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Supersensible Knowledge
GA 55

14 March 1907, Berlin

XI. Who are the Rosicrucians?

Today's subject, the Rosicrucians, is one which few people are able to connect even remotely adequate ideas. And indeed, it is not easy to arrive at anything conclusive about what the name implies. For most people it remains extremely vague. If books are consulted, one is informed that the Rosicrucians are thought to be some kind of sect that flourished in the early centuries of German culture. Some say that it is impossible to verify whether anything serious or rational ever existed behind the fraud and charlatanry associated with the name. On the other hand, some learned books do proffer a variety of information.

If what is written about Rosicrucianism is true, one could only come to the conclusion that it has consisted of nothing but idle boasting, pure fraud or worse. Even those who have attempted to justify it, do so with an air of patronage, though they may have found that Rosicrucianism is able to throw light on certain subjects. But what they have to say about it, for example, that it is involved with alchemy, with producing the philosopher's stone, the stone of the wise, and other alchemical feats, does not inspire much confidence.

However, these feats were for the genuine Rosicrucian nothing but symbols for the inner moral purification of the human soul. The transformations represented symbolically how inner human virtues should be developed. When the Rosicrucians spoke of transforming base metals into gold, they meant that it was possible to transform base vices into the gold of human virtue.

Those who uphold that the great work of the Rosicrucians is to be understood as being symbolic are met with the objection that in that case Rosicrucianism is simply trivial. It is difficult to see the need of all these alchemical inventions, such as the transformation of metals, simply to demonstrate the obvious fact that a human being should be moral and change his vices into virtues.

However, Rosicrucianism contains things of far greater import. Rather than further historical description, I shall give a factual account of Rosicrucianism. The historical aspect need concern us only insofar as we learn from it that Rosicrucianism has existed in the Occident since the fourteenth century, and that it goes back to a legendary figure, Christian Rosenkreuz,1Christian Rosenkreuz (15th century) was the founder of Rosicrucianism, a group of secret brotherhoods claiming esoteric wisdom in the late Middle Ages. about whom much is rumored, but history has little to say.

One incident that appears as a basic feature of various accounts can be summed up by saying that Christian Rosenkreuz—that is not his real name, but the one by which he is known—made journeys at the end of the fifteenth and the beginning of the sixteenth centuries. On journeys through the East he became acquainted with the book M————, a book from which, so we are mysteriously told, Paracelsus, the great medieval physician and mystic, gained his knowledge. This account is true, but what the book M————actually is, and what study of it signifies, is known only to initiates.

External information about Rosicrucianism stems from two writings that appeared at the beginning of the seventeenth century, the so-called Fama Fraternitatis in 1614, and a year later the Confessio, two books much disputed among scholars. The disputes were by no means confined to the usual controversy about books, that is, whether Valentin Andreae,2Valentin Andreae (1586–1654) theologian, wrote about Rosicrucianism. who in his later years was an ordinary normal clergyman, was really the author. In this case it was also disputed whether the author meant the books to be taken seriously or whether they were meant as satire, mocking a certain secret brotherhood known as the Rosicrucians. These two publications were followed by many others proffering all kinds of information about Rosicrucianism.

Someone without knowledge of the true background of Rosicrucianism, who picks up the writings of Valentin Andreae, or indeed any other Rosicrucian document, will find nothing exceptional in them. In fact, right up to our own time, it has been impossible to gain even elementary knowledge of this spiritual stream that still exists, and has done so since the fourteenth century. Everything published, written or printed is nothing but fragments, lost through betrayal into public hands. Not only are these fragments inaccurate; they have undergone all kinds of distortions through charlatanry, fraud, incomprehension and sheer stupidity. As long as it has existed, genuine Rosicrucianism has been passed an by word of mouth to members sworn to secrecy. That is also why nothing of great importance has found its way into public literature.

We shall speak today about certain elementary aspects of Rosicrucianism that can now be spoken of in public, for reasons which at the moment would take us too far to explain. Only when they are known can one make any sense of what is found in the often grotesque, often merely comic, but also often fraudulent, and seldom accurate information.

Rosicrucianism is one of the methods whereby what is called "initiation" can be attained. What initiation is has often been a subject of discussion in our circles To be initiated means that faculties slumbering in every human soul are awakened. These faculties enable a person to look into the spiritual world that exists behind our physical world. The physical world is an expression of the spiritual world of which it is a product. An initiate is someone who has applied the method of initiation, a method as exact and as scientifically worked out as those applied in chemistry, physics or any other science. The difference is that the method of initiation is not applied to begin with to anything external, but only to the human being; he is the instrument, the tool through which knowledge of the spiritual world is attained. An individual who genuinely strives to attain knowledge of the spirit recognizes the deep truth contained in Goethe's words:

Mysterious by Day's broad light,
Nature retains her veil, despite our clamors,
and what she won't reveal to human mind or sight
Cannot be wrenched from her with levers, screws or hammers.

( Faust, Part I, Night. trans. Bayard Taylor. )

Deep indeed are the secrets nature holds, but not as impenetrably deep as those maintain who are too comfortable to make the effort. The human spirit is certainly capable of penetrating nature's secrets: not, however, through the soul's ordinary faculties, but through higher ones, attained when its hidden forces have been developed through certain strictly circumscribed methods. A person who gradually prepares will eventually reach a point where knowledge attainable only through initiation is revealed to him; to speak in Goethe's sense: The great secret is revealed of what “ultimately holds the world together”—a revelation that is truly a fruit of initiation.

It has often been explained that the early stages of initiation can be embarked upon by anyone without any danger whatever. A prerequisite for the higher stages is the very highest conscientiousness and devotion to Truth in spiritual research. When an individual approaches the portals through which he looks into quite different worlds, he realizes the truth of what is often emphasized: that it is dangerous to impart the holy secrets of existence to great masses of people. However, to the extent that modern humanity is able, through inner preparation, gradually to find their way to the highest secrets of nature and the spiritual world, to that extent can they also be revealed.

The spiritual scientific movement is a path that guides human beings to the higher secrets. A number of such paths exist. That is not to say that the ultimate truth attainable takes different forms. The highest truth is one. No matter where or when human beings ever lived or live, once they reach the highest Truth, it is the same for all. It is comparable to the view from the mountaintop, which is the same for all who reach it, no matter what different paths they choose to get there. When one stands at a certain spot an the mountainside, when a path is available, one does not walk round the mountain for another path. The same applies to the path of higher knowledge, which must be in accordance with a person's nature. What comes into consideration here is too often overlooked, that is, the immense differences in human nature. The people of ancient India were inwardly organized differently from modern people. This difference in the higher members is apparent to spiritual research, though not to the external science of physiology or anatomy. It is thanks to this fact that we have preserved up to our own time a wonderful spiritual knowledge, and also the method whereby initiation was achieved—the path of yoga. This path leads those who are constituted like the people of ancient India to the summit of knowledge. For today's European it is as senseless to seek that path as it would be to first walk to the opposite side of the mountain and use the path there rather than the path available where one stands. The nature of today's European is completely different from that of the Oriental. A few centuries before the Christian era began, human nature was different from what it was to become a few centuries later. And today it is different again.

As we have seen, initiation is based upon awakening in human beings certain forces. Bearing this in mind, we must acknowledge that a person's nature must be taken into account when methods are developed whereby he becomes the instrument able to perceive and to investigate the spiritual world.

The wonderful method developed by the Rishis, the great spiritual teachers in ancient India, is still valid for those belonging to the Indian race. At the beginning of the Christian era the right method was the so-called Christian-Gnostic path. The human being who stands fully within today's civilization needs a different method. That is why in the course of centuries and millennia the great masters of wisdom who guide mankind's evolution change the methods that lead to the summit of wisdom.

The Rosicrucian method of initiation is especially for modern people; it meets the needs of modern conditions. Not only is it a Christian path, but it enables the striving human being to recognize that spiritual research and its achievements are in complete harmony with modern culture, and with modern humanity's whole outlook. It will for long centuries to come be the right method of initiation into spiritual life. When it was first inaugurated, certain rules were laid down for its adherents—rules that are basically still valid, and because they are strictly observed, Rosicrucians are not recognized by outsiders. Never to let it be known that one is a Rosicrucian is the first rule that only recently has been slightly modified. While the wisdom is fostered in narrow circles, its fruits should be available to all humanity. That is why until recently no Rosicrucian divulged what enabled him to investigate nature's secrets. Nothing of the knowledge was revealed; no hint was given theoretically or otherwise, but work was done that furthered civilization and implanted wisdom in ways hardly noticeable to others.

That is the first basic rule; to elaborate it further would lead too far. Suffice it to say that today this rule has been partly relaxed, but the higher Rosicrucian knowledge is not revealed. The second rule concerns conduct, and may be expressed as follows: Be truly part of the civilization and people to which you belong; be a member of the class in which you find yourself. Wear the clothes that are worn generally, nothing different or conspicuous. Thus, you will find that neither ambition nor selfishness motivates the Rosicrucian; he rather strives wherever possible to improve aspects of the prevailing culture, while never losing sight of the much loftier aims that link him with the central Rosicrucian wisdom.

The other basic rules need not concern us at the moment. We want to look at the actual Rosicrucian training as it still exists and has existed for centuries. What it is possible to say about it deals only with the elementary stages of the whole system of Rosicrucian schooling. Something ought to be said about this training that applies to spiritual scientific training, namely, that it should not be embarked upon without knowledgeable guidance. What is to be said about this subject you will find in my book Knowledge of Higher Worlds and its Attainment.

The preliminary Rosicrucian training consists of seven stages that need not be absolved in the sequence here enumerated. The teacher will lay more emphasis on one point or another, according to the pupil's individuality and special needs. Thus, it is a path of learning and inner development, adapted to the particular pupil. These are the seven steps:

1. Study, in the Rosicrucian sense of the word

2. Acquisition of imaginative knowledge

3. Acquisition of the occult script

4. Bringing rhythm into life, this is also described as preparing the philosopher's stone. This has nothing in common with the nonsense written about it.

5. Knowledge of the microcosm, that is, of man's essential nature

6. Becoming one with the macrocosm or great world

7. Attaining godliness (Gottseligkeit).

The sequence in which the student passes through these preliminary stages of Rosicrucian training depends on the students personality, but they must be absolved. What I have said about it so far, and also what I am going to say, must be looked upon as describing the ideal. Do not think that these things can be attained from one day to the next. However, one can at least learn the description of what today may seem a far distant goal. A start can always be made provided it is realized that patience, energy and perseverance are required.

The first stage or study, suggests to many something dry and pedantic. But in this case what is meant has nothing to do with erudition in the usual sense. One need not be a scholar to be an initiate. Spiritual knowledge and scholarship have no close connection. What is here meant by study is something rather different, but absolutely essential; and no genuine teacher of Rosicrucianism will guide the pupil to the higher stages if the student has no aptitude for what this first stage demands. It requires the student to develop a thinking that is thoroughly sensible and logical. This is necessary if the pupil is not to lose the ground under his feet at the higher stages. From the start it must be made clear that, unless all inclination towards fantasy and illusion is overcome, it is all too easy to fall into error when striving to enter spiritual realms. A person who is inclined to see things in a fanciful or unreal light is of no use to the spiritual world.

That is one reason; another is that though a person is born from the astral world, that is from the spiritual world next to the physical, as much as he is born from the physical world, what he experiences there is completely different from anything seen with physical sight or heard with physical ears. One thing, however, is the same in all three worlds—in the physical, the astral or spiritual, and the devachanic world—and that is logical thinking. It is precisely because it is the same in all three worlds that it can be learned already in the physical world, and thus provide a firm support when we enter the other worlds. If one's thoughts are like will-o-the-wisps so that no distinction is made between what is merely depicted and reality, then one is not qualified to rise into higher worlds. This happens for example in modern physics when the atom, which no one has even seen, is spoken of as if it were a material reality.

However, what we are discussing now is not what is generally meant by thinking. Ordinary thinking consists of combining physical facts. Here we are concerned with thinking that has become sense-free. Today there are learned people, including philosophers, who deny the existence of such thinking. Modern philosophers of great renown tell us that human beings cannot think in pure thoughts, only in thoughts that reflect something physical. Such a statement simply shows that the person concerned is not capable of thinking in pure thoughts. However, it is the height of arrogance to maintain that something is impossible just because one cannot accomplish it oneself. Human beings must be able to formulate thoughts that are not dependent on what is seen or heard physically. A person must be able to find himself in a world of pure thought when his attention is completely withdrawn from external reality. In spiritual science, and also in Rosicrucianism, this is known as self-created thinking. Someone who resolves to train his thinking in this direction may turn to books on spiritual science. There he will not find a thinking that combines physical facts, but thoughts derived from higher worlds, which present a self-sustaining continuous thinking. And as anyone can follow it, the reader is able to rise above the ordinary trivial way of thinking.

In order to make accessible the elementary stages of Rosicrucianism, it was necessary to make available in print and through lectures, material that had for centuries been guarded in closed circles. However, what has been released in recent decades is only the rudiments of an immeasurable, far-reaching world knowledge. In the course of time more and more will flow into mankind. Study of this material schools the pupil's thinking. For those who seek a still stricter schooling, my books Truth and Knowledge and The Philosophy of Freedom are particularly suitable. Those two books are not written like other books; no sentence can be placed anywhere but where it stands. Each of the books represents, not a collection of thoughts, but a thought-organism. Thought is not added to thought, each grows organically from the preceding one, like growth occurs in an organism. The thoughts must necessarily develop in like manner in the reader. In this way a person makes his own thinking with the characteristic that is self-generating. Without this kind of thinking the higher stages of Rosicrucianism cannot be attained. However, a study of the basic spiritual scientific literature will also school thinking; the more thorough schooling is not absolutely necessary in order to absolve the first stage of Rosicrucian training.

The second stage is the acquisition of imaginative thinking. This should only be attempted when the stage of study has been absolved, so that one possesses an inner foundation of knowledge and has made one's own thoughts that follow one another out of inner necessity. Without such a foundation it is all too easy to lose the ground under one's feet. But what is meant by imaginative thinking?

Goethe, who in his poem, The Mysteries, showed his profound knowledge of Rosicrucianism, gave a hint at what imaginative thinking was, in the words uttered by the Chorus Mysticus, in the second part of Faust: “All things transitory but as symbols are sent.” The knowledge that everything transitory was mere symbol was systematically cultivated wherever a Rosicrucian training was pursued. A Rosicrucian had to acquire an insight that recognizes in everything, something spiritual and eternal. In addition to ordinary knowledge of what he encountered an his journeys through life, a Rosicrucian had to acquire imaginative knowledge as well.

When someone meets you with a smiling face, you do not stop short at the characteristic contortion of his features, you see beyond the physiognomic expression and recognize that the smile reveals the person's inner life. Likewise you recognize tears to be an expression of inner pain and sorrow. In other words, the outer expresses the inner; through the physiognomy you perceive the depths of soul. A Rosicrucian has to learn this in regard to the whole of nature. As the human face, or the gesture of a hand, is the expression of a person's soul life, so, for the Rosicrucian, everything that takes place in nature is an expression of soul and spirit. Every stone, plant and animal, every current of air, the stars, all express soul and spirit just as do shining eyes, a wrinkled brow or tears. If you do not stop short at today's materialistic interpretation that regards what the Earth-Spirit says in Goethe's Faust as poetic fantasy, but recognize that it depicts reality, then you know what is meant by imaginative knowledge.

In the tides of life, in action's storm,
A fluctuant wave,
A shuttle free,
Birth and the Grave,
An eternal sea.
A weaving, flowing
Life, all-glowing,
Thus at time's humming loom 'tis my hand prepares
The garment of Life which the Deity wears!

If for you these words of the Earth-Spirit depict spiritual reality, then you will know that you possess a deeper logic, and can calmly accept being called a fool by materialists who only think they understand. As the human physiognomy expresses the life of the human soul, so does the physiognomy of the earth express the life of the Earth-Spirit. When you begin to read in nature, when nature reveals its mysteries, and different plants convey to you the Earth-Spirit's cheerfulness or sorrow, then you begin to understand imaginative knowledge. Then you will also recognize that it is this that is presented as the purest and most beautiful expression of the striving for imaginative knowledge in Rosicrucianism, and also in what preceded Rosicrucian¬ism, the ideal of the Holy Grail.

Let us look for a moment at the true nature of the Holy Grail. This ideal is always found in every Rosicrucian school. The form it takes I shall describe as a conversation which, however, never took place in reality because what I shall summarize could only be attained in the course of long training and development. However, what I shall say does convey what is looked up to as the Quest of the Holy Grail:

Look how the plant grows out of the earth. Its stem strives upward; its roots are sunk into the ground, pointing towards the centre of the earth. The opening blossom contains its reproductive organs, which bear the seeds through which the plant continues beyond itself. Charles Robert Darwin,3Charles Robert Darwin (1809–1882) the English naturalist who first formulated the theory of evolution. the famous natural scientist, is not the first to point out that, if a person is compared to the plant, it is the root, not the blossom, that corresponds to his head. This was said already by esoteric Rosicrucianism. The calyx, which chastely strives towards the sun, corresponds to the reproductive organs that in human beings are situated downwards. Human beings are inverted plants. A person turns downwards and covers up in shame the organs that the plant chastely turns upward to the light.

