Social Life
GA 203
21 January 1921, Dornach
Lecture I
Our lectures, in that period of time before I had to go away some weeks ago, all tended to show how that which we call Spiritual Science can pass over into real life. They tended to show how that which we call the Cosmos stands in a certain inner connection with what we ourselves inwardly experience in man. And if you just survey the lectures given upon this very theme, I beg you once in a way, radically to ask yourselves this question:—What would it signify for the sum total of the evolution of humanity if these most penetrating, most significant results of Anthroposophical Spiritual Science would only penetrate into the life of those human beings working and living in a social relation with each other. They would know that man, while he attains his consciousness in a physical body, is all the time preserving something in this physical body which points to the period of time before his birth, or rather before his conception, when he was in a condition in which he was filled with a longing once again to have the life between birth and death. He carried within him then the feeling that the soul that has lived for a long time in the Spiritual world again needs the perception of the world obtainable through the bodily senses in order to progress further, and also needs actions performed in a physical body. This conscious contemplation of the pre-existence of the soul, if really understood in the right way, would not remain a mere theoretical view, but would lay hold of one's Feeling and Will, and thereby become a direct force in life.
We can see this my dear friends, in the humanity of the present- age.—They all show something of a lack of initiative, in its broad outlines. This lack of initiative, which broadly speaking, works in a weakening way on all these forces which are necessary in order to turn our decaying life once again into an ascending one, can only be bettered when man becomes conscious of his community with the Spiritual world. That however cannot be brought into the human soul through any theoretical considerations, but only through the living perception of what man was before he descended into the physical world.
Again, if that which looks beyond the time which we pass here as human beings between birth and death, is not the object simply of a vague belief but of a clear cognition, it does not work so abstractly in man as do the religious confessions of to-day, but works concretely, as a direct force of life, Man then works in such a way that what lies in his labour extends beyond his death; and because a man can take up such ideas into himself, life is thereby poured into everything which as a rule man only knows.
Just think for a moment. To-day we have a widely-extended Science of Nature; and as regards this external Science, we must say that man has progressed enormously; but the last few years have shown that this progress has not improved humanity in any moral respect. Such persons as Wallace and others, to whom I have often pointed when I wanted to emphasise that years ago, they were quite right when they said, “We have indeed made immense progress with respect to our knowledge of the outer world, but as regards our moral nature, humanity compared with primeval times, has not progressed.”
This progress must come to-day, in this historic Age, because human beings cannot remain as they are now, in their present disposition of soul. But how can this change be brought about? How can the more theoretical view of the world be animated? Let us take an apparently coarse example. In our human life, we make use of coal. We know that this coal is a relic of old forests, and so fundamentally it is a plant-substance. But now, how is this plant-substance, how is the whole world of plants connected with man as such? Just reckon over a few thousand years and see how much carbon dioxide, carbonic-acid the air would then contain,—because we breathe out carbon dioxide into the air with each expiration,—and you will find that it is a large quantity.
In the course of a few thousand years it would be an enormous quantity. In the course of a few thousand years, it would cause man to disappear; it would extinguish life. But now the plants absorb this carbon dioxide, and excrete the carbon; they form their body out of that which they absorb from man's cast-off produce; and these plants which once covered the Earth, now compose our layers of coal, our coal strata.
You see, that is an extraordinary transformation. At first it is more the qualitative aspect which comes into consideration; because naturally that coal was not formed by our breath but by other beings; but this qualitative aspect has to be considered. That which in a sense we excrete from ourselves, furnishes the basis for what we again use from the Earth. Thus far one can think, according to the theoretical results arrived at by Science.
Spiritual Science leads us further, I must remind you of what I have told you. It is true that man lays aside his physical body when he goes with his soul and spirit into the Spiritual worlds; but I also told you that the physical body, which is laid aside, signifies just that which builds up the Earth again.
As in our expiration we give carbon to the plant-world, so we give our body to the entire Earth. And what we see around us, my dear friends, is simply the product of such beings as ourselves, beings who, during the Moon, Sun and Saturn epochs were our predecessors, and who gave to the Earth that which composes the Earth to-day. When future worlds come, there will live in them that which we now excrete as our bodily substance. That is a thought of infinite scope, if one follows it out, because from our knowledge of nature (which is but a half-knowledge), we can get the connection of man with the entire world, and it is important that we should get that, extremely important; for if we bring together all that has been laid down as a foundation in our earlier lectures, we must say; that in our entire human nature, not merely in our thinking but in our entire nature, even as far as our external body, lives what we have worked upon in ourselves as our moral ideals. That dualistic philosophy, which can build no bridge between the natural world and the moral sphere, cannot imagine how what we have in our moral ideals can be connected with the very processes in our muscles; but if one can look at the world as we have tried to do in our recent lectures, one sees how what we think in our moral ideals incorporates itself into the very processes of our body. One sees that the Spiritual and bodily processes are interwoven and form a unity.
This method of looking at things ought to become general. If only it were taken up as part of the education of children, human beings would grow up who would not look on one side to a world developed from a nebulous condition, out of which, the Sun, the Stars and the Planets have condensed, and from which too, through the welding-together of matter void of morale or being, humanity has developed in order finally to return back into a purely natural condition. That which springs up in our souls as moral Ideals would then again be one with what stood at the starting point of our Cosmic evolution in its purely natural existence. We human beings would then realise that we are called upon to incorporate into the life of nature, what we experience as moral ideals. And then, in future worlds, we should know that what we now experience morally will re-appear as the Laws of Nature.
If only children could grow up to-day under the influence of such a perception, they would be able to take their place in the world in such a way that they would feel themselves as part of the Cosmos, and would thereby have a feeling for life drawn from these very forces which they would absorb into themselves with their knowledge of the Cosmos. Indeed, being educated to action, they would then know that whatever they do is to be imprinted in the entire Cosmos. If only that were the prevailing feeling, how differently human beings would live; whereas to-day man asks himself: “What am I really in this world?” He sees himself standing alone, sprung forth from indefinite Nature-forces, and permeated with moral ideals like soap bubbles. Such a man can be crippled in his very feeling for life. When he looks up to the stars he sees them passing through Cosmic space, but he feels he has no connection with them. They themselves have only arisen in a natural way. They are perishable worlds, falling to pieces, serving no purpose, and having no inner Spirituality.
We must bear in mind what a life-force for humanity might be developed from a Spiritual method of looking at things. That must be pointed out again and again, because that is just what human beings to-day understand least of all. They say that a Spiritual view makes a man live apart from the world; but my dear friends, it is the present modern view which makes one avoid the world. Why is this so? Because it works with the dogmas of the past, which in the past served a good purpose, because they then arose from a certain instinctive clairvoyance. But this instinctive clairvoyance has now disappeared, and human beings have no longer any relationship to it. The dogmas still retained are no longer understood. It is not a question of their falsity, but of modern humanity having no longer a living relationship with them. And outside of the dogmas still maintained, humanity to-day only has a nature science devoid of spirit. Anthroposophy will give a spirit-filled Science of nature, a science able to animate man, and that which trickles, as a knowledge of the spirit, into nature, will then transform itself in man in the same way as do the food-substances in a physical respect. That knowledge is transformed in man into Social Force, and one would experience it if one earnestly realised that Spiritual knowledge is nourishment for the soul, and can be absorbed and digested—if I can use that expression—it can be digested and re-appear as a force working socially. We can get social impulses in no other way than by taking up Spiritual cognition from surrounding Nature. Anyone who thinks he can carry out social reforms from any other impulse, thinks about the things of this world as one who meditates about man and wishing to explain him as clearly as possible, and in order to explain him to himself, forbids him food. Whoever speaks to-day of social forms without having Spiritual knowledge, does the same thing with reference to the social order of humanity as a man who wishes to explain man and prescribes for him a hunger cure. That is just what stands as a deep absurdity in the modern views of humanity, and which it cannot see through.
When we enter this life between Birth and Death, what we carry with us from the Spiritual worlds is only like an image, and fundamentally the whole of our soul-life is a life of images, pictures. But in former Ages this picture-life was animated by what then already existed in the natural perception as spirit. In ancient times there existed no concept of nature which was not filled with spirit. People to-day can read older views, but they read nothing there of a Natural Science, that is, of a natural Science devoid of spirit. Whoever goes back, even into the 13th or 14th Centuries, and reads the things written and spoken of nature there, may mock at the childishness, the superstition then existing; but the essential is, that all the things described then were described as permeated by spirit. To-day, on the other hand, we try as far as possible to see the phenomena of nature without spirit. Indeed, we regard it as the very perfection of our scientific observations to see them without spirit.
That which we take up out of nature without spirit, can however no longer work animatingly in the pictorial existence of our soul. We remain at a standstill in this respect and will not admit that it is merely an image. But this image, which is really the image of a past life, will not be fructified by the present life around us. This present life should be fructified by the past life, so that it can then be carried through the Gate of Death into the Spiritual worlds. It is only Spiritual Science livingly beheld which can give man that which it has to give him.
Just take, for instance, the dogmas of the old books of religion. Many men to-day fight against these because they find and consider them nonsensical; but they are in no wise nonsensical. Even such a dogma as that of the Trinity has a most profound sense. It was read by human beings from nature itself by means of the old instinctive clairvoyance, and for thousands of years in the evolution of humanity that dogma gave man an infinite amount. The external Churches have preserved such dogmas, but to-day they hardly exist except as a certain vocal sound. Men to-day feel no need to develop a relationship with what was an object of an ancient clairvoyance, and so it remains something which has no relationship to man to-day, because of his modern nature, although at one time it was a living soul-nourishment. And again, apart from these dogmas, we have our external Science of Nature, in a state of utter deprivation, which kills the soul unless it is permeated by the spirit.
