The Forming of Destiny and Life after Death
GA 157a
16 November 1915, Berlin
1. Spiritual Life in the Physical World and Life Between Death and Rebirth
My dear Friends, This evening, when to my deep satisfaction I can be with you again after long absence, let our first thoughts be once more directed to the fields where the great events of our time are taking place, where so many of our dear brothers in humanity have to enter with their own life and soul for what the tasks of this time are requiring of them:
Spirits ever watchful, Guardians of their souls!
May your vibrations waft
To the Earth-men committed to your charge
Our souls' petitioning love:
That, united with your power,
Our prayer may helpfully radiate
To the souls it lovingly seeks.
And for those who in consequence of these events have already passed thro' the gate of death:
Spirits ever watchful, Guardians of their souls!
May your vibrations waft
To the Men of the Spheres committed to your charge
Our souls' petitioning love:
That, united with your power,
Our prayer may helpfully radiate
To the souls it lovingly seeks!
And that Spirit whom we are seeking thro' the deepening of Spiritual Science—the Spirit with whom we desire to unite, who descended on to the Earth and passed thro' earthly Death for the salvation of mankind, for the healing, progress and freedom of the Earth—may He be at your side in all your difficult duties.
N.B.—These Meditations were repeated at the beginning of each Lecture of this Course.
After a long absence I am able to be again in your midst, and I should like especially to devote the three lectures of this week to directing our gaze to a knowledge of the spiritual world, which stands more or less in close connection with those significant and deeply incisive events of our time which touch us so deeply. Our attention should not be turned immediately to the events themselves, but to what perhaps in everyone, in the feeling of us all, is connected with these events, like riddles, like uneasy questions concerning the destiny of man and the Cosmos. Our attention must be turned to this: to that wider destiny of the human soul, to which it is subject in that region of Cosmic existence to which the gaze of Spiritual Science is also directed, and which is not limited to earthly material existence. We are very much tempted at this time to knock at the door through which the human being passes when he forsakes this earthly body. We are urged towards that to which the human being can look up when he needs higher consolation, a deeper source of strength than can be obtained from material life. In how many ways does the voice of the spiritual world cry in these times to our hearts, even to those who do not wish to penetrate into the spiritual world, but whose hearts are nevertheless the windows into the spiritual world. How clearly and in how manifold a way does the spiritual world knock at these windows in our days. It is therefore fitting that we should once again bring together, from a special point of view, many things which we are able to know concerning this spiritual world.
One thing must be admitted by anyone who transcends the narrow prejudices of materialism (those prejudices which altogether deny the existence of a spiritual world). The view of those who do not deny the existence of a spiritual world but merely maintain that man can learn nothing of it by human means, goes somewhat further. If one does not stand at the standpoint of the absolute materialist, but has been so ripened by life as to admit at least the existence of a spiritual world—and this stage may soon be reached—even if such an one denied the possibility of knowing anything of it, he is not far from the thought that the knowledge which can be assimilated and the results which can be acquired through the ordinary material world, must indeed be trivial compared with that which spreads out as a wider kingdom in the spiritual world lying behind the physical-sensible. Certainly there are in our days narrow-minded materialistic souls who would enclose the entire human being in such narrow limits that man would have to be regarded as little higher than the animal, and belonging entirely to the animal-evolution. Certainly, there are such men. But they will become ever fewer; and, as we have often seen even Natural Science does not now admit these prejudices. And if one only begins by admitting that in the human being there is something which transcends external nature, very soon knowledge will arise of how trivial and limited is that which the physical-sensible world embraces, when compared with the greatness and might of the whole universe. And if we then study man himself, and become conscious of that which lives and can live in him, we cannot do otherwise than say: “No matter how far the spiritual world may extend, however great its kingdom, man is a kind of microcosm in himself.” However much a man may hold it as unproven; yet, he in his being, extends to the whole kingdom of the spiritual world. Although to sense-perception, those depths of the soul into which the deeper parts of the spiritual world extend may be concealed, they do extend into the human being. Man does not only consist of physical body, of a combination of external physical forces and substances, he is also a product of the entire Cosmos, a veritable microcosm. And much that we have striven and sought after, was intended to show, in detail, how far man is a product of the spiritual world, and how far in him are really to be sought, not only the forces of this earth, but we might also say those of all the heavens. If this thought is once grasped, it will be clear that by means of ordinary knowledge, we can really know but very little of man. Through ordinary science we know certain things concerning the laws of nature—which knowledge we acquire between birth and death. But even a very little penetration into spiritual science—not enough to be termed knowledge but enough to throw light upon life's riddles—will make us realise that, if we are to understand the human being, we must apply ourselves to something very different from the little external science that we can acquire between birth and death through the external means of the body, through the external senses and the understanding bound to the brain.
Now, let us unite this thought with another, with the thought which goes as a main thread through all our considerations: the thought of repeated earth-lives. That which probably most astonishes those who have busied themselves a little with our views, is this thought of repeated earth-lives, and that the time which we pass here between birth and death is relatively so short, compared with the time which we pass in the spiritual world between death and rebirth. From many different points of view we have stated that as a rule the time which man has to pass between death and rebirth is much, much longer than the relatively short time between birth and death here in physical life. There is a connection between the two thoughts which I have just expressed: that the little which we here acquire between birth and death, in the way of knowledge and fruits of life, stands to the spiritual wealth of the cosmos with which man is connected, in about the same ratio as the short time between birth and death stands to the longer time between death and rebirth. For in reality, it will occur to you from the many considerations which we have developed, that it is the task of the human soul between death and rebirth to assimilate quite other knowledge and forces from those we acquire here in our physical life.
Really, one can say, my dear friends, that when we enter physical earth-life, when we descend from the spiritual world and incarnate in the body given us by our ancestors through heredity, it is then our duty to have ready all the forces and all the fine ramifications of those forces which we require for the purpose of organising this body of ours. You know that our body, as we receive it, is born of our parents. But with this body our psychic-spiritual being unites, and this being has previously passed a long time in the spiritual world between death and rebirth. Could one see—if one were for a moment justified in making the hypothesis—what this external human being can become merely through the forces of heredity, through the forces peculiar to the substance bestowed on us by our parents, we should see that with these forces alone man cannot become what he is. Through these forces which represent our external physical existence, and into these substances and groups or organs, we must pour that which we as souls bring, into the form which we receive from our parents; and out of the abstract soul-substance we form the individual person we are.
As I have said: it is a foolish hypothesis, but we may make use of it, to make things clear: let us think for once what might have arisen if you all were merely born of your parents. Let us leave Karma out of consideration, and leave out of account the fact that we are, of course, born into definite families; and let us only regard physical heredity. Then you would all be alike as human beings. You would only have the general human physical character. That you are quite definite individuals, that so many individual beings sit here before us, rests on the fact that the general human form, even in its finest principles, is fashioned by the spiritual individuality which descends from the spiritual world and enters into that which is given by father and mother.
To that end, just as we must have fingers to grip an object in the physical world, just as we must perceive an object in order to grasp it—even as we must have the necessary organs and also must have learnt to grasp a thing—so must we have learnt to attach ourselves to all the different organs which form our body physically. We have all got ears, but we each hear in our own way. We all have eyes, but we see individually. For the external organs this is least perceptible; in the inner behaviour of man it is more striking. Thus we must insert our psychic-spiritual essence into all these quite general organs, and fashion them individually. We must learn to know the forces, the inner psychic-spiritual formations, so that what we receive through inheritance as ears, nose, eyes, brain, etc., we can fashion individually. That means that when at birth we enter the physical world we must have knowledge, and not only knowledge but practical possibilities of using it. This wonderful structure of man, how little do we really know of it through external science? We must inwardly learn the whole subtle structure of the brain, because we have to organise it inwardly. And all these spiritual-psychic processes, everything which makes it at all possible for us to be men in a human body between birth and death, all this we have to acquire for ourselves. Just as we have to acquire abilities for ourselves in life, so we must also acquire between death and rebirth the power of being men in physical life. We must keep this in view. It must be quite clear to us, and then we shall be able to form an idea of what we do not know of man through mere physical knowledge, but which we must realise through that other knowledge which we have to assimilate in a practical form between death and rebirth. But we know that what we shall assimilate between death and rebirth is built on to all that we have assimilated in earlier earth-lives. And so, just as in a certain sense our physical life here is regulated between birth and death, so too is our life between death and rebirth regulated. We enter physical life as one might say, half sleeping, dreaming, as small children. We cannot at once develop memory, this development we have first to learn. If, however, we examine things more closely, we find that during the time before we develop memory, certain relations to the outer world are acquired. The child first gropes and then learns to grasp. Thus certain things are acquired systematically. The child learns much during this time, much more than is usually supposed. Then again each single epoch of life so runs its course that the later epochs are based on the earlier ones. Not only is the structural formation of man built up here between birth and death—but his life also. And his life between death and rebirth is similarly ruled and regulated. In this respect—to become aware how regulated this life of ours is—we need only bring to mind one thing that we have long known.
We have often emphasised the fact that for our soul-life here in physical existence we need a conception of our Ego, which once acquired—in the second, third and fourth year of life, that time to which we can go back in memory—should never leave us. In a man with whom to a certain extent this Ego-thread is broken, a disturbance of the soul's equilibrium takes place. There are such people, as I have often mentioned, but they are really suffering from a severe psychic illness. It may happen that a man is suddenly torn away from the connection with his Ego. He does not remember his earlier life. He may, for instance, go to the station, and buy a ticket for some place or another. His reason functions quite normally. At the intervening stations he does everything necessary, in quite a reasonable way. But he does not remember anything that previously took place. His inner life only extends to the point when he resolved to buy a ticket and make the journey. He travels all over the world with his mind and reason quite in order. Then comes a moment when he knows: he is he. Till then, his soul-life was extinguished as regards memory. The understanding may be in order, although the memory is extinguished. The Ego is wrenched away and the man suffers from a severe psychic illness. I myself had an acquaintance who while occupying a relatively high post was suddenly seized by such an illness. He suddenly had the impulse to travel, after having forgotten everything about himself and who he was. He traveled, as one might say, blindly through the world from one place to the other, and found himself again in his native city, in an asylum for the homeless. Then it suddenly came back to him who he was. The interval was passed quite rationally, but was not connected with the rest of his life. The illness befell him a second time—but this time he committed suicide while still in that state of consciousness in which the memory was dissociated from the Ego.
Now, you see, just as in the life between birth and death the Ego must be a continuous thread, which may not at any time during daily life lose the possibility of remembering what has happened since that point in childhood to which one can go back, so must it be also in the life between death and rebirth. There, too, we must always have the possibility of preserving our Ego. Now this possibility is given us, and it is given us through the fact that the first days after death are passed in the manner we have often described. Immediately after death a man has before him, as in a mighty picture, the life which has just run its course. For several days he goes back over his whole past life, but always so that the whole life is there before him. It lies before him as in a great panorama. Now, of course, if observed more closely, it turns out that these days in their review of the past life, are as it were endowed with a certain power of observation. In a sense we regard the life during these days from the standpoint of the Ego. We see in particular everything in which our Ego was interested. We see the relations which we have with a person, but we see them in a connection with the results we ourselves obtained from them. Thus we do not regard things quite objectively, but see all that has borne fruit for ourselves. Man sees himself everywhere as the centre. And that is extremely necessary. For from these days when he thus sees everything which has been fruitful for him, arises that inner strength and force which he needs in the whole of his life between death and rebirth, in order there to be able firmly to retain the thought of the Ego. For we owe the power of being able to retain the Ego between death and rebirth to this vision of the last life; the power to do so really proceeds from this. And I must again specially emphasise this, even if I have said it before—the moment of death is of extraordinary significance. Death is something which most distinctly has two totally different aspects. Regarded here from the physical world it certainly has many sad aspects, many painful sides. But we really only see death here from the one side; after our death we see it from the other. It is then the most satisfying and most perfect occurrence that we can possibly experience, for there it is a living fact. Whereas here death is a proof of how frail and transitory the physical life of man is—when seen from the spiritual world it is actually a proof that the spirit continually wins the victory over everything non-spiritual, that the spirit is ever the life, the eternal, ever-unconquerable life.
Death is precisely the proof that in reality there is no death, that Death is a Maya, an illusion. Herein lies the great difference between the life from death to rebirth and our life here from birth to death. For as you know, no man can with ordinary physical means of cognition remember his own birth. No one can prove his own birth by personal experience, for he has not seen it himself. One's birth is something which cannot be seen by the human eye here in physical life. It lies before the time which we can remember. Birth is never included in our recollection. Death, however—and it is thereby distinguished from birth as regards its significance after death—death stands before our spiritual vision as the greatest, most significant, living and perfect event in our life between death and rebirth. For death is precisely the means by which we retain our Ego-consciousness after death. And just as little as it is possible in physical life to remember our birth, is it necessary and self-evident in the life between death and rebirth, that the great moment, when the spirit separates from the body should, during the whole time we pass in the spiritual world, always stand before our psychic-spiritual gaze. For from this death flows to us, in connection with what we have experienced here, the force we need to feel ourselves as ‘I.’ We might say: “If we were unable to die we could never experience a spiritual Ego. For we owe the possibility of experiencing a spiritual Ego to the fact that we can die physically.” Thus lie the facts for our Ego. The Ego is strengthened and invigorated through our experiencing those first days after death, in which we are still within our etheric body. Then the etheric body is laid aside and we experience—retrospectively—the preceding life; this we call the passage of the human soul through the soul-world; a life lasting longer than that shorter life which lasts only a few days, and which immediately follows physical death. Now, the opinion is very prevalent that a person who can look into the spiritual world immediately beholds everything. I have often corrected this. Nothing produces such humility as true insight into the spiritual world. For one may look for a very long time, and the investigation of the single facts of the spiritual world is really a long, long labour, and is accomplished by means of forces of the spiritual world. It is mere prejudice to believe that anyone who looks into the spiritual world can immediately give information about everything. Just as here in the physical world things are investigated gradually, in the course of time, so is it in the spiritual life; things have to be investigated little by little. And now I should like to touch on a point which must appear important to some of those here present: that is, the absolute agreement of the different spiritual facts as they gradually come to light, as they continually arise in new forms. Even to those who do not yet see into the spiritual world, this may be a proof of the truth of that for which a true and genuine investigation is striving. In my Occult Science I have given, from different standpoints, a definite time to the periods of the life between death and rebirth. I should now like to bring forward yet another standpoint which I did not quote in my Occult Science for a simple reason, which I will not conceal from you, so that you may see that Spiritual Science is striven for here in an honourable and upright manner: for the simple reason that at that time I did not yet know these facts myself, but was only able to discover them later. There is a certain connection between the spiritual life which can be developed here on the physical plane, and the spiritual life between death and rebirth. You already know that we pass our physical life here in waking and sleeping. On the one hand we have a full consciousness in the waking state, and then for the normal man an unconscious condition sets in, in the time between sleeping and waking.