To recognize that the human being is the plant inverted is basic to Rosicrucianism, as indeed to all esoteric knowledge. Human beings turn their reproductive organs towards the centre of the earth; in the plant they turn towards the sun. The plant root points towards the centre of the earth; human beings Lift their heads unfettered towards sunlit spaces. The animal occupies a position between the two. The three directions indicated by plant, animal and human are known as the cross. The animal represents the beam across, the plant the downward, the human being the upward pointing section of the vertical beam. Plato, the great philosopher of antiquity, stated that the World¬Soul is crucified on the World-Body. He meant that human beings represent the highest development of the World-Soul, which passes through the three kingdoms of plant, animal and human. The World-Soul is crucified on the cross of plants, animal and human kingdoms. These words of Plato are spoken completely in the sense of spiritual science and present a wonderful and deeply significant picture.

The pupil in the Rosicrucian school had repeatedly to bring the picture before his mind of the plant with its head downward and the reproductive organs stretching towards the beam of the sun. The sunbeam was called the “holy lance of love” that must penetrate the plant to enable the seeds to mature and grow. The pupil was told: Contemplate man in relation to the plant; compare the substance of which man is composed with that of the plant. Man, the plant turned upside down, has permeated his substance, his flesh, with physical cravings, passion and sensuality. The plant stretches in purity and chastity the reproductive organs towards the fertilizing sacred lance of love. This stage will be reached by an individual when he has completely purified all cravings. In the future, when earth evolution has reached its height, a person will attain this ideal. When no impure desires permeate the lower organs, a person will become as chaste and pure as the plant is now. That individual will stretch a lance of spiritual love, the completely spiritualized productive force, towards a calyx that opens as does that of the plant to the holy lance of love of the sunbeam.

Thus, the human being's development takes him through the kingdoms of nature. He purifies his being until he develops organs of which there are as yet only indications. The beginning of a future productive power can be seen when human beings create something that is sacred and noble—a force they will fully possess once their lower nature is purified. A new organ will then have developed; the calyx will arise on a higher level and open to the lance of Amfortas, as the plant calyx opens to the sun's spiritual lance of love.

Thus, what the Rosicrucian pupil depicted to himself represents on a lower level the great future ideal of mankind, attainable when the lower nature has been purified and chastely offers itself to the spiritualized sun of the future. Then human nature, which in one sense is higher, in another lower than that of the plant, will have developed within itself the innocence and purity of the plant calyx.

The Rosicrucian pupil grasped all of this in its spiritual meaning. He understood it as the mystery of the Holy Grail4Holy Grail, a cup or chalice, associated in medieval legend with unusual powers, especially the regeneration of life and water, and later with Christian purity. Became identified with the cup used at the Last Supper and given to Joseph of Arimathea.—mankind's highest ideal. He saw the whole of nature permeating and glowing with spiritual meaning. When everything is thus seen as symbol of the spirit, one is on the way to attain imaginative knowledge; color and sound separate from objects and become independent. Space becomes a world of color and sound in which spiritual beings announce their presence. The pupil rises from imaginative knowledge to direct knowledge of the spiritual realm. That is the path of the Rosicrucian pupil at the second stage of training.

The third stage is knowledge of the occult script. This is no ordinary writing, but one that is connected with nature's secrets. Let me at once make clear how to depict it. A widely used sign is the so-called vortex, which can be thought of as two intertwined figure 6's. This sign is used for indicating and also characterizing a certain type of event that can occur both physically and spiritually. For example, a developing plant will finally produce seeds from which new plants similar to the old one can develop. To think that anything material passes from the old plant to the new is materialistic prejudice without foundation and will eventually be refuted. What passes over to the new plant is formative forces. As far as matter is concerned, the old plant dies completely; materially its offspring is a completely new creation. This dying and new coming-into-being of the plant is indicated by drawing two intertwining spirals, that is, a vortex, but drawing it so that the two spirals do not touch.

spiral

Many events take place, both physical and spiritual, that correspond to such a vortex. For example, we know from spiritual research that the transition from the ancient Atlantean culture to the first post-Atlantean culture was such a vortex. Natural science only knows the most elementary aspects of this event. Spiritual science tells us that the space between Europe and America, which is now the Atlantic Ocean, was filled with a continent on which an ancient civilization developed, a continent that was submerged by the Flood. This proves that what Plato referred to as the disappearance of the Island of Poseidon is based on facts; the island was part of the ancient Atlantean continent. The spiritual aspect of that ancient culture vanished, and a new culture arose. The vortex is a sign for this event; the inward-turning spiral signifies the old civilization and the outward-turning the new.

As the transition took place from the old culture to the new, the sun rose in spring in the constellation of Cancer—as you know the sun moves forward in the course of the year. Later it rose in early spring in the constellation of Gemini, then in that of Taurus and later still in that of Aries. People have always felt that what reached them from the vault of heaven in the beams of the early spring sun was especially beneficial. This is why people venerated the ram when the spring sun rose in the constellation of Aries; it is also the reason for legends such as “The Golden Fleece” and others. Earlier than that the sun rose in spring in the constellation of Taurus, and we find in ancient Egypt the cult of the bull Apis. But the transition from Atlantis to post-Atlantis took place under the constellation of Cancer, whose sign is the intertwining spirals—a sign you find depicted in calendars.

There exist hundreds and thousands of such signs that the pupil gradually learns. The signs are not arbitrary; they enable those who understand them to immerse themselves in things and directly experience their essence. While study schools the faculty of reason, and imaginative knowledge the life of feelings, knowledge of the occult script takes hold of the will. It is the path into the realm of creativity. If study brings knowledge, and imagination spiritual vision, knowledge of the occult script brings magic. It brings direct insight into the laws of nature that slumber in things, direct knowledge of their very essence.

You can find many who make use of occult signs, even people like Eliphas Levi. This can provide an idea of what the signs look like, but not much can be learned, unless one is knowledgeable about them already. What is found in books an the subject is usually erroneous. The signs used to be regarded as sacred, at least by the initiates. If we go back far enough, we find that strict rules concerning their secrecy were imposed, incurring severe punishment if broken, to ensure they were not used for unworthy purposes.

The fourth stage is known as the preparation of the philosopher's stone (the stone of the wise). What is written about it is completely misleading; often it is such grotesque nonsense that if true anyone would be entitled to be scornful. What I am going to say will give you a great deal of insight into the truth of the matter.

At the end of the eighteenth century there appeared in an earnest periodical a notice concerning the philosopher's stone. It was clear from the wording of the notice that its author had some knowledge of the matter, yet gave the impression that he did not fully understand. The notice read: The philosopher's stone is something that all are acquainted with, something they often handle, and is found all over the world. It is just that people do not know that it is the philosopher's stone. A peculiar description of what the philosopher's stone was supposed to be, yet word for word quite correct.

Consider for a moment the process of human breathing. The regulation of the breath is connected with the discovery, or preparation of, the philosopher's stone. At present human beings inhale oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide, that is, what is exhaled is a compound of oxygen and carbon. A person inhales oxygen, life-giving air, and exhales carbon dioxide, which is poisonous to both human and animal. If animals, who breathe like human beings, had alone populated the earth, they would have poisoned the air, and neither they nor humans would be able to breathe today. So how does it come about that they are still able to breathe? It is because plants absorb the carbon dioxide, retain the carbon and give back the oxygen for human and animal to use again.

Thus, a beautiful reciprocal process takes place between the breath of humans and animal, and the breath, or rather assimilation, of the plant world. Think of someone who every day earns five shillings and spends two. He creates a surplus, and is in a different position than someone who earns two shillings but spends five. Something similar applies to breathing. However, the significant point is that this exchange takes place between human beings and the vegetable kingdom.

The process of breathing is indeed quite amazing, and we must look at it in a little more detail. Oxygen enters the human body; carbon dioxide is expelled from it. Carbon dioxide consists of oxygen and carbon; the plant retains the carbon and gives a person back the oxygen. Plants that grew millions of years ago are today dug out of the earth as coal. Looking at this coal we see carbon that was once inhaled by the plants. Thus, the ordinary breath, just described, shows how necessary the plant is to a person's life. It also shows that when humans breathe they accomplish only half the process; to complete it they need the plant that possesses something they lack to transform carbon into oxygen.

The Rosicrucians introduce a certain rhythm into the breath, detail of which can only be imparted directly by word of mouth. However, certain aspects can be mentioned without going into details. The pupil receives definite instruction concerning rhythmic breathing accompanied by thoughts of a special nature. The effect must be thought of as comparable to the persistent drip of water that wears away the stone. Certainly even the most highly developed person will not attain, by breathing in the Rosicrucian manner, a complete transformation of the inner life processes from one day to the next. However, the gradual change wrought in the human body leads eventually to a specific goal. At some time in the future a person will be able to transform within his own being carbonic acid into oxygen. Thus, what today the plant does for human beings—transforming the carbonic acid in the carbon¬will be done by man himself when the effect of the changed breath has become great enough. This will take place in an organ he will then possess, of which physiology and anatomy as yet know nothing, but which is nevertheless developing. An individual will accomplish the transformation himself. Instead of exhaling carbon a person will use it in his own being; with what he formerly had to give over to the plant he will build up his own body.

All this must be thought of in conjunction with what was said about the Holy Grail: that the purity and chastity of the plant nature would pan over into human nature. When a person's lower nature has reached the highest level of spirituality, it will in that respect be once more at the level of the plant as it is today. The process that takes place in the plant, a person will one day be able to carry out in his own being. He will more and more transform the substance of his present body into the ideal of a plant body, which will be the bearer of a much higher and more spiritual consciousness. Thus, the Rosicrucian pupil learns the alchemy that eventually will enable a person to transform the fluids and substances of the human body into carbon. Thus, what the plant does today—it builds its body from carbon—human beings will one day accomplish. He will build a structure from carbon that will be a person's future body. A great mystery lies hidden in the rhythm of the breath.

You will now understand the notice about the philosopher's stone alluded to earlier. But what is it that human beings will learn in regard to building up the human body in the future? They will learn to create ordinary coal—which is also what diamonds consist of—and from it build their body. Human beings will then possess a higher and more comprehensive consciousness. They will be able to take the carbon out of themselves and use it in their own being. They will form their own substance, that is, plant substance made of carbon. That is the alchemy that builds the philosopher's stone. The human body itself is the retort, transformed in the way indicated.

Thus, behind the rhythm of the breath lies hidden what is alluded to as the search for the philosopher's stone; though what is usually said about it is pure nonsense. The indications given here have only recently reached the public from the School of the Rosicrucians; you will not find them in any books. They represent a small part of the fourth stage: The quest of the philosopher's stone.

The fifth stage, or knowledge of the microcosm, the small world, points to something said by Paracelsus to which I have often referred, namely, that if we could draw an extract out of everything around us, it would prove to be like an extract taken from mankind. The substances and forces within us are like a miniature recapitulation of what exists in the rest of nature. When we look at the world around us we can say: What is within us is like a copy of the great archetype that exists outside. For example, take what light has brought about in human beings: ft created the eyes. Without eyes we would not see the light; the world would remain dark for us, and likewise for the animals. Those animals that wandered into dark caves to live, in Kentucky, lost the ability to see. If light did not exist we would not have eyes. The light enticed the organs of sight out of the organism. As Goethe said: “The eye is created by the light for the light, the ear by the sound for the sound.”

Everything is born from the microcosm. Hence, the secret that under certain instruction and guidance it is possible to enter deeply into the body, and investigate not only what pertains to the body, but to the spiritual realm, and also to the world of nature around us. A person who learns under certain conditions to immerse himself with certain thoughts meditatively in the inner eye will learn the true nature of light. Another area of great significance is between the eyebrows at the root of the nose. By meditatively sinking into this point one learns of important spiritual events that took place as this part of the head was formed from the surrounding world. Thus, one learns the spiritual construction of the human being. He is completely formed and built up by spiritual beings and forces. That is why he can, by delving into his own form, learn about the beings and forces that built up his organism.

A word must be said about delving into one's inner being. This penetrating down from the “I” into the bodily nature, and also the other exercises, ought only to be undertaken after due preparation. Before a start is made the powers of intellect and reason must be strengthened. That is why in Rosicrucian schools the training of thinking is obligatory. Furthermore, the pupil must be inwardly morally strong; this is essential as he may otherwise easily stumble. As a student learns to sink meditatively into every part of his body, other worlds dawn in him.

The deeper aspects of the Old Testament cannot be understood without this sinking into one's inner being. However, it must be done according to certain directions provided by a spiritual scientific training. Everything that is said here in this respect is derived from the spiritual world and can only be fully understood when one is able to discover it again within oneself. Man is born out of the macrocosm; within himself as microcosm he must rediscover its forces and laws. Not through anatomy does man learn about his own being, but through looking into his being and inwardly perceiving that the various areas emit light and sound. The inward-looking soul discovers that each organ has its own color and tone.

Human beings will have direct knowledge of the macrocosm when they learn to recognize, through a Rosicrucian training, what it is in their own being that is created from the universe. Once they know their inner being through meditatively sinking into the eye, or into the point above the root of the nose, human beings can spiritually recognize the laws of the macrocosm. Then, through their own insight, they will understand what it is that an inspired genius describes in the Old Testament. An individual looks into the Akasha Chronicle and is able to follow mankind's evolution through millions of years.

This is insight that can be attained through a Rosicrucian training. However, the training is very different from what is customary. Genuine self¬knowledge is neither reached by aimless brooding within oneself nor in believing, as is often taught nowadays, that by looking into oneself the inner god will speak. The power to recognize the great World-Self is attained by immersing oneself in the organs. It is true that down the ages the call has resounded: “Know thyself,” but it is equally true that within one's own being the higher self cannot be found. Rather, as Goethe pointed out, one's spirit must widen until it encompasses the world.

That can be attained by those who patiently follow the Rosicrucian path and reach the sixth stage, or becoming one with the macrocosm. Immersing oneself in one's inner being is not a path of comfort. Here phrases and generalities do not suffice. It is in concrete reality that one must plunge into every being and phenomenon and lovingly accept it as part of oneself. It is a concrete and intimate knowledge, far removed from merely indulging in phrases like: “Being in harmony with the world”; “being one with the World-Soul,” or “melt together with the world.” Such phrases are simply valueless compared with a Rosicrucian training. Here the aim is to strengthen and invigorate human soul-forces, rather than chatter about being in tune with the infinite and the like.

When a human being has attained this widening of the self, then, the seventh stage is within reach. Knowledge now becomes feeling; what lives in the soul is transformed into spiritual perception. A person no longer feels that he lives only within himself. He begins to experience himself in all beings: in the stone, plant and animal, in everything into which he is immersed. They reveal to him their essential nature, not in words or concepts, but to his innermost feelings. A time begins when universal sympathy unites him with all beings; he feels with them and participates in their existence. This living within all beings is the seventh stage, or attaining godliness (Gottseligkeit), the blessed repose within all things. When the human being no longer feels confined within his skin, when he feels himself united with all other beings, participating in their existence, and when his being encompasses the whole universe so that he can say to it all: “Thou are that,” then the words which Goethe, out of Rosicrucian knowledge, expresses in his poem The Mysteries will have meaning: “Who added to the cross the wreath of roses?”

However, these words can be spoken not only from the highest point of view, but from the moment that “the cross wreathed in roses”—what this expresses—has become one's ideal, one's watchword. It stands as the symbol for a human being's overcoming the lower self in which he merely broods, and his rising from it into the higher self that leads a person to the blissful experience of the life and being of all things. He will then understand Goethe's words in the poem: West-East Divan

And until thou truly hast
This dying and becoming,
Thou art but a troubled guest
O'er the dark earth roaming.

Unless one can grasp what is meant by the overcoming of the lower, narrow self and the rising into the higher self, it is not possible to understand the cross as symbol of dying and becoming—the wood representing the withering of the lower self, and the blossoming roses the becoming of the higher self. Nor can the words be understood with which we shall close the subject of Rosicrucianism—words also expressed by Goethe, which as watchword belong above the cross wreathed in roses symbolizing sevenfold man:

The power that holds constrained all humankind,
The victor o'er himself no more can bind.

Wer Sind die Rosenkreuzer?

Mit den Rosenkreuzern, die uns heute beschäftigen sollen, können in unserer Zeit die wenigsten Menschen einen Begriff verbinden, welcher der Sache auch nur einigermaßen entspricht. Es ist allerdings nicht so leicht, mit dem Namen Rosenkreuzer irgendeinen besonderen Begriff zu verbinden. Etwas Unbestimmtes scheint für viele Menschen hinter diesem Namen zu liegen. Wenn dann der eine oder der andere in kulturhistorischen oder sonstigen Büchern nachsieht, in denen man gewohnt ist, sich über solche Sachen Rat zu holen, so findet er allerdings einige Dinge darüber gesagt, zum Beispiel, daß die Rosenkreuzer eine Sekte oder dergleichen in den früheren Jahrhunderten deutscher Geistesentwicklung waren. Er findet auf der einen Seite von einigen hervorgehoben, daß man nicht richtig dahinterkommen könne, ob hinter dem vielen Schwindel und der Charlatanerie, welche sich einmal unter dem Namen des Rosenkreuzertums breitgemacht haben, auch irgend einmal etwas Vernünftiges und Klares gesteckt haben mag. Und auf der anderen Seite findet er dann auch allerlei Mitteilungen in gelehrten Büchern.

