The Rudolf Steiner Archive

15. Goethe's Gospel

[ 1 ] In this lecture, I would like to present a picture of the Theosophical worldview that is entirely free from any dogmatism, by attempting to show, through examples from our Central European spiritual life, what is unique to it. This is not a matter of introducing some foreign Oriental worldview, but rather of showing that Theosophy is life and must become life. It is not a new gospel, but the renewal of feelings deeply rooted in the human soul.

[ 2 ] What should interest us most is how the geniuses closest to us are imbued with what we call the theosophical worldview. Lessing, for example, believed in reincarnation. In Herder’s writings, we find ideas of reincarnation. In Schiller, we find them in his Philosophical Letters (1786), in the correspondence between Julius and Raphael (Schiller and Körner), and in the letters “On the Aesthetic Education of Man” (1793/94). Novalis also held this belief. In particular, we find a theosophical worldview in Goethe’s later works. While this may seem surprising at first, anyone who engages with the study of Goethe—especially with the profound poetry of Faust—will increasingly come to understand what I am attempting to explain. What I am about to describe has revealed itself to me in the most natural way.

[ 3 ] Goethe was, by his very nature and the innermost meaning of his life, a theosophist, because he never accepted any limits to his understanding, knowledge, or activity. Goethe was, by his very nature, destined for the worldview we are discussing here. He was convinced that human beings are deeply connected to the world, and that this world is not merely material, but rather an active, creative spirit; not merely pantheism with an indefinite, incomprehensible essence, but that we can ascend to a living relationship with the great God.

[ 4 ] As a seven-year-old boy, he gathered the sun’s rays and lit the little candle; by the fire of nature, he sought to kindle a service of sacrifice. In *Poetry and Truth*, he says: When we survey the various religions, we find in them a common core of truth. — The sages of all ages have always pointed to the pendulum swing between the higher and the lower self,

[ 5 ] When Goethe returned home after his studies in Leipzig following a serious illness, he devoted himself to mystical studies. He decided to express what was going on inside him—all that inner turmoil—in the *Faust* epic; in the legend through which the Middle Ages sought to depict the struggle between the old and new worldviews.

[ 6 ] The 16th century did not believe that one could advance toward salvation through the power of one’s own soul; it let Faust perish. Goethe, however, did so. After portraying Faust in his youth, in the “Ur-Faust,” as a striving human being, he placed him on a new foundation in the 1790s. In “Faust,” Goethe depicts the development of the human being from the lower to the higher soul forces and, as we shall yet see, also in the “Tale of the Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily.” His view was: Only the one who has passed through the stages of development, who has felt drawn to the divine, who has passed through doubt—only such a person has full conviction, has attained faith, and has struggled through disharmony to harmony. His “Faust” is a song of human perfection. We need not seek the path to perfection in the Bhagavad Gita; we also find the great problem in “Faust.” In “Faust,” Goethe sets himself the task of unraveling the mystery of evil.

[ 7 ] It is through the “Prologue in Heaven” that Goethe seeks to show us what his “Faust” is all about. The physical world is a reflection of the balance of forces in the supersensible world. Through the words of the prologue in heaven, Goethe describes the world of Devachan, the resounding world. He captures it in the image of Pythagorean celestial music:

The sun resounds in the old way
In brotherly spheres, a contest of song.

[ 8 ] Anyone who says that this is merely a superficial picture is speaking superficially.

Listen! Hear the storm of the Horae!
Resounding to the ears of the spirit
The new day is already dawning

[ 9 ] he also says this at the end of the Ariel scene; Goethe always speaks of the sounds of the spiritual world.

[ 10 ] In Theosophy, we speak of three worlds: the dream world, the astral or soul world, and the mental or spiritual world. The awakening of the spiritual eye first brings about tremendous changes in the dream life. As this new vision, this new world, opens up, it takes on a great deal of regularity. Of course, no science can be founded on what a person experiences there. The student or chela must learn to carry the consciousness of the second, astral world over into their waking consciousness through the dream. Later, then, during dreamless sleep, they have experiences through which they perceive the spiritual, the mental world.

[ 11 ] Consciousness in the astral world expresses itself through images; consciousness in the spiritual world through spiritual hearing. The Pythagoreans called this “sphere music.”

[ 12 ] Another important human principle is introduced in the prologue: the law of karma. — Anyone who knows that Goethe was thoroughly familiar with the mystics of the Middle Ages will not speak of superficial images when Goethe says:

The spirit world is not closed off,
Your mind is closed, your heart is dead!
Come, bathe, disciple, undaunted
Your earthly breast in the morning glow,

[ 13 ] “Morgenrot” is a term familiar to mystics. Jakob Böhme’s first work was titled: “Aurora, or the Dawn at Daybreak.”

