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Karmic Relationships VIII
GA 240

21 August 1924, Torquay

Lecture III

During the hour that has become available today I want to speak about certain things which will be easier to understand now that preparation has been made both in the general lecture-course and in the last two lectures to Members. I shall speak this evening about the karma of the Anthroposophical Society and continue this same theme in London during the next few days.

The lectures here have made it clear that in our own epoch the Impulse of the Being known in Christian terminology as the Archangel Michael is responsible for the spiritual guidance of civilised mankind. This particular Rulership—if so it may be called—of the spiritual life began in the seventies of last century and was preceded, as I said, by that of Gabriel. I shall now have something to say about certain aspects of the present Rulership of Michael.

Whenever Michael sends his impulses through the evolution of humanity in the sphere of earthly life, he is the bringer of the Sun-forces, the spiritual forces of the Sun. With this is connected the fact that during their waking consciousness men receive these Sun-forces into their physical and etheric bodies.

The present Rulership of Michael—which began not very long ago and will last from three to four centuries—signifies that the cosmic forces of the Sun penetrate right into the physical and etheric bodies of men. And here we must ask: What kind of forces, what kind of impulses are these cosmic Sun-forces?

Michael is essentially a Sun-Spirit. He is therefore the Spirit whose task in our epoch is to bring about a deeper, more esoteric understanding of the truths of Christianity. Christ came from the Sun. Christ, the Sun-Being, dwelt on the earth in the body of Jesus and has lived since then in super-sensible communion with the world of men. But before the whole Mystery connected with Christ can reveal itself to the soul, mankind must become sufficiently mature and the necessary deepening will to a great extent have to be achieved during the present Age of Michael.

Now whenever the Sun-forces work in upon the earth they are always connected with an impulse which streams into earthly civilisation as an inpouring wave of intellectuality, for in our sphere of existence everything possessed by man and by the world in general in the way of intellectuality, intelligence, derives from the Sun. The Sun is the source of all intellectual life operating in the service of the Spirit.

Utterance of this truth may evoke a certain inner resistance today, for men do right not to place too high a value upon intellect in its present form. Those who have any real understanding of the spiritual life will not set much store by the intellectuality prevailing in the modern age. It is abstract and formal, it crowds the human mind with ideas and concepts which are utterly remote from living reality, it is cold, dry and barren as compared with the warm, radiant life pulsing alike through the world and through man.

In respect of intelligence, however, this holds good only for the present time, since we are living in a very early period of the Michael Age and what we now possess as intelligence is still only just beginning to unfold in the general consciousness of mankind. In time to come this intelligence will have an altogether different character. In order to realise how the nature of intelligence changes during the course of human evolution, let us recall that in medieval Christian philosophy Thomas Aquinas still speaks of Beings, of “Intelligences” inhabiting the stars. As opposed to the materialistic views prevailing today, we ourselves regard the stars as colonies of spiritual Beings

This seems strange and far-fetched to the ears of a modern man who has not the remotest inkling that when he gazes at the stars he is gazing at Beings related in certain respects with his own life and inhabiting the stars just as we ourselves inhabit the earth.

In the 13th century, Thomas Aquinas speaks of Beings in the stars although he assigns to each star a single Being in the sense that earthly humanity would be regarded as a single unit if the earth were being observed from some distant heavenly body. We ourselves know that the stars are to be conceived as colonies of Beings in the cosmos. Thomas Aquinas does not speak of specific Beings or numbers of Beings inhabiting the stars, but when he refers to the “Intelligences” of the stars this authority of medieval Christian doctrine is continuing a tradition which at that time was already dying away. This is an indication that what is comprised to-day in the term “Intelligence” was once something altogether different.

In very ancient times a man did not produce his thoughts from out of himself; when he thought about the things of the world his thoughts were not the product of his own inner activity. The faculty of thinking, man's own activity in the forming of thoughts, has only fully unfolded since the 15th century, since the entry of the Consciousness or Spiritual Soul into the evolution of humanity. In olden, pre-Christian times it would never have occurred to men to believe that they were producing their own thoughts out of themselves; they did not feel that they themselves were forming their thoughts but rather that the thoughts were revealed to them from the things of the world. They felt: Intelligence is universal, cosmic; Intelligence is contained within the things of the world; the Intelligence-content, the Thought-content of things is perceived just as colours are perceived; the world is full of Intelligence, pervaded everywhere by Intelligence. In the course of his evolution man has acquired a drop of the Intelligence that is spread over the wide universe. Such was the conception in days of old.

And so man was conscious all the time that his thoughts were revealed to him, inspired into him. He ascribed Intelligence only to the universe, not to himself.

Now throughout the ages, the Regent of this Cosmic Intelligence which, like the light, streams over the whole world, has been the Spirit known by the name of Michael. Michael is the Ruler of the Cosmic Intelligence. But after the Mystery of Golgotha something of deep significance took place in that Michael's dominion over the Cosmic Intelligence gradually fell away from him, fell from his grasp. Since the earth began, Michael has administered the Cosmic Intelligence. And in the age of Alexander, of Aristotle, when a man was aware of thoughts, that is to say of the content of Intelligence within him, he did not regard these thoughts as his own, self-made thoughts; he felt that the thoughts were revealed to him through the Michael-Power, although in that pagan epoch this Being was known by a different name. This Thought-content gradually fell away from Michael. And if we look into the spiritual world we see that the descent of the Intelligence from the Sun to the earth is accomplished by about the 8th century A.D. In the 9th century men are already beginning, as the forerunners of those who came later, to unfold their own, personal intelligence; intelligence begins to take footing within the souls of individual men. And looking down from the Sun to the earth, Michael and his hosts could say: What we have administered through aeons of time has fallen away from us, has streamed downwards and is now to be found within the souls of men on earth.

Such was the mood and feeling prevailing in the Michael-community on the Sun. It was in the age of Alexander and for a few centuries previously that Michael had exercised his former earthly dominion. But at the time of the Mystery of Golgotha, Michael and his own were in the sphere of the Sun and from there they witnessed the departure of Christ from the Sun; they did not, as those who were below, witness His arrival among them on earth. Michael and his hosts witnessed the departure of Christ from the Sun and at the same time they saw that their dominion over the Intelligence was gradually falling from their grasp.

Thus in the periods of evolution after the Mystery of Golgotha, the course of development is as follows. Here we have the stream of spiritual, heavenly life (red) and here the stream of earthly life (yellow). Christ comes to the earth and lives henceforward in union with the earth. Until the 8th or 9th century the Intelligence is gradually sinking down to the earth (green). Men begin to ascribe what they call knowledge, what they unfold in thoughts, to their

own, personal intelligence. Michael sees that what he has administered through aeons is now to be found within the souls of men on earth. And in the Michael-community it was realised: During our next rulership (—it was to begin in the last third of the 19th century—) when our impulses are again to pour through earthly civilisation, it is on the earth that we shall have to seek for the Intelligence which has descended from the heavens in order that in the hearts and in the souls of men it may be possible for us again to administer what through aeons we have administered from the Sun, from the cosmos.

And so at this time the Michael-community prepared itself to find again in the hearts of men that which had fallen from its grasp that which under the influence of the Mystery of Golgotha had also been taking the path, albeit a more gradual path, from the heavens to the earth. I will now indicate briefly how Michael and his hosts have striven in order that from this present Michael Age onwards they may once again take hold of the Intelligence that fell away from them in the heavens. Michael who has been striving from the Sun for those on earth who perceive the Spiritual in the cosmos, desires henceforward to establish his citadel in the hearts and in the souls of men on earth. This is to begin in our present age. Christianity is to be guided into a realm of deeper truths inasmuch as understanding of Christ as a Sun Being is to arise within humanity through Michael, the Sun Spirit who has always ruled over the Intelligence, who can now no longer administer it in the cosmos but desires in future time to administer it in and through the hearts of men.

In seeking to discover the origin and source of Intelligence in whatever form it may be revealed, men turn today to the human head, because having descended from the heavens to the earth, the Intelligence weaves within the soul and is made manifest inwardly through the head. It was not always so in times when men strove for Intelligence for the essence of the Intelligence revealing itself from the Cosmos In those earlier epochs men strove for Intelligence not by developing the faculties of the head but by seeking for the Inspirations conveyed to them by the cosmic forces

An example of how in olden time men sought the Cosmic Intelligence in a way in which it is no longer sought today is to be found when one stands, as we were able to do last Sunday, at that place in Tintagel which was once the site of King Arthur's Castle and where he with his twelve companions exercised a power of far-reaching significance for Europe.

From the accounts contained in historical documents it will not be easy to form a true conception of the tasks and the mission of King Arthur and his Round Table as it is called. But this becomes possible when one stands on the actual site of the castle and gazes with the eye of spirit over the stretch of sea which an intervening cliff seems to divide into two. There, in a comparatively short time, one can perceive a wonderful interplay between the light and the air, but also between the elemental spirits living in light and air. One can see spirit-beings streaming to the earth in the rays of the Sun, one can see them mirrored in the glittering raindrops, one can see that which comes under the sway of earthly gravity appearing in the air as the denser spirit-beings of the air. Again, when the rain ceases and the rays of the Sun stream through the clear air, one perceives the elemental spirits intermingling in quite a different way. There one witnesses how the Sun works in earthly substance—and seeing it all from a place such as this, one is filled with a kind of pagan “piety”—not Christian but pagan piety, which is something altogether different. Pagan piety is a surrender of heart and feeling to the manifold spiritual beings working in the processes of nature.

Amid the conditions of modern social life it is not, generally speaking, possible for men to give effect to the processes coming to expression in the play of nature-forces. These things can be penetrated only by Initiation-knowledge. But you must understand that every spiritual attainment is dependent upon some essential and fundamental condition.

In the example I gave this morning1Lecture X. True and False Paths in Spiritual Investigation. to illustrate how the knowledge of material phenomena must be furthered and extended, I spoke of the interweaving, self-harmonising karma of two human beings as a necessary factor. And in the days of King Arthur and those around him, special conditions were required in order that the spirituality so wondrously revealed and borne in by the sea might flow into their mission and their tasks.

