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Foundations of Anthroposophy
GA 79

29 November 1921, Christiania

II. Man in the Light of Anthroposophy

Had I not spoken to you yesterday, I could not give you to-day's lecture in the form in which I intend to give it. This is not only because this lecture is to be a continuation of yesterday's lecture, but because the facts concerning man's true being which are accessible to anthroposophical research at first appear so paradoxical that it is necessary to know the sure foundation upon which such truths are based. I think that I explained to you sufficiently clearly that both in the direction of a critical attitude and in that of a conscientious form of investigation, Anthroposophy is well able to compete with everything which modern people are accustomed to consider as a scientific method and a scientific mentality.

The subject of to-day's lecture is man's true being which, lying at the foundation of his external physical being, forms and guides it. Spiritual science above all can show that man's physical being belongs more than one generally thinks to the development of the world as such, and this connection with the whole evolution of the world will form the subject of my next lecture. Earnest-minded people, and also earnest scientists have now a different view of man's true being than a few decades ago, at the height of materialism.

But the anthroposophical facts which will now be set forth will perhaps be rejected most strongly of all by those who seek to approach the element of soul and spirit in man by adhering, as it were, to the more materialistic aspect of science.

We can see that people now begin to take an interest in the causes which produce certain abnormal soul-conditions in man which subject him to hallucinations and delusions, to suggestion and auto-suggestion. People are now specially interested in these abnormal psychic phenomena, because they can be investigated in the same way in which physical experiments are carried on, without the unfolding of the soul's dormant forces, concerning which I spoke in my last lecture. People with an abnormal spiritual life are simply approached experimentally, and the phenomena are investigated in the same way in which one makes experiments in a laboratory.

Such people, and many who are not a prey of abnormal soul-conditions, frequently believe that unusual psychic conditions, visions or hallucinations, constitute some means of penetrating more deeply into man's true being; they even think that in these abnormal conditions a kind of revelation from the real spiritual worlds can be received.

Now that man's true being can be investigated in the light of Anthroposophy, it is possible to throw light upon the real meaning of these abnormal psychic conditions. Yesterday's critical examination of certain facts may have convinced you from the very outset that anthroposophical spiritual research can confront even such abnormal phenomena with a strictly critical attitude.

Another kind of phenomenon confronts us when it is possible to perceive certain thoughts of certain people under conditions of time and of space which must undoubtedly be designated as abnormal. These cases are now being discussed quite seriously by modern scientists. Telepathy is a phenomenon of this kind. During certain psychic conditions, thoughts can be perceived through telepathy without the ordinary instrument of the senses; indeed these thoughts can even be perceived at a distance. One also speaks of telekinesis, or of certain forces proceeding from the human being which manifest themselves simply through influences at a distance, without the physical intermediary of the human being, so that it appears as if it were possible to unfold will-power and to transmit it into space without the medium of the body. In scientific circles experiments have already been made with the application of scientific methods, experiments falling under the category of teleplastic, in which phantoms and apparently physical forms appear in connection with a person, or in his close proximity. It is clearly evident that these forms consist of a fine substance, of an etheric substance, and' that plastically they are permeated by something rooted as plastic force in human thinking, by something existing inhuman thought.

We therefore speak of telepathy, telekinesis and teleplastic. When anthroposophical spiritual science confronts these phenomena, it must again raise the critical question: Do these phenomena proceed from that part of the human being which, as explained yesterday, abandons the physical and the etheric body of man, at the moment of falling asleep, that sentient and volitional being which remains outside the body from the moment of falling asleep to the moment of waking up? Are the phenomena known as telepathy, telekinesis and teleplastic an activity of man's eternal soul-spiritual essence, of that part which we learned to know as his feeling and volitional being, or are they perhaps simply an activity of that part which remains behind on the bed during sleep, consisting solely of the physical and of the etheric body, or the body of formative forces?

If these phenomena are merely activities of the latter, they belong to that part which vanishes when we die, no matter how wonderful and extraordinary they may appear to us. For when we die, the part which remains behind on the bed during sleep, vanishes. What constitutes man's immortal, eternal being, that which abandons the physical and etheric body during sleep, as a rule also abandons the physical body when we are under some hypnotic influence, in the phenomena of telepathy, telekinesis and teleplastic. We must therefore say: These so-called wonderful phenomena cannot point to anything connected with man's eternal being; no matter how abnormal they are, they are connected with that part of his being which separates from him when he dies and which connects itself with the element of the earth. In that case they are only able to indicate a world which vanishes when the human being passes through the portal of death.

The spiritual science of Anthroposophy must therefore raise this critical objection in regard to certain phenomena which are widely recognised to-day, in the same way in which such objections had to be raised in regard to the phenomena described yesterday. It will be essential to know what Anthroposophy has to say concerning such phenomena, on the foundation of its investigations connected with man's true immortal essence.

Perhaps I may once more draw attention to the fact that through the exercises of meditation, through the exercises of thought and of the will mentioned yesterday and in other lectures which were given here, a condition can be created, particularly in regard to man's feeling and volitional part, which resembles the sleeping state, although it is radically different from sleep.

Yesterday I described to you how the sentient and volitional being in man, which is ordinarily unconscious and as it were lifeless, can be filled with inner life, with light and power, so that it is possible to create a condition in which man's feeling and volitional parts are outside the physical body as is the case during sleep, and in which these independent soul-spiritual parts can be used for anthroposophical research. In that case we no longer live in a dark world which renders us unconscious, but we are instead surrounded by a spiritual world, where the first object upon which we can look back is our physical body and our body of formative forces. This body of formative forces supplies to the inner soul-spiritual being, which has abandoned the physical and etheric body, a mirrored reflection of the world, in the form of thoughts which are now perceived as forces. Our thought-world, which was formerly connected with us, is now thrown back to us as mirrored reflections by the physical body which we left behind, so that we obtain an image of the world not because we obtain pictures of the external world through our sensory organs, for instance through the eye, which transmits us conscious experiences of the physical world, but because we now gain an image of the world's spiritual foundation through the fact that the human organism becomes as it were a sensory organ, which is now outside the human being, like any other object.

Through gradual progress in anthroposophical research, and by growing inwardly stronger and stronger, we can learn to know this being which is outside. I already explained to you that this condition in which an anthroposophical investigator lives, differs from everything which people experience in a visionary form, through hallucinations or through other psychic conditions. A spiritual investigator is always able to maintain a controlled, sound state of consciousness while investigating the higher world. He is in a condition which can really be designated as swinging to and fro from the perception of the spiritual world to that of the physical world. In other words, he can alternately live outside his physical body and his sensory perceptions, as already described, and return to his full consciousness, to his ordinary capacity of thinking, feeling and willing, so that he can judge his super-sensible experiences with his everyday thinking, feeling and willing, with his normal, cool-headed common sense, with the capacities with which he ordinarily judges life in general. The results of spiritual-scientific investigations can therefore be judged quite critically; a strictly critical attitude can be adopted towards the higher experiences which confront the soul of a spiritual-scientific investigator.

In abnormal soul-conditions we do not have this alternating from one state of consciousness to another. People who have visions or hallucinations cannot return at will, when they consider it best, to their ordinary, calm state of mind, through an effort of the will; that is to say, they cannot return at will into their physical body. They are led into such abnormal conditions by an involuntary sub-conscious element which produces hallucinations and visions, and the total absence of criticism in regard to their abnormal conditions is a fact which must be indicated over and over again, whenever the results of anthroposophical, spiritual-scientific research are brought into connection with things which have a visionary or hallucinatory character.

By swinging to and fro from a higher state of consciousness to the ordinary way of seeing things and to ordinary consciousness, we more and more attain the capacity to look back upon our physical and etheric bodies, which now exist objectively outside our soul-spiritual kernel; we look back upon the physical and etheric bodies with forces developed in the sentient and volitional part of our being. By ascending to the imaginative state of consciousness, we now really learn to know what we have before us as a picture of another world. The important point to be borne in mind is that through the imaginative and inspirational knowledge described in my last lectures, we really learn to form a judgment upon the physical body and the body of formative forces, which we now see from outside.

To use a comparison, it is as if we first had before us a picture and were to learn the corresponding reality which it represents by gaining a knowledge of the laws of perspective. But the reality which we gather from an ordinary picture is, after all, only an inner soul-experience, whereas the larger perspective in which we objectively look upon the physical body and the body of formative forces, is a real experience of facts. For we learn to know that the physical body and the body of formative forces contain, in an image, what we ourselves were, before descending into the physical world through birth or conception.

In this perspective, something frees itself from what we thus see before us and leads us back into the spiritual world through which we passed before we united ourselves through birth or conception with the physical substance given to us by our parents and ancestors, and transmitted by the physical stream of heredity here on earth. We can survey the soul-spiritual world which surrounds us before we came down into an earthly existence; it is the world which contains the forces that became united with our physical form, transmitted by our parents and forefathers.

We now learn to know ourselves in our pre-existence, in our pre-natal condition, and the characteristic fact which rises up before us is that in this picture representing man's pre-existent being we actually see the world reversed, in comparison with a physical perspective. In a physical perspective we see the nearest objects most clearly of all, and the further off they lie, the more they grow indistinct; this characterises the perspective of the spatial world.

But matters appear reversed in the perspective which now rises up out of the human being that remained behind. The things most closely related with our physical life on earth are those which are most familiar to our present experience; in reality we do not know our own inner being during our physical life on earth. Our physical life on earth is something which darkens our eternal being, our innermost kernel. But when we look into the pre-existent world, the things which we perceive spiritually first of all are not those which are most familiar to us in earthly life, not the closest, nearest things, but we first perceive the more distant things. If we have ascended through the three stages which can be developed through exercises as higher stages of knowledge, in accordance with descriptions contained in my book Knowledge of the Higher Worlds, then Imagination, Inspiration and Intuition really enable us to obtain a complete soul-spiritual picture of the universe, leading us back to a past life on earth.

Even as a physical perspective is limited in the distance, so the image which we obtain of a world in which we lived in a pre-existent condition is limited by a past earthly life which opens out to us through intuition. The spiritual science of Anthroposophy does not speak of anything fantastic nor of some logical inference when it speaks of the repeated lives on earth, for this knowledge is gained through cognition, it is a fact which presents itself to the real spiritual vision. But this spiritual vision, this spiritual perception, must first be drawn out of the depths of the soul. We then obtain a positive knowledge of the fact that man's physical body, man's etheric body or the body of formative forces, plastically contain those essential forces which lived in the human being during the time between death and a new birth.

This also explains that we have developed out of a spiritual world into the physical world. Within the physical body, which man carries not merely as a covering but as a kind of instrument, and within the etheric body, containing the living forces which lie at the foundation of the organs, of metabolism and growth, within these bodies which appear objectively before us in spiritual vision, lives the soul's inner kernel, which is plastically moulded into them, the soul's essential being, as it has developed in a soul-spiritual world since the last death until the last birth. When we abandon the physical and etheric body with our sentient-volitional being, we learn to know what we thus leave behind us, as the last thing, as it were, to which we longingly turned on growing old, so to speak, in the spiritual world; the last thing to which we turned in our existence between death and a new birth before “dying” in the spiritual world. Even as we perceive that our physical body begins to fade at a certain age, on approaching death through old age, so we perceive that our soul-spiritual being begins to fade in the spiritual world in which we then live.

This fading away of our soul-spiritual being reveals itself in our longing for the physical world, for a corporeal physical incarnation. Consequently that part which lives in our physical and etheric body constitutes, as it were, the last phase of our existence above in the spiritual world. During our sleep, when we go out of our physical body as sentient-volitional beings, we leave behind our past.

What do we then take with us? If we realise the fact that we leave behind our past, we can also realise the fact that what is ordinarily an unconscious experience from the moment of falling asleep to the moment of waking up, is that part of man's being which passes through the portal of death and re-enters a soul-spiritual world. That part of man's being which could not dive down into the physical and etheric body, which remained behind, as it were, that part goes out every night when we fall asleep, and it also passes again as a being of feeling and will, through the portal of death. Thus eternity becomes guaranteed to man through this real perception.

And if we now look back to what is striven for without any understanding by a certain modern scientific direction which clings to external, superficial facts in order to investigate phenomena such as telepathy, teleplastic and telekinesis, we see that these phenomena are really connected with man's past, with the part which perishes when he dies, with something which cannot constitute anything pertaining to the real super-sensible world, but only to forces which are connected with the human being in the physical realm of the earth.

If we vividly imagine that part of our pre-existent being which descends into a physical embodiment through conception and birth, we can understand that in its development it absorbs the forces and substances transmitted by the hereditary stream; it also takes in forces during the course of earthly existence which are absorbed through the process of nutrition and breathing and through everything which the human being receives from the external world. The human being only exists as a full reality in that being that descends into physical embodiment from a pre-existent, pre-natal life. Within the mother's body it already enters into and envelops itself with physical matter and later on draws in substance through breathing, nutrition, and so forth.

Only when the human being is awake, only during this normal condition of life, the part which man thus incorporates into himself enters into connection with his true being, with his sentient and volitional being, through the physical and etheric bodies. When the human being is awake, there exists a normal connection between his sentient-volitional being and his thinking capacity, which is bound up, as we already have seen, with the etheric body and with the physical body.

Let us now suppose that in a hypnotic condition man's sentient and volitional being is drawn out of the physical and the etheric body. The hypnotised man whom we then have before us, consists merely of the body of formative forces and of the physical body, with all the physical substances and forces which he has absorbed from the external physical world. There are many reciprocal relationships between these substances and forces and the environing world, and all this enters the human being. When the sentient, volitional part of man is outside the physical and etheric body, it is possible to observe the influence of these physical substances. Through anthroposophical investigation, we discover that this does not pertain to man's immortal essence, to man's inner kernel, but that it is something which pertains to the external world and which unites with his immortal part, something which became incorporated into it in the past.