These are the two basic evils which Spiritual Science as studied here, has to keep in mind: in order once more to give to the soul something which will animate it, and give it force, so that it can feel itself directly as a member of the entire Cosmos, and feel that responsibility in its social work which proceeds from knowing that as single individuals, even our tiniest action has a Cosmic significance for the whole evolution of the future. We have to look beyond that narrow circuit in which we are enclosed by reason of our lack of education; for that narrowing which man has himself brought about will increase more and more. That is why Spiritual Science meets with so much difficulty, because fundamentally that which it seeks to be, does not consist merely of words, nor thoughts, not merely ideas, but that which can permeate all those thoughts, flow through the words as the very Spiritual blood of life, and then trickle directly into each human soul. It is for that reason that, in any advocating of Spiritual Science, it is far more a question of how we speak than of what we say. We see to-day the most violent conflict between Materialism and Spiritualism. This conflict simply rests on the fact that human beings simply will not see what deep foundations this utterance has:—The truth always lies midway between two directly opposite associations.
My dear friends, is it true that God is within us? Is it true then that we are in God? It is true that we are in God. These two assertions are direct opposites. Both are true. God is in us, and we are in God; but the two assertions are polar opposites. The real truth, the whole truth lies between the two. The nature of all the conflict of ideas in the world rests on this—that human beings always tend to a one-sidedness, which is true, but only a one-sided truth; whereas the real truth lies between two opposite assertions. We must know both in order to get at the reality. For instance, to-day, in the present state of the evolution of the world, one must have the most earnest will to learn all we can of material existence above all, and not propagate the desire of those people who say: “We will only occupy ourselves with the Spirit: we do not want to know Matter.” To learn as much as possible of Matter is one side of human cognition, one thing for which the Will of man, must strive. On the other hand one must learn to know the Spirit, because between those two, lies what we are, and ought really to strive for. Both are wrong.—those who say the world is only Matter and those who say the world is only Spirit are wrong—For what is matter? Matter as human beings know it, is that which has remained behind from the Spirit, after the Spirit has become Spirit. Your own human form, my dear friends, is only what was once a thought of the Gods, which I here draw in red—the Divine workings of thought.
Just think; even as water that freezes gets a solid form, so this Divine thought gets a form and becomes the sheaths of man, (Blue). Then a new thought of God makes itself valid in the inner being of man, and then goes out again, (Red) and this Divine thought (left) was once transformed from a form which in still older times was also a thought of the Gods. Whatever we see as matter is nothing else than spirit which has become a firm form, and that which we perceive as the human spirit is simply a young form, a form engaged in the process of becoming. These two—Spirit and Matter—are only different because of their ages in the world—they only are of a different age. The mistake made about them does not consist in our applying ourselves either to Matter or to Spirit, but in wanting to maintain in the Present what we should so maintain in Life, which we should so fructify, that it may become something for the future.
Now just think. We bring something over into the present from our pre-existence in the Spiritual world; we bring that over as a Spiritual psychic life. But if we permeate that with a barren external spiritless Science of Nature, we harden it, we do not keep it germinal, we do not allow it to grow up for future worlds. We Ahrimanise it.
And if we try and grasp that which is already form, which is Divinity itself grown old and crystallised itself in form if we seek to grasp that in a nebulous way, through a nebulous mysticism into which we dream all kinds of things, we do not support ourselves on that which is given us by the Gods as our bodily support. And thus we Luciferise Matter. What is nebulous mysticism? Man should look into himself. He should recognise from out of the Cosmos that which he is in his own physical organism in his life between birth and death. Instead of that he cherishes the fantasy that he has a God within him. He has indeed a God within him, but he does not attain that through mystical fantasy, for he thus Luciferises what he should see in the later form of his own bodily sheaths. These are false views of Matter and Spirit, about which human beings come into strife with one another, for Matter and Spirit are one and the same, but at different ages of life.
That is something which it is very necessary our present Age should perceive; otherwise it can never come to an understanding of the social life. The attempt must be made to-day really to enter with one's thoughts into the true reality; but human beings do not want to do this,—they prefer to remain on the surface of things. A pretty little story was told to me a few days ago, which occurred a few weeks back in Zurich. Probably it has already been related to some of you here. One of our friends spoke at a University Celebration in Zurich about the scientific significance of Anthroposophy. A socialistic thinker in reply, got up and said: “One should not educate man to-day to such mystic phantasy, but to exact Science, for did not Goethe say: Into the inner being of nature no creative spirit can penetrate.”
You see, what this Swiss delegate brought forward rests simply on a superficial knowledge of what Goethe did say, For Goethe, quoting the above utterance of Halley said: “I have heard this repeated for 60 years and have sworn at it the whole time.” That is how the Spiritual Life is carried on to-day. That represents the accuracy with which men know things, and thus in a certain degree do they become authorities. Thus, do men strive to learn to know the world. Whether one man believes Goethe himself uttered what he swore at for 60 years, or whether as National Economists do they perform things such as I will characterise now, is really a matter of indifference. A very learned National Economist wrote a book about the free and the fixed formation of prices. He had to investigate a good deal as to the way in which, as I might say National Economy could be made social. Amongst the many things he discussed, is also the following. He says: Even George Brandes (who was himself no deep thinker) said: The people in their economic and social deeds are not guided by reason but by instinct.” Therefore, things should be explained to the people. That is what this National Economist is advocating. One must bring enlightenment to the people.
Now, my dear friends to this one could reply: In our many Universities, there are a great number of these National Economists, they are all enlightened, but when they arrange things amongst themselves, they are working exactly under the same institute instincts as the others,—neither more nor less. And so, as things are fashioned, especially to-day by our highly developed intelligence, as regards social life these same instincts remain, and are working. But now we must go further, we must now ask ourselves: How can we bring light into this working of the instincts, for that alone can be of social significance. It is simply nonsense to suppose that the majority of human beings can be guided by this; they cannot. Something must come in which can enter and transform these instincts. Reason cannot enter into them. We have here to remind ourselves of that ancient instinctive perception, (See Diagram) which has developed into our intellectuality; but this intellect lives only in the inner Spiritual life of man. On the other hand, the external forces working socially are permeated by instinct. Into this instinct something must penetrate which is related to the old instinctive vision, but which has an impulse from Spirituality. That is Imagination. Imagination must enter. (See Diagram) Imaginations as we call them in Spiritual Science, can alone give the force which can bring light to those instincts.
That which enables us to understand things to-day scientifically and externally; Botany, Zoology, Mathematics,—can be furnished by the intellect, but not that which implies human co-operation. There must enter what we have called Imagination. Imaginations must permeate the social life—that is the essential thing. In all social life which has developed from olden times up to recent times, there have lived the human instincts. It is actually only since the 2nd, and last third of the 19th Century that man has entered that age which no longer requires the old instincts. You can prove this exactly. Even at the turn of the 18th and 19th Century there still lived these ancient instincts in the social life of man. The uncertainty of man's instincts first appeared in that Age when intellect developed in its most shining form. Then tradition alone remained.
Just think, my dear friends, what gigantic efforts were made in the 19th Century, in order still to have moral views. Men had to preserve in the most abstract way what was still maintained from ancient times; and of necessity the old moral ideals were still propagated, though they were then petrified. We need to-day a rebirth of morality for that alone can produce what is social, that cannot come from the intellect, but simply and solely from moral intuition. Moral fantasy must raise itself to the Spiritual world, in order to fructify itself out of that world. That is now the essential, otherwise man faces the loss of moral impulses.
Those abstract Confessions which tend to belief alone cannot find in their faith the necessary strength for life to-day. Faith can give one something for the egoism of one's own soul; but with that egoism alone, at most one can live as an individual, separate being. If we want to enter into action, and that means social action, it is then necessary that we should be permeated with a Spiritual-psychic life-blood, and that can only come from a concrete Spiritual life. This consciousness of the Life-Force must flow through the Anthroposophical Movement into the Anthroposophical view of life. Especially from this point of view must one make oneself acquainted with these important concepts which to-day need a justification and defence.
Pantheism is a very favourite reproach against Anthroposophy, Pantheism, i.e., giving reverence to the things around us, for God lives in those things. That is heresy to the modern Confessions; and why? Why is it that the modern Confessions call our Anthroposophy a heresy? Because these Confessions are permeated through and through with materialism.—If the Jesuit regards the world around him simply as Matter, it is of course blasphemy to say that this Matter is Divine, is God. But can Anthroposophy help it if the Jesuits regard the world around them simply as Matter? It is not Matter, it is Spirit; and that which the Jesuits perceives as Matter in the world, that Anthroposophy has to show as illusion. We do not explain as Divine the world which we assert—is an illusion;—of course not, we do not claim that for Divine existence. Of course it is quite different to take what is around us and explain that as Divine, at the same time realising external sense-phenomena as illusion, than to regard it as mere Matter and then explain that the grossest Matter is Divine.