Man muß in der Tat sagen, wenn das stimmen würde, was in der einschlägigen Literatur über die Rosenkreuzer geschrieben ist, dann könnte man so ziemlich damit einverstanden sein, daß das, was sich hinter diesem Namen verbirgt, für eitle Windbeutelei, reinen Schwindel und vielleicht noch viel Schlimmeres zu halten ist. Und auch jene, die noch versuchen, das Rosenkreuzertum zu verteidigen, entweder von oben herab oder vielleicht auch, indem sie bemerklich machen, daß sie über ein besonderes Wissen verfügen oder Aufschlüsse zu geben in der Lage sind, erwecken bei unseren Zeitgenossen und unseren Anschauungen kein besonderes Vertrauen. Allzuviel kommt auch bei der Verteidigung der Rosenkreuzer nicht heraus;insbesondere dann nicht, wenn gesagt wird: Gewiß, das Rosenkreuzertum wird in Zusammenhang gebracht mit Alchemie, mit der Bereitung des Steines der Weisen und allerlei sonstigen alchemistischen Kunststücken. Aber diese Kunststücke bedeuten dem echten, wahren Rosenkreuzer nichts als ein Sinnbild für die innere, moralische Läuterung der Seele, die Heranbildung der besonderen menschlichen Tugenden. Und wenn man sagt, es werde in der Rosenkreuzerei davon gesprochen, daß man unedle Metalle in Gold verwandeln könne, so sei damit nichts anderes gemeint, als daß man die unedlen Metalle der verschiedenen Menschenuntugenden in das Gold der menschlichen Tugenden verwandeln könne, und daß dieser Verwandlungsprozeß nur eine symbolische Darstellung dessen sei, wie man sich innerlich moralisch entwickeln solle.

Wenn es so wäre, so würde die ganze Geschichte nichts weiter als eine Trivialität oder noch etwas viel Nichtigeres sein, denn es ist schlechterdings kaum einzusehen, warum man allerlei alchemistische Dinge wie Metallverwandlung und so weiter erfinden sollte,um ein so auf derHand liegendes Ding zu demonstrieren, daß der Mensch sich läutern und seine Untugenden verwandeln solle. Dieser Einwand kann immer gegen diejenigen gemacht werden, die das große Werk des Rosenkreuzertums wie etwas bloß Symbolisches auffassen. Aber in der Tat steckt etwas viel Tieferes dahinter.

Nicht länger möchte ich mich bei dem Geschichtlichen aufhalten. Das Geschichtliche soll uns heute, wo ich eine sachliche Auseinandersetzung über das Rosenkreuzertum zu geben beabsichtige, wenig angehen. Das Geschichtliche braucht uns nicht weiter zu berühren, als nur insofern wir dadurch erfahren, daß das Rosenkreuzertum eine Gründung, eine Stiftung ist, die seit dem vierzehnten Jahrhundert tatsächlich im Abendlande besteht, daß sie zurückgeht auf eine Persönlichkeit, welche fast sagenumwoben ist, wie man bemerken könnte, von der aber die Geschichte nicht viel zu melden weiß: Christian Rosenkreutz.

Was nun aus den verschiedenen Mitteilungen als ein gewisser Grundklang hervorgeht, ist dahin zusammenzufassen, daß Christian Rosenkreutz — so ist zwar nicht sein wahrer, wohl aber derjenige Name, unter dem er bekannt geworden ist — am Ende des fünfzehnten und im Beginne des sechzehnten Jahrhunderts auch Reisen gemacht habe, und daß er auf seinen Reisen durch das Morgenland das sogenannte Buch M. . . kennengelernt habe, jenes Buch, von dem uns sehr geheimnisvoll gesagt wird, daß Paracelsus, der große mittelalterliche Arzt und Mystiker, sein Wissen daraus geschöpft habe. Dies ist wirklich eine wahre Tatsache, doch nur die Eingeweihten wissen: erstens, was das Buch M... ist, und zweitens, was das Studium im Buche M. . . bedeutet.

Die äußere Welt ist immer wieder hingewiesen worden auf das Rosenkreuzertum durch die beiden Schriften, die vom Anfange des siebzehnten Jahrhunderts stammen. Im Jahre 1614 erschien die sogenannte «Fama Fraternitatis» und ein Jahr später die sogenannte «Confessio» — zwei Bücher, über die von gelehrter Seite viel gestritten worden ist. Und zwar nicht nur darüber, worüber bei so vielen Büchern sonst gestritten wird, ob jener Valentin Andreae, der in seinen späteren Lebensjahren ein ganz normaler Superintendent war, auch wirklich das Buch verfaßt hat —, sondern bei diesen Büchern ist auch darüber gestritten worden, ob sie von den Verfassern ernst genommen worden sind, oder ob sie nur ein Spott darüber sein sollten, daß es eine gewisse geheimnisvolle Brüderschaft desRosenkreuzes gäbe, welche diese und jene Tendenzen und Ziele habe. Dann gibt es im Gefolge dieser Schriften eine ganze Reihe anderer, die allerlei aus dem Bereiche des Rosenkreuzertums mitteilen. Wenn Sie die Schriften von Valentin Andreae und auch andere rosenkreuzerische Schriften in die Hand nehmen, dann werden Sie, wenn Sie die eigentliche Grundlage des Rosenkreuzertums nicht kennen, in diesen Schriften nichts besonderes finden. Denn es ist überhaupt bis in unsere Zeit hinein nicht möglich gewesen, auch nur das Elementarste aus dem Bereiche dieser Geistesströmung, die seit dem vierzehnten Jahrhundert wirklich existiert hat und auch heute noch existiert, kennenzulernen. Alles, was in die Literatur übergegangen ist, was geschrieben und gedruckt worden ist, sind einzelne Bruchstücke, einzelne verlorene, durch Verrat an die Offentlichkeit gekommene Dinge, die ungenau und in vielfacher Weise durch Charlatanerie, Schwindel, Unverstand und Dummheit verkehrt worden sind. Die wahre, echte Rosenkreuzerei ist, seitdem sie besteht, stets nur Gegenstand mündlicher Mitteilung an solche gewesen, welche sich eidlich zur Geheimhaltung verpflichten mußten. Daher ist auch nichts Erhebliches in die öffentliche Literatur übergegangen. Erst dann, wenn man dasjenige kennt, was heute — aus gewissen Gründen, die zu erläutern jetzt zu weit führen würde — in der elementaren Rosenkreuzerei öffentlich mitgeteilt werden kann und wovon wir heute werden sprechen können, kann man in den oftmals grotesken, oft bloß komischen, oft aber auch schwindelhaften und selten stimmenden Mitteilungen der Literatur einigen Sinn finden. Die Rosenkreuzerei ist eine der Methoden, wie man die sogenannte Einweihung erreichen kann. Was Einweihung heißt, davon ist des öfteren an dieser Stelle schon die Rede gewesen. Einweihen heißt, die in jeder Menschenseele schlummernden Fähigkeiten erwecken, durch die man hineinsehen kann in die geistigen Welten, die hinter unserer sinnlichen Welt liegen, und von denen unsere sinnliche Welt nur ein äußerer Ausdruck, eine Wirkung ist. Ein Eingeweihter ist derjenige, welcher die genau bestimmten, wissenschaftlich durchgearbeiteten Methoden der Einweihung angewendet hat, Methoden, die ebenso wissenschaftlich durchgearbeitet sind wie diejenigen der Chemie, der Physik oder anderer wissenschaftlicher Gebiete. Dasjenige, was in solchen Methoden durchgemacht wird, ist allerdings nicht etwas, was der Mensch auf etwas Außeres anzuwenden hat, sondern was sich zunächst nur auf ihn selbst bezieht, auf das Instrument, das Werkzeug, durch das man in die geistige Welt hineinsieht. Der wirkliche Geisteskenner weiß, wie tief und wahr Goethes Ausspruch ist:

Geheimnisvoll am lichten Tag
Läßt sich Natur des Schleiers nicht berauben,
Und was sie deinem Geist nicht offenbaren mag,
Das zwingst du ihr nicht ab mit Hebeln und mit Schrauben.

Tief, tief sind die Geheimnisse der Natur, aber nicht unergründlich tief, wie manche sagen möchten, die im höheren Sinne nur zu bequem sind, in die Geheimnisse der Natur einzudringen. Nicht unergründlich tief sind sie, sondern zu ergründen durch den Menschengeist, zwar nicht durch den Alltagsgeist, aber denMenschengeist, der verborgene Kräfte der Seele durch gewisse, streng umschriebene Methoden aus sich herausholt. Wenn der Mensch sich nach und nach vorbereitet, dann gelangt er allmählich dazu, dasjenige geoffenbart zu erhalten, was als ein Wissen nur denen zukommt, die wirklich eingeweiht sind: jenes große Geheimnis, von dem, was, um mit Goethes Ausspruch zu sprechen, «die Welt im Innersten zusammenhält». Die Enthüllung dieses Geheimnisses ist eigentlich die Frucht der wirklichen Einweihung.

Es ist hier des öfteren auseinandergesetzt worden, daß die ersten Stufen der Einweihung durchaus gefahrlos für jeden zu durchwandern sind, daß aber die höheren Stufen die größtmöglichste menschliche Hingabe an die unbedingteste Wahrheitserforschung verlangen. Wenn der Mensch sich jenen Pforten nähert, durch die er einen Einblick gewinnen kann in ganz andere Welten, dann weiß er allerdings, daß etwas von Wirklichkeit steckt hinter der oftmals gebrauchten Redensart, daß es gefährlich ist, großen Menschenmengen die heiligen Geheimnisse des Daseins mitzuteilen. Soweit es heute möglich ist und soweit es geschehen kann, die Menschen dazu vorzubereiten, allmählich den Weg finden zu können, zu den höchsten Geheimnissen der Natur und der geistigen Welt, soweit ist es auch möglich, die höheren Geheimnisse zu enthüllen. Was man die geisteswissenschaftliche Bewegung nennt, ist ein Pfad, der erschlossen ist, die Menschen dahin zu führen, daß sie den Weg zu den höheren Geheimnissen finden können. Solcher Wege zu den höheren Geheimnissen gibt es eine ganze Anzahl. Nicht als ob die letzte Weisheit, die der Mensch erringen kann, viele Gestalten annehmen könnte; das ist nicht der Fall. Die höchste Weisheit ist eine einheitliche. Wo und wann auch immer Menschen leben oder gelebt haben, wenn sie einmal zur höchsten Weisheit gekommen sind, dann ist diese höchste Weisheit für alle Menschen eine einheitliche, wie der Ausblick vom Gipfel eines Berges, wenn man ganz oben sich befindet, ein einheitlicher ist. Aber es gibt verschiedene Wege, um zum Gipfel des Berges hinaufzugelangen, und man wird denjenigen Weg wählen, welcher von dem Ausgangspunkte aus, an dem man sich befindet, der geeignetste ist. Wenn man an einem gewissen Punkte des Berges steht und einen Weg vom eigenenStandpunkte haben kann, so wird man nicht erst um den Berg herumgehen. So ist es auch mit dem Weg, der zu der höchsten Erkenntnis hinaufführt. Hier handelt es sich darum, daß die Ausgangspunkte, die man zu wählen hat, von der Menschennatur aus zu nehmen sind. Das, was hier in Betracht kommt, beachten die Menschen heutzutage viel zu wenig: Es ist die große Verschiedenheit der menschlichen Natur zu berücksichtigen. Anders organisiert als heute waren, wenn auch vielleicht nicht für die grobe Anatomie und Physiologie, aber für die feinere Geistesforschung, jene höheren Glieder des alten indischen Volkes, so daß es möglich war, bis heute eine wunderbare Geheim- oder Geisteswissenschaft zu bewahren und auch die dazugehörige Methode der Einweihung: die sogenannte Yoga-Schulung. Diese orientalische Yoga-SchuJlung ist der Weg, welcher zu dem Gipfel der Erkenntnis hinaufführt bei einer so organisierten Natur, wie die Angehörigen des alten indischen Volkes sie hatten. Für den heutigen Europäer würde derselbe Weg so unsinnig sein, wie wenn jemand, der an einem bestimmten Fußpunkte eines Berges steht, erst um den Berg herumgehen wollte, um einen Weg zu suchen und zu benützen. Die Natur des heutigen Europäers ist ganz anders als die orientalische Natur. Anders als heute war auch die menschliche Natur organisiert um die Zeit der Entstehung des Christentums herum, einige Jahrhunderte vorher und einige nachher.

Wenn wir daran festhalten, was eben gesagt worden ist, daß Einweihung soviel bedeutet wie innere Kräfte herauszuholen, innere Kräfte zu erwecken durch bestimmte Methoden, so daß der Mensch das Instrument wird, durch das er in die geistige Welt hineinschauen und sie erforschen kann, dann müssen wir zugeben, daß auf diese Menschennatur Rücksicht genommen werden muß. So wie die alten heiligen Rishis, jene großen Lehrer des alten indischen Volkes, die wunderbare Methode ausgearbeitet haben, die heute noch immer für die Angehörigen des indischen Volkstums ihre Gültigkeit hat, so wie im Anfange des Christentums die christlich-gnostische Methode hinaufführen mußte in die geistigen Gebiete, so muß für den modernen Menschen, für den Menschen, der in unserer heutigen Umwelt lebt, wenn er ganz und gar dieser heutigen Welt angehört und aus dieser die Bedingungen seines Daseins schöpft, eine andere Methode die taugliche sei. Deshalb erneuern die großen Meister der Weisheit, welche die Menschengeschicke leiten, im Laufe der Jahrhunderte und Jahrtausende immer wieder und wieder die Methoden, durch die der Gipfel der Weisheit erreicht werden kann. Für die heutige Menschheit, für den Menschen, der aus den modernen Bedingungen des Daseins herausgewachsen ist, sind gerade von der rosenkreuzerischen Strömung die rosenkreuzerischen Methoden begründet worden. Sie sind also Einweihungsmethoden, die geradeso zum Gipfel der Weisheit hinaufführen wie andere Methoden, nur daß sie auf besondere, augenblicklich vorhandene Bedingungen des modernen Menschen eingehen.

Nicht sind etwa die rosenkreuzerischen Methoden unchristlich oder antichristlich. Davon kann keine Rede sein. Dasjenige, was dasChristentum demMenschen an Schulung bieten kann, das wird auch in der rosenkreuzerischen Methode geboten. Aber zu gleicher Zeit erwirbt sich derjenige, der eine Rosenkreuzerschulung durchmacht, die Fähigkeit, die geheim- und geisteswissenschaftlichen Errungenschaften in vollem Einklang zu sehen mit der ganzen modernen Bildung, mit alledem, was modernes Fühlen und moderne Anschauung von der Natur des Geistes notwendig macht. Für lange Jahrhunderte in die Zukunft hinein werden die rosenkreuzerischen Methoden die richtigen Methoden der Einweihung in das geistige Leben sein. Als sie begründet worden sind, galten für ihre Anhänger gewisse Regeln. Diese Regeln gelten im Grunde genommen auch heute noch. Weil diese Regeln streng eingehalten werden von allen denen, die wirklich Rosenkreuzer sind, deshalb ist es für Außenstehende unmöglich, den Rosenkreuzer zu erkennen. Nie erkenne einer den anderen, das ist die erste Regel, die nur in Jletzter Zeit eine kleine Änderung erfahren hat. Ihr sollt die Weisheit im engsten Kreise pflegen, Ihr sollt aber die Resultate, die Früchte der Weisheit allen Menschen zugängJich machen. Deshalb trug der Rosenkreuzer bis vor kurzem dasjenige, wodurch er in die Tiefe der Natur hineinschaut, niemals vor das Publikum. Keine Theorie, kein Begriff, keine Idee, nichts von irgendwelchen Vorstellungen und Erkenntnissen wurde da gegeben, sondern Arbeiten wurden geleistet, welche die Kultur vorwärtsbringen und wodurch die Weisheit dem Volke in einer Weise eingeimpft wurde, daß die Außenstehenden nicht viel davon merken konnten.