The same thing can appear if the person succumbs to some kind of illness. In a normal condition, a diseased organ can be felt through pain, sickness, and so forth. This is the case when the volitional-sentient being is rightly connected with the physical and etheric body. But if the physical or even the etheric body is somehow deformed by illness, then through the disease of some organ, some inner member of the soul and spirit, the sentient-volitional being in man dives down more deeply into his animal-physical nature than is the case in a normal state of consciousness, when the memories are only thrown back like mirrored reflections. When the physical organs are sound, the human being dives down into his physical body only to a certain degree; but if the organs are diseased, if only one organ is diseased, the soul-spiritual being not only dives down as far as the point where pain arises in the normal course of an illness, but it dives down deeper still. The soul-spiritual being unites with the physical organism. Whereas in the ordinary course of life man's sentient-volitional being is normally connected only with the sensory and with the nervous system, it now becomes connected with the lower animalic organs and with the vegetative organs, so that the involuntary conditions of hallucination and of visionary experience arise. One sees that hallucinations and visionary experiences, as well as other similar conditions, are entirely united with man's physical and etheric bodies, and that therefore, they can only be experiences which vanish when the human being dies and can throw no light whatever upon the super-sensible world in which we live between death and a new birth. There is, however, one phenomenon attested by sound scientific research, namely that in a mediumistic condition it is possible to perceive thoughts of a certain importance, and sometimes one can be amazed at the very clever thoughts voiced by a medium in trance, i.e. by a person who is in a kind of hypnotic state, thoughts which would not be possible to him in a normal state of consciousness.

Does this fact contradict the explanations given above? It does not contradict them, because not only the physical body, but also the etheric body can exercise an influence in space, without the medium of the physical body. Even quite normal people, particularly those who have a spark of genius in them, may produce thoughts and phantasies which are not limited to the body of formative forces, and because these transcend normal life and even the human being himself, they go out, as it were, into the universal cosmic ether, which we shall learn to know in our next lecture.

We can really say that the artistic thoughts which transcend normal life continue to swing in the universal cosmic ether, thoughts which appear—if I may use this expression—in superhuman artistic creations and experiences. These thoughts whirr about in the cosmic ether.

People who prepare themselves through exercises of the will and meditation described yesterday, know that man does not only produce things physically, by physical deeds. They know that thoughts which are not required for the maintenance of individual life (individual life requires thinking forces which change into forces of growth) are imparted to the universal cosmic ether. When the etheric body is in some pathological condition, when it is deformed or when it becomes mediumistic through trance, then the thoughts which whirr about in the cosmic ether and which do not enter our normal consciousness, can penetrate into a person deprived of his soul-spiritual part and manifesting as a medium. And when, for instance, the thoughts of a dead person imparted to the universal ether manifest themselves through a medium, it is possible to believe that one is really perceiving the thoughts, the present thoughts of the departed soul, whereas in reality one only perceives the echo of thoughts rayed out before death, when that person was still living on the earth.

This is what should always be borne in mind, through a sound, critical, spiritual-scientific attitude. We should be aware whether we merely confront thought-echoes, or whether the development of super-sensible forces really enables us to penetrate into the super-sensible world to which we belong after death and before birth. Telepathy is merely an etheric transmission of thoughts with the exclusion of the senses. In telekinesis certain forces producing changes in the physical body through nutrition or through other physical substances, are stimulated to action in space without a physical intermediary. The human being only consists of about 10 per cent of solid substance; he is a liquid column in regard to the remaining 90 per cent. But he also consists of finer materials, extending to the etheric. In a pathological condition, when an organ is diseased, so that the soul-spiritual part dives down too deeply into the animalic part, it is possible to impart thoughts with the aid of these finer substances which are rayed out in a certain way. Teleplastic also arises in this way. In teleplastic the fine substantiality which is rayed out can be given form, and these forms moulded by thought may even be filled with light and radiance. Plastic forms arise, such as those described in the books of Schrenk-Notzing and of others. These works are always on a scientific level, and preclude any idea of swindle or fraud.

But in all these cases we simply have to do with activities proceeding from that part of man's being which perishes when he dies. They do not supply us with anything which can lead us into the real super-sensible world.

We penetrate into the real super-sensible world when we are able to observe things outside the body with the aid of our sentient-volitional being, through a systematic training and intensification of our normal soul-capacities and by maintaining our normal state of consciousness. In that case we can survey the past which appears in the physical and in the etheric body, the past which we rayed out from a spiritual world and which plastically moulded our physical and etheric substances.

And since we first perceive most clearly of all, so to speak, the things which lie further off, and only gradually the things in closer proximity, we are able to see as far as the point of our death in a preceding life. As described in my Theosophy this perception of our pre-existent, pre-natal life, enables us to give a description of man's experiences after death. We then describe things, as it were, from a reversed perspective. And thus all the descriptions which I have given you on man's conditions and experiences after death, are based upon that spiritual perception which can be attained in the manner I described yesterday and again to-day.

One can say that it is impossible to gain any direct experience of the higher worlds unless we first acquire it through an earnest striving after knowledge. Through the strengthening of thought, as described yesterday, we must create the possibility of being outside the body in a fully conscious state and of looking back upon it. This can only be attained by intensifying our thinking power. But we must also learn to make distinctions. Everything which comes from a preceding life lies open to our perception, but everything which pertains to the future is only accessible to inner experience.

These inner experiences are meagre in comparison with the mighty super-sensible tableau of pre-existent life which confronts us, for our prenatal existence can really form the content of a fully developed science. But anything which we can gather concerning the future will very much depend upon the inner strengthening of our sentient-volitional being, when it is outside the body. This sentient-volitional being can also be observed in its course of development during the physical life on earth, as it gradually matures for a higher state of existence after death. Differences become evident, if we first observe that part of man which ordinarily abandons him unconsciously during sleep, in a more youthful stage of life and then observe it in a maturer stage. The sentient-volitional being which abandons the body of a younger person during sleep, is more filled with a reflective, thoughtful element. We observe that it unconsciously reverberates the thoughts which the human being harbours. When a person grows older, he no longer carries out of his physical body so many thoughts when crossing the portal of sleep, but he takes out with his sentient-volitional being into the external world, forces of character, forces contained in his developed impulses of the will.

We can therefore say: During our earthly life, we gradually change from a being in whom thoughts are the predominant element, into a being who manifests in his soul-spiritual part more the echo of forces which constitute his character. Essentially speaking, we do not pass through the portal of sleep with our thoughts, for we leave them behind when we fall asleep and they shine forth through the physical body. We leave behind the thoughts which animated us during our earthly life from birth to death. We learn to look upon them as external thought-forces of the world; later on, after death, we learn to know them as an external world. We pass through the portal of sleep with these forces which have formed our character, which constitute our inner moral development. If we wish to interpret rightly every phase in the perspective which appears to us in the world of our pre-existent life, we must first gain this capacity through the development of our normal soul-forces.

In the previous lecture, I have already described to you that when a person intensifies his life of thought through meditation and concentration, so that he can live in thoughts in the same way in which he ordinarily lives in sensory impressions, in an inner life of thoughts as powerful, living and intensive as the life of the soul when it surrenders to sensory impressions, then he attains to imaginative knowledge. This inner thought-life intensified to the stage of imaginative consciousness, now enables him to confront not only the memory tableau of his past earthly life up to the present moment, but he surveys everything pertaining to his physical earthly organism, shaped and moulded by the body of formative forces. His first super-sensible experience is to look back from the present moment upon his whole earthly life, as far as childhood, in the form of a mighty tableau.

I already mentioned in my last lectures that the tableau which can thus be experienced, resembles in some points a fact which even serious scientists discuss to-day, for it is sufficiently attested that such a picture arises when a person is in mortal danger, with hardly any hope of escape. A drowning person, for instance, may experience in a great tableau that which constitutes the etheric time-body of formative forces; he looks upon this body.

Supersensible knowledge enables us to obtain this same survey, which constitutes the first experience after death through the right interpretation of the perspective described to you of our pre-existent, pre-natal life.

Then we recognise the fact that when the human being passes through the portal of death, he perceives for a short time, lasting only a few days (approximately as long as a person is able, in accordance with his organisation, to do without sleep for a few days) a kind of tableau, giving him a survey of his past earthly life in a kind of thought-web, but consisting of pictures. We obtain, for a short time, this survey of our earthly life, when we pass through the portal of death. I might say, that we face our earthly life without the participation of our feelings and of our will, purely in a kind of passive survey; after death, we learn to know this first condition as I have described it.

We must first gain this experience through super-sensible knowledge, through meditation and concentration, etc. But we require another kind of training if we wish to interpret rightly in this tableau the connection between our past earthly life and the life after death.

In our earthly life, and even in ordinary science, we generally surrender ourselves passively to the external world with our thoughts, feelings and will-impulses. We keep pace with the external world. We experience the Yesterday, then in connection with it the To-day, and a little later, the To-morrow. And the inner reflections of our thoughts, feelings and will-impulses, developed within the soul, are connected with the external course of time, as a continued natural experience. This, as it were, gives our ordinary thinking and feeling a kind of support, but man's thinking cannot reach the required degree of intensification, enabling it to make super-sensible investigations, if it passively submits to the external course of time. Other exercises are now needed; we must try—if I may use this expression—to think backwards. When the day is over, we should pass in review all that we have seen during the day, but we should not do this in the form of thoughts, nor critically, but in the form of pictures; we should, as it were, see everything once more, in the same way in which we see things through our phantasy but from evening to morning in reversed sequence. We should acquire a certain practice in this thinking backwards in the form of pictures. It is relatively easy to think backwards larger portions of the day, but in order to have a reversed picture of the day's course, atomistically small portions must also be surveyed backwards, and this must be practised for a long time.

We can then advance to other exercises; for instance, we can seek help by trying to experience a drama backwards, from the Fifth Act back to the First, try experiencing melodies inwardly, by hearing, as it were, soul-spiritually. We can thus attain the capacity of looking upon our life's memories (this is something different from the life-tableau described above) by conjuring them up before our soul backwards, in the form of imaginative pictures, so that our whole life stands before us, from the present moment back into the past. By making such exercises, we emancipate our thinking from the external course of time. The deeply rooted habit of following the course of time with our thinking and feeling must be overcome. By forcefully thinking backwards we are gradually enabled to make use of a far greater and stronger capacity of thinking than that employed for a merely passive thinking. Our thinking power can be essentially strengthened just by this way of thinking backwards.

And we then discover something which undoubtedly seems paradoxical to the normal consciousness and to the ordinary understanding. But in the same way in which one looks upon the physical world with conceptions flowing in the stream of time, so one gradually comes to look upon the spiritual world, when one's thinking has been emancipated from its connection with the external course of time.

This produces a further capacity which enables one to observe the new experiences and to interpret rightly, from the perspective already described, the things connected with the life-tableau which one sees for a few days after death.

After this life-tableau, we can see how man once more passes through his life, by living through it backwards in very real and vivid pictures. Man experiences, as it were, the soul-world before experiencing the spirit world. He lives backwards through life, from his death to his birth, but more quickly than during his earthly existence from birth to death. He lives through this life backwards.

The capacity to perceive this is acquired by the already mentioned exercises of thinking backwards. And now we gain a conception of how after death man experiences in this reversed course of soul-life everything that he experienced here on earth in his physical body. But he now experiences all these things with his soul, and he can see everything that harmed his progress morally. By this very living backwards through time, he can now survey from a higher standpoint what he would like to change in life. For he can see how certain moral defects handicapped his development towards perfection. But since he now experiences all this in a living way, it does not remain in the realm of thought. In this reversed course of soul-life—I might say, in this soul-life which he develops backwards, thought does not remain abstract, for abstract thoughts were left behind with death; thought now develops as a thinking force. It becomes an impulse which leads the human being to make amends during his next earthly life, in some way to experience facts which are opposite to those which now come before his soul. In the soul there develops something which in the next life appears in the form of subconscious longings to approach this or that experience in life. In this living backwards through our past life, we develop the desire to experience in our next earthly life events or facts which counterbalance those which we have gone through in the past. And so this reversed course of development contains the seed of something which we unconsciously bring with us when we are born again, something which can be described somewhat in the following way.

This is generally not accessible to the ordinary consciousness; nevertheless it lives in man. But observe merely with your plain common sense something which super-sensible research establishes as a fact—namely, how we approach some decisive fact in life.

Let us suppose that during one of our earthly lives we meet another human being in our 30th or 35th year (I will take a decisive event) and that he becomes our life-companion with whom we wish to share our further destiny in life, that we discover that our souls harmonise. An ordinary materialistic person will say that this was pure chance. Deeper minds—there are many, and they can be traced in history—have however reflected a little over this problem: If we now look back in life from this decisive event, if we survey what preceded it, what came before that, and still further back ... we find that the course of our life tending towards this event followed a definite plan. Sometimes we discover that an event which we thus experience in our life, a fact having such an incisive influence upon our life, appears like the organic conclusion of a well defined plan.

If we have first constructed such a plan hypothetically and lead it back as far as our birth, and if we then survey it with the aid of cognitive forces developed through meditation, retrospective thinking, will-exercises, we must really say to ourselves: This hypothetical plan which you constructed, may sometimes appear like a mere phantasy, but it is not always so. Precisely for decisive facts in life, it often reveals itself as of greatest importance that the human being carries within him from his birth a subconscious longing, and that guided by this longing, which he perhaps interprets quite differently in the various epochs of his life, he makes the first step, the second step and all the steps which finally lead him to the event which he formed as a seed during his retrospective experience after death and which carries him through his new earthly life as an undefined longing. We thus shape our destiny ourselves in an unconscious way. This enables us to recognise what we encounter during our earthly existence, this destiny or Karma, as it was designated in the ancient, instinctive, clairvoyant wisdom of the Orient. This destiny, on which our happiness and unhappiness, our joy and pain in life depends, we can learn to recognise by looking upon the sequence of our earthly lives.