You see how far asunder these things are, and we must not grow weary of really trying to make these things valid before the world. Otherwise there may be a repetition of what happened lately, when something was printed in a Swiss Newspaper by way of objection to my methods of attaining Spiritual knowledge. There it was asserted that I said that one can see the Spirit; but that cannot be, because the Spirit is not sensible, and only the things of sense can be perceived. One cannot grasp the Spirit, and therefore one cannot see it.
You see, what a hopeless way this is; the writer maintains nothing else but that—he cannot see the Spirit, and therefore no one can see the Spirit. One can know nothing of the Spirit because one cannot grasp it. And in such variations, the thoughts of a whole Newspaper goes on. What works so terribly destructively to-day, is the fact that people have not the consciousness that they should read such things to the end. “Into the inner being of nature no creative Spirit can penetrate”—thus ran the first two lines; but the person reading them stopped there, and did not notice that Goethe added; “I have heard this said for 60 years, and have cursed it all the time.”
What we must look for everywhere to-day is the prevailing superficiality. I have often pointed this out, but it cannot be done too often. We must trace everywhere this terrible clinging to superficiality. It can be chiefly seen where it works so terribly to-day externally, i.e. in the sphere of Social Economics; There people will not dive down into that which lies in the very essence of things. For instance, I have been told to-day, that people are constantly saying that “The Threefold State” (book) is so difficult to understand,—well, that they want something which they can understand much more easily. But, my dear friends, if, with these things that can easily be understood, nothing is done in social life, but men have simply bungled, it is necessary to grasp what is a little difficult, which requires effort. It is strange to demand that a thing be made more comprehensible, for it is really necessary for our modern social thinking that we should make an effort. Things one can easily understand have worked so abstractly, so ruinously to-day. To demand that such things should be made more comprehensible, is simply frivolous. It really is. Indeed, it is not a question that one should not cultivate such inwardly frivolous thoughts as “This is difficult”—for if it were given in any such form as is desired, it would simply give people something else with which they could bungle. For really objective work this apparent difficulty simply must be overcome, it simply urges us to make a study of that book. That is the essential. In this earnest way should one try to enter into these things, in such serious times as these.
Fünfter Vortrag
[ 1 ] Unsere Betrachtungen in der Zeit, bevor ich abgereist bin und schon Wochen vorher, liefen alle darauf hinaus, zu zeigen, wie das, was wir Geisteswissenschaft nennen, in das wirkliche Leben übergehen, hineingreifen kann, wie das, was wir die Welt nennen, in einem gewissen innigen Zusammenhang steht mit dem, was wir innerlich im Menschen erleben. Und indem Sie diese Betrachtungen überblicken, die wir gerade über diese Sachen angestellt haben, bitte ich Sie, einmal sich gründlich die Frage vorzulegen, was es bedeuten würde für die Gesamtentwickelung der Menschheit, wenn die eindringlichsten, die bedeutsamsten Ergebnisse anthroposophisch orientierter Geisteswissenschaft eindringen würden in das Leben der sozial miteinander arbeitenden Menschen. Man würde wissen, daß der Mensch, indem er zu seinem Bewußtsein kommt im physischen Leib, in diesem physischen Leib etwas bewahrt, was hinweist auf die Zeiten vor der Geburt beziehungsweise vor der Empfängnis, daß er da in einem Zustande war, der-die Begierde nach diesem Leben zwischen der Geburt und dem Tode in sich trug, der in sich trug die Empfindung davon, daß die Seele, die lange Zeit nur in geistigen Welten gelebt hat, das Anschauen der Welt durch die leiblichen Sinne, aber auch das Handeln aus dem physischen Leibe heraus braucht, um weiterzukommen.
[ 2 ] Dieses bewußte Hinblicken auf die Präexistenz der Seele würde gar nicht bloß, wenn es richtig verstanden würde, eine theoretische Ansicht bleiben, sondern es würde Gefühl und Wille ergreifen und damit unmittelbar eine Lebenskraft werden.
[ 3 ] Wir können es ja sehen an den Menschen der Gegenwart. Sie zeigen uns alle etwas von Mangel an Initiative im Großen. Dieser Mangel an Initiative im Großen, der so lähmend wirkt auf alle Kräfte, die notwendig sind, um das absteigende Leben wiederum zu einem Aufstieg zu bringen, diese Lähmung kann nur gebessert werden dadurch, daß der Mensch sich bewußt wird seiner Zugehörigkeit zur geistigen Welt. Das läßt sich aber nicht durch theoretische Erwägungen in die Seele hereinbringen, sondern allein durch die lebendige Anschauung desjenigen, was der Mensch war, bevor er heruntergestiegen ist in die physische Welt.
[ 4 ] Wenn das, was hinüberblickt über die Zeit, die der Mensch hier zwischen Geburt und Tod zubringt, nicht Gegenstand eines unbestimmten Glaubens ist, sondern wenn es Gegenstand eines hellen Wissens ist, dann wirkt es nicht so abstrakt im Menschen, wie heute das religiöse Bekenntnis wirkt, sondern konkret als unmittelbare Kraft im Menschen. Der Mensch arbeitet so, daß dies, was in seiner Arbeit liegt, über den Tod hinausreicht. Aber es wird dadurch, daß der Mensch solche Vorstellungen in sich aufnimmt, Leben hineingegossen in alles, was sonst der Mensch wissen kann.
[ 5 ] Bedenken Sie doch nur einmal, daß wir heute ein ausgebreitetes Naturwissen haben. In bezug auf das äußere Wissen müssen wir sagen: Die Menschheit ist ungeheuer fortgeschritten. Die letzten blutigen Jahre haben gezeigt, daß dieser Fortschritt die Menschheit nicht bessern konnte in moralischer Beziehung. Und eigentlich haben durchaus solche Menschen wie Wallace, auf den ich früher oftmals hingewiesen habe, wenn ich gerade das betonen wollte, Recht behalten, die gesagt haben: Wir haben einen ungeheuren Fortschritt in bezug auf die Erkenntnis der Außenwelt erlebt, aber in bezug auf die moralische Verfassung ist die Menschheit so wie in den Urzeiten, sie ist gar nicht fortgeschritten.
[ 6 ] Dieser Fortschritt muß heute in diesem historischen Zeitalter doch kommen, denn so wie die Menschen in ihrer Seelenverfassung jetzt sind, können sie nicht bleiben. Aber wie muß sich das vollziehen? Wie muß belebt werden die mehr theoretische Anschauung von der Welt? Nehmen Sie ein anscheinend grobes Beispiel. Wir benützen zum menschlichen Leben die Steinkohle. Wir wissen, diese Steinkohle bildet die Überreste alter Wälder, ist also im Grunde genommen pflanzliche Substanz. Wie hängt aber die pflanzliche Substanz, wie hängt die ganze Pflanzenwelt mit dem Menschen als solchem zusammen? — Wenn über wenige Jahrtausende hin ausgerechnet wird, wieviel Kohlensäure die Luft enthalten würde dadurch, daß wir Kohlensäure ausatmen, daß wir mit jedem Ausatmungszuge der Luft Kohlensäure abgeben, so ist das eine ungeheuer große Menge. Diese Kohlensäure würde im Laufe von Jahrtausenden die Menschheit dahinschwinden machen, sie würde das Leben tilgen. Aber die Pflanzen nehmen die Kohlensäure auf, scheiden den Kohlenstoff ab, machen ihren eigenen Leib aus dem, was sie aufnehmen aus den abgeschiedenen Produkten des Menschen, und die Pflanzen, die einstmals die Erde bedeckt haben, sie bilden wiederum das, was nun unsere Steinkohlenflöze, unsere Steinkohlenlager sind.
[ 7 ] Sie sehen, es ist eine merkwürdige Wanderung. Zunächst kommt mehr das Qualitative in Betracht; denn selbstverständlich sind von unserem Atmen nicht unsere Steinkohlen entstanden, sondern von anderen Wesen, aber es kommt dieses qualitativ in Betracht. Was wir gewissermaßen von uns ausscheiden, das bildet die Grundlage dessen, was wir wiederum von der Erde benutzen. So weit kann man denken nach den theoretischen Ergebnissen, zu denen die Naturwissenschaft gekommen ist.
[ 8 ] Geisteswissenschaft führt uns weiter. Ich erinnere Sie daran, wie ich Ihnen gesagt habe: Der Mensch legt seinen physischen Leib ab, indem er mit seinem Seelisch-Geistigen in geistige Welten geht. — Aber ich habe Ihnen auch gesagt: Dieser physische Leib, der abgelegt wird, bedeutet das, was die Erde wiederaufbaut.
