Donate books to help fund our work. Learn more→

The Rudolf Steiner Archive

a project of Steiner Online Library, a public charity

The Easter Festival in Relation to the Mysteries
GA 233a

22 April 1924, Dornach

IV. The Mysteries of Ephesus. The Aristotelian Categories

We have heard how there grew out of the Mysteries that which unites the consciousness of men with the world in such manner that this union comes to expression in the festivals of the year. We have understood above all how the Easter Festival grew out of the principle of initiation. From all this you will have realised how great a part the Mysteries have played in the whole evolution of mankind. All the spiritual life that passed through the world and evolved through mankind proceeded in ancient times from the Mysteries. The Mysteries were very powerful with respect to the whole guidance of the spiritual life.

Now mankind was predestined from the outset to evolve to spiritual freedom. The development of freedom necessarily involved a decline in the ancient Mysteries. For a period of time human beings had to stand less in connection with such a mighty guidance as proceeded from the Mysteries; they had to be left more to their own resources. Certainly we cannot say that the time has already come today when men have won true inner freedom and are ripe to pass on to what should follow the age of freedom. Decidedly we cannot say so. Nevertheless a sufficient number of human beings have passed through incarnations in which the power of the Mysteries was felt less than in former ages. And though the fruits of these incarnations are not yet ripe today, though the harvest is not yet, nevertheless it is there within the human being, it is latent in their souls.

If, as we have often said, a more spiritual age is now approaching once again, human beings will indeed evolve in time what in their dim consciousness they have not yet evolved today. But this above all will be necessary, that the knowledge, the vision, the conscious experience of the Spiritual that can arise from present-day Initiation shall be met out of the very freedom which men have gained with reverence and true respect. For if we do not revere, if we do not treasure it, true knowledge or indeed any spiritual life of mankind is in reality impossible. And in this sense we shall rightly use the times of the sacred festivals, we shall use them by trying to plant, however little, into our souls all this reverence for the spiritual life that has evolved in the course of human history. We shall learn to look as intimately as we can and see how the outer historical events signify facts and carry the spiritual life from one age into another.

We know in the first place that human individuals themselves return to the Earth again and again in their repeated earthly lives. Thus they carry with them experiences of former epochs into later ones. The human beings themselves are the most important factor in the progressive evolution of all that has taken place in human history. But the human beings of every age live in a particular environment. And the environment created by the Mysteries is among the most important. Thus it is a most important factor in the progress of mankind to carry from one age into another what human beings experienced in the Mysteries and what they then experience again, be it once more in sacred Mysteries working forth into mankind, or be it in some other forms of knowledge. Today it has to be in other forms of knowledge. For the real life of the Mysteries has more or less receded so far as the outer world is concerned and has not yet emerged again.

It is indeed the case that when that spiritual impulse which has gone forth from here, from the Goetheanum through the Christmas Foundation meeting, really finds its way into the life of the Anthroposophical Society—(the Society leading on to the Classes partially begun)—this Anthroposophical Society will provide the foundation for the Mysteries of the future. The future life of the Mysteries must consciously and deliberately be planted by this Anthroposophical Society. For this Anthroposophical Society has ever before it an event which can be turned to good account in future evolution even as a similar event was turned to good account once upon a time, namely, the burning of the Temple of Ephesus. Then and now, a great and deep wrong was done. Yet on the different planes of life these things appear in different ways and it lies in the freedom of mankind to turn to good account that which on one plane is a dreadful wrong, for it is just through these terrible events that a real progress of mankind can be achieved.

Now to enter into these things with sympathetic understanding we must grasp them, as I already said, as intimately as possible. How did the spiritual life of the world live in the Mysteries? I showed yesterday how the fixing of the yearly Easter Festival proceeds from the constellations of the Sun and Moon considered in a spiritual sense. I showed how the other planets are seen from the standpoint of the Moon. According to what is there experienced in beholding the other planets, man as he descends from his pre-earthly life into his earthly life is guided and instructed in the forming of his light-ether body.

We want to gain a true and vivid conception of how this light-ether body is created through the Moon forces, through the observation if I may put it so, in the spiritual Moon observatory. We want to understand how these ethereal forces are transmitted to the human being. To this end we may either observe it, as we have tried to do, out of the Cosmos directly, where these things are inscribed, where they exist as a real fact; but it is also important to let our hearts and minds be impressed by the part which human beings took in such a truth as this in different ages.

Never did human hearts and minds partake so intimately in this descent from the pre-earthly into the earthly life with regard to the final stage, the investment of man with his etheric body, never did they partake in this fact so intimately and deeply as in the Mysteries of Ephesus.

In the Mysteries of Ephesus the whole service that was devoted to her who is exoterically known as Diana or Artemis, the Goddess of Ephesus, was calculated to enable man to experience and enter into the spiritual life and movement within the ether of the Cosmos. We may say indeed that when the adherents of the Mystery of Ephesus approached the image of the Goddess they had a feeling, a sensation which grew into a spiritual listening and may be thus expressed. It was as though the Goddess spoke: “I delight in all things fruitful and creative in the far cosmic ether.”

A deep impression was made on those present when the Temple Goddess thus expressed her joy in all things growing, springing, sprouting in the far-spread ether of the world. And there was a feeling deeply akin to the springing and sprouting of life, a feeling that was wafted through the spiritual atmosphere of the Ephesian Sanctuary as a magic breath. For the Mystery was so arranged and instituted that we may truly say, nowhere have men lived with the growth of the plant life, with the springing and sprouting of the Earth into the plants, as they did in Ephesus.

And as a consequence a certain instruction could be given with great clearness in these Ephesian Mysteries, an instruction, if I may call it so, whose aim was to bring specially near to the heart and mind of those who belonged to Ephesus the secret of the Moon of which I told you yesterday.

This was something that every one of them had as his own experience. He knew what it was to feel himself as a form of light, for this process of receiving one's form of light through the Moon was made alive and vivid to the Ephesian pupils and Initiates. And there was a certain institution in the Ephesian Mysteries such that he who could let it work upon him in the sanctuary was altogether transplanted into this creating of one's being out of the Sunlight that wove around the Moon. And then there sounded forth towards him as though it were sounding from the Sun: J O A. (I O A).

He knew that this J O A calls to life his “I” and his astral body. J O—“I”, astral body; and then the approach of the light-ether body in the AJ O A. Now, as the J O A vibrated within him he felt himself as Ego, as astral body, as ether body.

And then it was as though there sounded forth and upward from the Earth—for man himself was transported into cosmic regions—it was as though there sounded to him upward from the Earth that which should permeate the J O A: eh-v. These were the forces of the Earth rising upwards in the eh-v.—J eh O v A.

And now in the JehOvA he felt the entire human being. He felt a premonition of the physical body which he would only have on Earth in the consonants belonging to the vowels; while the latter indicate, in the J O A, the “I”, the astral body, the etheric body. It was through this living penetration into the JehOvA that the Ephesian disciple could experience the final steps of man in his descent out of the spiritual world.

And in this feeling of the J O A one felt oneself as the very sound J O A within the light. Then one was truly MAN - resounding “I”, resounding astral body, clothed in the light-radiant etheric body. One was sound within the light. And so indeed one is as cosmic man, and as such one is able to perceive what is seen in the surrounding Cosmos just as here on Earth one is able to perceive through the eye what takes place within the physical horizon of the Earth.

And when the Ephesian pupil bore within him this J O A, when he bore this within him, he really felt himself as though transported into the Moon sphere; he partook in all that could be observed from the standpoint of the Moon.

At this stage the human being was still human being in the widest sense. Only at his descent to Earth did he become man and woman. But the disciple felt himself transported up into this region of the pre-earthly life which we pass through as we approach the Earth once more. It was in Ephesus that it became most intimately possible thus to arise into the Moon sphere, and then the disciples bore in their hearts and souls what they had witnessed and experienced, and it resounded in them somewhat as follows: [e.Ed: The original German is printed at the end of this lecture.]

  Offspring of all the Worlds! Thou Form of Light,
  Firm framéd by the Sun, with Luna's might,

  Endow'd with sounding Mars' life-stirring song,
  And swift-wing'd Mercury's motion in thy limbs,

  Illum'd with royal Jupiter's all-wisdom
  And grace-bestowing Venus' loveliness—That ghostly Saturn's ancient memoried devoutness
  Unto the world of Space and Time thee hallow!

Every Ephesian was permeated by this experience which he felt among the greatest things that pulsated through his human being.

  Offspring of all the Worlds! Thou Form of Light,
  Firm framéd by the Sun, with Luna's might,

  Endow'd with sounding Mars' life-stirring song,
  And swift-wing'd Mercury's motion in thy limbs.

  Illum'd with royal Jupiter's all-wisdom
  And grace-bestowing Venus' loveliness—That ghostly Saturn's ancient memoried devoutness
  Unto the world of Space and Time thee hallow!

It was indeed an experience in which the adherent of the Ephesian Mysteries felt himself as man fully and intensely, when there resounded in his ears that which lies hidden in these verses. For he felt: Now it has dawned upon me how I am connected with the planetary system in the forces of my etheric body. Pregnantly he brought this to expression, for these words are addressed to the etheric body by the great universe:

  Offspring of all the Worlds! Thou Form of Light,
  Firm framéd by the Sun, with Luna's might.

Here man is feeling himself within the power of the Moonlight.

  Endow'd with sounding Mars' life-stirring song.