Now you know also from what has been set forth in Knowledge of the Higher Worlds and its Attainment that this sleep-life may be lit up by consciousness, that it is possible to look into that which happens between falling asleep and waking up. If we can attain to this, and learn more and more of the life which man passes here in sleep, we really learn to know an amazing kingdom of Life. In this unconscious condition between falling asleep and waking up a vast and amazing kingdom of human life flows by unperceived by the normal human existence. A great deal goes on then. And that which very soon strikes us, in this sleep-life, is that it is much more active than the life between waking and sleeping. During sleep we are within our Ego and astral body, and have as it were, our physical body and etheric body outside us. Now, even this external life is an active one, with many people a very active life indeed. It appears so active to us because we do not take all the inactivities which exist in this outer life much into consideration. Really, if everything in this external life had to proceed from our own initiative, we should be greatly astonished how differently everything would take place.
Just consider—you get up every morning, you hardly form the resolution to get up, you do it from habit; and you do not really come to a closer knowledge of what it signifies to be so connected with the whole Cosmic-ordering, that you pass your life at definite times in one or other of these two conditions of waking and sleeping, and have to regulate your life accordingly. How many people think of this? It all goes on as a matter of course. And now try for once, to consider how much goes on in this way, so that in a sense, we go through life like automata. You will then come to recognise that there is a great deal more inactivity in the life between waking and falling asleep, but great activity in the life between sleeping and waking. There a complete and tremendous activity takes place. It is an interesting fact that people who are relatively indolent in external life between waking and sleeping are just the busiest between sleeping and waking. Man is then extremely active, only he knows nothing of this in ordinary life. If we examine more closely into that which drives the soul, that is, the Ego and astral body, we find that this activity is really intimately connected with the whole existence of man, though in our journey through life we consciously take but very little of it with us. We do not work upon all our life as it approaches us externally. I should like to give an apt instance of this. Just consider, you are now hearing this lecture, which lasts perhaps one hour. Really, without wishing to offend any of the dear friends sitting here, I may say: it would be possible to hear infinitely more in the words of this lecture than the different friends sitting here, are hearing. Indeed, it would be possible to gather much more from all I am saying, than I know myself. But what I mean is this—and I am only saying this in illustration of the above—you will go home presently, go to bed and sleep, and wake up tomorrow morning. And in the time between your sleeping and waking—quite unconsciously, of course, as regards the normal consciousness—you will work upon much of what you are now in a position to hear. You will work upon it a great deal in your next sleep and perhaps also during the following nights. One sees souls labouring between sleeping and waking in quite a different fashion at what they have absorbed. And even if it occurred that someone had listened very inattentively, and had merely been somewhat receptive, yet through that receptivity he would draw into his soul the spiritual powers and impulse in the lecture. And that would be worked upon during sleep, and transformed into what we require not only for the rest of life up till death, but beyond death. Thus we work over our whole life as it transpires by day between our waking and sleeping. Everything we experience by day we work upon during the night. Thus as it were, we learn lessons which we need for all the rest of our life here, and beyond death into the next incarnation. When we are asleep, we are our own prophetic transmuters of our life. This sleep-life is full of tremendously deep riddles, for it is much more deeply connected with what we experience, than is the external consciousness, and we work at it all from the standpoint of its fruitfulness for the following life. What we can make of ourselves through what we have experienced, is the object of our labour in the time between sleeping and waking. Whether we become stronger and more powerful in our soul, or perhaps have to reproach ourselves, we labour at all our experiences so that they become life-fruit. You see from this, that the life between sleeping and waking is really enormously significant, and that it goes deeply into the whole riddle of man.
Now, perhaps one day the spiritual investigator forms the intention—we may even say the purpose—of comparing this life of sleep with another, a super-sensible life, and he decides to compare it with those days which take their course during the life of Kamaloka. And note here, though this can only be seen by clairvoyance, that whereas here in life we can recollect all that we have experienced in our day-life, after death—after the time of the life-tableau is past—we obtain a memory of all our nights. This is an important secret which is revealed to us. We remember all our night-life. This review so presents itself that we really live backwards starting from the last night passed here in life, passing to the preceding one, and so on. In this way we experience the whole life again backwards, but as seen from the night-aspect. One experiences again in this retrospective recollection, what one has unconsciously thought and investigated. One really goes back through one's life, but not from the day-aspect. How long does that last approximately? Now remember that we sleep away about one-third of our life. As you know, there are people who naturally sleep much more. But on an average we sleep away a third of our life. Therefore this retrospect also lasts about one-third of our earth-life, because we experience the nights. Just think how wonderfully that agrees with the other points of view which have been elucidated. We have always said that the life in Kamaloka lasts about one-third of one's life. And when we take the above into consideration, we again see that it must be a third. Thus do these things harmonise. The details always fit in. That is the wonderful thing in spiritual investigation—one learns to know a fact, and when that is settled, one presently learns it again from another aspect.
It is always like the case of a man who climbs a hill from which he sees something first from one side and then from another side, yet the essential points are always the same. So that one can say: Here in earth-life between birth and death our life is so experienced that it is always torn away from us, it is always broken off by the night-life; and we only remember the day-life, the things we have experienced by day. But in the night-life we do more than remember them; we work upon them and transform them, as stated above. And what we cannot remember now, we remember during the Kamaloka life. That is an important connection, and from this you will grasp many things which perhaps could not be understood otherwise. Just consider, especially in our present time, how many relatively young men pass through the gates of death. I have already stated from many points of view the significance this has for the collective life of humanity. But let us first look at the two divisions which we have just characterised. (We will come on to other things in the course of these lectures.) Let us first consider the life in the etheric body which lasts only a few days, during which a man has his life tableau before him, and then we shall consider the life of the soul in the soul-world. In going through the previous life from the night-side we shall easily be able to see why the spiritual investigator must say that even these two periods of life between death and rebirth are different for a man who has gone relatively early through the gates of death; one who dies at a later age has different experiences. This concerns us very closely because so many now are dying at a relatively early age. You see it is really the case that the separate sections which I have distinguished are of great significance for our life here in the physical world. I have given these divisions of life thus: the first extends to the seventh year, to the change in dentition; the next to the fourteenth year, the time of puberty; another extends to the twenty-first year and so on; in periods of seven years. And if you earnestly consider what lies in these phases of life you will see that the thirty-fifth year becomes an important epoch. Till then we are, as it were, in a state of preparation, whereas later we have ended the preparatory stage and built up our life on the basis of what has been prepared up to the thirty-fifth year. This thirty-fifth year of life is of very great significance. Till then, not merely the bodily growth continues, but also the growth of the soul; for the soul of a man really grows.
Now, it must decidedly be emphasised that much of the ripened condition of life can only be attained after the thirty-fifth year. And if we consider this thirty-fifth year of life from another point of view, it will appear still more significant to us. You see, if we place these seven-year epochs of life before the soul, we first have the building up of the physical body to the age of seven, and the building up of the etheric body to the age of fourteen. From the fourteenth to the twenty-first year there is fashioned and organised what we call the astral body; then the sentient soul to the age of twenty-eight, the rational or intellectual soul to the age of thirty-five, and the self-conscious or spiritual soul to the age of forty-two. And then we come to spirit-self, which is a kind of evolving back again to the astral body, and so on. The further epochs of life do not progress in periods of seven years, but irregularly, for they will only evolve to regularity in the future. Thus, unless thwarted by the errors of education, a certain regularity is followed up to the thirty-fifth year. Now, we may be especially struck by the deeper significance of the entire development of life, when we observe people who die at these different epochs of life. Suppose—merely as an instance—that we follow the soul of an eleven, twelve, or thirteen-year old boy or girl, who goes through the gate of death at that early age. In accordance with what I have already described, it follows in such a case that the etheric body—which would theoretically have been able to care for the full life of the child—has these unused forces still within it. In general it happens, that man during the whole life between birth and death really prepares himself for death: he really makes himself ready for death. In reality our whole life is a preparation for death, in so far that we continually labour at the destruction of the body. If we could not destroy it we could never attain to perfection. For we purchase the perfection, as it were, with the destruction of the outer physical body. Now, when a boy of thirteen goes through the gate of death, he does not accomplish the long work of destruction, which he might have been able to do. He does not fulfil everything he might have done. This expresses itself in a noteworthy manner. If we follow such a soul, we find it in the spiritual world, after a certain time, a relatively short time, between death and rebirth, in what I might call a most noteworthy society. We find it among those souls who are so preparing themselves for their next life that they will soon have again to descend to the earth. These are the souls who will soon incarnate. Among these then, live such souls as pass through the gate of death at the age of eleven, twelve, or thirteen. They are placed among them. And if we look more closely into these connections it turns out, strange to say, that these souls who are soon to enter their earth-life, require that which these other souls can bring up to them from the earth to give them the strength they on their part require to enter a physical body. Thus the souls of the young form a strong help to those others who must soon descend to the earth. Young children who are quite normal, who have no prominent spiritual life, but are merely intelligent, are normally able to give certain assistance, which can no longer be given by one who dies in later years. He, too, has his task, each one must accommodate himself to his own Karma, and we should not on this account wish to die at this or that age, for we all die at the age permitted by our Karma. Thus the help a soul can offer to the souls awaiting incarnation cannot be given by one who dies in later years. That rests in the fact that during the first half of life a soul stands nearer to the entire spiritual world, in one sense, than in the second half of life. Yet in another sense this is not the case. But in a certain sense we do stand nearer to the spiritual world in the first half of our life. In fact the whole life so runs its course that the longer we live in the physical body the further we are from the spiritual world. A child of one year still stands very close to the spiritual world. When it forsakes the physical plane it is soon in the spiritual world. This is the case up to the fourteenth year; till then a child so lives in the physical body that it can easily enter the world of souls who are seeking an early incarnation. This is connected with the fact that even in the tableau, one who dies very young has different experiences from those of one who dies in later life.
Thus the thirty-fifth year of life is an important boundary. If a man dies before the thirty-fifth year, he first experiences the life-tableau, and then goes backwards through the night-life. But during this entire experience of the spiritual world, he sees—as it were ‘through a glass darkly,’ as if he were seeing it through the life-pictures—that spiritual world which he forsook on being born. His perspective still extends to the spiritual world. But if he has passed this thirty-fifth year then it is quite different. He no longer beholds that wherein he himself was before birth. That is one of those things which particularly strikes one now, when so many die young. For this looking back at the spiritual world still retains a certain significance up to the thirty-fifth year. Of course after the fourteenth, fifteenth, or sixteenth year it is no longer such a direct vision, but even from then to the thirty-fifth year, if death occurs, it is as if the spiritual life was everywhere reflected in the retrospective life-picture. If one dies quite in infancy, there is naturally not much experience of life to go back over—one can almost immediately look into the spiritual world. If a child dies at the age of thirteen, he has a retrospective tableau, but immediately behind that lies the spiritual world. He can still see the spiritual world clearly. If death takes place later, the spiritual world is not perceived so distinctly, but it is contained in what one sees as one's own life. Up to the thirty-fifth year we are still connected with that spiritual world from which we descended. One who dies before the age of thirty-five, experiences even in the first period of the life in which he sees the life-picture, and then in the retrospective journey through the soul-world, that he really is in a kind of homeland which he forsook at birth. He has the direct feeling of coming back home into the world from which he descended. This is of tremendous importance. For each one who dies thus is, in one sense, as you see, immediately placed more easily into the spiritual world than one who dies later. Out of his post-mortem survey he carries far more spirituality into his next life between birth and death. And those young men who die in such numbers in our present age, will from this standpoint become important bearers of spiritual truths and spiritual knowledge when they descend to earth again in their next incarnation. Thus we see that the terrible suffering which is poured over the world is nevertheless necessary for the course of existence as a whole. For the blood which now flows will be the symbol of a certain refreshing of spiritual life at a particular time in the future, and this is necessary for the whole evolution of humanity. Then will the souls, who now go through the gate of death so early, descend again; but most of them will descend different from what they would have been had they reached the limits of life in material existence, and then died. It is Cosmic Wisdom which now calls away a number of souls, that they may be allowed to perceive even in their retrospective tableau and experiences, deep spiritual secrets connected with the earth. That, too, is Cosmic Wisdom, for these souls are thus filled with that which they will behold in stronger form when they come to see it again; they will have been strengthened by the shorter earth life which they have undergone. That is the true Wisdom of the Cosmos. And so we must say that much of what rightly gives us pain when we are only able to regard it from the standpoint of earthly existence, shows us its redeeming side when we observe it from the standpoint of spiritual vision. Thus it is with the whole of life. Certainly, my dear friends, earthly pain cannot be at present avoided through such a consideration. It must be experienced. For that is the very condition for its compensation. If we did not experience it in the physical world it could never be compensated. But although we must suffer many things in the physical world, there are nevertheless moments in which we can place ourselves at the standpoint of the spiritual. Then we shall recognise that much of that which must appear to us as painful from a lower point of view is a tribute which must be offered to the higher spiritual worlds and the wise beings therein, in order that the evolution of the whole Cosmos and of human existence may go forward not in a one sided manner, but in every direction. The expiation for much suffering must be achieved, and to this end the suffering itself must first be endured. Spiritual science cannot indeed spare us that, but it can teach us to lay it on the altar of existence, to seek the compensation, and to recognise the Wisdom of the Cosmos, in spite of all the pain which for higher ends it must cause. This is what spiritual science can give us as a precious unction for the whole human existence. Thus from this standpoint also and right from the feelings which spiritual science can arouse in us, let us regard the powerful events of our time, and say again that which we have often repeated here:—
From the fighters' courage,
From the blood of battles,
From the mourners' suffering,
From the people's sacrifice,
There will ripen fruits of Spirit
If with consciousness the soul
Turns her thought to Spirit Realms.