[ 9 ] So wie wir im Ausatmen der Pflanzenwelt die Kohle geben, so geben wir der ganzen Erde unseren Leib. Und das, was wir um uns herum sehen, ist durchaus das Produkt solcher Wesen, wie wir selber sind, solcher Wesen, die unsere Vorgänger waren während der Monden-, Sonnen-, Saturnzeit, den drei ersten vorirdischen Verkörperungen unseres Planetensystems. Sie haben der Erde das abgegeben, was heute diese ganze Erde bildet. Und wenn künftige Welten kommen werden, so wird das in ihnen leben von uns, was wir als unser Leibliches absondern. Es ist ein Gedanke von ungeheurer Tragweite, wenn man ihn verfolgt. Denn aus unserem Naturerkennen heraus, das sonst nur halb bleibt, gewinnen wir einen Zusammenhang des Menschen mit der ganzen Umwelt. Das ist außerordentlich wichtig, daß wir das gewinnen. Denn wenn wir das zusammennehmen, was wir unseren Betrachtungen zugrunde gelegt haben, so müssen wir uns sagen: In unserem ganzen Menschen, nicht bloß in unserem Denken, sondern in unserem ganzen Menschen bis in die äußerste Leiblichkeit hinein lebt das, was wir in unsere sittlichen Ideale hinein verarbeiten. Jene dualistische Anschauungsweise, welche keine Brücke schlagen kann zwischen dem natürlichen Weltbilde und der moralischen Weltordnung, kann sich auch nicht vorstellen, wie sich das, was wir in unseren moralischen Idealen haben, mit unseren Muskelvorgängen verbindet. Sieht man die Welt so an, wie wir es in den letzten Betrachtungen gemacht haben, dann sieht man, wie sich einverleibt das, was wir in unseren moralischen Idealen denken, in unsere leiblichen Vorgänge. Man sieht einheitlich verwoben die geistigen und die leiblichen Vorgänge.
[ 10 ] Diese Anschauungsweise müßte allgemein werden. Würde sie aufgenommen in unsere Kindererziehung, so würden Menschen heranwachsen, die nicht auf der einen Seite im Sinne der Kant-Laplaceschen Theorie eine Welt haben, welche aus Nebelzuständen heraus sich gebildet hat, aus denen sich Sterne und Sonnen und Planeten abgeballt haben, aus denen dann durch Zusammenschweißen von moralischwesenlosen Materien die Menschen sich gebildet haben, die dann wiederum sich zurückverwandeln in rein Natürliches, sondern das, was in uns aufschießt als moralisches Ideal, würde eins sein mit dem, was am Ausgangspunkte unserer Weltentwickelung gestanden hat im rein natürlichen Dasein. Und wir Menschen würden uns erkennen als berufen, einzupflanzen dem natürlichen Dasein das, was wir als moralisches Ideal erleben. In künftigen Welten würden wir erkennen, daß als Naturgesetze auftritt, was wir jetzt moralisch erleben.
[ 11 ] Würden die Kinder unter dem Einfluß einer solchen Anschauung aufwachsen, dann würden sie sich so in die Welt hineinstellen, daß sie sich als ein Glied des Kosmos empfinden und dadurch Lebensgefühle haben würden aus jenen Kräften, die sie mit dem Erkennen des Kosmos in sich einsaugen. Ja, sie würden, indem sie zum Handeln erzogen werden, wissen, daß das, was sie tun, eingeprägt wäre in das Weltenganze. Wenn das Gefühl wäre, wie anders würden die Menschen leben als heute, wo es möglich ist, daß der Mensch, der sich frägt: Was bin ich eigentlich hier auf dieser Welt? — sich einsam stehend hier sieht, entsprungen aus unbestimmten Naturkräften, mit moralischen Idealen durchsetzt wie mit Seifenblasen. Solch ein Mensch kann gelähmt werden in bezug auf sein Lebensgefühl. Wenn er hinaufsieht in die Sternenwelten, sieht er die Sterne durch den Weltenraum gehen, hat aber keine Beziehung dazu; sie sind ja selber nur natürlich entstehende, in sich zerfallende Welten ohne Sinn und ohne innerliche Geistigkeit.
[ 12 ] Das muß man ins Auge fassen, was als Lebenskraft Geistesanschauung der Menschheit werden könnte. Auf das muß man immer wieder und wieder hinweisen, denn gerade das verstehen die Menschen der Gegenwart am allerwenigsten. Sie sprechen davon, daß die Geistesanschauung weltflüchtig wäre. Weltflüchtig ist die gegenwärtige Anschauung. Warum? Sie arbeitet mit den Dogmen der Vergangenheit, die in der Vergangenheit einen guten Sinn hatten, weil sie entsprungen sind aus einem gewissen instinktiven Hellsehen. Dieses instinktive Hellsehen ist verschwunden, die Menschen haben keinen Bezug mehr dazu. Die Dogmen, die sich erhalten haben, werden nicht mehr verstanden. Nicht darum handelt es sich, daß die Dogmen falsch sind, sondern daß die heutige Menschheit keinen Bezug zu ihnen hat. Und außer demjenigen, was als Dogmen erhalten geblieben ist, hat die Menschheit heute eine geistlose Naturwissenschaft. Anthroposophie will eine geisterfüllte Naturwissenschaft geben, eine den Menschen belebende Naturwissenschaft, und was da hereinträufelt als Erkenntnis des Geistes in der Natur, das verwandelt sich im Menschen, genauso wie sich die Nahrungsmittel in physischer Beziehung im Menschen verwandeln, in soziale Kraft. Man würde es erleben, wenn man ernsthaftig auf diese Dinge eingehen wollte, daß Geist-Erkenntnis als Nahrung der Seele aufgenommen, verdaut würde - wenn ich mich dieses Ausdruckes bedienen darf -, um als sozial wirksame Kraft aufzutreten. Wir werden auf keine andere Weise soziale Impulse gewinnen als dadurch, daß wir geistige Erkenntnisse aus der uns umgebenden Natur aufnehmen. Wer heute glaubt, soziale Reformen aus irgendeinem anderen Impuls heraus nehmen zu können, denkt über die Dinge der Welt so nach, wie ungefähr der nachdenkt über den Menschen, der ihm, um ihn möglichst gut zu ernähren, das Essen verbietet. Wer heute von sozialen Gestaltungen spricht und nicht mitspricht von geistiger Erkenntnis, will dasselbe tun mit Bezug auf die soziale Ordnung in der Menschheit, wie einer, der den Menschen ernähren will und ihm eine Hungerkur vorschreibt. Das steckt als tiefe Absurdität in den heutigen Anschauungen der Menschheit, und diese kann es durchaus nicht durchschauen. Was wir hereintragen aus geistigen Welten, indem wir in dieses Leben kommen zwischen Geburt und Tod, das ist ja durchaus nur wie ein Bild. Und im Grunde genommen ist unser Seelenleben ein Bildleben, und dieses Bildleben, es wurde in früheren Zeiten belebt von dem, was als Geistiges schon in der Naturanschauung vorhanden war. Es gab in alten Zeiten keine Naturanschauung ohne Geistanschauung. Die heutigen Menschen lesen nach über ältere Naturanschauungen; sie lesen da nichts von einer Naturwissenschaft, die ohne Geist war. Wer noch ins 13., 14. Jahrhundert zurückgeht und die Dinge liest, die damals über die Natur gesprochen wurden — mag er auch höhnen über das Kindische, über das Abergläubische -, der findet als das Wesentliche, daß alle diese Dinge, die geschildert worden sind, von Geist durchzogen geschildert sind. Heute bemühen wir uns so stark als möglich, die Naturerscheinungen ohne Geist zu sehen. Ja, wir sehen darin gerade die Vollkommenheit der Betrachtungen, alles ohne Geist zu sehen.
[ 13 ] Das aber, was wir aus der Natur ohne Geist aufnehmen, kann durchaus nicht mehr in das Bilddasein heute belebend eingreifen. Wir bleiben dann dabei stehen und wollen es uns nicht gestehen, Bild zu sein, bloßes Bild zu sein, Bild eines vergangenen Lebens, das nicht befruchtet sein will von dem Gegenwartsleben. Denn dieses Gegenwartsleben soll befruchten das vergangene Leben, damit es hinaufgetragen werden kann wiederum durch die Pforte des Todes in geistige Welten hinein. Nur so lebendig angeschaut kann eben Geisteswissenschaft dem Menschen das geben, was sie ihm geben soll.
[ 14 ] Nehmen Sie zum Beispiel die Dogmen der alten Religionswissenschaftsbücher. Es gibt heute viele Menschen, die kämpfen einfach gegen diese Dogmen, weil sie sie unsinnig finden. Sie sind keineswegs unsinnig, selbst nicht ein solches Dogma wie die Trinität, es hat sogar den allertiefsten Sinn. Mit den Mitteln der alten instinktiven Hellseherkunst wurde es von den Menschen abgelesen von der Natur selber. Und es gab Jahrtausende in der menschlichen Entwickelung, in denen dieses Dogma der Menschheit ungeheuer viel gab. Die äußeren Kirchen haben solche Dogmen bewahrt. Diese sind heute kaum mehr als etwas anderes vorhanden, denn als ein gewisser Wortlaut. Die Menschen haben kein Bedürfnis heute, ein Verhältnis zu dem zu entwickeln, was Gegenstand eines alten Hellsehens war. Es bleibt etwas, was gar keinen Bezug auf die Menschen hat vermöge ihrer heutigen Natur, während es einstmals lebendige Seelennahrung war. Außer diesen Dogmen haben wir die äußere Naturwissenschaft, die geistentblößte Naturwissenschaft, die uns die Seele tötet, wenn sie nicht durchgeistigt wird.