The sound which has an active, a creative, quality sounded forth to him from Mars. And then came that which fills the limbs of man with strength so that he becomes a mobile being:

  And swift-wing'd Mercury's motion in thy limbs.

And from Jupiter the light pours forth:

  Illum'd with royal Jupiter's all-wisdom,

And from Venus:

  And grace-bestowing Venus' loveliness—

So at length Saturn may gather it all up, rounding man off both inwardly and outwardly, preparing him to descend to the Earth and clothe himself in a physical body that he may live on, on Earth, as this being who in a physical garment bears the God within him:

  That ghostly Saturn's ancient memoried devoutness
  Unto the world of Space and Time thee hallow!

From all that I have here described, you will see that the spiritual life in Ephesus was filled with radiant light and colour. In this life of inner light and colour there was contained all that they knew of the true dignity of man throughout the Cosmos gathered together in the Easter thought. Many of the wanderers of whom I told you yesterday, who went from Mystery to Mystery that they might experience the life of the Mysteries in its totality, many of them declared ever and again with inner light and intimate joy how the harmony of the spheres had sounded forth to them in Ephesus when they had gazed into the Cosmos from the standpoint of the Moon, how the radiant astral light of the world had shone forth for them, how they had felt it in the Sunlight quivering around the Moon, the Sunlight filled with the spirit of the astral light, even as man himself is filled with living soul. In other places they had not experienced it thus, not at any rate with such joy and gladness and inner artistic understanding.

Now all these things were bound up with the Temple Sanctuary which then went up in the flames lit by the hand of a criminal or of a madman; but as I told you during the Christmas Foundation Meeting, [e.Ed: See: World History in the Light of Anthroposophy. (Eight lectures given at Dornach, 24th – 31st December, 1923. Obtainable from Rudolf Steiner Press.)] two Initiates of the Ephesian Mysteries were reincarnated in Aristotle and in Alexander. And these Individualities then came near what was still to be felt of these things in their time in the Mysteries of Samothrace.

At this point a seemingly chance event is of great spiritual significance in the evolution of the world. We have already mentioned it in our circle, indeed we mentioned it many years ago. When the Temple of Ephesus was burning it was the hour of Alexander's birth. But as the Temple burned something was really taking place.

How infinitely much had happened in the course of centuries for those who had belonged to this Temple. How much of spiritual light and wisdom had passed through these Temple spaces! Now that the flames broke forth from the Temple, all that had gone on in these Temple spaces was communicated to the cosmic ether. Thus we may truly say: The continuous Easter Festival at Ephesus which had been contained within these Temple spaces has since been written—albeit in letters less clearly visible—written in the great orb of the heavens inasmuch as the heavens are ethereal.

And it is so with many things. Very much of what is now human wisdom was in ancient times enclosed in Temple walls. It escaped the Temple walls, it is written in the cosmic ether and is visible there as soon as a man rises to spiritual Imagination. Spiritual Imagination is, as it were, the interpreter of the secret of the stars. Thus we may say, into the cosmic ether are written what were once upon a time the secrets of the Temples and we can read them imaginatively.

But we can also put it differently and it still remains the same. We can also say: I rise in the starlit night and look up to the heavens and give myself up to the impression of it all. And if I have the necessary faculty, all that is contained in the forms of the constellations and in the movements of the planets is transformed as it were into a great cosmic script.—And when we read the cosmic script a real content emerges of the kind which I described yesterday for the secret of the Moon. These things are really to be read in the cosmic writing, when the stars mean more to us than something merely to be calculated mechanically, mathematically, namely when they become for us the letters of the cosmic script.

To develop this idea still further, I must now refer to the following. In the time when the ancient Mysteries were already receding, the Mysteries of the Kabiri at Samothrace still existed. At the time of Alexander, Samothrace was still there as a place of remembrance, nay more, as a place for the active cultivation of the Mysteries, while as a general rule the life of the Mysteries was in its decline.

And there came the moment when through the influence of the Mysteries of the Kabiri there arose for Alexander and Aristotle something like a memory of the old Ephesian time which both of them had lived through during a certain century. And once more the J O A resounded and once again the words resounded:

  Offspring of all the Worlds! Thou Form of Light,
  Firm framéd by the Sun, with Luna's might,

  Endow'd with sounding Mars' life-stirring song
  And swift-wing'd Mercury's motion in thy limbs,

  Illum'd with royal Jupiter's all-wisdom
  And grace-bestowing Venus' loveliness—That ghostly Saturn's ancient memoried devoutness
  Unto the world of Space and Time thee hallow!

But in this remembrance, in this historic remembrance of an ancient time, there lay a certain power to create something new. And from that moment there went forth the power to create a new thing, yet a strange new thing which has been little noticed by mankind. You must come to understand what was the real character of the new creation that went forth from the working together of Alexander and Aristotle.

Take any great work of poetry or any other work. Take the most beautiful works written in German if you like, take a German translation of the Bhagavad Gita, take Goethe's Faust, or Iphigenia, or anything you value highly. Think of the rich and imposing content, let us say, of Goethe's Faust, and now think, my dear friends, through what is this great content transmitted to you? Let us assume that it is transmitted to you as it is to most people. At some time in your life you read Goethe's Faust. What is it that meets you on the physical plane? What is there on the paper? Nothing else but combinations of abcdef, and so forth. The whole mighty content of Faust dawns upon you simply by using combinations of the letters of the alphabet. There is nothing there on the paper that does not coincide with one or other of its twenty or so letters. From these twenty letters there is conjured on to the paper that which awakens for you, if you can read, the abundant content of Goethe's Faust. Nay more, you are free to say that this perpetual repetition of abcdef is a dreadful bore, it is the most abstract thing imaginable. And yet these most abstract things rightly combined give us the whole of Faust.

Now when the cosmic sounding in the Moon was there again and Aristotle and Alexander recognised what the fire at Ephesus had signified, when they saw how this fire had carried forth into the far ether of the world the content of the Mysteries of Ephesus, then it was that there arose in these two the inspiration to found the Cosmic Script. Only the Cosmic Script is not founded on abcdef. As our book writing is founded on letters, so is the Cosmic Writing founded on thoughts. Now there arose the letters of the Cosmic Writing.

If I now write them down before you they are as abstract as abcd:

  Quantity
  Quality
  Relation
  Space
  Time
  Position
  Activity (or Action)
  Passivity (or Suffering)

There you have so many concepts. Take these concepts which Aristotle first expounded to Alexander and learn to do the same with them as you have learnt to do with abcd. Then with Quantity, Quality, Relation, Space, Time, Position, Activity, Passivity, you will learn to read in the Cosmos.

But in the age of the abstract a strange thing happened in the logic of the schools. Imagine a school in which it was the custom not to teach people to read, but if you will, to manufacture books in which they have to learn abcd etc., again and again, in all manner of combinations, ac, ab, be, and so on. And suppose they never came to the point of using these letters in order to place before the soul rich and abundant contents. That would be the very thing which the world has done with Aristotle's Logic. In the textbooks of Logic these Categories, as they call them, are introduced. We learn them off by heart but do not know what to do with them. It is just as though we learn abcd off by heart and do not know what to do with the letters. Just as the content of Faust can be resolved into something as simple as the letters abcd and so forth, so the reading in the Cosmic Script resolves itself into these simple things which we must only learn to deal with. And fundamentally speaking, all that Anthroposophy has brought forth, and all that it can ever bring forth, is experienced from out of these concepts just as what you read in Faust is experienced from out of the letters. For in these simple concepts as the Cosmic Alphabet, all secrets of the spiritual and physical worlds are contained.

This was what happened in the further evolution of the world. Formerly there had been immediate spiritual experience for which the realities of Ephesus were still most characteristic. But now another thing came to take its place. It takes its start in the time of Alexander, but it was only in later times, throughout the Middle Ages, that it evolved in its peculiar form. It is a doubly hidden, double esoteric thing. Doubly esoteric is the meaning that dwells within these eight or nine concepts (for we may also extend the number to nine). Indeed we learn ever more and more to live in these simple concepts, and to experience them in our souls as vividly as we experience the abcd when we have before us the rich and manifold spiritual content of a book.

Thus you see, what was a mighty revelation of instinctive wisdom through thousands and thousands of years flowed at length into concepts whose inner force of life and strength must once more be revealed in time to come. In very truth the time will come when man will find again what is truly resting as in a grave, namely the cosmic wisdom and the cosmic light. Man will learn to read once more in the great universe. He will experience the resurrection of what lay hidden in the intervening time of human evolution between the two spiritual epochs.

And we, my dear friends, are here to make manifest once more the things that are hidden. We are here to create an Easter Festival as an experience of all mankind. And as on other occasions we could say: “Anthroposophy is a Christmas experience”—so we may say today: “Anthroposophy itself, in all its working, is an Easter experience, an experience of resurrection bound up with the experience of the grave.” It is important just at this present Easter Gathering for us to feel, if I may so describe it, the full festivity of the Anthroposophical striving. For we must feel that today we may go to some Spiritual Being who may perhaps be near to us immediately behind the threshold, and in face of him we say: “Ah! once upon a time mankind was blessed with a divine-spiritual revelation whose light still shone most radiantly in Ephesus. But now all this lies buried. How shall I dig out of the grave what thus lies buried? For surely one would imagine that that which has been can still be found in some historic way, can be found lying in the grave.” And then the Being will answer us as in a similar case once upon a time the corresponding Being answered: “That which ye seek is no longer here; it is in your hearts, if only ye open your hearts in the true way.”