This interplay between the sunlit air and the rippling, foam-crested waves continues to this day; over the sea and the rocky cliffs at this place, nature is still quick with spirit. But to take hold of the spirit-forces working there in nature would have been beyond the power of one individual alone. A group of men was necessary, one of whom felt himself as the representative of the Sun at the centre, and whose twelve companions were trained in such a way that in temperament, disposition and manner of acting, all of them together formed a twelve-fold whole—twelve individual men grouped as the Zodiacal constellations are grouped around the Sun. Such was the Round Table: King Arthur at the centre, surrounded by the Twelve, above each of whom a Zodiacal symbol was displayed, indicating the particular cosmic influence with which he was associated. Civilising forces went out from this place to Europe. It was here that King Arthur and his Twelve Knights drew into themselves from the Sun the strength wherewith to set forth on their mighty expeditions through Europe in order to battle with the wild, demonic powers of old still dominating large masses of the population, and drive them out of men. Under the guidance and direction of King Arthur, these Twelve were battling for outer civilisation.

To understand what the Twelve felt about themselves and their mission, it must be remembered that in olden time men did not claim a personal intelligence of their own. They did not say: I form my thoughts, my Intelligence-filled thoughts, myself. They experienced Intelligence as revealed Intelligence, and they sought for the revelations by forming themselves into a group like the one I have described, a group of twelve or thirteen. There they imbibed the Intelligence which enabled them to give direction and definition to the impulses needed for civilisation. And they too felt that their deeds were performed in the service of the Power known in Christian-Hebraic terminology as Michael. The whole configuration of this castle at Tintagel indicates that the Twelve under the direction of King Arthur were essentially a Michael-community, belonging to the age when Michael still administered the Cosmic Intelligence.

This was actually the community which worked longer than any other to ensure that Michael should retain his dominion over the Cosmic Intelligence. At the ruins of King Arthur's Castle today, the Akasha Chronicle still preserves the picture of the stones falling from those once mighty gates, and these falling stones become an image of the Cosmic Intelligence falling, sinking away from the hands of Michael into the minds and hearts of men.

At another place this Arthur-Michael stream has its polaric contrast: the Grail stream of which the Parsifal Legend tells.2See Rudolf Steiner, Christ and the Spiritual World, Leipzig, 28th December, 1913–2nd January, 1914. Rudolf Steiner Press, 1963. This other stream comes into being at a place where a more inward form of Christianity had taken refuge. In the Grail stream too we have the Twelve around the One but account is everywhere taken of the fact that the Intelligence, the Intelligence-filled thoughts, no longer flow as Revelations from the heavens to the earth; what has now streamed downward seems, in face of earthly thoughts, to be like the “pure fool”—Parsifal. It is realised here that the Intelligence must now be sought within the earthly sphere alone.

There in the North stands King Arthur's castle where men still turn to the Cosmic Intelligence and where they strive to instil the Intelligence belonging to the universe into civilisation on earth. And further to the South stands that other castle, the Grail castle, where the Intelligence is no longer drawn from the heavens but where it is realised that what is wisdom before men is foolishness before God and what is wisdom before God is foolishness before men. The impulse proceeding from this other castle in the South strives to penetrate the Intelligence that is now no longer the Cosmic Intelligence.

And so in olden times, lasting on into the age when the Mystery of Golgotha takes place over in Asia, we find in the Arthur stream the intense striving to ensure Michael's dominion over the Intelligence, and in the Grail stream going out from Spain, the striving in which account is taken of the fact that the Intelligence must in future be found on earth, since it no longer flows down from the heavens. The import of what I have just described to you breathes through the whole legend of the Grail.

Study of these two streams brings to light the great problem arising from the historical situation at that time. Men are confronted with the after-workings of the Arthur-principle and the after-workings of the Grail principle. The problem is: How does Michael himself, not a human being like Parsifal, but Michael himself, find the path leading from his Arthurian knights who strive to ensure his cosmic sovereignty, to his Grail knights who strive to prepare the way for him into the hearts and minds of men in order that therein he may again take hold of the Intelligence? And now the great problem of our own age takes definition: How shall the Michael Rulership bring about a deeper understanding of Christianity? Overwhelmingly this problem confronts us, marked by the contrast of the two castles: the one of which the ruins are to be seen to this day at Tintagel, and that other castle which will not easily be seen by human eyes, since in the spiritual realm it is surrounded, as it were, by a trackless forest, sixty leagues deep on every hand. Between these two castles looms the great question: How can Michael become the giver of the impulse which will lead to a deeper understanding of the truths of Christianity?

Now it would not be correct to say that the Knights of King Arthur were not battling for Christ and the real Christ Impulse. It was simply that they bore within them the urge to seek for Christ in the Sun and they would not abandon their conviction that the Sun is the fount of Christianity.

Hence their feeling that they were bringing the heavens down to the earth, that their Michael-battles were being waged for Christ Who works from the rays of the Sun. Within the Grail stream the Christ Impulse takes expression in a different way. Men are conscious that the Christ Impulse, having come down to the earth, must hence-forward be carried into effect through the hearts of men. The spiritual Essence of the Sun is now united with earthly evolution—such was their conviction.

I have told you in these lectures3See Lecture 4. True and False Paths in Spiritual Investigation. of individuals who in the 12th century taught and worked in the School of Chartres, where teachings still inspired by a lofty and sublime spirituality were given forth. I spoke of particular Teachers in the School of Chartres, among them Bernardus Sylvestris, Bernard of Chartres, Alanus ab Insulis—and there were others too, surrounded by a great company of pupils. Remembering what was especially characteristic of these Teachers of Chartres, we may say: In some measure they still preserved within them the old traditions of nature teeming with life and being as opposed to an abstract, material nature. And this was why there still hovered over the School of Chartres elements of that Sun-Christianity which the heroes of Arthur's Round Table, as Knights of Michael, had striven to implant as an impulse in the world.

In a remarkable way this School of Chartres stands midway between the Arthur-principle in the North and the Grail-principle in the South. And like shadows cast by the castle of King Arthur and the castle of the Grail, the super-sensible, invisible impulses made their way, not so much into the actual content of the teachings, as into the whole attitude and mood-of-soul of the pupils who gathered with glowing enthusiasm in the “lecture halls”—as we should say nowadays—of Chartres. These were times when in the Christianity presented by these Teachers of Chartres, Christ was conceived as the sublime Sun-Spirit Who had appeared in Jesus of Nazareth. So that when these men spoke of the Christ they saw His Impulse working on in earthly evolution in the sense of the Grail-conception, and at the same time they saw in Him the down-pouring Impulse of the Sun.

What is revealed to spiritual observation as the essence, the keynote of the teachings given forth at Chartres cannot be discovered today from surviving literary texts emanating from individual Teachers in the School of Chartres. To the modern student these writings seem scarcely more than glossaries of names. But in the brief sentences interspersed between the countless designations, names, definitions, those who read with spiritual penetration will discern the deep spirituality, the profound insight still possessed by these Teachers of Chartres.

Towards the end of the 12th century they passed through the gate of death into the spiritual world. And there they came together with that other stream which was also linked with the Michael Age of ancient time but in which full account was taken of the central truth of Christianity, namely that the Christ Impulse had come down from the heavens to the earth. In the spiritual world the Teachers of Chartres came into contact with all that the Aristotelians of old had been able, as a result of the expeditions of Alexander to Asia, to achieve in preparation for Christianity. But they also came together with Aristotle and Alexander themselves who were then in the spiritual world. The impulse of which these two individualities were the bearers could not take effect on the earth at that time because it counted upon an abandonment of the old, nature-inspired Christianity that had still been reflected in the teachings of Chartres where, as in Arthur's Round Table, a pagan Christianity, a pre-Christian Christianity prevailed. In the days of the Teachers of Chartres it was not possible for the Aristotelians, for those who had established and promoted Alexandrianism, to be on the earth. Their time came a little later, from the 13th century onwards.

But in the intervening period something of great significance took place. When the Teachers of Chartres and those who were associated with them had passed through the gate of death into the spiritual world, they came together with souls who were preparing to descend to the physical world and who were eventually led by their karma to the Order paramountly connected with the cultivation of knowledge in the Aristotelian form: the Order of the Dominicans. The men of Chartres came together with these other souls who were preparing to descend.

Using trivial words of modern speech, I will now describe what then transpired. At the turning-point of the 12th and 13th centuries, at the beginning of the 13th century, a kind of conference took place between the souls who had just arrived in the spiritual world and the souls who were about to descend. And the momentous agreement was reached, that Sun-Christianity as expressed, for example, in the Grail-principle and also in the teachings of Chartres, should now be united with Aristotelianism. Those who descended to earth became the founders of Scholasticism, the spiritual significance of which has never been truly assessed and in which, to begin with, men could only hope to win the day for their view of personal immortality in the Christian sense by advocating it in the most radical, extreme way. The Teachers of Chartres had laid less emphasis upon this principle of the personal immortality of man. They still inclined to the view that having passed through the gate of death the soul returns to the bosom of the Divinity. They spoke far less of personal, individual immortality than did the Dominican Schoolmen.

Many significant happenings were connected with what was here taking place. For example: When one of the Schoolmen had come down from the spiritual world to work for the spread of Christianity in an Aristotelian form, he had not, to begin with, been able fully to grasp the essential import of the Grail-principle. Karma had willed it so. And here lies the reason for the comparatively late appearance of Wolfram von Eschenbach's version of the Grail story. Another soul, who came down to the earth somewhat later than the first, brought with him the impulse that was necessary, and within the Dominican Order deliberations took place between an older and a younger Dominican as to how Aristotelianism might be united with the Christianity which, inspired more by nature and the workings of nature, had prevailed in King Arthur's Round Table.