A man will naturally very soon be inclined to say: How do matters then stand in regard to freedom,?—For if man is guided by destiny, how do matters stand in regard to human freedom?—Indeed, a solution of the question of destiny can only be gained by striving earnestly with the problem of freedom. At this point allow me to insert something personal, for it undoubtedly has an objective significance. In the early nineties of the past century I wrote my Philosophy of Spiritual Activity. The task of this book was to establish the experience, the fact of freedom. From man's own inner experiences I sought to characterise the consciousness of freedom as an absolute certainty. And the subsequent explanations which I have tried to give as a partial solution of the problem of destiny, such as the sketch which I gave you now, I consider to be in entire harmony with the descriptions of human freedom. Those who study my book Philosophy of Spiritual Activity will find however that I was obliged to renounce speaking of freedom of the human will at first, and to speak instead of a freedom experienced in thought, in pure thinking emancipated from the senses. In thoughts which consciously arise in the human soul as an ethical, moral ideal, in thoughts which have the strength to influence the human will and to lead it to action, in such thoughts there is freedom. We can speak of human freedom when we speak of human actions shaped by man's own free thinking, when he reaches the point, through a moral self-training, of not allowing his actions to be influenced by instincts, passions, emotions or by his temperament, but only by the devoted love for an action. In this devoted love for an action, can develop something which proceeds from the ideal strength of pure ethical thinking. This is a really free action.

Spiritual science now enables us to discover that during sleep thinking as such, the thinking which lies at the foundation of free ethical actions, remains behind in the mirroring physical body. It is thus something that man experiences between birth and death. Even if human life were not of immense value also from other aspects, the inclusion of the impulse of freedom in our experiences between birth and death renders our life on earth valuable in itself. In our physical existence on earth we attain freedom by developing thought as such, when thought loses the plastic force which it still has within the etheric body and is developed as pure thinking in the consciousness which we have in ordinary life.

In the early nineties of the past century I was therefore obliged to set forth a very daring thought in my Philosophy of Spiritual Activity. I had to speak of moral impulses in the form of ethical ideas and had to explain that these do not come to us from Nature, but through intuition. At that time I spoke of “moral phantasy.” Why?—In my Philosophy of Spiritual Activity I explained that these ethical motives stream into man from the spiritual world, but at first in the form of pictures. He receives them from the spiritual world as intuition.

But we thus come, as it were, to the other pole of what we experience here, in the physical world. Everywhere in the realm of Nature we discover necessity, if we look out into it with our sound common sense and with a scientific mentality. If we look into the world of moral impulses, then we discover freedom, but to begin with, freedom in the form of mere thought, of pure thinking, in the intuition that lives in the thinking activity. At first we do not know how these moral forces enter the will, for we perceive ethical intuitions unconsciously. So we have on the one hand Nature, to which we belong through our actions, and on the other hand our ethical experience. Through natural science alone, we should lose the possibility to ascribe reality and world-creative forces to these ethical intuitions. We experience Nature as it were, in its whole dense grossness, in its necessity. And then we experience freedom, but we experience it in the finely-woven impulses of thinking which reach the imaginative stage, and since these do not form part of Nature and can be experienced in free activity, we know that they come from the spiritual world, as I have indicated in my Philosophy of Spiritual Activity.

But something must now be inserted between these intuitions which are entirely of a picture-nature and unreal and which only acquire reality through ethical life, between these intuitions and the objective cognition of Nature and its laws. It is imagination and inspiration, which arise in the way I have described, that now insert themselves. In that case intuition too undergoes a change. The impulse which first appeared only in pure thinking, becomes as it were condensed into a spiritual reality.

In this newly acquired intuition, gained through imagination and inspiration, we do not learn to know our present Ego, but the Ego that passes through repeated lives on earth and that carries our destiny through these repeated earthly lives. In passing through these repeated earthly lives which moulded our destiny, we are not free. Yet we can always insert free actions into this web of destiny during our different lives on earth. Just because the imaginative intuition enables us to experience ethical impulses (not as realities, but as something which we can freely accept), we can weave freedom into the web of destiny during a definite earthly life. The fact that destiny bears us from one earthly life into another, does not render us less free than the fact that a steamer can carry us from Europe to America. Our future is determined by the decision to travel arrived at in Europe; yet within certain limits we are always free, and we can move about freely while we are in America. This is how destiny is borne from one earthly life into another. But to the world of facts which we thus experience during our repeated lives on earth, we can insert what wells up out of freedom during a definite life.

And so we see that those who struggle with the problem of freedom and see the solution in the contemplation of ethical ideas which can at first only be grasped through moral phantasy, but which penetrate from the spiritual world into the physical world of man,—we see that those who in this way acquire an understanding for the problem of freedom, have prepared themselves thereby for the comprehension of destiny, which enters human life almost like a necessity.

If we attain this intuition and understand the interweaving of destiny and freedom and thus intensify still further the forces acquired through meditation, concentration, retrospective thought, etc., we are able to contemplate, that is to interpret further the facts which appear to us in the spiritual perspective.

What now is attached to this retrospective experience is a life which takes its course in a purely spiritual sphere in which we now live towards a subsequent life on earth. In this spiritual sphere our experience is just the reverse of our experience during our earthly life. Here on earth, our inner experiences can, to begin with, only be perceived inwardly, as pictures. We do not experience our inner being with our ordinary consciousness, for our waking consciousness makes us experience the external world. We look out, as it were, from our own centre into the environing spatial world, into the spatial sphere, the external world. We are within ourselves and the external world is outside.

During our existence between death and a new birth this conception is just reversed: We are now centred in a world which constituted our external world here on earth, and the external world on earth now becomes a kind of inner world.

The inner world of human nature, which was not accessible to us during our earthly life, can now be experienced as an external world. And during our life between death and a new birth, our inner being becomes the world! And the world becomes our Ego.

And inasmuch as we experience something which is now higher than the world which surrounds us here on earth (for man is the crown of creation, he bears within himself a sphere which is higher than the surrounding world), we have within us a more valuable world during our existence between death and a new birth. The world which we thus experience as our own environment, but which is actually the mysterious world of man's inner being, is experienced creatively. In the spiritual world we experience these forces creatively, in common with higher spiritual Beings that surround our soul-spiritual being, in the same way in which the kingdoms of Nature, the plants, the animals and the minerals, surround our physical being on earth.

In communion with these spiritual Beings, we experience the forces out of which we gradually mould not only our destiny, the seed of our destiny, but also our prototype in the soul-spiritual world. This is the real prototype, that soul-spiritual being, which after a certain time is filled with the longing to incorporate again, to send down the prototype into a physical body, the prototype which it first shaped in living thoughts in the spiritual world. And since it must become united with a physical body, since it can only reach perfection in a physical body, this soul-spiritual being is filled with the impulse and longing to reincarnate here on earth. Out of the spirit comes that being from an existence lying before birth, or before conception, and unites with the physical body.

A true conception of the way in which man develops here on earth as a physical being (more exact details will be given the day after tomorrow) can only be gained if we can grasp the fact that what develops in the mother's body is only something which receives from a higher world the real being of man.

Natural science has a certain ambition and dream, consisting in the hope to discover one day the complicated chemical structure of cells, indeed of the most perfect cells, the reproductive cells, the germ cells of the human embryo. The spiritual science of Anthroposophy approaches this same problem, but with quite different means and from entirely different points of view. And Anthroposophy is able, in a certain way, to point out the direction in which to seek that which develops in the mother's body as germinative cell of the human embryo. Here we do not come across complicated chemical combinations, but in reality with a chaotic state of matter. We do not have before us a highly complicated chemical combination or some molecular structure, but a chaotic condition, a chaotic vortex of the ordered structure which exists in a crystal and in a chemical molecule. In the germinative cell matter is not developed to a further organisation, but it is pushed down into chaos, and from the corresponding substance, from the substance which becomes chaotic, then develops something which can now receive what comes down to it from above; the super-sensible man coming from the spiritual worlds.

The development of physical man will only be grasped if physical research is brought to the point of being able to see how the physical human germ by leading matter back to chaos, becomes capable of receiving the soul-spiritual germ which comes down from pre-existence. Only in this way it is possible to understand how the soul-spiritual part descending from the soul-spiritual world becomes united through conception and up to birth with what has de-materialised itself in the germ, in the early embryonic stage. All who carefully study the form and development of the embryo can find, even in its physical development, the confirmation of to-day's description, whereas this embryonic development will always remain a riddle to those who cannot consider it in this way.

To be sure, if we really wish to know man's true being we must receive from super-sensible research what also belongs to man. On earlier occasions, I have, for instance, pointed out that in the science dealing with the lower kingdoms, people would everywhere consider foolish things which are looked upon as wisdom in the investigation of the human being.

I already gave you the example of a magnet-needle, with one of its ends pointing North and the other one South. Now it would certainly not enter anyone's mind to say that the forces which it manifests are only contained in the magnet needle, in the space occupied by that needle. One looks upon the earth itself as a great magnet which exercises its influence upon the magnet-needle and which determines its direction. The magnet-needle is included in the structure of the whole earth-organism.

In this case one transcends the single thing, in order to recognise the great comprehensive whole and its inter-relation with the single object. Yet in the case of man one seeks to recognise everything pertaining to man by studying the development of the germ cell through the microscope and by contemplating only what is enclosed within the human skin! Just as little as the forces of the magnet can be explained through the magnet, just as little is it possible to know what develops in the human being if one does not bring him in relation with the whole world, not only with the spatial world, but also with the world of time; it is not possible to understand the' human being unless one goes back to his pre-existent, pre-natal being, revealing itself, as described, to super-sensible vision. We learn to know this pre-existent being when man lays aside his physical body here on earth, when we see his etheric body dissolving in the cosmic ether—we see this pre-existent being passing once more through the portal of death in order to begin a new cycle leading to a further adjustment of life's facts and to a higher perfection.

This is how man stands within the evolution of the world, if we look upon his essence as such. What we now receive, inasmuch as we bear our soul-spiritual being down to earth, pertains to the evolution of the world and must be included in the cosmic development, as we shall see in the next lecture. The human being will only be understood if what has been explained to-day is at the same time inserted into the being and becoming, that is, into the whole cosmic development. For man can only recognise the world by recognising himself. And what constitutes the universe is reflected in earthly life, and the human being lives through it after death and before birth. From this sphere he takes the forces which he himself incorporates with his physical body at birth or conception. The universe and man belong together not only outwardly, but also inwardly. Man bears the world within himself; the world as a totality forms man's being. The question which we have raised is therefore partially answered to-day; it will be fully answered, to the extent allowed to-day by science, in my next lecture.

In conclusion let me say a few more words. I want it to be really understood that the facts explained by the spiritual-scientific investigator are based upon the development of forces which ordinarily remain unconscious to the soul, but that from the anthroposophical standpoint, the spiritual-scientific investigator proceeds in such a way that he clothes the facts obtained through super-sensible vision in the thoughts which are ordinarily used in science. Everywhere he takes his thoughts with him. For his research-work must always be accompanied by that pendulum swinging from the super-sensible to the physical world. He must always stand as his own critic by the side of his higher being endowed with super-sensible vision. Consequently even those who have not made such exercises can really examine and test with their own thinking all the facts brought forward by the spiritual investigator; they can test them with their own thinking, if only they follow in an unprejudiced way their own sound common sense. It is really not true that only a spiritual investigator could test the facts brought forward by spiritual research. In the present time, we have grown too accustomed to the manner of thinking connected with external matter, with the external sequence of natural facts, and we find that a spiritual investigator cannot supply proofs valid for this' way of thinking. But those who penetrate into all the circumstances, understand the connection existing between the ordinary sound common sense and the methodically developed understanding of science, of external science. And those who think critically, and with sufficient lack of prejudice test all the facts advanced by the spiritual investigator, will be able to do this, even though they themselves are not endowed with super-sensible vision. The spiritual investigator brings forward everything in such a way that it can be tested. Those who say that a spiritual investigator merely relates what he sees through his own super-sensible vision without supplying any proofs, resembles a person who is accustomed to think that everything which he finds on earth stands upon a firm ground, and when someone explains to him a solar system immediately asks: What then does that rest upon?

Perhaps he does not perceive that it rests upon itself, that it is freely borne by its own forces. A person who asks for proofs resembles one who asks: On what foundation does a solar system stand then? He resembles such a person if he asks for ordinary proofs and means such proofs as can only be asked for the external sensory world, where it is possible to discover, without any proof, the things which the senses perceive, the existence of which can be proved through the senses.

But human thinking does not only exist for this purpose; human thinking can also rise to things which are demonstrable not only through sound common sense upon the foundation of sensory experience, but to things which are carried by their own inner forces, like a spiritual planetary system. Try to examine in this way, by applying it to anthroposophical spiritual investigation, the results obtained by such a self-supporting, self-demonstrating thinking; you will then find that the facts advanced by a spiritual investigator are inwardly just as surely founded—even without the so-called external supports—as a planetary system supports itself freely in cosmic space, and that a supporting foundation is only needed by what is terrestrial and heavy. This however must be remembered: that thinking must also become really free, it must become something which can carry itself inwardly, if sound human intelligence is to find a proof for the facts which spiritual research advances in connection with the being of man and the evolution of the world. That from this standpoint it is possible to prove everything, I shall hope to develop in my next lecture on the nature of world evolution, following the explanations now given on the nature of man.

Der Mensch Im Lichte Der Anthroposophie

Den heutigen Vortrag dürfte ich wohl kaum in der Form halten, wie ich es vorhabe, wenn nicht der gestrige vorangegangen wäre. Nicht nur aus dem Grunde, weil dieser Vortrag eine Fortsetzung des gestrigen sein soll, sondern auch aus dem anderen Grunde, weil das, was aus anthroposophischer Erkenntnis heraus über den eigentlichen Wesenskern des Menschen zu sagen ist, zunächst für die äußere Erfahrung so paradox klingt, daß es schon notwendig ist, die gesicherte Grundlage zu kennen, auf der solche Erkenntnisse aufgebaut sind. Und ich glaube bemerklich gemacht zu haben, daß sowohl nach der einen Seite, nach der Seite des kritischen Geistes, wie auch nach der Seite der gewissenhaften Forschung Anthroposophie es durchaus aufnehmen kann mit allem, was die neuere Zeit gewöhnt worden ist, für wissenschaftliche Methodik und wissenschaftliche Gesinnung zu halten.