Anthroposophy is there indeed; it lies at rest in human hearts, only these human hearts must be able to open themselves in the true way. This is what we must feel. Then in full consciousness, not instinctively as in ancient time, we shall be led back again into that wisdom which lived and shed its light in the ancient Mysteries.

This is what I would fain bring to your hearts at the present Easter time. For to permeate ourselves with this sacred, solemn feeling which can arise from Anthroposophy—this too will play its part and carry us upward into the spiritual world. This too must be united with the Christmas impulse which was given to us at Dornach. For the Christmas impulse must not remain a merely intellectual, theoretic and abstract one. It must be an impulse of the heart, it must not be dry and matter-of-fact. It must be sacred, solemn, joyful, not in sentimentality but out of the reality of the thing itself. Then even as Aristotle and Alexander used the fire of Ephesus when it flamed forth anew in their hearts, when it flamed forth in the Cosmic ether and bore down to them anew the secrets that were afterwards gathered up into the very simple concepts—then even as they could use the fire of Ephesus, so will it be our part to use what has also been carried out into the ether—for we may say so in all humility—in the names of the Goetheanum; namely all that has been intended and that shall be intended with Anthroposophy. But what does this imply? at the annual festival of mourning, at the time of Christmas and New Year, the very time in which our misfortune came upon us, it was granted us to send forth a new impulse from the Goetheanum. Why was it so? Because we may rightly feel that what hitherto was more or less an earthly thing, what was achieved and won and founded as an earthly thing, was carried forth with the names into the cosmic spaces. Just because this misfortune came upon us, when we recognise and know the consequence of it, we may justly say: henceforth we understand that we can no longer merely represent an earthly concern, but we represent a concern of the wide ethereal universe wherein the Spirit lives. For the concern of the Goetheanum is indeed a concern of the far and wide ether wherein there dwells the spirit-filled wisdom of the world. It has been carried forth and we may now fill ourselves with the Goetheanum impulses as with impulses coming in towards us from the Cosmos.

Take this as we will, take it as a picture. The picture signifies the deepest truth and this deep truth is expressed in simple words when we say: Since the Christmas Foundation impulse anthroposophical work shall be permeated with an esoteric character. This esoteric character is here because what was once earthly rayed forth into the cosmic spaces through the astral light that played its part in the physical fire, and because this returns again as a living power into the impulses of the Anthroposophical Movement if only we are able to receive them.

Then, when we can do this, we shall feel as one part of all that lives in Anthroposophy the Anthroposophical Easter mood which can never, never think that the spirit dies, but that it rises again and again. And Anthroposophy must hold to this Spirit that arises ever again out of eternal foundations.

Let us receive this as an Easter thought and as an Easter feeling into our hearts. Then, my dear friends, we shall carry with us from this Gathering feelings that will give us courage and strength to work when we stand once more in our different places when this Easter visit is over.

(Original of verse in this lecture):

Weltentsprossenes Wesen, du in Lichtgestalt,
Von der Sonne erkraftet in der Mondgewalt,

Dich beschenket des Mars erschaffendes Klingen
Und Merkurs gliedbewegendes Schwingen,

Dich erleuchtet Jupiters erstrahlende Weisheit
Und der Venus liebetragende Schönheit—
Dass Saturn's weltenalte Geist-Innigkeit
Dich dem Raumessein und Zeitenwerden weihe!

Vierter Vortrag

Wir haben gesehen, wie aus den Mysterien herausgewachsen ist dasjenige, was im Bewußtsein die Menschen mit der Welt so verbindet, daß diese Verbindung zur Darstellung kommen kann in dem festlichen Jahreslaufe, und wir haben ja insbesondere gesehen, wie das Osterfest herausgewachsen ist aus dem Initiationsprinzip. Aus der ganzen Darstellung wird Ihnen hervorgegangen sein, welche bedeutsame Rolle das Mysterienwesen in der ganzen Entwickelung der Menschheit gespielt hat.

Es ist ja mit diesem Mysterienwesen so, daß im Grunde genommen alles, was geistig durch die Welt ging, durch die Menschheit sich entwickelte, daß das in alten Zeiten alles hervorgegangen ist aus den Mysterien. Wenn man ein heutiges Wort anwenden möchte, so müßte man sagen: Die Mysterien waren sehr mächtig in bezug auf die ganze Lenkung des geistigen Lebens.

Nun war die Menschheit von vornherein dazu bestimmt, die Freiheit zu entwickeln. Zur Entwickelung der Freiheit war es notwendig, daß das alte Mysterienwesen zurückgegangen ist und eine Zeitlang die Menschen weniger im Zusammenhang standen mit einer solchen mächtigen Lenkung, wie sie von den Mysterien ausging, und gewissermaßen mehr sich selbst überlassen waren. Man kann ganz gewiß nicht sagen, daß heute der Zeitpunkt bereits herangerückt sei, in dem die Menschen sich ihre wahre innere Freiheit schon erobert haben und nun reif wären, zum Nächsten überzugehen, was auf das Zeitalter der Freiheit folgen soll. Gewiß, das kann man nicht sagen. Aber immerhin, es sind genügend viele Menschen durchgegangen durch Inkarnationen, in denen weniger die Macht der Mysterien gespürt worden ist als in früheren Zeiten. Und wenn auch die Saat des Durchgehens durch diese Inkarnationen heute noch nicht aufgegangen ist, sie ist in den Menschen. Sie steckt in den Menschenseelen drinnen.

Wenn nun ein Zeitalter heranrückt, welches wieder geistiger ist, so werden schon die Menschen das entwickeln, was sie heute in der Dumpfheit noch nicht entwickelt haben. Aber es wird vor allen Dingen notwendig sein, daß dem Erkennen, dem Schauen, dem Erleben des Geistigen, die aus der heutigen Initiation geholt werden können, entgegengebracht werde auch aus der Freiheit heraus Schätzung, Ehrfurcht. Denn ohne Schätzung, ohne Ehrfurcht ist eine wirkliche Erkenntnis, ist ein geistiges Leben der Menschheit eigentlich nicht möglich. Es ist doch so, daß wir die Festeszeiten richtig anwenden, wenn wir gerade sie dazu gebrauchen, diese Schätzung, diese Ehrfurcht vor dem Geistigen, wie es sich entwickelt hat im Laufe der Menschheitsgeschichte, ein wenig versuchen, in unsere Seele einzupflanzen, wenn wir möglichst intim hinzuschauen lernen auf die Art und Weise, wie die äußeren geschichtlichen Ereignisse Geistiges bedeuten, Geistiges von einem Zeitalter in das andere tragen. Zunächst ist es ja so, daß die Menschen in wiederholten Erdenleben immer wiederum ins Erdendasein kommen. Dadurch tragen sie dasjenige, was sie in früheren Epochen erlebt haben, in spätere Epochen herüber. Die Menschen sind das wichtigste Glied in bezug auf das Weiterentwickeln dessen, was innerhalb der Menschheitsgeschichte geschieht. Aber die Menschen leben doch zu allen Zeiten in einer bestimmten Umgebung. Und eine wichtigste Umgebung ist schon die Mysterienumgebung. Ein Wichtigstes im Menschheitsfortschritt ist das Herübertragen dessen, was Menschen in Mysterien erlebt haben und wiedererleben, sei es wiederum in Mysterien, wo es hinauswirkt in die Menschheit, sei es sonst irgendwie im Erkennen. Heute muß es ja sonst irgendwie im Erkennen sein, denn das eigentliche Mysterienwesen ist mehr oder weniger für die heutige Außenwelt zurückgegangen, muß erst wiederum auftreten.

Wir müssen ja sagen: Es ist schon so, daß, wenn jener Impuls, der durch die Weihnachtstagung von hier, vom Goetheanum, ausgegangen ist, wirklich sich einlebt in der Anthroposophischen Gesellschaft, dann wird die Anthroposophische Gesellschaft, indem sie weiter hinführt zu den Klassen, die einzurichten sind - zum Teil hat diese Einrichtung ja schon begonnen -, die Grundlage sein für das weitere Mysterienwesen. Es muß das weitere Mysterienwesen bewußt gepflanzt werden durch diese Anthroposophische Gesellschaft. Diese Anthroposophische Gesellschaft hat ja vor sich ein Ereignis, das ebenso in der Entwickelung verwertet werden kann, wie einstmals verwertet worden ist ein ähnliches Ereignis: der Brand des Tempels von Ephesus. Da und dort lag ein bedeutsames Unrecht zugrunde. Allein die Dinge nehmen sich ja auf den verschiedenen Niveaus eben verschieden aus, und es kann dasjenige, was auf einem Niveau ein furchtbares Unrecht ist, in der Freiheit der Menschen dann verwendet werden in dem Sinne, daß gerade durch solche schauderhaften Ereignisse ein wirklicher Menschheitsfortschritt hervorgerufen werde.

Nun muß man aber, wenn man auf solche Dinge verständnisvoll eingehen will, möglichst intim, wie ich schon sagte, die Dinge fassen. Man muß hineinschauen in die besondere Art, wie in den Mysterien das Geistige der Welt gelebt hat. Ich habe gestern darauf hingedeutet, wie aus Sonnen- und Mondenkonstellation, wenn man sie geistig nimmt, herauswächst die Festsetzung des jährlichen Osterfestes, und ich habe darauf hingedeutet, daß vom Mondengesichtspunkte aus die anderen Planeten geschaut werden. Und nach dem, was man erfährt im Schauen der anderen Planeten, wird der Mensch angeleitet beim Heruntersteigen aus dem vorirdischen Dasein in das irdische Dasein, wie er sich seinen Lichtätherleib bildet.