[ 15 ] Das sind die beiden Grundübel, welche die Geisteswissenschaft, wie sie hier gemeint ist, im Auge hat. Sie will der Seele wiederum etwas geben, was diese Seele beleben kann, was dieser Seele Kraft einimpfen kann, so daß die Seele unmittelbar sich erfühlt als ein Glied des ganzen Kosmos und in ihrem sozialen Wirken jene Verantwortlichkeit fühlt, die davon herrührt, daß unser kleines Wirken als einzelner Mensch eine kosmische Bedeutung für die ganze Entwickelung der Zukunft hat. Hinausblicken müssen wir über den engen Kreis, den wir uns heute durch eine geistentblößte Bildung ziehen. Denn diese Einengung hat die Menschheit selbst vollzogen und will sie immer mehr und mehr vollziehen. Deshalb hat es Geisteswissenschaft so schwer, weil sie im Grunde genommen eben gerade das sein will, was nicht bloß in den Worten, nicht in den Gedanken, nicht in den Ideen liegt, sondern was wie ein geistig-seelisches Lebensblut erst durch die Gedanken, durch die Ideen, durch die Worte durchfließt und unmittelbar in des Menschen Seele hineinträufelt. Daher kommt es auch bei Vertretung der Geisteswissenschaft viel mehr darauf an, wie gesprochen wird, denn was gesprochen wird. Wir sehen heute den heftigen Streit zwischen Materialismus und Spiritualismus. Dieser heftige Streit rührt ja nur davon her, daß die Menschen nicht einsehen wollen, daß eine tiefe Begründung der Ausspruch hat: Zwischen zwei entgegengesetzten Behauptungen liegt die Wahrheit mittendrinnen.
[ 16 ] Ist es wahr, daß Gott in uns ist? — Es ist eine Wahrheit, daß Gott in uns ist. - Ist es wahr, daß wir in Gott sind? — Es ist wahr, daß wir in Gott sind. — Die beiden Behauptungen sind entgegengesetzt. Beide sind wahr, Gott ist in uns, wir sind in Gott. Die beiden Behauptungen sind entgegengesetzt. Die wirkliche, die ganze Wahrheit liegt mittendrinnen. Und das Wesen alles Streites der Ideen in der Welt beruht darauf, daß immer die Menschen nach einer Einseitigkeit gehen, die wahr ist, aber eben eine einseitige Wahrheit ist, während die wirkliche Wahrheit zwischen zwei entgegengesetzten Behauptungen drinnenliegt. Man muß beides kennen, wenn man an die Wahrheit herankommen will. Man muß zum Beispiel heute, so wie die Weltentwickelung einmal liegt, den ernstesten Willen haben, das materielle Dasein kennenzulernen, man darf ja nicht in die Sucht jener Leute verfallen, welche sagen: Wir wollen uns mit dem Geiste beschäftigen, wir wollen die Materie nicht kennenlernen. — Soviel als möglich die Materie als solche kennenzulernen, das ist die eine Seite des menschlichen Erkenntnis- und Willensstrebens, die andere Seite ist es, auch den Geist kennenzulernen. Denn zwischen beiden drinnen liegt, was wir eigentlich anstreben sollen, und beide Parteien haben unrecht, diejenigen, die sagen, die Welt sei nur Materie, und diejenigen, die sagen, die Welt sei nur Geist. Denn, was ist Materie? Materie, so wie der Mensch sie kennt, ist das, was von dem Geiste zurückgeblieben ist, nachdem der Geist wieder Geist geworden ist. Ihre eigene Menschenform ist nichts anderes als das, was einstmals Gottesgedanke war (siehe Zeichnung, links), was einstmals göttliche Gedankenwirkungen waren. Denken Sie sich, wie ein Wasser, das gefriert, Form bekommt; so bekommt dieser Gottesgedanke Form und wird Menschenhülle. Und ein neuer Gedanke, ein neuer Gottesgedanke macht sich in des Menschen Inneren geltend, der dann wiederum hinausgeht, und dieser Gottesgedanke hier (links) war wiederum umgewandelt von einer Form, die in älteren Zeiten Gedanke war. Was wir als Materie anschauen, es ist ja nichts anderes als festgewordener Geist, und das, was wir als Menschengeist anschauen, ist junge Form, ist in der Entstehung begriffene Gestalt. Geist und Materie sind ja nur nach den Lebensaltern in der Welt verschieden. Und der Fehler ihnen gegenüber besteht nicht darin, daß wir uns der Materie zuwenden oder daß wir uns dem Geiste zuwenden, sondern daß wir das, was wir im Leben erhalten sollten, was wir befruchten sollten, damit es Zukunft werden kann, in der Gegenwart erhalten wollen.
[ 17 ] Wenn wir das, was wir aus unserer Präexistenz in die Gegenwart hereingetragen haben, was wir also als seelisch-geistiges Leben haben, nur durchdringen mit der trockenen, äußeren geistentblößten Naturwissenschaft, dann verhärten wir es, lassen es nicht keimfähig sein, lassen es nicht auswachsen zu künftigen Welten, wir verahrimanisieren es.
[ 18 ] Und wenn wir das, was Form ist, was altgewordene Gottheit ist, was in Formen sich kristallisiert hat, erfassen wollen durch eine nebulose Mystik, in die wir alles mögliche hineinträumen, dann stützen wir uns nicht auf das, was uns als unsere Stütze, als unsere körperliche Stütze die Gottheit gegeben hat, sondern wir verluziferisieren das Materielle. Was ist nebulose Mystik? — Der Mensch sollte in sich hineinschauen, er sollte aus dem Kosmos heraus in seinem physischen Organismus das erkennen, was er in diesem Leben zwischen Geburt und Tod ist. Statt dessen phantasiert er, daß er in sich selber eine Gottheit habe. Er hat sie in sich; aber er erlangt das nicht durch mystische Phantasterei. Er verluziferisiert das, was er in der späteren Gestalt der leiblichen Hülle sehen sollte. Es sind falsche Anschauungen vom Materiellen und vom Geistigen, durch die die Menschen miteinander in Streit kommen; denn das Materielle und das Geistige sind dasselbe, nur in verschiedenen Lebensaltern.
[ 19 ] Das ist es, was der Gegenwart ganz besonders notwendig ist zu durchschauen. Sie kommt sonst nicht zu einer Erfassung des sozialen Lebens. Man muß heute schon den Versuch machen, wirklich hineinzudringen mit seinen Gedanken in die reale Wirklichkeit. Das wollen die Menschen heute nicht. Sie wollen an der Oberfläche bleiben.
[ 20 ] Mir wurde vor einigen Tagen eine nette kleine Geschichte, die vor ganz kurzer Zeit in Zürich passiert ist, erzählt. Einer unserer Freunde sprach in Zürich bei einer Universitätsfeier über die wissenschaftliche Bedeutung der Anthroposophie. Darauf hat ein sozialistisch denkender Mann geantwortet, man solle doch heute nicht die Menschen zu solch mystisch Phantastischem erziehen, sondern zu exakter Wissenschaft, habe doch Goethe schon gesagt: «Ins Innre der Natur dringt kein erschaffner Geist.»
[ 21 ] Was dieser schweizerische Abgeordnete vorgebracht hat, rührt doch nur her aus einem oberflächlichen Anschauen der Dinge, die Goethe gesagt hat. Denn indem Goethe diesen Ausspruch Hallers zitiert, sagt er: «Das hör’ ich sechzig Jahre wiederholen und fluche drauf...» So wird heute mit dem geistigen Leben verfahren, so kennt man die Dinge und so ist man heute in einem gewissen Grade doch eine Autorität. In dieser Form ungefähr strebt man aber überhaupt heute an, die Welt kennenzulernen. Ob nun einer glaubt, Goethe habe den Ausspruch getan, auf den er sechzig Jahre «geflucht» hat, oder ob einer als Volkswirtschafter sich das Folgende leistet, das ist schon schließlich einerlei. Ein sehr gelehrt arbeitender Volkswirtschafter, Nationalökonom, hat ein Buch geschrieben über die gebundene und offene Preisbildung. Da hatte er viel nachzuforschen über die Art und Weise, wie, ich möchte sagen, die Volkswirtschaft sozial gemacht werden könnte. Unter den verschiedenen Dingen, die er da bespricht, ist auch dieses. Er sagt: Schon Georg Brandes habe gesagt, das Volk werde in seinen sozialen, in seinen wirtschaftlichen Handlungen nicht durch Vernunft, sondern durch Instinkte geleitet. Daher müsse man das Volk aufklären. Man müsse Aufklärungen unter das Volk bringen.
[ 22 ] Nun ist Georg Brandes kein tiefdenkender Mann; aber man kann da erwidern: An so und so vielen Universitäten sind so und so viele Volkswirtschafter; die sind aufgeklärt. Aber wenn sie miteinander wirtschaften, dann arbeiten unter ihnen die Instinkte genau so wie unter den anderen, durchaus nicht anders. Denn so wie die Dinge heute sich gestaltet haben, gerade durch die hochentwickelte Intelligenz, sind für das soziale Leben nur die Instinkte geblieben. Die Instinkte wirken. Aber jetzt muß man weitergehen. Jetzt muß man sich fragen: Wie bringt man Licht in dieses Wirken der Instinkte hinein? — Denn einzig und allein das kann eine soziale Bedeutung haben. Es ist einfach Unsinn, zu glauben, daß eine Mehrheit von Menschen durch diese Instinkte geleitet werden kann. Das kann sie nicht. Die Instinkte rühren einfach vom Zusammenleben der Menschen her. Da muß etwas hinein, was diese Instinkte verwandelt, was in diese Instinkte hinein kann. Vernunft kann nicht in die Instinkte hinein. Wir haben uns zu erinnern an das alte instinktive Schauen; es hat sich entwickelt in unseren Intellektualismus. Aber dieser Intellektualismus lebt ja nur in dem inneren geistigen Dasein des Menschen. Dagegen sind die äußeren sozialen Wirkenskräfte vom Instinkt durchtränkt. In diesen Instinkt muß wiederum etwas eindringen, was verwandt ist mit diesem instinktiven Schauen, aber einen Einschlag aus der Geistigkeit hat: es muß die Imagination eindringen. Wir haben also: Altes instinktives Schauen — Intellekt — Imagination. Nur die Imagination, wie wir sie nennen in der Geisteswissenschaft, gibt die Kraft, in das instinktive Leben Licht hineinzubringen.
