Fundamentals of Therapy
GA 27
I. True Knowledge of the Human Being as a Foundation for the Art of Medicine
[ 1 ] This book will indicate new possibilities for the science and art of Medicine. It will only be possible to form an accurate view of what is described if the reader is willing to accept the points of view that predominated at that time when the medical approach outlined here came into being.
[ 2 ] It is not a question of opposition to modern [homogenic] medicine which is working with scientific methods. We take full cognizance of the value of its principles. It is also our opinion that what we are offering should only be used in medical work by those individuals who can be fully active as qualified physicians in the sense of those principles.
[ 3 ] On the other hand, to all that can be known about the human being with the scientific methods that are recognized today, we add a further knowledge, whose discoveries are made by different methods. And out of this deeper knowledge of the World and Man, we find ourselves compelled to work for an extension of the art of medicine.
[ 4] Fundamentally speaking, the [homogenic] medicine of today can offer no objection to what we have to say, seeing that we on our side do not deny its principles. He alone could reject our efforts a priori who would require us not only to affirm his science but to adduce no further knowledge extending beyond the limits of his own.
[ 5 ] We see this extension of our knowledge of the World and Man in Anthroposophy, which was founded by Rudolf Steiner. To the knowledge of the physical man which alone is accessible to the natural-scientific methods of today, Anthroposophy adds that of spiritual man. Nor does it merely proceed by dint of reflective thought from knowledge of the physical to knowledge of the spiritual. On such a path, one only finds oneself face to face with more or less well conceived hypotheses, of which no one can prove that there is anything in reality to correspond to them.
[ 6 ] Before making statements about the spiritual, Anthroposophy evolves the methods which give it the right to make such statements. Some insight will be gained into the nature of these methods if the following be considered: all the results of the accepted science of our time are derived in the last resort from the impressions of the human senses. However far man may extend the sphere of what is yielded by his senses, in experiment or in observation with the help of instruments, nothing essentially new is added by these means to his experience of the world in which the senses place him.
[ 7 ] His thinking, too, in as much as he applies it in his researches of the physical world, can add nothing new to what is given through the senses. In thought he combines and analyses the sense-impressions in order to discover laws (the laws of nature), and yet, as a researcher of the material world he must admit: this thinking that wells up from within me adds nothing real to what is already real in the material world of sense.
[ 8 ] All this immediately changes if we no longer stop short at that thinking which man acquires through his experience of ordinary life and education. This thinking can be strengthened and reinforced within ourselves. We place some simple, easily encompassed idea in the centre of consciousness and, to the exclusion of all other thoughts, concentrate all the power of the soul on such representations. As a muscle grows strong when exerted again and again in the direction of the same force, so our force of soul grows strong when exercised in this way with respect to that sphere of existence which otherwise holds sway in thought. It should again be emphasized that these exercises must be based on simple, easily encompassed thoughts. For in carrying out the exercises the soul must not be exposed to any kind of influences from the subconscious or unconscious. (Here we can but indicate the principle of such exercises; a fuller description, and directions showing how such exercises should be done in individual cases, will be found in the books, such as Knowledge of the Higher Worlds and Occult Science, and other anthroposophical works.
[ 9 ] It is tempting to object that anyone who thus gives himself up with all his strength to certain thoughts placed in the focus of consciousness will thereby expose himself to all manner of auto-suggestion and the like, and that he will simply enter a realm of fantasy. But Anthroposophy shows how the exercises should be done from the outset, so that this objection loses its validity. It shows the way to advance within the sphere of consciousness, step by step and fully wide-awake in carrying out the exercises, as in the solving of an arithmetical or geometrical problem. At no point in solving a problem of arithmetic or geometry can our consciousness veer off into unconscious regions; nor can it do so during the practices here indicated, provided always that the anthroposophical suggestions are properly observed.
[ 10 ] In the course of such practice we attain a strengthening of a power of thought, of which we had not the remotest idea before. Like a new content of our human being we feel this power of thought holding sway within us. And with this new content of our own human being there is revealed at the same time a world-content which, though we may perhaps have divined its existence before, was unknown to us by actual experience until now. If in moments of introspection we consider our everyday activity of thought, we find that the thoughts are pale and shadow-like beside the impressions that our senses give us.
[ 11 ] What we experience in the now strengthened capacity of thought is not pale or shadow-like by any means. It is full of inner content, vividly real and graphic; it is, indeed, of a reality far more intense than the contents of our sense perceptions. A new world begins to dawn for the man who has thus enhanced the force of his perceptive faculty.
[ 12 ] He, who until now was only able to perceive in the world of the senses, learns to apperceive in this new world; and as he does so he discovers that all the laws of nature known to him before hold good in the physical world only; it is of the intrinsic nature of the world he has now entered that its laws are different, in fact, the very opposite to those of the physical world. In this world for instance the earthly force of gravity does not apply, on the contrary, another force emerges, working not from the centre of the earth outwards but in the reverse direction, from the circumference of the universe towards the centre of the earth. And so it is in like manner with the other forces of the physical world.
[ 13 ] Man's faculty to perceive in this world, attainable as it is by exercise and practice, is called, in Anthroposophy, the imaginative faculty of knowledge. Imaginative not for the reason that one is dealing with “fantasies”, the word is used because the content of consciousness is filled with pictures, instead of the mere shadows of thought. And as in sense perception we feel as an immediate experience that we are in a world of reality, so it is in the activity of soul, which is here called imaginative knowledge. The world to which this knowledge relates is called in Anthroposophy the etheric world. This is not to suggest the hypothetical ether of modern physics, it is something really seen in the spirit. The name is used in keeping with older, instinctive presentiments with regard to that world. Against what can now be known with full clarity, these old presentiments no longer have a scientific value; but if we wish to designate a thing we have to choose some name.
[ 14 ] Within the etheric world an etheric bodily nature of man is perceptible, existing in addition to the physical bodily nature.
[ 15 ] This etheric body is also to be found in its essential nature in the plant-world. Plants too have their etheric body. The physical laws really only hold good for the world of lifeless mineral nature.
[ 16 ] The plant-world is possible on earth because there are substances in the earthly realm which do not remain enclosed within, or limited to the physical laws, but can lay aside the whole complex of physical law and assume one which opposes it. The physical laws work streaming from the earth; the etheric work from all sides of the universe streaming to the earth. It is not possible for man to understand how the plant world comes into being, till he sees in it the interplay of the earthly and physical with the cosmic-etheric.
