Genesis
GA 122
17 August 1910, Munich
1. The Mystery of the Archetypal Word
For anyone who has a background of Spiritual Science, and has absorbed something of its teaching about the evolution of the world, then goes on to study those tremendous opening words of our Bible, an entirely new world should dawn upon him.
There is probably no account of human evolution so open to misinterpretation as this record known as Genesis, the description of the creation of the world in six or seven days. When the man of today calls to life in his soul, in any language familiar to him, the words In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth, they convey to him scarcely a faint reflection of what lived in the soul of an ancient Hebrew who allowed the words to work upon him. It is not in the least a question of being able to replace the old words by modern ones; it is much more important that we should have been prepared by Anthroposophy to feel at least something of the mood which lived in the heart and mind of the Hebrew pupil of old when he brought to life within himself the words: B'reschit bara elohim et haschamayim v'et ha'aretz.1See Figure 1, below. A whole world lived while such words were vibrating through his soul.
What was it like—this inner world which lived in the soul of the pupil? We can only compare it with what can take place in the soul of a man to whom a seer has described the pictures he experienced on looking into the spiritual world. For what in the last resort is Spiritual Science but the outcome of seership, of the living intuitions which the seer receives when, having freed himself from the conditions of sense-perception and of the intellect bound up with the physical body, he looks with spiritual organs into the spiritual worlds? If he wishes to translate what he sees there into the language of the physical world, he can only do so in pictures, but if his descriptive powers suffice, he will do it in pictures which are able to awaken in his hearers a mental image corresponding with what he himself sees in the spiritual worlds. Thereby something comes into existence which must not be mistaken for a description of things and events in the physical sense-world; something comes into existence which we must never forget belongs to an entirely different world—a world which does indeed underlie and maintain the ordinary sense-world of our ideas, impressions and perceptions, yet in no way coincides with that world.
If we want to portray the origin of this our sense-world, including the origin of man himself, our ideas cannot be confined to that world itself. No science equipped only with ideas borrowed from the world of the senses can reach the origin of sense-existence. For sense-existence is rooted in the supersensible, and although we can go a long way back historically, or geologically, we must realise that, if we are to reach to actual origins, there is a certain point in the far distant past at which we must leave the field of the sense-perceptible and penetrate into regions that can only be grasped super-sensibly. What we call Genesis does not begin with the description of anything perceptible by the senses, anything which the eye could see in the physical world. In the course of these lectures we shall become thoroughly convinced that it would be quite wrong to take the opening words of Genesis as referring to events which can be seen with the outward eye. So long as one connects the words “heaven and earth” with any residue of the sensuously visible one has not reached the stage to which the first part of the Genesis account points us back. Today there is practically no way of obtaining light upon the world it describes except through Spiritual Science. Through Spiritual Science we may indeed hope to approach the mystery of the archetypal words with which the Bible opens, and to get some inkling of their content.
Wherein lies their peculiar secret? It lies in the fact that they are written in the Hebrew tongue, a language which works upon the soul quite differently from any modern language. Although the Hebrew of these early chapters may not perhaps have the same effect today, at one time it did work in such a way that when a letter was sounded it called up in the soul a picture. Pictures arose in the soul of anyone who entered with lively sympathy into the words, and allowed them to work upon him—pictures harmoniously arranged, organic pictures, pictures which may be compared with what the seer can still see today when he rises from the sensible to the supersensible. The Hebrew language, or, better said, the language of the first chapters of the Bible, enabled the soul to call up imaginal pictures which were not wholly unlike those that are presented to the seer when, freed from his body, he is able to look into supersensible regions of existence.
In order to realise in some measure the power of these archetypal words we must disregard the pale and shadowy impressions which any modern language makes upon the soul, and try to get some idea of the creative power inherent in sound-sequences in this ancient tongue. It is of immense importance that in the course of these lectures we too should seek to place before our souls the very pictures which arose in the Hebrew pupil of old when these sounds worked creatively in him. In fact we must find a method of penetrating the primeval record entirely different from those used by modern research.
I have now given you an indication of our line of approach. We shall only slowly and gradually learn to comprehend what lived in the ancient Hebrew sage when he allowed those most powerful words to work upon him, words which we do at least still possess. So our next task will be to free ourselves as far as possible from the familiar, and from the ideas and images of “heaven and earth,” of “Gods,” of “creation,” of “in the beginning,” which we have hitherto held. The more thoroughly we can do this the better we shall be able to penetrate into the spirit of a document which arose out of psychic conditions quite different from those of today.
First of all we must be quite clear as to the point of time in evolution we are speaking of, when we deal with the opening words of the Bible. You know of course that contemporary clairvoyant investigation makes it possible to describe to some extent the origin and development of our earth and of human existence. In my book Occult Science I tried to describe the gradual growth of our earth as the planetary scene of human existence, through the three preliminary stages of Saturn, Sun and Moon.2To avoid any ambiguity, capital letters will be used throughout this book for the words Sun and Moon, when they refer to the planetary evolutions preceding that of our earth. Today you will have in mind, at least in broad outline, what I described there. At what point then in the spiritual scientific account should we place what draws near to our souls in the mighty word B'reschit? Where does it belong?
If we look back for a moment to ancient Saturn, we picture it as a cosmic body having as yet nothing of the material existence to which we are accustomed. Of all that we find in our own environment it has nothing but heat. No air or water or solid earth is as yet to be found upon ancient Saturn; even where it is densest, there is only fire—living, weaving warmth. Then, to this living, weaving warmth, a kind of air or gaseous element is added; and we have a true picture of the Sun existence if we think of it as an interweaving, an interpenetration, of a gaseous, airy element and a warmth element. Then comes the third condition, which we call the Moon evolution. There the watery element is added to the warmth and the air. There is as yet nothing of what in our present earth we call solid. But the old Moon evolution has a peculiar characteristic. It divides into two parts. If we look back upon old Saturn, we see it as a single whole of weaving warmth; and the old Sun we still see as a mingling of gaseous and warmth elements. During the Moon existence there takes place this separation into a part which is Sun and a part which retains the Moon nature. It is only when we come to the fourth stage of our planetary evolution that the earth element is added to the earlier warmth, gaseous and watery elements. In order that this solid element could come into existence, the division which had taken place previously during the Moon evolution had first to repeat itself. Once again the sun had to withdraw. Thus there is a certain moment in the evolution of our planet when, out of the universal complication of fire and air and water, the denser, more earthy element separates from the finer, gaseous element of the sun; and it is only in this earthy element that what we today call solid is able to form.
Let us concentrate on this moment, when the sun withdraws from its former state of union with the rest of the planet and begins to send its forces to the earth from without. Let us bear in mind that this was what made it possible, within the earth, for the solid element—what we today call matter—to begin to condense. If we fix this moment firmly in our minds we have the point of time at which Genesis, the creation story, begins. This is what it is describing. We should not associate with the opening words of Genesis the abstract, shadowy idea we get when we say “In the beginning,” which is something unspeakably poverty-stricken compared with what the ancient Hebrew sage felt. If we would bring the sound B'reschit before our souls in the right way, there must arise before us—in the only way it can do so, in mental images—all that happened through the severance of sun and earth, all that was to be found at the actual moment when the separation into two had just taken place. Furthermore we must be aware that throughout the whole of the Saturn, Sun and Moon evolutions, spiritual Beings were its leaders and its bearers; and that warmth, air, water are only the outer expressions, the outer garments of spiritual Beings who are the reality. Thus when we contemplate the condition which obtained at the moment of separation of sun and earth, and picture it to ourselves in thoughts full of material images, we must also be conscious that the elementary “water,” “air,” “fire,” which we have in our mind's eye, is still only the means of expression for moving, weaving spirit which, during the course of the preceding Saturn, Sun and Moon stages has advanced, has progressed, and at the time now being described has reached a certain stage in its evolution.
Let us place before us the picture of an immense cosmic globe, composed of weaving elements of water, air or gas and fire, a globe which splits apart into a solar and a telluric element; but let us conceive too that this elementary substance is only the expression of a spiritual. Let us imagine that from this substantial habitation, woven of the elements of water, air and heat, the countenances of spiritual Beings, weaving within it, look out upon us, spiritual Beings who reveal themselves in this element which we have had to represent to ourselves through material images. Let us imagine that we have before us spiritual Beings, turning their countenances towards us, as it were, using their own soul-spiritual forces to organise cosmic bodies with the help of warmth, air and water. Let us try to imagine this!
There we have a picture of an elementary sheath, which, to give a very rough sensuous image of it, we may perhaps liken to a snail-shell, but a shell woven not of solid matter, like the snail's, but from the forest elements of water, air and fire. Let us think of spirit, in the form of countenances, within this sheath, gazing upon us, using this sheath as a means of manifestation, a force of very revelation which, as it were, pricks outward into manifestation from what lies hidden in the supersensible.