Nun, wenn man die Anschauung gewinnen will, wie dieser Lichtätherleib durch die Mondenkräfte, durch die Mondenbeobachtungen, ich möchte sagen durch das geistige Mondenobservatorium, wie diese Ätherkräfte dem Menschen überliefert werden, wenn man das recht verstehen will, so kann man es so beobachten, wie wir es nun versucht haben, aus dem Kosmos heraus, wo es eingeschrieben ist, wo esals ein Faktum existiert. Aber es ist auch wichtig, den menschlichen Anteil, der in den verschiedenen Zeiten an einer solchen Wahrheit da ist, auf das Gemüt wirken zu lassen.

Und in der Tat, niemals war der Anteil, den menschliche Gemüter genommen haben an diesem Heruntersteigen vom vorirdischen Dasein in das irdische in bezug auf die letzte Etappe, die Umkleidung des Menschen mit dem Ätherleib, niemals war ein so intimer, inniger Anteil an dieser Tatsache genommen worden als gerade in den Mysterien von Ephesus. In den Mysterien von Ephesus war es so, daß der ganze Dienst, welcher der exoterisch Artemis genannten Göttin von Ephesus dargebracht wurde, eigentlich darauf gerichtet war, das geistige Weben und Leben innerhalb des Äthers der Welt, innerhalb des Äthers des Kosmos, mitzuerleben. Man kann schon sagen, wenn die Angehörigen des Mysteriums von Ephesus sich dem Götterbilde nahten, dann war es eine Empfindung, die sich aber steigerte bis zum Anhören und die etwa so auszudrücken ist, wie wenn es die Sprache der Göttin wäre: Ich freue mich über alles Fruchttragende im weiten Weltenäther.

Es war ein tiefer Eindruck, der ausgeübt wurde durch dieses Aussprechen inniger Freude der Tempelgött in über alles Wachsende, Sprießende, Sprossende im weiten Weltenäther. Und innig verwandtes Fühlen mit dem Sprießen und Sprossen war ja insbesondere etwas, was wie ein Zauberhauch die Atmosphäre, die geistige Atmosphäre von dem ephesischen Heiligtum durchströmte. Es war dieses Mysterium schon so angeordnet, so eingerichtet, daß man sagen kann, nirgends ist eigentlich so mitgelebt worden mit dem Wachsen des Pflanzenwesens, mit dem Sprießen und Sprossen der Erde in das Pflanzenwesen hinein, als in Ephesus.

Das führte denn auch dazu, daß gerade in diesem ephesischen Mysterium mit besonderer Deutlichkeit der Unterricht gegeben werden konnte, wenn ich es so nennen darf, der darauf hinausging, besonders dieses Mondengeheimnis, von dem ich gestern sprach, an das Gemüt der zu Ephesus Gehörigen heranzubringen.

Es war etwas, was jeder wie sein eigenes Erlebnis hatte, sich zu fühlen als Lichtgestalt, weil das so lebendig gemacht wurde vor den ephesischen Schülern und Initiierten: dieses Durch-den-Mond-seineLichtgestalt-Bekommen. Und es war eine Einrichtung in Ephesus, die etwa so war: Derjenige, der diese Einrichtung in der Weihestätte auf sich wirken lassen konnte, der wurde wirklich ganz hineinversetzt in dieses Sichherausbilden aus dem den Mond umwandelnden Sonnenlichte. Dann tönte es an ihn heran, wie wenn es von der Sonne herübertönte: \(J O A\).

Dieses \(J O A\), von dem wußte er, daß es regsam macht sein Ich, seinen astralischen Leib. \(J O\) - Ich, astralischer Leib, und das Herankommen des Lichtätherleibes in dem \(A\) - \(J O A\). Jetzt fühlte er sich, indem vibrierte in ihm das \(J O A\), jetzt fühlte er sich als Ich, als astralischen Leib, als ätherischen Leib.

Und dann war es, wie wenn von der Erde heraufklänge, denn der Mensch war versetzt in das Kosmische, wie wenn von der Erde heraufklänge dasjenige, was das \(J O A\) durchsetzte, \(eh-v\). Das waren die Kräfte der Erde, die heraufkamen in dem \(eh-v\).

Und nun fühlte er, in dem khOvA fühlte er den ganzen Menschen. Das Vorgefühl des physischen Leibes, den er erst auf der Erde hatte, fühlte er angedeutet in den Konsonanten, die hinzugehörten zu dem Vokalischen, was in dem \(J O A\) andeutet Ich, astralischen Leib, ätherischen Leib. Dieses Sicheinleben in dem \(Jeh Ov A\), das war es, was den ephesischen Schüler erfühlen ließ die letzten Schritte für das Heruntersteigen aus der geistigen Welt.

Aber es war zu gleicher Zeit dieses Erfühlen des \(J O A\) so, daß man sich fühlte im Lichte drinnen als dieser Klang \(J O A\). Dann war man Mensch: klingendes Ich, klingender astralischer Leib, in lichtglänzendem Ätherleib. Dann war man Klang im Licht. So ist man als kosmischer Mensch.

Und so ist man fähig, aufzunehmen dasjenige, was man im Kosmos draußen sieht, wie man durch sein Auge hier auf der Erde fähig ist, aufzunehmen, was im physischen Umkreise der Erde geschieht.

Dann fühlte sich der ephesische Schüler wirklich, wenn er in sich trug dieses \(J O A\), wie versetzt in die Mondensphäre. Er nahm teil an demjenigen, was beobachtet werden konnte vom Gesichtspunkte des Mondes aus.

Da war der Mensch noch Mensch im allgemeinen. Er wurde erst Mann und Weib beim Heruntersteigen auf die Erde. Da aber fühlte der Mensch sich hinaufversetzt in diese Region des vorirdischen Daseins, aber eben des Herankommens an das Irdische. Den ephesischen Schülern wurde dieses Sichhinaufversetzen in die Mondensphäre eben ganz besonders intim möglich. Dann trugen sie in ihrem Herzen, in ihrer Seele dasjenige, was sie miterlebt haben und was etwa in der folgenden Weise dem ephesischen Schüler erklang:

Weltentsprossenes Wesen, du in Lichtgestalt,
Von der Sonne erkraftet in der Mondgewalt,

Dich beschenket des Mars erschaffendes Klingen
Und Merkurs gliedbewegende Schwingen,

Dich erleuchtet Jupiters erstrahlende Weisheit
Und der Venus liebetragende Schönheit —

Daß Saturns weltenalte Geist-Innigkeit
Dich dem Raumessein und Zeitenwerden weihe!

Das war dasjenige, von dem jeder Epheser durchdrungen war. Das rechnete er zum Wichtigsten, was seinen Menschen durchpulste (der Text wurde an die Tafel geschrieben):

Weltentsprossenes Wesen, du in Lichtgestalt
Von der Sonne erkraftet in der Monagewalt,

Dich beschenket des Mars erschaffendes Klingen
Und Merkurs gliedbewegende Schwingen,

Dich erleuchtet Jupiters erstrahlende Weisheit
Und der Venus hiebetragende Schönheit

Daß Saturns weltenalte Geist-Innigkeit
Dich dem Raumessein und Zeitenwerden weihe!

Man kann schon sagen: Es war für den zu den ephesischen Mysterien Gehörigen etwas wie sich so recht als Mensch fühlen, wenn ihm - ich will mich etwas trivial ausdrücken -, wenn ihm in den Ohren klang das, was in diesen Sprüchen liegt. Denn er fühlte ja: damit ist ihm das Bewußtsein von dem aufgegangen, wie er mit dem Planetensystem zusammenhängt in den Kräften seines Ätherleibes. Und prägnant kam das zum Ausdruck. Das ist zum Ätherleib vom Weltenall gesprochen:

Weltentsprossenes Wesen, du in Lichtgestalt,
Von der Sonne erkraftet in der Mondgewalt.

Nun ist der Mensch sich fühlend in der Gewalt des Mondenlichtes:

Dich beschenket des Mars erschaffendes Klingen.

Das Klingen, das etwas Erschaffendes, etwas Schöpferisches hatte, klang herüber vom Mars. Und dasjenige, was dem Menschen die Glieder erkraftet, daß er ein bewegliches Wesen wurde:

Und Merkurs gliedbewegende Schwingen.

Vom Jupiter leuchtet es herüber:

Dich erleuchtet Jupiters erstrahlende Weisheit.

Von der Venus leuchtet es herüber:

Und der Venus liebetragende Schönheit.

Damit dann Saturn alles zusammenfassen kann, was den Menschen abrundet innerlich und äußerlich und ihn bereitet, daß er heruntersteigen kann auf die Erde, sich mit einem physischen Leibe umkleidet und als dieses physisch umkleidete Wesen, das den Gott in sich trägt, auf der Erde weiterleben kann:

Daß Saturns weltenalte Geist-Innigkeit
Dich dem Raumessein und Zeitenwerden weihe!