Erster Vortrag
Während der Kriegsjahre wurden von Rudolf Steiner vor jeden von ihm innerhalb der Anthroposophischen Gesellschaft gehaltenen Vortrag in den vom Kriege betroffenen Ländern die folgenden Gedenkworte gesprochen:
Wir gedenken, meine lieben Freunde, der schützenden Geister derer, die draußen stehen auf den großen Feldern der Ereignisse der Gegenwart:
Geister Eurer Seelen, wirkende Wächter,
Eure Schwingen mögen bringen
Unserer Seelen bittende Liebe
Eurer Hut vertrauten Erdenmenschen,
Daß, mit Eurer Macht geeint,
Unsre Bitte helfend strahle
Den Seelen, die sie liebend sucht.
Und zu den schützenden Geistern derer uns wendend, die infolge dieser Leidensereignisse schon durch des Todes Pforte gegangen sind:
Geister Eurer Seelen, wirkende Wächter,
Eure Schwingen mögen bringen
Unserer Seelen bittende Liebe
Eurer Hut vertrauten Sphärenmenschen,
Daß, mit Eurer Macht geeint,
Unsre Bitte helfend strahle
Den Seelen, die sie liebend sucht.
Und der Geist, dem wir uns zu nahen suchen durch unsere Geisteswissenschaft seit Jahren, der Geist, der zu der Erde Heil und zu der Menschheit Freiheit und Fortschritt durch das Mysterium von Golgatha gegangen ist, Er sei mit Euch und Euren schweren Pflichten!
Da ich nach langer Abwesenheit zu meiner tiefen Befriedigung wiederum in Ihrer Mitte sein darf, so möchte ich die drei Vorträge dieser Woche vor allen Dingen dazu verwenden, unsere Blicke hinzuwenden auf Erkenntnisse der geistigen Welt, die in einem näheren oder entfernteren Zusammenhang stehen mit demjenigen, was uns ja aus den bedeutsamen, tief einschneidenden Zeitereignissen so sehr beschäftigen und berühren muß. Nicht zunächst auf diese Zeitereignisse selber soll der Blick geworfen werden, sondern auf dasjenige, was wohl in allen Seelen, in allen Empfindungen mit diesen Zeitereignissen wie Rätselfragen, wie bange Fragen an Menschen- und Weltenschicksal zusammenhängt: Auf jenes weitere Schicksal der Menschenseele, welchem die Menschenseele unterliegt auf demjenigen Felde des Weltendaseins, dem der Blick der Geisteswissenschaft ja auch zugewendet ist und das sich nicht erschöpft mit dem irdischen, dem materiellen Dasein, darauf soll der Blick gewendet werden. So nahe, meine lieben Freunde, liegt es uns ja in dieser Zeit, anzuklopfen an die Pforte, durch die das Menschenwesen dringt, wenn es diesen irdischen Leib in irgendeiner Form verläßt. Zu dem hin drängt es uns, zu dem das Menschenwesen aufblicken kann, wenn es einen höheren Trost, eine tiefere Kraftquelle braucht, als der Trost sein kann, der nur vom materiellen Leben kommt, als die Kraftquellen sein können, die nur innerhalb des materiellen Lebens liegen. Wie tausendfältig klopft die Stimme der geistigen Welt in unserer Zeit an unsere Herzen, auch solcher Menschen, die ja oftmals mit ihren Herzen nicht eindringen wollen in die geistige Welt, obwohl diese Herzen auch für jene Menschen die Fenster sind in die geistige Welt hinaus. Wie deutlich klopft so tausendfältig diese geistige Welt in unserer Zeit an diese Fenster, und wie muß es uns naheliegen, wiederum einmal von einem besonderen Gesichtspunkte aus zusammenzufassen mancherlei, was wir wissen können über diese geistige Welt.
Eine geistige Welt wird derjenige bald zugeben müssen, der über die engsten Vorurteile des Materialismus hinausgekommen ist, und engbegrenzte Vorurteile des Materialismus möchte ich die nennen, aus denen heraus das Dasein einer geistigen Welt überhaupt abgeleugnet wird. Etwas weiter ist ja schon der Blick derjenigen Menschen, die diese geistige Welt nicht ableugnen, sondern nur behaupten, man könne mit menschlichen Mitteln von dieser geistigen Welt nichts wissen. Wie gesagt, wenn man nicht auf dem ganz beschränkten materialistischen Standpunkt der ersteren Art steht und durch das menschliche Leben so weit gereift ist - und man kann bald so weit reifen -, eine geistige Welt - wenn man schon ihre Erkennbarkeit leugnen wollte — wenigstens zuzugeben, so wird man daran denken müssen, daß das Wissen, das man sich aneignen kann, und die Lebensresultate, die man erzielen kann durch die gewöhnliche materielle Welt, geringfügig sind gegenüber dem, was sich als ein weiter Reichtum 'ausbreitet in der geistigen Welt, die hinter der physisch-sinnlichen liegt.
Gewiß, es gibt in unserer Zeit engherzige materialistische Seelen, welche das ganze menschliche Wesen in so enge Grenzen fassen wollen, daß? man den Menschen anzusehen habe als nur ein wenig höher entwickelt als das Tier, aber ganz im Sinne der tierischen Entwickelung liegend. Gewiß, es gibt solche Menschen. Aber sie werden wohl immer weniger werden, denn, wie wir oftmals gesehen haben, schon die gewöhnliche Wissenschaft läßt diese Vorurteile nicht aufkommen. Und wenn man nur einmal anfängt zuzugestehen, daß im Menschenwesen noch etwas ist, was über das äußerlich Natürliche hinausragt, dann wird einem sehr bald eine Erkenntnis darüber aufgehen können, wie geringfügig, wie engbegrenzt dasjenige ist, was die physische, sinnliche Welt umfaßt, gegenüber dem Großen, Gewaltigen, das die ganze Welt umfaßt. Und wenn man dann auf den Menschen selber sieht, wenn man sich bewußst wird dessen, was im Menschen lebt und leben kann, so kann man doch nicht anders als sagen: So weit auch die geistige Welt reicht, so groß auch ihr Reichtum ist, der Mensch ist eine Art Mikrokosmos in sich. Man möge es für noch so unbekannt halten: in sein Wesen reicht herein der ganze Reichtum der geistigen Welt. Wie gesagt, mag für das sinnliche Anschauen jene Tiefe der Seele noch so verborgen sein, in die die tieferen Partien der geistigen Welt hineinreichen, sie reichen hinein in das menschliche Wesen. Der Mensch ist nicht nur, wie das sein physischer Leib ist, ein Zusammenwirken äußerer physischer Kräfte und Substanzen, der Mensch ist ein Ergebnis der ganzen Welt, ein wirklicher Mikrokosmos. Und vieles, was wir treiben, vieles, was wir aufsuchten, war ja dazu bestimmt, uns im einzelnen klarzumachen, inwiefern der Mensch ein Ergebnis der geistigen Welt ist, inwiefern in ihm wirklich zu suchen sind nicht nur die Kräfte dieser Erde, sondern die aller Himmel, könnte man sagen.
Wenn man aber nur einmal erfaßt wird von diesem Gedanken, dann wird einem auch klar, daß) man ja mit dem gewöhnlichen Wissen von dem Menschen im Grunde das allerwenigste weiß. Mit diesem gewöhnlichen Wissen weiß man einiges über die Gesetze der Natur, man erwirbt sich dieses Wissen zwischen Geburt und Tod. Aber man wird eben nur durch ein klein wenig Vertiefung in die Geisteswissenschaft — nicht einmal, indem man ihr Bekenner ist, sondern nur, indem man Lebensrätsel aufwirft -— schon erkennen, daß man, wenn man den Menschen erkennen will, an etwas ganz anderes noch sich wenden muß als an das bißchen äußere Wissen, das man erwerben kann zwischen Geburt und Tod durch die äußeren Mittel des Leibes, durch die äußeren Sinne und den Verstand, der an das Gehirn gebunden ist.
Nun, meine lieben Freunde, verbinden wir diesen Gedanken mit einem anderen, mit dem Gedanken, der sozusagen wie ein roter Faden durch alle unsere Betrachtungen geht: mit dem Gedanken der wiederholten Erdenleben. Was denen, die sich ein wenig beschäftigt haben mit unseren Anschauungen, bei diesem Gedanken der wiederholten Erdenleben zunächst am meisten auffallen muß, das ist, daß die Zeit, die wir hier zubringen zwischen Geburt und Tod, verhältnismäßig kurz ist gegenüber der Zeit, die wir in der geistigen Welt zwischen dem Tod und einer neuen Geburt zubringen. Von den verschiedensten Gesichtspunkten aus haben wir besprochen, daß in der Regel diese Zeit, die der Mensch zu durchleben hat zwischen dem Tod und einer neuen Geburt, viel, viel länger ist als die verhältnismäßig kurze Zeit zwischen Geburt und Tod hier im physischen Leben.
Es besteht zwischen den beiden Gedanken, die ich eben äußerte, ein Zusammenhang: das wenige, das wir uns hier erwerben an Wissen und Lebensfrüchten zwischen Geburt und Tod, das steht zu dem geistigen Reichtum der Welten, mit denen der Mensch zusammenhängt, ungefähr in demselben Verhältnis wie die kurze Zeit zwischen Geburt und Tod zu der langen Zeit zwischen dem Tod und einer neuen Geburt. Denn in der Tat, das wird Ihnen hervorgehen aus manchen Betrachtungen, die wir gepflogen haben, daß es ja die Aufgabe der Menschenseele ist zwischen dem Tod und einer neuen Geburt, sich ganz andere Erkenntnisse und Kräfte anzueignen, als die Erkenntnisse und Kräfte sind, die man sich hier im physischen Leben aneignet. Wirklich, man kann sagen, meine lieben Freunde, wenn wir so hereintreten in das physische Erdenleben, wenn wir aus der geistigen Welt kommen und einverkörpert werden in den Leib, den uns die Vererbungslinie gibt von unseren Ahnen her, dann gehört es zu unserer Aufgabe, alle die Kräfte und alle die feinen Verzweigungen dieser Kräfte zu haben, die wir brauchen, um diesen unseren Leib durchzuorganisieren.
Sehen Sie, unser Leib, so wie wir ihn bekommen, wird uns von unseren Eltern geboren. Aber mit diesem Leibe verbindet sich unser geistig-seelisches Wesen, das eine lange Zeit vorher durchgemacht hat in der geistigen Welt zwischen Tod und neuer Geburt. Könnte man sehen - wenn es überhaupt berechtigt wäre, die Hypothese auch nur einen Augenblick in Erwägung zu ziehen -, was dieses äußere Menschenwesen werden kann nur durch die Kräfte der Vererbung, die Kräfte, die der Substanz eigen sind, die von den EItern uns übergeben werden, dann würden wir sehen, daß mit diesen Kräften der Mensch nicht werden kann der, der er ist. Wir müssen in diese Kräfte, die unser äußeres physisches Dasein darstellen, in diese Substanzen und Organgliederungen, in die Form, die wir von den Eltern bekommen, hineingießen dasjenige, was wir als Seele mitbringen, und es aus dem Abstrakten zu dieser individuellen Persönlichkeit machen, die wir sind. Wie gesagt, es ist eine törichte Hypothese, aber man kann sie aufstellen, um sich etwas klarzumachen: Denken wir uns einmal, was entstehen würde, wenn Sie alle nur von Ihren Eltern geboren sein könnten? Wir sehen dabei von Karma ab, sehen davon ab, daß wir natürlich in bestimmte Familien hineingeboren werden, wir sehen nur auf die physische Vererbung. Da würden Sie alle gleich sein als Menschen, da würden Sie nur den allgemeinen physischen Menschencharakter haben! Daß Sie ein ganz bestimmter individueller Mensch sind, daß soundsoviele individuelle Menschen hier vor uns sitzen, das rührt davon her, daß die allgemeine Menschheitsschablone bis in die feinste Gliederung ausziseliert ist von der geistigen Individualität, die aus der geistigen Welt kommt und untertaucht in dasjenige, was von Vater und Mutter gegeben wird. Dazu muß man ebenso, wie man Finger haben muß, um einen Gegenstand der physischen Welt zu ergreifen, und wie man eben den Gegenstand sehen muß, um ihn zu ergreifen, wie man dazu Organe haben und auch gelernt haben muß, etwas zu ergreifen - das Kind kann ja nicht einen Gegenstand ergreifen, es muß es erst lernen -, so muß man gelernt haben, sich anzuschließen all den einzelnen Organen, die unseren Organismus physisch bilden.