Call up before your souls this picture which I have just tried to paint for you, this image of the living weaving of spirit in a kind of matter; imagine too the inner soul-force which causes it to happen; concentrate for a moment on this to the exclusion of all else, and you will then have something approximating to what lived in an ancient Hebrew sage when the sounds B'reschit penetrated his soul. Bet the first letter, called forth the weaving of the habitation in substance; Resch the second sound, summoned up the countenances of the spiritual Beings who wove within this dwelling, and Schin the third sound, the prickly, stinging force which worked its way out from within to manifestation.
Now the underlying principle behind such a description is dawning upon us. And when we have grasped that, we are able to appreciate something of the spirit of this language; it had a creativeness of which the modern man with his abstract speech has no inkling.
Now let us place ourselves at the moment immediately preceding the physical coagulation, the physical densification of our earth. Let us imagine it as vividly as possible. We shall have to admit that in describing what was taking place at that moment we cannot make use of any of the ideas which we use today to describe processes in the external sense-world. Hence you will see that it is utterly inadequate to associate any external deed with the second word we meet in Genesis—bara—however closely that deed might resemble what we understand today as creation. We do not thus get near to the meaning of that word. Where can we turn for help? The word implies something which lies very near the boundary where the sensible passes over directly into the supersensible, into pure spirit. And anyone who wishes to grasp the meaning of the word bara, which is usually translated “created” (In the beginning God created ...), must in no wise associate it with any productive activity which can be seen with physical eyes.
Take a look into your own inner being! Imagine yourselves as having been asleep for a while, then waking up, and, without opening your eyes to things around you, calling up in your souls by inner activity certain images. Bring home vividly to yourselves this inner activity, this productive meditation, this cogitation, which calls forth a soul-content from the depths of the soul as if by magic. If you like you can use the word “excogitate” for this conjuring up of a soul-content out of the depths into the field of consciousness; think of this activity, which man can only perform with his mental images, but think of it now as a real, cosmic, creative activity. Instead of your own meditation, your own inward experience in thinking, try to imagine cosmic thinking-then you have the content of the second word of Genesis, bara. However spiritually you may think it, you can only liken it to the thought-life you are able to bring before yourselves in your own musing, you cannot get nearer to it than that!
And now imagine that during your musing two kinds of images come before your souls. Suppose there is a man to whom on awakening two different kinds of thought occur, a man who muses about two different kinds of thing. Suppose that one kind of thought is the picture either of some activity, or of some external thing or of some being; it does not come about through external sight, through perception, but through reflection, through the creative activity of his soul in the field of his consciousness. Suppose that the second complex of ideas which arises in this awakening man is a desire, something which the man's whole disposition and constitution of soul can prompt him to will. We have elements both of thought and of desire coming up in our souls through inner reflection. Now imagine, instead of the human soul, the Beings called in Genesis the Elohim, reflecting within themselves. Instead of one human soul, think of a multiplicity of reflecting spiritual Beings, who, however, in a similar way—save that their musing is cosmic—call forth by reflection from within themselves two complexes which might be compared with what I have just been describing—a pure thought-element and an element of desire. Thus instead of thinking of the musing' human soul, we think of a group of cosmic Beings who awaken in themselves two complexes; one of the nature of thought or ideation, that is, one which manifests something, expresses itself outwardly, phenomenally; and another of the nature of desire, which lives in inner movement, inner stimulation, which is permeated with inner activity. Let us think of these cosmic Beings, who are called in Genesis the Elohim, musing in this way. The word bara, “created,” brings their musing home to us. Then let us think that through this creative musing two complexes arise, one tending towards external revelation, external manifestation, and another consisting of an inward stimulus, an inward life; then we have the two complexes which arose in the soul of the ancient Hebrew sage when the words haschamayim and ha'aretz—represented for the modern man by “heaven” and “earth”—sounded through his soul. Let us try to forget the modern man's conception of “heaven and earth.” Let us try to bring the two complexes before the soul, the one which tends more to disclose itself, tends to outward manifestation, is disposed to call forth some outside effect; and the other complex, the complex of inner stimulation, of something which would experience itself inwardly, something which quickens itself inwardly; then we have what expresses the meaning of the two words haschamayim and ha'aretz.
As for the Elohim themselves, what kind of Beings are they?
In the course of these lectures we shall learn to know them better, and to describe them in terms of Spiritual Science; but for the present let us try to reach in some measure the meaning of this archetypal word “Elohim.” Whoever wishes to get an idea of what lived in the soul of the ancient Hebrew sage when he used this word should clearly understand that in those days there was a lively comprehension of the fact that our earth evolution had a definite meaning and a definite goal. What was this meaning and this goal?
Our earth evolution can only have a meaning, if during its course something arises which was not there before. A perpetual repetition of what was already there would be a meaningless existence, and unless the Hebrew sage of old had known that our earth, after having passed through its preliminary stages, had to bring something new into existence, he would have regarded its genesis as meaningless. Through the coming into existence of the earth something new became possible, it became possible for man to become man as we know him. In none of the earlier stages of evolution was man present as the being he is today, the being that he will more and more become in the future; that was not possible in earlier stages. And those spiritual Beings who directed the Saturn, Sun and Moon evolutions were of a different nature from man—for the moment we will not enter into the question whether they were higher or lower. Those Beings who wove in the fiery, gaseous and watery stages of elementary existence, who wove a Saturn, Sun and Moon existence, who at the beginning of earth existence were weaving its fabric—how best do we come to know them? ... How can we draw near to them?
We should have to go into very many things to get anywhere near an understanding of these Beings. To begin with, however, we can come to know one aspect of them, and that will suffice to bring us at least one step nearer to the potent meaning of the ancient Bible words. Let us consider those Beings for a moment—the Beings who stood nearest to man at the time when he was created from what had developed out of the Saturn, Sun and Moon evolutions. Let us ask those Beings what they really wanted. Let us ask them what was their will, their purpose. Then we shall be able to get at least some idea of their nature. They had great ability; in the course of their evolution they had acquired capacities in various directions. One of them could do this, another that. But we understand the nature of these Beings best if we realise that at the time we are now considering they were working as a group towards a common goal; they were moved by a common aim. Although at a higher level, it is as if a group of men, each with his own special skill, were to co-operate today. Each of them can do something, and now they say to each other: “You can do this, I can do that, the third among us can do something else. We will unite our activities to produce a work in common in which each of our capacities can be used.” Let us then imagine such p. group of men, a group each of whom practises a different craft, but which is united by a common aim. What they intend to bring into existence is not yet there. The unit at which they are working lives to begin with only as an aim. What is there is a multiplicity. The unit lives, to begin with, only as an ideal. Now think of a group of spiritual Beings who have passed through the evolutions of Saturn, Sun and Moon, each one of whom has a specific ability, and who all at the moment I have indicated make the decision: “We will combine our activities for a common end, we will all work in the same direction.” And the picture of this goal arose before each of them. What was this goal? It was man, earthly man!
Thus earthly man lived as the ultimate goal in a group of spiritual Beings who had resolved to combine their several skills in order to arrive at something which they themselves did not possess at all, something which did not belong to them, but which they were able to achieve by combined effort. If you accept all that I have described to you—the elementary sheath, the cosmic, meditative spiritual Beings working within it, the two complexes, one of desire quickening inwardly, and another manifesting outwardly—and then ascribe the common purpose I have just mentioned to those spiritual Beings whose countenances gaze out of the elementary sheath, then you have what lived in the heart of the Hebrew sage of old in the word Elohim.
Now we have brought before us in picture form what lives in these all-powerful archetypal words. Then let us forget all that a man of today can think and feel when he utters the words: In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. Bearing in mind all that I have told you today, try to put this picture before you. There is the sphere in which fiery, gaseous and watery elements weave. Within this active, weaving elementary sphere a group of pondering spiritual Beings live. They are engaged in productive pondering, their pondering is penetrated through and through by their intention to direct their whole operation towards the form of man. And the first-fruits of their musing is the idea of something manifesting itself outwardly, announcing itself, and something else inwardly active, inwardly animated.
“In the elementary sheath the primeval Spirits pondered the outwardly manifesting and the inwardly mobile.” Try to bring before yourselves in these terms what is said in the first lines of the Bible, then you will have a foundation for all that is to come before our souls in the next few days as the true meaning of those all-powerful archetypal words which contain such a sublime revelation for mankind—the revelation of its own origin.