Was den Gegenstand des heutigen Vortrags bildet, ist eben der eigentliche menschliche Wesenskern, der ja auch gestaltend, dirigierend dem äußeren physischen Menschen zugrunde liegt. Der physische Mensch gehört, wie gerade Geisteswissenschaft zeigen kann, mehr als man gewöhnlich annimmt, der Weltentwickelung als solcher an und wird mehr der Gegenstand des nächsten Vortrags im Zusammenhange eben mit der ganzen Weltenentwickelung sein müssen. Auch in bezug auf das eigentliche Wesen des Menschen denkt man heute anders in ernsten Kreisen, auch ernsten wissenschaftlichen Kreisen, als es noch vor einigen Jahrzehnten in der Hochblüte des Materialismus gerade bei den aufgeklärtesten Menschen üblich war. Aber was als Anthroposophie in diesem Vortrage vor Sie hintritt, wird vielleicht stärker als von manchen anderen Seiten gerade von denen zurückgewiesen, die nun auf ihre Art, ich möchte sagen, mit Festhaltung des mehr materialistischen Geistes der Wissenschaft herantreten möchten an das geistig-seelische Element im Menschen. Wir sehen, wie heute die Menschen sich zu interessieren beginnen, die eigentlichen Gründe herauszufinden, warum der Mensch in gewisse abnorme Seelenzustände kommen kann, in denen er Halluzinatorisches, Illusionäres erlebt, in denen er der Suggestion und Autosuggestion zugänglich ist. Für diese abnormen Seelenerscheinungen interessiert man sich aus dem Grunde heute ganz besonders, weil sie ja - ohne daß die in der Seele schlummernden Kräfte, von deren Entwickelung ich gesprochen habe, wirklich entfaltet werden — so, wie man ein äußeres Experiment vollbringt, der Untersuchung unterzogen werden können. Man geht einfach heran an solche Persönlichkeiten, welche in dieser Weise ein abnormes Geistesleben haben, und untersucht die Erscheinungen, wie man im Laboratorium oder im physikalischen Kabinett gewöhnt ist, Versuche zu machen. Diese Persönlichkeiten und manche, die auch nicht den entsprechenden abnormen Seelenzuständen unterliegen, haben sehr häufig den Glauben, daß man gerade durch solche abnorme Seelenzustände, durch visionäres Schauen, durch halluzinatorische Erfahrung irgendwelche Mittel in die Hand bekommen könne, tiefer in die wahre Wesenheit des Menschen einzudringen. Ja, es wird sogar geglaubt, daß man in solchen Zuständen eine Art Offenbarung aus wirklichen geistigen Welten erhalten könne. Wir werden, wenn wir heute vom anthroposophischen Standpunkte aus das menschliche Wesen untersuchen, gerade in der Lage sein, wiederum eine Art Licht zurückzuwerfen auf die Bedeutung dieser abnormen Seelenzustände. Aus der Kritik, die ich gestern gegeben habe, werden Sie von vornherein überzeugt sein können, daß auch diesen Erscheinungen gegenüber anthroposophische Geistesforschung im vollsten Sinne des Wortes kritisch ist.

Eine andere Art von Erscheinung tritt dann auf, wenn gewisse Gedanken von Persönlichkeiten zweifellos unter nicht gewöhnlichen Raumes- und Zeitbedingungen erfahren werden können. Man spricht über diese Fälle ja heute auch schon in ganz ernsten wissenschaftlichen Kreisen. Eine solche Erscheinung ist die Telepathie. Da spricht man davon, daß ohne die gewöhnliche sinnliche Vermittlung die Menschen in gewissen Seelenzuständen für Gedankliches, vielleicht sogar für Gedankliches, das in der Entfernung sich abspielt, eine gewisse Wahrnehmung entfalten zu können. Man spricht von Telekinese, das heißt von gewissen Kräften, die von den Menschen ausgehen können, und die ohne die physische Vermittlung des Menschen, gewissermaßen bloß durch Einwirkung in die Ferne, sich äußern, sich offenbaren, so daß es dann scheint, als ob der Mensch einen Willen entfalten könne ohne die Vermittlung seiner Gliedmaßen, in die Entfernung hin. Ja, man hat auch heute schon in wissenschaftlicher Beziehung Versuche angestellt mit wissenschaftlicher Methodik, welche man einreiht in das Kapitel der Teleplastik, wo an dem Menschen oder in der Nähe des Menschen materienartige Gebilde, Phantome erscheinen, denen man deutlich ansieht, daß sie meinetwillen aus feiner Materie bestehen, aus Ätherischem bestehen, daß ihnen aber plastisch, als eine plastische Gestaltungskraft das eingegliedert ist, was in dem menschlichen Gedanken wurzelt, was in den menschlichen Gedanken vorhanden ist.

Man spricht also von Telepathie, Telekinese, man spricht von Teleplastik. Anthroposophische Geisteswissenschaft muß gegenüber diesen Erscheinungen wiederum die kritische Frage aufwerfen: Rühren diese Erscheinungen wirklich her von dem, wovon gestern gesagt worden ist, daß es im Einschlafen als Gefühls-Willenswesen aus dem physischen und dem Äther- oder Bildekräfteleib des Menschen heraustritt und außerhalb verharrt vom Einschlafen bis zum Aufwachen? Hat man es in dem, was sich als Telepathie im Menschen äußert, als Telekinese, als Teleplastik, hat man es da mit einer Wirkung des ewigen Geistig-Seelischen, dessen, was wir als Gefühls- und Willenswesen kennen gelernt haben, zu tun oder hat man es vielleicht nur mit dem zu tun, was zurückgelassen wird im Bette, wenn der Mensch schläft, was also besteht aus dem physischen Leib und dem ätherischen oder Bildekräfteleib? Wenn man es nur mit dem letzteren zu tun hat, dann mögen diese Erscheinungen einem noch so wunderbar vorkommen, sie mögen noch so absonderlich sein, sie gehören dann zu dem, was mit dem Tode des Menschen verschwindet. Denn mit dem Tode des Menschen verschwindet das, was beim Einschlafen zurückbleibt. Das, was das eigentlich unsterbliche, ewige Wesen des Menschen ist, was im Einschlafen sich herauszieht aus dem physischen und dem Bildekräfteleib, das ist in der Regel dann, wenn diese Erscheinungen der Telepathie, der Teleplastik, der Telekinese auftreten, auch irgendwie unter hypnotischem Einfluß oder dergleichen aus dem physischen und dem Ätherleib heraus entfernt. So daß man sagen muß: Diese sogenannten wunderbaren Erscheinungen können auf nichts hindeuten, was mit dem ewigen Wesenskern des Menschen zusammenhängt. Wenn sie auch noch so wunderbar sind, sie sind gebunden an das, was im Tode sich loslöst und dem Elemente der Erde sich verbindet. Sie können dann nur hinweisen auf eine Welt, die ebenfalls dem Menschen entschwindet, wenn er durch die Pforte des Todes geht. Diesen kritischen Einwand muß also gegenüber einzelnen, heute vielfach schon anerkannten Erscheinungen, anthroposophische Geisteswissenschaft ebenso machen, wie gegenüber denjenigen Erscheinungen, die ich Ihnen gestern erzählt habe, und es wird darauf ankommen, was Anthroposophie zu diesen Erscheinungen zu sagen hat, nachdem sie ihrerseits ihre Forschungen angestellt hat über das, was der wahrhaft ewige Wesenskern des Menschen ist.

Nun darf ich vielleicht wiederum darauf aufmerksam machen, daß ja durch jene gedanklichen, meditativen und durch jene Willensübungen, von denen ich gestern und in meinen früheren hiesigen Vorträgen gesprochen habe, ein Zustand herbeigeführt wird im Menschen, und zwar gerade im Gefühls- und Willenswesen des Menschen, der auf der einen Seite dem Schlafzustande ähnlich ist, sich aber doch wiederum von diesem radikal unterscheidet.

Ich habe gestern dargestellt, wie innerlich lebendig durchleuchtet, durchkraftet das sonst bewußtlose, gleichsam abgelähmte Gefühls- und Willenswesen des Menschen wird, wie also der Mensch Zustände dadurch behufs anthroposophischer Forschung herbeiführen kann, wodurch er ebenso mit seinem Gefühls- und Willenswesen außerhalb des physischen Leibes ist, wie er es im Schlafe ist. Aber er ist dann nicht in einer dunklen, finsteren Welt, in einer Welt, die für ihn Bewußtlosigkeit bedingt, er ist in einer Welt geistiger Umgebung. Und für ihn wird vor allen Dingen das erste Objekt, auf das er zurückblicken kann, sein eigener physischer Leib und sein eigener Bildekräfteleib, jener Bildekräfteleib, der aus Gedanken, die man aber als Kräfte wahrnimmt, die Welt zurückspiegelt zu dem Wesenskern des Menschen, der aus diesem physischen und Bildekräfteleib herausgetreten ist. Die Gedankenwelt, die man früher mit sich verbunden hatte, sie wird gewissermaßen von dem zurückgebliebenen physischen Leib zurückgespiegelt, und man erlangt ein Bild der Welt jetzt nicht dadurch, daß sich bloß in den Sinnesorganen, wie etwa im Auge, die äußere Welt spiegelt und so die physische Welt bewußt erfahren wird, sondern man erlangt ein Bild der geistigen Grundlage der Welt dadurch, daß gewissermaßen der ganze menschliche Organismus zu einer Art von einzigem, totalem Sinnesorgan wird, das aber jetzt, wie ein anderes Objekt, außerhalb des Menschen ist.

Dieses außerhalb des Menschen befindliche Wesen, das lernt der Mensch allmählich kennen, wenn er immer weiter und weiter in anthroposophischer Forschung vorrückt, innerlich immer kräftiger und kräftiger wird. Ich habe schon gesagt: Von allem, was der Mensch erleben kann als Visionär, als jemand, der halluziniert, als jemand, der überhaupt in abnormen Seelenzuständen ist, unterscheidet sich dieser Zustand, in den sich der anthroposophische Geistesforscher bringt, dadurch, daß er immer die Möglichkeit hat, sein gesundes, besonnenes Bewußtsein neben dem Schauen der höheren Welt zu behalten. Es tritt wirklich für den Menschen nun etwas ein, das man nennen kann ein Hin- und Herpendeln, ein Hin- und Herschwingen zwischen dem Schauen der geistigen Welt und dem Schauen der physischen Welt. Das heißt, der Mensch kann abwechselnd außer seinem physischen Leibe sein und in der Weise beobachten, wie ich es eben gesagt habe; er kann aber auch wiederum ın ihm zu voller Bewußtheit, zum gewöhnlichen Denken, Fühlen und Wollen zurückkehren und das Erlebte beurteilen mit dem gewöhnlichen Denken, Fühlen und Wollen, mit der gewöhnlichen gesunden Besonnenheit, mit der er sonst das äußere Sinnenleben und das gewöhnliche Leben überhaupt beurteilt. So daß der Mensch völlig kritisch, mit derjenigen Kritik, die er sich nur heranerzogen hat im Leben, dem gegenüberstehen kann, was er in dieser Weise erforscht, was vor ihm als ein höheres Erlebnis der Seele auftritt.

Dieses Abwechseln zwischen den Zuständen, das ist bei abnormen Seelenzuständen nicht vorhanden. Der Visionär, der Halluzinant hat nicht die Möglichkeit, durch seinen gesunden besonnenen Willen willkürlich wiederum zurückzukehren, wann er eben es für richtig hält, zu seiner gewöhnlichen Besonnenheit, das heißt in seinen gewöhnlichen Körper. Es ist etwas Unwillkürliches, etwas Unterbewußtes, was ihn in diesen abnormen Zuständen zum Halluzinieren, zur Vision bringt, und gerade diese Kritiklosigkeit gegenüber den abnormen Zuständen ist es, auf die immer wieder und wieder hingewiesen werden muß, wenn das, was anthroposophische Geistesforschung hervorbringt, nun auch zusammengeworfen wird mit dem, was eben dem Halluzinatorischen, dem visionären Wesen angehört.

Indem man aber auf diese Weise hin- und herschwingt zwischen dem übersinnlichen Schauen und dem gewöhnlichen Bewußtseinszustande, gelangt man immer mehr und mehr dazu, mit den Kräften, die man im Gefühls- und Willenswesen sich ausgebildet hat, zurückzuschauen auf das, was als physischer Leib und als Ätherleib oder Bildekräfteleib objektiv nunmehr außer dem geistig-seelischen Wesenskern des Menschen ist. Und man lernt, indem man sich emporgerungen hat zum imaginativen Bewußtsein, nun wirklich das, was man so vor sich hat, als ein Bild einer anderen Welt kennen. Und das ist das Wichtige, daß man durch imaginatives und durch inspiriertes Erkennen, wie ich es beschrieben habe in den letzten Tagen, beurteilen lernt, was das eigentlich ist, was man da nunmehr von außen als physischen und Bildekräfteleib ansieht. Es ist so, wenn ich mich eines Vergleiches bedienen darf, wie wenn jemand ein Bild zunächst vor sich hat und durch Kenntnis der Perspektive aus diesem Bilde heraus die entsprechende Wirklichkeit, die es abbilden soll, kennenlernt. Nur daß dasjenige, was man auf diese Weise aus einem gewöhnlichen Bilde als die entsprechende Wirklichkeit kennenlernt, eben doch nur ein inneres seelisches Erlebnis ist, währenddem die Perspektive, zu der sich bei fortschreitender Geistesforschung dieser objektive physische Leib, dieser objektive Bildekräfteleib erweitert, doch ein Tatsachenerlebnis ist. Man lernt nämlich erkennen, daß in diesem physischen Leib und in diesem Bildekräfteleib dasjenige enthalten ist, und zwar im Abbilde enthalten ist, was der Mensch war, bevor er durch die Geburt oder sagen wir durch die Empfängnis in die physische Welt heruntergestiegen ist. Es löst sich los gewissermaßen aus demjenigen, was man vor sich hat, das, was die Perspektive zurück in die geistig-seelische Welt hineingibt, die man durchgemacht hat, bevor man durch Konzeption und Geburt sich vereinigt hat mit der physischen Materie, die man durch Eltern und Voreltern, durch die physischen Vererbungsströmungen auf der Erde empfangen hat. Und aufgeschlossen wird für die Anschauung das, was die geistig-seelische Umgebung des Menschen war, bevor er in das Erdendasein heruntergestiegen ist, aufgeschlossen wird diejenige Welt, in der die Kräfte sind, die der Mensch eingegliedert hat in die physische Form, die ihm von Eltern und Voreltern übergeben worden ist.