Nicht wahr, wir haben «im allgemeinen» Ohren, aber wir hören in individueller Weise. Wir haben «im allgemeinen» Augen, aber wir sehen in individueller Weise. Für die äußeren Organe ist es noch am wenigsten wahrnehmbar, für das innere Verhalten des Menschen aber, da fallt es schon stärker auf. Deshalb müssen wir unser Geistig-Seelisches hineinschieben in alle diese ganz allgemein gehaltenen Organe, wir müssen das ganz individuell gestalten, müssen die Kräfte, die innerlich-geistig-seelischen Handgriffe kennen, um das, was wir als Ohren, Nase, Augen, Gehirn, um all das, was wir als Vererbungsorgane erhalten haben, individuell zu gestalten. Das heißt, wir müssen, wenn wir in die physische Welt durch die Geburt eintreten, Kenntnisse haben, und nicht nur Kenntnisse, sondern praktische Möglichkeiten der Anwendung dieses ganzen Wunderbaues des Menschen, von dem wir so wenig durch äußere Wissenschaft wirklich wissen. Wir müssen zum Beispiel den ganzen feinen Bau des Gehirns innerlich kennen, weil wir ihn innerlich durchorganisieren müssen. Und alle diese geistig-seelischen Handgriffe, alles dieses, was uns möglich macht, überhaupt in einem Menschenleibe zwischen Geburt und Tod ein Mensch zu sein, all das müssen wir uns erwerben. Genau wie wir uns Geschicklichkeiten im Leben erwerben müssen, so müssen wir uns die Fähigkeit, im physischen Leben ein Mensch sein zu können, zwischen dem Tod und einer neuen Geburt erwerben.
Das müssen wir ins Auge fassen, meine lieben Freunde, das muß uns ganz klar sein. Und wir werden uns dann auch einen Begriff machen können, was wir alles durch bloß physisches Wissen vom Menschen nicht erkennen und was wir erkennen müssen durch jenes andere Wissen, das wir uns praktisch anzueignen haben zwischen dem Tod und einer neuen Geburt. Aber wir wissen: Dasjenige, was wir uns aneignen zwischen dem Tod und einer neuen Geburt, das ist ja aufgebaut auf alledem, was wir uns in den früheren Erdenleben angeeignet haben. Und so, wie geregelt ist in einer gewissen Weise unser physisches Leben hier zwischen Geburt und Tod, so ist auch in einer gewissen Weise geregelt unser Leben zwischen dem Tod und einer neuen Geburt. Nicht wahr, wir treten in das physische Leben herein, man möchte sagen halb schlafend, träumend, als kleines Kind. Wir können zunächst nicht ein Gedächtnis entwickeln, wir lernen erst, ein Gedächtnis zu entwickeln. Wenn wir aber genauer zusehen, finden wir, daß in der Zeit, bis wir das Gedächtnis entwikkeln, gewisse Anpassungen an die äußere Welt erworben werden. Das Kind krabbelt zuerst und lernt dann erst greifen. Da werden gewisse Dinge erworben, systematisch erworben. Aber es wird vieles gelernt in dieser Zeit, viel mehr, als man gewöhnlich beobachtet. Dann wiederum ist jede einzelne Lebensepoche so verlaufend, daß das Spätere sich auf Früherem aufbaut. Das Menschenleben ist also auch hier zwischen Geburt und Tod in seinem Verlaufe aufgebaut, nicht nur in seinem körperlichen Bau. Ebenso geregelt ist das Leben zwischen Tod und neuer Geburt. Und da brauchen wir uns nur einzelnes vor die Seele zu rücken, das wir langst kennen, so werden wir gewahr werden, wie geregelt dieses Leben ist.
Sehen Sie, das haben wir ja öfter betont, wir brauchen hier zu unserem seelischen Leben im physischen Dasein eine Vorstellung unseres Ich, die nicht abreißt, nachdem sie einmal geknüpft worden ist im zweiten, dritten, vierten Lebensjahr, an den Zeitpunkt, bis zu dem wir uns zurückerinnern. Bei Menschen, bei denen gewissermaßen dieser Ich-Faden abreißt, findet eine Störung des seelischen Gleichgewichts statt. Es gibt solche Menschen, ich habe es schon öfters erwähnt, aber das, was solche Menschen haben, ist immer eine schwere Seelenkrankheit. Es kommt vor, daß ein Mensch plötzlich herausgerissen wird aus dem Zusammenhang seines Ich. Er erinnert sich nicht an sein früheres Leben, das er gelebt hat. Er geht, sagen wir, zum Bahnhof, kauft sich ein Billett nach irgendeinem Ort. Sein Verstand funktioniert ganz ordentlich. Bei allen Übergangsstationen macht er alles Nötige ganz vernünftig. Aber er erinnert sich nicht an das, was vorher war. Sein inneres Leben ist nur ausgebreitet bis zu einem Punkte, wo er sich entschlossen hat, sich ein Billett zu kaufen und die Reise zu machen. Er reist in der Welt herum, sein Verstand ist ganz in Ordnung. Dann kommt ein Augenblick, wo er weiß: er ist «er». Vorher war sein Seelenleben gedächtnismäßig ausgelöscht. Der Verstand kann in Ordnung sein, das Gedächtnis ist ausgelöscht. Dann ist das Ich eben zerrissen, und der Mensch unterliegt einer schweren Seelenkrankheit.
Ich habe selbst einen Bekannten gehabt, der in einer verhältnismäßig hohen Stellung plötzlich von einer solchen Krankheit befallen wurde. Er bekam plötzlich den Drang, nachdem er alles vergessen hatte, was er selber war, herumzureisen. Er reiste, wie wir sagen würden, blindlings in der Welt herum von einem Ort zum andern und fand sich wiederum hier in Berlin in einem Asyl für Obdachlose. Da kam er wiederum darauf: Du bist der, der du bist! Die Zwischenzeit war zwar ganz verständig gewesen, aber hing nicht zusammen mit dem übrigen Leben. Dann überfiel ihn ein zweites Mal diese Krankheit; da hat er dann freiwillig den Tod gesucht, in dem Bewußtsein, in dem das Gedächtnis mit dem Ich noch ausgeschaltet war.
Nun, sehen Sie, so wie in diesem Leben zwischen Geburt und Tod das Ich ein kontinuierlicher Faden sein muß, und in keinem Augenblick während des Tageslebens abgerissen werden darf diese Möglichkeit, sich an alles das zu erinnern, was verlaufen ist seit dem Zeitpunkt in der Kindheit, an den man sich zurückerinnert, so muß es auch sein in dem Leben zwischen Tod und neuer Geburt. Da müssen wir auch immer die Möglichkeit haben, unser Ich zu bewahren. Nun, diese Möglichkeit wird uns gegeben, und sie wird uns dadurch gegeben, daß die ersten Zeiten nach dem Tode eben so verlaufen, wie wir es öfter beschrieben haben. Die allererste Zeit nach dem Tode verläuft ja so, daß man wie in einem großen Tableau sein eben abgelaufenes Leben vor sich hat. Man umfaßt durch Tage hindurch, aber immer so, daß das Ganze da ist, gewissermaßen auf einmal sein bisheriges Leben. Man hat es wie in einem großen Panorama vor sich. Wenn man allerdings genauer zusieht, dann stellt sich heraus, daß diese Tage mit ihrem Rückblick auf das verflossene Leben sozusagen schon mit einer gewissen Nuance der Beobachtung behaftet sind. Man sieht gewissermaßen das Leben in diesen Tagen von dem Gesichtspunkte des Ich aus, man sieht besonders alles dasjenige, woran unser Ich beteiligt war. Ich will sagen, man sieht die Beziehungen, die man zu einem Menschen gehabt hat, aber man sieht diese Beziehungen zu dem Menschen in einem solchen Zusammenhange, daß man gewahr wird, welche Früchte für einen selbst diese Beziehung zu dem Menschen getragen hat. Man sieht also die Sache nicht ganz objektiv, sondern man sieht all das, was Früchte für einen selber getragen hat. Man sieht sich überall im Mittelpunkt drinnen. Und das ist unendlich notwendig, denn von diesen Tagen, wo man so alles sieht, was fruchtbar für einen geworden ist, geht aus jene innere Stärke und Kraft, die man braucht im ganzen Leben zwischen dem Tod und einer neuen Geburt, um nun da den Ich-Gedanken festhalten zu können. Denn man verdankt die Kraft, das Ich festhalten zu können zwischen dem Tod und einer neuen Geburt, diesem Anschauen des letzten Lebens; von dem geht diese Kraft eigentlich aus. Und insbesondere, meine lieben Freunde - ich muß das noch einmal betonen, wenn ich es auch hier schon gesagt habe -, insbesondere ist da der Moment des Sterbens von außerordentlicher Bedeutung.
Der Tod ist etwas, was am allermeisten zwei total voneinander verschiedene Seiten hat. Der Tod von hier aus, von der physischen Welt aus gesehen, hat gewiß viele trostlose Seiten, viele schmerzliche Seiten. Aber es ist wirklich so, daß man von hier aus den Tod von der einen Seite nur ansieht, wenn man aber gestorben ist, sieht man ihn von der anderen. Da ist er das befriedigendste, vollkommenste Ereignis, das man überhaupt erlebt, denn er ist da lebendige Tatsache. Während er hier ein Beweis dafür ist, auch für unsere Empfindung, für unser Gefühl, wie hinfällig, wie vergänglich das physische Leben des Menschen ist, ist der Tod, angeblickt von der geistigen Welt aus, gerade ein Beweis dafür, daß immerdar der Geist den Sieg über alles Ungeistige davonträgt, daß immerdar der Geist das Leben ist, das unvergängliche, das nie versiegende Leben. Er ist gerade ein Beweis dafür, daß es keinen Tod gibt in Wirklichkeit, daß der Tod eine Maja, ein Schein ist. Darin liegt auch der große Unterschied zwischen dem Leben von dem Tode bis zu einer neuen Geburt und dem Leben hier von der Geburt bis zum Tode.
Denn sehen Sie, kein Mensch kann sich mit gewöhnlichen physischen Erkenntnismitteln an seine eigene Geburt erinnern. Die eigene Geburt kann niemand aus der Erfahrung beweisen, weil er sie nicht gesehen hat. Die Geburt ist etwas, das vor dem Menschenauge hier im physischen Leben nicht stehen kann. Die Geburt liegt vor der Zeit, an die man sich erinnert. Und die Geburt steht nie da. Der Tod aber - und dadurch unterscheidet er sich von der Geburt in seiner Bedeutung nach dem Tode - steht immer als das größte, bedeutendste, lebendigste, vollkommenste Ereignis vor dem geistigen Auge in der Zeit zwischen dem Tod und einer neuen Geburt. Denn der Tod ist eben das, wovon wir unser Ich-Bewußtsein nach dem Tode haben. Und ebenso wie es uns hier in unserem physischen Leben unmöglich ist, uns an unsere Geburt zu erinnern, ebenso notwendig und selbstverständlich ist es in der ganzen Zeit, die wir in der geistigen Welt verbringen, in dem Leben zwischen Tod und neuer Geburt, daß immer der Moment, wo der Geist sich losringt von dem Leibe, vor unserem geistig-seelischen Blick steht. Denn aus diesem Tode heraus fließt uns eben im Zusammenhang mit dem, was wir hier erlebt haben, die Kraft, die wir brauchen, um uns als Ich zu fühlen. Man möchte sagen: könnten wir nicht sterben, so könnten wir ein geistiges Ich überhaupt nicht erleben. Denn daß wir ein geistiges Ich erleben, verdanken wir dem Umstande, daß wir physisch sterben können. So also liegt die Sache für unser Ich. Dieses Ich wird gestärkt und gekräftigt dadurch, daß wir die ersten Tage, in denen wir noch im Ätherleibe sind, nach dem Tode erleben. Dann wird dieser Ätherleib abgelegt, und wir erleben rücklaufend das Leben, das wir den Durchgang der Menschenseele durch die Seelenwelt nennen können, ein Leben, das nun schon länger dauert als das kurze, nur Tage andauernde Leben, das unmittelbar auf den physischen Tod folgt.
Nun ist die Meinung sehr verbreitet, daß derjenige, der in die geistige Welt hineinsehen kann, sogleich alles überschaut. Ich habe das schon oft korrigiert. Nichts macht so bescheiden, als das wirkliche Hineinsehen in die geistige Welt. Denn man kann lange hineinsehen, aber das Erforschen der einzelnen Tatsachen der geistigen Welt, das ist eben in der geistigen Welt mit den Kräften der geistigen Welt eine wirklich lange, lange Arbeit, und es ist ein Vorurteil, wenn man glaubt, daß derjenige, der in die geistige Welt hineinsieht, nun gleich über alles Auskunft geben könne. Und gerade so, wie hier in der physischen Welt nach und nach die Dinge erforscht werden, von Epoche zu Epoche, so ist das auch für das geistige Leben so, daß nach und nach die Dinge erforscht werden. Aber gerade — und jetzt möchte ich auf einen Punkt eingehen, der doch der einen oder anderen hier sitzenden Seele wichtig sein muß -, gerade die absolute Zusammenstimmung der einzelnen geistigen Tatsachen, wenn man sie so nach und nach erforscht, wie sie sich immer wieder und wiederum herausstellen von neuem, die kann auch demjenigen, der noch nicht in die geistige Welt hineinsieht, ein Beweis der Berechtigung desjenigen sein, was in ehrlichem Forschen errungen wird aus der geistigen Welt. In meiner «Geheimwissenschaft» habe ich schon bestimmte Zeiten angegeben, wie lange die einzelnen Abschnitte in dem Leben zwischen Tod und neuer Geburt dauern, aus verschiedenen Gesichtspunkten heraus. Nun gibt es aber noch einen anderen Gesichtspunkt, den ich jetzt anführen möchte und den ich in meiner «Geheimwissenschaft» noch nicht angeführt habe, aus einem einfachen Grunde, den ich Ihnen nicht verhehlen möchte, damit Sie auch daraus entnehmen können, daß hier in ehrlicher, aufrichtiger Weise Geisteswissenschaft getrieben wird: aus dem einfachen Grunde, weil ich es dazumal noch nicht gewußt habe, sondern es erst nachher erforschen konnte. Es ergibt sich nämlich ein gewisser Zusammenhang zwischen dem Leben, das als geistiges Leben hier auf dem physischen Plan entfaltet werden kann, und dem geistigen Leben zwischen dem Tod und einer neuen Geburt.
