Hi Knowledge Junkie2012,
This is what Gurdjieff had to say on the different bodies of man in "In Search of the Miraculous"
[quote author=ISOTM]
"According to an ancient teaching, traces of which may be found in many systems, old and new, a man who has attained the full development possible for man, a man in the full sense of the word, consists of four bodies. These four bodies are composed of substances which gradually become finer and finer, mutually interpenetrate one another, and form four independent organisms, standing in a definite relationship to one another but capable of independent action.
[/quote]
The finer substances being referred to here is the 4th Way concept of hydrogens which is discussed in ISOTM as well as Mouravieff's Gnosis trilogy. The cassiopedia entry
here gives a concise overview.
[quote author=ISOTM]
"The reason why it is possible for four bodies to exist is that the human organism, that is, the physical body, has such a complex organization that, under certain conditions, a new independent organism can grow in it, affording a much more convenient and responsive instrument for the activity of consciousness than the physical body. The consciousness manifested in this new body is capable of governing it, and it has full power and full control over the physical body. In this second body, under certain conditions, a third body can grow, again having characteristics of its own. The consciousness manifested in this third body has full power and control over the first two bodies; and the third body possesses the possibility of acquiring knowledge inaccessible either to the first or to the second body. In the third body, under certain conditions, a fourth can grow, which differs as much from the third as the third differs from the second and the second from the first. The consciousness manifested in the fourth body has full control over the first three bodies and itself.
"These four bodies are defined in different teachings in various ways." G. drew a
diagram, reproduced in Figure 1, and said:
"The first is the physical body, in Christian terminology the 'carnal' body; the second, in Christian terminology, is the 'natural' body; the third is the 'spiritual' body; and the fourth, in the terminology of esoteric Christianity, is the 'divine' body. In theosophical terminology the first is the 'physical' body, the second is the 'astral,' the third is the 'mental,' and the fourth the 'causal.'1
"In the terminology of certain Eastern teachings the first body is the 'carriage' (body), the second body is the 'horse' (feelings, desires), the third the 'driver' (mind), and the fourth the 'master' (I, consciousness, will).
"Such comparisons and parallels may be found in most systems and teachings which recognize something more in man than the physical body. But almost all these teachings, while repeating in a more or less familiar form the definitions and divisions of the ancient teaching, have forgotten or omitted its most important feature, which is: that man is not born with the finer bodies, and that they can only be artificially cultivated in him provided favorable conditions both internal and external are present.
"The 'astral body' is not an indispensable implement for man. It is a great luxury which only a few can afford. A man can live quite well without an 'astral body.' His physical body possesses all the functions necessary for life. A man without 'astral body' may even produce the impression of being a very intellectual or even spiritual man, and may deceive not only others but also himself.
"This applies still more, of course, to the 'mental body' and the fourth body.
Ordinary man does not possess these bodies or their corresponding functions. But he often thinks, and makes others think, that he does. The reasons for this are, first, the fact that the physical body works with the same substances of which the higher bodies are composed, only these substances are not crystallized in him, do not belong to him; and secondly, it has all the functions analogous to those of the higher bodies, though of course they differ from them considerably. The chief difference between the functions of a man possessing the physical body only and the functions of the four bodies, is that, in the first case, the functions of the physical body govern all the other functions, in other words, everything is governed by the body which, in its turn, is governed by external influences.
"In the first case," said G., "that is, in relation to the functions of a man of physical body only, the automaton depends upon external influences, and the next three functions depend upon the physical body and the external influences it receives. Desires or aversions—'I want,' 'I don't want,' 'I like,' 'I don't like'—that is, functions occupying the place of the second body, depend upon accidental shocks and influences. Thinking, which corresponds to the functions of the third body, is an entirely mechanical process. 'Will' is absent in ordinary mechanical man, he has desires only; and a greater or lesser permanence of desires and wishes is called a strong or a weak will.
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So it seems like the functions of the higher bodies - emotions, thought and will - could be mimicked by the physical body in conjunction with external stimuli. Thus we can have instinctual drives which appear as "will", instinctual likes and dislikes appearing as "emotions" and automatic thinking appearing as "thought". This according to Gurdjieff is the default condition for humanity.