Man lernt sich jetzt kennen im präexistenten Zustande, und das Eigentümliche, das da auftritt, das ist, daß man tatsächlich in diesem Tableau, das die präexistente Wesenheit des Menschen darstellt, die Welt im Grunde umgekehrt sieht im Verhältnis zu einer physischen Perspektive. Im Verhältnis zu einer physischen Perspektive ist es so, daß man die nächsten Gegenstände deutlich sieht, und daß eben in demselben Maße, in dem die Gegenstände weiter entfernt liegen, die Dinge ungenauer werden. Es liegt das wiederum im Wesen des perspektivischen Schauens in der Raumeswelt. In derjenigen Perspektive, die einem jetzt aufsteigt aus dem zurückgebliebenen Menschenwesen, in der ist es umgekehrt. Was nahe ist dem physischen Erdenleben, das steht nahe auch dem gegenwärtigen Erleben, und der Mensch kennt ja sein Inneres im physischen Erdenleben nicht. Es ist sein physisches Erdenleben etwas, das ihm seinen ewigen Wesenskern verdunkelt. Dieses Nächste, das wird nun nicht am frühesten geistig sichtbar, wenn man also in die präexistente Welt hineinschaut, sondern es wird zuerst das Fernere sichtbar. Und wenn man aufgestiegen ist durch die drei Stufen, die man durch Übungen als höhere Erkenntnisstufen in sich ausbilden kann in dem Sinne, wie ich es in meinem Buche «Wie erlangt man Erkenntnisse der höheren Welten?» beschrieben habe, so gelangt man tatsächlich durch Imagination, Inspiration und Intuition dazu, ein geschlossenes, geistig-seelisches Weltenbild zu erhalten, das einen zurückführt bis zu einem vorigen Erdenleben.

Wie eine physische Perspektive begrenzt ist in der Ferne, so ist durch ein zurückliegendes Erdenleben, das sich einem durch Intuition erschließt, dasjenige begrenzt, was man als das Bild der Welt bekommt, die man im präexistenten Zustand durchlebt hat. Es ist weder irgend etwas Phantastisches, noch irgend etwas logisch Erschlossenes, wenn in anthroposophischer Geisteswissenschaft gesprochen wird von den wiederholten Erdenleben, sondern es ist etwas durch Erkenntnis Errungenes, etwas, was sich dem wirklichen geistigen Schauen darstellt. Dieses geistige Schauen muß allerdings erst aus den Tiefen des seelischen Wesens hervorgeholt werden. Man erlangt dann eine positive Erkenntnis davon, daß in dem physischen Leib des Menschen und in dem ätherischen oder Bildekräfteleib des Menschen sich eingestaltet, eingebildet haben diejenigen Wesenskräfte, die im Menschen waren in der Zeit zwischen dem Tod und einer neuen Geburt.

Das erklärt mit, daß man sich hereinentwickelt hat aus einer geistigen Welt in die physische. Und in den physischen Leib, den man an sich gewissermaßen als Werkzeug, nicht bloß als Umhüllung trägt, und in den Bildekräfteleib, der die lebendigen Kräfte enthält, die den Organen, dem Stoffwechsel, dem Wachstum zugrunde liegen, in diesen physischen Leib und Ätherleib, der dann für das geistige Schauen als Objektivität vor uns erscheint, ist hineingebildet der Wesenskern der Seele, wie er sich seit dem letzten Tode bis zu dieser Geburt durch eine geistig-seelische Welt hindurch entwickelt hat. Man lernt das, was der Mensch zurückläßt, wenn er sich als Gefühls-Willenswesen herausbegibt aus seinem physischen und Ätherleib, gewissermaßen als das letzte kennen, zu dem sich der Mensch sehnend aus der geistigen Welt hingeneigt hat, nachdem er gewissermaßen in der geistigen Welt alt geworden und der geistigen Welt abgestorben ist in dem Leben zwischen dem Tode und der neuen Geburt. So wie der Mensch seinen physischen Leib welk werden findet in einem gewissen Alter, wenn er dem Alterstode entgegengeht, so findet der Mensch in der geistigen Welt dasjenige geistig-seelische Wesen, in dem er sich dann befindet, abwelkend.

Dieses Abwelken gibt sich kund in der Sehnsucht nach der physischen Welt, nach leiblich-physischer Verkörperung. Und so ist das, was im physischen Leib des Menschen lebt, was im Ätherleib lebt, gewissermaßen die letzte Phase des Lebens oben in der geistigen Welt. Wir lassen unsere Vergangenheit zurück, wenn wir im Schlafe als Gefühls-Willenswesen aus unserem physischen Leib heraustreten. Und was nehmen wir dann mit? Indem wir uns klar werden, daß wir unsere Vergangenheit zurücklassen, werden wir uns auch klar, daß das, was wir vom Einschlafen bis zum Aufwachen für das gewöhnliche Bewußtsein bewußtlos erleben, dasjenige im Menschen ist, was nun durch die Pforte des Todes geht, und neuerdings in eine geistig-seelische Welt sich hineinbegibt. Der Teil der menschlichen Wesenheit, der nicht im physischen Leib und im Ätherleib untertauchen konnte, der gewissermaßen übrigbleibt, der geht jede Nacht beim Einschlafen heraus und geht als Gefühls- und Willenswesen nun auch wiederum durch die Pforte des Todes. So wird die Ewigkeit dem Menschen verbürgt durch diese wirkliche Anschauung.

Und sehen wir jetzt auf das zurück, was von einer gewissen, im Äußerlichen gebliebenen Wissenschaft heute unbegreiflicherweise angestrebt wird für die Erkenntnis durch die Untersuchung von Erscheinungen wie Telepathie, Teleplastik, Telekinese, dann sieht man, daß diese Erscheinungen tatsächlich gebunden sind an das, was des Menschen Vergangenheit darstellt, was mit seinem Tode zugrunde geht, was also nicht etwas darstellen kann von der wirklichen übersinnlichen Welt, sondern nur von den Kräften, die in dieser sinnlichen Erdenwelt mit dem Menschen verbunden sind.

Stellen wir uns einmal das lebendig vor, was aus unserer präexistenten Wesenheit durch die Konzeption und Geburt heruntersteigt zur physischen Verkörperung, so werden wir es ja begreiflich finden, daß das nun in sich aufnimmt, in seine Gestaltung einbezieht diejenigen Kräfte und Materien, welche durch die Vererbungsströmung übergeben werden, aber auch jene, die aufgenommen werden im Laufe des Lebens mit den Nahrungsmitteln, mit der Atmung, mit alledem, was der Mensch von der äußeren Welt empfängt. Denn der Mensch ist in seiner vollen Innerlichkeit doch nur in dem Wesen, das aus dem präexistenten Dasein heruntergeht zur physischen Verkörperung. Er gliedert sich ein, er umhüllt sich mit physischer Materie schon im Mutterleibe, dann später durch Atmung, durch Nahrungsaufnahme und so weiter.

Was der Mensch sich da eingliedert, das kommt in ein Verhältnis zu dem eigentlichen Wesen des Menschen nur im Normalzustande, durch jene Vermittlung, welche der physische Leib und der Ätherleib mit dem Gefühls-Willenswesen des Menschen im Wachzustand haben. Da ist ein normaler Zusammenhang zwischen dem Gefühls-Willenswesen des Menschen und seiner an den Bildekräfteleib, wie wir gesehen haben, gebundenen Gedankenkraft, wie auch mit dem physischen Leib vorhanden.

Nehmen wir nun an, durch das Versetzen des Menschen in einen hypnotischen Zustand wird das Gefühls- und Willenswesen aus dem physischen und dem Ätherleib herausgeholt. Wir haben dann den Menschen, den hypnotisierten Menschen vor uns als einen bloßen Bildekräfteleib und physischen Leib mit all demjenigen, was er nun an physischen Stoffen und an physischen Kräften von der irdischen Außenwelt aufgenommen hat. Diese physischen Stoffe haben nun allerlei Wechselverhältnisse mit der Umgebung; die tragen sie in den Menschen hinein. Was aus diesen Stoffen selber wirken kann, das tritt in die Erscheinung, wenn das GefühlsWillenswesen aus dem physischen Leib und aus dem Ätherleib heraus ist. Wir haben es also eigentlich — das zeigt anthroposophische Forschung — nicht mit irgend etwas zu tun, was zum ewigen Wesenskern des Menschen gehört, sondern was in diesen ewigen Wesenskern, aber in der Vergangenheit, eingegliedert wird aus der äußeren Welt. Dasselbe kann eintreten, wenn der Mensch irgendwelchen krankhaften Zuständen unterliegt. Im normalen Zustande empfindet der Mensch irgendein krankes Organ durch Schmerz, durch Übelsein oder dergleichen. Das ist dann der Fall, wenn in der richtigen Weise verbunden ist das Gefühls-Willenswesen mit dem physischen Leib und dem Ätherleib. Wenn aber irgendwie der physische Leib des Menschen oder auch der ätherische Leib durch Krankheit weitgehend deformiert ist, so taucht nun durch die Erkrankung irgendeines Organs, irgendeines inneren Gliedes das Geistig-Seelische, das Gefühls-Willenswesen des Menschen tiefer hinein in die animalische, in die physische Natur, als das im normalen Bewußtsein der Fall ist, wo wie spiegelnd zurückgeworfen werden nur die Erinnerungen. Der Mensch taucht bei gesunden Organen nur bis zu einem gewissen Grade unter in seinen physischen Leib. Sind aber die Organe irgendwie krank — oftmals nur bei einem kranken Organ —, so taucht der Mensch mit seinem geistig-seelischen Wesen nicht bloß, wenn die Erkrankung die entsprechende Form annimmt, bis zur Schmerzempfindung unter, sondern er taucht tiefer unter. Er verbindet sich mit seinem geistig-seelischen Wesen mit dem Organismus. Während der Mensch sonst nur seinen Sinnen nach und seinem Nervensystem nach mit seinem Gefühls-Willenswesen verbunden ist, wird er nun mit den niederen animalischen Organen und mit den vegetativen Organen verbunden und gelangt dadurch zu den unfreien Zuständen des Halluzinierens, des visionären Erlebens. Man sieht, daß das Halluzinieren, das visionäre Erleben ebenso wie die anderen Zustände durchaus an den physischen und an den ätherischen Leib des Menschen gebunden sind, daß sie also nur Erlebnisse darstellen können, die mit dem Tod des Menschen verschwinden, die nicht aufklären können über die übersinnliche Welt, in der sich der Mensch befindet zwischen dem Tode und einer neuen Geburt. Allerdings ist das eine richtig und durch Untersuchungen gesichert, daß es auch möglich ist, daß der Mensch Gedankenhaftes von einer gewissen Bedeutung im medialen, im mediumistischen Zustande wahrnimmt, so daß man manchmal erstaunt sein kann darüber, welche dem Menschen im gewöhnlichen Bewußtsein unmöglichen, genialischen Gedanken aus der Trance, also auch aus einer Art hypnotischem Zustand heraus kommen.

Spricht das aber gegen das eben Gesagte? Es spricht nicht dagegen, aus dem Grunde, weil nicht nur der physische Leib gewissermaßen in den Raum hinein ohne physische Vermittlung in der angeführten Weise wirken kann, sondern auch der Bildekräfteleib. Nun kommt es aber vor, daß sogar ganz normale Menschen, aber namentlich solche Menschen, welche gewisse geniale Anlagen haben, etwas in sich an Gedanken, an Phantasiebildern erzeugen, das nicht im Bildekräfteleib sich erschöpft, sondern das, weil es über das normale Leben des Menschen hinausgeht, auch über den Menschen hinaus, gewissermaßen über seine Haut hinaus in dem allgemeinen Weltenäther wirkt, den wir in dem nächsten Vortrag kennenlernen werden.

Man kann schon davon sprechen, daß in dem allgemeinen Weltenäther das fortschwingt, was zum Beispiel als künstlerische Gedanken über das normale Menschenleben hinaus in einem — wenn ich mich des Ausdrucks bedienen darf — übermenschlichen Erleben und Gestalten vorkommt. Es gibt solche herumschwirrenden Gedanken. Und gerade wer sich durch Meditation, durch diejenigen Willensübungen, von denen ich gestern und am vorhergehenden Tage gesprochen habe, dazu vorbereitet hat, der weiß, daß der Mensch nicht nur das in der Welt bewirkt, was er durch seine physischen Leistungen bewirkt. Er weiß, daß die Gedanken, die nicht notwendig sind zu der Aufrechterhaltung des individuellen Lebens — dazu sind Gedanken notwendig, die sich dann zu Wachstumskräften umbilden —, sich dem allgemeinen Weltenäther mitteilen. Und wenn dann der Ätherleib des Menschen in einer Art pathologischen Zustands ist, wenn er deformiert ist oder durch den Trancezustand mediumistisch wird, dann kann allerdings das, was in den normalen Zustand des Menschen nicht hereindringt, die herumschwirrende Gedankenwelt, gerade in den entgeisteten und in den entseelten Menschen, der sich als ein Medium kundgibt, hereindringen. Und wenn nun zum Beispiel ein Mensch, der gestorben ist, durch irgend etwas solche Gedanken dem allgemeinen Weltenäther mitgeteilt hat, und diese durch ein Medium zum Vorschein kommen, so kann man dann glauben, daß man wirklich die Gedanken, die gegenwärtigen Gedanken des Toten vernähme, während man im Grunde genommen nur den Nachklang der Gedanken vernimmt, die der Lebende noch vor seinem Tode ausgestrahlt hat.