Zweiter Vortrag
Wenn derjenige, welcher auf dem Boden der Geisteswissenschaft steht und einiges von dem aufgenommen hat, was aus der Anthroposophie heraus über die Entwickelung unserer Welt gesagt werden kann, vorzudringen vermag zu jenen gewaltigen Worten, die am Ausgangspunkte unserer Bibel stehen, so sollte ihm etwas aufgehen können wie eine völlig neue geistige Welt. Es ist wohl kaum irgendeinem Dokumente der Menschheitsentwickelung gegenüber die Möglichkeit, sich von dem wahren Sinn zu entfernen, eine so große wie bei diesem Dokumente, das man gewöhnlich die Genesis, die Beschreibung des sogenannten Sechs- oder Siebentagewerks nennt.
Wenn der moderne Mensch in irgendeiner Sprache, die jetzt dem Menschen geläufig sein kann, Worte in seiner Seele wachruft, wie etwa, sagen wir in der deutschen Sprache, «Im Urbeginne schufen die Götter die Himmel und die Erde», so ist das, was in diesen Worten liegt, kaum ein schwacher Abglanz, kaum ein Schattenbild zu nennen von dem, was lebendig war in den Seelen derer, die im hebräischen Altertum die Eingangsworte der Bibel auf sich haben wirken lassen. Denn es kommt diesem Dokumente gegenüber wahrlich zum allergeringsten Teil darauf an, daß wir imstande sind, moderne Worte an die Stelle der alten zu setzen. Es kommt vielmehr darauf an, daß wir uns durch unsere anthroposophische Vorbereitung in den Stand setzen, wenigstens einiges von dem Stimmungsgehalt nachzufühlen, der bei einem alten hebräischen Schüler im Herzen und in der Seele lebte, wenn er die Worte in sich lebendig machte: B'reschit bara elohim et haschamajim w'et ha'arez.
Eine ganze Welt lebte in den Augenblicken, da ihm solche Worte durch die Seele zuckten. Was für eine Welt? Womit können wir die Innenwelt, die in der Seele eines solchen Schülers lebte, vergleichen? Nur mit dem können wir sie vergleichen, was in der Seele des Menschen vorgehen kann, der jene Bilder geschildert erhält, die der Seher erlebt, wenn er in die geistigen Welten selber hineinschaut.
Was wird uns denn schließlich geschildert in dem, was wir die geisteswissenschaftliche Lehre nennen? Wir wissen, die Quellen dieser Lehre sind die Ergebnisse des Sehertums, sind die lebendigen Anschauungen, die der Seher empfängt, wenn er sich in seiner ganzen Auffassung freimacht von den Bedingungen der sinnlichen Wahrnehmung und des an den physischen Leib gebundenen Verstandes, wenn er mit geistigen Organen in die geistige Welt hineinschaut. Das, was er da schaut in der geistigen Welt, er kann es, wenn er es in die Sprachen der physischen Welt übersetzen will, nur in Bildern ausdrücken, aber in Bildern, welche, wenn die Fähigkeit des seherhaften Darstellers hinreicht, in entsprechender Weise eine Vorstellung davon hervorrufen können, was der Seher selbst erschaut in den geistigen Welten. Dann kommt allerdings etwas zustande, was nicht verwechselt werden darf mit irgendeiner Beschreibung von Dingen oder Ereignissen der physisch-sinnlichen Welt, es kommt etwas zustande, bei dem man sich fortdauernd bewußt sein muß, daß man es mit einer ganz anderen Welt zu tun hat, mit einer Welt, die der sinnlichen zwar zugrunde liegt, die aber im eigentlichen Sinne sich in keiner Art deckt mit den Vorstellungen, Eindrücken und Wahrnehmungen der gewöhnlichen Sinneswelt.
Will man sich den Ursprung dieser unserer Sinneswelt einschließlich des Menschen vor die Seele hinmalen, dann kann man mit seinem Vorstellen nicht innerhalb der Sinneswelt verbleiben. Alle Wissenschaften, welche zu den Ursprüngen gehen wollen und nichts mitbringen als Vorstellungen, die aus der Sinneswelt entnommen sind, können nicht zu den Ursprüngen des sinnlichen Daseins gelangen. Denn das sinnliche Dasein wurzelt in dem übersinnlichen Dasein, und wir können zwar geschichtlich oder meinetwillen geologisch eine lange Strecke weiter und immer weiter zurückgehen; wollen wir aber bis zu den Ursprüngen dringen, dann müssen wir uns bewußt sein, daß wir von einem bestimmten Punkte ab in urferner Vergangenheit das Feld des Sinnlichen verlassen und hinaufdringen müssen in Gebiete, die nur übersinnlich zu fassen sind. Dasjenige, was man die Genesis nennt, beginnt nicht mit der Darstellung irgendeines Sinnlichen, nicht mit der Darstellung von irgend etwas, was Augen sehen könnten in der äußeren physischen Welt. Und wir werden im Verlaufe der Vorträge uns hinlänglich davon überzeugen, wie irrtümlich es wäre, wenn man die Worte der ersten Partien der Genesis auf Dinge oder Ereignisse beziehen wollte, die ein äußerliches Auge sehen kann, die wir erleben können, wenn wir mit den äußeren Sinnesorganen unseren Umblick in der Welt halten. Solange man daher mit den Worten «Himmel und Erde» noch irgend etwas verbindet, was einen Rest enthält von sinnlich Sichtbarem, so lange ist man nicht da angekommen, wohin die ersten Partien der Genesis zielen. In der Gegenwart ist es kaum möglich, anders hineinzuleuchten in die Welt, auf die hiermit hingedeutet wird, als durch die Geisteswissenschaft. Aber durch diese Geisteswissenschaft gibt es in gewissem Sinne auch eine Möglichkeit, heranzutreten an das, was man nennen möchte das Mysterium der Urworte, mit denen die Bibel beginnt, und etwas nachzufühlen von dem, was in diesen Urworten liegt.
Worin besteht denn eigentlich das ganz Eigenartige dieser Urworte? Wenn ich mich zunächst abstrakt ausdrücken darf, so muß ich sagen, es besteht darin, daß sie in hebräischer Sprache geschrieben sind, in einer Sprache, die ganz anders auf die Seele wirkt, als irgendeine moderne Sprache wirken kann. Wenn diese Sprache, in der die ersten Partien der Bibel uns zunächst vorliegen, heute auch nicht mehr so wirkt, einstmals hat sie so gewirkt, daß, wenn ein Buchstabe durch die Seele lautete, ein Bild in ihr wachgerufen wurde. Vor der Seele dessen, der mit lebendigem Anteil die Worte auf sich wirken ließ, tauchten in einer gewissen Harmonie, ja in einer organischen Form Bilder auf, die sich vergleichen lassen mit dem, was der Seher heute noch sehen kann, wenn er von dem Sinnlichen zum Übersinnlichen vorschreitet. Man möchte sagen, die hebräische Sprache, oder besser gesagt die Sprache der ersten Partien der Bibel, war eine Art von Mittel, aus der Seele herauszurufen bildhafte Vorstellungen, welche nahe heranrückten an die Gesichte, die der Seher erhält, wenn er fähig wird, leibfrei zu schauen in die übersinnlichen Partien des Daseins.
Deshalb wird, um diese gewaltigen Urworte der Menschheit einigermaßen lebendig vor die Seele hinzustellen, notwendig sein, daß man absieht von allem Schattenhaften, von allem Blassen, das irgendeine moderne Sprache in ihren Wirkungen auf die Seele hat, und daß man sich einen Begriff verschafft von dem gewaltig Lebensvollen, dem Aufrüttelnden und Schöpferischen, das irgendeine Lautfolge in dieser alten Sprache hatte. Und so ist es von unendlicher Wichtigkeit, daß wir im Verlaufe dieser Vorträge auch versuchen, ein wenig vor unsere Seele hinzustellen jene Bilder, die da auftauchten in dem althebräischen Schüler, wenn der betreffende Laut schöpferisch in seiner Seele wirkte und ein Bild vor diese Seele hinstellte. Sie sehen daraus, daß es einen ganz anderen Weg geben muß, in diese Urkunde einzudringen, als alle die Wege, die heute gewählt werden, um irgendwelche alte Urkunden zu verstehen.
Damit habe ich einiges von den Gesichtspunkten angegeben, welche uns leiten werden. Wir werden nur langsam und allmählich vordringen können zu dem, was uns eine lebendige Vorstellung dessen geben kann, was in dem althebräischen Weisen gelebt hat, wenn er jene gewaltigsten Worte auf sich wirken ließ, die wir als Worte wenigstens noch in der Welt haben. So wird es unsere nächste Aufgabe sein, so wenig wie möglich an Bekanntes anzuknüpfen und so viel wie möglich uns freizumachen von alledem, was wir bisher uns vorstellten, wenn wir von Himmel und Erde, von Göttern, von Erschaffen und Schaffen und von einem Urbeginne sprechen. Und je mehr wir uns freimachen können von dem, was wir bisher gefühlt haben bei solchen Worten, desto besser werden wir in den Geist eines Dokumentes eindringen, das aus ganz anderen Seelenbedingungen heraus sich entwickelt hat, als sie in der Gegenwart herrschen. Vor allen Dingen aber müssen wir uns darüber verständigen, wovon wir denn eigentlich geisteswissenschaftlich reden, wenn wir von den Einleitungsworten der Bibel sprechen.