[ 14 ] From the very beginning, Faust strives to transcend the boundaries of physical life. The description of the Earth Spirit is rendered entirely in technical-mystical terms—a wondrous depiction of the Earth’s astral body, an imperishable garment of the soul, spiritually fashioned and woven from the fruits of life. The Earth Spirit is not a symbol; for Goethe, it is a real being. He assumed that there were planetary beings on the planets and that their bodies, like ours, were made of flesh. Goethe’s creed was that the Earth Spirit had taught him not only to observe the unified essence of stone, plant, animal, and human, but to feel and sense it. It had taught him the brotherhood of all creation, up to humanity, the crown of creation. He also expressed this creed at the ages of thirty-five and thirty-six in *The Mysteries*. A pilgrim walks toward the monastery. At the gate, he sees a Rose Cross. The Rosicrucian symbol represents the realms of nature: stone, plant, animal = cross. Roses = love. Goethe himself later stated that each of the twelve personalities in “The Mysteries” represents one of the great world creeds or one of the great world religions. The pilgrim’s purpose was to seek the true inner core of the world religions.

[ 15 ] In the first part, we see the young Faust full of emotion and inner conflict. Through his encounter with the tempter, Faust must guide his lower self through all manner of errors. In Mephistopheles, Goethe created the embodiment of an ancient idea contained within all profound spiritual wisdom. He sought to unravel the mystery of evil. Evil is the sum of all those forces that oppose the progress of human perfection. If truth consists in further development, then every obstacle is a lie. Mephistopheles is the one who corrupts through lies; Mephiz, the corrupter—Tophel, in Hebrew, the liar. He guides us through all the experiences of the lower self.

[ 16 ] Toward the end of the first part, Faust stands before the Earth Spirit in a different light; he comes to realize that it is possible to truly know the self. Having overcome his errors, he enters the spiritual world through purification.

[ 17 ] Faust ends in old age, and that is when one becomes a mystic. In Eckermann’s Conversations with Goethe, Goethe says: “To the initiated, it will soon become apparent that there is much depth to be found in this *Faust*.”

[ 18 ] The Path to the Mothers: in all mysticism, the highest spiritual reality is feminine; knowledge is a process of fertilization. The fire on the tripod is the primordial matter; the Realm of the Mothers represents the source of all things; from this the spirit originates. To enter the spiritual realm—Devachan in the language of Theosophy—requires moral qualification. The aim of Theosophy is to lead people upward. Human beings must first make themselves capable of this, make themselves worthy. When Faust leads Helena up for the first time, he is consumed by wild passion, and thus Helena vanishes.

[ 19 ] Faust is to fathom the profound mystery of human nature: how body, soul, and spirit are united.

[ 20 ] The spirit is eternal; it existed before birth and will continue to exist after death; the soul is the link between the spirit and the body; in its development, it first inclines more toward the body, then toward the spirit, and with the spirit, toward that which is enduring and eternal. The development of the spiritual eye aids in this process.

[ 21 ] In *Faust*, we are now led into the laboratory where the homunculus is created; this becomes wonderfully clear when the homunculus is understood as a soul that has not yet incarnated. The homunculus is to receive a body. Goethe depicts the gradual development of the physical body in a magnificent image in the Classical Walpurgis Night. Proteus is the sage who knows how the physical metamorphoses take place. The homunculus must begin with the mineral realm, followed by the plant kingdom. To describe the passage through the plant kingdom, Goethe uses the expression: “It grumbles so.”

[ 22 ] Sexuality only emerges at a certain stage. Eros unites with the homunculus: the human being comes into being through the union of the psychological masculine and the psychological feminine.

[ 23 ] Faust’s blindness symbolizes this: the physical world fades away for him; his inner vision dawns upon him. A magnificent image for this process: “And as long as you do not have this: Die and Become . . .” The mystics express it this way: “And so death is the root of all life.” And: “Whoever does not die before he dies, perishes before he dies.”

[ 24 ] In the final scene of *Faust*, the Chorus Mysticus says:

All that is fleeting
Is but a parable;
The imperfect
Here becomes an event;<
The indescribable,
Here it is accomplished:
The eternal feminine
Draws us upward.

[ 25 ] In all forms of mysticism, the striving human soul is described as something feminine. The union of the soul with the mystery of the world—this spiritual union is expressed by mystics as the wedding of the Lamb. Goethe expressed this view even more deeply in the “Tale of the Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily.” Regarding the final act of Goethe’s “Faust,” Goethe himself said—in his conversations with Eckermann—that he had wanted to depict Faust’s ascent in the image of Montserrat at the end. This is hinted at in the poem “The Secrets.” Parzival, the valley wanderer. When Faust went blind, he was given the opportunity to rapidly evolve upward. Thus he entered the higher regions—the Devachan, as we would say. But Goethe also drew on Catholic ideas. Thus he had Father Marianus appear in the “most pristine cell.” This implied liberation from all that is sexual, that is, standing above man and woman. That is why he also gave him a woman’s name with a masculine ending. Now, instead of the dual-gendered, the single-gendered took its place. He had fully awakened in Buddhi. Buddhi, the sixth fundamental principle, had gained the upper hand over everything else.