Then the time came for those individualities who had been teachers in the Dominican Order also to return to the spiritual world. And now the great agreement was reached under the leadership of Michael himself who looking down to the Intelligence that was now on the earth gathered his own around him: spiritual beings belonging to the super-sensible worlds, a great host of elemental spirits, and many, many discarnate human souls who were longing for a renewal of Christianity. It was too early, yet, for this to take effect in the physical world. But a great and mighty super-sensible School was instituted under the leadership of Michael, embracing all those souls in whom the impulses of paganism still echoed on but who were nevertheless longing for Christianity, and those souls who had already lived on the earth during the early centuries of Christendom and who bore Christianity within them in the form it had then assumed. A Michael host gathered together in super-sensible realms, receiving in the spiritual world the teachings which had been imparted by the Michael Teachers in the old Alexander time, in the time of the Grail tradition and which had also taken effect in impulses like that going out from Arthur's Round Table.

Christian souls of every type and quality felt drawn to this Michael-community where, on the one side, deeply significant teaching was imparted concerning the ancient Mysteries and the spiritual impulses at work in olden days, while, on the other, a vista was opened into the future when' in the last third of the 19th century, Michael would again be working on earth and when all the teachings given forth in this heavenly School under Michael's own leadership in the 15th and 16th centuries, were to be carried down to the earth.

If you seek for the souls who gathered around this School of Michael at that time, preparing for the later period on earth, you will find among them very many who now feel the urge to come to the Anthroposophical Movement. Karma has so guided these souls that in the life between death and a new birth at that time they thronged around Michael, preparing to carry down a Cosmic Christianity again to the earth.

The fact that the karma of very many of the souls who have come into the Anthroposophical Movement with real sincerity is connected with these preliminary conditions and antecedents, makes the Anthroposophical Movement into the true Michael Movement, the Movement that is predestined to bring about the renewal of Christianity. This lies in the karma of the Anthroposophical Movement. It lies, too, in the karma of many individuals who have come with sincerity into that Movement. To carry into the world the Michael Impulse which in this way can be pictured in all its concrete reality, which is betokened by many a sign on the earth today and also comes strikingly to expression in the wonderful play of nature-forces around the ruins of Arthur's castle—this is the task of the Anthroposophical Movement in a very special sense. For in the course of the centuries the Michael Impulse must find its way into the world of men if civilisation is not to perish from the earth.

This was what I wanted to inscribe in your hearts in the lecture for which time was fortunately available today.

Dritter Vortrag

Ich möchte, da uns diese Stunde heute noch geschenkt wird, einiges Ergänzende sagen zu dem schon hier Vorgebrachten, einzelne Dinge besprechen, die gerade dadurch heute leichter verständlich sein werden, weil teils in den Vormittagsstunden, teils in den letzten Mitgliederversammlungen die vorbereitenden Dinge dazu ja schon berührt worden sind. Es wird sich darum handeln, daß einiges gesagt werden soll heute abend über Dinge, die mit dem Karma der Anthroposophischen Gesellschaft zusammenhängen. Weiter ausführen werde ich ja solche’Themata dann in den nächsten Tagen in London.

Aus den Vorträgen, die ich hier gehalten habe, geht ja hervor, daß wir für unsere Zeit die Auffassung haben müssen, daß die geistige Führung der Menschheit, der zivilisierten Menschheit, unter dem Impuls der Wesenheit steht, die wir mit dem christlichen Namen Michael bezeichnen. Diese besondere, wenn wir es so nennen wollen, Herrschaft des geistigen Lebens hat ja in den siebziger Jahren des vorigen Jahrhunderts begonnen. Ihr ging, wie ich schon gesagt habe, die GabrielHerrschaft voran. Nun möchte ich einiges bemerken über die Dinge, die mit dieser Michael-Herrschaft, wie sie heute ist, zusammenhängen.

Michael ist immer, wenn er innerhalb des irdischen Lebens seine Impulse durch die Entwickelung der Menschheit leitet, der Geist, der die Sonnenkräfte, die geistigen Sonnenkräfte, in die menschliche Entwickelung hineinleitet. Damit hängt ja zusammen, daß der Mensch, wie Sie heute morgen in den allgemeinen Vorträgen hören konnten, während seines Tagwachens in seinen physischen und in seinen Ätherleib diese Sonnenkräfte hereinbekommt.

Nun bedeutet die diesmalige Herrschaft Michaels, die eben vor kurzem begonnen hat und drei bis vier Jahrhunderte dauern wird, daß endgültig in den physischen und in den Ätherleib des Menschen die kosmischen Sonnenkräfte übergehen. Wir müssen uns da vor allen Dingen fragen: Was für Kräfte, was für Impulse stellen diese kosmischen Sonnenkräfte dar? Michael ist vorzugsweise Sonnengeist. Daher ist er auch derjenige Geist, der in unserer Epoche namentlich die Aufgabe hat, das Christentum nach seiner Wahrheit wesentlich zu vertiefen. Man kann geradezu sagen, Christus stamme aus der Sonne. Das Sonnenwesen Christi — ich habe das ja oftmals ausgeführt - hat durch den Leib des Jesus auf Erden gelebt, lebt in übersinnlicher Art seither mit der Menschenwelt zusammen. Die Menschheit muß aber erst allmählich reif werden, das ganze Mysterium, das mit dem Christus zusammenhängt, in die Seele aufzunehmen. Ein wesentlicher Teil dieser Vertiefung wird in unserem Michael-Zeitalter eintreten müssen.

Nun bestanden die Sonnenkräfte, wenn sie auf die Erde wirken, immer darinnen, daß sie zusammenhängen mit einer Impulswelle, die sich strömend in die Erdenzivilisation ergießt und die wir charakterisieren können als intellektuelle Welle. Denn alles, was der Mensch an Intellekt, was die Welt überhaupt an Intellekt hat, soweit unsere Welt in Betracht kommt, stammt von der Sonne. Die Sonne ist Quell alles Intellektuellen.

Wenn man diese Wahrheit ausspricht, so kann man vielleicht sogar bei den Menschen der Gegenwart einigen Gefühlswiderstand wahrnehmen, denn es ist ganz richtig, von der heutigen Form des Intellekts nicht allzuviel zu halten, Und gerade derjenige, der mit dem spirituellen Leben bekannt wird, kann allerdings von der heutigen Intellektualität nicht viel halten. Sie ist eine abstrakt logische; sie ist etwas, was den Menschen mit schattenhaften Begriffen und Ideen anfüllt, die weit, weit weggehen von der lebensvollen Wirklichkeit, die kalt und trocken und nüchtern sind gegenüber dem, was als warmes, leuchtendes Leben durch die Welt und durch den Menschen pulsiert.

Aber so ist es nur heute mit der Intelligenz, weil das, was wir heute als Intelligenz haben, im allgemeinen Bewußtsein der Menschheit eben erst im Anfang ist, wie wir ja auch erst im Anfang des Michael-Zeitalters stehen. Diese Intelligenz wird einmal etwas ganz, ganz anderes werden. Und wenn man sich eine Vorstellung davon machen will, was diese Intelligenz anderes noch werden kann im Lauf der Menschheitsentwickelung, dann muß man daran denken, wie noch Thomas Aquinas in der mittelalterlichen christlichen Philosophie jene Wesen, die die Sterne bewohnen, mit dem Namen Intelligenzen bezeichnet hat. Nicht wahr, wir mußten ja auch gegenüber der heutigen materialistischen Auffassung sagen, daß die Sterne Kolonien von geistigen Wesenheiten sind. Das berührt den heutigen Menschen fremdartig, weil er gar nicht daran denkt, daß er, wenn er zu den Sternen aufblickt, zu Wesen aufblickt, die mit seinem eigenen Leben etwas zu tun haben und die eben Sterne bewohnen, wie wir Menschen die Erde bewohnen.

Thomas von Aguino bezeichnet im 13., mittelalterlichen Jahrhundert die Wesen, welche Sternenbewohner sind, obwohl er bei einem Stern noch immer mehr von einem einheitlichen Wesen spricht, so, wie man von der Menschheit der Erde als einem einheitlichen Wesen sprechen würde, wenn man von einem fremden Stern aus sie betrachtete. Also obwohl er nicht immer sagt, daß einzelne Wesen oder viele Wesen, wie wir ja wissen, die Sterne bewohnen, so daß wir die Sterne als Kolonien im Kosmos anzusprechen haben, wenn er also auch von einem einheitlichen Sternwesen spricht, so redet er doch von den Intelligenzen der Sterne. Und damit steht dieser christliche Kirchenlehrer des Mittelalters, des 13. Jahrhunderts, noch innerhalb jener Tradition, die damals schon im Verglimmen, im Abnehmen, in der Dekadenz war, die aber deutlich noch darauf hinweist, daß alles, was wir mit dem Namen Intelligenz zusammenfassen, einmal etwas anderes war, als es heute ist.

Wenn wir in uralte Zeiten der Menschheitsentwickelung zurückgehen - ich habe darauf schon hingewiesen hier in den Vorträgen -, so ist es beim Menschen nicht so, daß er die Gedanken aus sich heraus erzeugt, daß er über die Dinge durch seine eigene Kraft denkt. Denn diese innere Seelenfähigkeit des Denkens, diese innere Aktivität des Gedankenbildens ist ja eigentlich erst vollständig entwickelt seit dem 15. Jahrhundert, seit dem Eindringen der Bewußtseinsseele in die Menschheitsentwickelung. Und wenn wir in vorchristliche Zeiten zurückgehen, in alte Zeiten, so finden wir überall, daß die Menschen noch gar nicht das Bewußtsein haben, daß sie selbst denken; sie fühlen gar nicht, daß sie Gedanken haben, sondern sie empfinden: die Gedanken werden ihnen aus den Dingen geoffenbart. Die Intelligenz ist kosmisch überall ausgebreitet. In den Dingen ist die Intelligenz. Und wie man die Farben wahrnimmt, so nimmt man auch den intelligenten Inhalt, den Gedankeninhalt der Dinge wahr. Die Welt ist voller Intelligenz. Allüberall ist intelligentes Wesen. Der Mensch hat diese Intelligenz sich gewissermafßen im Lauf der neuesten Zeit angeeignet. Man möchte sagen: Die Intelligenz ist etwas, was im weiten Weltenall ausgebreitet ist, wovon der Mensch in der neueren Zeit überall einen Tropfen bekommen hat. Das ist dann der Mensch.