Das ist der erste Grundsatz, den weiter auszuführen zu weit führen würde, und in bezug auf dessen Kern ich nur bemerken wollte, daß er heutzutage zum Teil durchbrochen wird, daß aber die höhere rosenkreuzerische Weisheit nicht verkündet werden darf. Der zweite Grundsatz bezieht sich auf die Art des Auftretens und heißt: Gehe auf in derjenigen Volksmasse und derjenigen Kulturströmung, in die du hineingestellt worden bist. Sei ein Mitglied des Volkes und Standes der Bildungs- und der Kulturstufe, in die du hineingestellt worden bist. Trage kein besonderes Kleid, wie es gewöhnlich ausgedrückt wird, trage das allgemeineKleid, welches die anderen tragen. — Daher werden Sie als eine Art und Weise finden, daß der Rosenkreuzer da, wo er wirkt, möglichst wenig aus der Ehrsucht und aus der Selbstsucht heraus zu wirken sucht. Er wird versuchen, da und dort an Kulturströmungen anzuknüpfen, bestrebt sein, sie zu vertiefen und das Vorhandene zu gebrauchen, aber er wird immer im Auge haben etwas, was noch viel tiefer ist, was ihn verbindet mit der Zentralweisheit des Rosenkreuzertums selbst. Die anderen Grundsätze brauchen uns jetzt nicht zu beschäftigen, denn wir wollen uns jetzt mit der Rosenkreuzerschulung befassen, wie sie seit Jahrhunderten bestanden hat und noch besteht. Die Dinge, die mitgeteilt werden können, sind in gewisser Beziehung elementar, sind nur der Anfang des ganzen Systems der Rosenkreuzerschulung. Es muß aber gesagt werden, daß von dieser Schulung dasselbe gilt, was von jeder geisteswissenschaftlichen Schulung gesagt werden kann: daß die Menschen nicht literarisch suchen sollen, sondern nur dann sich praktisch mit der Sache beschäftigen möchten, wenn sie die persönliche Anleitung eines Wissenden haben. Alles, was man in dieser Beziehung sagen kann, finden Sie in der Zeitschrift «Luzifer-Gnosis» von Nr. 13 an unter dem Titel: «Wie erlangt man Erkenntnisse der höheren Welten?»

Was bei der Rosenkreuzerschulung zwecks Eintretens in die geistige Welt der Schüler zu absolvieren hat, sind folgende sieben Stufen. Diese brauchen nicht etwa in der Reihenfolge, wie ich sie aufzählen werde, von dem Schüler durchgemacht zu werden. Der Lehrer wird, je nach der Individualität des Schülers, aus dem einen oder dem anderen Punkte dasjenige herausheben, was gerade für den Schüler notwendig ist, und wird so eine Art von Lehrgang, eine Art von innerem Entwicklungsgang dem betreffenden Schüler persönlich zu geben haben. Hier muß man aber die Stufen der Rosenkreuzerschulung aufzählen. Es sind sieben:

1. Was man im rosenkreuzerischen Sinne «Studium» nennt.

2. Was man als Aneignung der sogenannten imaginativen Erkenntnis bezeichnet.

3. Was man die Aneignung der okkulten Schrift nennt.

4. Was man entweder mit dem anspruchslosen Wort bezeichnet: Rhythmisierung des Lebens, oder auch, und zwar im wahrhaftigen Sinne: die Bereitung des Steins der Weisen. Das ist etwas, was es gibt, was nur nicht jenes törichte Ding ist, von dem Sie in Büchern lesen können.

5. Was man die Erkenntnis des Mikrokosmos, das heißt der eigenen menschlichen Natur nennt.

6. Was man nennt: das Aufgehen in den Makrokosmos oder in die große Welt draußen.

7. Was man nennt: die Erreichung der Gottseligkeit.

In welcher Aufeinanderfolge der Schüler diese Stufen durchmacht, das hängt ganz von seiner Individualität ab. Durchmachen aber muß er sie in der elementaren Rosenkreuzerschulung. Betrachten Sie das, was ich Ihnen bezüglich der Rosenkreuzerschulung gesagt habe und was ich jetzt noch charakterisieren werde, als eine Art Ideal. Glauben Sie nicht, daß man es von heute auf morgen ausführen kann, aber man muß das, was einem heute noch fernsteht, seinem tieferen Inhalte nach, wenigstens dem Wortlaute nach kennenlernen. Beginnen kann der Mensch zu jeder Zeit, wenn er sich bewußt ist, daß er Geduld, Energie und Ausdauer haben muß.

Der erste Punkt, das Studium, schließt ein Wort ein, das für viele pendantisch klingt. Es wird aber keine Gelehrsamkeit darunter verstanden. Um Eingeweihter zu sein, braucht man nicht gelehrt zu sein. Gelehrsamkeit hat mit geistiger Erkenntnis nicht allzuviel zu tun. Unter dem Studium, um das es sich hier handelt, ist etwas anderes zu verstehen. Dieses Studium ist aber unerläßlich, und niemand darf durch einen wirklich kundigen Lehrer der Rosenkreuzerei in höhere Stufen eingeführt werden, wenn er nicht Neigung hat, die Stufe des Studiums wirklich durchzumachen. Durch das Studium soll sich der Schüler ein völlig vernünftiges, ganz und gar logisches Denken aneignen, ein Denken, welches ihn davor bewahrt, beim Durchgang durch die folgenden Stufen — wie das leicht sein könnte — den Boden unter den Füßen zu verlieren. Es muß durchaus festgehalten werden, daß derjenige, der eintreten soll in die geistige Welt, sie vorher kennenlernen soll, da sie in manche Irrpfade hineinführen kann, welcher Gefahr er nur dann entgeht, wenn er alles Phantastische, alles Unlogische, alles, was irgendwie unvernünftig sein könnte, vor allen Dingen abgelegt hat. Ein Phantast, der sich Vorstellungen über allerlei Unwirkliches macht, ist nicht zu gebrauchen für die geistige Welt.

Das ist der eine Grund. Der andere Grund ist der, daß man, wenn man in die höheren Welten kommt, das Mannigfaltigste an Wahrnehmungen erfährt, was durch und durch verschieden ist von dem, was uns hier in der Sinnenwelt umgibt. Derjenige, welcher hineinschauen kann — wenn ihm die inneren Sinne der Seele geöffnet werden — in die uns am nächsten befindlichen geistigen Welten, die wir gewohnt sind, die astrale und geistige Welt zu nennen, in die Welten, aus denen der Mensch ebenso herausgeboren ist wie aus der physischen Welt, lernt Dinge kennen, die grundverschieden sind von den Wahrnehmungen in unserer Sinnenwelt. Wer die astrale oder geistige Welt betritt, weiß, wie grundverschieden diese Welten sind von dem, was er hier mit Augen zu sehen, mit Ohren zu hören gewohnt ist. Aber eines ist gleich durch alle drei Welten, durch die physische, astrale, geistige oder devachanische Welt, und das ist das logische Denken. Weil das logische Denken in allen drei Welten dasselbe ist, deshalb kann es hier in dieser physischen Welt schon gelernt werden, so daß wir durch dasselbe eine feste Stütze in den anderen Welten haben werden. Lernt man aber so denken, daß der Gedanke irrlichteliert, so daß man nicht unterscheiden kann Phantasiegebilde von Wirklichkeit, so daß man zum Beispiel, wie unsere Physiker heute es tun, Atome, die niemand in unserer physischen Welt gesehen hat, wie etwas Wirkliches behandelt, gibt man sich solchen Phantasien schon in der physischen Welt hin, dann ist man nicht fähig, sich hinaufzuheben in die höheren Welten. Denken Sie sich einmal, was ein Mensch, der nicht an strenge und unerbittliche Logik gewohnt ist, von den höheren Welten für Zeug erzählen könnte.

Nun handelt es sich allerdings nicht um das, was man im gewöhnlichen Sinne Denken nennt. Das gewöhnliche Denken ist nur ein Kombinieren sinnlicher Wirklichkeiten. Hier handelt es sich aber um ein Denken, das sinnlichkeitsfrei geworden ist. Gelehrte und Philosophen leugnen heutzutage ein solches Denken überhaupt. Sie können bei vielen Philosophen, die heute einen großen Namen haben, nachlesen, daß der Mensch nicht in bloßen Gedanken denken könne, sondern immer nur in solchen Gedanken denken müsse, die einen Rest von sinnlichen Bildern enthalten. Wenn ein Philosoph das sagt, dann beweist das nichts weiter, als daß er nicht in reinen Gedanken denken kann, und es ist eine unbeschreibliche Unbescheidenheit, wenn man das, was man selber nicht kann, als eine allgemeine Unfähigkeit hinstellt. Der Mensch muß imstande sein, sich Gedanken zu bilden, die nicht mehr von Wahrnehmungen der Augen und Ohren abhängig sind, so daß er in einer reinen Gedankenwelt leben kann, in der Welt, die er in sich selber findet, wenn er die Aufmerksamkeit von den äußeren, sinnlichen Wirklichkeiten ablenkt. Dieses Denken nennt man in der Geisteswissenschaft und auch im Rosenkreuzertum das sich selbst erzeugende Denken. Derjenige, der nichts anderes tun will, um ein solches Studium zu absolvieren, mag die Lehrbücher der heutigen Geisteswissenschaft vornehmen. Das, was Sie da finden, sind nicht bloß sinnnliche Kombinationen, sondern Gedanken, die aus höheren Welten stammen, Gedanken, die ein geschlossenes Denken darstellen, das jeder verstehen kann, so daß er nicht bei der gewöhnlichen, trivialen Art des Denkens stehenzubleiben braucht.

Um die erste Stufe der Rosenkreuzerschulung möglich zu machen, ist es nötig, daß das, was seit Jahrhunderten im engsten Kreise behütet worden ist, durch Literatur und Vorträge der Menschheit zugänglich gemacht wird. Was zugänglich gemacht wird, ist aber nichts anderes als das Einmaleins, der Anfang des großen und unermeßlichen Weltenwissens. Mit der Zeit wird immer mehr davon in die Menschheit einfließen. Seit einigen Dezennien ist der elementare Teil desselben der Menschheit enthüllt worden. Daran können Sie Ihr Denken schulen. Für diejenigen, die das gründlicher machen wollen, die also in eine solche strenge SchuJlung desDenkens eintreten wollen, sind meine beiden Bücher «Wahrheit und Wissenschaft» und «Die Philosophie der Freiheit» bestimmt. Diese Bücher sind nicht so geschrieben wie andere Bücher, daß sie einen Satz einer bestimmten Stelle auch an eine andere Stelle des betreffenden Buches setzen könnten. Diese Bücher sind keine Gedanken-Aggregate, sondern Gedanken-Organismen. Ein Gedanke wächst wie ein Organismus, er wächst organisch aus dem anderen heraus. Diese Bücher sind also nicht so geschrieben, daß einfach ein Gedanke zum anderen hinzugefügt wird, sondern so, daß die späteren Gedanken aus den vorhergehenden herausgewachsen sind wie bei einem Organismus. So müssen in dem Leser auch die Gedanken herauswachsen, er muß spüren, wie er hingetrieben wird zu dem Denken; und dann macht er sich jene eigentümliche Art des Denkens, das sich selbst erzeugende Denken, zu eigen, ohne welches man die höheren Stufen der rosenkreuzerischen Schulung nicht erlangen kann, obgleich diese gründlichere Art nicht absolut notwendig ist und man sehr gut bei der geisteswissenschaftlichen, elementaren Literatur bleiben kann, da diese den Stoff für das Studium auch abzugeben vermag.

Das zweite ist die Aneignung des imaginativen Denkens. Dasjenige, was ich imaginatives Denken nenne, sollte man sich erst aneignen, wenn man auf diese Weise strenge innere Gedankennotwendigkeit in sich aufgenommen hat, so daß man einen strengen Wissenskern besitzt. Man kann sonst leicht den Boden unter den Füßen verlieren. Was ist nun imaginatives Denken? Goethe, der in seinem rosenkreuzerischen Gedicht «Die Geheimnisse» gezeigt hat, wie tief er in die rosenkreuzerischen Geheimnisse eingeweiht war, gibt einen Hinweis in einem schönen Spruch des Chorus Mysticus im zweiten Teil des Faust, wo er das Geleitwort gegeben hat: «Alles Vergängliche ist nur ein Gleichnis.» Dies wurde überall, wo eine innere rosenkreuzerische Schulung vorhanden war, in systematischer Weise entwickelt. Der Rosenkreuzer mußte fähig werden, durch die ganze Welt zu gehen und neben der logischen Erkenntnis sich die imaginative Erkenntnis derselben anzueignen, diejenige Erkenntnis, die in allem, was um uns herum ist, ein Geistiges, ein Unvergängliches sieht. Wenn Sie einem Menschen gegenübertreten und Sie sehen auf seinem Antlitz ein heiteres Lächeln, dann werden Sie nicht dabei stehenbleiben, nur jene eigentümlichen Windungen im Gesicht, die Physiognomie, die sich Ihrem Auge darbietet, zu beschreiben. Es wird vielmehr Ihre Seele sich klar sein darüber, daß in jenem eigentümlichen Ausdruck der Heiterkeit sich das innere Leben der Seele verrät, ebensowenig wie Sie bei perlenden Tränen dabei stehenbleiben werden, sie zu untersuchen. Sie werden sich klar darüber sein, daß die Tränen der Ausdruck inneren Schmerzes, inneren Leides sind. Das Außere ist Ausdruck des Inneren. Sie sehen in der Physiognomie bis auf den Grund der Seele. Der ganzen übrigen Natur gegenüber muß das der Rosenkreuzerschüler lernen. So wie das menschliche Antlitz und die Bewegung der Hände Ausdrucksmittel sind für das menschliche Seelenleben, so ist alles, was in der Natur vorgeht, Ausdruck eines seelisch-geistigen Lebens. Wie die Geste Ausdruck für unsere Seele ist, so wird für den Rosenkreuzer alles — nicht bloß als poetisches Bild, sondern als tiefe Wirklichkeit —, die ganze Erde um uns herum der Ausdruck seelisch-geistigen Lebens: die Steine, Pflanzen und Tiere, die Sterne, jeder Luftzug. Alles, was um uns herum ist, wird so der Ausdruck von Seelisch-Geistigem, nicht etwa in poetischer Beziehung, sondern in Wirklichkeit, wie das leuchtende Auge, die sich runzelnde Stirne, die perlende Träne physiognomische Ausdrücke innerer Seelenzustände sind. Dann erst wissen Sie, was imaginative Erkenntnis heißt, wenn Ihnen das, was Goethe in seinem Faust vom Erdgeiste sagt, nicht mehr ein poetisches Bild, sondern Wirklichkeit ist, wenn Sie bei dem heutigen materialistischen Sinn unserer Bevölkerung nicht stehenbleiben, sondern bei dem Worte des Erdgeistes Wirklichkeit zu erkennen vermögen, während man heute froh ist, wenn man ein poetisches Bild darin genießen kann:

In Lebensfluten, im Tatensturm
Wall’ ich auf und ab,
Webe hin und her!
Geburt und Grab,
Ein ewiges Meer,
Ein wechselnd Weben,
Ein glühend Leben,
So schaff’ ich am sausenden Webstuhl der Zeit
Und wirke der Gottheit lebendiges Kleid.

Wenn Ihnen diese Worte des Erdgeistes Wirklichkeit geworden sind und Sie es ruhig aushalten können, daß Sie von Materialisten für einen Narren gehalten werden, da Sie wissen, daß Sie eine tiefere Logik haben, da Sie wissen, daß jene phantastischer sind und nur zu wissen glauben, daß Sie aber wissen, daß Sie einer freien Wirklichkeit des Geistes gegenüberstehen, und ebenso wahr und wirklich, wie eine menschliche Seele in den Physiognomien lebt, auch in der Erdphysiognomie ein Erdgeist lebt. Wenn Sie in einer Pflanze die Heiterkeit des Erdgeistes erblicken, wenn die Erde Ihnen der Ausdruck des leiderfüllten Erdgeistes wird, wenn Ihnen die Natur so erscheint, als wenn sie zu Ihnen spräche, wie wenn sie Ihnen ihr Geheimnis wirklich mitteilte, wenn Sie das erleben, dann fangen Sie an, ihre Geheimnisse zu buchstabieren und zu verstehen, was es heißt: imaginative Erkenntnis zu erwerben. Dann kommen Sie dahin, zu verstehen, wie dies im Rosenkreuzertum und auch bei den Vorfahren des Rosenkreuzertums in dem großen okkulten Ideal des heiligen Grals hingestellt worden ist als dem reinsten und schönsten Ausdruck für das Streben nach imaginativer Erkenntnis.

Lassen Sie uns einmal einen Blick werfen auf die wahre Natur dieses Ideals vom heiligen Gral. Es tritt Ihnen in jeder Rosenkreuzerschule in der Weise vor Augen, wie ich es jetzt charakterisieren will. Ich benutze hierzu die Form eines Dialogs, der aber niemals in wirklichen Rosenkreuzerschulen gehalten worden ist. Da wurde durch lange Entwicklungsmethoden im Leben das erreicht, was ich jetzt im Dialog zusammenfassen will. Er gibt das, was das Ideal des heiligen Grals wirklich enthält.