Nun, aus dem, was ich da beschreibe, können Sie ja entnehmen, daß das Leben, das geistige Leben in Ephesus ein innerlich helles war, ein farbiges war. In diesem innerlich hellen, farbigen Leben war ja tatsächlich dasjenige enthalten, was im Ostergedanken zusammenfaßte alles, was man je gewußt hat über des Menschen wahre Würde im ganzen Kosmos, im ganzen Weltenall. Und mannigfache von denjenigen Wanderern - ich habe sie gestern erwähnt -, die von Mysterium zu Mysterium gingen, um das Ganze des Mysterienwesens auf sich wirken zu lassen, mannigfache von diesen Wanderern haben doch immer wieder versichert: So hell, so innig, wie ihnen in Ephesus erklungen ist die Sphärenharmonie aus diesem Wahrnehmen vom Mondesgesichtspunkte aus, wo ihnen erschienen ist das leuchtendste Astrallicht der Welt, indem sie es verspürt haben in dem den Mond umglimmenden Sonnenlichte, das durchgeistigt ist, so wie der Mensch beseelt ist, durchgeistigt ist vom Astrallichte, so haben sie an anderen Orten das nicht, wenigstens nicht mit jener Freudigkeit, mit jener inneren Künstlerauffassung wahrnehmen können.

Das alles war ja gebunden an diejenige Tempelstätte, die dann durch Verbrecherhand oder Wahnsinnigenhand in Flammen aufging. Aber Eingeweihte der ephesischen Mysterien waren ja, wie ich während der Weihnachtstagung erwähnte, wiederverkörpert in Aristoteles und Alexander. Und diese Individualitäten sind dann nahegekommen dem, was in jener Zeit noch zu verspüren war an den Mysterien von Samothrake.

Nun ist ja ein scheinbar äußerlich zufälliges Ereignis von einer großen geistigen Bedeutung in der Weltentwickelung. Es ist schon erwähnt worden unter uns, sogar seit vielen Jahren erwähnt worden: Als der Tempel von Ephesus brannte, war das die Geburtsstunde Alexanders des Großen. Aber indem dieser Tempel brannte, spielte sich ja etwas ab.

Oh, wie ungeheuer viel war für diejenigen, die zu diesem Tempel gehörten, im Laufe von Jahrhunderten geschehen! Wie viel Geistiges an Licht und Weisheit ist durch diese Tempelräume gegangen. Und alles, was da durch diese Tempelräume ging, ist ja mitgeteilt worden, während die Flammen herausschlugen aus dem Tempel zu Ephesus, ist ja mitgeteilt worden dem Weltenäther. So daß man sagen kann: Das kontinuierliche Osterfest zu Ephesus, das in den Tempelräumen eingeschlossen war, ist seither eingeschrieben, wenn auch mit weniger deutlich wahrnehmbaren Lettern, in den ganzen Weltendom, insofern der Weltendom ätherisch ist.

Und so ist es überhaupt mit vielem. Vieles von dem, was menschliche Weisheit ist, war in alten Zeiten umschlossen von Tempelwänden. Es ist den Tempelwänden entflohen, ist in den Weltenäther eingeschrieben und wird da sofort sichtbar, wenn der Mensch zur wirklichen Imagination aufsteigt. Diese Imagination ist gewissermaßen die Interpretin der Sternengeheimnisse. Man kann so sagen: In den Weltenäther ist eingeschrieben dasjenige, was einstmals Tempelgeheimnis war, und man kann es mit der Imagination daraus lesen.

Man kann aber auch anders sagen, und es ist dasselbe, wenn man anders sagt. Man kann auch sagen: Ich stelle mich in sternheller Nacht auf, beschaue mir den Sternenhimmel, lasse seinen Eindruck auf mich wirken. Und es verwandelt sich, wenn der Mensch dazu die Fähigkeit hat, das, was in den Formen der Sternbilder ist, was in den Bewegungen der Wandelsterne ist, es verwandelt sich wie in eine große Weltenschrift. Und liest man diese Weltenschrift, so kommt etwas heraus von der Art, wie ich es gestern auseinandergesetzt habe für das Mondengeheimnis. Diese Dinge sind durchaus zu lesen in der Weltenschrift, wenn einem die Sterne nicht mehr bloß sind das mathematisch und mechanisch Errechenbare, sondern wenn sie einem sind die Lettern der kosmischen Schrift.

Nun aber möchte ich noch das Folgende für die Weiterentwickelung der Sache sagen. Gerade beim Herantreten an die kabirischen Geheimnisse in Samothrake in der Zeit, als nun schon die alten Mysterien zurückgingen — Samothrake war ja noch als Erinnerungsstätte und auch noch als Pflegestätte, als Arbeitsstätte da, aber im allgemeinen ging das Mysterienwesen schon zurück in der Alexanderzeit -, da war eben ein Moment, wo für Alexander und Aristoteles durch den Einfluß der Kabirenmysterien etwas entstand wie eine Erinnerung an die alte ephesische Zeit, die ja von beiden mitgemacht war in einem bestimmten Jahrhundert. Wieder erklang da das \(J O A\)-Wort, und wieder erklang das:

Weltentsprossenes Wesen, du in Lichtgestalt,
Von der Sonne erkraftet in der Mondgewalt,

Dich beschenket des Mars erschaffendes Klingen
Und Merkurs gliedbewegende Schwingen,

Dich erleuchtet Jupiters erstrahlende Weisheit
Und der Venus liebetragende Schönheit

Daß Saturns weltenalte Geist-Innigkeit
Dich dem Raumessein und Zeitenwerden weihe!

Aber in dieser Erinnerung, in dieser historischen Erinnerung an Altes lag eine gewisse Kraft, Kraft, ein Neues zu schaffen. Und von jenem Moment ging die Kraft aus, ein Neues zu schaffen, aber ein merkwürdiges Neues, das die Menschheit wenig beachtet hat. Denn Sie müssen eigentlich erst verstehen, wie dieses Neue-Schaffen, das aus dem Zusammenwirken von Alexander und Aristoteles ausging, nun seiner Art nach beschaffen war.

Nehmen Sie irgendein bedeutendes Dichtwerk oder anderes Werk - und Sie können die schönsten Werke nehmen -, nehmen Sie meinetwillen eine deutsch übersetzte Bhagavad Gita, nehmen Sie Goethes «Faust», nehmen Sie die Iphigenie oder irgend etwas, was Sie hochschätzen, und denken Sie an den reichen, gewaltigen Inhalt, sagen wir, an den reichen, gewaltigen Inhalt von Goethes «Faust». Und jetzt, wodurch wird denn Ihnen, meine lieben Freunde, dieser reiche Inhalt vermittelt? Nehmen wir an, er würde Ihnen so vermittelt, wie er für die meisten Menschen ja vermittelt wird. Sie lesen den «Faust» irgendeinmal in Ihrem Leben. Was tritt Ihnen denn da auf dem physischen Plane entgegen? Was ist denn auf dem Papiere? Nichts anderes ist auf dem Papiere als Kombinationen von \(a b c d e\) fund so weiter. Alles, wodurch einem der große, gewaltige Inhalt des «Faust» aufgeht, sind ja nur Kombinationen von \(a b c d e f\) und so weiter. Wenn Sie das Alphabet kennen, so gibt es nichts auf dem Papier, was dasteht, was nicht zusammenfällt mit einem der etlichen zwanzig Buchstaben. Aus diesen etlichen zwanzig Buchstaben ist etwas hervorgezaubert auf dem Papier, was Ihnen hervorruft, wenn Sie eben lesen können, den ganzen reichen Inhalt des «Faust». Und es steht Ihnen sogar etwas frei. Es steht Ihnen frei, das Hersagen von \(a b c d e\) fund so weiter furchtbar langweilig zu finden, zu sagen, das ist ja eigentlich das Aller-Allerabstrakteste. Und dennoch, dieses Aller-Allerabstrakteste, in richtiger Weise kombiniert, gibt den ganzen «Faust»!

Und nun entstand, als jenes Monden-Weltenerklingen wieder da war, in dem erkannt wurde von Aristoteles und Alexander, was das Feuer von Ephesus bedeutete, wie dieses Feuer hinausgetragen hat in Welten-Ätherfernen dasjenige, was das Geheimnis von Ephesus war, da war es, daß in diesen beiden entstand die Inspiration, die Weltenschrift zu begründen. Nur, die Weltenschrift wird nicht begründet mit \(a b c d e f\), sondern die Weltenschrift wird begründet, wie die Buchschrift mit Buchstaben, so diese mit Gedanken. Und es entstanden die Lettern der Weltenschrift.

Wenn ich es Ihnen aufschreibe, sind sie ebenso abstrakt wie \(a b c e d\):

Quantität, also Menge
Qualität, Eigenschaft
Relation
Raum
Zeit
Lage
Tun
Leiden

Da haben Sie eine Anzahl von Begriffen. Lernen Sie mit diesen Begriffen, die zuerst Aristoteles dem Alexander vorgeführt hat, lernen Sie mit diesen Begriffen dasselbe vollführen, was Sie gelernt haben mit \(a b c d\), dann lernen Sie aus Qualität, Quantität, Relation, Raum, Zeit, Lage, Tun, Leiden -, aus dem lernen Sie lesen im Kosmos.