Das ist es, was sich eine gesunde geisteswissenschaftliche Kritik immer vorhalten muß: ob man es zu tun hat mit Gedankennachklängen, oder ob man tatsächlich dadurch, daß wirklich übersinnliche Kräfte entwickelt werden, in die übersinnliche Welt eindringt, welcher der Mensch nach seinem Tode und vor seiner Geburt angehört. Hat man es zu tun mit Telepathie, so ist das nichts anderes als eine ätherische Vermittlung der Gedanken bei Ausschaltung der Sinne. Hat man es zu tun mit Telekinese, so werden gewisse, durch die Nahrung, durch die sonstige physische Materie in dem veränderten physischen Leib entstehende Kräfte angeregt, durch den Raum hindurch ohne physische Vermittlung zu wirken. Der Mensch besteht ja nur zu etwa zehn Prozent aus festen Teilen, er ist zu neunzig Prozent Flüssigkeitssäule, er ist aber auch aus feineren Materien bestehend, bis zu den Äthermaterien hin. Und mit denjenigen Materien, die er in einer gewissen Weise ausstrahlt, kann er, gerade wenn er in einer gewissen Weise, wie ich es angedeutet habe, durch krankhafte Organe, durch pathologische Zustände, mit seinem Geistig-Seelischen zu tief in sein Animalisches untertaucht, seine Gedanken mitgeben den Ausstrahlungen. Dann entsteht auch die Teleplastik. Er kann dann formen, was er an feiner Materialität ausstrahlt, und dieses durch den Gedanken Geformte kann auch lichtvoll durchglänzt sein. Es entstehen plastische Formen, wie sie eben, ohne daß man dabei an Schwindel oder an Täuschung zu denken braucht, in den immer wissenschaftlich gehaltenen Werken von Schrenck-Notzing und ähnlichen dargestellt sind. Aber man hat es da nie mit etwas anderem zu tun als mit Wirkungen des im Tode untergehenden Teiles der menschlichen Wesenheit. Man hat es mit nichts zu tun, was in die wirklich übersinnliche Welt hineinführt. In diese wirkliche übersinnliche Welt wird man hineingeführt, wenn man durch die ganz systematische Ausbildung der normalen Seelenfähigkeiten und unter Aufrechterhaltung des gewöhnlichen Bewußtseins in dieser Weise zu einer Beobachtung außerhalb seines Leibes mit seinem Gefühls-Willenswesen kommt, und dadurch an seiner Vergangenheit im physischen und im ätherischen Leibe dasjenige überblickt, was man herübergestrahlt hat aus einer geistigen Welt, und was gestaltend eingreift in die physische und die ätherische Materie. Und da man das Weiterliegende, ich möchte sagen, zunächst genau sieht, und allmählich erst dasjenige, was näher liegt, so sieht man da hinein bis zu der Grenze, bis zu demjenigen Punkt, wo der Tod des vorangegangenen Lebens liegt. Daher kann man auch so, wie ich es in meiner «Theosophie» getan habe, das, was der Mensch nach dem Tode erlebt, beschreiben aus dieser Beobachtung des präexistenten Lebens heraus. Man beschreibt dann wirklich eine Perspektive, ich möchte sagen, in umgekehrter Richtung, wie man sie vor sich hat. Und es ist also alles das, was ich über die Zustände des Menschen nach dem Tode beschrieben habe, durchaus auf Grundlage derjenigen Schauungen beschrieben, welche in der Weise erlangt werden, wie ich es gestern und auch heute wiederum geschildert habe.

Man kann sagen: Nichts kann der Mensch von den höheren Welten erfahren, als das, was er sich zunächst herangebildet hat im ernsten Erkenntnisringen. Man muß durch Gedankenerkraftung, wie ich sie gestern charakterisiert habe, die Möglichkeit herbeiführen, im bewußten Zustande außerhalb seines Leibes zu treten, und dann auf das Leibliche hinzuschauen. Das kann man nur eben durch diese Gedankenerkraftung erlangen. Aber man muß nun unterscheiden lernen: Was man vom vorhergehenden Leben hat, das hat man durch Anschauung. Dasjenige, was man künftig sein wird, man hat es durch inneres Erlebnis. Daher kann — so spärlich diese inneren Erlebnisse sind gegenüber dem, was man als ein mächtiges übersinnliches Tableau aus dem präexistenten Leben vor sich hat — das präexistente Leben wirklich Inhalt einer ausgebildeten Wissenschaft sein. Das aber, was der Mensch über die Zukunft erfährt, wird sehr stark davon abhängen, wie er sich innerlich in seinem ewigen gefühls- und willensmäßigen Wesen außerhalb seines Leibes erkraften kann. Und auch dieses Gefühls- und Willenswesen können Sie schon in seiner Entwickelung durch das physische ErdenJeben und in seinem Entgegenreifen zu einem höheren Zustande nach dem Tode beobachten. Wenn man die Beobachtung so anstellt, daß man das, was sonst bewußtlos im Einschlafen aus dem menschlichen Leibe sich herauszieht, in einem mehr jugendlichen Daseinszustande und dann in einem mehr älteren Daseinszustande beobachtet, so bietet es Unterschiede dar. Was sich als Gefühls- und Willenswesen beim jüngeren Menschen aus dem physischen Leibe schlafend herauszieht, das enthält mehr das Gedankenhafte. Es zeigt sich, daß in ihm unbewußt nachschwingt, was der Mensch als Gedankenhaftes in sich birgt. Wenn der Mensch älter wird, dann trägt er durch die Pforte des Schlafes nicht mehr so sehr das Gedankenhafte hinaus aus dem physischen Leibe, sondern dann trägt er mehr das, was in den Kräften seines Charakters, in den Kräften seiner ausgebildeten Willensimpulse liegt, durch die Schlafenspforte in die äußere Welt hinaus. Daher kann man sagen: Von einem mehr Gedankeninhalt-tragenden Wesen entwickelt man sich im Geistig-Seelischen durch das Erdenleben hindurch zu einem solchen Wesen, welches mehr im Geistig-Seelischen das Nachklingen der Charakterbeschaffenheit des Menschen zeigt. Man geht eigentlich im wesentlichen durch die Pforte des Schlafes nicht mit seinen Gedanken. Die Gedanken läßt man im Einschlafen zurück, sie erglänzen am physischen Leibe. Die Gedanken, von denen man beseelt war im Erdenleben zwischen Geburt und Tod, die läßt man auch da zurück. Man lernt sie als die äußere Gedankenkraft der Welt erkennen; man lernt sie später als eine Außenwelt kennen nach dem Tode. Man geht durch die Pforte des Schlafes vorzugsweise mit dem hindurch, was der Charakter des Menschen geworden ist, was die innerliche moralische Bildung geworden ist. Und jede Phase, die man nun wirklich richtig interpretieren will in jener Perspektive in das präexistente Leben, man muß sie sich erringen für die Erkenntnis durch die Ausbildung von normalen Seelenkräften.

Ich habe es Ihnen schon in dem verflossenen Vortrage dargestellt: Wenn der Mensch das Denken, das Gedankenleben so erkraftet durch Meditation, Konzentration dieses Gedankenlebens, daß er in Gedanken leben kann, wie sonst nur in sinnlichen Bildern, daß das innere Gedankenleben so kräftig, so lebendig, so intensiv wird, wie sonst nur das Seelenleben ist, wenn es an die Sinneseindrücke hingegeben wird, dann kommt der Mensch zum imaginativen Erkennen. Und durch dieses bis zur Bildhaftigkeit erkraftete innere Gedankenleben bekommt der Mensch vor sich jetzt nicht das Erinnerungstableau über das eben verflossene, bis zu diesem Erlebnispunkte reichende Erdenleben, sondern er überschaut, was alles an diesem physischen Erdenorganismus der Bildekräfteleib organisiert hat. Er schaut in einem mächtigen Tableau als erste übersinnliche Erfahrung auf sein eigenes, eben bis zu diesem Lebenspunkte vorgedrungenes Erdenleben bis zur Kindheit zurück.

Ich erwähnte schon in den vergangenen Vorträgen, daß dieses Tableau, das der Mensch erlebt, in etwas demjenigen gleicht, von dem heute auch schon durchaus ernste Naturforscher sprechen, weil es genügend untersucht ist, daß dies auftritt, wenn der Mensch einer Todesgefahr nahe ist, der er sehr schwer entrinnt. Wenn der Mensch zum Beispiel dem Ertrinken nahe ist, erlebt er in einem großen Tableau eben auch das, was da der ätherische, zeitliche Bildekräfteleib ist: er wird überschaut. Dasselbe wird überschaut im übersinnlichen Erkennen, und dasselbe stellt sich dar im ersten Erlebnis nach dem Tode durch die richtige Ausdeutung der Perspektive, die ich Ihnen geschildert habe von dem präexistenten Leben. Man erkennt da: Wenn der Mensch durch die Pforte des Todes tritt, vernimmt er für eine sehr kurze Zeit, die nach Tagen nur datiert — etwa so lange, als der Mensch es vermöge seiner Organisation aushalten kann, ohne Schlaf zu bleiben durch mehrere Tage —, eine Art Tableau, das ihn sein letztes Erdenleben wie in einem Gedankengewebe, das aber bildhaft ist, überschauen läßt. Man bekommt eine solche Überschau über das Erdenleben durch eine kurze Zeit hindurch, wenn man durch die Pforte des Todes getreten ist. Ich möchte sagen: Ohne Gefühls- und Willensanteil, rein in einer Art von passiver Überschau hat man dieses Erdenleben vor sich, und auf die Weise, wie ich es geschildert habe, lernt man diesen ersten Zustand nach dem Tode kennen. Man muß ihn erst kennenlernen durch übersinnliche Erkenntnis, durch Meditation und Konzentration und so weiter. Will man aber richtig ausdeuten, was sich an dieses Tableau vom vergangenen Erdenleben in dem Leben nach dem Tode anschließt, so bedarf man noch einer anderen Art von Übung.

Der Mensch überläßt sich gewöhnlich im Erdenleben und auch in der gewöhnlichen Wissenschaft, mit seinen Gedanken, mit seinem Empfinden, auch mit seinen Gefühls- und Willensimpulsen passiv der äußeren Welt. Er schreitet mit der äußeren Welt vorwärts. Das Gestern erlebt er, und daran anschließend eben in der späteren Zeit das Heute, und in einer wieder späteren Zeit das Morgen. Und was der Mensch als die inneren Gedanken-, Gefühls- und Willensspiegelungen entwickelt im seelischen Leben, das schließt sich auch als fortlaufendes natürliches Erleben an den äußeren Zeitverlauf an. Dadurch hat man, ich möchte sagen, eine gewisse Unterstützung für das gewöhnliche Denken, das gewöhnliche Empfinden auch. Aber man kann nicht bis zu dem Grade, den man für die übersinnliche Forschung braucht, das Denken des Menschen erkraften, wenn man sich nur in dieser Weise passiv dem äußeren Zeitverlauf hingibt. Man muß noch andere Übungen machen: Man muß versuchen, wenn ich es so ausdrücken darf, rückwärts zu denken. Das heißt, man kann ja, wenn der Tag vorübergegangen ist, sich — nicht in Gedanken, auch nicht mit einer Kritik, sondern in Bildern, wie wenn man wiedersehen würde, was man im Tagesverlauf gesehen hat — wie in der Phantasie das an seiner Seele vorüberziehen lassen, aber vom Abend zum Morgen, in umgekehrter Folge. Man muß sich eine gewisse Praxis in solchen rückwärts-bildlichen Vorstellungen aneignen. Denn es ist verhältnismäßig leicht, größere Partien rückwärts vorzustellen, aber man muß dazu lange, wirklich, ich möchte sagen, atomistisch kleine Partien von rückwärts nach vorne vorstellen, wirklich umgekehrt vorstellen den Lebensverlauf des Tages. Man kann dann zu anderen Übungen vorrücken, sich vielleicht unterstützen dadurch, daß man, sagen wir, ein Drama vom fünften Akt rückwärts bis zum ersten Akt aufdröselt, daß man Melodien von rückwärts nach vorne innerlich durchempfindet, gewissermaßen geistig-seelisch hört. Und man kann dann dazu kommen, die Erinnerungen des Lebens — das ist jetzt etwas anderes als das geschilderte Tableau — so aufzufassen, daß man wirklich sein Leben vom gegenwärtigen Zeitpunkt, indem man heraufholt aus dem Gedächtnisse, was man durchgemacht hat, in umgekehrter Weise und bildhaft-imaginativ vor die Seele hinzaubert. Indem man solche Übungen macht, reißt man das Denken los von dem äußeren Zeitverlaufe. Die Gewohnheit, die man sich tief eingewurzelt hat, mit dem Denken, mit dem Empfinden, mit dem Fühlen dem äußeren Zeitverlaufe zu folgen, diese Gewohnheit muß überwunden werden. Und durch das kraftvolle Rückwärtsdenken wird man in die Lage versetzt, einer viel größeren, stärkeren Denkkraft sich zu bedienen, als man sie zu dem bloß passiven Denken braucht. Gerade durch dieses Rückwärtsdenken wird die Denkkraft wesentlich verstärkt.