Sieh Dir an die Pflanze, wie sie herauswächst aus der Erde, Ihre Wurzel ist in den Boden hineingesenkt, sie ist nach dem Mittelpunkt der Erde hin gerichtet, der Stengel strebt nach oben, die Blüte nach oben öffnend, darinnen die befruchtenden Organe, die den Samen zeugen werden, wodurch die Pflanze über sich selbst hinauslebt. Nicht erst Darwin, der große Naturforscher, hat davon gesprochen, daß, wenn man die Pflanze mit dem Menschen vergleicht, nicht die Blüte, sondern die Wurzel mit dem Kopfe verglichen werden müsse. Die Wurzel der Pflanze entspricht dem Kopfe des Menschen — so sagte schon der Rosenkreuzer-Okkultismus —, und dasjenige, was von der Pflanze als Blütenkelch der Sonne keusch entgegenstrebt, das ist das, was der Mensch als Befruchtungsorgane nach unten wendet. Der Mensch ist eine umgekehrte Pflanze. Er wendet die Organe, welche die Pflanze keusch nach oben dem Lichte zuwendet, schamvoll nach unten und verhüllt sie. Der Mensch ist die umgekehrte Pflanze: das ist ein Grundsatz des Rosenkreuzer-Okkultismus und des Okkultismus aller Zeiten. Die Pflanze ist mit den Befruchtungsorganen keusch der Sonne zugewendet. Der Mensch hat die Befruchtungsorgane nach dem Mittelpunkte der Erde gerichtet, den Kopf frei nach dem Sonnenraum hinaus. Zwischen beiden, mitten drinnen, steht das Tier, Die drei Richtungen, die sich durch die Pflanze, das Tier und den Menschen ergeben, bezeichnet man als das Kreuz. Die Pflanze ist der Balken, der nach unten geht, das Tier ist der Querbalken, der Mensch ist der Balken nach oben. Wenn Plato, der große eingeweihte Philosoph des Altertums, sagt, daß die Weltseele an dem Kreuze des Weltenleibes gekreuzigt ist, so bedeutet das nichts anderes, als daß der Mensch die höchste Ausgestaltung der Weltenseele darstellt, und daß die Weltenseele hindurchgegangen ist durch die drei Reiche: Pflanzenreich, Tierreich und Menschenreich. Die Weltenseele ist an dem Kreuze: Pflanzenreich, Tierreich und Menschenreich, den drei Naturreichen, gekreuzigt. — Ein wunderbar tiefes Bild von Plato, ganz aus der Geisteswissenschaft herausgesprochen.

Unzählige Male wurde dieses Bild in den Rosenkreuzerschulen wiederholt: Schaut Euch die Pflanze an mit dem Kopf nach unten, mit den Befruchtungsorganen nach oben, die sich dem Sonnenstrahl entgegenstrecken. — Diesen Sonnenstrahl nannte man die heilige Liebeslanze, welche die Pflanze zu durchdringen hat, damit der Same zum Wachsen und Reifen kommen kann. Nun sagte man dem Schüler: Richte den Blick hinauf bis zum Menschen, sieh dir die Pflanze und dann den Menschen an, vergleiche desMenschen Materie und Stoff mit denen der Pflanze. Der Mensch ist die umgekehrte Pflanze, er ist es geworden, weil er seinen Stoff, sein Fleisch durchdrungen hat mit physischer Begierde, mit Leidenschaft und Sinnlichkeit. Keusch und rein darf die Pflanze die Befruchtungsorgane der Befruchtungslanze, der hehren Liebeslanze, entgegenstrecken. Der Mensch kommt auf einen ähnlichen Standpunkt in der Zeit, wo er die Begierde vollkommen geläutert haben wird, so daß er in eine Zukunft hineinblickt, die ihm die Erfüllung des Ideals bringen wird: Du bist so keusch und rein wie der Blütenkelch der Pflanze. Dann wirst du auf der Höhe der irdischen Entwicklung angelangt sein, dann wird nicht mehr unreine Begierde deine niederen Organe durchziehen, dann wirst du die geistige Liebeslanze, deine produktive Kraft, die dann ganz geistig sein wird, entgegenstrecken dem Blütenkelch, wie der Pflanzenkelch sich öffnet der heiligen Liebeslanze im Sonnenstrahl. So geht der Mensch durch die Reiche der Natur hindurch und läutert sich hinauf bis zur Entwicklung derjenigen Organe, die heute erst in der Anlage begriffen sind. Wenn der Mensch in dem, was heilig und edel ist, etwas hervorbringt, so ist er am Anfang einer zukünftigen, produktiven Kraft, die er haben wird, wenn seine niedere Natur ihre vollständige Läuterung durchgemacht hat. Dann wird er ein neues Organ haben. Der Blütenkelch der Pflanze wird auf höherer Stufe neuerdings erstehen und wird der Lanze des Amfortas entgegengestreckt werden, wie der Blütenkelch der geistigen Liebeslanze der Sonne.

So stelle dir auf niederer Stufe dasjenige dar, was, als hohes Ideal gegeben, in Zukunft des Menschen Geschlecht sein wird, wenn alles Niedere geläutert sein wird und alles keusch und rein sich entgegenhalten wird der vergeistigten Sonne der Zukunft, wenn dieser Pflanzenkelch hindurchgegangen sein wird durch die Menschennatur, die in gewisser Beziehung höher, in gewisser Beziehung niederer stehen wird als die Pflanze, wenn er hinaufgeläutert sein wird bis zur höchsten Geistigkeit, und vorgehalten wird der vergeistigten Sonne als der heilige Kelch, der erhöhte Pflanzenkelch, der durch die Menschheit hindurchgegangen ist.

Dies wurde geistig erfaßt von dem Rosenkreuzerschüler, es ist das Geheimnis des heiligen Gral, das höchste Ideal, das vor den Menschen hingestellt werden kann. So erscheint die ganze Natur mit einem geistigen Sinn durchglüht und durchströmt. Wenn man so alles erfaßt, alles als ein Gleichnis des Geistigen sieht, dann ist man auf dem Wege, die imaginative Erkenntnis zu erwerben. Dann dringen aus den Dingen die Farben und werden selbständig, es dringen aus ihnen die Töne und werden selbständig, der Raum erfüllt sich mit einer selbständigen Farben- und Tonwelt, und in diesen kündigen sich geistige Wesenheiten an. Wir steigen von der imaginativen Erkenntnis zu der wirklichen Erkenntnis des geistigen Raumes auf. Das ist der Weg, den der Rosenkreuzer auf der zweiten Stufe seiner Schulung nimmt.

Das dritte ist die Kenntnis der okkulten Schrift. Die okkulte Schrift ist keine gewöhnliche Schrift, sondern eine solche, die mit den Naturgeheimnissen zusammenhängt. Ich möchte Ihnen gleich klarmachen, was Sie sich unter der okkulten Schrift vorzustellen haben. Ein verbreitetes Zeichen dieser Schrift ist der sogenannte Wirbel. Sie können sich denselben so vorstellen, daß Sie sich zwei Sechser ineinander verschlungen denken. Dieses Zeichen gebraucht man, um gewisse Erscheinungen, die in der ganzen natürlichen und geistigen Welt vorhanden sind, zu kennzeichnen und ihre innere: Natur zu charakterisieren. Wenn Sie eine Pflanze nehmen und betrachten, so werden Sie finden, daß sie sich bis zum Samenkorn entwickelt. Wenn Sie dieses Samenkorn in die Erde legen, so entwickelt sich eine ähnliche Pflanze, die der alten gleich ist. Daß da etwas Stoffliches von der alten Pflanze in die neue übergeht, ist ein materielles Vorurteil, das durch nichts gerechtfertigt ist und von der Zukunft widerlegt werden wird. In die neue Pflanze geht lediglich die bildsame Kraft über. Die alte Pflanze erstirbt stofflich ganz und gar, und die neue Pflanze ist stofflich etwas ganz Neues. Nicht das allergeringste Stoffliche geht aus der alten Pflanze in die neue über. Diesen neuen Ansatz einer Entstehung und eines Vergehens einer Pflanze bezeichnet man dadurch, daß man zwei sich ineinander schlingende Spiralen, also einen Wirbel zeichnet, und zwar ohne eine Verbindung der beiden Linien zu bewirken.

spiral

Nun finden sich solche Wirbel sowohl in der äußeren als auch in der geistigen Natur. So sagt uns zum Beispiel die Geistesforschung, daß in der Entwicklung der Menschheit einst ein solcher Wirbel vorhanden war, als die alte atlantische Kultur in die neue nachatlantische Kultur überging. Die Geisteswissenschaft zeigt Ihnen hier etwas, was die heutige Naturwissenschaft nur in der ersten elementarsten Stufe kennt. Sie zeigt Ihnen, daß das, was heute Meer ist zwischen Europa und Amerika, ausgefüllt war mit einem Kontinente, daß sich eine uralte Kultur da entwickelt hatte, daß durch die «Sündflut» jener Kontinent überflutet wurde und verschwand. Dies zeigt uns, daß das, was uns Plato von dem Untergang der Insel Poseidonis mitteilt, auf Richtigkeit beruht, und daß sie ein Rest des uralten, atlantischen Kontinentes war. Jene Kultur verschwand in bezug auf ihre geistige Eigenschaft, und eine neue Kultur trat auf, so daß man diesen Vorgang kennzeichnen kann mit den zwei ineinander sich schlingenden Spiralen, dem Wirbel. Das Alte wird bezeichnet durch die sich hineinschlingende Spirale, das Neue durch die sich herausschlingende.

Als der Übergang von der atlantischen Kultur in die nachatlantische vor sich ging, da erschien im Frühlinge die Sonne im Sternbilde des Krebses. Sie wissen, daß die Sonne im Laufe des Jahres vorwärtsrückt. In jener alten Zeit ging sie, wie gesagt, bei Frühlingsanfang im Sternbilde des Krebses auf, dann eine Zeitlang im Sternbilde der Zwillinge, dann im Sternbilde des Stieres und dann des Widders. Die Völker haben immer dasjenige als etwas besonders Wohlträtiges empfunden, was ihnen vom Himmelsgewölbe die ersten Sonnenstrahlen zusendet. Daher sehen Sie, daß man, als die Sonne anfing im Sternbilde des Widders aufzugehen, angefangen hat, den Widder zu verehren. Daher rühren die ganzen Lammsagen, die Sage vom goldenen Vließ und so weiter. Früher, bevor die Sonne im Sternbilde des Widders aufgegangen war, ging sie im Sternbilde des Stieres auf. Daher haben die Kulturen, welche den WidderKulturen vorangegangen sind, den Stier als heiliges Tier verehrt. Sie finden daher in jener Zeit zum Beispiel die Verehrung des ägyptischen Stieres Apis. In der Zeit des Überganges von der atlantischen in die nachatlantische Zeit haben Sie die Herrschaft des Sternbildes des Krebses gehabt. Und daher haben Sie die zwei ineinandergeschlungenen Wirbel als Zeichen des Krebses im Kalender.

Es gibt hunderte, tausende dieser Zeichen, die man nach und nach lernt. Das sind nicht willkürliche Zeichen. Wenn man sie kennt, zeigen sie einem die Wege, um hineinzukriechen in die Dinge und in den Dingen zu leben. Wie das Studium den Verstand, die imaginative Erkenntnis das Gemüt ergreift, so ergreift die Erkenntnis der okkulten Schrift den Willen. Sie zeigt uns die Wege beim Schaffen und Produzieren. Wenn daher das Studium uns Erkenntnis, die Imagination Anschauung bringt, so bringt uns die Erkenntnis der okkulten Schrift Magie, die Erkenntnis der in den Dingen schlummernden Naturgesetze, die Erkenntnis, die uns tiefer in das Wesen der Dinge hineinführt. Sie können bei vielen — meinetwegen auch bei Eliphas Levi — viele okkulte Zeichen finden. Derjenige aber, der nichts weiß von diesen Dingen, wird wenig dabei lernen können. Sie können indessen eine Andeutung darin finden, wie sie aussehen. In den Werken, die Sie darüber gedruckt finden, steht gewöhnlich Unzutreffendes. Heilig gehalten wurden von allen Völkern, von den Eingeweihten wenigstens, diese okkulten Schriftzeichen. Und wenn wir weiter zurückgehen, finden wir strenge Bestimmungen über deren Geheimhaltung, damit diejenigen, welche solche Zeichen gebrauchen dürfen, sie nie unwürdig gebrauchen mögen. Die strengsten Strafen sind auf die Übertretung dieser Bestimmungen gesetzt.

Das vierte ist das, was man die Bereitung des Steines der Weisen nennt. Was Sie darüber in der Literatur finden, ist ziemlich unzutreffend, ja sogar meistens törichtes Zeug. Wäre der Stein der Weisen das, was da geschildert wird, so hätte jeder ein Recht, darüber zu spotten. Sie werden ein Stück davon erkennen, wenn Sie meiner Betrachtung folgen: sie wird Ihnen einen großen Einblick geben. Am Ende des achtzehnten Jahrhunderts stand in einer ernstzunehmenden mitteldeutschen Zeitschrift eine Notiz über den Stein der Weisen. Wer diese Notiz liest und etwas von der Sache versteht, der findet, daß der Schreiber irgendwo einmal etwas darüber vernommen hat. Seine Worte sind ganz richtig, aber man sieht auch, daß er seine Worte selbst nicht richtig versteht. Der Verfasser der Notiz schreibt da: Der Stein der Weisen ist etwas, was alle Menschen kennen, etwas, was die meisten Menschen oft und oft in der Hand haben, was man an vielen Orten der Erde findet und von dem nur der Mensch nicht weiß, daß es der Stein der Weisen ist. — Eine sonderbare Beschreibung ist das, wie der Stein der Weisen sein soll, und dennoch wörtlich wahr. Man muß die Sache nur richtig verstehen.

Betrachten Sie einmal den menschlichen Atmungsprozeß, denn mit einer Regulierung des Atmens hängt das zusammen, was man die Auffindung oder Bereitung des Steines der Weisen nennt. Der Mensch atmet heute Sauerstoff ein und Kohlensäure aus, also die Verbindung des Sauerstoffs mit Kohlenstoff wird ausgeatmet. Der Mensch atmet Sauerstoff, die Lebensluft, ein und Kohlensäure, ein wirkliches Gift, aus. Mit dieser Kohlensäure kann der Mensch und das Tier nicht leben. Würden die Tiere, die geradeso atmen wie der Mensch, allein auf der Erde sein und hätten sie immer so geatmet wie heute, so würden sie die Luft um sich herum verpestet haben, und weder Tier noch Mensch könnte heute noch atmen. Woher kommt es nun, daß sie aber noch atmen können? Daher, daß die Pflanze die Kohlensäure aufnimmt, den Kohlenstoff in sich behält und den Sauerstoff wieder zurückgibt, so daß Menschen und Tiere den Sauerstoff wieder zur Atmung benützen können. Es ist also ein schöner Wechselprozeß zwischen der Atmung der Tier- und Menschenwelt und der Atmung oder dem Assimilationsprozeß der Pflanzenwelt — Assimilationsprozeß, damit kein pedantischer Gelehrter etwas dagegen einwenden kann. Derjenige, der jeden Tag fünf Mark einnimmt und jeden Tag zwei Mark ausgibt, schafft einen Überschuß, bei ihm steht die Sache anders als bei demjenigen, der fünf Mark ausgibt und nur zwei Mark einnimmt. Ähnlich kann es auch bei der Atmung sein. Das Wesentliche aber hierbei ist, daß dieser Tauschprozeß zwischen Mensch und Pflanzenwelt besteht.

Dieser Tauschprozeß ist höchst merkwürdig. Betrachten wir ihn deshalb noch einmal etwas näher. In den MenschenJeib geht Sauerstoff ein, aus dem Menschenleib kommt KohJensäure heraus. Kohlensäure besteht aus Sauerstoff und Kohlenstoff. Die Pflanze behält den Kohlenstoff und gibt den Sauerstoff dem Menschen wieder zurück. Sie können in der Steinkohle, die Sie Jahrmillionen nach Entstehung der betreffenden Pflanze aus der Erde herausgraben, den Kohlenstoff, welchen die Pflanze eingeatmet hat, wieder erblicken. Der gewöhnliche Atmungsprozeß, der so verläuft, wie er eben geschildert wurde, zeigt an, wie notwendig der Mensch zu seinem Leben heute die Pflanze hat, und wie in ihm beim Atmungsprozeß etwas vorgeht, was nur ein halber Prozeß ist. Er braucht die Pflanze als etwas, was nicht in ihm ist, damit sie ihm den Kohlenstoff in Sauerstoff umwandelt.