[ 23 ] Was uns befähigt, rein äußerlich die Dinge wissenschaftlich zu begreifen, Botanik, Zoologie, Mathematik zu schaffen, das kann vom Intellekt gespeist werden, nicht aber das, was menschliches Zusammenwirken bedeutet. Was wir Imagination genannt haben, das muß hinein. Die Imagination muß das soziale Leben durchdringen. Das ist es, worauf es ankommt. In allem sozialen Leben, das bis in die neueste Zeit herauf aus alten Zeiten sich entwickelt hatte, lebten menschliche Instinkte. Im Grunde genommen hat erst im zweiten, im dritten Drittel des 19. Jahrhunderts die Menschheit den Eintritt in das Zeitalter vollzogen, das nicht mehr alte Instinkte will. Sie können es ganz genau nachweisen, daß noch um die Wende des 18. zum 19. Jahrhundert in dem sozialen Dasein durchaus noch alte Instinkte lebten. Die Unsicherheit dieser Instinkte ist erst in dem Zeitalter eingetreten, in dem gerade der Intellekt am glänzendsten sich entwickelt hat. Das soziale Leben blieb dann Tradition.
[ 24 ] Denken Sie doch nur einmal, welche Riesenmühe die Menschen gehabt haben im 19. Jahrhundert, um überhaupt noch sittliche Anschauungen zu haben. Sie haben in der abstraktesten Weise konservieren müssen, was aus alten Zeiten erhalten war. Und es ging ja nur notdürftig, die alten moralischen Ideale als Petrefakte fortzupflanzen. Wir brauchen heute eine Neugeburt des Moralischen, denn nur das kann wiederum auch das Soziale hervorbringen. Das kann aber nicht hervorgehen aus dem Intellekt, sondern einzig und allein aus der moralischen Intuition. Die Phantasie, die moralische Phantasie muß sich zur geistigen Welt erheben, um sich aus der geistigen Welt zu befruchten. Darauf kommt es heute an, sonst geht die Menschheit in den Verlust der moralischen Impulse hinein.
[ 25 ] Jene abstrakten Bekenntnisse, die nur nach dem Glauben hintendieren, können aus diesem Glauben heraus keine Kraft für das Leben finden. Glaube allein gibt zwar etwas dem Seelenegoismus; aber mit dem Seelenegoismus kann man eben zur Not noch als einzelner Mensch leben. Will man ins Handeln eingreifen, und das bedeutet ja, im Sozialen sich betätigen, dann ist notwendig, daß geistig-seelisches Lebensblut uns durchdringt. Das aber kann nur vom konkreten geistigen Leben kommen. Das muß durch die anthroposophische Bewegung fließen, dieses Bewußtsein von der Lebenskraft anthroposophischer Weltanschauung.
[ 26 ] Pantheismus ist ein beliebter Vorwurf, der gerade auch gegen so etwas wie anthroposophisch orientierte Geisteswissenschaft erhoben wird. Pantheismus ist vor den gegenwärtigen Bekenntnissen Kerzerei, ist die Verirrung, daß in den Dingen, die uns umgeben, das Göttliche lebe. Aber warum nennen die gegenwärtigen Bekenntnisse unsere anthroposophisch orientierte Geisteswissenschaft eine Ketzerei? — Weil diese Bekenntnisse ganz von Materialismus durchsetzt sind! — Gewiß, wenn der Jesuit die Welt ringsherum nur für eine Materie ansieht, dann ist es eine Gotteslästerung, zu sagen, diese Materie sei Gott. Aber kann denn anthroposophisch orientierte Geisteswissenschaft etwas dafür, daß der Jesuit X die Welt ringsherum nur für Materie anschauen kann? — Sie ist nicht Materie, sie ist Geist, und das, was der Jesuit X in der Welt ringsherum als Materie erkennt, das zeigt anthroposophisch orientierte Geisteswissenschaft als Illusion. Man erklärt gar nicht die Welt, die man da für Illusion erklärt, als das göttliche Sein, selbstverständlich nicht. Allein es ist etwas anderes, das, was einen umgibt, für göttlich zu erklären, wenn man zu gleicher Zeit das äußere sinnliche Dasein als Illusion erkennt, als wenn man es als grobklotzige Materie ansieht und dann diese grobklotzige Materie für das Göttliche erklären wollte.
[ 27 ] Sie sehen, wie weit auseinander die Dinge sind, die der andere meint, und die hier wirklich innerhalb unserer anthroposophischen Geisteswissenschaft da sind. Aber wir dürfen nicht müde werden, diese Dinge tatsächlich vor der Welt geltend zu machen. Sonst kann das vorkommen, was jüngst hier in einer Schweizer Zeitung gestanden hat als ein Einwand gegen meine Methode, zur Geist-Erkenntnis zu kommen. Da wird ungefähr gesagt, ich behauptete, man könne den Geist schauen; aber das ginge doch nicht, denn der Geist sei doch nichts Sinnliches, und nur das Sinnliche könne man schauen. Den Geist könne man nicht greifen, also könne doch niemand den Geist schauen.
[ 28 ] Sie sehen, es ist wirklich eine trostlose Art, die da auftritt, die in nichts Geringerem wurzelt als eben darin, daß der Betreffende sagt, er könne nicht den Geist schauen, also könne niemand irgend etwas vom Geist sagen; vom Geist könne man nichts wissen, denn den Geist könne man nicht greifen. Und in solcher Variante spielt sich der Gedankengang eines ganzen Feuilletons ab. Das ist es, was in der Gegenwart so furchtbar verheerend wirkt, daß die Menschen eben nicht das Bewußtsein haben, zu Ende lesen zu müssen oder überhaupt sich mit den Dingen bekanntmachen zu müssen. «Ins Innre der Natur dringt kein erschaffner Geist», so heißen die zwei ersten Zeilen bei Goethe. Bei ihnen bleibt man stehen und merkt nicht, daß Goethe gleich anschließend sagt: «Drauf fluche ich seit sechzig Jahren!»
[ 29 ] Was wir in der Gegenwart überall feststellen müssen, das ist die Oberflächlichkeit; man kann nicht oft genug darauf aufmerksam machen. Wir müssen überall diesen furchtbaren Hang zur Oberflächlichkeit aufspüren. Er äußert sich ja heute vorzugsweise, wo er auch äußerlich furchtbar schädlich wirkt, auf dem Gebiete des sozialen, des ökonomischen Denkens. Da will man nicht in die Dinge untertauchen, nicht in das untertauchen, was in der Natur der Dinge liegt.
[ 30 ] Es wurde mir zum Beispiel heute mitgeteilt, daß Menschen eines gewissen Gebietes sagen — es wird ja häufig gesagt — die «Kernpunkte der sozialen Frage» seien so schwer zu fassen. Ich denke mir, wenn jemand sagt: Etwas ist schwer zu fassen —, dann will er etwas Leichtes haben, etwas, was er leicht fassen kann. Wenn man aber mit dem, was einer leicht fassen kann, im sozialen Leben nichts anfangen kann, wenn man damit eben nur pfuscht, wenn es eben nötig ist, das gerade zu fassen, was einem ein bißchen schwer wird, wobei man sich ein bißchen anstrengen muß, weil es gerade das Notwendige für ein heutiges soziales Denken ist, etwas Schwereres zu denken, wenn das gerade der ungeheure Schaden der neuesten Zeit gewesen wäre, daß die Leute das soziale Leben mit leicht faßlichen Gedanken durchdringen wollten und es daher ruiniert haben, dann wäre der Ausspruch, eine Sache sei schwer auf diesem Gebiete, geradezu frivol! Und das ist er im Grunde genommen auch. Es handelt sich darum, daß man eben gar nicht diesen innerlich frivolen Gedanken hegt, die Sache sei schwer. Denn wenn die Gedanken eben so gegeben würden, wie man sie haben will, dann taugen sie zu nichts anderem als zum Pfuschen. Zum sachgemäßen Arbeiten wird es eben notwendig sein, diese scheinbare Schwierigkeit wirklich zu überwinden und sich auf die Sache einzulassen. Das ist es, worauf es ankommt. In dieser ernsten Weise sollte man sich mit den Angelegenheiten des Lebens in dieser ernsten Zeit befassen.
[ 31 ] Davon wollen wir dann morgen weiterreden.
Fifth lecture
[ 1 ] Our reflections in the time before I left, and even weeks before that, all pointed to showing how what we call spiritual science can transition into real life, how what we call the world is intimately connected with what we experience within ourselves. And as you review these reflections we have just made on these matters, I ask you to consider thoroughly what it would mean for the overall development of humanity if the most compelling and significant results of anthroposophically oriented spiritual science were to penetrate the lives of people working together socially. We would know that when human beings come to consciousness in the physical body, they preserve something in this physical body that points to the time before birth or before conception, that they were in a state that carried within itself the longing for this life between birth and death, that carried within itself the feeling that that the soul, which has lived for a long time only in spiritual worlds, needs to see the world through the physical senses, but also to act out of the physical body in order to progress.