Und da entdeckt man dann etwas, was ja gewiß für das gewöhnliche Bewußtsein, das gewöhnliche Erkennen sich paradox anhört. Aber geradeso, wie man mit den im Zeitlauf verfließenden Vorstellungen die sinnliche Welt schaut, so schaut man allmählich die geistige Welt, wenn man sein Denken auf diese Weise losgerissen hat von der Gebundenheit an den äußeren Zeitlauf. Und man erlangt dadurch eine weitere Fähigkeit. Die gibt einem da die Möglichkeit, das weitere Erleben zu beobachten, und aus der Perspektive heraus, die ich geschildert habe, richtig zu deuten, was sich an das Lebenstableau anschließt, welches man durch einige Tage hindurch nach dem Tode erlebt. Man schaut jetzt, wie der Mensch nach seinem Lebenstableau, nun rückwärtslaufend in seinem Erleben, das Leben noch einmal in sehr realer Bildlichkeit durchmacht. Der Mensch durchlebt gewissermaßen die Seelenwelt vor der Geisteswelt. Und zwar schneller, als er hier zwischen Geburt und Tod gelebt hat, lebt er sich zurück nach dem Tode bis zu der Geburt. Er durchläuft dieses Leben rückwärts. Die Möglichkeit, das zu durchschauen, erwirbt man sich durch die angedeuteten Übungen des Rückwärtsdenkens. Und jetzt bekommt man eine Anschauung davon, wie der Mensch in diesem rückwärtslaufenden Seelenleben nach dem Tode alles das erlebt, was er hier im Erdenleben im physischen Leibe durchgemacht hat. Nur erlebt er es jetzt seelisch, und er kann alles das schauen, durch das er seinen Fortschritt moralisch beeinträchtigt hat. Er kann gerade bei diesen rückwärtslaufenden Zeiten eine Revue halten über das, was er, jetzt von einem höheren Gesichtspunkte aus, anders wünschen muß für sein Leben. Er kann sehen, wie er sich durch moralische Defekte zurückgehalten hat in seiner Vollkommenheit. Da er aber alles das jetzt lebendig erlebt, bleibt es nicht beim Gedanken. In dem seelischen Leben, das in dieser Weise rückwärts verläuft, ich möchte sagen, im Seelenleben rückwärts sich entwickelt, bleibt der Gedanke eben nicht abstrakt, denn die abstrakten Gedanken sind zurückgelassen worden im Tode, er entwikkelt sich als Gedankenkraft. Und er entwickelt sich als der Impuls, in einem nächsten Erdenleben in irgendeiner Weise wieder gutzumachen, in irgendeiner Weise die entgegengesetzten Tatsachen zu erleben von denjenigen, die gewissermaßen jetzt vor die Seele treten. Es entwickelt sich in der Seele etwas, was dann im nächsten Erdenleben auftritt als die unterbewußten Sehnsuchten, im Leben sich dem oder jenem zu nähern. Es entwickelt sich gerade bei diesem Rückwärtsleben für alles, was man im Erdenleben durchgemacht hat, die Sehnsucht, eine sich im nächsten Erdenleben anschließende andere Tatsache, die diese ausgleicht, zu erleben. Und so erlebt man in diesem Rückwärts-sich-Entwickeln die Keimanlage zu dem, was man unbewußt durch die nächste Geburt bringt, und was etwa in der folgenden Weise geschildert werden kann.

Dem alltäglichen Bewußtsein entzieht sich gewöhnlich dieses, was aber doch im Menschen lebt. Aber man beobachte, selbst nur mit dem gesunden Menschenverstande, etwas, was allerdings dann übersinnliche Forschung zur Gewißheit bringt: wie man an irgendeine wichtige, entscheidende Lebenstatsache herankommt.

Nehmen wir einmal an, in einem Erdenleben treten wir im dreißigsten, fünfunddreißigsten Jahr vor einen anderen Erdenmenschen, in dem wir — ich will eben ein durchaus entscheidendes Ereignis nennen — einen Lebensgefährten finden, mit dem wir das weitere Leben durchmessen wollen, und wir finden, daß die Seelen zusammenstimmen. Der äußere materialistisch denkende Mensch nennt das einen Zufall. Tiefere Geister — es gibt deren genügend, und man kann sie geschichtlich nachweisen — haben aber auch ein bißchen nachgedacht darüber: Wenn man jetzt von diesem Ereignisse, das so entscheidend ist, ım Leben zurückschaut zu dem, was vorher und wieder vorher, und weiter vorher war, dann nimmt sich unsere Lebensführung, die zu diesem Ereignisse hintendierte, sehr planmäßig aus. Und wir finden manchmal das, was wir so im Leben erfahren als eine Tatsache, die nun eingreift in unser Leben, wie den organischen Abschluß dessen, was wie ein Plan sich ausnimmt. Wenn man einen solchen Plan zunächst hypothetisch konstruiert hat, und dann das hypothetisch Konstruierte, bis zur Geburt hin Konstruierte, durchschaut mit dem, was Entwickelung übersinnlicher Erkenntniskräfte durch Meditation, Rückwärtsdenken, Willensentwickelung, wie ich sie geschildert habe, ist, dann kommt man allerdings dazu, sich zu sagen: Das, was du dir da hypothetisch konstruiert hast, mag manchmal wirklich nur ein Phantasiebild sein, ist es aber nicht immer. Es zeigt sich vielmehr gerade für entscheidende Tatsachen im Leben manchmal von größter Bedeutung, daß der Mensch eine unterbewußte Sehnsucht seit der Geburt in sich trägt, und daß aus dieser Sehnsucht, die er sich vielleicht in entsprechenden Lebensepochen ganz verschieden auslegt, er den ersten Schritt, den zweiten Schritt macht, alle Schritte, die ihn zuletzt zu dem Ereignis hinführen, das er keimhaft in jenem Rückwärtsleben nach dem Tode sich eingebildet hat, und das uns jetzt als unbestimmte Sehnsucht durch das neue Erdenleben trägt, so daß wir uns dadurch auf unbewußte Weise unser Schicksal selber machen. Wir gelangen auf diese Weise dazu, zu erkennen, was wir im Erdenleben als Schicksal finden, oder wie es in der alten instinktiven Hellseherweisheit des Orients genannt worden ist: Karma. Dieses Schicksal, von dem unser ganzes Glück und Unglück, unsere Lust und unser Leid im Leben abhängen, wir lernen es erkennen dadurch, daß wir die aufeinanderfolgenden Erdenleben erblicken.

Da wird natürlich der Mensch dann sehr bald geneigt sein, zu sagen: Ja, was ist denn dann mit der Freiheit? Dann wird ja der Mensch schicksalsmäßig gelenkt und geleitet! Wie ist es denn da mit der menschlichen Freiheit? — Ja, zu dieser Lösung der Schicksalsfrage kommt der Mensch eigentlich nur, wenn er ernst gerungen hat mit dem Freiheitsproblem. Und ich darf an dieser Stelle, weil es gewiß eine objektive Bedeutung hat, ein Persönliches wiederum einfügen. Ich habe im Beginn der neunziger Jahre des vorigen Jahrhunderts meine «Philosophie der Freiheit» geschrieben. Diese «Philosophie der Freiheit», sie hatte sich die Aufgabe gesetzt, gerade das Erlebnis, die Tatsache der Freiheit sicherzustellen. Ich versuchte aus dem, was der Mensch in sich erlebt, das Freiheitsbewußtsein als ein absolut Sicheres zu kennzeichnen. Und so ist das, was ich später versucht habe darzustellen, als die teilweise Lösung der Schicksalsfrage, wie ich sie jetzt skizziert habe, durchaus von mir in Harmonie gedacht worden mit demjenigen, was ich dargestellt habe als die menschliche Freiheit. Wer dieses Buch, meine «Philosophie der Freiheit» studiert, wird allerdings finden, daß ich genötigt war, nicht von einer Freiheit des Willens zunächst zu sprechen, sondern von der Freiheit dessen, was im Gedanken, und zwar in dem sinnlichkeitsfreien Gedanken, im reinen Gedanken, erlebt wird, in demjenigen Gedanken aber, der in der menschlichen Seele bewußt als ein sittliches, als ein moralisches Ideal auftaucht, und der diejenige Stärke erlangt, die auf den Willen des Menschen motivierend wirken kann. Wir können von Freiheit des Menschen sprechen, wenn wir von jenen Handlungen des Menschen sprechen, die aus seinem freien Denken heraus gestaltet werden, wo der Mensch durch eine moralische Selbsterziehung dazu kommt, daß ihn die Instinkte, die Triebe, die Emotionen, sein Temperament nicht beeinflussen zu einer Handlung, sondern allein die hingebungsvolle Liebe zu einer Handlung. In dieser hingebungsvollen Liebe zu einer Handlung kann sich entwickeln, was aus der idealen Stärke des reinen sittlichen Gedankens hervorgeht. Das ist eine wirkliche freie Handlung.

Nun kommt man gerade durch Geisteswissenschaft darauf, daß das Denken als solches, dieses Denken, welches dem sittlichen freien Handeln zugrunde liegt, im Schlafzustande zurückbleibt in dem spiegelnden physischen Leib, daß das also etwas ist, was der Mensch erlebt zwischen der Geburt und dem Tode, was das Erdenleben allein schon durch diese Eingliederung des Freiheitsimpulses wertvoll macht, wenn es sonst nicht unendlich wertvoll wäre. Wir werden darüber im nächsten Vortrage zu sprechen haben. Frei wird der Mensch in dem einen physischen Erdenleben, wo er den Gedanken als solchen entwickelt, wo der Gedanke seine plastizierende Kraft verliert, die er noch in dem Ätherleib hat, und wo er als reiner Gedanke in dem im Leben befindlichen Bewußtsein entwickelt ist. Ich war daher genötigt, etwas sehr Gewagtes in dieser «Philosophie der Freiheit» dazumal im Beginn der neunziger Jahre darzustellen. Ich hatte die moralischen Impulse als sittliche Ideale darzustellen und mußte sagen: die kommen dem Menschen nicht aus der physischen Welt, die kommen dem Menschen nicht aus der Natur, die kommen dem Menschen durch eine Intuition. Und ich sprach dazumal von «moralischer Phantasie». Und warum das? Ich sagte dazumal in meiner «Philosophie der Freiheit»: Aus der Geisteswelt heraus strömen in den Menschen, aber zunächst nur als Bilder, diese sittlichen Motive ein. Er empfängt sie als Intuition aus der geistigen Welt.

Aber man gelangt auf diese Weise, ich möchte sagen, zu dem anderen Pol dessen, was man hier in der physischen Welt erlebt. Sieht man mit gesundem Menschenverstand und mit wissenschaftlicher Schulung in die natürliche Daseinswelt hinaus, dann entdeckt man überall Notwendigkeit. Sieht man hinein in die Welt der moralischen Impulse, dann entdeckt man die Freiheit, aber die Freiheit zunächst im bloßen Gedanken, im reinen Denken, in denkerischer Intuition. Und man weiß zunächst nicht, wie sich Kräfte hineinbegeben in den Willen, denn man sieht diese sittlichen Intuitionen unbewußt. Man hat auf der einen Seite die Natur, der man angehört, indem man handelt, und man hat auf der anderen Seite sein sittliches Erleben, und es entschwindet einem für diese sittlichen Intuitionen, wenn man nichts anderes hat zunächst als die Naturwissenschaft, die Möglichkeit, diesen sittlichen Intuitionen Realität zuzuschreiben, weltschöpferische Kräfte zuzuschreiben. Man erlebt gewissermaßen die Natur in ihrer ganzen derben Dichtigkeit, in ihrer Notwendigkeit. Man erlebt die Freiheit, aber man erlebt sie in den fein gewobenen, bis zur Bildhaftigkeit herabgetriebenen Gedankenimpulsen, von denen man weiß, weil sie eben der Natur nicht angehören können, weil sie sich in freier Tätigkeit erleben, und das habe ich in meiner «Philosophie der Freiheit» angedeutet, daß sie aus der geistigen Welt kommen. Aber es muß sich nun etwas einschieben zwischen diese Intuitionen, die durchaus bildhaft, unreal sind, die nur durch das sittliche Leben real werden, und dem, was man als gegenständliches Erkennen für die Naturordnung hat. Und da schieben sich ein die Imagination und die Inspiration, die auf die Weise entstehen, wie ich das geschildert habe. Und dann wird die Intuition auch etwas anderes. Dann verdichtet sich gewissermaßen das, was einem zuerst nur im reinen Denken entgegengetreten ist, zu einer geistigen Realität. Man lernt in dieser nach der Imagination und Inspiration neu errungenen Intuition jetzt nicht sein gegenwärtiges Ich erkennen, sondern dasjenige Ich, das durch wiederholte Erdenleben hindurchgeht, und das unser Schicksal durch diese wiederholten Erdenleben in der Weise hindurchträgt, wie ich es dargestellt habe. Wir sind unfrei, indem wir die wiederholten Erdenleben durchleben und ein Schicksal dadurch gestaltet haben. Aber wir können stets in dieses Schicksalsgewebe die freien Handlungen einverweben in den einzelnen Erdenleben. Gerade dadurch, daß wir in bildhaften Intuitionen die sittlichen Impulse erleben — nicht als Realitäten, sondern als etwas, zu dem wir uns frei bekennen können —, können wir die Freiheit im einzelnen Erdenleben in das Schicksalsgewebe einverweben. Und so werden wir dadurch, daß wir durch das Schicksal von Erdenleben zu Erdenleben getragen werden, nicht unfreier, als wir etwa werden, wenn wir uns durch ein Schiff von Europa nach Amerika tragen lassen. Da sind wir durch den Entschluß, den wir hier in Europa fassen, allerdings in unserer Zukunft bestimmt. Aber wir sind jederzeit in gewissen Grenzen freie Wesen, und solange wir drüben in Amerika sind, können wir uns frei bewegen. So tragen wir das Schicksal von Erdenleben zu Erdenleben. Aber in die Tatsachenwelt, die wir so in wiederholten Erdenleben erfahren, kann hineingestellt werden, was aus der Freiheit im einzelnen Erdenleben quillt.

Und so sieht man gerade, daß derjenige, der mit dem Freiheitsproblem ringt, der das Problem der Freiheit gelöst sieht durch das Anschauen der zunächst nur in moralischer Phantasie erfaßbaren, aber aus der geistigen Welt in die physische Welt des Menschen hereinstrebenden sittlichen Ideen, daß, wer in dieser Weise sich ein Verständnis für die Freiheit erwirbt, gerade dadurch sich vorbereitet hat zum Verständnis für das Schicksalsgemäße, das wie eine Art von Notwendigkeit in das menschliche Leben eingreift.