Sie wissen ja, aus dem, was heute der seherischen Forschung möglich ist, können wir den Hergang, die Entwickelung unserer Erde und des Menschendaseins in gewissem Sinn beschreiben. Und es ist von mir versucht worden in meinem Buche «Die Geheimwissenschaft», aus den drei unserem Erdendasein vorausgehenden Stufen der Entwickelung, aus dem Saturn-, Sonnen- und Mondendasein, nach und nach das Erdendasein, die Erde, als den Schauplatz, als den planetarischen Schauplatz des Menschen zu beschreiben. Und Sie haben gewiß gegenwärtig, wenigstens in großen Zügen, was da beschrieben worden ist. Es fragt sich nun: Wohin sollen wir das stellen, was mit dem gewaltigen B’reschit an unsere Seele heranrückt? Wohin sollen wir das stellen in unserer geisteswissenschaftlichen Beschreibung? Wohin gehört es?
Machen wir uns einmal klar in bezug auf einen gewissen Gesichtspunkt, wie wir uns das Saturn-, Sonnen- und Mondendasein vor Augen malen können. Wenn wir kurz den Blick zurückwenden auf den alten Saturn, dann steht er vor unserer Seele bildhaft als ein Weltenkörper, der noch nichts von dem hat, was wir gewohnt sind, das stoffliche Dasein um uns herum zu nennen. Er ist ein Weltenkörper, der von alledem, was wir in unserer Umgebung haben, eigentlich nur das Element der Wärme in sich hat. Wärme oder Feuer, in sich webendes Wärmeelement, noch nichts von Luft, nichts von Wasser, nichts von fester Erde ist zu finden auf dem alten Saturn, so daß da, wo er am dichtesten ist, er lebende, webende Wärme ist. Und wir wissen, daß dann das Dasein vordringt zum sogenannten Sonnendasein. Da haben wir dann zu der webenden, lebenden Wärme eine Art luft- oder gasförmiges Element hinzukommend, und wir stellen uns bildhaft den planetarischen Zustand der Sonne richtig vor, wenn wir uns ihn, soweit er als elementarischer Zustand in Betracht kommt, denken als ein Ineinanderweben und Ineinanderleben gasiger, luftförmiger Elemente und Wärmeelemente. Wir haben dann als dritten Zustand in der Entwickelung unseres Erdendaseins den sogenannten Mondenzustand zu betrachten. Bei diesem kommt zur Wärme und zur Luft dasjenige hinzu, was wir den wässerigen elementarischen Zustand nennen können. Noch nichts von dem, was wir in unserem heutigen irdischen Dasein das erdige, das feste Element nennen, ist während dieses alten Mondenzustandes vorhanden. Aber ein Eigentümliches tritt auf während dieses alten Mondendaseins: es teilt sich die frühere Einheit, in der unser planetarisches Dasein verlaufen ist. Wenn wir auf den alten Saturn blicken, so erscheint er uns als eine Einheit von in sich webender Wärme. Noch die alte Sonne erscheint uns als in sich webende Gas- und Wärmeelemente. Während des Mondendaseins tritt eine Spaltung eines Sonnenhaften und eines Mondhaften auf. Und erst dann, wenn wir zu der vierten Stufe unserer planetarischen Entwickelung kommen, sehen wir, wie zu den früheren elementarischen Zuständen, zu dem feurigen oder wärmehaften, zu dem luftförmigen, zu dem wässerigen Elemente das in sich feste, das erdhafte Element hinzutritt. Damit dieses feste Element in unserem planetarischen Dasein auftreten konnte, mußte sich die Spaltung, die schon während des Mondendaseins stattgefunden hatte, wiederholen. Das Sonnenhafte mußte noch einmal herausgehen aus unserem planetarischen Erdenhaften. So daß wir einen gewissen Zeitpunkt in der Entwickelung unseres Planeten haben, wo aus einem gemeinsamen planetarischen Zustande, in dem noch ineinander verwoben sind die Elemente des Feuers, der Luft und des Wassers, auseinandertreten das dichtere erdige Element und das feinere luftartige Sonnenelement. Und nur in diesem Erdhaften konnte sich das bilden, das sich verdichten, was wir heute als das Feste bezeichnen.
Halten wir einmal diesen Moment fest, wo aus einem gemeinsamen planetarischen Verhältnis das Sonnenhafte heraustritt und fortan von außen seine Kräfte unserem Erdhaften zusendet. Halten wir daran fest, daß damals auch die Möglichkeit gegeben war, daß sich in dem Erdhaften das Feste, das, was wir heute im stofflichen Sinne das Feste nennen, vorbereitete, sich in dem Erdhaften gleichsam verdichtete. Halten wir diesen Moment fest, dann haben wir denjenigen Zeitpunkt, in dem die Genesis, die Bibel, einsetzt. Von diesem Zustand spricht sie. Wir dürfen mit dem ersten Worte der Genesis durchaus nicht verbinden jenes Abstrakte, Schattenhafte, was man heute im Auge hat, wenn man etwa das Wort «Im Anfang» oder «Im Urbeginne» ausspricht. Damit würde man gegenüber dem, was der alte hebräische Weise empfand, etwas unsäglich Armseliges zum Ausdruck bringen. Alles das, was man sich nur vorstellen kann in jener Zweiheit, welche entstand durch die Auseinandergliederung des Sonnenhaften und des Erdhaften, alles das, was sozusagen im Moment dieser Trennung vorhanden war, was sich eben in die Zweiheit gliederte, alles das muß vor unserer Seele auftauchen, wenn wir B’reschit, das «Im Anfang», «Im Urbeginn» in der richtigen Weise vor unsere Seele hinstellen wollen. Und nicht nur das allein darf in unserer Seele auftauchen, sondern wir müssen uns bewußt sein, daß in dieser ganzen Entwickelung, die wir die Saturn-, Sonnen- und Mondenentwickelung nennen, geistige Wesenheiten die Lenker und Leiter und auch die Träger der ganzen Entwickelung waren, und daß dasjenige, was wir das Wärme-, das Luft-, das Wasserelement nennen, immer nur der äußere Ausdruck, das äußere Kleid ist für die geistigen Wesenheiten, die die Wirklichkeit der Entwickelung sind. Auch dann, wenn wir hinblicken auf jenen Zustand, der bei der Trennung des Sonnenhaften von dem Erdenhaften vorhanden war, und uns ihn in einem von Stoffesvorstellungen erfüllten Bilde denken, auch dann müssen wir uns bewußt sein, daß wir in alledem, was wir da unter dem Bilde des elementarischen Wassers, der Luft, des Feuers vor unsere Seele hinmalen, nur das Ausdrucksmittel für webende Geistigkeit haben, für webende Geistigkeit, die durch die vorangehenden drei Stufen, durch die Saturn-, Sonnen- und Mondenstufe, gestiegen ist und an diesem Zeitpunkt, den ich eben charakterisiert habe, auf einer gewissen Entwickelungsstufe ihres Daseins angelangt ist.
Stellen wir einmal vor unsere Seele dieses Bild von in sich webendem wässerigem, luft- oder gasförmigem und feurigem Elemente wie eine gewaltige Weltenkugel, die sich auseinanderspaltet in ein sonnenhaftes und in ein erdenhaftes Element; stellen wir uns aber vor, daß alles das, was wir in diesem Elementarisch-Stofflichen in der Vorstellung haben, nur das Ausdrucksmittel für Geistiges ist. Stellen wir uns vor, daß aus diesem Stoffgehäuse, das gewoben ist aus einem wässerigen, luftförmigen und einem Wärmeelement, uns anblicken die Antlitze von geistigen Wesenheiten, die da drinnen weben, die in diesem durch Stoffesvorstellungen für unsere Seele repräsentierten Element sich manifestieren, sich offenbaren. Stellen wir uns vor, daß wir geistige Wesenheiten vor uns haben, die uns gleichsam ihr Antlitz zuwenden und die da arbeiten mit Hilfe von Wärme, Luft und Wasser, um Weltenkörper durch die Kraft ihres Geistig-Seelischen zu organisieren. Stellen wir uns einmal dieses Bild vor!