So it is with the etheric body of man himself. Through the etheric body something is taking place in man which is not a straightforward continuation of the laws and workings of the physical body with its forces, but rests on a quite different foundation: in effect the physical substances, as they pour into the etheric realm, divest themselves to begin with of their physical forces.
[ 17 ] The forces that prevail in the etheric body are active at the beginning of man's life on earth, and most distinctly during the embryonic period; they are the forces of growth and formative development. During the course of earthly life a part of these forces emancipates itself from this formative and growth activity and becomes the forces of thought, just those forces which, for the ordinary consciousness, bring forth the shadow-like world of man's thoughts.
[ 18 ] It is of the greatest importance to know that man's ordinary forces of thought are refined formative and growth forces. Something spiritual reveals itself in the formation and growth of the human organism. The spiritual element then appears during the course of life as the spiritual force of thought. [ 19 ] And this force of thought is only a part of the human formative and growth force that works in the etheric.
The other part remains true to the purpose it fulfilled in the beginning of man's life. But because the human being continues to evolve even when his growth and formation have reached an advanced stage, that is, when they are to a certain degree completed, the etheric spiritual force, which lives and works in the organism, is able to emerge in later life as the capacity for thought.
[ 20 ] Thus the formative or sculptural force, appearing from the one side in the soul-content of our thought, is revealed to the imaginative spiritual vision from the other side as an etheric-spiritual reality.
If we now follow the material substance of the earth into the etheric formative process we find wherever they enter this formative process these substances assume a form of being which estranges them from physical nature. While they are thus estranged, they enter into a world where the spiritual comes to meet them transforming them into its own being.
[ 21 ] The way of ascending to the etherically living nature of man as described here is a very different thing from the unscientific postulation of a “vital force” which was customary even up to the middle of the nineteenth century in order to explain the living entities. Here it is a question of the actual seeing—that is to say, the spiritual perception—of a reality which, like the physical body, is present in man and in everything that lives. To bring about spiritual perception of the etheric we do not merely continue ordinary thinking nor do we invent another world through fantasy. Rather we extend the human powers of cognition in an exact way; and this extension yields experience of an extended universe.
[ 22 ] The exercises leading to higher perception can be carried further. Just as we exert an enhanced power in concentrating on thoughts placed deliberately in the centre of our consciousness, so we can now apply such an enhanced power in order to suppress the imaginations—(pictures of a spiritual-etheric reality)—achieved by the former process. We then reach a state of completely emptied consciousness. We are awake and aware, but our wakefulness to begin with has no content. (Further details are to be found in the above-mentioned books.) But this wakefulness does not remain without content. Our consciousness, emptied as it is of any physical or etheric pictorial impressions, becomes filled with a content that pours into it from a real spiritual world, even as the impressions from the physical world pour into the physical senses.
[ 23 ] By imaginative knowledge we have come to know a second member of the human being; by the emptied consciousness becoming filled with spiritual content we learn to know a third. Anthroposophy calls the knowledge that comes about in this way knowledge by inspiration. (The reader should not let these terms confuse him, they are borrowed from the instinctive ways of looking into spiritual worlds which belonged to more primitive ages, but the sense in which they are here used is stated exactly.) The world to which man gains entry by “inspiration” is called the “astral world”. When one is speaking in the sense explained here of an “etheric world”, we mean those influences that work from the circumference of the universe towards the earth. If we speak of the “astral world”, we proceed, as is seen by the perception of inspired consciousness, from the influences of the cosmos towards certain spiritual beings which reveal themselves in these influences, just as the materials of the earth reveal themselves in the forces that radiate out from the earth. We speak of real spiritual beings working from the distant universe just as we speak of the stars and constellations when we look out physically into the heavens at nighttime. Hence the expression “astral world”. In this astral world man bears the third member of his human nature, namely his astral body.
[ 24 ] The earth's substances must also flow into this astral body. Through this it is estranged from its physical nature.—Just as man has the etheric body in common with the world of plants, so he has his astral body in common with the world of animals.
[ 25 ] What essentially raises the human being above the animal world can be recognized through a form of cognition still higher than inspiration. At this point Anthroposophy speaks of intuition. In inspiration a world of spiritual beings manifests itself; in intuition, the relationship of the discerning human being to the world grows more intimate. He now brings to fullest consciousness within himself that which is purely spiritual, and in the conscious experience of it, he realises immediately that it has nothing to do with experience from bodily nature. Through this he transplants himself into a life which can only be described as a life of the human spirit among other spirit-beings. In inspiration the spiritual beings of the world reveal themselves; through intuition we ourselves live with these beings.
[ 26 ] Through this we come to acknowledge the fourth member of the human being, the essential “I”. Once again we become aware of how the material of the earth, in adapting to the life and being of the “I”, estranges itself yet further from its physical nature. The nature which this material assumes as “ego organization” is, to begin with, that form of earthly substance in which it is farthest estranged from its earthly physical character.
[ 27 ] In the human organization, that which we thus learn to know as the “astral body” and “I ” is not bound to the physical body in the same way as the etheric body. Inspiration and intuition show how in sleep the “astral body” and the “I” separate from the physical and etheric, and that it is only in the waking state that there is the full mutual permeation of the four members of man's nature to form a human entity.
In sleep the physical and the etheric human body are left behind in the physical and etheric world. Yet they are not in the same position as the physical and the etheric body of a plant or plant-like being. For they bear within them the after-effects of the astral and the Ego-nature. Indeed, in the very moment when they would no longer bear these aftereffects within them, the human being must awaken. A human physical body must never be subjected to the merely physical, nor a human etheric body to the merely etheric effects. Through this they would disintegrate.
[ 28 ] Inspiration and intuition however also show something else. Physical substance experiences further development of its nature in its transition to living and moving in the etheric. It is a condition of life that the organic body is snatched out of the earthly state to be built up by the extraterrestrial cosmos. This building activity however brings about life, but not consciousness, and not self-consciousness.
The astral body must build up its organization within the physical and the etheric; the ego must do the same with regard to the ego organization. But in this building there is no conscious development of the soul life. For this to occur a process of destruction must oppose the process of building. The astral body builds up its organs; it destroys them by allowing the soul to develop an activity of feeling within consciousness; the ego builds up its “ego-organization”; it destroys this, in that will-activity becomes active in self-consciousness.
[ 29 ] The spirit within the human being does not unfold on the basis of constructive material activity but on the basis of what it destroys. Wherever the spirit is to work in man, matter must withdraw from its activity.