[ 2 ] This conscious consideration of the pre-existence of the soul would not remain a theoretical view if it were properly understood, but would take hold of the feelings and will and thus immediately become a life force.
[ 3 ] We can see this in the people of today. They all show us a lack of initiative in the big picture. This lack of initiative in the big picture, which has such a paralyzing effect on all the forces necessary to bring the descending life back up again, can only be remedied by humans becoming aware of their belonging to the spiritual world. However, this cannot be brought into the soul through theoretical considerations, but only through a living perception of what human beings were before they descended into the physical world.
[ 4 ] If what looks beyond the time that human beings spend here between birth and death is not the object of an indefinite belief, but is the object of clear knowledge, then it does not work in human beings in such an abstract way as religious confession does today, but concretely as an immediate force within human beings. Human beings work in such a way that what lies in their work extends beyond death. But by taking such ideas into themselves, human beings pour life into everything else that human beings can know.
[ 5 ] Just consider how extensive our knowledge of nature is today. With regard to external knowledge, we must say that humanity has made tremendous progress. The last few bloody years have shown that this progress has not improved humanity in moral terms. And actually, people like Wallace, whom I have often referred to in the past when I wanted to emphasize this point, were right when they said: We have experienced tremendous progress in terms of our knowledge of the external world, but in terms of its moral constitution, humanity is just as it was in primeval times; it has not progressed at all.
[ 6 ] This progress must come today, in this historical age, because human beings cannot remain in their present state of mind. But how is this to be accomplished? How is the more theoretical view of the world to be enlivened? Take an apparently crude example. We use coal for human life. We know that coal is the remains of ancient forests and is therefore basically a plant substance. But how is this plant substance, how is the entire plant world connected with man as such? — If we calculate how much carbon dioxide the air would contain over a few millennia as a result of our exhaling carbon dioxide, of our releasing carbon dioxide with every breath we take, the amount would be enormous. Over the course of millennia, this carbon dioxide would cause humanity to disappear; it would destroy life. But plants absorb carbon dioxide, separate the carbon, build their own bodies from what they absorb from the waste products of humans, and the plants that once covered the earth in turn form what are now our coal seams, our coal deposits.
[ 7 ] You see, it is a strange migration. At first, the qualitative aspect comes into play; for it is obvious that our coal was not created by our breathing, but by other beings, but this qualitative aspect comes into play. What we excrete, so to speak, forms the basis of what we in turn use from the earth. This is as far as we can think according to the theoretical findings of natural science.
[ 8 ] Spiritual science takes us further. I remind you of what I have told you: human beings shed their physical bodies by entering spiritual worlds with their soul and spirit. — But I also told you that this physical body that is laid down is what the earth rebuilds.
[ 9 ] Just as we give carbon to the plant world when we exhale, we give our bodies to the whole earth. And what we see around us is entirely the product of beings like ourselves, beings who were our predecessors during the lunar, solar, and Saturnian periods, the three first pre-earth incarnations of our planetary system. They gave to the earth what today forms the whole earth. And when future worlds come, what we separate as our physical body will live on in them. This is a thought of immense significance when you pursue it. For out of our knowledge of nature, which otherwise remains only half-complete, we gain a connection between human beings and the entire environment. It is extremely important that we gain this. For when we take together what we have laid as the basis for our considerations, we must say to ourselves: in our whole human being, not only in our thinking, but in our whole human being down to the outermost physicality, there lives what we incorporate into our moral ideals. The dualistic view, which cannot bridge the gap between the natural world and the moral world order, cannot imagine how what we have in our moral ideals is connected to our muscular processes. If we look at the world as we have done in our recent reflections, we see how what we think in our moral ideals is incorporated into our bodily processes. We see the spiritual and bodily processes as uniformly interwoven.
[ 10 ] This view should become commonplace. If it were incorporated into our education of children, people would grow up who did not have, on the one hand, a world that had formed out of a state of nebulae, from which stars and suns and planets had separated, and from which, through the fusion of morally unformed matter, human beings had formed, who then in turn reverted to pure natural beings, but rather that which springs up within us as a moral ideal would be one with that which stood at the starting point of our world's development in purely natural existence. And we humans would recognize ourselves as called upon to implant into natural existence that which we experience as a moral ideal. In future worlds, we would recognize that what we now experience morally appears as natural laws.
[ 11 ] If children grew up under the influence of such a view, they would place themselves in the world in such a way that they would feel themselves to be a member of the cosmos and would thereby have feelings for life from those forces which they absorb within themselves through their knowledge of the cosmos. Yes, as they were educated to act, they would know that what they did was imprinted in the whole world. If this were the case, how differently would people live today, when it is possible for a person who asks himself, “What am I actually doing here in this world?” to see himself standing here alone, sprung from indeterminate forces of nature, imbued with moral ideals like soap bubbles. Such a person can become paralyzed in his attitude toward life. When he looks up at the starry heavens, he sees the stars passing through space, but has no relationship to them; they are themselves only naturally arising, decaying worlds without meaning and without inner spirituality.
[ 12 ] We must consider what could become the spiritual outlook of humanity as a life force. We must point this out again and again, because this is precisely what people today understand least. They say that the spiritual outlook is escapist. It is the current outlook that is escapist. Why? It works with the dogmas of the past, which made good sense in the past because they sprang from a certain instinctive clairvoyance. This instinctive clairvoyance has disappeared; people no longer have any connection to it. The dogmas that have survived are no longer understood. It is not that the dogmas are wrong, but that today's humanity has no connection to them. And apart from what has been preserved as dogma, humanity today has a spiritless natural science. Anthroposophy wants to provide a spiritual natural science, a natural science that enlivens human beings, and what trickles in as knowledge of the spirit in nature is transformed in human beings, just as food is transformed in human beings in a physical sense, into social power. If one were to seriously engage with these things, one would experience that spiritual knowledge is taken in as nourishment for the soul, digested — if I may use that expression — in order to emerge as a socially effective force. We will gain social impulses in no other way than by taking in spiritual knowledge from the nature that surrounds us. Anyone who believes today that social reforms can be undertaken on the basis of some other impulse thinks about the things of the world in much the same way as someone who, in order to feed a person as well as possible, forbids them to eat. Anyone who speaks of social structures today and does not speak of spiritual knowledge wants to do the same thing with regard to the social order of humanity as someone who wants to feed people and prescribes a starvation diet for them. This is a profound absurdity in the current views of humanity, and humanity is completely unable to see through it. What we bring with us from spiritual worlds when we come into this life between birth and death is really only like a picture. And basically, our soul life is a picture life, and this picture life was enlivened in earlier times by what was already present as spirit in the view of nature. In ancient times, there was no view of nature without a view of spirit. People today read about older views of nature; they read nothing about a natural science that was without spirit. If you go back to the 13th or 14th century and read what was said about nature at that time — even if you scoff at the childishness and superstition — you will find that the essence of all these things that were described is imbued with spirit. Today we strive as hard as possible to see natural phenomena without spirit. Indeed, we see in this the perfection of observation, to see everything without spirit.
[ 13 ] But what we take from nature without spirit can no longer have a life-giving effect on our present existence. We then remain stuck there and do not want to admit to ourselves that we are images, mere images, images of a past life that does not want to be fertilized by present life. For this present life is meant to fertilize the past life so that it can be carried up again through the gate of death into spiritual worlds. Only when viewed in this living way can spiritual science give man what it is meant to give him.
[ 14 ] Take, for example, the dogmas of the old religious science books. Today, many people simply fight against these dogmas because they find them nonsensical. They are by no means nonsensical, not even a dogma such as the Trinity; it even has the deepest meaning. Using the means of the old instinctive clairvoyant art, it was read by people from nature itself. And there were millennia in human development in which this dogma gave humanity an enormous amount. The external churches have preserved such dogmas. Today, they exist as little more than a certain wording. People today have no need to develop a relationship with what was the object of ancient clairvoyance. It remains something that has no connection with people because of their present nature, whereas it was once living nourishment for the soul. Apart from these dogmas, we have external natural science, natural science stripped of spirit, which kills the soul if it is not spiritualized.
[ 15 ] These are the two fundamental evils that spiritual science, as it is meant here, has in view. It wants to give the soul something that can enliven it, something that can instill strength in it, so that the soul immediately feels itself to be a member of the whole cosmos and feels in its social activity the responsibility that arises from the fact that our small activity as individual human beings has a cosmic significance for the whole development of the future. We must look beyond the narrow circle that we have drawn around ourselves today through an education that has stripped away the spirit. For humanity itself has brought about this narrowing and wants to bring it about more and more. This is why spiritual science has such a difficult time, because it wants to be precisely that which does not lie merely in words, thoughts, or ideas, but which, like spiritual and soul life blood, flows through thoughts, ideas, and words and pours directly into the human soul. This is why, when representing spiritual science, it is much more important how something is said than what is said. Today we see the fierce dispute between materialism and spiritualism. This fierce dispute stems solely from the fact that people do not want to understand that there is a profound reason for the saying: “The truth lies in the middle between two opposing assertions.”