Da haben wir das Bild einer elementarischen Hülle, einer Hülle, die wir uns etwa vorstellen können wie ein Schneckenhaus, wenn wir uns eine recht grobe sinnliche Vorstellung bilden wollen, einer Hülle aber, die nicht aus den festen Stoffen geformt ist wie das Schneckenhaus, sondern die aus feinsten wäßrigen, luft- oder gasförmigen und feurigen Elementen gewoben ist. Da drinnen denken wir uns ein Geistiges, das uns anblickt wie Antlitze, die gerade durch diese Hülle sich offenbaren und eine Kraft der Offenbarung selber sind, eine Kraft, die sozusagen aus dem übersinnlich Verborgenen in das Offenbare sich herausstachelt, wenn ich das Wort gebrauchen darf.
Rufen Sie sich dieses Bild, das ich eben zu malen versuchte, vor die Seele, dieses lebendige Weben eines Geistigen in einem Stofflichen, und rufen Sie sich vor die Seele die innere seelische Kraft, welche das Weben im Stoffe, das Organisieren im Stoffe bewirkt, und sehen Sie einen Augenblick ab von allem übrigen: dann haben Sie vor sich das, was etwa in der Seele eines althebräischen Weisen lebte, wenn die Laute B’reschit diese Seele durchdrangen. Bet, der erste Buchstabe, rief hervor das stoffliche Weben des Gehäuses, Resch, der zweite Mitlaut, rief hervor das Antlitzhafte der geistigen Wesenheiten, die in diesem Gehäuse drinnen woben, und Schin, der dritte Laut, rief hervor die stachelige Kraft, die aus dem Inneren sich emporarbeitet, um sich zu offenbaren.
So ungefähr kommen wir zu dem Prinzip, das solch einer Beschreibung zugrunde liegt. Und wenn wir zu diesem Prinzip vordringen, dann können wir zugleich etwas empfinden von dem Geiste dieser Sprache, die, wie gesagt, etwas Schöpferisches in der Seele hatte, wovon der moderne Mensch bei seinen abstrakten Sprachen gar keine Ahnung mehr hat.
Stellen wir uns jetzt einmal so recht in den Moment hinein, der sozusagen vor der physischen Koagulierung, vor der physischen Verdichtung unseres Erdendaseins liegt, denn so war der Moment, den ich im Auge habe. Stellen wir uns diesen Moment recht lebendig vor, dann werden wir sagen müssen: Wollen wir das, was da geschieht, beschreiben, dann dürfen wir nichts verwenden von all den Vorstellungen, die wir anwenden, wenn wir heute die äußeren Sinnesvorgänge beschreiben wollen. — Daher ist es unendlich dilettantisch, wenn man das zweite der Worte, mit denen wir es zu tun haben in der Genesis, so auffaßt, daß man irgendeine äußere Tatsache, und sei sie noch so sehr anklingend an das, was wir heute unter «Schaffen» und «Schöpfen» verstehen, an das Wort heranbringt. Damit kommen wir nicht an das zweite Wort der Genesis heran. Wohin können wir uns nun wenden? Es ist mit diesem Worte etwas gemeint, was in der Tat hart an die Grenze herantritt, wo das Sinnliche unmittelbar schon in das Übersinnlich-Geistige hinein übergeht. Und der Mensch, der sich eine Vorstellung von dem machen will, was man so gewöhnlich mit «schuf» übersetzt: «Im Urbeginne schufen die Götter», der darf in keiner Weise dieses Wort an irgend etwas heranbringen, was mit Augen, mit gewöhnlichen sinnlichen Augen als eine schöpferische Betätigung, als eine hervorbringende Betätigung geschaut werden kann.
Schauen Sie, meine lieben Freunde, in Ihr Inneres. Versuchen Sie sich einmal in eine Lage zu versetzen, so daß Sie etwa, sagen wir, eine Weile geschlafen haben, dann aufwachen und, ohne daß Sie den Blick auf eine äußere Tatsache richten, in sich auferwecken durch die innere Seelentätigkeit gewisse Vorstellungen in Ihrer Seele. Vergegenwärtigen Sie sich diese innere Tätigkeit, dieses produktive Sinnen, das aus dem Seeleninneren einen Seeleninhalt hervorzaubert. Gebrauchen Sie meinetwillen das Wort «Ersinnen» für dieses Hervorzaubern eines Seeleninhaltes aus den Seelenuntergründen in das bewußte Blickfeld Ihrer Seele hinein, und denken Sie sich jetzt das, was der Mensch nur kann mit seinen Vorstellungen, als eine Tätigkeit, die nun wirklich kosmisch-schöpferisch ist. Denken Sie sich statt Ihres Sinnens, statt Ihres innerlichen denkerischen Erlebens ein kosmisches Denken, dann haben Sie das, was in diesem zweiten Worte der Genesis, bara, drinnen liegt. So geistig, als Sie es nur denken können, so nahe Sie es nur heranbringen können an das Gedankenmäßige, das Sie sich in Ihrem eigenen Sinnen vor Augen führen, so nahe Sie das nur heranbringen können!
Und jetzt stellen Sie sich vor, daß Sie während dieses Sinnens in der Seele gleichsam zweierlei Vorstellungsgruppen vor Ihre Seele hinleiten. Nehmen wir einmal, um möglichst deutlich eine solche fernliegende Sache zu schildern, einen Menschen, der aufwacht und dem zweierlei einfällt, der also zweierlei ersinnt. Das eine, was er ersinnt, sei das Bild von irgendeiner Tätigkeit oder einem äußeren Ding oder Wesen; das tritt nicht durch äußere Anschauung, nicht durch Wahrnehmung, sondern durch Sinnen, durch schöpferische Tätigkeit der Seele in das Blickfeld des Bewußtseins. Das aber, was als zweiter Vorstellungskomplex auftreten soll bei einem so Aufwachenden, das sei eine Begierde, irgend etwas, was der Mensch wollen kann nach seiner ganzen Anlage und Seelenverfassung. So haben wir ein vorstellungsmäßiges und ein begierdenhaftes Element, das auftaucht vor unserer Seele durch inneres Sinnen. Nunmehr stellen Sie sich statt der Menschenseele, die also in sich sinnt, dasjenige vor, was in der Genesis die Elohim genannt wird. Denken Sie sich statt der Einheit der Menschenseele eine Mehrheit sinnender geistiger Wesenheiten, die aber in einer ähnlichen Weise aus ihrem Inneren hervorrufen durch Ersinnen zwei Komplexe, die ich vergleichen möchte mit dem, was ich Ihnen eben beschrieben habe, mit einem rein vorstellungsmäßigen und einem begierdenhaften Komplex. Wir denken uns also statt der sinnenden Menschenseele eine kosmische Organisation von Wesenheiten, die in sich in ähnlicher Weise wachrufen, nur daß ihr Sinnen ein kosmisches ist, zwei solche Komplexe, einen vorstellungsartigen, das heißt einen solchen, der irgend etwas offenbart, der also nach außen hin sich auslebt, der nach außen hin erscheint, und einen anderen Komplex, der begierdenhaft ist, der durch innerliche Regsamkeit lebt, ein innerlich sich Regendes, ein innerlich von Regsamkeit Durchsetztes. Wir denken uns also jene kosmischen Wesenheiten, die als die Elohim bezeichnet werden, wir denken sie uns so sinnend, und dieses Sinnen vergegenwärtigen wit uns bei dem Worte «sie schufen», bara. Und dann denken wir uns, daß durch dieses schöpferische Sinnen zwei solche Komplexe entstehen, ein Komplex, der mehr darauf hingeht, ein sich äußerlich Offenbarendes, ein nach außen sich Kundgebendes zu sein, und ein anderer Komplex, ein innerlich Regsames, ein innerlich Lebendiges; dann haben wir ungefähr jene zwei Vorstellungskomplexe, welche auftauchten in der Seele des althebräischen Weisen, wenn die Worte, für die heute «die Himmel und die Erde» stehen, seine Seele durchklangen, haschamajim und ha'arez. Suchen wir womöglich zu vergessen, was der moderne Mensch unter Himmel und Erde sich denkt, versuchen wir die beiden Vorstellungskomplexe vor die Seele zu führen, den Komplex des nach außen sich Kundgebenden, des sich Offenbarenden, den Komplex dessen, was da drängt, nach außen irgendwelche Wirkung hervorzurufen, und jenen anderen Komplex des innerlich Regsamen, dessen, was sich selbst im Inneren erleben will, was sich im Inneren lebendig regt, dann haben wir das haschamajim und das andere Wort, ha'arez.
Und die Elohim selber — wir werden sie im Verlaufe der Vorträge noch genauer kennenlernen und sie übersetzen in unsere geisteswissenschaftliche Sprache, jetzt aber wollen wir versuchen, einigermaßen an den Sinn der Urworte heranzudringen —, die Elohim selber, was sind sie für Wesenheiten? Wer sich eine Vorstellung machen will, was in der Seele des althebräischen Weisen lebte, wenn er dieses Wort gebrauchte, der muß sich klar sein, daß in jener Zeit ganz lebendig der Sinn dafür vorhanden war, daß unsere Erdenentwickelung eben einen bestimmten Sinn, ein bestimmtes Ziel hat. Welches ist dieser Sinn, welches ist dieses Ziel unserer Erdenentwickelung?