Sie wissen ja, daß wir unser Leben hier als physisches Leben verbringen in Wachen und Schlafen, daß wir einerseits ein volles Bewußtsein haben im Wachzustand und daß dann für den normalen Menschen ein unbewußter Zustand verläuft in der Zeit zwischen Einschlafen und Aufwachen. Sie wissen auch aus dem, was auseinandergesetzt worden ist in «Wie erlangt man Erkenntnisse der höheren Welten%», daß dieses Schlafesleben durchstrahlt werden kann von Bewußtsein, daß man hineinschauen kann in dasjenige, was zwischen dem Einschlafen und Aufwachen geschieht. Wenn man nun dazu gelangt, immer mehr und mehr kennenzulernen das Leben, das der Mensch hier zwischen Geburt und Tod verbringt im Schlafe, da lernt man ja wirklich einen ungeheuren Reichtum des Lebens kennen. Ein ungeheurer Reichtum des Menschenlebens verfließt eben für das normale menschliche Dasein in diesem unbewußten Zustande zwischen dem Einschlafen und dem Aufwachen. Da geht ungeheuer viel vor. Und dasjenige, was sehr bald auffällt in diesem Schlafesleben, das ist das, daß dieses Schlafesleben ein ungeheuer viel aktiveres Leben ist als das Leben vom Aufwachen bis zum Einschlafen.
Wir sind ja während des Schlafens in unserem Ich und Astralleibe und haben sozusagen außer uns liegen unseren physischen Leib und den Ätherleib. Nun gewiß, auch dieses äußere Leben ist ein aktives Leben, bei manchen Menschen ja sogar ein sehr aktives Leben. Es kommt einem nämlich so aktiv vor, weil wir alle die Passivitäten, die in diesem äußeren Leben sind, eigentlich gar nicht so sehr in Erwägung ziehen. Wirklich, wenn alles aus unserer Initiative hervorgehen müßte, was das äußere Leben trägt, dann würden wir uns sehr verwundern, wie anders es vor sich gehen würde. Denken Sie einmal: Sie stehen jeden Morgen auf. Sie kommen kaum zu dem Entschluß, aufzustehen, Sie tun es aus Gewohnheit. Und Sie kommen wirklich nicht zu einer genaueren Erkenntnis dessen, was das heißt, daß man so zusammenhängt mit der ganzen Welteinrichtung, daß man in gewissen Zeiten in dem einen und anderen Zustand sein Leben zubringen muß, daß das in entsprechender Weise pendeln muß - ja, wo wäre solche Überlegung, das verläuft ganz gewohnheitsmäßig. Und nun versuchen Sie einmal zu überlegen, wie vieles so verläuft, daß wir gewissermaßen als Automaten durch das Leben gehen. Dann kommen Sie darauf, zu erkennen, daß ungeheuer viel Passives ist im Leben zwischen dem Aufwachen und dem Einschlafen, aber viel Aktives in dem Leben zwischen dem Einschlafen und dem Aufwachen. Da ist völlige Aktivität, ungeheure Aktivität. Interessant ist, daß Menschen, die verhältnismäßig träge sind im äußeren Leben zwischen dem Aufwachen und dem Einschlafen, gerade die geschäftigsten sind zwischen dem Einschlafen und dem Aufwachen. Da ist der Mensch ungeheuer tätig, nur im normalen Leben weiß er es nicht. Und wenn man genauer hineinsieht in das, was die Seele — also Ich und Astralleib - da treibt, so ist diese Tätigkeit wirklich mit dem ganzen Dasein des Menschen innig zusammenhängend. Wenn wir so durch das Leben schreiten, nehmen wir ja bewußt außerordentlich wenig von diesem Leben mit. Wir verarbeiten das Leben, so wie es äußerlich an uns herankommt, durchaus nicht vollständig. Ich möchte ein naheliegendes Beispiel nehmen. Sehen Sie, jetzt hören Sie sich diesen Vortrag an, der, sagen wir, eine Stunde dauert. Ja, wirklich ohne irgend jemandem nahetreten zu wollen von den lieben Freunden, die hier sitzen, darf ich sagen: Es wäre möglich, ungeheuer viel mehr in den Worten dieses Vortrages zu hören, als die einzelnen verehrten Freunde hören, die hier sitzen. Denn es wäre möglich, viel mehr zu hören, als ich selber weiß von dem, was ich sagen kann. Aber Sie werden - dieses soll nur gesagt werden, um das andere zu betonen — nach Hause gehen, Sie werden sich ins Bett legen und schlafen und morgen früh aufwachen. Und in der Zeit zwischen dem Einschlafen und Aufwachen werden Sie - allerdings ganz unbewußt für das normale Bewußtsein — vieles von dem, was Sie jetzt gar nicht in der Lage sind zu hören, verarbeiten. Sie verarbeiten es ungeheuer genau in Ihrem nächsten Schlafe, und vielleicht auch noch in den anderen Nächten verarbeiten Sie es. Man sieht die Seele in einer ganz anderen Weise zwischen Einschlafen und Aufwachen das verarbeiten, was aufgenommen wird. Und selbst wenn das vorkäme, daß jemand sehr unaufmerksam zugehört hätte, aber nur etwas hingebungsvoll wäre, so würde er schon durch das Hingebungsvolle doch mit seiner Seele verbinden dasjenige, was in dem Vortrag an geistigen Potenzen, an geistigen Impulsen liegt. Und das würde dann während des Schlafes verarbeitet, wie wir es brauchen, nicht nur für das nächste Leben bis zum Tode, sondern über den Tod hinaus.
So verarbeiten wir das ganze Leben, wie es verläuft im Wachzustande, vom Aufwachen bis zum Einschlafen. Alles, was wir den Tag über erleben, das verarbeiten wir während der Nacht, so daß wir sozusagen Lehren daraus ziehen, wie wir es brauchen für unser ganzes folgendes Leben über den Tod hinaus, bis in die nächste Inkarnation hinein. Wir sind unsere eigenen prophetischen Verarbeiter unseres Lebens, wenn wir in Schlaf versinken. Dieses Schlafleben ist ein tief Rätselvolles, weil es viel inniger zusammenhängt mit dem, was wir erleben, als es mit dem äußeren Bewußtsein zusammenhängen kann. Aber wir verarbeiten das alles unter dem Gesichtspunkte seiner Fruchtbarkeit für das folgende Leben. Was wir aus uns machen können dadurch, daß wir das erfahren haben, darauf geht unsere Arbeit in der Zeit zwischen dem Einschlafen und dem Aufwachen. Wenn wir in der Seele energischer, mächtiger werden oder wenn wir uns Vorwürfe zu machen haben -: wir verarbeiten das, was wir auf diese Art erleben, so, daß es Lebensfrucht wird. Sie sehen daraus, meine lieben Freunde, daß dieses Leben zwischen dem Einschlafen und Aufwachen wirklich ungeheuer bedeutungsvoll ist, daß es tief einschneidet in das ganze Menschenrätsel.
Nun kommt dem Geistesforscher eines Tages die Intention - ja, man kann wohl sagen, die Absicht kommt dem Geistesforscher eines Tages -, nun einmal dieses Leben des Schlafes zu vergleichen mit einem anderen Leben, mit einem außersinnlichen Leben. Und da verfällt er dann darauf, es zu vergleichen mit den Tagen, die folgen auf das Lebenstableau, im Kamaloka. Und siehe da, meine lieben Freunde — aber es ergibt sich das eben erst dem Blick der Forschung -, während man sich hier im Leben gedächtnismäßig erinnert an all das, was man im Tagesleben erlebt hat, nach dem Tode, nachdem der Moment vorbei ist, bis zu dem das Lebenstableau gedauert hat, da bekommt man ein Gedächtnis für alle seine Nächte. Und das ist ein wichtiges Geheimnis, das einem aufgeht. Man erinnert sich an alles Nachtleben. Dieser Rückgang stellt sich so dar, daß man wirklich von der letzten Nacht, die man hier verbracht hat im Leben, zur vorhergehenden und so immer weiter zurücklebt. Man erlebt da das ganze Leben wieder zurück, aber so, wie man es angeschaut hat von der Nachtseite aus. Also alles das, was man über das Leben unbewußt gedacht und geforscht hat, erlebt man wiederum im rücklaufenden Gedächtnis. Man geht sein Leben wirklich durch, aber nicht von der Tagseite aus.
Wie lange kann das ungefähr dauern? Nun, denken Sie sich, daß man ungefähr ein Drittel seines Lebens verschläft. Es gibt Menschen, die schlafen natürlich noch viel länger, aber im Durchschnitt ist es doch ein Drittel des Lebens, das man verschläft. Deshalb dauert auch der Rückgang ungefähr ein Drittel des verbrachten Erdenlebens, weil man die Nächte durchlebt. Denken Sie, wie wunderbar das zusammenstimmt mit den anderen Gesichtspunkten, die sich ergeben. Wir haben immer gesagt, daß das Kamaloka-Leben ungefähr ein Drittel dauert der Lebensdauer. Wenn man aber das vorher Gesagte in Betracht zieht, dann sieht man ein, daß es wiederum ein Drittel sein muß. So stimmen die Dinge zusammen! Alle einzelnen Dinge stimmen immer wieder zusammen. Das ist das Wunderbare bei der Geistesforschung: Man lernt eine Tatsache kennen, und ist sie bestimmt, so lernt man sie von einer anderen Seite kennen. Es ist so, wie wenn man auf einen Berg steigt: Da hat man eine Aussicht einmal von der einen Seite und dann von einer anderen Seite. Trotz der Verschiedenheit wird das Wesentliche immer zusammenstimmen. So können wir hier sagen: Im Erdenleben zwischen Geburt und Tod durchlebt man das Leben so, daß es einem immer abgerissen wird, daf3 es einem immer unterbrochen wird durch das Nachtleben, und man erinnert sich an das Tagesleben, an die Dinge, die man im Tagesleben erlebt hat. Aber in dem Nachtleben hat man sich in anderer Weise mit diesen Dingen beschäftigt, man hat sie, wie gesagt, nur verarbeitet. An das, woran man sich im physischen Leben nicht erinnern kann, daran erinnert man sich aber während des Kamaloka-Lebens. Das ist nun ein wichtiger Zusammenhang, und daraus werden Sie manches begreifen, was vielleicht sonst nicht so ohne weiteres zu begreifen ist.
Sehen Sie, insbesondere in unserer jetzigen Zeit gehen ja sehr viele, verhältnismäßig junge Menschen durch die Pforte des Todes hindurch. Ich habe schon von vielen Gesichtspunkten aus gesagt, was das für eine Bedeutung hat für das gesamte Leben des Menschen. Aber sehen wir zunächst nur auf die beiden Abschnitte, die wir jetzt charakterisiert haben - auf anderes werden wir noch kommen in diesen Tagen -, auf das Leben, das nur Tage dauert, im Ätherleib, wo man das Lebenstableau vor sich hat, und dann auf das Leben der Seele in der Seelenwelt. Indem man nachtweise das vorhergehende Erdenleben durchschreitet, wird man leicht einsehen können, warum der Geistesforscher sagen muß: Schon diese beiden Abschnitte des Lebens zwischen Tod und neuer Geburt sind anders für einen Menschen, der verhältnismäßig früh durch die Pforte des Todes gegangen ist, als für einen, der erst spät durch sie hindurchgegangen ist. Das geht uns ja nahe, weil jetzt so viele Menschen in verhältnismäßig frühem Alter durch die Pforte des Todes gehen.