[ 30 ] Even the origin of thought in the etheric body depends not on a further development but, on the contrary, on a destruction of etheric being. Conscious thinking does not take place in the processes of growth and formation, but in the processes of deformation, fading, dying which are continually interwoven with the etheric events.
[ 31 ] In conscious thinking, the thoughts liberate themselves out of the physical form and become human experiences as soul formations.
[ 32 ] If we consider the human being on the basis of such a knowledge of man, we become aware that the nature of the whole man, or of any single organ, is only seen with clarity if one knows how the physical, the etheric, the astral body and the ego work in him. There are organs in which the chief agent is the ego; in others the ego works but little, and the physical organization is predominant.
[ 33 ] Just as the healthy man can only be understood by recognizing how the higher members of man's being take possession of the earthly substance, compelling it into their service, and in this connection also recognizing how the earthly substance becomes transformed when it enters the sphere of action of the higher members of man's nature; so we can only understand the unhealthy man if we understand the situation in which the organism as a whole, or a certain organ or series of organs, find themselves when the mode of action of the higher members falls into irregularity. We shall only be able to think of therapeutic substances when we evolve a knowledge of how some earthly substance or earthly process is related to the etheric, to the astral and to the ego. Only then shall we be able to achieve the desired result, by introducing an earthly substance into the human organism or by treatment with an earthly process of activity, enabling the higher members of the human being to unfold again unhindered, or by the earthly substance (of the physical body) finding, in what has been added, the necessary support to bring it into the path where it becomes a basis for the earthly working of the spiritual.
[ 34 ] Man is what he is by virtue of physical body, etheric body, soul (astral body) and ego (spirit). He must, in health, be seen and understood from the aspect of these his members; in disease he must be observed in the disturbance of their equilibrium, and for his healing we must find the therapeutic substances that can restore the balance.
[ 35 ] A medical approach built on such a basis is to be suggested in this book.
I. Wahre Menschenwesen-Erkenntnis als Grundlage medizinischer Kunst
[ 1 ] In dieser Schrift wird auf neue Möglichkeiten für das ärztliche Wissen und Können hingewiesen. Richtig beurteilen wird man das Vorgebrachte nur, wenn man sich auf die Gesichtspunkte einlassen kann, die leitend waren, als die medizinischen Anschauungen zustande kamen, von denen hier gesprochen wird.
[ 2 ] Nicht um eine Opposition gegen die mit den anerkannten wissenschaftlichen Methoden der Gegenwart arbeitende Medizin handelt es sich. Diese wird von uns in ihren Prinzipien voll anerkannt. Und wir haben die Meinung, daß das von uns Gegebene nur derjenige in der ärztlichen Kunst verwenden soll, der im Sinne dieser Prinzipien vollgültig Arzt sein kann.
[ 3 ] Allein wir fügen zu dem, was man mit den heute anerkannten wissenschaftlichen Methoden über den Menschen wissen kann, noch weitere Erkenntnisse hinzu, die durch andere Methoden gefunden werden, und sehen uns daher gezwungen, aus dieser erweiterten Welt- und Menschenerkenntnis auch für eine Erweiterung der ärztlichen Kunst zu arbeiten.
[ 4 ] Eine Einwendung der anerkannten Medizin kann im Grunde gegen das, was wir vorbringen, nicht gemacht werden, da wir diese nicht verneinen. Nur derjenige, der nicht nur verlangt, man müsse sein Wissen bejahen, sondern der dazu noch den Anspruch erhebt, man dürfe keine Erkenntnis vorbringen, die über die seinige hinausgeht, kann unseren Versuch von vorneherein ablehnen.
[ 5 ] Die Erweiterung der Welt- und Menschenerkenntnis sehen wir in der von Rudolf Steiner begründeten Anthroposophie. Sie fügt zu der Erkenntnis des physischen des Menschen, die allein durch die naturwissenschaftlichen Methoden der Gegenwart gewonnen werden kann, diejenige vom geistigen Menschen. Sie geht nicht durch ein bloßes Nachdenken von Erkenntnissen des Physischen zu solchen des Geistigen über. Auf diesem Wege sieht man sich doch nur vor mehr oder weniger gut gedachte Hypothesen gestellt, von denen niemand beweisen kann, daß ihnen in der Wirklichkeit etwas entspricht.
[ 6 ] Die Anthroposophie bildet, bevor sie über das Geistige Aussagen macht, die Methoden aus, die sie berechtigen, solche Aussagen zu machen. Um einen Einblick in diese Methoden zu bekommen, bedenke man das Folgende: Alle Ergebnisse der gegenwärtig anerkannten Naturwissenschaft sind im Grunde aus den Eindrücken der menschlichen Sinne gewonnen. Denn wenn auch der Mensch im Experiment oder in der Beobachtung mit Werkzeugen das erweitert, was die Sinne ihm geben können, so kommt dadurch nichts wesentlich Neues zu den Erfahrungen über die Welt hinzu, in der der Mensch durch seine Sinne lebt.
[ 7 ] Aber auch durch das Denken, insofern dieses bei der Erforschung der physischen Welt tätig ist, kommt nichts Neues zu dem sinnenfällig Gegebenen hinzu. Das Denken kombiniert, analysiert usw. die Sinneseindrücke, um zu Gesetzen (Naturgesetzen) zu gelangen; aber es muß sich der Erforscher der Sinneswelt sagen: dieses Denken, das da aus mir hervorquillt, fügt etwas Wirkliches zu dem Wirklichen der Sinneswelt nicht hinzu.
[ 8 ] Das aber wird sogleich anders, wenn man nicht bei dem Denken stehen bleibt, zu dem es der Mensch zunächst durch Leben und Erziehung bringt. Man kann dieses Denken in sich verstärken, erkraften. Man kann einfache, leicht überschaubare Gedanken in den Mittelpunkt des Bewußtseins stellen, und dann, mit Ausschluß aller anderen Gedanken, alle Kraft der Seele auf solchen Vorstellungen halten. Wie ein Muskel erstarkt, wenn er immer wieder in der Richtung der gleichen Kraft angespannt wird, so erstarkt die seelische Kraft mit Bezug auf dasjenige Gebiet, das sonst im Denken waltet, wenn sie in der angegebenen Art Übungen macht. Man muß betonen, daß diesen Übungen einfache, leicht überschaubare Gedanken zugrunde liegen müssen. Denn die Seele darf, während sie solche Übungen macht, keinerlei Einflüssen eines halb oder ganz Unbewußten ausgesetzt sein. (Wir können hier nur das Prinzip solcher Übungen angeben; eine ausführliche Darstellung und Anleitung, wie solche Übungen im Einzelnen zu machen sind, findet man in Rudolf Steiner's «Wie erlangt man Erkenntnisse der höheren Welten», in dessen «Geheimwissenschaft» und in anderen anthroposophischen Schriften.)