Beim alten Menschen war es aber so, daß er in jedem Augenblick, wo er dachte, sich dessen bewußt war, daß die Gedanken ihm inspiriert werden, geoffenbart werden. Er schrieb nur dem Weltenall Intelligenz zu, nicht sich.

Nun war zu allen Zeiten der Verwalter dieser kosmischen Intelligenz, die sich von der Sonne wie das Licht ausstrahlend über die ganze Welt verbreitet, eben der Geist, der mit dem Namen Michael bezeichnet wird. Michael ist der Verwalter der kosmischen Intelligenz. In der neueren nachchristlichen Zeit trat aber nun die bedeutsame Tatsache auf, daß nach dem Mysterium von Golgatha allmählich Michael die Verwaltung über die Intelligenz entfiel, daß sie ihm verlorenging. Solange die Erde besteht, hat Michael die kosmische Intelligenz verwalter. Und wenn ein Mensch Gedanken, das heißt intelligenten Inhalt, in sich gefühlt hat, noch in der Alexander-, in der Aristoteleszeit, dann betrachtete er diese Gedanken nicht als seine eigenen Gedankeninhalte, sondern als die ihm durch die Michael-Macht geoffenbarten Gedanken, wenn man auch in jener heidnischen Zeit dieses Wesen anders bezeichnet hat. Aber dieser Gedankeninhalt entfiel Michael nach und nach. Und wir sehen, wenn wir in die geistige Welt hineinschauen, dieses Heruntersinken der Intelligenz von der Sonne auf die Erde, das sich vollzieht so bis gegen das 8. nachchristliche Jahrhundert hin. Im 9. nachchristlichen Jahrhundert, da beginnen die Menschen schon, ich möchte sagen, als Vorläufer der späteren, Eigenintelligenz zu entwickeln, da faßt die Intelligenz ihren Sitz in den Seelen der Menschen. Und Michael und die Seinen schauen hinunter von der Sonne auf die Erde und können sagen: Was wir durch Äonen verwaltet haben, das ist uns entsunken, das ist uns verlorengegangen, das ist hinuntergeströmt und ist jetzt in den Seelen der Menschen auf Erden.

Sehen Sie, meine lieben Freunde, das war die Stimmung innerhalb der Michael-Gemeinschaft auf der Sonne. Zur Alexanderzeit und Jahrhunderte vorher war es so, daß die vorige Herrschaft des Michael auf der Erde war. Zur Zeit des Mysteriums von Golgatha war aber Michael mit den Seinen in der Sonne. Und man sah nicht nur den Christus zur Zeit des Mysteriums von Golgatha die Sonne verlassen, die MichaelAnhänger sahen ja nicht so wie die Erdenbewohner den Christus herankommen, sie sahen ihn fortgehen von der Sonne, aber sie sahen zugleich, wie ihnen die Herrschaft über die Intelligenz allmählich entsank.

So haben wir im Lauf der neueren Menschheitsentwickelung die Erscheinung, daß vom Mysterium von Golgatha aus die Entwickelung so fortgeht: wenn hier die geistig-himmlische Linie ist und hier die irdische (s. Zeichnung: rot und gelb), daß der Christus zur Erde kommt und mit der Erde weiter sich entwickelt, daß das intelligente Wesen nach und nach auf die Erde heruntersteigt, bis ins 8., 9. Jahrhundert (grün). Da beginnen die Menschen in dem, was sie Wissenschaft nennen, was sie in ihren Gedanken entwickeln, sich die eigene individuelle, persönliche Intelligenz zuzuschreiben. Michael sieht unter den Menschen dasjenige, was er durch Äonen verwaltet hat. Und es ist die Stimmung innerhalb der Michael-Gemeinschaft: Wir müssen bei unserer nächsten Herrschaft - die eben im letzten Drittel des 19. Jahrhunderts beginnen sollte-, wenn wir wiederum die Erdenzivilisation mit unseren Impulsen durchdringen, wir müssen die Intelligenz, die vom Himmel auf die Erde gesunken ist, dort wieder finden, um in den Herzen, in den Seelen der Menschen das zu verwalten, was wir von der Sonne, vom Kosmos aus durch Äonen verwaltet haben.

Und so ist in dieser Zeit eine Vorbereitung, um in den Herzen der Menschen von seiten der Michael-Gemeinschaft das wiederzufinden, was verlorengegangen ist, was gewissermaßen unter dem Einfluß des Mysteriums von Golgatha auch den Zug, wenn auch einen längeren Zug, vom Himmel zur Erde durchgemacht hat. Wie das zuging im weiteren, daß Michael und die Seinen anstrebten, die ihnen im Sonnenhimmel entfallene Intelligenz in den Herzen der Menschen von diesem Michael-Zeitalter an, vom Ende der siebziger Jahre des vorigen Jahrhunderts beginnend, wieder zu erobern, das möchte ich Ihnen ein wenig beschreiben. Michael, der von der Sonne auf die Erde gestrebt hat für diejenigen, die Geistiges im Kosmos schauen, Michael will in der Zukunft seinen Sitz aufschlagen in den Herzen, in den Seelen der Erdenmenschen. Und das soll beginnen mit unserem Zeitalter, das soll sein eine Führung des Christentums in tiefere Wahrheiten hinein, indem Christus seine Erklärung, sein Einleben in die Menschheit als Sonnenwesen finden soll durch jenen Sonnengeist — Michael -, der das Begreifen, das heißt die Intelligenz, immer verwaltet hat, der es nun nicht im Kosmos verwalten kann, der es aber in Zukunft durch die Herzen der Menschen verwalten will.


Wenn man heute Intelligenz irgendwie geoffenbart findet und man will ihrem Ursprung nachgehen, dann wendet man sich an einen menschlichen Kopf, weil eben die Intelligenz sozusagen vom Himmel auf die Erde heruntergekommen ist, in der menschlichen Seele webt und innerlich durch das Haupt des Menschen, durch den Kopf, sich manifestiert. So war es nicht immer, wenn man Intelligenz anstrebte, wenn man das anstrebte, was als intelligentes Wesen aus dem Kosmos sich offenbarte. Auch der Mensch strebte nicht durch eine Entwickelung seines Hauptes in früheren Zeiten Intelligenz an, sondern er strebte sie dadurch an, daß er die Inspiration durch die Kräfte des Kosmos suchte.

Ich möchte sagen: Ein Beispiel davon, wie die kosmische Intelligenz gesucht werden kann, wie sie heute nicht mehr gesucht wird, wie sie aber einmal gesucht wurde, bekommt man, wenn man — wie es uns gegönnt war am letzten Sonntag — in Tintagel an der Stelle steht, wo einstmals das Artusschloß gestanden hat, wo Artus seine Herrschaft geführt hat, diese sonderbare, für die europäische Welt bedeutungsvolle Herrschaft geführt hat mit seinen zwölf Genossen.

Man wird aus dem, was geschichtliche Dokumente von Artus und seiner Tafelrunde berichten, nicht leicht eine Vorstellung bekommen davon, was eigentlich die Aufgaben dieser sogenannten Tafelrunde des Artus waren. Aber man bekommt eine Vorstellung, wenn man mit geistigem Auge an der Stelle steht, wo einstmals das Schloß stand, und hinschaut auf das Stück Meer, das man da überblickt, über jenes Stück Meer, das durch einen Gebirgskogel gewissermaßen in zwei Teile geteilt wird. Da kann man in verhältnismäßig kurzer Zeit ein wunderbares Spiel zwischen Licht und Luft, aber auch zwischen den Elementargeistern, die in Licht und Luft leben, schauen. Da kann man schauen, wie jene geistigen Wesenheiten, die bald mit den Sonnenstrahlen sich auf die Erde ergießen, bald im flimmernd-fließenden, flüssigen Regenguß sich spiegeln und ihre Spiegelung auffangen, dasjenige, was den Schwerkräften der Erde unterliegt, in der Luft sich in den dichteren Luftgeistern äußert. Da kann man wiederum schauen, wenn der Regen sich auslöscht und die Sonnenstrahlen die Luft in Reinheit durchdringen, wie auf eine ganz andere Art das Spiel der Elementargeister da stattfindet. Da schaut man Sonnenwirkung im Erdenstoffe. Da wird man, wenn man das schaut, vorzugsweise von einer solchen Stätte aus, wie diese ist, da wird man «heidnisch-andächtig» — man kann nicht recht «christlich-andächtig» werden, heidnisch andächtig ist etwas anderes als christliche Andacht -, man wird dann heidnisch andächtig. Heidnisch andächtig sein, heißt, sich hingeben mit Herz und Gemüt an die in den Naturwirkungen anwesenden geistigen Wesenheiten, zu der Vielheit der in den Naturwirkungen vorhandenen geistigen Wesenheiten.

Nun ist es im allgemeinen für den heutigen Menschen bei unseren sozialen Einrichtungen nicht möglich, diese Wirkungen, die sich da äußern im Spiel der Naturkräfte, festzuhalten. Nur der Initiationserkenntnis ist es möglich, in diese Dinge einzudringen. Aber sehen Sie, zu allem, was im Geist erlangt werden soll, gehört ja immer etwas, was Grundbedingung ist. Ich sagte Ihnen heute morgen bei jenem Beispiel, durch das ich zunächst erläutert habe, was für die Erkenntnis äußerer Erscheinungen getan werden muß, daß dazu das sich harmonisierende Karma von zwei Menschen wirken muß. Damit in der rechten Weise in die Mission, in die Aufgabe des Königs Artus und der Seinen damals das einfließen konnte, was sich vom Meer herein in einer so wunderbaren Weise geisterhaft offenbart, mußte damals etwas Besonderes da sein.