Nun gibt es eine Rhythmisierung des Atmungsprozesses in rosenkreuzerischem Sinn, über die indessen Näheres nur von Mensch zu Mensch mitgeteilt werden kann. Es kann zwar hier darauf hingedeutet werden, aber nur so, daß von einem Eingehen in Einzelheiten Abstand genommen wird. Aber der Rosenkreuzerschüler bekam und bekommt seine bestimmte Anweisung, er mußte in einer bestimmten Weise atmen, in einem bestimmten Rhythmus und mit ganz bestimmten Gedankenformen. Dadurch wird sein Atmungsprozeß umgewandelt. Diese Umwandlung können Sie sich nur vorstellen, wenn Sie den Ausspruch berücksichtigen: Steter Tropfen höhlt den Stein. Auch bei den höchststehenden Menschen wird nicht von heute auf morgen der ganze innere Lebensprozeß umgestaltet, wenn in rosenkreuzerischer Form geatmet wird. Aber dasjenige, was bei solcher Atmung im Leibe des Menschen umgestaltet wird, geht nach einer bestimmten Richtung hin, nämlich dahin, daß der Mensch in Zukunft imstande ist, in sich selbst die Kohlensäure wieder in brauchbaren Sauerstoff umzuwandeln, so daß das, was heute draußen in der Pflanze vor sich geht: die Umwandlung der Kohlensäure in den Kohlenstoff, das, was heute die Pflanze dem Menschen abnimmt, von dem Menschen, wenn der Atmungsprozeß immer weiter und weiter wirken wird in dem Einzuweihenden, in einem eigenen Organ bewirkt werden wird, von dem Physiologie und Anatomie noch nichts wissen, das aber gleichwohl in der Entwicklung begriffen ist. Der Mensch wird also dann selbst die Umwandlung bewirken. Statt den Kohlenstoff [mit der Kohlensäure] hinauszuatmen und an die Pflanze abzugeben, wird er ihn in sich selbst verwenden und seinen eigenen Leib mit Hilfe des Kohlenstoffes, den er vorher an die Pflanze abgeben mußte, auferbauen (siehe Hinweise).

Halten Sie das, was ich eben gesagt habe, zusammen mit dem, was ich von dem Ideal des heiligen Grals mitgeteilt habe: nämlich daß die reine keusche Pflanzennatur durchgegangen sein wird durch die Menschennatur, und daß diese Menschennatur in ihrer höchsten Geistigkeit wieder bei der Pflanze von heute angekommen sein wird. Den Pflanzenprozeß in sich selbst durchzumachen, wird der Mensch einst imstande sein. Seine jetzigen Stoffe, die er in sich hat, wird er immer mehr zu jenem Ideal hinbilden, daß der Körper ein Pflanzenleib und der Träger eines viel höheren und geistigeren Bewußtseins sein wird. So lernt der Schüler die Alchemie, durch die er in den Stand gesetzt wird, die Säfte und Stoffe des Menschen in Kohlenstoff umzuwandeln. Was heute die Pflanze tut, indem sie ihren Leib aus Kohlenstoff auferbaut, das wird der Mensch einst selbst tun. Er wird sich aus Kohlenstoff eine Struktur des Leibes bilden, die die Struktur des künftigen Menschenleibes sein wird,.

Ein großes Geheimnis verbirgt sich hinter dem, was man die Rhythmisierung des Atmungsprozesses nennt. Jetzt verstehen Sie wohl jene Andeutung über den Stein der Weisen, die in der vorhin zitierten Notiz enthalten ist. Was lernt der Mensch also bezüglich des Aufbaues seiner späteren Leibesform? Er lernt die gewöhnliche Kohle erzeugen, die auch die Substanz des Diamanten ist, um damit seinen Leib aufzubauen. Diesen Kohlenstoff wird der Mensch bei einem erhöhten und erweiterten Bewußtsein aus sich selbst entnehmen und in sich selbst verwenden können. Er wird seine eigene Substanz, die auf der Kohlenstoffstruktur aufgebaute Pflanzensubstanz bilden können. Das ist die Alchemie, welche zur Bildung des Steines der Weisen hinführt. Der Menschenleib selbst ist jene Retorte, die in dem Sinne verwandelt wird, wie es eben hier angedeutet worden ist.

So verbirgt sich hinter der Regulierung des Atmungsprozesses, hinter dem, was man oft bezüglich desSteines der Weisen, aber meist in ganz unsinniger Weise, angedeutet findet, das, was man die Auffindung oder Bereitung des Steines der Weisen nennt. Das sind die Andeutungen, wie sie erst seit kurzem aus den Rosenkreuzerschulen in die Offentlichkeit gedrungen sind. Vergeblich werden Sie sie in Büchern suchen. Das ist ein kleiner Teil der vierten Stufe: die Aufsuchung des Steines der Weisen.

Das fünfte besteht in dem, was man die Erkenntnis des Mikrokosmos, der kleinen Welt, nennt. Das führt uns auf das zurück, was Paracelsus gesagt hat und worauf ich schon oft hingewiesen habe: Alle Dinge, die um uns herum sind, würden, wenn wir aus ihnen einen Auszug nehmen könnten, als Extrakt den Menschen ergeben. Der Mensch hat in sich diejenigen Stoffe und Kräfte, welche als kurze Rekapitulation der ganzen übrigen Natur erscheinen, so daß, wenn wir die Natur um uns sehen, wir sagen können, was draußen in der Natur ist, ist im großen das Urbild von dem, was in uns allen als Nachbild erscheint. Nehmen wir zum Beispiel das Licht. Was hat nun dieses Licht im Menschen bewirkt? Wenn es kein menschliches Auge gäbe, so könnte es nicht das Licht gewahr werden. Die Welt wäre finster und dunkel für uns. Aber ebenso wie Tiere, wenn sie in finstere Höhlen einwandern, wie zum Beispiel in die Höhlen von Kentucky, das Sehvermögen verlieren, so wird auf der anderen Seite das Auge vom Lichte selbst geschaffen. Wir hätten kein Auge, wenn es kein Licht gäbe. Das Licht hat erst unsere Sehorgane aus der Haut, aus dem Organismus herausgelockt. Das Auge, hat Goethe gesagt, ist vom Licht und für das Licht, das Ohr vom Ton und für den Ton geschaffen. Alle Dinge sind aus der großen Welt, dem Makrokosmos, herausgeboren. Darin beruht das Geheimnis, daß man unter gewissen Anleitungen und Anweisungen, durch eine Vertiefung in den Körper hinein, nicht bloß die leibliche, sondern auch die geistige Welt ergründen und die uns umgebende Natur erkennen lernen kann. Wer unter gewissen Bedingungen lernt, mit gewissen Gedankenformen sich meditativ ganz in das Innere des Auges zu versenken, der lernt die innere, wesentliche Natur des Lichtes erkennen. Zwischen den Augenbrauen, an der Nasenwurzel, ist ein Punkt, der in dieser Beziehung auch von hoher Bedeutung ist. Wenn man sich in ihn vertieft, dann lernt man bedeutsame, wichtige Vorgänge in der geistigen Welt kennen, die sich abgespielt haben, als diese Partie des Kopfes sich aus der umliegenden Welt herausgebildet hat. So lernt man die geistige Zusammenfügung des Menschen kennen. Aus geistigen Wesenheiten und Kräften heraus ist der Mensch ganz und gar gebildet. Wenn er sich daher in seine Form vertieft, lernt er die Wesenheiten und geistigen Kräfte erkennen, die seinen Organismus, die seine Form aufgebaut haben.

Eine Bemerkung muß hier noch gemacht werden. Dieses Versenken ins Innere des Menschen, ebenso wie die anderen Übungen, die hinunterarbeiten in das Leibliche, durch die vom Ich aus in den physischen Leib hineingearbeitet wird — Atman kommt von Atmen —, sollten nicht ohne Vorbereitung vorgenommen werden. Wenn man damit zu arbeiten anfängt, muß man eigentlich geistig schon vorgearbeitet haben. Deshalb wird in der Rosenkreuzerschulung auch streng auf Gedankenschulung gehalten. Es ist auch bei dieser Schulung für den Schüler die große Moral, ein fester innerer Wesenskern nötig. Wenn er diese nicht hat, so kann er straucheln. In jedes Glied kann er sich meditativ versenken, und Welten gehen ihm in seinem Inneren auf. Niemand kann die wahre Natur des Alten Testamentes kennenlernen ohne eine solche Versenkung in das eigentlich menschliche Innere, allerdings nach bestimmten Vorschriften, die ihm in der geisteswissenschaftlichen Schulung gegeben werden können. Alle diese Dinge sind aus der Geisteswissenschaft, aus Einblicken in die geistige Welt heraus geschrieben. Daher kann man sie auch nur verstehen, wenn man imstande ist, sie wieder in sich aufzusuchen. Der Mensch ist aus dem Makrokosmos herausgeboren, und er muß als Mikrokosmos die darin wirkenden Kräfte und Gesetze wieder in sich finden. Nicht als Anatom kann man den Menschen in sich kennenlernen. Nur dann kann man das, wenn man lernt, in sein eigenes Inneres zu blicken, das dann in einzelnen Gebieten leuchtend und tönend wird. Jedes Organ hat seine bestimmte Farbe und seinen bestimmten Ton, wenn das Ganze bloßgelegt wird vor der nach innen schauenden Seele. Wenn der Mensch durch die Rosenkreuzerschulung in seinem Innern kennengelernt hat, was aus dem Makrokosmos heraus geschaffen worden ist, dann kann er in sich die Dinge kennenlernen, die im Makrokosmos sind. Hat der Mensch, durch Versenkung in sein Auge oder in den Punkt über der Nasenwurzel, sein Inneres erkannt, dann kann er herausgehen und die großen Gesetze im großen Kosmos geistig erkennen. Und er lernt dann aus eigener Anschauung geistig dasjenige erkennen, was ein inspirierter Genius im Alten Testament beschrieben hat, er sieht es in der Akasha-Chronik und kann die Menschheitsentwicklung durch Jahrmillionen hindurch verfolgen.

Das kann man alles durch eine solche Schulung wirklich erkennen. Das ist aber eine andere Schulung als die gewöhnliche. Man darf nicht glauben, daß Selbsterkenntnis durch planloses Hineinbrüten in sich errungen wird oder daß, wenn man hineinschaut in sich, der Gott im Inneren zu sprechen anfängt, wie das heute häufig gelehrt wird. Nein, man muß in seine Organe sich vertiefen, um dann das große Selbst der Welt erkennen zu können. Wahr ist es: durch alle Zeiten geht der Spruch «Erkenne dich selbst», aber ebenso wahr ist es, daß das höhere Selbst nicht durch das eigene Innere zu erkennen ist, sondern, wie schon Goethe, der große Seher, sagt, indem man seinen Geist zum Universum erweitert. Das geschieht auf der sechsten Stufe der rosenkreuzerischen Schulung, wenn man auf diese Weise geduldig seinen Weg geht. Nicht bequem ist der Weg. Man muß in sein Wesen untertauchen. Man kann nicht zufrieden sein mit Phrasen und Allgemeinheiten. Man muß in jedes Wesen eintauchen, es liebevoll in sich aufnehmen. Jede Bequemlichkeit muß einem fremd werden. Untertauchen muß man in die Wesen, im Konkreten, im Besonderen die Wesen kennenlernen, nicht herumreden über, was man so nennt: Harmonie mit der Welt, Einswerden mit der Weltenseele, Zusammenschmelzen mit der Welt. Solche Phrasen sind nichts wert gegenüber der Rosenkreuzerschulung, die nicht von Harmonie mit dem Unendlichen schwätzt oder sich in ähnlichen Phrasen ergeht, sondern die Kräfte in der Menschenseele lebendig werden läßt.

Wenn der Mensch sein Selbst so zu erweitern versucht hat, dann wird die siebente Stufe der Seele nicht mehr fern liegen. Dann verwandelt sich Erkenntnis in Gefühl, dann geht das, was in seiner Seele lebendig ist, in Empfindung über, und er hört auf, sich nur in sich selbst zu fühlen. Er fängt an, sich in jedem Wesen zu fühlen. Wenn er untergetaucht ist in jeden Stein, in jede Pflanze, in jedes Tier, dann fühlt er mit Pflanze, Stein und Tier, und es sagt, es offenbart ihm jedes einzelne Ding seine Wesenheit, nicht in Worten, nicht in Begriffen, sondern im innersten Gefühl. Dann beginnt jene Zeit, wo ihn ein allgemeines Netz von Sympathie mit den Wesen verbindet, wo er sich in alle Wesen hineinlebt. Dies Hineinleben in alle Wesen nennt man die siebente Stufe, die Gottseligkeit, das selige Ruhen in allen Wesen. Wenn der Mensch sein Selbst verbunden fühlt mit allen übrigen Wesenheiten, nicht mehr in seiner Haut lebt, sondern eingegangen ist in alle Wesen, mitfühlt mit allen Wesen, wenn er ausgebreitet ist in dem ganzen Weltenraum, so daß er zu allem sagen kann: «Das bist du», wenn er ganz Gefühl, ganz Seligkeit geworden ist, dann darf das gesagt werden, was Goethe aus der Rosenkreuzerschulung heraus in seinem Gedichte «Die Geheimnisse» ausspricht:

«Wer hat dem Kreuze Rosen zugesellt?»

Das darf aber nicht nur gesagt werden von dem höchsten Standpunkte, sondern von den ersten Schritten an, wo man dasjenige zu seinem Losungswort macht, was sich ausdrückt in dem von Rosen umschlungenen Kreuz. Das Kreuz ist der Ausdruck dafür, daß der Mensch jenes Selbst, in das man hineinbrütet und das nur das niedere Selbst ist, welches niemals das höhere Selbst gewahren kann, überwindet, daß er herausgeht aus dem niederen Selbst, aufgeht in dem Höheren, das ihn selig hineinführt in das Leben und Weben von allen Wesenheiten, wenn er einsieht, was da steht in einem Gedichte des «West-Ostlichen Divan» von Goethe:

«Und solang du das nicht hast,
Dieses: Stirb und Werde,
Bist du nur ein trüber Gast
Auf der dunklen Erde.»

Ja, wer es nicht verstehen kann, dieses Überwinden des eng begrenzten Selbst und dieses Aufgehen im höheren Selbst, wer es nicht begreifen kann, jenes Symbolum des Sterbens und des Werdens, das Verdorren des niederen Selbst und das Aufblühen der Rosen des höheren Selbst, der kann nicht jene Devise begreifen, die Goethe ausgesprochen hat und mit der wir das Sachliche des Rosenkreuzertums beschließen wollen, das Losungswort, das Zeichen der sieben Glieder, das über dem mit Rosen umwundenen Kreuz stehen muß:

«Von der Gewalt, die alle Wesen bindet,
Befreit der Mensch sich, der sich überwindet.»

Who are the Rosicrucians?

Very few people today can associate the Rosicrucians, who are our subject today, with anything that even remotely corresponds to the reality. It is not easy to associate any particular concept with the name Rosicrucian. For many people, there seems to be something vague behind this name. When one or the other looks it up in cultural history or other books, where one usually seeks advice on such matters, one finds a few things said about it, for example, that the Rosicrucians were a sect or something similar in the earlier centuries of German intellectual development. On the one hand, they find some people emphasizing that it is impossible to determine whether there was ever anything sensible and clear behind the many frauds and charlatanism that once spread under the name of Rosicrucianism. On the other hand, they also find all kinds of information in scholarly books.

It must indeed be said that if what is written about the Rosicrucians in the relevant literature were true, then one could pretty much agree that what lies behind this name is to be considered vain windbaggery, pure fraud, and perhaps even worse. And even those who still try to defend Rosicrucianism, either condescendingly or perhaps by pointing out that they have special knowledge or are able to provide insights, do not inspire particular confidence in our contemporaries and our views. Not much comes of defending the Rosicrucians, especially when it is said: Certainly, Rosicrucianism is associated with alchemy, with the preparation of the philosopher's stone and all kinds of other alchemical feats. But these feats mean nothing to the genuine, true Rosicrucian except as a symbol of the inner, moral purification of the soul, the development of special human virtues. And when it is said that Rosicrucianism speaks of the possibility of transforming base metals into gold, this means nothing other than that the base metals of various human vices can be transformed into the gold of human virtues, and that this process of transformation is only a symbolic representation of how one should develop morally within oneself.

If this were the case, the whole story would be nothing more than a triviality or something even more insignificant, for it is difficult to see why one should invent all kinds of alchemical things such as metal transmutation and so on in order to demonstrate something so obvious, namely that human beings should purify themselves and transform their vices. This objection can always be made against those who regard the great work of Rosicrucianism as something merely symbolic. But in fact, there is something much deeper behind it.

I do not wish to dwell any longer on the historical aspects. Today, as I intend to give a factual account of Rosicrucianism, the historical aspects are of little concern to us. History need not concern us any further than to the extent that we learn that Rosicrucianism is a foundation, an institution that has actually existed in the West since the fourteenth century, that it goes back to a personality who is almost legendary, as one might notice, but about whom history does not have much to say: Christian Rosenkreutz.

What emerges from the various accounts as a certain basic theme can be summarized as follows: Christian Rosenkreutz — not his real name, but the name by which he became known — also traveled at the end of the fifteenth and beginning of the sixteenth centuries, and on his travels through the Orient he became acquainted with the so-called Book M... , that book about which we are told very mysteriously that Paracelsus, the great medieval physician and mystic, drew his knowledge from it. This is indeed a true fact, but only the initiated know: first, what the Book M... is, and second, what the study of the Book M... means.