‚ Sehen Sie, es ist ja so, daß wirklich die einzelnen Abschnitte, die ich angegeben habe für das physische Leben, für dieses Leben eine große Bedeutung haben. Ich habe die Lebensabschnitte angegeben: den ersten bis zum siebenten Jahre, bis zum Zahnwechsel, dann bis zum vierzehnten Jahre, zur Geschlechtsreife, dann bis zum einundzwanzigsten Jahre und so weiter, von sieben zu sieben Jahren. Und wenn Sie das ernst nehmen, was in diesen Unterscheidungen des dahinfließenden Lebens liegt, so ist uns ja das fünfunddreißigste Jahr ein wichtiger Lebensabschnitt. Bis dahin sind wir sozusagen in einer Art von Vorbereitung, während wir später die Vorbereitung beendet haben und das Leben mehr aufbauen auf Grundlage dessen, was bis zum fünfunddreißigsten Jahr vorbereitet wurde. Dieses fünfunddreißigste Lebensjahr hat eine sehr große Bedeutung. Bis dahin dauert zwar nicht gerade das körperliche, aber das seelische Wachstum bei einem Menschen, der nun wirklich seelisch wächst. Dann muß entschieden betont werden, daß manches von dem, was Reifezustand des Lebens ist, erst nach dem fünfunddreißigsten Lebensjahr gewonnen werden kann. Nun, wenn wir aber dieses fünfunddreißigste Lebensjahr von einem anderen Gesichtpunkte betrachten, dann wird es uns noch bedeutsamer erscheinen. Sehen Sie, wenn wir diese siebenjährigen Lebensepochen uns vor die Seele führen, haben wir zunächst bis zum siebenten Jahre die Ausbildung des physischen Leibes, bis zum vierzehnten Jahre die Ausbildung des Ätherleibes. Vom vierzehnten bis zum einundzwanzigsten Jahr gliedert sich, gestaltet sich aus dasjenige, was wir den Astralleib nennen, dann die Empfindungsseele bis zum achtundzwanzigsten Lebensjahr, die Verstandes- oder Gemütsseele bis zum fünfunddreißigsten Jahr, und dann weiter die Bewußtseinsseele bis zum zweiundvierzigsten Jahr. Und dann kommen wir zum Geistselbst, was eine Art Zurückentwickelung an dem Astralleib ist, und so weiter. Die weiteren Lebensepochen verlaufen nicht in siebenjährigen Perioden, sondern unregelmäßig. Da wird es in der Zukunft erst zu einer Regelmäßigkeit kommen. Abgesehen von dem, was die Erziehung sündigt, geht es aber bis zum fünfunddreißigsten Jahr mit einer ziemlichen Regelmäßigkeit.
Nun, auffallen kann einem dasjenige, was die tiefere Bedeutung dieser ganzen Lebensentwickelung ist, namentlich dann, wenn man Menschen betrachtet, die da sterben in diesen verschiedenen Lebensaltern. Nehmen wir an - dies sei zunächst beispielsweise angeführt —, wir verfolgen die Seele eines elf-, zwölf-, dreizehnjahrigen Mädchens oder Knaben, eine Seele, die also elf-, zwölf-, dreizehnjährig durch die Pforte des Todes gegangen ist. Nach dem, was ich schon ausgeführt habe, liegt ja in einem solchen Falle das vor, daß der Ätherleib - er hätte ja in der Theorie noch die ganzen folgenden Jahre versorgen können - unverbrauchte Kräfte in sich hat. Aber auch im übrigen liegt das vor, daß der Mensch ja eigentlich während des ganzen Lebens zwischen Geburt und Tod sich vorbereitet für den Tod. Er bereitet sich wirklich vor für den Tod, denn eigentlich besteht unser ganzes Leben darin, eine Vorbereitung für den Tod zu sein insofern, als wir ja fortwährend arbeiten an der Zerstörung des Leibes. Könnten wir ihn nicht zerstören, so könnten wir es überhaupt zu keiner Vollkommenheit bringen, denn diese Vollkommenheit erkaufen wir sozusagen mit einer Zerstörung des äußeren physischen Leibes. Wenn nun der Mensch dreizehnjährig durch die Pforte des Todes geht, so leistet er eine ganz lange Zerstörungsarbeit nicht, die er eigentlich hätte leisten können. Er macht nicht mit das, was er hätte mitmachen können. Das drückt sich in einer merkwürdigen Weise aus.
Wenn wir eine solche Seele verfolgen, so finden wir sie in der geistigen Welt in einer bestimmten Zeit zwischen dem Tod und einer neuen Geburt verhältnismäßig sehr bald in einer, ich möchte sagen, höchst bemerkenswerten Gesellschaft: Wir finden sie mitten unter denjenigen Seelen, die sich vorbereiten für ein nächstes Leben so, daß sie schon bald auf diese Erde herunterkommen müssen, also unter Seelen, die sich bald verkörpern. Unter denen leben dann solche Seelen, die durch die Pforte des Todes gegangen sind im elften, zwölften, dreizehnten, vierzehnten Jahre, die werden da hineinversetzt. Und wenn man sich genauer umsieht in diesen Zusammenhängen, da stellt es sich eigentümlicherweise heraus, daß diese Seelen, die nun bald in ihr Erdenleben heruntergehen, das brauchen, was ihnen diese anderen Seelen hinauftragen können von der Erde, um sich ihrerseits wiederum an Kraft zu erstarken, die sie brauchen, um sich zu verleiblichen. Also die jugendlichen Seelen bilden eine starke Hilfe für diejenigen Seelen, die nun bald herunterkommen müssen auf die Erde.
Solche Hilfe, wie unter normalen Verhältnissen junge Kinder, die ganz normal waren, das heißt kein hervorragendes geistiges Leben hatten, sondern nur aufgeweckte Kinder waren, solche Hilfe, wie die leisten, kann man zum Beispiel nicht mehr leisten, wenn man im späteren Alter stirbt. Da hat man auch seine Aufgabe. Jeder muß sich seinem Karma fügen und soll nicht denken: Ich möchte in diesem oder jenem Lebensalter sterben; sondern man stirbt in dem Alter, in dem einen das Karma sterben läßt. Solche Hilfe, die man leisten kann als Seele für jene Seelen, die da erwarten ihre Inkarnation, kann man also nicht mehr leisten, wenn man im späteren Lebensalter stirbt. Das hängt damit zusammen, dafß3 man in der ersten Lebenshälfte in einer gewissen Weise der geistigen Welt noch nähersteht als in der zweiten Lebenshälfte. In einer anderen Weise ist es wieder nicht der Fall; aber in einer gewissen Weise steht man der geistigen Welt näher in der ersten Lebenshälfte. Das ganze Leben verläuft nämlich so, daß, je länger man im physischen Leibe lebt, man sich desto mehr von der geistigen Welt entfernt. Ein Kind von einem Jahr steht der geistigen Welt noch sehr nahe. Es verläßt den physischen Plan und ist schnell drinnen in der geistigen Welt. Noch bis zum vierzehnten Jahr ist es so; da ist man so im physischen Leibe drinnen, daß man leicht in die Welt der Seelen kommen kann, die bald wiederum ihre Inkarnation suchen. Das bedingt, daß ein Sterben in sehr jugendlichem Alter damit verbunden ist, schon bei dem Tableau, das man da durchlebt, anderes zu erleben, als der erlebt, welcher in späterem Alter stirbt. Und da ist das fünfunddreißigste Lebensjahr eine wichtige Grenze.
Wenn man vor dem fünfunddreißigsten Lebensjahr stirbt, dann erlebt man zunächst das Lebenstableau, dann geht man das Leben durch die Nächte zurück. Aber während dieser Rückschau auf das vergangene Leben sieht man wie von «hinter dem Spiegel, wie wenn man durch das Lebenstableau durchsehen würde, die geistige Weit, die man verlassen hat, indem man geboren worden ist. Die Perspektive geht noch hin auf die geistige Welt. Hat man das fünfunddreißigste Lebensjahr überschritten, so ist das ganz anders. Man sieht nicht so hinein, wie man selber drinnen war, bevor man geboren worden ist. Das ist etwas von dem, was einem jetzt gerade so besonders auffällt, wo so viele Menschen jung sterben. Denn dieses «Die geistige Welt noch hinten sehen», das hat noch eine gewisse Bedeutung bis zum 35. Lebensjahr. Nach dem vierzehnten bis sechzehnten Lebensjahr ist es allerdings kein solch direktes Sehen mehr, aber von da ab bis zum fünfunddreißigsten Lebensjahr, wenn da gestorben wird, da ist es so, als ob in dem Lebenstableau, dem Rückblick, sich noch überall drinnen spiegeln würde das geistige Leben. Also wenn man ganz als Kind stirbt, sieht man eigentlich nicht viel von einem durchlebten Leben; da sieht man fast ganz gleich in die geistige Welt hinein. Wenn man als dreizehnjähriges Kind stirbt, so hat man schon einen Rückblick, aber dahinter liegt die geistige Welt. Man hat sie noch klar, die geistige Welt. Stirbt man noch später, so hat man sie zwar nicht unmittelbar, aber sie ist in dem enthalten, was man als eigenes Leben sieht. Man hängt also noch zusammen mit demjenigen, aus dem man herausgekommen ist, bis zum fünfunddreißigsten Jahr, so daß der, welcher vor dem fünfunddreißigsten Jahr stirbt, wirklich schon in diesen ersten Lebensabschnitten, die er da durchlebt in den Tagen, in denen er das Lebenstableau sieht, dann wiederum bei dem Rückgang durch die Seelenwelt, eigentlich durch dieses Erleben in eine Art Heimat, die er mit der Geburt verlassen hat, recht unmittelbar wiederum hineinkommt. Er hat unmittelbar das Erlebnis: Du kommst hinein in eine Welt, aus der du herausgetreten bist. Das ist von einer ungeheuren Wichtigkeit, denn jeder, der so stirbt, wird unmittelbar, wie Sie sehen, von einer gewissen Seite her leichter in die geistige Welt versetzt als einer, der später stirbt. Er trägt also aus dem Rückblick, den er hat nach dem Tode, in sein nächstes Leben zwischen Geburt und Tod ungeheuer viel Spirituelles, ungeheuer viel Geistiges hinein. Und die vielen, die in unserer jetzigen Zeit früh sterben, die werden auch von diesem Gesichtspunkte aus wichtige Träger der geistigen Wahrheiten und geistigen Erkenntnisse sein, wenn sie in einer nächsten Inkarnation wiederum herunterkommen auf die Erde.
So sieht man, wie der ungeheure Schmerz, der sich ausgießt über die Welt, doch notwendig ist für den gesamten Verlauf des Daseins. Denn das Blut, das jetzt fließt, wird das Symbolum sein für eine gewisse Erfrischung des spirituellen Lebens in einer gewissen Zukunft, die der gesamten Entwickelung der Menschheit notwendig ist. Denn anders werden die Seelen, die jetzt so früh durch die Pforte des Todes gehen, herunterkommen, die meisten werden anders herunterkommen, als sie heruntergekommen wären, wenn sie im materiellen Dasein bis an die äußerste Grenze des Lebens gekommen und dann gestorben wären. Auch das ist Weisheit der Welt, daß jetzt eine Anzahl von Seelen hinweggerufen werden, damit sie schon in dem Rückblicke und Rückerleben tiefe geistige Geheimnisse auf eine dem Irdischen verwandte Art schauen können. Das ist auch Weisheit der Welt, damit diese Seelen dann erfüllt werden können mit dem, was sie stärker schauen, wenn sie es noch einmal schauen, gestärkt werden durch das kürzere irdische Leben, das sie durchgemacht haben.
Das ist wirkliche Weisheit der Welt. Und so muß man sagen, daß vieles von dem, was uns mit Recht tief schmerzt, wenn wir den Blick bloß darauf richten können vom Gesichtspunkte des irdischen Daseins aus, daß vieles davon uns seinen versöhnenden Anblick zeigt, wenn wir es vom Gesichtspunkte des geistigen Anschauens betrachten können. Nun, so ist es mit dem ganzen Leben. Gewiß, meine lieben Freunde, der irdische Schmerz kann durch eine solche Betrachtung ja zunächst nicht vermindert werden. Er muß auch durchlebt werden. Denn das ist eben die Bedingung dafür, daß er wiederum ausgeglichen werden kann. Hätten wir ihn nicht erlebt in der physischen Welt, so könnte er nicht ausgeglichen werden. Aber wenn wir auch leiden müssen über vieles in der physischen Welt, so gibt es doch auch Augenblicke, in denen wir uns versetzen können auf die Standpunkte des Geistigen. Dann werden wir gar manches, was von niederen Gesichtspunkten aus uns schmerzvoll erscheinen muß, eben erkennen als einen Tribut, der gebracht werden muß den höheren geistigen Welten mit ihren Weisheiten, damit nicht in einseitiger, sondern in allseitiger Weise die Entwickelung der ganzen Welt und des Menschendaseins vorwärtsgehen kann.
Das Versöhnende für manchen Schmerz muß eben erst errungen werden, und dazu muß der Schmerz erst durchgemacht werden. Ersparen kann uns ja die Geisteswissenschaft gewiß den Schmerz nicht, aber sie kann uns lehren, ihn hinzutragen auf den Altar des Daseins und den Ausgleich zu suchen, und die Weisheit der Welt anzuerkennen trotz allem Schmerz, den sie um höherer Ziele willen verursachen muß. Das ist das, was uns als cine wichtige Wegzehrung für das ganze menschliche Dasein Geisteswissenschaft eben geben kann. So dürfen wir auch von diesem Gesichtspunkte aus, ich möchte sagen, so recht aus den Empfindungen, die uns die Geisteswissenschaft geben kann, hinblickend auf die auch schmerzvollen Ereignisse unserer Zeit, eben sagen, was wir oftmals hier sagten:
Aus dem Mut der Kämpfer,
Aus dem Blut der Schlachten,
Aus dem Leid Verlassener,
Aus des Volkes Opfertaten
Wird erwachsen Geistesfrucht—
Lenken Seelen geistbewußt
Ihren Sinn ins Geisterreich.
First Lecture
During the war years, Rudolf Steiner spoke the following words of remembrance before each lecture he gave within the Anthroposophical Society in countries affected by the war:
We remember, my dear friends, the protective spirits of those who stand outside on the great fields of present events:
Spirits of your souls, guardian angels,
May your wings bring
The pleading love of our souls
To the earthly beings entrusted to your care,
So that, united with your power,
Our plea may shine forth
To the souls who seek it with love.
And turning to the protective spirits of those who, as a result of these suffering events, have already passed through the gates of death:
Spirits of your souls, active guardians,
May your wings bring
The pleading love of our souls
Your protection to the people of the spheres whom you trust,
That, united with your power,
Our plea may shine helpfully
Upon the souls whom it lovingly seeks.