[ 9 ] Es liegt nahe, den Einwand zu erheben, daß jemand, der sich so mit aller Kraft bestimmten, in den Mittelpunkt des Bewußtseins gerückten Gedanken hingibt, allerlei Autosuggestionen und dergleichen ausgesetzt ist, und daß er einfach in das Gebiet der Einbildung hineinkommt. Allein Anthroposophie zeigt zugleich, wie die Übungen verlaufen müssen, damit dieser Einwand völlig unberechtigt ist. Sie zeigt, wie man innerhalb des Bewußtseins in vollbesonnener Art während des Übens so fortschreitet wie beim Lösen eines arithmetischen oder geometetrischen Problems. Wie da das Bewußtsein nirgends ins Unbewußte ausgleiten kann, so auch nicht während des angedeuteten Übens, wenn die anthroposophischen Anleitungen richtig befolgt werden.
[ 10 ] Im Verfolge dieses Übens kommt man zu einer Verstärkung der Denkkraft, von der man vorher keine Ahnung hatte. Man fühlt die waltende Denkkraft in sich wie einen neuen Inhalt des Menschenwesens. Und zugleich mit diesem Inhalt seines eigenen Menschenwesens offenbart sich ein Weltinhalt, den man vorher vielleicht geahnt, aber nicht durch Erfahrung gekannt hat. Sieht man einmal in Augenblicken der Selbstbeobachtung auf das gewöhnliche Denken hin, so findet man die Gedanken schattenhaft, blaß gegenüber den Eindrücken, die die Sinne geben.
[ 11 ] Was man jetzt in der verstärkten Denkkraft wahrnimmt, ist durchaus nicht blaß und schattenhaft; es ist vollinhaltlich, konkret-bildhaft; es ist von einer viel intensiveren Wirklichkeit als der Inhalt der Sinneseindrücke. Es geht dem Menschen eine neue Welt auf, indem er auf die angegebene Art die Kraft seiner Wahrnehmungsfähigkeit erweitert hat.
[ 12 ] Indem der Mensch in dieser Welt wahrnehmen lernt, wie er früher nur innerhalb der sinnlichen Welt wahrnehmen konnte, wird ihm klar, daß alle Naturgesetze, die er vorher gekannt hatte, nur in der physischen Welt gelten; und daß das Wesen der Welt, die er jetzt betreten hat, darin besteht, daß ihre Gesetze andere, ja die entgegengesetzten gegenüber denen der physischen Welt sind. In dieser Welt gilt nicht das Gesetz der Anziehungskraft der Erde, sondern im Gegenteil, es tritt eine Kraft auf, die nicht von dem Mittelpunkt der Erde nach auswärts wirkt, sondern umgekehrt so, daß ihre Richtung von dem Umkreis des Weltalls her nach dem Mittelpunkt der Erde geht. Und entsprechend ist es mit den andern Kräften der physischen Welt.
[ 13 ] In der Anthroposophie wird die durch Übung erlangte Fähigkeit des Menschen, diese Welt zu schauen, die imaginative Erkenntnis-Kraft genannt. Imaginativ nicht aus dem Grunde, weil man es mit «Einbildungen» zu tun habe, sondern weil der Inhalt des Bewußtseins nicht mit Gedankenschatten, sondern mit Bildern erfüllt ist. Und wie man sich durch die Sinneswahrnehmung im unmittelbaren Erleben in einer Wirklichkeit fühlt, so auch in der Seelentätigkeit des imaginativen Erkennens. Die Welt, auf die sich diese Erkenntnis bezieht, wird von der Anthroposophie die ätherische Welt genannt. Es handelt sich dabei nicht um den hypothetischen Äther der gegenwärtigen Physik, sondern um ein wirklich geistig Geschautes. Der Name wird im Einklange mit älteren instinktiven Ahnungen dieser Welt gegeben. Diese haben gegenüber dem, was gegenwärtig klar erkannt werden kann, keinen Erkenntniswert mehr; aber will man etwas bezeichnen, so braucht man Namen.
[ 14 ] Innerhalb dieser Ätherwelt ist eine neben der physischen Leiblichkeit des Menschen bestehende ätherische Leiblichkeit wahrnehmbar.
[ 15 ] Diese ätherische Leiblichkeit ist etwas, das sich ihrem Wesen nach auch in der Pflanzenwelt findet. Die Pflanzen haben ihren Ätherleib. Die physischen Gesetze gelten tatsächlich nur für die Welt des leblosen Mineralischen.
[ 16 ] Die Pflanzenwelt ist auf der Erde dadurch möglich, daß es Substanzen im Irdischen gibt, die nicht innerhalb der physischen Gesetze beschlossen bleiben, sondern die alle physische Gesetzmäßigkeit ablegen und eine solche annehmen können, die dieser entgegengesetzt ist. Die physischen Gesetze wirken wie ausströmend von der Erde die ätherischen wirken wie von allen Seiten des Weltumfanges auf die Erde zuströmend Man begreift das Werden der Pflanzenwelt nur, wenn man in ihr das Zusammenwirken des Irdisch Physischen und des Kosmisch Ätherischen sieht. Und so ist es mit Bezug auf den Ätherleib des Menschen. Durch ihn geschieht im Menschen etwas, das nicht in der Fortsetzung des gesetzmäßigen Wirkens der Kräfte des physischen Leibes liegt, sondern das zur Grundlage hat, daß die physischen Stoffe, indem sie in das einströmen, sich zuerst ihrer physischen Kräfte entledigen.
[ 17 ] Diese im Ätherleibe wirksamen Kräfte betätigten sich im Beginne des menschlichen Erdenlebens - am deutlichsten während der Embryonalzeit - als Gestaltungs- und Wachstumskräfte. Im Verlaufe des Erdenlebens emanzipiert sich ein Teil dieser Kräfte von der Betätigung in Gestaltung und Wachstum und wird Denkkräfte, eben jene Kräfte, die für das gewöhnliche Bewußtsein die schattenhafte Gedankenwelt hervorbringen.
[ 18 ] Es ist von der allergrößten Bedeutung zu wissen, daß die gewöhnlichen Denkkräfte des Menschen die verfeinerten Gestaltungs- und Wachstumskräfte sind. Im Gestalten und Wachsen des menschlichen Organismus offenbart sich ein Geistiges. Denn dieses Geistige erscheint dann im Lebensverlaufe als die geistige Denkkraft.