Es ist ja durchaus so, als ob heute noch das Spiel, das da über den sich kräuselnden, den schäumenden Meereswellen in der Luftregion, von der Sonne durchleuchtet und durchglänzt, sich fortsetzt, als ob heute noch die Natur über diesem Meer, an diesen Bergen überall geisterte. Aber um das festzuhalten, was da in den Naturwirkungen geisterte, dazu gehörte, daß nicht nur ein Mensch dies aufnahm. Dazu gehörte eine Gruppe von Menschen, eine Gruppe von Menschen, von der sich einer als Sonne im Mittelpunkt fühlte und dessen zwölf Genossen stets so erzogen wurden, daß sie in ihrem Temperament, in ihrem Gemüt, in ihrer ganzen Wesensäußerung zusammen eine Zwölfheit ergaben, die man ebenso gruppieren konnte als einzelne zwölf sich gruppierende Menschen, wie die Bilder des Tierkreises um die Sonne herum sind. So daß eben auch die Tafelrunde darin bestand, daß der König Artus den Mittelsitz hatte und ringsherum zwölf angeordnet waren, die da, wo sie sozusagen in ihrem Consilium zusammen waren, über sich die Tierkreisbilder als ihr Emblem, als ihr Signum hatten, um zu zeigen, unter welchem kosmischen Einfluß sie standen. Von diesem Ort ging sozusagen die Zivilisation Europas aus. Da nahmen der König Artus und seine Zwölf die Kräfte auf, die sie sich von der Sonne holten, um ihre mächtigen Züge durch das übrige Europa zu machen und dafür zu kämpfen, daß die alten wilden dämonischen Gewalten, die zum großen Teil damals noch in der europäischen Bevölkerung waren, aus den Menschen herauskamen. Für die äußere Zivilisation kämpften diese zwölf Genossen des Königs Artus, der sie dirigierte.

Wenn wir uns nun fragen: Wie fühlten sich denn die Zwölf? Als was fühlten sie sich? Ja, wir verstehen nur, was da war, wenn wir auf das zurückgehen, was ich eben ausgeführt habe. Intelligenz fühlten die Menschen nicht in sich. Sie sagten nicht: Ich erarbeite mir meine Gedanken, meine intelligenten Gedanken -, sondern sie empfanden die Intelligenz als das Geoffenbarte, und sie suchten die Offenbarungen durch eine solche Gruppe, wie ich sie geschildert habe, zu zwölf oder dreizehn. Da sogen sie die Intelligenz herein, jene Intelligenz, die sie brauchten, um die zivilisatorischen Impulse zu formen. Und sie fühlten sich wiederum unter der Macht, dieman mit dem christlich-hebräischen Namen Michael bezeichnen kann. Im eminentesten Sinn ist sogar — die ganze Konfiguration des Artusschlosses zeigt es — die Schar der Zwölf unter der Direktion des Königs Artus eine Michael-Schar, eine MichaelSchar aus jener Zeit, da Michael noch die kosmische Intelligenz verwaltete.

Ja, diese Schar ist es sogar, die am längsten daran festgehalten hat, Michael die Herrschaft über die kosmische Intelligenz zu sichern. Und man möchte sagen: Wenn man heute hinschaut auf die Trümmer des Artusschlosses, so fühlt man heute noch aus der Akasha-Chronik die Steine herunterfallen von dem, was einstmals mächtige Schloßpforten waren, und mit dem Herunterfallen dieser Steine fühlt man etwas wie ein irdisches Bild des Heruntersinkens der Intelligenz, der kosmischen Intelligenz aus den Händen des Michael in die Gemüter der Menschen hinein.

Und es ersteht neben der Artus-Michael-Strömung eine polarische Gegenströmung, diejenige Strömung an einem anderen Ort, an einem Ort, wohin sich mehr das innerliche Christentum dann geflüchtet hat, es entsteht die Gralsströmung. Jene Kommunikation besteht, die Sie angedeutet finden in der Parzivalsage. Die Gralsströmung findet sich. Auch in dieser Gralsströmung finden wir die zwölf um den einen, aber so, daß nun durchaus gerechnet wird damit, daß vom Himmel zur Erde herunterfließend sich nicht mehr offenbart die Intelligenz, Gedanken intelligenter Art, sondern daß jetzt dasjenige, was herunterfließt, sich wie der reine Tor - Parzival - ausnimmt gegenüber den Erdengedanken. Das fließt also nun vom Himmel herunter, und es wird auf die Intelligenz nur noch innerhalb des Irdischen gerechnet.

Da ist im Norden hier herüben die Artusburg, wo man noch denkt an die kosmische Intelligenz, wo man die Intelligenz des Weltenalls zur Zivilisation der Erde einführen will. Da ist die Gegenburg, die Gralsburg, wo vom Himmel herunter nicht mehr die Intelligenz geholt wird, wo voll gerechnet wird damit, daß, was weise ist vor den Menschen, töricht ist vor Gott, und was weise ist vor Gott, töricht ist vor den Menschen, Da fließt aus von dem Schloß mehr im Süden dasjenige, was sich mit Ausschluß der Intelligenz in die Intelligenz erst hineinergießen will.

Und so haben wir in älteren Zeiten, die aber noch durchaus hinaufgehen bis in jene Zeiten, wo da drüben in Asien das Mysterium von Golgatha stattfindet, da haben wir in jenen alten Zeiten, wenn wir uns so recht hineinstellen in das, was geschieht, auf der einen Seite die vehemente Bestrebung, Michaels kosmische Herrschaft über die Intelligenz zu sichern durch das Artusprinzip, auf der anderen Seite von Spanien aus in dem Gralsprinzip das Bestreben, damit zu rechnen, daß die Intelligenz in der Zukunft auf der Erde gefunden werden müsse, daß sie nicht mehr vom Himmel herunterströmt. Die ganze Gralssage atmet den Sinn dessen, was ich eben ausgesprochen habe.

So finden wir, indem wir diese zwei Strömungen gewissermaßen nebeneinanderstellen, das große Problem, das dazumal gestellt worden ist, ich möchte sagen, durch dasjenige, was historisch vor den Menschen stand: die Nachwirkungen des Artusprinzips und die Nachwirkungen des Gralsprinzips. Das Problem war gestellt: Wie findet nicht nur ein Mensch wie Parzival, sondern wie findet auch Michael selber den Weg von seinen Artusprotektoren, die seine kosmische Herrschaft sichern wollen, zu seinen Gralsprotektoren, die ihm den Weg hinein in die Herzen bahnen wollen, in die Gemüter der Menschen, damit er die Intelligenz dort ergreifen kann? Und es schließt sich uns zusammen, was wie das große Problem unseres Zeitalters vor uns steht: daß durch die Michael-Herrschaft das Christentum in einem tieferen Sinn erfaßt werden soll. Es steht gewaltig vor uns, dieses Problem, hingeschrieben durch die beiden Gegensätze, durch jene Burg, deren Trümmerhaufen in Tintagel zu sehen sind, und in jener Burg, die ja von den Menschen nicht so leicht gesehen wird, weil sie überall umrankt ist von dem Geisterwalde, der sechzig Meilen im Umkreis sich erstreckt. Zwischen diesen beiden Burgen aber steht die mächtige Frage: Wie wird Michael der neue Impulsgeber für die Erfassung der Wahrheit des Christentums?

Man kann nun nicht sagen, daß die Ritter des Königs Artus nicht gekämpft hätten für den Christus und im Sinn des Christus-Impulses. Nur lag in ihnen das, daß sie den Christus noch in der Sonne suchten und nicht aufhören wollten, das Christus-Wesen in der Sonne zu suchen. Darin gerade lag das, wodurch sie fühlten, daß sie den Himmel auf die Erde heruntertrugen, daß sie für den aus den Sonnenstrahlen wirkenden Christus ihre Michael-Kämpfe führten. Nun, in einem anderen Sinn wirkte dann innerhalb der Gralsströmung der Christus-Impuls mit vollem Bewußtsein, daß er heruntergekommen ist auf die Erde, daß er durch die Herzen der Menschen getragen werden muß, daß er gewissermaßen das Geistigste der Sonne mit der Erdenevolution der Menschen vereinigt.

Nun habe ich Ihnen in diesen Tagen von jenen Individualitäten, Persönlichkeiten, erzählen können, die im 12. Jahrhundert noch in der von hoher Geistigkeit getragenen Schule von Chartres gewirkt haben. Ich habe Sie aufmerksam gemacht auf solche Lehrer der Schule von Chartres wie Bernardus Sylvestris, Bernardus von Chartres selber, Alanus ab Insulis, auch einige andere haben da gelehrt und eine große Schülerschaft um sich gehabt. Wenn man all das nimmt, was ich Ihnen ja schon charakterisiert habe, was eigen war diesen großen Lehrern von Chartres, so kann man sagen: Sie hatten noch etwas in sich von den alten Traditionen einer lebendig wesenhaften Natur, nicht der abstrakten Natur, die materiell war. Und deshalb war es denn auch, daß, ich möchte sagen, über der Schule von Chartres noch etwas schwebte von jenem Sonnenchristentum, das als Michaels-Ritter die Helden der Artustafelrunde als Impulse in die Welt zu setzen versuchten.

Sie ist schon in einer merkwürdigen Weise, diese Schule von Chartres, ich möchte sagen, hereingestellt mitten zwischen dem nordischen Artusprinzip und dem südlichen Christus-Prinzip. Und wie die Schatten der Artusburg und die Schatten der Gralsburg wirken herein die übersinnlichen unsichtbaren Impulse, nicht so sehr in den Inhalt der Lehre als vielmehr in den ganzen Ton, in die Haltung, in die Stimmung dessen, was in den - wir würden heute sagen - Hörsälen von Chartres an begeisterten Schülern da war.

Es war das die Zeit, in der namentlich von diesen Lehrern von Chartres das Christentum durchaus so vertreten wurde, daß überall geschaut wurde in dem Christus, der in Jesus von Nazareth erschienen ist, das hohe Sonnenwesen. So daß man, ich möchte sagen, gleichzeitig, wenn man von dem Christus sprach, den nach dem Sinn der Gralsanschauung innerhalb der Erdenevolution fortwirkenden Christus-Impuls sah, aber auch zu gleicher Zeit das Herabströmen des Sonnenimpulses in dem Christus.

Was sich da der geistigen Anschauung darbot als der Grundton der Lehre von Chartres, das ist heute nicht aus den literarischen Dokumenten zu gewinnen, die von den einzelnen Lehrern der Schule von Chartres vorhanden sind. Die nehmen sich aus für den Menschen, der sie heute liest, fast wie Namenskataloge. Aber wer sie mit spiritueller Einsicht liest, der sieht gerade in den kurzen Zwischensätzen, die sich zwischen den so reichlich angeführten Namen und Terminologien und Definitionen finden, die tiefe Einsicht, die spirituelle Einsicht, die noch diese Lehrer von Chartres gehabt haben.