And the spirit we have been seeking to approach for years through our spiritual science, the spirit that has brought healing to the earth and freedom and progress to humanity through the mystery of Golgotha, may He be with you and your difficult duties!
As I am deeply gratified to be back among you after a long absence, I would like to use this week's three lectures primarily to turn our attention to insights into the spiritual world that are closely or remotely related to what must be so preoccupying and moving us in view of the momentous and profound events of our time. We should not focus primarily on these events themselves, but rather on what is connected in all souls, in all feelings, with these events, like riddles, like anxious questions about the fate of humanity and the world: We should turn our gaze to the further destiny of the human soul, to which the human soul is subject in that field of world existence to which spiritual science is also directed and which is not exhausted by earthly, material existence. So close, my dear friends, is it for us at this time to knock on the door through which the human being passes when it leaves this earthly body in whatever form. We are drawn to that toward which human beings can look when they need a higher consolation, a deeper source of strength than the consolation that can come only from material life, than the sources of strength that lie only within material life. How manifoldly does the voice of the spiritual world knock on our hearts in our time, even on the hearts of those who often do not want to penetrate the spiritual world with their hearts, although these hearts are also windows into the spiritual world for those people. How clearly this spiritual world knocks on these windows in our time, and how obvious it must be to us to summarize once again, from a special point of view, some of what we can know about this spiritual world.
Anyone who has overcome the narrowest prejudices of materialism will soon have to admit that a spiritual world exists, and I would call narrow prejudices of materialism those from which the existence of a spiritual world is denied altogether. Those who do not deny this spiritual world, but only claim that it is impossible to know anything about it by human means, have already taken a step further. As I said, if one does not stand on the very limited materialistic standpoint of the former type and has matured through human life to such an extent—and one can soon mature to this extent— a spiritual world—even if one wanted to deny its knowability—at least admit it, then one will have to consider that the knowledge one can acquire and the results one can achieve through the ordinary material world are insignificant compared to the vast riches that lie in the spiritual world behind the physical-sensory world.
Certainly, there are narrow-minded materialistic souls in our time who want to confine the whole human being within such narrow limits that one must regard man as only a little higher developed than the animal, but still entirely in line with animal development. Certainly, there are such people. But they will probably become fewer and fewer, for, as we have often seen, even ordinary science does not allow these prejudices to arise. And once one begins to admit that there is something in the human being that transcends the external natural world, one very soon realizes how insignificant and limited the physical, sensory world is in comparison to the great and powerful world that encompasses the whole universe. And when one then looks at human beings themselves, when one becomes aware of what lives and can live in human beings, one cannot help but say: however far the spiritual world extends, however great its riches are, human beings are a kind of microcosm in themselves. No matter how unknown it may be, the whole richness of the spiritual world reaches into their being. As I said, however hidden that depth of the soul may be to sensory perception, into which the deeper parts of the spiritual world extend, they extend into the human being. Man is not only, as his physical body is, an interaction of external physical forces and substances; man is the result of the whole world, a real microcosm. And much of what we do, much of what we seek, is intended to make it clear to us in detail to what extent man is a result of the spiritual world, to what extent it is not only the forces of this earth that are to be sought in him, but those of all the heavens, one might say.
But once you grasp this idea, it becomes clear that with our ordinary knowledge of human beings, we know very little indeed. With this ordinary knowledge, we know something about the laws of nature, which we acquire between birth and death. But it is only through a little deeper study of spiritual science — not even by professing it, but only by raising questions about the mysteries of life — that if you want to understand human beings, you have to turn to something completely different than the little bit of external knowledge you can acquire between birth and death through the external means of the body, through the external senses and the intellect, which is bound to the brain.
Now, my dear friends, let us connect this thought with another, with the thought that runs like a thread through all our considerations: with the thought of repeated earthly lives. What must strike those who have given some thought to our views most at first about this idea of repeated earthly lives is that the time we spend here between birth and death is relatively short compared to the time we spend in the spiritual world between death and a new birth. We have discussed from various points of view that, as a rule, the time that human beings have to live between death and a new birth is much, much longer than the relatively short time between birth and death here in physical life.
There is a connection between the two thoughts I just expressed: the little we acquire here in knowledge and fruits of life between birth and death is to the spiritual wealth of the worlds with which human beings are connected in about the same ratio as the short time between birth and death is to the long time between death and a new birth. For indeed, it will become clear to you from some of the considerations we have made that it is the task of the human soul between death and a new birth to acquire completely different insights and powers than those acquired here in physical life. Indeed, my dear friends, when we enter physical life on earth, when we come from the spiritual world and are embodied in the body given to us by our ancestors through heredity, it is our task to have all the powers and all the subtle ramifications of these powers that we need to organize our body.
You see, our body, as we receive it, is given to us by our parents. But connected to this body is our spiritual-soul being, which has undergone a long period of time in the spiritual world between death and new birth. If we could see—if it were even justified to consider the hypothesis for a moment—what this outer human being can become solely through the forces of heredity, the forces inherent in the substance handed down to us by our parents, then we would see that with these forces alone, human beings cannot become what they are. We must pour into these forces that constitute our outer physical existence, into these substances and organ structures, into the form we receive from our parents, that which we bring with us as soul, and transform it from the abstract into the individual personality that we are. As I said, it is a foolish hypothesis, but one can put it forward in order to clarify something: Let us imagine what would happen if you could only be born of your parents. We will disregard karma, disregard the fact that we are naturally born into certain families, and consider only physical heredity. You would all be the same as human beings, you would only have the general physical character of human beings! The fact that you are a specific individual human being, that so many individual human beings are sitting here before us, stems from the fact that the general human template is chiseled down to the finest detail by the spiritual individuality that comes from the spiritual world and is submerged in what is given by father and mother. Just as you need fingers to grasp an object in the physical world, and just as you need to see the object in order to grasp it, and just as you need organs and must learn how to grasp something—a child cannot grasp an object, it must first learn how to do so—so you must learn to connect with all the individual organs that physically make up your organism.
Isn't it true that we “in general” have ears, but we hear in an individual way? We “in general” have eyes, but we see in an individual way. This is least noticeable in the external organs, but it is more noticeable in the inner behavior of human beings. That is why we must insert our spiritual-soul life into all these organs, which are very general in nature. We must shape them individually and know the inner spiritual-soul forces at work in order to individually shape what we perceive as ears, nose, eyes, brain, and all that we have received as organs of heredity. This means that when we enter the physical world through birth, we must have knowledge, and not just knowledge, but practical possibilities for applying this entire miraculous structure of the human being, about which we know so little through external science. For example, we must know the entire delicate structure of the brain internally, because we must organize it internally. And all these mental and spiritual maneuvers, everything that enables us to be human beings in a human body between birth and death, we must acquire. Just as we must acquire skills in life, so we must acquire the ability to be human beings in physical life between death and a new birth.
We must bear this in mind, my dear friends, it must be quite clear to us. And then we will also be able to form a concept of all that we cannot recognize through mere physical knowledge of human beings and what we must recognize through that other knowledge which we have to acquire practically between death and a new birth. But we know that what we acquire between death and a new birth is built upon everything we have acquired in our previous earthly lives. And just as our physical life here between birth and death is regulated in a certain way, so too is our life between death and a new birth regulated in a certain way. Isn't it true that we enter physical life half asleep, dreaming, as small children? At first we cannot develop a memory; we first have to learn to develop a memory. But if we look more closely, we find that during the time until we develop our memory, we acquire certain adaptations to the outer world. The child first crawls and then learns to grasp. Certain things are acquired, systematically acquired. But much is learned during this time, much more than is usually observed. Then again, each individual stage of life proceeds in such a way that what comes later builds on what came before. Human life is therefore also structured between birth and death, not only in its physical constitution. Life between death and rebirth is just as regulated. And we need only bring to mind individual things that we have known for a long time to become aware of how regulated this life is.
You see, we have emphasized this often: for our soul life in physical existence, we need a concept of our I that does not break off after it has been formed in the second, third, or fourth year of life, at the point in time to which we can remember back. In people in whom this thread of the self breaks off, so to speak, a disturbance of the spiritual balance occurs. There are such people, as I have often mentioned, but what such people have is always a serious mental illness. It happens that a person is suddenly torn out of the context of his self. He does not remember the former life he lived. Let's say they go to the train station and buy a ticket to some place. Their mind is working just fine. At all the stops along the way, they do everything they need to do. But they don't remember what happened before. Their inner life only goes back to the point where they decided to buy a ticket and go on the trip. He travels around the world, his mind is perfectly fine. Then comes a moment when he knows: he is “himself.” Before that, his soul life was wiped out of his memory. The mind may be fine, but the memory is wiped out. Then the ego is torn apart, and the person is subject to a serious mental illness.
I myself had an acquaintance who, while in a relatively high position, was suddenly struck by such an illness. After forgetting everything about himself, he was suddenly overcome by the urge to travel. He traveled, as we would say, blindly around the world from one place to another and found himself back here in Berlin in a homeless shelter. Then he realized: You are who you are! The intervening period had been quite reasonable, but it had no connection with the rest of his life. Then this illness struck him a second time; he then voluntarily sought death, in the knowledge that his memory and his ego had been wiped out.
Now, you see, just as in this life between birth and death the ego must be a continuous thread and must not be broken at any moment during daily life, so too must it be in the life between death and rebirth. We must always have the possibility of preserving our ego. Now, this possibility is given to us, and it is given to us by the fact that the first moments after death proceed in the way we have often described. The very first moment after death is such that one has one's life just passed before one's eyes, as in a large tableau. One encompasses days, but always in such a way that the whole is there, one's entire life up to that point, as it were, all at once. One has it before one as in a great panorama. If one looks more closely, however, one discovers that these days, with their retrospective view of the past life, are already imbued with a certain nuance of observation. One sees, as it were, the life of these days from the point of view of the self; one sees especially everything in which our self was involved. I mean to say that one sees the relationships one has had with a person, but one sees these relationships with the person in such a context that one becomes aware of the fruits that this relationship with the person has borne for oneself. So you don't see things completely objectively, but you see everything that has borne fruit for you personally. You see yourself at the center of everything. And that is infinitely necessary, because from these days, when you see everything that has been fruitful for you, there emanates the inner strength and power that you need throughout your entire life between death and a new birth in order to be able to hold on to the idea of the self. For it is to this viewing of one's last life that we owe the strength to hold on to the I between death and a new birth; this is where this strength actually comes from. And in particular, my dear friends — I must emphasize this once again, even though I have already said it here — in particular, the moment of dying is of extraordinary importance.
Death is something that has two completely different sides. Death as seen from here, from the physical world, certainly has many bleak sides, many painful sides. But it is really the case that from here we only see death from one side, but when we have died, we see it from the other. There it is the most satisfying, most perfect event one can ever experience, for there it is a living fact. While here it is proof, even for our senses, for our feelings, of how transitory and fleeting human physical life is, death, viewed from the spiritual world, is precisely proof that the spirit always triumphs over everything that is not spiritual, that the spirit is always life, the imperishable, never-ending life. It is proof that there is no death in reality, that death is an illusion, a mere appearance. Therein lies the great difference between life from death to a new birth and life here from birth to death.
For you see, no human being can remember his own birth by ordinary physical means of knowledge. No one can prove his own birth from experience, because he did not see it. Birth is something that cannot stand before the human eye here in physical life. Birth lies before the time that can be remembered. And birth never stands there. Death, however—and this is what distinguishes it from birth in its significance after death—always stands before the spiritual eye as the greatest, most significant, most vivid, most perfect event in the time between death and a new birth. For death is precisely that from which we derive our self-consciousness after death. And just as it is impossible for us here in our physical life to remember our birth, so it is necessary and self-evident throughout the entire time we spend in the spiritual world, in the life between death and new birth, that the moment when the spirit breaks free from the body always stands before our spiritual-soul gaze. For it is out of this death, in connection with what we have experienced here, that the power we need to feel ourselves as I flows to us. One might say: if we could not die, we could not experience a spiritual I at all. For we owe the fact that we experience a spiritual I to the circumstance that we can die physically. So this is how things stand for our I. This I is strengthened and fortified by the fact that we experience the first days after death while we are still in the etheric body. Then this etheric body is laid aside, and we experience in reverse the life that we can call the passage of the human soul through the soul world, a life that now lasts longer than the short life of only a few days that immediately follows physical death.
Now, it is a very widespread opinion that anyone who can look into the spiritual world immediately sees everything. I have often corrected this. Nothing makes one as humble as actually looking into the spiritual world. For one can look into it for a long time, but exploring the individual facts of the spiritual world, that is a really long, long task in the spiritual world with the forces of the spiritual world, and it is a prejudice to believe that those who look into the spiritual world can immediately provide information about everything. And just as here in the physical world things are explored little by little, from epoch to epoch, so too in spiritual life things are explored little by little. But precisely — and now I would like to touch on a point that must be important to one or the other soul sitting here — precisely the absolute harmony of the individual spiritual facts, when they are gradually explored as they repeatedly reveal themselves anew, can also be proof to those who do not yet see into the spiritual world of the validity of what what is achieved in honest research from the spiritual world. In my “Secret Science,” I have already indicated certain periods of time, from various points of view, how long the individual stages in the life between death and new birth last. However, there is another point of view that I would now like to mention, which I did not mention in my “Secret Science” for a simple reason that I do not wish to conceal from you, so that you may also see that spiritual science is being pursued here in an honest and sincere manner: for the simple reason that I did not know it at the time, but was only able to research it afterwards. There is a certain connection between the life that can unfold as spiritual life here on the physical plane and the spiritual life between death and a new birth.
