

“The exceeding smallness of its [ether] Particles may contribute to the greatness of the force by which those Particles may recede from one another, and thereby make the Medium exceedingly more rare and elastik than Air, and by consequence exceedingly less able to resist the motions of Projectiles, and exceedingly more able to press upon gross Bodies, by endeavoring to expand it self.” Newton

“[He supposed that nature] “may be nothing but various Contextures of some certaine aethereall Spirits or vapours condens’d as it were by precipitation, much after the manner that vapours are condensed into water or exhalations into grosser Substances and after condensation wrought into various formes, at first by the immediate hand of the Creator, and ever since by the power of Nature… Thus perhaps may all things be originated from aether.” Newton

Pastor

In Tom Bearden’s glossary under the Tesla, Nikola heading…one recognizes Tesla’s genius regarding his “understanding” that.. “From his experiments he knew that the EM wave in vacuum was longitudinal, like sound waves. I showed that the universal medium is a gaseous body in which only longitudinal pulses can be propagated, involving alternating compressions and expansions similar to those produced by sound waves in the air. Thus, a wireless transmitter does not emit Hertz waves which are a myth, but sound waves in the ether, behaving in every respect like those in the air, except that, owing to the great elastic force and extremely small density of the medium, their speed is that of light.” [Tesla]

TESLA, NIKOLA Source: http://www.cheniere.org/techpapers/Annotated%20Glossary.htm

Famous American “migr” electrical inventor and eccentric who’s numerous inventions fueled much of the electrical 20th century.

Tesla produced the AC system, including polyphase systems. From his experiments he knew that the EM wave in vacuum was longitudinal, like sound waves. In spite of his great accomplishments, his eccentricities and grandiose pronouncements did not endear him to electrodynamicists! An example is his acrid comment: “…I showed that the universal medium is a gaseous body in which only longitudinal pulses can be propagated, involving alternating compressions and expansions similar to those produced by sound waves in the air. Thus, a wireless transmitter does not emit Hertz waves which are a myth, but sound waves in the ether, behaving in every respect like those in the air, except that, owing to the great elastic force and extremely small density of the medium, their speed is that of light.” Another major example is his statement: “The Hertz wave theory of wireless transmission may be kept up for a while, but I do not hesitate to say that in a short time it will be recognized as one of the most remarkable and inexplicable aberrations of the scientific mind which has ever been recorded in history.”

Ironically, modern quantum mechanics has almost proven Tesla right that “the universal medium is a gaseous body.” Today the modern QM vacuum is very much like a virtual particle gas. And of course the discussions in this present annotated glossary show why I personally am of the opinion that Tesla was also correct in his firm disbelief that those Faraday-Maxwell “taut physical strings without physical holders” filled the ether and provided transverse EM wave oscillations. I also agree with him that the EM wave in vacuum is a longitudinal wave, exactly like a sound wave. I believe that the transverse gyroelectron precession waves that our instruments actually measure in the conductor when it receives an incoming EM wave from the vacuum, proves that the vacuum wave is indeed longitudinal else it would seem we must discard the spin of an electron and the theory of gyroscopes. Finally, one should see, e.g., Patrick Cornille, “Inhomogeneous Waves and Maxwell’s Equations.” Chapter 4 in Essays on the Formal Aspects of Electromagnetic Theory, Aklesh Lakhtakia, Ed., World Scientific, New York, 1993. Cornille clearly shows that Maxwell’s equations are directly created by scalar potential interferometry. As he states, this means that EM force field wave s are created by the interference of sound-type scalar potential waves, or “sound creates light.” This strongly supports Tesla’s original statement that EM waves in the vacuum are actually EM sound waves, much like sound waves in a gas.

As a viewer of the research of others it is most gratifying to come across those statements of fact that appear to corroborate one’s beliefs, impressions, and attitudes regarding our understanding of the “system of creation”.

We live in a world of chaos theory and of extreme complexity, ranging from the micro to the macro systems dealing in complex infinities… So when one finds a refreshing statement like Tesla’s, equating: “EM wave in vacuum was longitudinal, like sound waves” I regain my respect for the Biblical pronouncement: Then God [said], “Let there be light” as the first initiator of Creation. [from the Book of Genesis].

For the “Light” that God spoke into existence became the canvas upon which the Creation was painted [structured]

All the Best,

Leslie R. Pastor 2002, 12/03

Russell quote:

“Light is the living substance of Mind in action. It is the creating principle of the One substance.

The One substance is the etheric “spiritual” substance of the One universal Mind.

The entire “created” universe of all that is, ever has been, or ever will be, is but the One substance in motion, light.”

“The material substance of Mind is an all pervading ether which is indivisible, inseparable, indestructible, unalterable and unchangedable; but potentially it contains the appearance of all these dimensions of separability in the states of motion which register the dynamic process of thinking.
The words “spirit” and “ether” are used to express the tenuity of the dimensionless universe, as “solidity” is used to express the compactness of the apparently measurable universe.”

“The temperature in the wake of the steamer is higher than that of the surrounding water. Similarly the temperature of the spiral nebula is higher than that of the surrounding “ether” matter, because of the heat energy generated by thinking and transferred to the whirling spheres.”

“When giant suns have radiated their heat to the absolute zero of the surrounding ether substance of Mind, they cease all appearance of individual existence. Their forms have disappeared with the cessation of motion, but their substance is as eternal as Mind is eternal.”

“Man’s speed of light is the speed at which that state of motion-in-opposition, known as incandescent luminosity appears to travel through those high octaves of integrating matter which man calls “empty space,” or the “ether of space.” This measure of light is but the high measure of a great range of apparent speeds.”