The outside world has repeatedly been made aware of Rosicrucianism through two writings dating from the beginning of the seventeenth century. In 1614, the so-called “Fama Fraternitatis” appeared, and a year later the so-called “Confessio” — two books that have been much debated by scholars. And not only about what is usually debated in so many books, whether Valentin Andreae, who in his later years was a perfectly normal superintendent, really wrote the book — but also whether these books were taken seriously by their authors or whether they were merely intended as a mockery of the existence of a certain mysterious Rosicrucian brotherhood with certain tendencies and goals. In the wake of these writings, there are a whole series of others that communicate all kinds of things from the realm of Rosicrucianism. If you pick up the writings of Valentin Andreae and other Rosicrucian writings, you will find nothing special in them if you do not know the actual basis of Rosicrucianism. For even to this day, it has not been possible to learn even the most elementary things about this spiritual movement, which has really existed since the fourteenth century and still exists today. Everything that has passed into literature, everything that has been written and printed, are individual fragments, individual lost items that have been betrayed to the public, which have been distorted in many ways by charlatanism, fraud, ignorance, and stupidity. Since its inception, the true, genuine Rosicrucianism has always been communicated only orally to those who had to swear an oath of secrecy. Therefore, nothing significant has been passed on to public literature. Only when one knows what can be publicly communicated today in elementary Rosicrucianism—for certain reasons that would take too long to explain here—and what we can talk about today, can one find some meaning in the often grotesque, often merely comical, but often also fraudulent and rarely accurate reports in literature. Rosicrucianism is one of the methods by which one can attain what is called initiation. What initiation means has already been discussed here on several occasions. Initiation means awakening the abilities that lie dormant in every human soul, through which one can see into the spiritual worlds that lie behind our sensory world, and of which our sensory world is only an outer expression, an effect. An initiate is someone who has applied the precisely defined, scientifically worked out methods of initiation, methods that are just as scientifically worked out as those of chemistry, physics, or other scientific fields. What is achieved through such methods, however, is not something that a person can apply to something external, but something that initially relates only to themselves, to the instrument, the tool through which one sees into the spiritual world. The true spiritual connoisseur knows how profound and true Goethe's saying is:

Mysterious in the light of day
Nature cannot be robbed of its veil,
And what it may not reveal to your spirit,
You cannot force it out with levers and screws.

Deep, deep are the mysteries of nature, but not unfathomably deep, as some would like to say, who are simply too comfortable in the higher sense to penetrate the mysteries of nature. They are not unfathomably deep, but can be fathomed by the human spirit, not by the everyday spirit, but by the human spirit that draws out the hidden powers of the soul through certain, strictly defined methods. If man prepares himself gradually, he will gradually come to receive the revelation of that knowledge which is only available to those who are truly initiated: that great mystery of what, in Goethe's words, “holds the world together at its core.” The revelation of this secret is actually the fruit of true initiation.

It has often been discussed here that the first stages of initiation are quite safe for anyone to pass through, but that the higher stages require the greatest possible human dedication to the most unconditional search for truth. When a person approaches those gates through which he can gain insight into completely different worlds, he knows that there is some truth behind the often-used saying that it is dangerous to reveal the sacred secrets of existence to large crowds of people. To the extent that it is possible today, and to the extent that it can be done, to prepare people to gradually find their way to the highest secrets of nature and the spiritual world, to that extent it is also possible to reveal the higher secrets. What is called the spiritual science movement is a path that has been opened up to lead people to find their way to the higher mysteries. There are a number of such paths to the higher mysteries. It is not as if the ultimate wisdom that human beings can attain could take many forms; that is not the case. The highest wisdom is a unified one. Wherever and whenever people live or have lived, once they have attained the highest wisdom, this highest wisdom is one and the same for all people, just as the view from the summit of a mountain is one and the same when you are at the very top. But there are different ways to reach the summit of the mountain, and one will choose the path that is most suitable from the starting point where one is located. If one stands at a certain point on the mountain and can take a path from one's own standpoint, one will not first go around the mountain. The same is true of the path that leads to the highest knowledge. Here, the starting points that one has to choose must be taken from human nature. What is important here is something that people today pay far too little attention to: the great diversity of human nature must be taken into account. The higher members of the ancient Indian people were organized differently than today, perhaps not in terms of gross anatomy and physiology, but in terms of finer spiritual research, so that it was possible to preserve a wonderful secret or Spiritual Science to this day, as well as the associated method of initiation: the so-called yoga training. This Oriental yoga training is the path that leads to the summit of knowledge in a nature organized as that of the ancient Indian people. For today's Europeans, the same path would be as nonsensical as if someone standing at a certain point at the foot of a mountain wanted to walk around the mountain first in order to find and use a path. The nature of today's Europeans is very different from that of the Orientals. Unlike today, human nature was also organized around the time of the emergence of Christianity, a few centuries before and a few centuries after.

If we hold fast to what has just been said, that initiation means bringing out inner powers, awakening inner powers through certain methods, so that man becomes the instrument through which he can look into and explore the spiritual world, then we must admit that this human nature must be taken into account. Just as the ancient holy rishis, those great teachers of the ancient Indian people, developed the wonderful method that is still valid today for members of the Indian culture, just as in the beginning of Christianity the Christian-Gnostic method had to lead up into the spiritual realms, so for modern man, for the man who lives in our present environment, if he belongs entirely to this present world and draws the conditions of his existence from it, another method must be suitable. That is why the great masters of wisdom who guide human destiny have, over the course of centuries and millennia, repeatedly renewed the methods by which the summit of wisdom can be reached. For today's humanity, for people who have outgrown the modern conditions of existence, the Rosicrucian methods have been established by the Rosicrucian movement. They are therefore methods of initiation that lead to the summit of wisdom just like other methods, except that they respond to the special, currently existing conditions of modern people.

The Rosicrucian methods are not unchristian or anti-christian. That is out of the question. What Christianity can offer people in terms of training is also offered in the Rosicrucian method. But at the same time, those who undergo Rosicrucian training acquire the ability to see the achievements of esoteric and Spiritual Science in full harmony with all modern education, with everything that modern feeling and modern views of the nature of the spirit make necessary. For many centuries to come, the Rosicrucian methods will be the right methods for initiation into spiritual life. When they were established, certain rules applied to their followers. These rules still apply today. Because these rules are strictly observed by all those who are truly Rosicrucians, it is impossible for outsiders to recognize a Rosicrucian. No one shall recognize another; that is the first rule, which has only undergone a slight change in recent times. You shall cultivate wisdom in the closest circle, but you shall make the results, the fruits of wisdom, accessible to all people. That is why, until recently, Rosicrucians never revealed to the public that which enabled them to look into the depths of nature. No theory, no concept, no idea, nothing of any kind of mental image or insight was given, but work was done that advanced culture and instilled wisdom in the people in such a way that outsiders could not notice much of it.

This is the first principle, which would take too long to explain in detail, and regarding the essence of which I would only like to note that it is being partially broken today, but that the higher Rosicrucian wisdom must not be proclaimed. The second principle relates to the manner of appearance and is called: Blend in with the masses and the cultural currents into which you have been placed. Be a member of the people and class of education and culture into which you have been placed. Do not wear special clothing, as is commonly expressed, but wear the general clothing that others wear. — Therefore, you will find that the Rosicrucian, wherever he works, tries as little as possible to act out of ambition and selfishness. He will try to connect with cultural trends here and there, strive to deepen them and make use of what already exists, but he will always keep in mind something that is even deeper, something that connects him with the central wisdom of Rosicrucianism itself. We need not concern ourselves with the other principles at this point, for we now want to deal with Rosicrucian training as it has existed for centuries and still exists today. The things that can be communicated are, in a certain sense, elementary; they are only the beginning of the whole system of Rosicrucian training. However, it must be said that the same applies to this training as can be said of any spiritual scientific training: that people should not seek it out in books, but should only engage with it in practice if they have the personal guidance of someone who knows. Everything that can be said in this regard can be found in the magazine “Luzifer-Gnosis” from No. 13 onwards under the title: “How does one attain knowledge of the higher worlds?”

In Rosicrucian training, students must complete the following seven stages in order to enter the spiritual world. These do not necessarily have to be completed by the student in the order in which I will list them. Depending on the individuality of the student, the teacher will emphasize one or the other point that is necessary for the student and will thus have to give a kind of course, a kind of inner development process, to the student in question personally. Here, however, the stages of Rosicrucian training must be listed. There are seven:

1. What is called “study” in the Rosicrucian sense.

2. What is called the acquisition of so-called imaginative knowledge.

3. What is called the acquisition of occult writing.

4. What is referred to either by the unassuming term “rhythmicization of life” or, in the true sense, “the preparation of the philosopher's stone.” This is something that exists, but it is not that foolish thing you can read about in books.

5. What is called the knowledge of the microcosm, that is, of one's own human nature.

6. What is called merging with the macrocosm or the great world outside.

7. What is called the attainment of godliness.

The order in which the student goes through these stages depends entirely on his individuality. But he must go through them in the elementary Rosicrucian training. Consider what I have told you about Rosicrucian training and what I am about to characterize as a kind of ideal. Do not believe that it can be accomplished overnight, but one must get to know what is still distant today, at least in terms of its deeper meaning, if not in terms of its literal meaning. One can begin at any time, provided one is aware that one must have patience, energy, and perseverance.

The first point, study, includes a word that sounds pedantic to many. However, it does not imply erudition. To be an initiate, one does not need to be learned. Scholarship has little to do with spiritual knowledge. The study referred to here is something else entirely. However, this study is indispensable, and no one may be initiated into higher stages by a truly knowledgeable teacher of Rosicrucianism unless they have the inclination to truly go through the stage of study. Through study, the student should acquire a completely rational, entirely logical way of thinking, a way of thinking that will prevent him from losing his footing as he passes through the following stages, as could easily happen. It must be emphasized that those who are to enter the spiritual world must first become acquainted with it, since it can lead them down many wrong paths, a danger they can only avoid if they have discarded all that is fantastical, all that is illogical, all that could in any way be unreasonable. A fantasist who forms mental images of all kinds of unreal things is of no use to the spiritual world.

That is one reason. The other reason is that when one enters the higher worlds, one experiences the most diverse perceptions, which are completely different from what surrounds us here in the sensory world. Those who can look into the spiritual worlds closest to us — which we are accustomed to calling the astral and spiritual worlds — when the inner senses of the soul are opened to them, into the worlds from which human beings are born just as from the physical world, learn things that are fundamentally different from the perceptions in our sensory world. Those who enter the astral or spiritual world know how fundamentally different these worlds are from what they are accustomed to seeing with their eyes and hearing with their ears here. But one thing is the same in all three worlds, the physical, astral, spiritual, or devachanic world, and that is logical thinking. Because logical thinking is the same in all three worlds, it can already be learned here in this physical world, so that we will have a firm foundation in the other worlds through it. But if one learns to think in such a way that one's thoughts become confused, so that one cannot distinguish between fantasy and reality, so that, for example, as our physicists do today, one treats atoms, which no one in our physical world has ever seen, as something real, if one indulges in such fantasies already in the physical world, and then you are not able to lift yourself up into the higher worlds. Just imagine what a person who is not accustomed to strict and relentless logic could say about the higher worlds.

Now, however, this is not what is commonly called thinking. Ordinary thinking is only a combination of sensory realities. Here, however, we are dealing with thinking that has become free of sensuality. Scholars and philosophers today deny such thinking altogether. You can read in the works of many philosophers who are well-known today that human beings cannot think in mere thoughts, but must always think in thoughts that contain a remnant of sensual images. When a philosopher says this, it proves nothing more than that he cannot think in pure thoughts, and it is an indescribable immodesty to present what one cannot do oneself as a general inability. Human beings must be able to form thoughts that are no longer dependent on perceptions of the eyes and ears, so that they can live in a pure world of thought, in the world they find within themselves when they divert their attention from external, sensory realities. In Spiritual Science and also in Rosicrucianism, this kind of thinking is called self-generating thinking. Those who wish to do nothing else in order to complete such a course of study may consult the textbooks of today's Spiritual Science. What you will find there are not merely sensory combinations, but thoughts that originate from higher worlds, thoughts that represent a coherent way of thinking that everyone can understand, so that they need not remain stuck in the ordinary, trivial way of thinking.

In order to make the first stage of Rosicrucian training possible, it is necessary that what has been kept secret for centuries in the narrowest circles be made accessible to humanity through literature and lectures. What is made accessible, however, is nothing more than the basics, the beginning of the great and immeasurable knowledge of the world. With time, more and more of this will flow into humanity. For several decades now, the elementary part of this knowledge has been revealed to humanity. You can train your thinking on this basis. For those who want to do this more thoroughly, who want to enter into such a rigorous training of thought, my two books, Truth and Science and The Philosophy of Freedom, are intended. These books are not written like other books, in such a way that a sentence from one place could be put in another place in the book. These books are not aggregates of thoughts, but organisms of thought. A thought grows like an organism; it grows organically out of another. These books are therefore not written in such a way that one thought is simply added to another, but in such a way that the later thoughts have grown out of the previous ones, as in an organism. In the same way, the thoughts must grow out of the reader; he must feel how he is drawn to thinking; and then he will adopt that peculiar kind of thinking, self-generating thinking, without which one cannot attain the higher stages of Rosicrucian training, although this more thorough kind is not absolutely necessary and one can very well stick to elementary Spiritual Science literature, since it also provides the material for study.

The second is the acquisition of imaginative thinking. What I call imaginative thinking should only be acquired once one has absorbed a strict inner necessity of thought in this way, so that one possesses a strict core of knowledge. Otherwise, one can easily lose one's footing. What, then, is imaginative thinking? Goethe, who showed in his Rosicrucian poem “Die Geheimnisse” (The Secrets) how deeply he was initiated into the Rosicrucian mysteries, gives a hint in a beautiful saying from the Chorus Mysticus in the second part of Faust, where he wrote the foreword: “Everything transitory is only a parable.” This was developed systematically wherever there was inner Rosicrucian training. The Rosicrucian had to become capable of going through the whole world and, in addition to logical knowledge, acquiring imaginative knowledge of it, the kind of knowledge that sees something spiritual and imperishable in everything around us. When you meet a person and see a cheerful smile on their face, you will not stop to describe only those peculiar contours of the face, the physiognomy that presents itself to your eye. Rather, your soul will be clear that this peculiar expression of cheerfulness reveals the inner life of the soul, just as you will not stop to examine sparkling tears. You will be clear that tears are the expression of inner pain, inner suffering. The outer is an expression of the inner. You see into the depths of the soul in the physiognomy. The Rosicrucian student must learn this in relation to the whole of nature. Just as the human face and the movement of the hands are means of expression for the human soul life, so everything that happens in nature is an expression of a soul-spiritual life. Just as gestures are an expression of our soul, so for Rosicrucians everything — not merely as a poetic image, but as a profound reality — the whole earth around us becomes an expression of spiritual life: the stones, plants, and animals, the stars, every breath of air. Everything around us thus becomes an expression of the soul and spirit, not in a poetic sense, but in reality, just as the shining eye, the furrowed brow, and the sparkling tear are physiognomic expressions of inner states of the soul. Only then will you know what imaginative knowledge means, when what Goethe says in his Faust about the earth spirit is no longer a poetic image but reality, when you do not stop at the materialistic sense of our population today, but are able to recognize reality in the words of the earth spirit, while today people are happy if they can enjoy a poetic image in it:

In the floods of life, in the storm of deeds
I surge up and down,
Weaving back and forth!
Birth and grave,
An eternal sea,
A changing weaving,
A glowing life,
So I work at the whirring loom of time
And weave the living garment of the deity.

If these words of the Earth Spirit have become reality for you and you can calmly endure being considered a fool by materialists, because you know that you have a deeper logic, because you know that they are more fantastical and only believe they know, but you know that you are facing a free reality of the spirit, and just as true and real as a human soul lives in physiognomies, so too does an earth spirit live in the physiognomy of the earth. When you see the cheerfulness of the earth spirit in a plant, when the earth becomes for you the expression of the sorrowful earth spirit, when nature appears to you as if it were speaking to you, as if it were really communicating its secret to you, when you experience this, then you begin to spell out its secrets and understand what it means to acquire imaginative knowledge. Then you will come to understand how this has been presented in Rosicrucianism and also by the ancestors of Rosicrucianism in the great occult ideal of the Holy Grail as the purest and most beautiful expression of the striving for imaginative knowledge.

Let us take a look at the true nature of this ideal of the Holy Grail. It appears before your eyes in every Rosicrucian school in the way I am about to describe. I will use the form of a dialogue, but one that has never been held in real Rosicrucian schools. What I am about to summarize in this dialogue was achieved through long methods of development in life. It expresses what the ideal of the Holy Grail really contains.

Look at the plant as it grows out of the earth, its roots sunk into the ground, directed toward the center of the earth, its stem striving upward, its flower opening upward, within it the fertilizing organs that will produce the seed, through which the plant lives beyond itself. It was not only Darwin, the great naturalist, who said that when comparing the plant with the human being, it is not the flower but the root that must be compared with the head. The root of the plant corresponds to the head of the human being — as Rosicrucian occultism already said — and what the plant chastely strives toward as a calyx toward the sun is what the human being turns downward as fertilizing organs. Man is an inverted plant. He turns the organs that the plant chastely turns upward toward the light bashfully downward and covers them. Man is the inverted plant: this is a principle of Rosicrucian occultism and of occultism of all times. The plant is chastely turned toward the sun with its fertilizing organs. Human beings have directed their reproductive organs toward the center of the earth, their heads freely turned toward the sun. Between the two, in the middle, stands the animal. The three directions resulting from the plant, the animal, and the human being are referred to as the cross. The plant is the beam that goes downward, the animal is the crossbeam, and the human being is the beam that goes upward. When Plato, the great initiated philosopher of antiquity, says that the world soul is crucified on the cross of the world body, this means nothing other than that man represents the highest manifestation of the world soul, and that the world soul has passed through the three kingdoms: the plant kingdom, the animal kingdom, and the human kingdom. The world soul is crucified on the cross: the plant kingdom, the animal kingdom, and the human kingdom, the three kingdoms of nature. — A wonderfully profound image from Plato, expressed entirely from the perspective of Spiritual Science.