[ 19 ] Und diese Denkkraft ist nur ein Teil der im Ätherischen wehenden menschlichen Gestaltungs- und Wachstumskraft. Der andere Teil bleibt seiner im menschlichen Lebensbeginne innegehabten Aufgabe getreu. Nur weil der Mensch, wenn seine Gestaltung und sein Wachstum vorgerückt, das ist, bis zu einem gewissen Grade abgeschlossen sind, sich noch weiter entwickelt, kann das Ätherisch-Geistige, das im Organismus webt und lebt, im weiteren Leben als Denkkraft auftreten.
[ 20 ] So offenbart sich der imaginativen geistigen Anschauung die bildsame (plastische) Kraft als ein Ätherisch-Geistiges von der einen Seite, das von der andern Seite als der Seelen-Inhalt des Denkens auftritt. Verfolgt man nun das Substanzielle der Erdenstoffe in die Ätherbildung hinein, so muß man sagen: diese Stoffe nehmen überall da, wo sie in diese Bildung eintreten, ein Wesen an, durch das sie sich der physischen Natur entfremden. In dieser Entfremdung treten sie in eine Welt ein, in der ihnen das Geistige entgegenkommt und sie in sein eigenes Wesen verwandelt.
[ 21 ] So aufsteigen zu der ätherisch-lebendigen Wesenheit des Menschen, wie es hier geschildert wird, ist etwas wesentlich anderes als das unwissenschaftliche Behaupten einer «Lebenskraft», das noch bis zur Mitte des neunzehnten Jahrhunderts üblich war, um die lebendigen Körper zu erklären. Hier handelt es sich um das wirkliche Anschauen -um das geistige Wahrnehmen - eines Wesenhaften, das im Menschen wie in allem Lebendigen ebenso vorhanden ist wie der physische Leib. Und um dieses Anschauen zu bewirken, wird nicht etwa in unbestimmter Art mit dem gewöhnlichen Denken weitergedacht; es wird auch nicht durch die Einbildungskraft eine andere Welt ersonnen; es wird vielmehr das menschliche Erkennen in ganz exakter Art erweitert, und diese Erweiterung ergibt auch die Erfahrung über eine erweiterte Welt.
[ 22 ] Die Übungen, die ein höheres Wahrnehmen herbeiführen, können fortgesetzt werden. Man kann, wie man eine erhöhte Kraft anwendet, sich auf Gedanken, die man in den Mittelpunkt des Bewußtseins gerückt hat, zu konzentrieren, auch darauf wieder eine solch erhöhte Kraft anwenden, die erlangten Imaginationen (Bilder einer geistig-ätherischen Wirklichkeit) zu unterdrücken. Dann erlangt man den Zustand des völlig leeren Bewußtseins. Man ist bloß wach, ohne daß zunächst das Wachsein einen Inhalt hat. (Das Genauere findet man in den oben erwähnten Büchern.) Aber dieses Wachsein ohne Inhalt bleibt nicht. Das von allen physisch- und auch ätherisch-bildhaften Eindrücken leer gewordene Bewußtsein erfüllt sich mit einem Inhalt, der ihm aus einer realen geistigen Welt zuströmt, wie den physischen Sinnen die Eindrücke aus der physischen Welt zuströmen.
[ 23 ] Man hat durch die imaginative Erkenntnis ein zweites Glied der menschlichen Wesenheit kennengelernt; man lernt durch die Erfüllung des leeren Bewußtseins mit geistigem Inhalt ein drittes Glied kennen. Die Anthroposophie nennt das Erkennen, das auf diese Art zustande kommt, dasjenige durch Inspiration. (Man soll sich durch diese Ausdrücke nicht beirren lassen; sie sind einer primitiven Zeiten angehörigen instinktiven Art, in geistige Welten zu sehen, entnommen; aber, was hier mit ihnen gemeint ist, wird ja exakt gesagt.) Und die Welt, in die man durch die Inspiration Eintritt gewinnt, bezeichnet sie als die astralische Welt. - Spricht man, wie hier auseinandergesetzt, von «ätherischer Welt», so meint man die Wirkungen, die vom Weltumfange nach der Erde zu wirken. Spricht man aber von «astralischer Welt», so geht man in Gemäßheit dessen, was das inspirierte Bewußtsein beobachtet, von den Wirkungen aus dem Weltumfang zu bestimmten Geist-Wesenheiten über die in diesen Wirkungen sich offenbaren, wie in den von der Erde ausgehenden Kräften sich die Erdenstoffe offenbaren. Man spricht von aus den Weltenfernen wirkenden konkreten Geist-Wesenheiten, wie man beim sinnlichen Anblick des nächtlichen Himmels von Sternen und Sternbildern spricht. Daher der Ausdruck «astralische Welt». In dieser astralischen Welt trägt der Mensch das dritte Glied seiner Wesenheit: seinen astralischen Leib.
[ 24 ] Auch in diesen astralischen Leib muß die Erdenstofflichkeit einströmen. Sie entfremdet sich damit weiter ihrer physischen Wesenheit. - Wie der Mensch seinen ätherischen Leib mit der Pflanzenwelt, so hat er seinen astralischen Leib mit der Tierwelt gemeinsam.
[ 25 ] Die den Menschen über die Tierwelt hinaushebende, eigentlich menschliche Wesenheit wird durch eine noch höhere Erkenntnisart als die Inspiration erkannt. Die Anthroposophie spricht da von Intuition. In der Inspiration offenbart sich eine Welt geistiger Wesenheiten; in der Intuition wird das Verhältnis des erkennenden Menschen zu dieser Welt ein näheres. Man bringt das zum Vollbewußtsein in sich, was rein geistig ist, wovon man im bewußten Erleben unmittelbar erfährt, daß es mit dem Erleben durch die Körperlichkeit nichts zu tun hat. Dadurch versetzt man sich in ein Leben, das ein solches als Menschengeist unter anderen geistigen Wesenheiten ist. In der Inspiration offenbaren sich die geistigen Wesenheiten der Welt; durch die Intuition lebt man mit diesen Wesenheiten.
[ 26 ] Man gelangt dadurch zur Anerkennung des vierten Gliedes der menschlichen Wesenheit, zum eigentlichen «Ich». Wieder wird man gewahr, wie die Erdenstofflichkeit indem sie sich dem Weben und Wesen des «Ich» einfügt, sich noch weiter ihrem physischen Wesen entfremdet. Die Wesenheit, welche diese Stofflichkeit als «Ich-Organisation» annimmt, ist zunächst die Form des Erdenstoffes, in der sich dieser am meisten seiner irdisch-physischen Art entfremdet.