In der Schullogik ist in der Zeit der Abstraktivität etwas Besonderes geschehen. Denken Sie nur einmal, wenn in irgendeiner Schule die Gepflogenheit wäre, die Leute nicht lesen zu lehren, sondern meinetwillen nur Bücher zu fabrizieren, in denen sie immer \(a b c d\) lernen müßten in allen möglichen Kombinationen: \(a c, a b, b e\) und so weiter - aber nicht dazu kämen, diese Buchstaben zu verwenden, um reiche Inhalte sich vor die Seele zu stellen, dann wäre das dasselbe, was die Welt mit Aristoteles’ Logik gemacht hat. In den Logiken ist es so, daß ja diese, man nennt es Kategorien, aufgeführt werden. Man lernt sie auswendig, aber man weiß mit ihnen nichts anzufangen. Das würde entsprechen dem, daßmanabcde auswendig lernte und nichts mit ihnen anzufangen wüßte. Zurück auf etwas so Einfaches, wie der Inhalt des «Faust» in \(a b c d\) — was man nur lernen muß - geht dasjenige, was Lesen in der Weltenschrift ist. Und im Grunde genommen ist das, was Anthroposophie hervorgebracht hat und jemals hervorbringen kann, aus diesen Begriffen so erlebt, wie das Gelesene des «Faust» erlebt wird aus den Buchstaben. Denn alle Geheimnisse der physischen und geistigen Welt sind in diesen einfachen Begriffen als dem Weltenalphabet enthalten.

Es ist in der Weltentwickelung das geschehen, daß gegenüber dem früheren unmittelbaren Wahrnehmen, für das die Tatsachen von Ephesus noch etwas Allercharakteristischstes sind, etwas getreten ist, was von der Alexanderzeit aus den Anfang nimmt, was sich dann später erst besonders entwickelt durch das Mittelalter hindurch, was tief verborgen ist, was tief esoterisch ist. Tief esoterisch ist der Sinn, der lebt in diesen acht, oder man kann sie auch auf zehn erweitern, in diesen acht oder zehn einfachen Begriffen. Und wir lernen eigentlich immer mehr in diesen einfachen Begriffen leben, aber wir müssen streben, sie so lebendig in der Seele zu erleben, wie man in der Seele lebendig erlebt das Abc, wenn man eben einen reichgegliederten, geisterfüllten Inhalt hat.

So sehen Sie, wie in zehn Begriffe, deren innere Leuchte- und Wirkekraft erst wiederum enthüllt werden muß, hineinlief dasjenige, was eine gewaltige, instinktive Weisheitsoffenbarung durch Jahrtausende war. Und es wird schon einstmals dahin kommen, daß man dasjenige, was eigentlich wie im Grabe ruht, die Weltenweisheit, das Weltenlicht, wiederum finden wird, wenn man wieder lesen lernen wird im Weltenall, wenn man erleben wird die Auferstehung dessen, was in der Zwischenzeit der Menschheitsentwickelung zwischen den zwei geistigen Epochen verborgen worden ist.

Wir sind ja da, meine lieben Freunde, um das, was verborgen worden ist, wieder offenbar zu machen. Wir sind ja da, um Ostern als Menschheitserlebnis zu gestalten. Und so, wie bei anderen Gelegenheiten gesagt werden konnte: Anthroposophie ist ein Weihnachtserlebnis, so ist Anthroposophie selber in ihrem ganzen Wirken ein Ostererlebnis, ein Auferstehungserlebnis, verbunden mit dem Grabeserlebnis. Es ist wichtig, daß wir gerade bei diesem Osterzusammensein empfinden - wenn ich mich so ausdrücken darf - die Feierlichkeit des anthroposophischen Strebens, indem wir etwas empfinden davon, daß wir gehen können heute zu einem geistigen Wesen, das uns vielleicht nahestehen kann, unmittelbar hinter der Schwelle nahestehen kann, und dem gegenüber wir sprechen: Ach, da war einmal die Menschheit gesegnet mit göttlich-geistiger Offenbarung, die besonders noch geleuchtet hat in Ephesus. Aber nun ist das alles begraben. Wie grabe ich aus das, was so begraben ist! Denn man möchte doch glauben, daß dasjenige, was war, irgendwie geschichtlich gefunden werden kann, gefunden werden kann in seinem Grabe.

Da wird uns das Wesen erwidern, wie einstmals im ähnlichen Fall das entsprechende Wesen erwidert hatte: Das, was ihr suchet, ist nicht mehr hie, das ist in euren Herzen, wenn ihr eure Herzen nur in der richtigen Weise erschließet.

Es ruht schon Anthroposophie in den Menschenherzen. Diese Menschenherzen müssen nur sich selber richtig erschließen können. Und das sollen wir empfinden, dann werden wir in voller Besonnenheit, nicht wie es in alten Zeiten instinktiv war, zurückgeführt zu jener Weisheit, welche in den Mysterien leuchtete und lebte.

Das ist dasjenige, was ich gerne gerade um diese Osterzeit an Ihre Herzen heranbringen möchte. Denn sich durchdringen mit dem, was wie eine feierliche Stimmung aus Anthroposophie heraus in jedem Menschenherzen, das zur Anthroposophie gehört, sich entflammen kann, darin liegt durchaus etwas, was auch hinaufträgt in die geistige Welt und was verbunden sein muß mit dem Weihnachtsimpuls, der zu Dornach gegeben worden ist. Denn dieser Impuls darf kein bloß erdachter, kein intellektualistischer bleiben, dieser Impuls muß ein Herzensimpuls sein; dieser Impuls darf kein trocken-nüchterner sein, dieser Impuls muß, nicht in Sentimentalität, sondern aus der Sache selber heraus, ein feierlicher sein können. Ebenso wie durch Aristoteles und Alexander das Feuer von Ephesus benutzt worden ist, als es in ihren Herzen neu aufflammte, aber zunächst aufflammte im Äther draußen, von dem es ihnen erneut entgegentrug die Geheimnisse, die dann gefaßt werden konnten in Allereinfachstes, wie da benutzt werden konnte das Feuer von Ephesus, so obliegt es uns, und werden wir auch schon imstande sein können, zu benutzen dasjenige, was - man darf es in aller Bescheidenheit sagen - auch in den Äther als die Flammen des Goetheanum das hinausgetragen hat, was durch Anthroposophie gewollt worden ist, weiter gewollt werden soll.

Aber was geht denn daraus hervor, meine lieben Freunde? Es geht daraus hervor, daß wir durften als Jahrestrauerfeier um die Weihnachts-Neujahrszeit, welche dieselbe ist, in der uns das Unglück hier getroffen hat, daß wir da durften einen neuen Impuls ausgehen lassen vom Goetheanum. Warum? Weil wir fühlen dürfen: Was mehr oder weniger Erdensache vorher war, erarbeitet, begründet wurde als Erdensache, das ist mit den Flammen hinausgetragen in die Weltenweiten. Wir dürfen, gerade weil uns dieses Unglück getroffen hat, in dem Erkennen der Folgen dieses Unglückes sagen: Nunmehr verstehen wir es, daß wir nicht bloß eine Erdensache vertreten dürfen, sondern eine Sache der weiten ätherischen Welt, in der der Geist lebt. Denn es ist die Sache vom Goetheanum eine Sache des weiten Äthers, in dem geisterfüllte Weisheit der Welt lebt. Es ist hinausgetragen worden, und wir dürfen uns von den Goetheanum-Impulsen als aus dem Kosmos hereinkommend durchdringen.

Nehmen wir das, wie wir wollen, nehmen wir es als Bild. Das Bild bedeutet aber eine tiefe Wahrheit. Und diese tiefe Wahrheit wird eben in einfachen Worten dadurch ausgedrückt, daß man sagt: Das anthroposophische Wirken soll seit dem Weihnachtsimpuls mit einem esoterischen Zug durchdrungen sein. Dieser esoterische Zug ist deshalb da, weil das, was irdisch war, durch das, was mitgewirkt hat im physischen Feuer, aber als Astrallicht, welches hinausstrahlt in den Weltenraum - weil das wiederum zurückwirkt hinein in die Impulse der anthroposophischen Bewegung, wenn wir nur in der Lage sind, diese Impulse aufzunehmen.

Dann, wenn wir das vermögen, dann empfinden wir in alledem, was in Anthroposophie lebt, ein wichtiges Glied darinnen. Und dieses eine wichtige Glied darinnen, das ist die anthroposophische Osterstimmung, jene anthroposophische Osterstimmung, die da niemals der Überzeugung sein kann, daß der Geist stirbt, sondern daß, wenn er stirbt durch die Welt, er immer wieder aufersteht. Und an den aus ewigen Gründen immer wieder auferstehenden Geist muß sich Anthroposophie halten.

Das nehmen wir auf, nehmen wir auf als Ostergedanke und Osterempfindung in unsere Herzen. Und wir werden, meine lieben Freunde, von diesem Zusammensein Gefühle wegtragen, die uns Arbeitsmut, Arbeitskraft geben, wenn wir wiederum an anderer Stätte stehen.

Fourth Lecture

We have seen how out of the Mysteries has grown that which in consciousness connects men with the world in such a way that this connection can come to expression in the festive course of the year, and we have seen in particular how the Easter festival has grown out of the initiation principle. From the whole account you will have seen what a significant role the Mystery Being has played in the whole development of mankind.

It is so with this mystery being that basically everything that went spiritually through the world developed through humanity, that in ancient times everything emerged from the mysteries. If you want to use a modern word, you would have to say that the Mysteries were very powerful in terms of the whole direction of spiritual life.

Now humanity was destined from the outset to develop freedom. For the development of freedom it was necessary that the old Mystery system should recede and that for a time men should have less connection with such powerful guidance as emanated from the Mysteries, and be left more to themselves, so to speak. It certainly cannot be said that today the time has already approached when men have already conquered their true inner freedom and are now ripe to pass on to the next thing that is to follow the age of freedom. Certainly, that cannot be said. But after all, enough people have passed through incarnations in which the power of the Mysteries has been felt less than in earlier times. And even if the seed of passing through these incarnations has not yet sprouted today, it is in people. It is in the human souls.