“The ecstasy of my thinking varies the spectra of ten times ten billion stars and illumines the ether of endless space.”

“Man has to do with illusion during those periods in which he is forming the idea of himself as illusion; so, therefore, it is necessary that he shall understand the dimensions of the universe of illusion in order that he may control them.

Man has long ago discarded the corpuscular theory of light in favor of a theory of electromagnetic effect of undulating waves which are supposed to exist in the ether.

He must now replace this second theory, for the ether of man’s concept is non- existent. There are no undulating ether waves.

Light is corpuscular.”

Russell,

Young

“either caloric or a universal ether; higher still perhaps are the causes of gravitation, and the imediate agents of attractions of all kinds… It seems therefore natural to believe that the analogy may be continued still further, until it rises into existences absolutely immaterial and spiritual. We know not but that thousands of spiritual worlds may exist unseen forever by human eyes.” Young

The etheric body, ether-body, ether body, a name given by neo-Theosopy to a supposed vital body propounded in esoteric philosophies as the first or lowest layer in the “human energy field” or aura It is said to be in immediate contact with the physical body to sustain it and connect it with “higher” bodies.

The English term “etheric” in this context seems to derive from the Theosophycal writings of Madam Blavatsky, but its use was formalized by C.W.Leadbeater and Annie Besant due to the elimination of Hindu terminology from the system of seven planes and bodies. (Adyar School of Theosophy).

The term gained some general popularity after the 1914-18 war, Dr.Walter John Kilner having adopted it for a layer of the “human atmosphere” which, as he claimed in a popular book, could be rendered visible to the naked eye by means of certain exercises.

The classical element Aether of Platonic and Aristotlean physics continued in Victorian scientific proposals of a Luminiferous ether as well as the cognate chemical substance ether. According to Theosophists and Alice Bailey the etheric body inhabits etheric plane which corresponds to the four higher subplanes of the physical plane. The intended reference is therefore to some extremely rarefied matter, analogous in usage to the word “spirit” (originally “breath”). In selecting it as the term for a clearly-defined concept in an Indian-derived metaphysical system, the Theosophists aligned it with ideas such as the prana-maya-kosha(sheath made of prana, subtle breath or life-force) of Vedantic thought.

In popular use it is often confounded with the related concept of astral body as for example in the term astral projection- the early Theosophists had called it the “astral double”. Others prefer to speak of the “lower and higher astral”.

Beings that possess only etheric bodies

In the teachings of Theosophy, Devas are regarded as living either in the atmosphere of the planets of the solar system (Planetary Angels) or inside the Sun (Solar Angels) (presumably other planetary systems and stars have their own angels) and they help to guide the operation of the processes of nature such as the process of evolution and the growth of plants; their appearance is reputedly like colored flames about the size of a human being. It is believed by Theosophists that devas can be observed when the third eye is activated. Some (but not most) devas originally incarnated as human beings.

It is believed by Theosophists that nature spirits, elements (gnomes, ondines, sylphs, and salamanders), and fairies can be also be observed when the third eye is activated. It is maintained by Theosophists that these less evolutionarily developed beings have never been previously incarnated as human beings; they are regarded as being on a separate line of spiritual evolution called the “deva evolution”; eventually, as their souls advance as they reincarnate, it is believed they will incarnate as devas.

It is asserted by Theosophists that all of the above mentioned beings possess etheric bodies (but no physical bodies) that are composed of etheric matter, a type of matter finer and more pure that is composed of smaller particles than ordinary physical plane matter (See the book Occult Chemistry by C.W. Leadbeater)

Linga sarira is a Sanskrit term for the invisible double of the human body, the etheric body or etheric double (or astral body in some Theosophical concepts). It is one of the seven principles of the human being, according to Theosophical philosophy.

Rudolf Steiner, the founder of Anthroposophy often referred to the etheric body (therleib or “Life Body”) in association with the etheric formative forces and the evolution of man and the cosmos. According to him, it can be perceived by a person gifted with clairvoyance as being of “peach-blossom color”.

Steiner considered the etheric reality or life principle as quite distinct from the physical material reality, being intermediate between the physical world and the astral or soul world. The etheric body can be characterized as the life force also present in the plant kingdom. It maintains the physical body’s form until death. At that time, it separates from the physical body and the physical reverts to natural disintegration.

According to Max Heindel’s Rosicrucian writings, the etheric body, composed of four ethers, is called the “Vital Body” since the ether is the way of ingress for vital force from the Sun and the field of agencies in nature which promote such vital activities as assimilation, growth, and propagation. It is an exact counterpart of our physical body, molecule for molecule, and organ for organ, but it is of the opposite polarity. It is slightly larger, extending about one and one-half inches beyond the periphery of the physical body.

Samael Aun Weor teaches that the vital body is the tetra-dimensional part of the physical body and the foundation of organic life. He states that in the second Initiation of Fire, which is reached through working with sexual magic with a spouse, the Kundalini rises in the vital body. Then the initiate learns how to separate the two superior ethers from the others in order for them to serve as a vehicle to travel out of the physical body.

On the Tree of Life of the Kabbalah, the vital body is often related to the sephira Yesod

Some clairvoyants and occultists have produced drawings and paintings that record their perceptions of the etheric body; see Leadbeater’s Man Visible and Invisible for one example. The images produced by Kirlian photography bear obvious resemblances to these graphics, showing a spiky-looking energy field extending a few inches around the human body (as well as other biological specimens, like leaves, and objects like coins). The fact that Kirlian photography can capture the acupuncture points of the body links the technology with concepts of parna, qi, bioplasma, and related ideas and theories. For some believers in the etheric body, Kirlian photography provides important supporting evidence though skeptics are generally not swayed.