Unsere Erdenentwickelung hat einen Sinn, ein Ziel nur dann, wenn innerhalb ihrer etwas auftritt, was vorher nicht da war. Eine ewige Wiederholung, eine Wiederkehr dessen, was schon da war, wäre ein sinnloses Dasein, und als ein solches sinnloses Dasein hätte vor allen Dingen der althebräische Weise die Erdengenesis empfunden, wenn er nicht hätte denken können, daß die Erde, nachdem sie sich herausentwickelt hat aus anderen Zuständen, etwas Neues, gegenüber allem Früheren Neues bringen müsse. Durch dieses Erdendasein wurde ein Neues möglich: daß nämlich der Mensch gerade so wurde, wie er innerhalb des Erdendaseins sich zeigt. So wie der Mensch innerhalb des Erdendaseins auftritt als das Wesen, das er heute schon ist, als das Wesen, zu dem er sich entwickeln wird in immer weiter und weitergehender Zukunft, so war dieser Mensch in allen früheren Entwickelungsstadien nicht vorhanden, so war er auch in den früheren Entwickelungsstadien nicht möglich. Und anders geartet als der Mensch — wir wollen jetzt nicht den Begriff des Niederen und des Höheren einführen — waren diejenigen geistigen Wesenheiten, welche die äußere Entwickelung führten und trugen, die wir als Saturn-, Sonnen- und Mondenentwickelung bezeichnen. Jene Wesenheiten, die da woben in den elementarischen Daseinsstufen des Feurigen, Gasigen, Wäßrigen, die da woben ein Saturn-, ein Sonnen-, ein Mondendasein, die da woben an dem Beginn des Erdendaseins, wie lernen wir sie am besten in bezug auf ihre Wesenheit kennen? Wie kommen wir ihnen nahe?
Wir müßten allerdings vieles, vieles beschreiben, wenn wir diesen Wesenheiten einigermaßen nahekommen wollten. Wir können sie aber nach einer Seite hin zunächst kennen lernen, und das wird genügen, um uns wenigstens einen Schritt näher zu bringen dem gewaltigen Sinn der biblischen Urworte. Wir wollen sie einmal betrachten, diese Wesenheiten, die dem Menschen in gewisser Beziehung am nächsten standen, als er selbst herausgebilder wurde aus dem, was sich heranentwickelt hatte aus dem alten Saturn-, Sonnen- und Mondendasein. Wir wollen sie einmal befragen, diese Wesenheiten, nach dem, was sie eigentlich wollten. Wir wollen sie nach ihrem Willen befragen, nach ihrer Absicht gleichsam. Dann werden wir wenigstens eine kleine Vorstellung von ihrer Wesenheit erhalten können. Was wollten sie, diese Wesenheiten? — Sie konnten vieles, sie hatten sich ein Können im Verlaufe der Entwickelung, die sie durchgemacht hatten, nach der einen oder anderen Richtung erworben. Der eine konnte dies, der andere jenes. Aber wir stellen uns ihr Wesen am besten vor, wenn wir uns sagen: In jenem Zeitpunkt, den wir eben ins Auge gefaßt haben, wirkte in einer Gruppe von solchen Wesenheiten ein gemeinsames Ziel, ein gemeinsames Motiv. — Es ist auf einer höheren Stufe etwa so, wie wenn eine Gruppe von Menschen heute zusammenkäme, von denen jeder eine bestimmte Geschicklichkeit hat. Ein jeder von ihnen kann etwas, und nun sagen sie sich gegenseitig: Du kannst dies, ich kann das, der dritte jenes. Wir wollen alle unsere Tätigkeiten jetzt zusammenfließen lassen, um ein gemeinsames Werk zu tun, wo eines jeden Tätigkeit angebracht werden kann. — Nehmen wir also eine solche Gruppe von Menschen an, von denen ein jeder etwas anderes kann, die aber ein gemeinsames Ziel haben. Das, was da entstehen soll, ist noch nicht da. Die Einheit, an der sie arbeiten, lebt zunächst überhaupt erst als Ziel, sie ist noch gar nicht vorhanden. Es ist eine Vielheit da, die Einheit lebt zunächst als ein Ideal. Nun denken Sie sich eine Gruppe von geistigen Wesenheiten, die sich entwickelt haben durch Saturn, Sonne und Mond, von denen eine jede etwas ganz Bestimmtes kann, und die in dem Moment, den ich charakterisiert habe, den Entschluß fassen: Wir wollen unsere Tätigkeiten gruppieren zu einem gemeinsamen Ziel, wir wollen uns eine einheitliche Richtung geben. — Und vor dem Blick eines jeden tauchte das Bild dieses Zieles auf. Und was war das Ziel? Der Mensch, der Erdenmensch.
So lebte der Erdenmensch als Ziel in einer Gruppe von göttlichgeistigen Wesenheiten, die beschlossen hatten, ihre verschiedenen Künste zusammenwirken zu lassen, um das zu erreichen, was sie selber gar nicht hatten, was ihnen selber nicht eignete, was sie aber hervorbringen konnten durch gemeinschaftliche Arbeit. Wenn Sie das alles nehmen, was ich Ihnen beschrieben habe als elementarische Hülle, als darin wirkende, kosmisch sinnende, geistige Wesenheiten, als zwei Komplexe, einen begierdenhaften, innerlich regsamen und einen nach außen sich offenbarenden, wenn Sie das alles nehmen und dann jenen geistigen Wesenheiten, die gleichsam aus dem Elementarischen heraus mit ihrem Antlitz blicken, dieses gemeinsame Ziel zuschreiben, das ich soeben charakterisiert habe, dann haben Sie das, was da lebte in dem Herzen eines althebräischen Weisen bei dem Worte Elohim. Und jetzt haben wir in bildhafter Weise zusammengetragen, was in diesen allgewaltigen Urworten lebt.
Vergessen wir also zunächst einmal alles das, was ein moderner Mensch fühlen und denken kann, wenn er ausspricht die Worte «Im Urbeginne schufen die Götter die Himmel und die Erde». Versuchen wir unter Berücksichtigung alles dessen, was heute gesagt worden ist, vor unser Auge folgendes Bild hinzustellen: Da ist webendes elementarisches Element, darinnen webt Feuriges, Gasförmiges, Wässeriges. Innerhalb dieses Elementarischen, Wirksamen, Webenden leben geistige Wesenheiten, eine Gruppe von geistigen Wesenheiten, die sinnen. Im produktiven Sinnen sind sie begriffen, und durch ihr produktives Sinnen hindurch dringt das Ziel, zum Menschenbild hin die ganze Wirksamkeit zu lenken. Und als erstes tritt auf aus diesem Sinnen die Vorstellung eines sich nach außen Offenbarenden, sich Kundgebenden, und eines innerlich Regsamen, eines innerlich in sich Belebten: In dem elementarischen Gehäuse ersannen die Urgeister das nach außen hin Erscheinende, das nach innen Regsame.
Versuchen Sie einmal, in diesen Worten sich zu vergegenwärtigen, was in der ersten Zeile der Bibel gesagt wird, dann werden Sie die Grundlage haben für das, was wir in den weiteren Tagen uns vor die Seele zu führen haben als den wahren Sinn dieser allgewaltigen Urworte, durch die der Menschheit ein Größtes, nämlich ihr eigener Ursprung, geoffenbart ist.
Second Lecture
If someone who stands on the ground of spiritual science and has absorbed some of what anthroposophy has to say about the development of our world is able to penetrate the powerful words that stand at the beginning of our Bible, then something like a completely new spiritual world should open up before them. There is hardly any document in the history of human development that offers as much opportunity to stray from the true meaning as this document, which is commonly called Genesis, the description of the so-called six or seven days of creation.
When modern man, in any language that is now familiar to him, awakens words in his soul such as, say, in the German language, “In the beginning, the gods created the heavens and the earth,” what lies in these words is hardly a faint reflection, hardly a shadow image of what was alive in the souls of those who, in ancient Hebrew times, allowed the opening words of the Bible to work upon them. For it is truly of the least importance in relation to this document that we are able to substitute modern words for the old ones. What matters much more is that, through our anthroposophical preparation, we enable ourselves to feel at least some of the mood that lived in the heart and soul of an ancient Hebrew student when he brought the words to life within himself: B'reschit bara elohim et haschamajim w'et ha'arez.
A whole world lived in the moments when such words flashed through his soul. What kind of world? With what can we compare the inner world that lived in the soul of such a student? We can only compare it with what can happen in the soul of a person who is shown the images that the seer experiences when he looks into the spiritual worlds himself.