This image was repeated countless times in the Rosicrucian schools: Look at the plant with its head down, its fertilizing organs pointing upward, stretching toward the sunbeam. — This sunbeam was called the holy lance of love, which must penetrate the plant so that the seed can grow and ripen. Now the student was told: Look up to the human being, look at the plant and then at the human being, compare the matter and substance of the human being with those of the plant. The human being is the reverse of the plant; he has become so because he has penetrated his substance, his flesh, with physical desire, with passion and sensuality. Chaste and pure, the plant may stretch out its fertilizing organs toward the fertilizing lance, the noble lance of love. Human beings will reach a similar position at a time when they will have completely purified their desires, so that they will look into a future that will bring them the fulfillment of the ideal: you are as chaste and pure as the calyx of the plant. Then you will have reached the height of earthly development, then no more impure desire will permeate your lower organs, then you will extend the spiritual lance of love, your productive power, which will then be entirely spiritual, toward the calyx, just as the plant calyx opens to the sacred lance of love in the sunbeam. Thus, man passes through the realms of nature and purifies himself up to the development of those organs which are only in their infancy today. When man produces something that is holy and noble, he is at the beginning of a future productive power that he will have when his lower nature has undergone its complete purification. Then he will have a new organ. The calyx of the plant will be reborn at a higher level and will be held out to Amfortas's lance, like the calyx of the spiritual lance of love of the sun.

So imagine at a lower level that which, given as a high ideal, will be the future of the human race when all that is base has been purified and all that is chaste and pure will stand before the spiritualized sun of the future, when this plant calyx will have passed through human nature, which in a certain respect will be higher, in a certain respect lower than the plant, when it will have been purified up to the highest spirituality and held up to the spiritualized sun as the holy chalice, the exalted plant calyx that has passed through humanity.

This was spiritually grasped by the Rosicrucian disciple; it is the secret of the Holy Grail, the highest ideal that can be set before human beings. Thus, the whole of nature appears to be imbued and permeated with a spiritual meaning. When one grasps everything in this way, seeing everything as a parable of the spiritual, then one is on the path to acquiring imaginative knowledge. Then colors emerge from things and become independent, sounds emerge from them and become independent, space fills with an independent world of colors and sounds, and spiritual beings announce themselves in this world. We ascend from imaginative knowledge to the real knowledge of spiritual space. This is the path that Rosicrucians take in the second stage of their training.

The third is knowledge of occult writing. Occult writing is not ordinary writing, but writing that is connected with the secrets of nature. I would like to explain to you right away what you should understand by occult writing. A common symbol of this writing is the so-called vortex. You can imagine it as two sixes intertwined. This symbol is used to mark certain phenomena that exist throughout the natural and spiritual world and to characterize their inner nature. If you take a plant and observe it, you will find that it develops into a seed. If you place this seed in the ground, a similar plant will develop, identical to the old one. The idea that something material passes from the old plant to the new is a materialistic prejudice that is not justified by anything and will be refuted by the future. Only the formative power passes into the new plant. The old plant dies completely in material terms, and the new plant is something completely new in material terms. Not the slightest bit of material substance passes from the old plant to the new. This new approach to the origin and passing away of a plant is represented by drawing two intertwined spirals, i.e., a vortex, without connecting the two lines.

spiral

Such spirals are found in both the external and spiritual worlds. Spiritual research tells us, for example, that such a spiral existed in the development of humanity when the ancient Atlantean culture transitioned into the new post-Atlantean culture. Spiritual Science shows you something here that today's natural science knows only at the most elementary level. It shows you that what is now the sea between Europe and America was once filled with a continent, that an ancient culture had developed there, and that this continent was flooded and disappeared as a result of the “Great Flood.” This shows us that what Plato tells us about the demise of the island of Poseidonis is true, and that it was a remnant of the ancient Atlantean continent. That culture disappeared in terms of its spiritual character, and a new culture emerged, so that this process can be characterized by two intertwining spirals, the vortex. The old is represented by the spiral turning inward, the new by the spiral turning outward.

When the transition from Atlantean culture to post-Atlantean culture took place, the sun appeared in the constellation of Cancer in the spring. You know that the sun moves forward in the course of the year. In those ancient times, as I said, it rose in the constellation of Cancer at the beginning of spring, then for a while in the constellation of Gemini, then in the constellation of Taurus, and then in Aries. People have always considered the first rays of sunshine sent to them from the vault of heaven to be something particularly auspicious. Therefore, you can see that when the sun began to rise in the constellation of Aries, people began to worship the ram. This is the origin of all the legends about lambs, the legend of the Golden Fleece, and so on. In the past, before the sun rose in the constellation of Aries, it rose in the constellation of Taurus. That is why the cultures that preceded the Aries cultures worshipped the bull as a sacred animal. That is why, for example, you find the worship of the Egyptian bull Apis in that period. During the transition from the Atlantean to the post-Atlantean era, the constellation of Cancer ruled. And that is why you have the two intertwined spirals as the sign of Cancer in the calendar.

There are hundreds, thousands of these signs, which one learns gradually. These are not arbitrary signs. Once you know them, they show you the ways to crawl into things and live in things. Just as study captures the mind and imaginative knowledge captures the heart, so the knowledge of occult writing captures the will. It shows us the ways of creating and producing. Therefore, if study brings us knowledge and imagination brings us insight, then knowledge of occult writing brings us magic, knowledge of the natural laws slumbering in things, knowledge that leads us deeper into the essence of things. You can find many occult signs in many places — even in Eliphas Levi, for that matter. But those who know nothing about these things will learn little from them. However, you can find a hint of what they look like. The works you find printed on this subject usually contain inaccuracies. These occult symbols were held sacred by all peoples, at least by the initiates. And if we go further back, we find strict rules about keeping them secret, so that those who are allowed to use such symbols may never use them unworthily. The strictest penalties are imposed for violating these rules.

The fourth is what is called the preparation of the philosopher's stone. What you find about it in literature is quite inaccurate, even foolish in most cases. If the philosopher's stone were what is described there, everyone would have a right to mock it. You will recognize a piece of it if you follow my reasoning: it will give you great insight. At the end of the eighteenth century, a serious Central German magazine published a note about the philosopher's stone. Anyone who reads this note and understands something about the subject will find that the writer has heard something about it somewhere. His words are quite correct, but it is also clear that he himself does not understand his words correctly. The author of the note writes: The philosopher's stone is something that all people know, something that most people often hold in their hands, something that can be found in many places on earth, and something that only humans do not know is the philosopher's stone. — This is a strange description of what the philosopher's stone is supposed to be, and yet it is literally true. One only has to understand the matter correctly.

Consider the human respiratory process, because regulating breathing is related to what is called the discovery or preparation of the philosopher's stone. Today, humans inhale oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide, i.e., the combination of oxygen and carbon is exhaled. Humans breathe in oxygen, the air of life, and breathe out carbon dioxide, a real poison. Humans and animals cannot live with this carbon dioxide. If animals that breathe just like humans were alone on earth and had always breathed as they do today, they would have polluted the air around them, and neither animals nor humans would be able to breathe today. So how is it that they can still breathe? It is because plants absorb carbon dioxide, retain the carbon, and release the oxygen back into the air, so that humans and animals can use the oxygen to breathe again. It is therefore a beautiful exchange process between the respiration of the animal and human world and the respiration or assimilation process of the plant world — assimilation process, so that no pedantic scholar can object to it. Someone who earns five marks a day and spends two marks a day creates a surplus; their situation is different from that of someone who spends five marks and only earns two marks. The same can be said of respiration. The essential point here, however, is that this exchange process exists between humans and the plant world.

This exchange process is highly remarkable. Let us therefore take a closer look at it. Oxygen enters the human body and carbon dioxide leaves it. Carbon dioxide consists of oxygen and carbon. The plant retains the carbon and returns the oxygen to the human being. In the coal that you dig out of the earth millions of years after the plant in question was formed, you can see the carbon that the plant inhaled. The normal breathing process, which proceeds as just described, shows how necessary plants are for human life today and how something happens in the breathing process that is only a half process. Humans need plants as something that is not within them, so that they can convert carbon into oxygen.

Now there is a rhythmization of the breathing process in the Rosicrucian sense, about which, however, details can only be communicated from person to person. It can be hinted at here, but only in such a way that no details are given. But the Rosicrucian student received and continues to receive specific instructions: he had to breathe in a certain way, in a certain rhythm and with very specific thought forms. This transforms his breathing process. You can only form a mental image of this transformation if you consider the saying: constant dripping wears away the stone. Even in the most highly developed human beings, the entire inner life process is not transformed overnight when breathing in the Rosicrucian manner. But what is transformed in the human body through such breathing goes in a certain direction, namely that in the future, humans will be able to transform carbon dioxide back into usable oxygen within themselves, so that what happens outside in plants today — the conversion of carbon dioxide into carbon, what the plant takes from the human being today, will be effected by the human being himself, if the breathing process continues to work further and further in the initiate, in an organ of his own, of which physiology and anatomy still know nothing, but which is nevertheless in the process of development. Humans will then effect the conversion themselves. Instead of exhaling the carbon [with the carbon dioxide] and passing it on to the plant, they will use it within themselves and build up their own bodies with the help of the carbon that they previously had to pass on to the plant (see notes).

Consider what I have just said together with what I have shared about the ideal of the Holy Grail: namely, that pure, chaste plant nature will have passed through human nature, and that this human nature, in its highest spirituality, will have returned to the plant of today. Humans will one day be able to undergo the plant process within themselves. He will increasingly mold his present substances within himself toward that ideal, so that the body will be a plant body and the bearer of a much higher and more spiritual consciousness. Thus the student learns alchemy, through which he is enabled to transform the juices and substances of the human being into carbon. What plants do today by building their bodies from carbon, humans will one day do themselves. They will form a body structure from carbon that will be the structure of the future human body.

A great mystery lies behind what is called the rhythmization of the breathing process. Now you can understand the reference to the philosopher's stone contained in the note quoted earlier. So what does the human being learn about the structure of his future body? He learns to produce ordinary coal, which is also the substance of diamonds, in order to build his body. With an elevated and expanded consciousness, humans will be able to extract this carbon from themselves and use it within themselves. They will be able to form their own substance, the plant substance built on the carbon structure. This is the alchemy that leads to the formation of the philosopher's stone. The human body itself is the retort that is transformed in the sense just indicated here.

Thus, behind the regulation of the breathing process, behind what is often hinted at in relation to the philosopher's stone, but mostly in a completely nonsensical way, lies what is called the discovery or preparation of the philosopher's stone. These are the hints that have only recently come to public attention from the Rosicrucian schools. You will search for them in vain in books. This is a small part of the fourth stage: the search for the philosopher's stone.

The fifth consists of what is called the knowledge of the microcosm, the small world. This brings us back to what Paracelsus said and what I have often pointed out: all things around us, if we could extract them, would result in the human being. Human beings have within them those substances and forces that appear as a brief recapitulation of the rest of nature, so that when we see nature around us, we can say that what is out there in nature is, in essence, the archetype of what appears in all of us as an afterimage. Take light, for example. What has this light done in humans? If there were no human eye, it could not perceive light. The world would be dark and gloomy for us. But just as animals lose their sight when they migrate into dark caves, such as the caves of Kentucky, so, on the other hand, the eye is created by light itself. We would have no eyes if there were no light. It was light that drew our organs of sight out of the skin, out of the organism. Goethe said that the eye was created by light and for light, and the ear by sound and for sound. All things are born out of the great world, the macrocosm. This is the secret that, under certain guidance and instruction, by delving deep into the body, one can explore not only the physical world but also the spiritual world and learn to recognize the nature that surrounds us. Those who, under certain conditions, learn to meditate and immerse themselves completely in the inner eye with certain thought forms, learn to recognize the inner, essential nature of light. Between the eyebrows, at the root of the nose, there is a point that is also of great importance in this regard. When one delves into it, one learns about significant, important events in the spiritual world that took place when this part of the head developed out of the surrounding world. In this way, one learns about the spiritual composition of the human being. Human beings are formed entirely from spiritual beings and forces. Therefore, when they delve into their form, they learn to recognize the beings and spiritual forces that have built up their organism, their form.

One remark must be made here. This immersion into the inner being of the human being, like the other exercises that work down into the physical body, through which the ego works into the physical body — Atman comes from breathing — should not be undertaken without preparation. When one begins to work with them, one must already have done some preliminary spiritual work. That is why the Rosicrucian training also places great emphasis on thought training. In this training, too, the student needs a strong moral character and a firm inner core. If he does not have this, he may stumble. He can meditatively immerse himself in each limb, and worlds will open up within him. No one can know the true nature of the Old Testament without such immersion in the innermost human being, according to certain rules that can be given to them in spiritual science training. All these things are written from Spiritual Science, from insights into the spiritual world. Therefore, one can only understand them if one is able to seek them out again within oneself. Human beings are born out of the macrocosm, and as microcosms they must find the forces and laws at work in it again within themselves. One cannot get to know the human being within oneself as an anatomist. This is only possible if one learns to look into one's own inner being, which then becomes luminous and resonant in individual areas. Each organ has its own specific color and tone when the whole is revealed to the soul looking inward. When, through Rosicrucian training, the human being has come to know within himself what has been created out of the macrocosm, then he can come to know within himself the things that are in the macrocosm. When the human being has recognized his inner being through contemplation of his eye or the point above the root of the nose, then he can go out and spiritually recognize the great laws in the great cosmos. And then, from their own observation, they learn to recognize spiritually what an inspired genius described in the Old Testament; they see it in the Akashic Records and can follow the development of humanity through millions of years.

All this can truly be recognized through such training. But this is a different kind of training than the usual kind. One must not believe that self-knowledge is achieved by brooding aimlessly within oneself, or that when one looks within, the God within begins to speak, as is often taught today. No, one must delve deeply into one's organs in order to be able to recognize the great Self of the world. It is true that the saying “Know thyself” has been repeated throughout the ages, but it is equally true that the higher self cannot be recognized through one's own inner being, but, as Goethe, the great seer, said, by expanding one's spirit to the universe. This happens on the sixth level of Rosicrucian training, if one patiently follows this path. The path is not easy. One must immerse oneself in one's being. One cannot be satisfied with phrases and generalities. One must immerse oneself in every being, lovingly take it in. Every comfort must become foreign to one. One must immerse oneself in beings, in the concrete, in particular, get to know beings, not talk around what is called: harmony with the world, becoming one with the world soul, merging with the world. Such phrases are worthless compared to Rosicrucian training, which does not prattle on about harmony with the infinite or indulge in similar phrases, but rather brings the forces in the human soul to life.

When a person has tried to expand their self in this way, the seventh stage of the soul is no longer far away. Then knowledge is transformed into feeling, then what is alive in their soul is transformed into sensation, and they cease to feel only within themselves. They begin to feel themselves in every being. When they have immersed themselves in every stone, every plant, every animal, then they feel with plants, stones, and animals, and it says that every single thing reveals its essence to them, not in words, not in concepts, but in the innermost feeling. Then begins that time when a general network of sympathy connects them with beings, when they empathize with all beings. This empathizing with all beings is called the seventh stage, godliness, blissful rest in all beings. When the human being feels his self connected with all other beings, no longer lives in his own skin, but has entered into all beings, empathizes with all beings, when he is spread out in the whole universe, so that he can say to everything: “That is you,” when they have become all feeling, all bliss, then what Goethe expresses in his poem “The Secrets” from the Rosicrucian training may be said:

“Who has placed roses on the cross?”

But this must not only be said from the highest point of view, but from the very first steps, where one makes one's watchword what is expressed in the cross entwined with roses. The cross is the expression of the fact that man overcomes that self into which he broods and which is only the lower self, which can never perceive the higher self, that he emerges from the lower self, ascends into the higher, which leads him blissfully into the life and weaving of all beings, when he understands what is written in a poem from Goethe's “West-Eastern Divan” by Goethe:

"And as long as you don't have that,
This: Die and Become,
You are only a dull guest
On the dark earth."

Yes, those who cannot understand this overcoming of the narrowly limited self and this merging into the higher self, those who cannot comprehend that symbol of dying and becoming, the withering of the lower self and the blossoming of the roses of the higher self, cannot understand that motto which Goethe expressed and with which we wish to conclude the factual aspects of Rosicrucianism, the watchword, the sign of the seven members, which must stand above the cross entwined with roses:

“From the power that binds all beings,
The human being who overcomes himself is freed.”