You know that we spend our lives here as physical lives in waking and sleeping, that on the one hand we have full consciousness in the waking state and that then, for normal human beings, an unconscious state occurs in the time between falling asleep and waking up. You also know from what has been discussed in “How to Attain Knowledge of Higher Worlds” that this life of sleep can be permeated by consciousness, that one can look into what happens between falling asleep and waking up. When one comes to know more and more about the life that human beings spend here between birth and death in sleep, one really comes to know an immense richness of life. An immense richness of human life flows away for normal human existence in this unconscious state between falling asleep and waking up. An enormous amount happens there. And what very quickly becomes apparent in this sleep life is that this sleep life is an immensely more active life than the life from waking up to falling asleep.
During sleep, we are in our ego and astral body and have, so to speak, our physical body and etheric body lying outside of us. Now, of course, this outer life is also an active life, and for some people it is even a very active life. It seems so active because we do not really take into account all the passivity that is present in this outer life. Really, if everything that makes up our outer life had to come from our own initiative, we would be very surprised at how different things would be. Think about it: you get up every morning. You hardly make the decision to get up; you do it out of habit. And you really do not come to a more precise understanding of what it means to be so connected with the whole structure of the world, that at certain times you have to spend your life in one state or another, that this has to oscillate in a corresponding manner — indeed, where would such a consideration come from? It all happens quite habitually. Now try to think about how much of our lives proceed in this way, so that we go through life as automatons, so to speak. Then you will come to realize that there is an enormous amount of passivity in life between waking up and falling asleep, but a great deal of activity in the life between falling asleep and waking up. There is complete activity, tremendous activity. It is interesting that people who are relatively sluggish in their outer life between waking and falling asleep are precisely the busiest between falling asleep and waking up. There, the human being is tremendously active, only in normal life he does not know it. And if you look more closely at what the soul — that is, the I and the astral body — is doing there, this activity is really intimately connected with the whole of human existence. When we go through life in this way, we consciously take in very little of this life. We do not process life completely as it comes to us externally. Let me give you an obvious example. You are now listening to this lecture, which lasts, let's say, an hour. Yes, without wishing to offend any of my dear friends sitting here, I can say that it would be possible to hear much more in the words of this lecture than the individual friends sitting here can hear. For it would be possible to hear much more than I myself know of what I can say. But you will—and this is only to emphasize the other point—go home, go to bed, and sleep, and wake up tomorrow morning. And in the time between falling asleep and waking up, you will—though completely unconsciously for your normal consciousness—process much of what you are not able to hear now. You will process it incredibly precisely in your next sleep, and perhaps you will continue to process it in the nights that follow. One sees the soul processing what is taken in between falling asleep and waking up in a completely different way. And even if someone were to listen very inattentively, but were only somewhat devoted, they would still connect with their soul through their devotion and absorb the spiritual powers and spiritual impulses contained in the lecture. And this would then be processed during sleep as we need it, not only for the next life until death, but beyond death.
This is how we process our entire life as it unfolds in the waking state, from waking up to falling asleep. Everything we experience during the day is processed during the night, so that we learn lessons from it, as it were, as we need them for our entire life after death, until the next incarnation. When we fall asleep, we are our own prophetic processors of our lives. This sleep life is deeply mysterious because it is much more intimately connected with what we experience than it can be connected with our outer consciousness. But we process all of this from the point of view of its fruitfulness for the next life. What we can make of ourselves through what we have experienced is the focus of our work in the time between falling asleep and waking up. When we become more energetic and powerful in our souls, or when we have something to reproach ourselves for, we process what we experience in this way so that it becomes fruit for life. You can see from this, my dear friends, that this life between falling asleep and waking up is truly immensely significant, that it cuts deeply into the whole mystery of the human being.
Now one day the spiritual researcher has the intention—yes, one can well say that the intention comes to the spiritual researcher one day—to compare this life of sleep with another life, with a supersensible life. And then he falls into the trap of comparing it with the days that follow the life tableau in Kamaloka. And lo and behold, my dear friends — but this only becomes apparent to the researcher — while here in life we remember everything we have experienced in our daily lives, after death, after the moment has passed in which the life tableau lasted, we gain a memory of all our nights. And this is an important secret that dawns on us. One remembers all of one's night life. This regression is such that one really lives back from the last night one spent here in life to the previous one, and so on and so forth. One experiences one's whole life again, but as one viewed it from the night side. So everything one unconsciously thought and researched about life is experienced again in one's retrograde memory. You really go through your life, but not from the daytime side.
How long can this take, approximately? Well, consider that you sleep for about a third of your life. There are people who sleep much longer, of course, but on average, you sleep for a third of your life. That is why the decline also takes about a third of the life spent on earth, because one lives through the nights. Think how wonderfully this fits in with the other points of view that arise. We have always said that the Kamaloka life lasts about a third of the lifespan. But if one considers what has been said before, one sees that it must be a third. So everything fits together! All individual things always fit together. That is the wonderful thing about spiritual research: you learn one fact, and once you are certain of it, you learn it from another angle. It is like climbing a mountain: you have a view from one side and then from another. Despite the differences, the essentials always fit together. So we can say here: In earthly life between birth and death, one lives through life in such a way that it is always torn away from one, that it is always interrupted by night life, and one remembers the daytime life, the things one has experienced in daytime life. But in night life, one has dealt with these things in a different way; one has, as I said, only processed them. However, during the Kamaloka life, one remembers what one cannot remember in physical life. This is an important connection, and from it you will understand many things that might otherwise not be so easy to understand.
You see, especially in our present time, a great many relatively young people are passing through the gate of death. I have already spoken from many points of view about what this means for the whole of human life. But let us first look only at the two stages we have just characterized—we will come to the others in the next few days—at the life that lasts only a few days in the etheric body, where one has the tableau of one's life before one, and then at the life of the soul in the soul world. As one passes through the previous earthly life during the night, it becomes easy to understand why spiritual researchers must say that these two stages of life between death and rebirth are different for a person who has passed through the gate of death relatively early than for one who has passed through it late. This is close to our hearts because so many people now pass through the gate of death at a relatively early age.
You see, it is really the case that the individual stages I have indicated for physical life, for this life, are of great significance. I have indicated the stages of life: the first to the seventh year, until the change of teeth, then until the fourteenth year, to sexual maturity, then until the twenty-first year, and so on, from seven to seven years. And if you take seriously what lies in these distinctions of the passing life, then the thirty-fifth year is an important stage of life for us. Until then, we are, so to speak, in a kind of preparation, while later we have completed the preparation and build our life more on the basis of what has been prepared up to the age of thirty-five. This thirty-fifth year of life has a very great significance. Until then, it is not so much physical growth that takes place in a person who is truly growing spiritually, but rather spiritual growth. It must then be emphasized that some of the things that constitute maturity in life can only be gained after the age of thirty-five. Now, if we look at this thirty-fifth year from another point of view, it will seem even more significant to us. You see, if we consider these seven-year stages of life, we have first the formation of the physical body up to the age of seven, and then the formation of the etheric body up to the age of fourteen. From the fourteenth to the twenty-first year, what we call the astral body is formed, then the sentient soul until the twenty-eighth year, the intellectual or emotional soul until the thirty-fifth year, and then the conscious soul until the forty-second year. And then we come to the spirit self, which is a kind of regression in the astral body, and so on. The subsequent stages of life do not proceed in seven-year periods, but irregularly. Only in the future will there be any regularity. Apart from the sins of education, however, things proceed with considerable regularity until the age of thirty-five.
Now, what is striking is the deeper meaning of this whole life development, especially when we look at people who die at these different ages. Let us assume, for example, that we follow the soul of an eleven-, twelve-, or thirteen-year-old girl or boy, a soul that has passed through the gate of death at the age of eleven, twelve, or thirteen. According to what I have already explained, in such a case the etheric body — which in theory could have continued to nourish the child for all the years to come — still has unused forces within it. But there is also the fact that human beings actually spend their entire lives between birth and death preparing for death. He really prepares himself for death, because our whole life actually consists in being a preparation for death, inasmuch as we are constantly working on the destruction of the body. If we could not destroy it, we could not achieve perfection at all, for we purchase this perfection, so to speak, with the destruction of the outer physical body. When a person passes through the gate of death at the age of thirteen, they do not carry out a very long process of destruction that they could actually have carried out. They do not participate in what they could have participated in. This is expressed in a remarkable way.
If we follow such a soul, we find it in the spiritual world at a certain time between death and a new birth, relatively soon, in what I would call a most remarkable company: we find it in the midst of those souls who are preparing for a next life in such a way that they must soon come down to this earth, that is, among souls who will soon incarnate. Among them live souls who have passed through the gate of death in the eleventh, twelfth, thirteenth, or fourteenth year; they are placed there. And if one looks more closely at these connections, it turns out, strangely enough, that these souls, who will soon descend into their earthly lives, need what these other souls can carry up to them from the earth in order to regain the strength they need to incarnate. Thus, the youthful souls are a powerful help to those souls who must soon descend to earth.
Such help as is provided under normal circumstances by young children who were quite normal, that is, who did not have an outstanding spiritual life but were simply bright children, cannot be provided, for example, if one dies at a later age. There, too, one has one's task. Everyone must submit to their karma and should not think: I would like to die at this or that age; rather, one dies at the age at which karma allows one to die. Such help, which one can give as a soul to those souls who are waiting for their incarnation, can therefore no longer be given if one dies at a later age. This is connected with the fact that in the first half of life one is in a certain sense closer to the spiritual world than in the second half. In another sense this is not the case, but in a certain sense one is closer to the spiritual world in the first half of life. For the whole of life proceeds in such a way that the longer one lives in the physical body, the further one moves away from the spiritual world. A one-year-old child is still very close to the spiritual world. It leaves the physical plane and quickly enters the spiritual world. This is still the case until the age of fourteen; at that age, one is so immersed in the physical body that one can easily enter the world of souls that are soon seeking their next incarnation. This means that dying at a very young age is associated with experiencing something different in the tableau one goes through than someone who dies at a later age. And the age of thirty-five is an important boundary in this respect.
If you die before the age of thirty-five, you first experience the tableau of your life, then you go back through your life during the nights. But during this review of your past life, you see, as if from “behind a mirror,” as if you were looking through the tableau of your life, the spiritual world that you left when you were born. The perspective still extends to the spiritual world. Once you have passed the age of thirty-five, it is completely different. You do not see into it as you were inside before you were born. This is something that is particularly striking now, when so many people die young. For this “seeing the spiritual world still behind you” has a certain significance until the age of 35. After the age of fourteen to sixteen, however, it is no longer such direct seeing, but from then until the age of thirty-five, when one dies, it is as if the spiritual life is still reflected everywhere in the tableau of life, in the review. So if you die as a child, you don't really see much of the life you have lived; you see almost entirely into the spiritual world. If you die as a thirteen-year-old child, you already have a retrospective view, but behind it lies the spiritual world. You still have a clear picture of the spiritual world. If you die later, you don't have it immediately, but it is contained in what you see as your own life. So you are still connected to the person you came from until the age of thirty-five, so that those who die before the age of thirty-five really experience these first stages of life which they live through in the days when they see the tableau of life, and then again, during the descent through the soul world, actually through this experience, into a kind of home which they left at birth. They have the immediate experience: You enter a world from which you have stepped out. This is of tremendous importance, because everyone who dies in this way is, as you can see, immediately transferred to the spiritual world more easily than someone who dies later. So, from the perspective he has after death, he carries an enormous amount of spirituality, an enormous amount of spiritual knowledge, into his next life between birth and death. And the many who die early in our present time will also be important bearers of spiritual truths and spiritual insights from this point of view when they come down to earth again in a next incarnation.
Thus we see how the tremendous pain that is pouring out over the world is nevertheless necessary for the entire course of existence. For the blood that is now flowing will be the symbol of a certain refreshment of spiritual life in a certain future, which is necessary for the entire development of humanity. For otherwise the souls that are now passing so early through the gate of death will come down, most of them will come down differently than they would have come down if they had reached the utmost limits of life in their material existence and then died. It is also the wisdom of the world that a number of souls are now being called away so that, in looking back and reliving their lives, they may see deep spiritual secrets in a way that is related to the earthly. This is also the wisdom of the world, so that these souls can then be filled with what they see more clearly when they see it again, strengthened by the shorter earthly life they have lived through.
This is the real wisdom of the world. And so we must say that much of what rightly causes us deep pain when we can only look at it from the standpoint of earthly existence, much of it shows us its conciliatory aspect when we can view it from the standpoint of spiritual perception. Now, this is how it is with the whole of life. Certainly, my dear friends, earthly pain cannot be alleviated by such a view at first. It must also be lived through. For that is precisely the condition for it to be balanced out again. If we had not experienced it in the physical world, it could not be balanced out. But even if we have to suffer through many things in the physical world, there are still moments when we can put ourselves in the spiritual perspective. Then we will recognize many things that must appear painful to us from a lower point of view as a tribute that must be paid to the higher spiritual worlds with their wisdom, so that the development of the whole world and of human existence can proceed in a balanced way rather than in a one-sided way.
The reconciliation for some pain must first be achieved, and to do this, the pain must first be endured. Spiritual science certainly cannot spare us pain, but it can teach us to carry it to the altar of existence and seek balance, and to recognize the wisdom of the world despite all the pain it must cause for the sake of higher goals. This is what spiritual science can give us as an important provision for the whole of human existence. From this point of view, I would say that it is precisely from the feelings that spiritual science can give us that we can look at the painful events of our time and say what we have often said here:
From the courage of the fighters,
From the blood of the battles,
From the suffering of the forsaken,
From the sacrifices of the people
The fruits of the spirit will grow—
Souls will consciously guide
Their minds into the realm of spirits.