The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Spiritual Realms and Human Self-knowledge

[ 1 ] The guiding principles sent out from the Goetheanum to the members of the Anthroposophical Society in recent weeks direct the soul's gaze toward the beings of the spiritual realms, with which human beings are connected just as much as they are with the natural realms below.

[ 2 ] A true self-knowledge of the human being can become the guide to these spiritual realms. And if such self-knowledge is sought with the right sense, then an understanding of what anthroposophy conveys from its insight into the life of the spiritual world will open up within it. One must only practice self-knowledge in the true sense, not in the sense of merely staring into one's “inner self.”

[ 3 ] With such true self-knowledge, one first finds what lives in one's memory. In thought images, one brings to consciousness the shadows of what one has experienced directly and vividly in the past. When one sees a shadow, an inner urge directs one's thinking toward the object that casts the shadow. Those who carry a memory within themselves cannot direct their soul's gaze in such a direct way toward the experience that continues to have an effect in their memory. But if they truly reflect on their own being, they will have to say to themselves: they themselves, according to their soul's essence, are what the experiences have made them, experiences that cast their shadows in their memory. The shadows of memory appear in consciousness, while what casts shadows in memory shines in the soul. Dead shadows lie in memory; living being lies in the soul, in which memory works.

[ 4 ] One need only clarify this relationship between memory and real soul life, and in this striving for clarity in self-knowledge, one will feel how one is on the path to the spiritual world.

[ 5 ] Through memory, one sees the spiritual aspect of one's own soul. For ordinary consciousness, this seeing does not lead to a real grasp of what the gaze is directed at. One looks at something, but the gaze encounters no reality. Anthroposophy points to this reality through imaginative knowledge. It points from the shadow to the light. It does this by speaking of the etheric body of the human being. It shows how the physical body works in the shadow images of thought, but how the etheric body lives in the light.

[ 6 ] With the physical body, the human being is in the sensory world; with the etheric body, he is in the etheric world. In the sensory world, he has an environment; he also has one in the etheric world. Anthroposophy speaks of this environment as the first hidden world in which the human being finds himself. It is the realm of the third hierarchy.

[ 7 ] Now approach language in the same way as you approached memory. It springs from within the human being like memory. In it, the human being connects with a being, just as in memory he connects with his own experiences. There is also a shadow aspect to words. This is more powerful than the shadow aspect of memory thoughts. By internally shadowing their experiences in memory, human beings are themselves active in the whole process with their own hidden self. They are present when the light casts its shadow.

[ 8 ] There is also shadow casting in language. Words are shadows. What shines there? More powerful things shine because words are more powerful shadows than thoughts of memory. What can create memories in the human self in the course of an earthly life cannot be created by words. Human beings must learn this in connection with other human beings. A being lying deeper within him than that which casts shadows in memory must participate in this. Anthroposophy speaks here, out of inspired knowledge, of the astral body, just as it speaks of the etheric body in relation to memory. The astral body joins the physical and etheric bodies as a third member of the human being.

[ 9 ] But this third member also has a world environment. It is that of the second hierarchy. Human language provides a shadow image of this second hierarchy. Human beings live within the realm of this hierarchy with their astral body.

[ 10 ] One can go further. When speaking, the human being participates with a part of his being. In speaking, he sets his inner being in motion. That which surrounds this inner being remains at rest in the act of speaking itself. The movement of speaking escapes this human being who remains at rest. But the whole human being comes into motion when he brings into activity that which is limb-like in him. In this movement, the human being is no less expressive than in memory and speech. Memory expresses experiences; speech has its essence precisely in that it is the expression of something. In the same way, the human being moved in his whole being expresses a “something.”

[ 11 ] Anthroposophy identifies what is expressed in this way as another limb of the human being. Based on intuitive knowledge, it speaks of the “true self” or the “I.” It also finds a world environment for this. It is that of the first hierarchy.

[ 12 ] When human beings approach their memories, they encounter a first supersensible being, their own etheric being. Anthroposophy points out the corresponding world environment to them. When human beings perceive themselves as speakers, they encounter their astral being. This is no longer grasped in what only works inwardly like memory. It is seen by inspiration as that which shapes a physical process in speech from the spiritual realm. Speech is a physical process. It is based on creation from the realm of the second hierarchy.

[ 13 ] There is a more intense physical activity in the whole moving human being than in speech. It is not something in the human being that is being formed; the whole human being is being formed. Here the first hierarchy is at work in the physical realm that is weaving into form.

[ 14 ] In this way, true self-knowledge of the human being can be practiced. But in doing so, the human being does not grasp his own self alone. Step by step, he grasps his members: the physical body, the etheric body, the astral body, the self. But in comprehending these, they also gradually approach higher worlds which, like the three natural kingdoms—the animal, plant, and mineral kingdoms—belong as three spiritual kingdoms to the whole world in which their being unfolds.

Further guiding principles issued by the Anthroposophical Society at the Goetheanum

[ 15 ] 69. The third hierarchy reveals itself as purely spiritual-soul. It weaves in what human beings experience inwardly in a soul-like way. Neither etheric nor physical processes could arise if only this hierarchy were at work. Only soul processes could exist.

[ 16 ] 70. The second hierarchy reveals itself as a spiritual-soul entity working in the etheric. Everything etheric is a manifestation of the second hierarchy. However, it does not reveal itself directly in the physical. Its power extends only to etheric processes. Only the soul and etheric would exist if only the third and second hierarchies were active.

[ 17 ] 71. The strongest, first hierarchy reveals itself as that which is spiritually active in the physical. It shapes the physical world into the cosmos. The third and second hierarchies are the serving entities in this process.

(Continued in the next issue.)