[ 27 ] Was man in dieser Art als «astralischen Leib» und «Ich» kennen lernt, ist nicht in gleicher Art an den physischen Leib in der Menschenorganisation gebunden wie der ätherische Leib. Inspiration und Intuition zeigen, wie im Schlafe sich «astralischer Leib» und «Ich» vom physischen und ätherischen Leib trennen, und wie nur im Wachzustande ein völliges Durchdringen der vier Glieder der Menschennatur zur menschlichen Einheitswesenheit vorhanden ist. Im Schlafe sind in der physischen und ätherischen Welt der physische und ätherische Menschenleib verblieben. Sie sind da aber nicht in der Lage, in der physischer und ätherischer Leib eines Pflanzenwesens sind. Sie tragen in sich die Nachwirkungen der astralischen und der Ich-Wesenheit. Und in dem Augenblicke, in dem sie diese Nachwirkungen nicht mehr in sich tragen würden, muß Erwachen eintreten. Ein menschlicher physischer Leib darf niemals bloßen physischen, ein menschlicher Ätherleib niemals bloßen ätherischen Wirkungen unterliegen. Sie würden dadurch zerfallen.
[ 28 ] Nun zeigen aber Inspiration und Intuition noch etwas anderes. Die physische Stofflichkeit erfährt eine Weiterbildung ihres Wesens, indem sie zum Weben und Leben im Ätherischen übergeht. Und Leben hängt davon ab, daß der organische Körper dem Wesen des Irdischen entrissen und vom außerirdischen Weltall herein aufgebaut wird. Allein diese nicht aber zum Bewußtsein und nicht zum Selbstbewußtsein. Es muß sich der Astralleib seine Organisation innerhalb der physischen und der ätherischen aufbauen; es muß ein Gleiches das Ich in Bezug auf die Ich-Organisation tun. Aber in diesem Aufbau ergibt sich keine bewußte Entfaltung des Seelenlebens. Es muß, damit ein solches zustande kommt, dem Aufbau ein Abbau gegenüberstehen. Der astralische Leib baut sich seine Organe auf; er baut sie wieder ab indem er die Gefühlstätigkeit im Bewußtsein der Seele entfalten läßt; das Ich baut sich seine «Ich-Organisation» auf; es baut sie wieder ab, indem die Willenstätigkeit im Selbstbewußtsein wirksam wird.
[ 29 ] Der Geist entfaltet sich innerhalb der Menschenwesenheit nicht auf der Grundlage aufbauender Stofftätigkeit, sondern auf derjenigen abbauender. Wo im Menschen Geist wirken soll, da muß der Stoff sich von seiner Tätigkeit zurückziehen.
[ 30 ] Schon die Entstehung des Denkens innerhalb des ätherischen Leibes beruht nicht auf einer Fortsetzung des ätherischen Wesens, sondern auf einem Abbau desselben. Das bewußte Denken geschieht nicht in Vorgängen des Gestaltens und Wachstums, sondern in solchen der Entgestaltung und des Welkens, Absterbens, die fortdauernd dem ätherischen Geschehen eingegliedert sind.
[ 31 ] In dem bewußten Denken lösen sich aus der leiblichen Gestaltung die Gedanken heraus und werden als seelische Gestaltungen menschliche Erlebnisse.
[ 32 ] Sieht man nun auf der Grundlage einer solchen Menschenerkenntnis auf das Menschenwesen hin, so wird man gewahr, wie man sowohl den Gesamtmenschen wie auch ein einzelnes Organ nur durchschauen kann, wenn man weiß, wie in ihm der physische, der ätherische, der astralische Leib und das Ich wirken. Es gibt Organe, in denen vornehmlich das Ich tätig ist; es gibt solche, in denen das Ich nur wenig wirkt, dagegen die physische Organisation überwiegt.
[ 33 ] Wie man den gesunden Menschen nur durchschauen kann, wenn man erkennt, wie sich die höheren Glieder der Menschenwesenheit des Erdenstoffes bemächtigen, um ihn in ihren Dienst zu zwingen, und wenn man auch erkennt, wie der Erdenstoff sich wandelt, indem er in den Bereich der Wirksamkeit der höheren Glieder der Menschennatur tritt; so kann man auch den kranken Menschen nur verstehen, wenn man einsieht, in welche Lage der Gesamt-Organismus oder ein Organ oder eine Organreihe kommen, wenn die Wirkungsweise der höheren Glieder in Unregelmäßigkeit verfällt Und an Heilmittel wird man nur denken können, wenn man ein Wissen darüber entwickelt, wie ein Erdenstoff oder Erdenvorgang zum Ätherischen, zum Astralischen, zum Ich sich verhält. Denn nur dann wird man durch Einfügung eines Erdenstoffes in den menschlichen Organismus, oder durch Behandlung mit einer Erdentätigkeit bewirken können, daß die höheren Glieder der Menschenwesenheit sich ungehindert entfalten können, oder auch, daß die Erdenstofflichkeit an dem Zugefügten die nötige Unterstützung findet, um auf den Weg zu kommen, auf dem sie Grundlage wird für irdisches Wirken des Geistigen.
[ 34 ] Der Mensch ist, was er ist, durch Leib, Ätherleib, Seele (astralischer Leib) und Ich (Geist). Er mußt als Gesunder aus diesen Gliedern heraus angeschaut; er muß als Kranker in dem gestörten Gleichgewicht dieser Glieder wahrgenommen; es müssen zu seiner Gesundheit Heilmittel gefunden werden, die das gestörte Gleichgewicht wieder herstellen.
[ 35 ] Auf eine medizinische Anschauung, die auf solche Grundlagen baut, wird in dieser Schrift hingedeutet.
I. True knowledge of the human being as the basis of medical art
[ 1 ] In this paper, new possibilities for medical knowledge and skill are pointed out. One will only be able to judge what is presented correctly if one is able to engage with the points of view that were guiding when the medical views spoken of here came about.
[ 2 ] This is not an opposition to medicine working with the recognized scientific methods of the present. We fully recognize its principles. And we are of the opinion that what we have given should only be used in the art of medicine by those who can be fully valid doctors in the sense of these principles.
[ 3 ] Only we add to what can be known about man with the scientific methods recognized today, further insights that are found by other methods, and therefore see ourselves compelled to work for an expansion of the medical art from this expanded knowledge of the world and man.