Nun gingen diese Lehrer von Chartres dann gegen das Ende des 12. Jahrhunderts hin durch die Pforte des Todes, in die geistige Welt hinein. Dort trafen sie zusammen mit jener anderen Strömung, die an die alte Michaels-Zeit anknüpfte, die aber durchaus mit dem vollen Christentum rechnete: mit dem vom Himmel auf die Erde herabgekommenen Christus-Impuls. In der geistigen Welt trafen sie zusammen mit alledem, was an Vorbereitung des Christentums in alter Zeit durch die Aristoteliker geleistet wurde dadurch, daß Alexander der Große seinen Zug nach Asien hinüber unternommen hatte, sie trafen zusammen aber auch mit dem ja damals in der geistigen Welt befindlichen Aristoteles und Alexander selber. Was diese beiden in sich trugen, konnte damals nicht auf der Erde sein, weil es durchaus mit einem Aufgeben des alten naturhaften Christentums rechnete, wie es noch im Abglanz in der Lehre von Chartres vorhanden war, wo eben noch so etwas nachwirkte wie, ich möchte sagen, das heidnische Christentum, das vorchristliche Christentum, das auch in der Artusrunde vorhanden war. In dieser Zeit, als die Lehrer von Chartres wirkten, konnten die Aristoteliker, konnten diejenigen, die den Alexandrinismus begründeten und förderten, nicht auf der Erde sein. Ihre Zeit kam etwas später, erst vom 13. Jahrhundert ab.

Aber da trat etwas sehr Bedeutsames ein in der Zwischenzeit. Diejenigen, die die Lehrer von Chartres waren, und alle, die dazu gehörten, trafen, als sie eben durch die Pforte des Todes gegangen waren, hinaufgestiegen waren in die geistige Welt, mit denen zusammen, die sich gerade vorbereiteten, um herunterzusteigen in die physische Welt, und die gemäß ihrem Karma dazumal hinstrebten zu dem vorzugsweise den Aristotelismus und Alexandrinismus pflegenden Dominikaner-Orden. Also mit diesen sich für den Herunterstieg vorbereitenden Seelen trafen sie zusammen. Und wenn ich in heutigen trivialen Worten sprechen soll, so möchte ich sagen, es fand da statt an der Zeitenwende zwischen dem 12. und 13. Jahrhundert, im Beginn des 13. Jahrhunderts, eine Art von Besprechung zwischen den eben angekommenen und den herabsteigenden Seelen. Und in dieser Besprechung fand statt der große Ausgleich, indem vereinigt werden sollte das Wirken des Sonnenchristentums, wie es sich zum Beispiel im Gralsprinzip offenbart, wie es sich dann auch in den Lehren von Chartres offenbart, mit dem, was Aristotelismus, Alexandrinismus war. Und die Alexandriner stiegen herunter, begründeten die heute gar nicht genug gewürdigte, geistig bedeutsame Scholastik, innerhalb der erkämpft wurde das, was nur zunächst durch das Radikale eines Extrems erkämpft werden konnte: die Einsicht in die persönliche Unsterblichkeit des Menschen im christlichen Sinn, diese persönliche Unsterblichkeit, die die Lehrer von Chartres nicht so streng vertraten. Sie hatten durchaus noch etwas von dem in sich, daß sie sagten: Die Seele, wenn sie durch die Pforte des Todes geht, kehrt in den Schoß des Göttlichen zurück. Sie sprachen viel weniger von der persönlichen, individuellen Unsterblichkeit als die Dominikanerlehrer, die Scholastiker.

Manches Bedeutsame spielte sich da ab. Es war zum Beispiel, als einer der Scholastikerlehrer heruntergestiegen war aus der geistigen Welt, um dann den Aristotelismus im christlichen Sinn zu verbreiten, bei diesem Herunterstieg — das Karma wollte es so — noch nicht möglich, im vollen Sinn dasjenige zu verbinden mit der Seele, was der tiefere Inhalt des Gralsprinzips war. Aus diesem Grunde wurde ja verhältnismäßig spät die Gralsauffassung des Wolfram von Eschenbach bewirkt. Da brachte ein anderer, der etwas später herunterkam, das Entsprechende nach, und innerhalb des Dominikaner-Ordens wurde von einem älteren und einem jüngeren Dominikaner verhandelt über die vollständige Verbindung zwischen dem Aristotelismus und demjenigen, was ein mehr naturhaftes Christentum war, wie es in der Artusrunde lebte. Dann gingen auch die Individualitäten, die da als die Dominikanerlehrer vorhanden waren, hinauf in die geistige Welt. Und jetzt fand jener reale große Ausgleich statt unter der Führung des Michael selber, der herunterschaute auf die nunmehr auf der Erde befindliche Intelligenz, der aber jetzt die Seinen sammelte: Geistige Wesenheiten der überirdischen Welt, eine große Summe von Elementarwesen und viele, viele entkörperte Menschenseelen, deren innerer seelischer Zug hindrängte nach einer Erneuerung des Christentums. Dies konnte noch nicht gleich stattfinden in der physischen Welt, weil die Zeiten dafür noch nicht erfüllt waren. Es wurde aber eine große mächtige, übersinnliche Weisheitsinstitution unter der Führung Michaels selber gegründet, wo alle die Seelen vereinigt wurden, die noch heidnisch angehaucht waren, die aber nach dem Christentum strebten, auch diejenigen Seelen, die in den ersten christlichen Jahrhunderten schon einmal mit dem Christentum im Herzen, wie es damals vorhanden war, auf der Erde gelebt hatten. Eine Michael-Schar bildete sich aus, die in übersinnlichen Regionen, in der geistigen Welt aufnahm jene Lehren der Michael-Lehrer aus der alten Alexanderzeit, der Michael-Lehrer aus der Zeit der Gralstradition, der Michael-Lehrer auch, wie sie in solchen Impulsen wie dem Artusimpuls vorhanden waren.

Alle möglichen christlich nuancierten Seelen fühlten sich hingezogen zu dieser Michaels-Gemeinschaft, wo auf der einen Seite bedeutsam gelehrt wurde über die alten Mysterien, über alle alten Impulse spiritueller Art, wo aber auch hingewiesen wurde auf die Zukunft, auf das letzte Drittel des 19. Jahrhunderts, wo Michael wieder auf der Erde wirken sollte und wo alle diejenigen Lehren, die nun, ich möchte sagen, in einer himmlischen Schule unter der Führung des Michael im 15.,16. Jahrhundert entwickelt wurden, heruntergetragen werden sollten auf die Erde.

Und wenn Sie nach denjenigen Seelen suchen, die sich dazumal um die Schule des Michael selber scharten, sich vorbereitend für die spätere Erdenzeit, dann finden Sie eben darunter zahlreiche Seelen, die heute den Drang fühlen nach der anthroposophischen Bewegung. Das Karma hat diese Seelen so geführt, daß sie sich dazumal in dem Leben zwischen dem Tod und einer neuen Geburt um Michael scharten, um wiederum ein kosmisches Christentum auf die Erde herunterzutragen.

Daß aber das Karma eine große Reihe von Seelen, diejenigen, die ehrlich in die anthroposophische Bewegung hereingekommen sind, mit solchen Antezedenzien, mit solchen Vorbedingungen vereinigt hat, das macht die anthroposophische Bewegung zu der eigentlichen MichaelBewegung, zu der das Christentum in Wahrheit erneuernden Bewegung. Das liegt im Karma der anthroposophischen Bewegung. Das liegt aber auch in dem Karma vieler einzelner von denen, die in ehrlicher Weise an die anthroposophische Bewegung herangekommen sind. Diesen Michael-Impuls, der auf diese Weise konkret erfaßt werden kann, der in zahlreichen Denkmälern hier auf der Erde zu verfolgen ist, der einem auch frappierend entgegentritt, wenn man die wunderbaren Naturspiele um das zerstörte Artusschloß sieht, diesen Michael-Impuls in die Welt zu tragen — denn er muß im Lauf der Jahrhunderte in die Zivilisation hineinkommen, wenn diese nicht ganz zugrunde gehen soll -, das ist insbesondere die Aufgabe der anthroposophischen Bewegung.

Dies wollte ich zunächst in diesem heutigen Vortrag, der uns geschenkt worden ist, noch einmal in Ihre Herzen einschreiben.

Third Lecture

Since this hour is still given to us today, I would like to say a few supplementary things to what has already been said here, to discuss individual things which will be easier to understand today precisely because the preparatory matters for this have already been touched upon, partly in the morning hours and partly in the last general meetings. It will be a matter of saying something this evening about things connected with the karma of the Anthroposophical Society. I will then elaborate on such topics in the next few days in London.

From the lectures I have given here, it is clear that for our time we must have the view that the spiritual guidance of mankind, of civilized mankind, is under the impulse of the Being whom we designate by the Christian name Michael. This special, if we want to call it that, dominion of spiritual life began in the seventies of the last century. As I have already said, it was preceded by the reign of Gabriel. Now I would like to make a few remarks about the things that are connected with this Michael reign as it is today.

Michael is always, when he leads his impulses within earthly life through the development of mankind, the spirit who leads the sun forces, the spiritual sun forces, into human development. This is connected with the fact that man, as you could hear this morning in the general lectures, receives these solar forces into his physical and etheric body during his day awakening.

Now the reign of Michael this time, which has just begun and will last three to four centuries, means that the cosmic solar forces will finally pass into the physical and etheric bodies of man. Above all, we must ask ourselves: What kind of forces, what kind of impulses do these cosmic solar forces represent? Michael is preferably a sun spirit. Therefore, he is also the spirit who, in our epoch, has the task of essentially deepening Christianity according to its truth. You could almost say that Christ comes from the sun. The solar being of Christ - as I have often explained - has lived on earth through the body of Jesus and has lived together with the human world in a supersensible way ever since. But humanity must first gradually mature to absorb the whole mystery connected with the Christ into the soul. An essential part of this deepening will have to occur in our Michael Age.