When an age approaches that is more spiritual again, people will already develop what they have not yet developed in their dullness today. But above all it will be necessary that the recognition, the seeing, the experiencing of the spiritual, which can be drawn from today's initiation, should also be met with appreciation and reverence out of freedom. For without appreciation, without reverence, real knowledge, a spiritual life of mankind is actually not possible. It is, after all, the case that we use the festive seasons correctly if we use them to try to implant this appreciation, this reverence for the spiritual, as it has developed in the course of human history, into our souls, if we learn to look as intimately as possible at the way in which external historical events signify the spiritual, carry the spiritual from one age into another. First of all, it is the case that people always come back to earthly existence in repeated earthly lives. In this way they carry over into later epochs what they have experienced in earlier epochs. People are the most important link in the further development of what happens within human history. But people live in a certain environment at all times. And one of the most important environments is the Mystery environment. One of the most important aspects of human progress is the transmission of what people have experienced and re-experienced in the Mysteries, be it again in the Mysteries, where it works out into humanity, be it in some other way in cognition. Today it must somehow be in cognition, because the actual mystery being has more or less receded for today's outside world and must first appear again.

We must say: It is already the case that if the impulse that has gone out from here, from the Goetheanum, through the Christmas Conference, really settles into the Anthroposophical Society, then the Anthroposophical Society, by leading further towards the classes that are to be established - in part this establishment has already begun - will be the basis for the further Mystery Being. The further Mystery Being must be consciously planted through this Anthroposophical Society. This Anthroposophical Society has before it an event that can be utilized in its development just as a similar event was once utilized: the burning of the temple of Ephesus. There was a significant injustice here and there. But things are different on the different levels, and what is a terrible injustice on one level can then be used in the freedom of people in the sense that it is precisely through such terrible events that a real progress of humanity is brought about.

But now, if you want to approach such things with understanding, you have to grasp them as intimately as possible, as I have already said. One must look into the special way in which the spiritual of the world has lived in the Mysteries. Yesterday, I pointed out how the determination of the annual Easter festival grows out of the constellation of the sun and moon, if one takes them spiritually, and I pointed out that the other planets are seen from the point of view of the moon. And according to what one experiences in seeing the other planets, man is guided in his descent from the pre-earthly existence into the earthly existence, as he forms his light etheric body.

Now, if one wants to gain an insight into how this light etheric body is transmitted to man through the lunar forces, through the lunar observations, I would like to say through the spiritual lunar observatory, how these etheric forces are transmitted to man, if one wants to understand this correctly, then one can observe it as we have now tried, out of the cosmos, where it is inscribed, where it exists as a fact. But it is also important to let the human part that is there in the different times of such a truth have an effect on the mind.

And indeed, never has the share that human minds have taken in this descent from the pre-earthly existence into the earthly with regard to the last stage, the cloaking of man with the etheric body, never has such an intimate, heartfelt share been taken in this fact as precisely in the mysteries of Ephesus. In the mysteries of Ephesus it was so that the whole service offered to the goddess of Ephesus, exoterically called Artemis, was actually directed towards experiencing the spiritual weaving and life within the ether of the world, within the ether of the cosmos. It can be said that when the members of the Mystery of Ephesus approached the image of the goddess, it was a feeling that increased to the point of being heard and that can be expressed in the same way as if it were the language of the goddess: I rejoice in all that bears fruit in the vast ether of the world.

It was a deep impression that was made by this expression of the temple goddess's heartfelt joy over everything that grows, sprouts and sprouts in the vast ether of the world. And an intimately related feeling with the sprouting and sprouting was something that flowed through the atmosphere, the spiritual atmosphere of the Ephesian sanctuary like a magic breath. This mystery was already so arranged, so set up, that one can say that nowhere else has the growth of the plant being, the sprouting and sprouting of the earth into the plant being, been so lived with as in Ephesus.

This also led to the fact that it was precisely in this Ephesian mystery that the teaching could be given with particular clarity, if I may call it that, which aimed in particular to bring this mystery of the moon, of which I spoke yesterday, to the minds of those who belonged to Ephesus.

It was something that everyone had as their own experience, to feel like a figure of light, because it was made so vivid before the Ephesian disciples and initiates: this coming through the moon to be a figure of light. And there was an arrangement in Ephesus that was something like this: the one who was able to let this arrangement in the place of consecration have an effect on him was really completely immersed in this forming of himself out of the sunlight that transforms the moon. Then it sounded to him as if it were coming from the sun: \(J O A\).

This \(J O A\), he knew that it made his ego, his astral body, active. \(J O\) - I, astral body, and the approach of the light etheric body in the \(A\) - \(J O A\). Now he felt himself, in that the \(J O A\) vibrated in him, now he felt himself as I, as astral body, as etheric body.

And then it was as if that which permeated the \(J O A\) sounded up from the earth, for the human being was transferred into the cosmic, as if that which permeated the \(eh-v\) sounded up from the earth. These were the forces of the earth that came up in the \(eh-v\).

And now he felt, in the khOvA he felt the whole human being. The premonition of the physical body, which he first had on earth, he felt indicated in the consonants, which belonged to the vocalic, which in the \(J O A\) indicates I, astral body, etheric body. This dwelling in the \(Jeh Ov A\), that was what made the Ephesian disciple feel the last steps for the descent from the spiritual world.

But at the same time this feeling of the \(J O A\) was such that one felt oneself in the light within as this sound \(J O A\). Then one was human: sounding ego, sounding astral body, in light-shining etheric body. Then you were sound in the light. This is how you are as a cosmic human being.

And so one is able to absorb what one sees in the cosmos outside, just as one is able to absorb through one's eye here on earth what happens in the physical orbit of the earth.

Then the Ephesian disciple really felt, when he carried this \(J O A\) within him, as if he had been transported into the lunar sphere. He participated in that which could be observed from the point of view of the moon.

Then man was still man in general. He only became man and woman when he descended to earth. But then man felt himself transferred upwards into this region of pre-earthly existence, but precisely of approaching the earthly. The Ephesian disciples were able to experience this transfer into the lunar sphere in a particularly intimate way. Then they carried in their heart, in their soul that which they had experienced and which sounded to the Ephesian disciple in the following way:

World-sprouted being, you in the form of light,
Strengthened by the sun in the power of the moon,

The creative sound of Mars bestowed upon you
And Mercury's limb-moving wings,

You are illuminated by Jupiter's radiant wisdom
And Venus' love-bearing beauty -

That Saturn's world-old spirit-intimacy
Consecrate you to the being of space and becoming of time!

This was what every Ephesian was imbued with. He counted this as the most important thing that pulsated through his man (the text was written on the blackboard):

World-sprouted being, you in the form of light
Empowered by the sun in the power of the moon,

The gift of Mars' creating sound
And Mercury's limb-moving wings,

You are illuminated by Jupiter's radiant wisdom
And Venus' heft-bearing beauty

That Saturn's world-old spirit-intimacy
Consecrate you to the being of space and the becoming of time!

It can be said that for those who belonged to the Ephesian Mysteries it was something like feeling truly human when - I will express myself somewhat trivially - what lies in these sayings rang in his ears. For he felt that the consciousness of how he is connected with the planetary system in the forces of his etheric body had dawned on him. And this was expressed succinctly. This is spoken to the etheric body of the universe:

World-sprouted being, you in light form,
Strengthened by the sun in the power of the moon.

Now man feels himself in the power of the moonlight:

You are gifted with the creative sound of Mars.

The sound, which had something creating, something creative, sounded over from Mars. And that which strengthened man's limbs so that he became a moving being:

And Mercury's limb-moving wings.

From Jupiter it shines over:

You are illuminated by Jupiter's radiant wisdom.

From Venus it shines forth:

And Venus' love-bearing beauty.

So that Saturn can then summarize everything that rounds off man inwardly and outwardly and prepares him so that he can descend to earth, clothe himself with a physical body and continue to live on earth as this physically clothed being who carries the God within him:

That Saturn's world-old spirit interiority
consecrate you to being space and becoming time!

Well, from what I am describing you can see that the life, the spiritual life in Ephesus was an inwardly bright, colorful one. This inwardly bright, colorful life actually contained that which in the Easter thought summarized everything that has ever been known about man's true dignity in the whole cosmos, in the whole universe. And many of those wanderers - I mentioned them yesterday - who went from Mystery to Mystery in order to let the whole of the Mystery work on them, many of these wanderers have repeatedly affirmed: As brightly, as intimately as the harmony of the spheres resounded to them in Ephesus from this perception from the lunar point of view, where the most luminous astral light of the world appeared to them, in that they felt it in the sunlight glowing around the moon, which is spiritualized, just as man is ensouled, spiritualized by the astral light, they have not been able to perceive it in other places, at least not with that joyfulness, with that inner artist's conception.

All this was bound to the temple site, which then went up in flames at the hands of criminals or madmen. But initiates of the Ephesian Mysteries were, as I mentioned during the Christmas conference, re-embodied in Aristotle and Alexander. And these individualities then came close to what could still be felt in the mysteries of Samothrace at that time.

Now an apparently outwardly coincidental event is of great spiritual significance in the development of the world. It has already been mentioned among us, even for many years: When the temple of Ephesus burned, it was the hour of Alexander the Great's birth. But while this temple was burning, something was happening.