What, then, is ultimately described to us in what we call spiritual science? We know that the sources of this teaching are the results of clairvoyance, the living perceptions that the clairvoyant receives when he frees himself in his entire perception from the conditions of sensory perception and from the intellect bound to the physical body, when he looks into the spiritual world with spiritual organs. What he sees in the spiritual world, he can only express in images when he wants to translate it into the languages of the physical world, but in images which, if the ability of the seer is sufficient, can evoke in a corresponding way a conception of what the seer himself sees in the spiritual worlds. Then, however, something comes into being that must not be confused with any description of things or events in the physical-sensory world; something comes into being in which one must be constantly aware that one is dealing with a completely different world, a world that underlies the sensory world, but which in the true sense does not coincide in any way with the ideas, impressions, and perceptions of the ordinary sensory world.
If one wants to picture the origin of our sensory world, including human beings, before one's soul, then one cannot remain within the sensory world with one's imagination. All sciences that seek to go back to the origins and bring with them nothing but ideas taken from the sensory world cannot reach the origins of sensory existence. For sensory existence is rooted in supersensible existence, and although we can go back a long way in history or, for my sake, in geology, if we want to penetrate to the origins, we must be aware that from a certain point in the distant past we must leave the realm of the sensory and ascend into realms that can only be grasped supersensually. What is called Genesis does not begin with the representation of anything sensory, not with the representation of anything that the eyes can see in the external physical world. And in the course of these lectures we will become sufficiently convinced of how mistaken it would be to apply the words of the first parts of Genesis to things or events that can be seen by the outer eye, that we can experience when we look around the world with our outer sense organs. As long as one still associates the words “heaven and earth” with anything that contains a remnant of the sensually visible, one has not arrived at the point where the first parts of Genesis are aiming. In the present, it is hardly possible to gain insight into the world referred to here other than through spiritual science. But through this spiritual science, there is also, in a certain sense, a possibility of approaching what one might call the mystery of the primal words with which the Bible begins, and of gaining some understanding of what lies in these primal words.
What is it that makes these primeval words so unique? If I may express myself abstractly at first, I would say that it is the fact that they are written in Hebrew, a language that has a completely different effect on the soul than any modern language can have. Although this language, in which the first parts of the Bible are presented to us today, no longer has the same effect, it once had such an effect that when a letter passed through the soul, an image was evoked in it. Before the soul of those who let the words take effect on them with living participation, images arose in a certain harmony, indeed in an organic form, which can be compared to what the seer can still see today when he progresses from the sensual to the supersensible. One might say that the Hebrew language, or rather the language of the first parts of the Bible, was a kind of means of calling forth from the soul pictorial ideas that came close to the visions that the seer receives when he becomes capable of looking with his body free into the supersensible parts of existence.
Therefore, in order to present these powerful primal words of humanity to the soul in a somewhat living form, it will be necessary to disregard everything shadowy and pale that any modern language has in its effect on the soul, and to gain a conception of the powerfully life-filled, stirring, and creative nature that any sequence of sounds had in this ancient language. And so it is of infinite importance that in the course of these lectures we also try to place before our soul those images that arose in the ancient Hebrew student when the sound in question worked creatively in his soul and placed an image before that soul. You can see from this that there must be a completely different way of penetrating this document than all the ways chosen today to understand any ancient documents.
I have thus indicated some of the points of view that will guide us. We will only be able to advance slowly and gradually toward what can give us a living idea of what lived in the ancient Hebrew sage when he allowed those most powerful words, which we at least still have in the world as words, to work upon him. So our next task will be to tie ourselves as little as possible to what is familiar and to free ourselves as much as possible from everything we have imagined up to now when we speak of heaven and earth, of gods, of creation and creation, and of a beginning. And the more we can free ourselves from what we have felt up to now when hearing such words, the better we will be able to penetrate the spirit of a document that developed out of soul conditions that are completely different from those that prevail today. Above all, however, we must agree on what we actually mean in terms of spiritual science when we speak of the introductory words of the Bible.
As you know, from what is possible today through clairvoyant research, we can describe in a certain sense the course and development of our Earth and of human existence. And in my book The Secret Science, I have attempted to describe, step by step, the three stages of development that preceded our earthly existence—the Saturn, Sun, and Moon—and to describe earthly existence, the Earth, as the stage, the planetary stage, of human life. And you certainly have, at least in broad outlines, what has been described there. The question now arises: Where shall we place that which approaches our soul with the mighty B'reschit? Where shall we place it in our spiritual scientific description? Where does it belong?
Let us first clarify, from a certain point of view, how we can picture the Saturn, Sun, and Moon existences. If we briefly turn our gaze back to ancient Saturn, it appears before our soul as a world body that has nothing of what we are accustomed to calling the material existence around us. It is a world body that actually contains only the element of warmth from everything we have in our environment. Heat or fire, a heat element weaving within itself, nothing of air, nothing of water, nothing of solid earth can be found on the old Saturn, so that where it is densest, it is living, weaving heat. And we know that then existence advances to what we call solar existence. Then we have a kind of air or gas element added to the weaving, living heat, and we can correctly imagine the planetary state of the sun when we think of it, as far as it can be considered an elemental state, as an interweaving and interliving of gaseous, air-like elements and heat elements. We then have to consider the so-called lunar state as the third state in the development of our earthly existence. In this state, what we can call the watery elemental state is added to the warmth and air. Nothing of what we call the earthy, solid element in our present earthly existence is yet present during this ancient lunar state. But something peculiar occurs during this ancient lunar existence: the former unity in which our planetary existence took place is divided. When we look at the ancient Saturn, it appears to us as a unity of heat weaving within itself. Even the ancient Sun appears to us as gas and heat elements weaving within themselves. During the lunar existence, a division occurs between the solar and the lunar. And only when we reach the fourth stage of our planetary development do we see how the solid, earthy element joins the earlier elemental states, the fiery or warm, the airy, and the watery elements. In order for this solid element to appear in our planetary existence, the division that had already taken place during the Moon's existence had to be repeated. The solar element had to leave our planetary earth element once again. Thus, we have a certain point in the development of our planet where, out of a common planetary state in which the elements of fire, air, and water are still interwoven, the denser earth element and the finer air-like sun element separate. And only in this earth element could that which we today call the solid form condense.
Let us hold fast to this moment when the solar emerges from a common planetary relationship and from then on sends its forces to our earth from outside. Let us hold fast to the fact that at that time it was also possible for the solid, what we today call solid in the material sense, to prepare itself in the earthy, to condense, as it were, in the earthy. If we hold fast to this moment, then we have the point in time at which Genesis, the Bible, begins. This is the state of which it speaks. We must not associate the first words of Genesis with the abstract, shadowy concept that we have in mind today when we say, for example, “In the beginning” or “In the beginning.” To do so would be to express something unspeakably poor in comparison with what the ancient Hebrew sages felt. Everything that can be imagined in that duality which arose through the separation of the solar and the earthly, everything that existed, so to speak, at the moment of this separation, everything that was divided into duality, must appear before our soul if we want to place B'reschit, the “In the beginning,” “In the primeval beginning,” before our soul in the right way. And not only that alone must appear before our soul, but we must be conscious that in this entire evolution, which we call the Saturn, Sun, and Moon evolutions, spiritual beings were the guides and leaders and also the bearers of the entire evolution, and that what we call the elements of heat, air, and water are always only the outer expression, the outer garment for the spiritual beings who are the reality of evolution. Even when we look at the state that existed at the separation of the solar from the earthly, and imagine it in a picture filled with material concepts, even then we must be aware that in all that we paint before our soul under the image of elemental water, air, fire, we have only the means of expression for a weaving spirituality, for a weaving spirituality that has risen through the preceding three stages, through the Saturn, Sun, and Moon stages, and has arrived at this point in time, which I have just characterized, at a certain stage of development in its existence.
Let us imagine before our soul this image of watery, airy, or gaseous elements weaving within themselves like a mighty globe that splits into a sun-like and an earth-like element; but let us imagine that everything we have in our imagination in this elemental substance is only the means of expression for the spiritual. Let us imagine that from this material shell, which is woven from a watery, airy, and a warm element, the faces of spiritual beings look at us, beings who weave within, who manifest themselves, reveal themselves in this element represented for our soul by material ideas. Let us imagine that we have spiritual beings before us who turn their faces toward us, as it were, and who work with the help of heat, air, and water to organize world bodies through the power of their spiritual-soul nature. Let us imagine this picture!
There we have the image of an elemental shell, a shell that we can imagine, for example, as a snail shell if we want to form a rather crude sensory image, but a shell that is not formed from solid substances like the snail shell, but is woven from the finest watery, airy, or gaseous and fiery elements. Inside, we imagine a spiritual being that looks at us like faces revealing themselves through this shell and are themselves a power of revelation, a power that, so to speak, pushes itself out of the supersensible realm into the visible realm, if I may use that expression.