Now the solar forces, when they act upon the earth, have always consisted in the fact that they are connected with a wave of impulses which pours into the earth's civilization and which we can characterize as an intellectual wave. For all that man has of intellect, all that the world has of intellect in general, as far as our world is concerned, comes from the sun. The sun is the source of all intellect.

When this truth is spoken, one can perhaps even perceive some emotional resistance in people of the present day, for it is quite right not to think too much of the present form of intellect, and it is precisely those who become acquainted with the spiritual life who cannot think much of today's intellectuality. It is an abstract, logical one; it is something that fills people with shadowy concepts and ideas that are far, far removed from the living reality, that are cold and dry and sober in comparison to what pulsates through the world and through people as warm, luminous life.

But this is only the case today with intelligence, because what we have today as intelligence is only just beginning in the general consciousness of humanity, just as we are only at the beginning of the Michael Age. This intelligence will one day become something very, very different. And if you want to get a mental image of what else this intelligence can become in the course of human development, then you have to remember how Thomas Aquinas, in medieval Christian philosophy, called those beings who inhabit the stars intelligences. Not true, we also had to say, in contrast to today's materialistic view, that the stars are colonies of spiritual beings. This is strange to people today because they do not even think that when they look up at the stars they are looking up at beings who have something to do with their own lives and who inhabit the stars just as we humans inhabit the earth.

Thomas of Aguino in the 13th, medieval century refers to the beings who are star dwellers, although he still speaks of a star more as a unified being, just as one would speak of the humanity of the earth as a unified being if one were looking at it from a foreign star. So although he does not always say that individual beings or many beings, as we know, inhabit the stars, so that we have to speak of the stars as colonies in the cosmos, even if he speaks of a unified star being, he still speaks of the intelligences of the stars. And thus this Christian Doctor of the Church from the Middle Ages, the 13th century, still stands within that tradition which was already fading, declining, decadent at the time, but which still clearly indicates that everything we summarize with the name intelligence was once something different from what it is today.

If we go back to ancient times in the development of mankind - I have already referred to this here in the lectures - it is not the case with man that he generates thoughts out of himself, that he thinks about things through his own power. For this inner soul ability to think, this inner activity of forming thoughts, has actually only been fully developed since the 15th century, since the penetration of the consciousness soul into the development of mankind. And if we go back to pre-Christian times, to ancient times, we find everywhere that people do not yet have the consciousness that they themselves are thinking; they do not even feel that they have thoughts, but they sense: the thoughts are revealed to them from things. Intelligence is cosmically spread everywhere. Intelligence is in things. And just as one perceives the colors, one also perceives the intelligent content, the thought content of things. The world is full of intelligence. There is intelligence everywhere. To a certain extent, man has acquired this intelligence in the course of recent times. One might say that intelligence is something that is spread throughout the vast universe, of which man has received a drop everywhere in recent times. This then is the human being.

But with the old man it was so that at every moment when he thought he was aware that his thoughts were inspired, revealed to him. He only attributed intelligence to the universe, not to himself.

Now at all times the administrator of this cosmic intelligence, which radiates from the sun like light over the whole world, was precisely the spirit who is called Michael. Michael is the administrator of cosmic intelligence. In the more recent post-Christian era, however, the significant fact arose that after the Mystery of Golgotha, Michael gradually lost his stewardship over intelligence, that it was lost to him. As long as the earth exists, Michael has administered the cosmic intelligence. And when a man felt thoughts, that is, intelligent content, within himself, still in the time of Alexander, in the time of Aristotle, then he did not regard these thoughts as his own thought-contents, but as the thoughts revealed to him through the Michael-power, even if in those pagan times this being was called something else. But this thought content gradually fell away from Michael. And when we look into the spiritual world, we see this descent of intelligence from the sun to the earth, which took place until the 8th century AD. In the 9th century A.D., people begin to develop their own intelligence, I would like to say as a forerunner of the later, intelligence takes up residence in the souls of people. And Michael and his people look down from the sun to the earth and can say: What we have administered through the eons has sunk away from us, it has been lost to us, it has flowed down and is now in the souls of men on earth.

You see, my dear friends, that was the mood within the Michael community on the sun. At the time of Alexander and centuries before, it was such that the previous reign of Michael was on earth. At the time of the Mystery of Golgotha, however, Michael was in the sun with his own. And not only was the Christ seen to leave the sun at the time of the Mystery of Golgotha, the followers of Michael did not see the Christ approaching like the inhabitants of the earth, they saw him depart from the sun, but at the same time they saw how their dominion over the intelligence gradually slipped away from them.

So in the course of the more recent development of mankind we have the phenomenon that from the Mystery of Golgotha the development continues in this way: when here is the spiritual-celestial line and here the earthly (see drawing: red and yellow), that the Christ comes to earth and continues to develop with the earth, that the intelligent being gradually descends to earth, up to the 8th, 9th century (green). Then people begin to ascribe to themselves their own individual, personal intelligence in what they call science, what they develop in their thoughts. Michael sees among people that which he has administered through the eons. And it is the mood within the Michael community: we must, in our next reign - which should begin in the last third of the 19th century - when we again penetrate the earth civilization with our impulses, we must find the intelligence that has descended from heaven to earth there again, in order to administer in the hearts, in the souls of men that which we have administered from the sun, from the cosmos through aeons.

And so in this time there is a preparation to find again in the hearts of men on the part of the Michael Community that which has been lost, that which to a certain extent under the influence of the Mystery of Golgotha has also undergone the procession, albeit a longer procession, from heaven to earth. I would like to describe to you a little how Michael and his followers endeavored to recapture the intelligence that had been lost to them in the solar heavens in the hearts of men from this Michael Age onwards, beginning at the end of the seventies of the last century. Michael, who aspired from the sun to earth for those who see the spiritual in the cosmos, Michael wants to take up residence in the hearts, in the souls of people on earth in the future. And that is to begin with our age, that is to be a guidance of Christianity into deeper truths, in that Christ is to find his explanation, his living into humanity as a solar being through that solar spirit - Michael - who has always administered comprehension, that is intelligence, who now cannot administer it in the cosmos, but who wants to administer it in the future through the hearts of human beings.


If you somehow find intelligence revealed today and you want to trace its origin, then you turn to a human head, because intelligence has come down from heaven to earth, so to speak, weaves in the human soul and manifests itself inwardly through the head of man, through the head. This was not always the case when we strove for intelligence, when we strove for that which manifested itself as an intelligent being from the cosmos. Nor did man strive for intelligence through a development of his head in earlier times, but he strived for it by seeking inspiration through the forces of the cosmos.

I would like to say: An example of how cosmic intelligence can be sought, how it is no longer sought today, but how it was once sought, can be seen when one stands - as we were privileged to do last Sunday - in Tintagel on the site where Arthur's castle once stood, where Arthur led his reign, this strange reign, significant for the European world, with his twelve comrades.

It is not easy to get a mental image of what the tasks of this so-called Round Table of Arthur were from what historical documents tell us about Arthur and his Round Table. But you can get a mental image if you stand with your mind's eye at the place where the castle once stood and look out over the piece of sea that you are overlooking, over that piece of sea that is divided into two parts, so to speak, by a mountain range. In a relatively short time you can see a wonderful interplay between light and air, but also between the elemental spirits that live in light and air. There you can see how those spiritual entities, which sometimes pour down on the earth with the sun's rays, sometimes reflect themselves in the shimmering, flowing, liquid downpour and catch their reflection, that which is subject to the gravitational forces of the earth, expresses itself in the air in the denser air spirits. Then again, when the rain is extinguished and the sun's rays penetrate the air in purity, you can see how the play of the elemental spirits takes place in a completely different way. There you can see the effect of the sun in the earth's matter. When one sees this, preferably from such a place as this, one becomes “pagan and devout” - one cannot really become “Christian and devout”, pagan devotion is something different from Christian devotion - one then becomes pagan and devout. To be pagan devout means to devote oneself with heart and mind to the spiritual entities present in the effects of nature, to the multiplicity of spiritual entities present in the effects of nature.

Now it is generally not possible for people today, with our social institutions, to hold on to these effects that express themselves in the play of the forces of nature. Only initiatory knowledge is able to penetrate these things. But you see, everything that is to be attained in the spirit always involves something that is a basic condition. I told you this morning in the example by which I first explained what must be done for the knowledge of external phenomena that the harmonizing karma of two people must work for this. In order for the mission, the task of King Arthur and his people at that time to be able to incorporate in the right way that which is revealed from the sea in such a wonderful ghostly way, something special had to be there at that time.

It is indeed as if the play that continues today over the rippling, foaming waves of the sea in the region of the air, illuminated and shining through by the sun, as if nature were still ghostly today over this sea, on these mountains everywhere. But in order to hold on to what was being haunted by the effects of nature, it was necessary for more than just one person to record it. It required a group of men, a group of men, one of whom felt himself to be the sun at the center, and whose twelve comrades were always so educated that in their temperament, in their disposition, in their whole expression of being, together they formed a twelvefold group, which could be grouped as twelve individual men grouped together, just as the pictures of the zodiac are around the sun. Thus the Round Table also consisted of King Arthur sitting in the middle and twelve people arranged around him, who, where they were together in their consilium, so to speak, had the zodiacal pictures above them as their emblem, as their signum, to show under which cosmic influence they stood. It was from this place that the civilization of Europe began, so to speak. There King Arthur and his twelve took up the powers which they drew from the sun to make their mighty marches through the rest of Europe and to fight to bring out of the people the old wild demoniacal forces which were for the most part still in the European population at that time. These twelve comrades of King Arthur, who directed them, fought for external civilization.

If we now ask ourselves: How did the twelve feel? What did they feel like? Yes, we can only understand what was there if we go back to what I have just said. The people did not feel intelligence within themselves. They did not say: I am working out my thoughts, my intelligent thoughts - but they felt intelligence as that which was revealed, and they sought revelations through such a group as I have described, twelve or thirteen. Then they called in the intelligence, the intelligence they needed to form the impulses of civilization. And they in turn felt themselves to be under the power that can be described by the Christian-Hebrew name Michael. In the most eminent sense even - the whole configuration of the Arthurian castle shows it - the band of twelve under the direction of King Arthur is a Michael band, a Michael band from that time when Michael still administered the cosmic intelligence.

