Astral Spirits

Astral Spirits. The star (Gr. astron) and fire worship of the eastern religions rested on the doctrine that every heavenly body is animated by a pervading spirit, forming, as it were, its soul; and this doctrine passed into the religio-physical theories of the Greeks and Jews, and even into the Christian world. In the demonology or spirit-systems of Christendom in the middle ages, astral spirits are conceived of sometimes as fallen angels, sometimes as souls of departed men, sometimes as spirits originating in fire, and hovering between heaven, earth, and hell, without belonging to any one of these provinces. Their intercourse with men and their influence were variously represented, according to the notion formed of their nature. As the belief in spirits and witchcraft reached its height in the 15th century, the demonologists, or special students of this subject, systematised the strange fancies of that wild period; and astral spirits were made to occupy the first rank among evil or demoniacal spirits. Paracelsus, however, and others attributed to every human being an astral spirit, or sidereal element, in which the human soul, or spirit proper, is thought to inhere, and which lives for a time after the person dies. Moreover, Paracelsus recognised astral or sidereal elements in matter. Astral salt was the basis of the solidity and incombustible parts of bodies; astral sulphur was the source of combustion and vegetation; astral mercury, of volatility and fluidity. These three elements were analogous to the three elements of man—body, soul, and spirit.