Call to mind the image I have just tried to paint, this living weaving of the spiritual in the material, and call to mind the inner spiritual force that causes the weaving in the material, the organizing in the material, and look away for a moment from everything else: then you will have before you what lived in the soul of an ancient Hebrew sage when the sounds B'reschit penetrated that soul. Bet, the first letter, brought forth the material weaving of the shell; Resch, the second consonant, brought forth the facial features of the spiritual beings weaving within this shell; and Schin, the third sound, brought forth the prickly force that works its way up from within to reveal itself.
This is roughly how we arrive at the principle underlying such a description. And when we penetrate to this principle, we can at the same time sense something of the spirit of this language, which, as I said, had something creative in the soul, something of which modern man, with his abstract languages, has no idea anymore.
Let us now place ourselves in the moment that lies, so to speak, before the physical coagulation, before the physical condensation of our earthly existence, for that was the moment I had in mind. If we imagine this moment vividly, we will have to say: if we want to describe what is happening here, we cannot use any of the concepts we apply today when we want to describe external sensory processes. — It is therefore infinitely amateurish to interpret the second of the words we are dealing with in Genesis in such a way that we apply to it some external fact, however much it may resemble what we today understand by “creating” and “forming.” This does not bring us any closer to the second word in Genesis. Where can we turn now? This word refers to something that indeed comes very close to the boundary where the sensual immediately merges into the supersensible-spiritual. And the person who wants to form an idea of what is usually translated as “created”: “In the beginning, the gods created,” cannot in any way relate this word to anything that can be seen with the eyes, with ordinary sensory eyes, as a creative activity, as an activity that brings something into being.
Look within yourselves, my dear friends. Try to put yourselves in a situation where you have been asleep for a while, then wake up and, without directing your gaze to any external fact, awaken certain ideas in your soul through your inner soul activity. Bring to mind this inner activity, this productive thinking that conjures up soul content from the inner soul. For my sake, use the word “conceive” for this conjuring of soul content from the depths of the soul into the conscious field of vision of your soul, and now think of what human beings can only do with their ideas as an activity that is truly cosmic and creative. Instead of your thinking, instead of your inner intellectual experience, imagine cosmic thinking, and then you will have what lies within this second word of Genesis, bara. As spiritual as you can think it, as close as you can bring it to the intellectual, which you bring before your eyes in your own thinking, as close as you can bring it!
And now imagine that during this thinking you are leading two groups of ideas before your soul, as it were. To describe such a remote thing as clearly as possible, let us take a person who wakes up and two things occur to him, who therefore conceives two things. The first thing he conceives is the image of some activity or an external thing or being; this does not enter the field of consciousness through external observation or perception, but through the soul's creative activity. But what should appear as the second complex of ideas in someone who is waking up is a desire, something that the person can want according to their entire disposition and state of mind. So we have an imaginative and a desirous element that arise before our soul through inner thinking. Now, instead of the human soul that is thinking within itself, imagine what is called the Elohim in Genesis. Instead of the unity of the human soul, think of a multitude of contemplative spiritual beings who, in a similar way, bring forth from within themselves, through contemplation, two complexes which I would compare with what I have just described to you, with a purely imaginative and a desire-driven complex. So instead of the contemplative human soul, we imagine a cosmic organization of beings who awaken within themselves in a similar way, only that their thinking is cosmic, two such complexes, one imaginative, that is, one that reveals something, that lives outwardly, that appears outwardly, and another complex that is desirous, that lives through inner activity, an inner stirring, an inner activity. We therefore imagine those cosmic beings who are called the Elohim, we imagine them thinking in this way, and we visualize this thinking when we hear the word “they created,” bara. And then we imagine that through this creative thinking two such complexes arise, one complex that tends more toward being something that reveals itself outwardly, something that manifests itself outwardly, and another complex, something inwardly active, inwardly alive; then we have approximately those two complexes of ideas that arose in the soul of the ancient Hebrew sage when the words that today stand for “the heavens and the earth” resounded through his soul, hashamayim and ha'arez. Let us try to forget what modern man thinks of as heaven and earth, and try to bring the two complexes of ideas before our soul, the complex of what manifests itself outwardly, of what reveals itself, the complex of what urges outwardly to produce some effect, and the other complex of what is inwardly active, of what wants to experience itself inwardly, what stirs within, then we have the hashamayim and the other word, ha'arez.
And the Elohim themselves — we will get to know them better in the course of these lectures and translate them into our spiritual scientific language, but now let us try to approach the meaning of the primal words — the Elohim themselves, what kind of beings are they? If you want to get an idea of what was going on in the soul of the ancient Hebrew sages when they used this word, you have to realize that back then, people really felt that our Earth's development had a specific meaning, a specific goal. What is this meaning, what is the goal of our Earth's development?
Our earthly development has a meaning, a goal, only if something arises within it that was not there before. An eternal repetition, a return of what already existed, would be a meaningless existence, and the ancient Hebrew sage would have perceived the genesis of the earth as such a meaningless existence if he had not been able to think that the earth, after developing out of other states, must bring something new, something new in relation to everything that had gone before. Through this earthly existence, something new became possible: namely, that human beings became exactly as they appear within earthly existence. Just as man appears within earthly existence as the being he already is today, as the being he will develop into in the ever-advancing future, so this man did not exist in all earlier stages of development, nor was he possible in the earlier stages of development. And different in nature from man — we do not want to introduce the concept of lower and higher here — were those spiritual beings who guided and carried the outer development, which we call the Saturn, Sun, and Moon evolutions. How can we best understand the nature of those beings that wove in the elemental stages of fiery, gaseous, and watery existence, that wove a Saturn, Sun, and Moon existence, that wove at the beginning of Earth existence? How can we come closer to them?
We would have to describe many, many things if we wanted to come reasonably close to these beings. But we can get to know them from one side, and that will suffice to bring us at least one step closer to the powerful meaning of the biblical primal words. Let us consider these essences, which were closest to human beings in a certain sense when they themselves emerged from what had developed from the old Saturn, Sun, and Moon existence. Let us ask these beings what they actually wanted. Let us ask them about their will, their intention, as it were. Then we will at least be able to form a small idea of their nature. What did these beings want? They were capable of many things; in the course of their development they had acquired abilities in one direction or another. One could do this, another that. But we can best imagine their nature if we say to ourselves: at the moment we have just considered, a common goal, a common motive was at work in a group of such beings. — At a higher level, it is something like a group of people coming together today, each of whom has a particular skill. Each of them can do something, and now they say to each other: You can do this, I can do that, the third can do the other. Let us now combine all our activities to do a common work, where each person's activity can be applied. — Let us assume, then, such a group of people, each of whom can do something different, but who have a common goal. What is to come into being is not yet there. The unity they are working toward initially exists only as a goal; it does not yet exist. There is a multiplicity, and unity initially exists as an ideal. Now imagine a group of spiritual beings who have developed through Saturn, the Sun, and the Moon, each of whom can do something very specific, and who, at the moment I have described, make the decision: We want to group our activities toward a common goal; we want to give ourselves a unified direction. — And before the eyes of each one, the image of this goal appeared. And what was the goal? The human being, the earthly human being.
Thus, the human being lived as the goal in a group of divine-spiritual beings who had decided to combine their various arts in order to achieve what they themselves did not have, what was not their own, but what they could bring forth through communal work. If you take everything I have described to you as an elementary shell, as cosmic, spiritual beings working within it, as two complexes, one desirous, inwardly active, and one manifesting itself outwardly, if you take all this and then attribute this common goal to those spiritual beings who, as it were, look out from the elemental world with their faces, which I have just characterized, then you have what lived in the heart of an ancient Hebrew sage when he uttered the word Elohim. And now we have gathered together in a pictorial way what lives in these almighty primal words.
Let us therefore first forget everything that a modern person can feel and think when they utter the words “In the beginning, the gods created the heavens and the earth.” Taking into account everything that has been said today, let us try to picture the following image before our eyes: There is a weaving elemental element, within which fiery, gaseous, and watery elements are weaving. Within this elemental, active, weaving substance live spiritual beings, a group of spiritual beings that sense. They are engaged in productive thinking, and through their productive thinking the goal of directing all their activity toward the human form penetrates. And the first thing to emerge from this thinking is the idea of something revealing itself outwardly, manifesting itself, and something inwardly active, something inwardly animated: in the elemental shell, the primordial spirits conceived what appears outwardly and what is active inwardly.
Try to visualize in these words what is said in the first line of the Bible, and you will have the foundation for what we must bring before our souls in the days to come as the true meaning of these almighty primal words, through which the greatest thing, namely humanity's own origin, is revealed to humanity.