Yes, it is this band that has held on the longest to secure Michael's rule over the cosmic intelligence. And one would like to say: If one looks today at the ruins of Arthur's castle, one can still feel the stones falling from the Akashic Chronicle from what were once mighty castle gates, and with the falling of these stones one feels something like an earthly image of the descent of intelligence, of cosmic intelligence from the hands of Michael into the minds of men.

And alongside the Artus-Michael current a polar counter-current arises, the current in another place, in a place where inner Christianity has taken refuge, the Grail current arises. That communication exists which you find hinted at in the Parzival saga. The Grail current is found. In this Grail current we also find the twelve around the one, but in such a way that now it is definitely reckoned with that intelligence, thoughts of an intelligent kind, no longer reveal themselves flowing down from heaven to earth, but that now that which flows down is like the pure gate - Parzival - compared to the earth thoughts. So that now flows down from heaven, and intelligence is only counted on within the earthly.

There is the castle of Arthur over here in the north, where one still thinks of the cosmic intelligence, where one wants to introduce the intelligence of the universe to the civilization of the earth. There is the opposite castle, the Castle of the Holy Grail, where intelligence is no longer brought down from heaven, where it is fully reckoned that what is wise before men is foolish before God, and what is wise before God is foolish before men, There flows out from the castle more to the south that which first wants to pour itself into intelligence with the exclusion of intelligence.

And so we have in older times, which however still go up to those times, where over there in Asia the Mystery of Golgotha takes place, there we have in those old times, when we really place ourselves into what happens, on the one side the vehement striving, Michael's cosmic dominion over intelligence through the Arthurian principle, and on the other hand, from Spain in the Grail principle, the endeavor to reckon with the fact that intelligence would have to be found on earth in the future, that it would no longer stream down from heaven. The whole Grail legend breathes the meaning of what I have just said.

So, by placing these two currents side by side, so to speak, we find the great problem that was posed at that time, I would say, by that which historically stood before men: the after-effects of the Arthurian principle and the after-effects of the Grail principle. The problem was posed: How does not only a man like Parzival, but how does Michael himself find the way from his Arthurian protectors, who want to secure his cosmic dominion, to his Grail protectors, who want to pave the way for him into the hearts, into the minds of men, so that he can seize the intelligence there? And it comes together for us what stands before us as the great problem of our age: that through the Michael rule Christianity is to be grasped in a deeper sense. This problem stands mightily before us, written by the two opposites, by that castle whose ruins can be seen in Tintagel, and in that castle which is not so easily seen by men, because it is surrounded everywhere by the ghostly forest that stretches sixty miles around it. But between these two castles stands the mighty question: How does Michael become the new source of inspiration for grasping the truth of Christianity?

It cannot be said that the knights of King Arthur did not fight for the Christ and in the spirit of the Christ-impulse. It was just that they were still seeking the Christ in the sun and did not want to stop seeking the Christ-being in the sun. This was precisely what made them feel that they were carrying heaven down to earth, that they were fighting their Michael battles for the Christ working out of the sun's rays. Now, in another sense, the Christ impulse then worked within the Grail current with full awareness that it has come down to earth, that it must be carried through the hearts of men, that it unites, as it were, the most spiritual of the sun with the earth evolution of men.

Now I have been able to tell you in these days about those individualities, personalities, who were still active in the 12th century in the school of Chartres, which was borne by high spirituality. I have drawn your attention to such teachers of the School of Chartres as Bernardus Sylvestris, Bernardus of Chartres himself, Alanus ab Insulis, and a few others who taught there and had a large number of students around them. If you take everything that I have already characterized for you, which was characteristic of these great teachers of Chartres, you can say that they still had something of the old traditions of a living, essential nature in them, not the abstract nature that was material. And that is why, I would say, something of that solar Christianity still hovered over the school of Chartres, which the heroes of the Arthurian Round Table tried to bring into the world as the Knights of St. Michael.

In a strange way, this school of Chartres, I would like to say, is placed in the middle between the Nordic Arthurian principle and the southern Christ principle. And like the shadows of Arthur's Castle and the shadows of the Castle of the Holy Grail, the supernatural, invisible impulses are at work here, not so much in the content of the teaching as in the whole tone, in the attitude, in the mood of the enthusiastic students in the - we would say today - lecture halls of Chartres.

This was the time when Christianity was represented by these teachers of Chartres in such a way that the high solar being was seen everywhere in the Christ who appeared in Jesus of Nazareth. So that, I would like to say, when one spoke of the Christ, one simultaneously saw the Christ impulse continuing to work within the earth evolution according to the meaning of the Grail view, but also at the same time the flowing down of the sun impulse in the Christ.

What presented itself to the spiritual view as the basic tone of the teaching of Chartres cannot be gained today from the literary documents that are available from the individual teachers of the School of Chartres. To the person reading them today, they look almost like catalogs of names. But if you read them with spiritual insight, you will see the deep insight, the spiritual insight that these teachers of Chartres still had, especially in the short sentences that can be found between the names, terminology and definitions that are so abundantly cited.

Now, towards the end of the 12th century, these teachers of Chartres went through the gate of death, into the spiritual world. There they met up with that other current which followed on from the old Michael era, but which reckoned with full Christianity: with the Christ impulse that had come down to earth from heaven. In the spiritual world they coincided with all the preparations for Christianity made in ancient times by the Aristotelians through the fact that Alexander the Great had undertaken his journey across to Asia, but they also coincided with Aristotle and Alexander himself, who was then in the spiritual world. What these two carried within them could not have been on earth at that time, because it was definitely counting on the abandonment of the old natural Christianity, as it was still present in the teachings of Chartres, where something like, I would like to say, pagan Christianity, pre-Christian Christianity, which was also present in the Arthurian world, was still at work. At that time, when the teachers of Chartres were working, the Aristotelians, those who founded and promoted Alexandrianism, could not be on earth. Their time came a little later, from the 13th century onwards.

But something very significant occurred in the meantime. Those who were the teachers of Chartres, and all who belonged to them, when they had just passed through the gate of death and had ascended into the spiritual world, met with those who were just preparing to descend into the physical world, and who, according to their karma at that time, were striving towards the Dominican order, which preferably cultivated Aristotelianism and Alexandrinism. So they met with these souls who were preparing for their descent. And if I were to speak in today's trivial terms, I would say that at the turn of the 12th and 13th centuries, at the beginning of the 13th century, a kind of meeting took place between the souls who had just arrived and those who were descending. And in this meeting the great reconciliation took place, in which the work of solar Christianity, as revealed for example in the Grail principle, as it was then also revealed in the teachings of Chartres, was to be united with what was Aristotelianism, Alexandrianism. And the Alexandrians descended, founded the spiritually significant scholasticism that is not appreciated enough today, within which was fought for what could only initially be fought for through the radicalism of an extreme: the insight into the personal immortality of man in the Christian sense, this personal immortality that the teachers of Chartres did not advocate so strictly. They still had something of the saying that the soul, when it passes through the gate of death, returns to the bosom of the divine. They spoke much less of personal, individual immortality than the Dominican teachers, the scholastics.

Some significant things happened there. For example, when one of the Scholastic teachers had descended from the spiritual world in order to spread Aristotelianism in the Christian sense, it was not yet possible during this descent - karma wanted it that way - to connect with the soul in the full sense that which was the deeper content of the Grail principle. It was for this reason that Wolfram von Eschenbach's conception of the Grail came about relatively late. Then someone else, who came down a little later, brought the equivalent, and within the Dominican order an older and a younger Dominican negotiated the complete connection between Aristotelianism and that which was a more natural Christianity, as it lived in the Arthurian Circle. Then the individualities who were there as the Dominican teachers also went up into the spiritual world. And now that real great equalization took place under the guidance of Michael himself, who looked down on the intelligence now on earth, but who now gathered his own: spiritual beings of the supernatural world, a great sum of elemental beings and many, many disembodied human souls, whose inner soul urged for a renewal of Christianity. This could not yet take place immediately in the physical world because the times for it were not yet fulfilled. However, a great, powerful, supersensible institution of wisdom was founded under the leadership of Michael himself, where all the souls were united who were still pagan in nature but who were striving for Christianity, including those souls who had already lived on earth in the first Christian centuries with Christianity in their hearts, as it existed at that time. A Michael crowd formed, which absorbed in supersensible regions, in the spiritual world, those teachings of the Michael teachers from the old Alexander time, the Michael teachers from the time of the Grail tradition, the Michael teachers also, as they were present in such impulses as the Arthurian impulse.

All kinds of Christian nuanced souls felt drawn to this Michael community, where on the one hand there was significant teaching about the old mysteries, about all the old impulses of a spiritual nature, but where there was also reference to the future, to the last third of the 19th century, where Michael was to work on earth again and where all those teachings that were now, I would like to say, developed in a heavenly school under the guidance of Michael in the 15th, 16th century, were to be carried down to earth.

And if you look for those souls who gathered around the school of Michael himself at that time, preparing themselves for the later time on earth, then you will find numerous souls among them who today feel the urge for the anthroposophical movement. Karma has led these souls in such a way that they gathered around Michael in the life between death and a new birth in order to again carry a cosmic Christianity down to earth.

But the fact that karma has united a large number of souls, those who have honestly come into the anthroposophical movement, with such antecedents, with such preconditions, makes the anthroposophical movement the real Michael movement, the movement that renews Christianity in truth. This lies in the karma of the anthroposophical movement. But it also lies in the karma of many individuals who have approached the anthroposophical movement in an honest way. This Michael impulse, which can be grasped concretely in this way, which can be traced in numerous monuments here on earth, which is also strikingly apparent when one sees the wonderful nature plays around the destroyed Arthurian castle, to carry this Michael impulse into the world - for it must enter civilization in the course of the centuries if it is not to perish completely - that is the task of the anthroposophical movement in particular.

I wanted to inscribe this in your hearts once again in this lecture that has been given to us today.