[ 16 ] Is it true that God is in us? — It is true that God is in us. — Is it true that we are in God? — It is true that we are in God. — The two assertions are contradictory. Both are true, God is in us, we are in God. The two assertions are contradictory. The real, the whole truth lies in between. And the essence of all disputes about ideas in the world is based on the fact that people always seek a one-sidedness that is true, but is precisely a one-sided truth, while the real truth lies between two contradictory assertions. One must know both if one wants to approach the truth. For example, given the current state of world development, one must have the most serious will to get to know material existence; one must not fall into the addiction of those people who say: We want to occupy ourselves with the spirit, we do not want to get to know matter. To get to know matter as such as much as possible is one side of human striving for knowledge and will; the other side is to get to know the spirit as well. For between the two lies what we should actually strive for, and both sides are wrong, those who say that the world is only matter and those who say that the world is only spirit. For what is matter? Matter, as man knows it, is what remains of the spirit after the spirit has become spirit again. Its own human form is nothing other than what was once God's thought (see drawing, left), what were once divine thought-impulses. Think of how water freezes and takes shape; in the same way, God's thought takes shape and becomes the human shell. And a new thought, a new thought of God, asserts itself within the human being, which then goes out again, and this thought of God here (left) was in turn transformed from a form that was thought in earlier times. What we see as matter is nothing other than spirit that has become solid, and what we see as human spirit is a young form, a shape in the process of formation. Spirit and matter are only different in the world according to the stages of life. And the mistake we make in relation to them is not that we turn to matter or that we turn to spirit, but that we want to preserve in the present what we should preserve in life, what we should fertilize so that it can become the future.
[ 17 ] If we permeate what we have brought into the present from our pre-existence, what we have as spiritual life, only with dry, external, spiritless natural science, then we harden it, prevent it from germinating, prevent it from growing into future worlds, we dehumanize it.
[ 18 ] And if we want to grasp what is form, what is old divinity, what has crystallized into forms, through a nebulous mysticism into which we dream all kinds of things, then we do not rely on what God has given us as our support, as our physical support, but we luciferize the material. What is nebulous mysticism? — Man should look within himself, he should recognize from the cosmos in his physical organism what he is in this life between birth and death. Instead, he fantasizes that he has a deity within himself. He has it within himself, but he does not attain it through mystical fantasies. He luciferizes what he should see in the later form of the physical shell. It is false views of the material and the spiritual that cause people to quarrel with one another, for the material and the spiritual are the same, only in different stages of life.
[ 19 ] This is what the present age particularly needs to understand. Otherwise, it will not be able to grasp social life. Today, we must already make the attempt to really penetrate real reality with our thoughts. People today do not want to do this. They want to remain on the surface.
[ 20 ] A few days ago, I was told a nice little story that happened in Zurich very recently. One of our friends was speaking at a university ceremony in Zurich about the scientific significance of anthroposophy. A socialist-minded man replied that people today should not be educated in such mystical fantasies, but rather in exact science, since Goethe had already said: “No creative spirit penetrates into the inner nature of things.”
[ 21 ] What this Swiss representative said stems only from a superficial view of what Goethe said. For when Goethe quotes Haller's statement, he says: “I've heard that repeated for sixty years and curse it...” This is how intellectual life is conducted today, this is how things are understood, and this is how one becomes an authority to a certain degree. In this form, at least, is how people strive to understand the world today. Whether one believes that Goethe made the statement that he “cursed” for sixty years, or whether an economist allows himself to say the following, is ultimately irrelevant. A very learned economist, a national economist, has written a book about fixed and open price formation. In it, he had to do a lot of research into the way in which, I would say, the national economy could be made social. Among the various things he discusses is this. He says: Georg Brandes already said that the people are guided in their social and economic actions not by reason but by instinct. Therefore, the people must be enlightened. Enlightenment must be brought to the people.
[ 22 ] Now, Georg Brandes is not a deeply thinking man; but one can reply: there are so many economists at so many universities; they are enlightened. But when they do business with each other, instincts work among them just as they do among everyone else, no different at all. Because the way things are today, precisely because of our highly developed intelligence, only instincts remain for social life. Instincts are at work. But now we have to go further. Now we must ask ourselves: How can we shed light on this workings of instincts? — For that alone can have social significance. It is simply nonsense to believe that a majority of people can be guided by these instincts. They cannot. Instincts simply arise from people living together. Something must be added that transforms these instincts, something that can enter into these instincts. Reason cannot enter into instincts. We must remember the old instinctive way of seeing; it has developed into our intellectualism. But this intellectualism lives only in the inner spiritual existence of the human being. In contrast, the external social forces are saturated with instinct. Something must penetrate these instincts that is related to this instinctive perception but has an impact from the spiritual realm: imagination must penetrate. So we have: old instinctive perception — intellect — imagination. Only imagination, as we call it in spiritual science, gives the power to bring light into instinctive life.
[ 23 ] What enables us to understand things scientifically in a purely external way, to create botany, zoology, mathematics, can be fed by the intellect, but not what human interaction means. What we have called imagination must be brought in. Imagination must permeate social life. That is what matters. Human instincts lived in all social life that had developed from ancient times up to the most recent period. Basically, it was only in the second and third thirds of the 19th century that humanity entered the age that no longer wants old instincts. You can prove quite clearly that old instincts were still very much alive in social existence at the turn of the 18th to the 19th century. The uncertainty of these instincts only arose in the age in which the intellect developed most brilliantly. Social life then remained tradition.
[ 24 ] Just think of the enormous effort people had to make in the 19th century in order to have any moral views at all. They had to preserve what had been handed down from ancient times in the most abstract way possible. And it was only possible to perpetuate the old moral ideals as fossils. Today we need a rebirth of morality, because only that can in turn bring about social progress. But this cannot come from the intellect, but solely from moral intuition. The imagination, the moral imagination, must rise to the spiritual world in order to be fertilized by it. This is what matters today, otherwise humanity will lose its moral impulse.
[ 25 ] Those abstract professions of faith that merely tend toward belief cannot find any power for life out of this belief. Faith alone gives something to the egoism of the soul, but with egoism one can still live as an individual, if necessary. If one wants to intervene in action, and that means being active in society, then it is necessary that spiritual-soul life permeates us. But that can only come from concrete spiritual life. This must flow through the anthroposophical movement, this awareness of the life force of the anthroposophical worldview.
[ 26 ] Pantheism is a popular accusation that is often levelled against something like anthroposophically oriented spiritual science. Pantheism, prior to current creeds, is superstition, the aberration that the divine lives in the things that surround us. But why do current creeds call our anthroposophically oriented spiritual science heresy? Because these creeds are completely permeated by materialism! — Certainly, if the Jesuit regards the world around him as nothing but matter, then it is blasphemy to say that this matter is God. But can anthroposophically oriented spiritual science be blamed for the fact that Jesuit X can only see the world around him as matter? — It is not matter, it is spirit, and what Jesuit X recognizes as matter in the world around him, anthroposophically oriented spiritual science shows to be an illusion. One does not explain the world that one declares to be an illusion as divine being, of course not. But it is one thing to declare what surrounds us to be divine while at the same time recognizing external sensory existence as an illusion, and quite another to regard it as coarse matter and then declare this coarse matter to be divine.
[ 27 ] You see how far apart are the things that the other person means and what is really there within our anthroposophical spiritual science. But we must not tire of actually asserting these things before the world. Otherwise, what recently appeared in a Swiss newspaper as an objection to my method of arriving at spiritual knowledge could happen. It says, more or less, that I claim that one can see the spirit, but that this is impossible because the spirit is not something sensual, and only the sensual can be seen. The spirit cannot be grasped, so no one can see the spirit.
[ 28 ] You see, this is really a desolate way of thinking, rooted in nothing less than the fact that the person concerned says he cannot see the spirit, so no one can say anything about the spirit; nothing can be known about the spirit because the spirit cannot be grasped. And this line of thought runs through an entire feature article. This is what is so terribly devastating in the present day: people are not aware that they need to read to the end or even familiarize themselves with things. “No creative spirit penetrates into the innermost nature,” are the first two lines of Goethe's poem. We linger over these lines and fail to notice that Goethe immediately follows them with: “I have been cursing it for sixty years!”
[ 29 ] What we see everywhere today is superficiality; we cannot emphasize this enough. We must seek out this terrible tendency toward superficiality everywhere. Today, it manifests itself most prominently in the realm of social and economic thought, where it also has a terribly damaging effect on the outside. People do not want to delve into things, to delve into what lies at the heart of things.
[ 30 ] For example, I was told today that people in a certain area say — and this is often said — that the “crucial points of the social question” are so difficult to grasp. I think to myself, when someone says something is difficult to grasp, they want something easy, something they can easily grasp. But if you can't do anything with what you can easily grasp in social life, if you just botch it up when you need to grasp something that is a little difficult, which requires a little effort because it is precisely what is necessary for today's social thinking to think something more difficult, if that had been the tremendous damage of recent times, that people wanted to permeate social life with easily graspable thoughts and thus ruined it, then the statement that something is difficult in this area would be downright frivolous! And that is basically what it is. The point is that one should not entertain this inwardly frivolous thought that the matter is difficult. For if thoughts were given just as one wants them to be, they would be good for nothing but botching. In order to work properly, it will be necessary to really overcome this apparent difficulty and get involved in the matter. That is what matters. It is in this serious manner that one should deal with the affairs of life in these serious times.
[ 31 ] We will continue this discussion tomorrow.