[ 4 ] An objection to recognized medicine cannot in principle be made against what we put forward, since we do not deny it. Only those who not only demand that we must affirm their knowledge, but who also claim that we may not put forward any knowledge that goes beyond their own, can reject our attempt from the outset.
[ 5 ] We see the expansion of knowledge of the world and the human being in the anthroposophy founded by Rudolf Steiner. It adds to the knowledge of the physical human being, which can only be gained through the scientific methods of the present, that of the spiritual human being. It does not pass from knowledge of the physical to knowledge of the spiritual through mere reflection. In this way, one is only faced with more or less well-conceived hypotheses, of which no one can prove that they correspond to anything in reality.
[ 6 ] Before anthroposophy makes statements about the spiritual, it develops the methods that entitle it to make such statements. To gain an insight into these methods, consider the following: All the results of currently recognized natural science are basically derived from the impressions of the human senses. For even if man expands what the senses can give him through experimentation or observation with tools, this does not add anything essentially new to the experiences about the world in which man lives through his senses.
[ 7 ] But also through thinking, insofar as it is active in the exploration of the physical world, nothing new is added to the sensory given. Thinking combines, analyzes, etc. the sensory impressions in order to arrive at laws (laws of nature); but the investigator of the sensory world must say to himself: this thinking that springs forth from me does not add anything real to what is real in the sensory world.
[ 8 ] But this immediately changes if one does not stop at the thinking to which man initially brings himself through life and education. You can reinforce and strengthen this way of thinking. One can place simple, easily comprehensible thoughts at the center of consciousness and then, to the exclusion of all other thoughts, keep all the soul's strength on such ideas. Just as a muscle strengthens when it is repeatedly tensed in the direction of the same force, so the power of the soul strengthens in relation to the area that otherwise governs the mind when it performs exercises in the manner indicated. It must be emphasized that these exercises must be based on simple, easily comprehensible thoughts. For the soul, while doing such exercises, must not be exposed to any influences of a half or completely unconscious mind. (We can only give the principle of such exercises here; a detailed description and instructions on how to do such exercises in detail can be found in Rudolf Steiner's "How to Attain Knowledge of the Higher Worlds", in his "Secret Science" and in other anthroposophical writings.)
[ 9 ] It is obvious to raise the objection that someone who devotes himself with all his strength to certain thoughts that have moved to the center of consciousness is exposed to all kinds of autosuggestions and the like, and that he simply enters the realm of imagination. Anthroposophy alone shows at the same time how the exercises must proceed so that this objection is completely unjustified. It shows how one progresses within the consciousness, in a fully prudent manner, while practicing, in the same way as when solving an arithmetical or geometrical problem. Just as the conscious mind cannot slip into the unconscious anywhere, neither can it do so during the indicated practice if the anthroposophical instructions are followed correctly.
[ 10 ] In the course of this practice, one comes to a strengthening of the thinking power of which one previously had no idea. One feels the active thinking power within oneself as a new content of the human being. And at the same time as this content of one's own human being, a world content is revealed that one may have previously suspected but not known through experience. If one looks at ordinary thinking in moments of introspection, one finds the thoughts shadowy, pale in comparison to the impressions given by the senses.
[ 11 ] What one now perceives in the intensified power of thought is by no means pale and shadowy; it is full of content, concrete-image-like; it is of a much more intense reality than the content of the sensory impressions. A new world opens up to man by expanding the power of his perceptive faculty in the manner described.
[ 12 ] When man learns to perceive in this world as he could previously only perceive within the sensory world, he realizes that all the laws of nature which he had previously known apply only in the physical world; and that the essence of the world which he has now entered consists in the fact that its laws are different, indeed the opposite of those of the physical world. In this world the law of attraction of the earth does not apply, but on the contrary, a force appears which does not work outwards from the center of the earth, but the other way round, so that its direction goes from the circumference of the universe to the center of the earth. And it is the same with the other forces of the physical world.
[ 13 ] In anthroposophy, the human being's ability to see this world, acquired through practice, is called the imaginative power of cognition. Imaginative not because we are dealing with "imaginations", but because the content of consciousness is not filled with shadows of thought, but with images. And just as one feels oneself in a reality through sensory perception in direct experience, so too in the soul activity of imaginative cognition. Anthroposophy calls the world to which this cognition relates the etheric world. This is not the hypothetical ether of contemporary physics, but something that is really spiritually seen. The name is given in harmony with older instinctive intuitions of this world. These no longer have any cognitive value compared to what can be clearly recognized at present; but if you want to describe something, you need names.
[ 14 ] Within this etheric world, an etheric corporeality is perceptible alongside the physical corporeality of the human being.
[ 15 ] This etheric corporeality is something that is also found in the plant world. Plants have an etheric body. The physical laws actually only apply to the world of lifeless minerals.
[ 16 ] The plant world is possible on earth because there are substances in the earthly world that do not remain determined within the physical laws, but that can discard all physical lawfulness and assume one that is contrary to it. The physical laws act as if emanating from the earth, the etheric laws act as if flowing towards the earth from all sides of the world's circumference. The development of the plant world can only be understood if one sees in it the interaction of the earthly physical and the cosmic etheric. And so it is with regard to the etheric body of man. Through it something happens in man which does not lie in the continuation of the lawful working of the forces of the physical body, but which has as its basis that the physical substances, by flowing into it, first get rid of their physical forces.
[ 17 ] These forces active in the etheric body were active at the beginning of human life on earth - most clearly during the embryonic period - as forces of formation and growth. In the course of life on earth, a part of these forces emancipates itself from the activity of formation and growth and becomes thinking forces, precisely those forces that produce the shadowy world of thoughts for the ordinary consciousness.
[ 18 ] It is of the utmost importance to know that man's ordinary powers of thought are the refined powers of formation and growth. In the shaping and growth of the human organism a spiritual is revealed. For this spiritual then appears in the course of life as the spiritual thinking power.
[ 19 ] And this thinking power is only a part of the human formative and growth power blowing in the etheric. The other part remains true to the task it had at the beginning of human life. Only because the human being, when his formation and growth are advanced, that is, completed to a certain degree, continues to develop, can the etheric-spiritual, which weaves and lives in the organism, appear in further life as thinking power.
[ 20 ] So the imaginative spiritual view reveals itself as an etheric-spiritual force from one side, which appears from the other side as the soul-content of thought. If one now follows the substantiality of the earth substances into the ether formation, one must say: these substances take on an essence wherever they enter this formation, through which they alienate themselves from physical nature. In this alienation they enter a world in which the spiritual meets them and transforms them into its own being.