[quote author=ISOTM]
"In the second case, that is, in relation to the functions of the four bodies, the automatism of the physical body depends upon the influences of the other bodies. Instead of the discordant and often contradictory activity of different desires, there is one single I, whole, indivisible, and permanent; there is individuality, dominating the physical body and its desires and able to overcome both its reluctance and its resistance. Instead of the mechanical process of thinking there is consciousness. And there is will, that is, a power, not merely composed of various often contradictory desires belonging to different "I's," but issuing from consciousness and governed by individuality or a single and permanent I. Only such a will can be called "free," for it is independent of accident and cannot be altered or directed from without.
[/quote]
The above is the condition of "Man" who has developed all the 4 bodies.
Unlike all other teachings that talk about higher bodies, G said that these bodies are not present by default but are formed (fused) only by a continuing inner struggle (or fire) generating friction trough the agency of what he called "conscious labor and intentional suffering".
[quote author=ISOTM]
"An Eastern teaching describes the functions of the four bodies, their gradual growth, and the conditions of this growth, in the following way:
"Let us imagine a vessel or a retort filled with various metallic powders. The powders are not in any way connected with each other and every accidental change in the position of the retort changes the relative position of the powders. If the retort be shaken or tapped with the finger, then the powder which was at the top may appear at the bottom or in the middle, while the one which was at the bottom may appear at the top. There is nothing permanent in the position of the powders and under such conditions there can be nothing permanent. This is an exact picture of our psychic life. Each succeeding moment, new influences may change die position of the powder which is on the top and put in its place another which is absolutely its opposite. Science calls this state of the powders the state of mechanical mixture. The essential characteristic of the interrelation of the powders to one another in this kind of mixture is the instability of these interrelations and their variability.
"It is impossible to stabilize the interrelation of powders in a state of mechanical mixture. But the powders may be fused; the nature of the powders makes this possible. To do this a special kind of fire must be lighted under the retort which, by heating and melting the powders, finally fuses them together. Fused in this way the powders will be in the state of a chemical compound. And now they can no longer be separated by those simple methods which separated and made them change places when they were in a state of mechanical mixture. The contents of the retort have become indivisible, 'individual.' This is a picture of the formation of the second body. The fire by means of which fusion is attained is produced by 'friction,' which in its turn is produced in man by the struggle between 'yes' and 'no.' If a man gives way to all his desires, or panders to them, there will be no inner struggle in him, no 'friction,' no fire. But if, for the sake of attaining a definite aim, he struggles with desires that hinder him, he will then create a fire which will gradually transform his inner world into a single whole.
[/quote]
The term "soul" does not seem to have an exact correspondence in the 4th Way scheme. If we treat "soul" as consciousness, then in this scheme there would be different levels of such consciousness - viz. animal-like instinct driven consciousness at the lowest level and fully formed objective consciousness at the highest level. In esoteric terms, the word "soul" is perhaps mostly used above the level of instinct driven consciousness.
In "Lost Christianity", Jacob Needleman used the word "soul" to indicate "the intermediate principle in human nature occupying the place between the Spirit and the body". He identified a special type of attention - attention of the heart - as the power or function of the soul. Appearance of the soul is associated with the experience of "psychological pain of contradiction" and to sustain or gather its presence, voluntary attention is needed. Such an attention would be needed for the core 4th Way practice of self-observation with the accompanying struggle between "yes and no" and consequent possible development of higher bodies.
With attention, we come to the physical organ of the brain where neuroscience shows that voluntary directed attention is largely a function of the pre-frontal cortex. Sustained voluntary attention required for self-observation in real-time burns a lot of energy in the brain and is not required for the purpose of ordinary life. Also the instinct of the physical body takes one away from the psychological pain that seems inevitable to the process of crystallizing the higher bodies. Thus these modern scientific observations tie in to the 4th way premise that man does not possess crystallized higher bodies under ordinary circumstances.
Given the circular nature of "attention as power of the soul" and "harnessing the energy released through the psychological pain of contradiction (or struggle of yes and no) to build higher bodies", it appears that one must start with a seed of the soul or capacity for this mode of attention in order to develop these higher bodies - a self-enhancing feedback loop in other words. Such capacity is possibly entirely missing in certain cases (like psychopathology) whereas a weak presence of such capacity in most cases does not lead to actualizing the potential of "soul-making".
fwiw