Oh, how much had happened over the centuries for those who belonged to this temple! How much spiritual light and wisdom has passed through these temple rooms. And everything that passed through these temple rooms was communicated to the ether of the world as the flames burst forth from the temple at Ephesus. So that one can say: The continuous Easter festival at Ephesus, which was enclosed in the temple rooms, has since been inscribed, albeit with less clearly perceptible letters, in the whole world dome, insofar as the world dome is ethereal.

And so it is with many things. Much of what is human wisdom was enclosed by temple walls in ancient times. It has escaped from the temple walls, is inscribed in the ether of the world and becomes immediately visible there when the human being ascends to real imagination. This imagination is, so to speak, the interpreter of the mysteries of the stars. One can say that what was once a temple secret is inscribed in the world ether and can be read from it with the imagination.

But one can also say otherwise, and it is the same if one says otherwise. You can also say: I stand up in a starry night, look at the starry sky, let its impression work on me. And it transforms, if man has the ability to do so, what is in the forms of the constellations, what is in the movements of the wandering stars, it transforms as if into a great world script. And if one reads this world script, something of the kind that I explained yesterday emerges for the lunar mystery. These things can certainly be read in the world script, when the stars are no longer merely the mathematically and mechanically calculable, but when they are the letters of the cosmic script.

Now, however, I would like to say the following for the further development of the matter. Just when approaching the Kabirian mysteries in Samothrace at the time when the old mysteries were already receding - Samothrace was still there as a place of remembrance and also as a place of care, as a place of work, but in general the mystery system was already receding in Alexander's time - there was a moment when for Alexander and Aristotle, through the influence of the Kabirian mysteries, something like a memory of the old Ephesian time arose, which had been experienced by both of them in a certain century. Again the \(J O A\)-word resounded, and again the:

World-sprouted being, you in the form of light,
Strengthened by the sun in the power of the moon,

You are gifted with the creative sound of Mars
And Mercury's limb-moving wings,

You are illuminated by Jupiter's radiant wisdom
And Venus' love-bearing beauty

That Saturn's world-old spirit-intimacy
Consecrate you to the being of space and the becoming of time!

But in this memory, in this historical memory of the old lay a certain power, the power to create something new. And from that moment emanated the power to create a new, but a strange new that humanity has paid little attention to. For you must first understand what the nature of this new creation, which emanated from the collaboration between Alexander and Aristotle, was.

Take any important work of poetry or other work - and you can take the most beautiful works - take, if you like, a German translation of the Bhagavad Gita, take Goethe's Faust, take Iphigenia or anything else that you hold in high esteem, and think of the rich, powerful content, let us say, of the rich, powerful content of Goethe's Faust. And now, my dear friends, how is this rich content conveyed to you? Let us assume that it is conveyed to you in the same way that it is conveyed to most people. You read “Faust” at some point in your life. What do you encounter on the physical plane? What is on the paper? Nothing else is on the paper but combinations of \(a b c d e\) and so on. Everything by which the great, enormous content of Faust is revealed to us are only combinations of \(a b c d e f\) and so on. If you know the alphabet, there is nothing on paper that does not coincide with one of the twenty or so letters. Something has been conjured up on the paper from these twenty or so letters which, if you can read, evokes the entire rich content of Faust. And you are even free to do so. You are free to find the recitation of \(a b c d e\) fund and so on terribly boring, to say that it is actually the most abstract thing of all. And yet, this all-very-abstract, combined in the right way, gives the whole of “Faust”!

And now, when that moon world resounding was there again, in which it was recognized by Aristotle and Alexander what the fire of Ephesus meant, how this fire carried out into world ether distances that which was the secret of Ephesus, it was then that the inspiration arose in these two to found the world writing. Only, the world script is not founded with \(a b c d e f\), but the world script is founded, as the book script with letters, so this one with thoughts. And the letters of the world script were created.

If I write it down for you, they are just as abstract as \(a b c e d\):

Quantity, therefore quantity
Quality, property
relation
Space
time
Position
Doing
Suffering

There you have a number of concepts. Learn with these concepts, which Aristotle first demonstrated to Alexander, learn with these concepts to do the same as you have learned with \(a b c d\), then learn from quality, quantity, relation, space, time, position, doing, suffering - from this you learn to read in the cosmos.

Something special happened in school logic during the period of abstractness. Just think if it were the custom in some school not to teach people to read, but, for my sake, only to produce books in which they always had to learn \(a b c d\) in all possible combinations: \(a c, a b, b e\) and so on - but would not get to use these letters to place rich content before their souls, then that would be the same thing the world has done with Aristotle's logic. In the logics it is the case that these, they are called categories, are listed. You learn them by heart, but you don't know what to do with them. That would be like memorizing them and not knowing what to do with them. Reading in the world script goes back to something as simple as the content of “Faust” in \(a b c d\) - which one only has to learn. And basically, what anthroposophy has produced and can ever produce is experienced from these concepts in the same way that what is read in Faust is experienced from the letters. For all the secrets of the physical and spiritual world are contained in these simple concepts as the world alphabet.

What has happened in the development of the world is that, in contrast to the earlier direct perception, for which the facts of Ephesus are still something most characteristic, something has arisen which starts from the time of Alexander, which then later develops particularly through the Middle Ages, which is deeply hidden, which is deeply esoteric. Deeply esoteric is the meaning that lives in these eight, or you can also expand them to ten, in these eight or ten simple concepts. And we actually learn to live more and more in these simple concepts, but we must strive to experience them as vividly in the soul as one experiences the Abc vividly in the soul when one has a richly structured, spirit-filled content.

So you see how that which was a powerful, instinctive revelation of wisdom through millennia ran into ten concepts whose inner luminosity and working power must first be revealed again. And one day it will come to pass that what actually rests as if in the grave, the world wisdom, the world light, will be found again when one will learn to read again in the universe, when one will experience the resurrection of what has been hidden in the intervening time of human development between the two spiritual epochs.

We are here, my dear friends, to reveal again that which has been hidden. We are here to shape Easter as a human experience. And so, as has been said on other occasions: Anthroposophy is a Christmas experience, so anthroposophy itself in all its work is an Easter experience, a resurrection experience, connected with the experience of the grave. It is important that it is precisely at this Easter gathering that we feel - if I may express myself thus - the solemnity of anthroposophical striving, in that we feel something of the fact that we can go today to a spiritual being who may be close to us, close to us just beyond the threshold, and to whom we speak: Oh, once upon a time mankind was blessed with divine-spiritual revelation, which especially still shone in Ephesus. But now all that is buried. How I dig up what is so buried! For one would like to believe that that which was can somehow be found historically, can be found in its grave.

Then the being will reply to us, as the corresponding being once replied in a similar case: That which you seek is no longer here, it is in your hearts, if only you open your hearts in the right way.

Anthroposophy already rests in human hearts. These human hearts only need to be able to open themselves up properly. And we should feel this, then we will be led back to the wisdom that shone and lived in the Mysteries in full reflection, not instinctively as it was in ancient times.

This is what I would like to bring to your hearts, especially at this Easter time. For to be imbued with that which, like a solemn mood from anthroposophy, can be kindled in every human heart that belongs to anthroposophy, therein lies something that also carries up into the spiritual world and which must be connected with the Christmas impulse that was given at Dornach. For this impulse must not remain a merely conceived, intellectual impulse, it must be an impulse of the heart; this impulse must not be a dry, sober impulse, this impulse must be able to be a solemn one, not in sentimentality, but out of the matter itself. Just as the fire of Ephesus was used by Aristotle and Alexander when it flared up anew in their hearts, but first flared up in the ether outside, from which it again carried the mysteries to them, which could then be grasped in the simplest terms, just as the fire of Ephesus could be used there, so it is incumbent upon us, and we will also be able to use that which - it may be said in all modesty - has also carried out into the ether as the flames of the Goetheanum that which has been willed and is to be willed further through Anthroposophy.

But what emerges from this, my dear friends? It is clear from the fact that we were allowed to let a new impulse emanate from the Goetheanum as an annual mourning ceremony around the Christmas-New Year time, which is the same time in which the misfortune struck us here. Why? Because we are allowed to feel: What was more or less an earthly matter before, worked out, founded as an earthly matter, has been carried out into the world with the flames. Precisely because this misfortune has befallen us, we may say, recognizing the consequences of this misfortune: Now we understand that we may not merely represent an earthly matter, but a matter of the wide etheric world in which the spirit lives. For the matter of the Goetheanum is a matter of the vast ether in which the spirit-filled wisdom of the world lives. It has been carried out, and we may allow ourselves to be penetrated by the Goetheanum impulses as coming in from the cosmos.

Let us take this as we will, let us take it as an image. But the image signifies a profound truth. And this profound truth is expressed in simple terms by saying that anthroposophical work has been imbued with an esoteric trait since the Christmas impulse. This esoteric trait is there because that which was earthly, through that which worked in the physical fire, but as astral light which radiates out into the world space - because this in turn works back into the impulses of the anthroposophical movement, if only we are able to absorb these impulses.

Then, if we are able to do so, we will perceive an important link in everything that lives in anthroposophy. And this one important link in it is the anthroposophical Easter mood, that anthroposophical Easter mood which can never be convinced that the spirit dies, but that when it dies through the world, it always rises again. And anthroposophy must adhere to the spirit that rises again and again for eternal reasons.

We take this up, we take it into our hearts as Easter thoughts and Easter feelings. And we will, my dear friends, carry feelings away from this togetherness that will give us the courage to work, the strength to work, when we stand again in another place.