[ 21 ] This ascent to the etheric-living essence of man, as described here, is something essentially different from the unscientific assertion of a "life force", which was still common until the middle of the nineteenth century to explain living bodies. Here we are dealing with the real contemplation - the spiritual perception - of a beingness that is just as present in man as in all living things as the physical body. And in order to bring about this contemplation, we do not continue to think in an indeterminate way with ordinary thinking; nor do we invent another world through the imagination; rather, human cognition is expanded in a very precise way, and this expansion also results in the experience of an expanded world.
[ 22 ] The exercises that bring about a higher perception can be continued. Just as one applies an increased power to concentrate on thoughts that one has brought to the center of consciousness, one can also apply such an increased power to suppress the acquired imaginations (images of a spiritual-etheric reality). Then one attains the state of completely empty consciousness. One is merely awake, without initially being awake having any content. (More details can be found in the books mentioned above.) But this wakefulness without content does not remain. Consciousness, which has become empty of all physical and etheric-visual impressions, is filled with a content that flows to it from a real spiritual world, just as impressions flow to the physical senses from the physical world.
[ 23 ] Through imaginative cognition one has come to know a second member of the human being; through the filling of the empty consciousness with spiritual content one comes to know a third member. Anthroposophy calls the cognition that comes about in this way that which comes about through inspiration. (One should not be misled by these expressions; they are taken from an instinctive way of seeing into spiritual worlds belonging to primitive times; but what is meant by them here is said exactly). And the world into which one gains entrance through inspiration is called the astral world. - When we speak of the "etheric world", as we have done here, we mean the effects that work from the world towards the earth. If, however, we speak of the "astral world", we pass, in accordance with what the inspired consciousness observes, from the effects from the world's circumference to certain spirit-entities which manifest themselves in these effects, just as the earthly substances manifest themselves in the forces emanating from the earth. One speaks of concrete spirit-entities working from the world's distances, just as one speaks of stars and constellations when looking at the night sky with the senses. Hence the expression "astral world". In this astral world, man carries the third member of his being: his astral body.
[ 24 ] Earthly materiality must also flow into this astral body. It thus alienates itself further from its physical essence. - Just as man shares his etheric body with the plant world, so he shares his astral body with the animal world.
[ 25 ] The actual human essence that lifts man above the animal world is recognized through an even higher form of cognition than inspiration. Anthroposophy speaks of intuition. In inspiration a world of spiritual beings is revealed; in intuition the relationship of the cognizing human being to this world becomes a closer one. One brings to full consciousness that which is purely spiritual, of which one experiences directly in the conscious experience that it has nothing to do with the experience through corporeality. Thereby one puts oneself into a life that is such as a human spirit among other spiritual beings. In inspiration, the spiritual entities of the world reveal themselves; through intuition, one lives with these entities.
[ 26 ] Through this, one arrives at the recognition of the fourth member of the human being, the actual "I". Again one becomes aware of how the earthly materiality, by integrating itself into the weaving and being of the "I", alienates itself even further from its physical being. The entity that takes on this materiality as an "I-organization" is initially the form of earth matter in which it is most alienated from its earthly-physical nature.
[ 27 ] What we come to know in this way as the "astral body" and "I" is not bound to the physical body in the human organization in the same way as the etheric body. Inspiration and intuition show how in sleep the "astral body" and "I" are separated from the physical and etheric body, and how only in the waking state is there a complete penetration of the four members of human nature into the human unified being. In sleep, the physical and etheric human bodies remain in the physical and etheric world. However, they are not in the position in which the physical and etheric bodies of a plant being are. They carry within them the after-effects of the astral and ego entities. And the moment they would no longer carry these after-effects within them, awakening must occur. A human physical body must never be subject to mere physical effects, a human etheric body never to mere etheric effects. They would disintegrate as a result.
[ 28 ] Now, however, inspiration and intuition reveal something else. Physical materiality undergoes a further development of its essence by transitioning to weaving and life in the etheric. And life depends on the organic body being torn from the essence of the earthly and built up from the extraterrestrial universe. But this alone does not lead to consciousness and not to self-consciousness. The astral body must build up its organization within the physical and the etheric; the ego must do the same in relation to the ego organization. But in this building up there is no conscious unfolding of the soul life. In order for this to come about, the building up must be contrasted with a breaking down. The astral body builds up its organs; it breaks them down again by allowing the activity of feeling to unfold in the consciousness of the soul; the ego builds up its "ego organization"; it breaks it down again by allowing the activity of will to become effective in self-consciousness.
[ 29 ] The spirit unfolds within the human being not on the basis of constructive material activity, but on that of degradative activity. Where spirit is to work in man, matter must withdraw from its activity.
[ 30 ] Even the emergence of thought within the etheric body is not based on a continuation of the etheric being, but on a degradation of it. The conscious thinking happens not in processes of forming and growth, but in those of de-forming and withering, dying, which are continuously incorporated into the etheric events.
[ 31 ] In conscious thinking, thoughts are detached from bodily formations and become human experiences as mental formations.
[ 32 ] If one now looks at the human being on the basis of such a knowledge of man, one realizes how one can only see through both the entire human being and an individual organ if one knows how the physical, the etheric, the astral body and the ego work in it. There are organs in which the ego is primarily active; there are others in which the ego is only slightly active, while the physical organization predominates.
[ 33 ] Just as one can only see through the healthy human being if one recognizes how the higher members of the human being take possession of the earthly substance in order to force it into their service, and if one also recognizes how the earthly substance changes by entering the sphere of activity of the higher members of the human nature; so one can only understand the sick human being if one recognizes the situation in which the whole organism or an organ or a series of organs find themselves when the functioning of the higher members becomes irregular And one will only be able to think of remedies if one develops a knowledge of how an earth substance or earth process relates to the etheric, to the astral, to the ego. For only then will it be possible, by inserting an earth substance into the human organism, or by treating it with an earth activity, to bring about that the higher members of the human being can unfold unhindered, or also that the earth materiality finds the necessary support in what has been added, in order to get on the path on which it becomes the basis for earthly work of the spiritual.
[ 34 ] Man is what he is through body, etheric body, soul (astral body) and I (spirit). He must be seen as a healthy person out of these members; he must be perceived as a sick person in the disturbed balance of these members; remedies must be found for his health that restore the disturbed balance.
[ 35 ] A medical view based on such foundations is indicated in this writing.