Wenn man zu dieser Intuition vorgedrungen ist, wenn man verstanden hat, Schicksal und Freiheit ineinander zu verweben, und dadurch noch weiter jene Kräfte verstärkt hat, die man sich durch Meditation, Konzentration, Rückwärtsdenken und so weiter erworben hat, dann kann man das, was sich in der Perspektive darbietet, auch anschauen, beziehungsweise weiter deuten. Was sich nun anschließt an dieses Rückwärtsleben, es ist ein Leben in einem rein geistigen Gebiete, in dem man nun entgegenlebt dem folgenden Erdenleben. Und in diesem geistigen Gebiete erlebt man, ich möchte sagen, in umgekehrter Weise wie hier im Erdenleben. Hier im Erdenleben erlebt man so, daß dasjenige, was in uns ist, zunächst nur innerlich in Bildern geschaut werden kann. Man erlebt im gewöhnlichen Bewußtsein nicht das Innere des Menschen, man erlebt aber im Wachbewußtsein die Außenwelt. Gewissermaßen für seinen eigenen Mittelpunkt sieht man im Raumumkreis, in der Raumsphäre, die Außenwelt. Der Mensch ist in sich, die Außenwelt außer ihm. In der Zeit zwischen dem Tode und einer neuen Geburt wird die Anschauung gerade umgekehrt: Der Mensch geht auf in demjenigen, was hier seine Außenwelt war. Er empfindet das, was hier seine Außenwelt war, wie eine Innenwelt. Und das, was ihm hier verschlossen ist, das Innere der Menschennatur, das empfindet er jetzt als die Außenwelt. Der Mensch mit seinem Innern wird für das Leben zwischen dem Tod und neuer Geburt die Welt und die Welt wird Ich. Und indem der Mensch dasjenige erlebt, was nun höher ist als das, was wir hier in der Welt um uns herum haben — denn der Mensch ist die Krone der Schöpfung, er trägt in seinem Innern ein höheres Gebiet als die Umwelt ist —, hat er also eine wertvollere Welt zwischen dem Tod und einer neuen Geburt in sich. Und was er so erlebt als seine Welt, was aber eigentlich die geheimnisvolle Welt des Menscheninnern ist, das erlebt er schöpferisch. Er erlebt in der geistigen Welt schöpferisch die Kräfte in Gemeinschaft von höheren geistigen Wesenheiten, von denen wir umgeben sind als geistig-seelischer Mensch, so wie wir hier als physischer Mensch umgeben sind von den drei Reichen der Natur, von Tieren, Pflanzen und Mineralien. Man erlebt in Gemeinschaft mit diesen geistigen Wesen die Kräfte, aus denen man nach und nach nicht nur sein Schicksal zimmert, den Keim seines Schicksals, sondern aus denen man in der geistig-seelischen Welt das Vorbild bildet, aber das reale Vorbild, das geist-seelische Wesen, das dann nach einer bestimmten Zeit die Sehnsucht bekommt, das, was es zunächst als Vorbild, aber lebendig, in gedankenkraftmäßiger Weise lebendig ausgebildet hat, wieder zu verkörpern. Weil es zusammenhängen muß nun mit einem physischen Leib, erst in einem physischen Leib wiederum seine Vollendung erhalten kann, bekommt dieses geistig-seelische Wesen den Drang, die Sehnsucht, sich hier auf Erden wiederum zu verkörpern. Aus dem Geiste heraus kommt das, was als unsere vorgeburtliche, oder vor der Konzeption liegende Existenz sich mit dem fleischlichen Leib verbindet. Man wird auch erst eine richtige Vorstellung von der Art und Weise bekommen, wie der Mensch als physisches Wesen hier in die Erde hereingebildet wird — das Genauere darüber werden wir auch noch übermorgen zu besprechen haben —, wenn man einsehen wird, wie dasjenige, was sich im Leibe der Mutter bildet, nur etwas ist, was aus einer höheren Welt aufnimmt das eigentliche Wesen des Menschen.

Die Naturwissenschaft hat einen gewissen Traum, der darinnen besteht, daß man einstmals die Zellen, und wohl auch die vollkommensten Zellen, die Fortpflanzungszellen, die Keimzellen des menschlichen Embryos erforschen können wird in bezug auf ihre komplizierte chemische Verbindung. Mit allerdings ganz anderen Mitteln und aus ganz anderen Gesichtspunkten heraus geht an dasselbe Problem anthroposophische Geisteswissenschaft. Und sie kommt dazu, gewissermaßen die Richtung anzudeuten, in welcher das gesucht werden muß, was sich im Leibe der Mutter als Keimzelle des menschlichen Embryos ausbildet. Da hat man es nicht zu tun mit einer komplizierteren chemischen Verbindung, sondern da hat man es in Wahrheit zu tun mit dem ChaotischWerden der Materie. Nicht eine hochkomplizierte, chemische Verbindung oder eine Gestaltung des Molekularwesens ist es, sondern ein Chaos-Werden, ein chaotisches Durcheinanderwirbeln dessen, was im Kristall, was im chemischen Molekül in einer Gesetzmäßigkeit zueinander gestaltet ist. Es wird Materie in der Keimzelle nicht zu einer weiteren Gesetzmäßigkeit ausgebaut, sondern ins Chaos heruntergedrängt, und aus der entsprechenden Materie, aus der chaotisch werdenden Materie bildet sich dasjenige, was nun aufnehmen kann das sich Heruntersenkende: den aus geistigen Welten kommenden übersinnlichen Menschen. Und nur dann wird man begreifen, was sich als physischer Mensch ausbildet, wenn man physische Forschung heranbringt bis zu dem Punkt, wo man schauen kann, wie der physische Menschenkeim gerade dadurch, daß er die Materie wiederum ins Chaos zurückgeführt hat, fähig wird, den geistig-seelischen Keim, der aus der Präexistenz herunterkommt, nun aufzunehmen. Nur so begreift man, wie sich verbindet durch Konzeption und bis zur Geburt hin das, was aus den geistig-seelischen Welten heruntersteigt, mit dem, was sich entmaterialisiert hat im Keime beim beginnenden Embryowachstum. Jeder, der wirklich sinnvoll die Gestaltung des Embryos betrachtet, der kann schon aus dieser physischen Gestaltung des Embryos herauslesen, was ich Ihnen heute dargestellt habe, während die Embryonalentwickelung immer rätselhaft bleibt, wenn man sie nicht in dieser Weise zu betrachten vermag.

Es muß allerdings, will man das Wesen des Menschen wirklich erkennen, durch übersinnliche Forschung das erhalten werden, was zum Menschen auch gehört. Ich habe zum Beispiel bei früheren Gelegenheiten darauf hingewiesen, wie man in der Wissenschaft der niederen Reiche überall diejenigen Dinge für töricht ansehen würde, die man bei der Erforschung des Menschen als Weisheit ansieht. Man nehme an, sagte ich, daß jemand eine Magnetnadel vor sich hat: Sie weist mit dem einen Ende nach Norden, mit dem anderen nach Süden. Keinem Menschen würde es einfallen zu sagen: Nur in der Magnetnadel, in dem Raum, den die Materie dieser Magnetnadel einschließt, liegen die Kräfte, daß sie da hinweist. — Man sieht die Erde selber als einen großen Magneten an, der auf die einzelne Magnetnadel wirkt, und der diese Richtung bedingt. Man gliedert die einzelne Magnetnadel ein in den ganzen Erdenorganismus. Man geht also aus dem einzelnen Wesen heraus, um das große, umfassende Ganze zu erkennen, auch in seiner Wechselwirkung mit dem einzelnen Wesen zu erkennen. Nur beim Menschen möchte man, indem man mit dem Mikroskop die Entwickelung der Keimzelle verfolgt, allein aus dem, was in der menschlichen Haut eingeschlossen ist, das erkennen, was den Menschen hervorbringt. Niemals wird man — ebensowenig wie die Richtung der Magnetnadel aus ihr selbst zu erklären ist — erfahren können, was im Menschen sich entwickelt, wenn man nicht den Menschen in das Verhältnis zur ganzen Welt bringt, und nicht nur zur Raumeswelt, sondern auch zur Zeitenwelt, wenn man nicht zurückgeht zu dem, was sich einem im übersinnlichen Schauen als das präexistente Wesen des Menschen in der geschilderten Weise enthüllt. Das lernt man so erkennen als dasjenige, was man nun wiederum, wenn der Mensch seinen physischen Leib hier ablegt, in seinem Ätherleib sich auflösen sieht im Weltenäther, und was nun wiederum durch die Pforte des Todes geht, um neuerdings einen solchen Kreislauf anzutreten, aber zur weiteren Ausgleichung der Lebenstatsachen und zu höherer Vervollkommnung.

So stellt sich der Mensch zunächst, wenn man sein Wesen an sich betrachtet, in die Weltentwickelung hinein. Und was dem Menschen nun zukommt, indem er sein geistig-seelisches Wesen herunterträgt, das gehört der Weltentwickelung an, das muß in die Weltentwickelung, die wir übermorgen betrachten wollen, eingegliedert werden. Der Mensch wird erst erklärlich werden, wenn das, was heute ausgeführt worden ist, zu gleicher Zeit eingegliedert wird dem Werden und Wesen und Weben, das heißt der ganzen Entwickelung der Welt. Denn der Mensch kann die Welt nur erkennen, indem er sich erkennt. Und dasjenige, was Welt ist, es spiegelt sich im Erdenleben, der Mensch durchlebt es nach dem Tode und vor der Geburt. Aus ihm entnimmt er die Kräfte, die er selber bei der Geburt oder Empfängnis eingliedert in seinen physischen Leib. Welt und Mensch gehören nicht nur äußerlich, gehören innerlich zusammen. Der Mensch trägt in sich die Welt, die Welt als Totalität bildet des Menschen Wesen. Daher wird die Frage, die hier aufgeworfen worden ist, für heute teilweise beantwortet sein. Sie wird ihre volle Beantwortung, soweit sie heute schon der Wissenschaft möglich ist, im nächsten Vortrag erfahren können.

Zum Schlusse möchte ich nur ein paar Worte sagen. Ich möchte, daß wirklich durchschaut werde, wie das, was der Geistesforscher vorbringt, zwar auf der Entwickelung gewisser sonst der Seele unbewußt bleibender Kräfte beruht, daß aber der Geistesforscher vom anthroposophischen Gesichtspunkte aus so vorgeht, daß er in die gewöhnlichen Gedanken, die man sonst in der Wissenschaft hat, das kleidet, was er aus seinem Schauen heraus vorzutragen hat. Überallhin nimmt er seine Gedanken mit. Denn jener Pendelschlag, jenes Schwingen zwischen übersinnlicher und sinnlicher Welt muß ihn fortwährend bei seinem Forschen begleiten. Er muß stets als sein eigener Kritiker neben seinem höheren Wesen, das die übersinnlichen Schauungen hat, stehen. Daher kann auch derjenige, der nicht solche Übungen gemacht hat, wenn er sich nur wirklich unbefangen dem gesunden Menschenverstande hingibt, gedanklich alles nachprüfen, was der Geistesforscher vorbringt. Und es ist eigentlich nicht richtig, daß das, was der Geistesforscher vorbringt, nur geprüft werden könnte wiederum vom Geistesforscher. Man hat sich nur in der heutigen Zeit zu sehr an das an die äußere Materialität, an die äußere Naturfolge gebundene Denken gewöhnt, und man findet dann, daß der Geistesforscher nicht Beweise habe von diesem Denken. Wer aber die ganze Sachlage durchschaut, der durchschaut, welches Verhältnis zwischen dem gewöhnlichen gesunden Menschenverstande und dem methodisch gebildeten Verstande der Wissenschaft, der äußeren Wissenschaft ist. Und wer dann kritisch vorgeht und in seinen Gedanken, aber nur unbefangen genug, alles dasjenige prüft, was der Geistesforscher vorbringt, wird es, auch ohne daß er selbst Schauungen hat, nachprüfen können. Der Geistesforscher bringt alles in der Art vor, daß es auf diese Weise nachgeprüft werden kann. Und wer da sagt, der Geistesforscher erzähle bloß aus seinem Schauen, er gäbe aber nicht die Beweise, der gleicht einem Menschen, der gewöhnt ist, daß alles das, was er auf der Erde findet, auf einem festen Boden stehe, und der dann fragt, wenn man ihm ein Sonnensystem auseinandersetzt: Ja, worauf ruht denn das? — Daß es in sich selber ruht, daß es sich durch seine eigenen Kräfte frei trägt, das gewahrt er vielleicht nicht. Einem solchen Menschen, der fragt: Auf welchem Boden steht denn ein Sonnensystem? — gleicht derjenige, der in gewöhnlicher Weise Beweise verlangt, und solche Beweise meint, die man nur für die äußere Sinnenwelt verlangen kann, wo man ohne Beweise findet, was man eben mit den Sinnen wahrgenommen hat, was durch die Sinne aufweisbar ist.

Dazu ist aber das Denken des Menschen nicht allein da. Das Denken kann sich auch aufschwingen, nicht bloß das bewiesen zu finden durch den gesunden Menschenverstand, was durch die Sinneserfahrung gestützt ist, sondern dasjenige, was sich gewissermaßen wie ein geistiges Planetensystem innerlich selber trägt. Prüfen Sie in dieser Weise, indem Sie auf anthroposophische Geistesforschung das anwenden, was ein solches sich selbst tragendes, sich selbst beweisendes Denken gibt, dann werden Sie das, was der Geistesforscher vorbringt, innerlich so gesichert finden, auch ohne die sogenannten äußeren Stützen, wie das Planetensystem sich frei im Weltenraume trägt, und nur dasjenige, was irdisch ist und schwer ist, gestützt werden muß. Das aber muß bedacht werden, daß das Denken auch wirklich frei werden muß, zu dem werden muß, was sich innerlich selber tragen kann, wenn man durch den gesunden Menschenverstand bewiesen finden will das, was zu sagen ist von der Geistesforschung aus über das Wesen des Menschen und über das Wesen der Weltentwickelung. Daß von diesem Punkte aus alles bewiesen werden kann, werde ich nun, nach der Auseinandersetzung über das Wesen des Menschen, mir erlauben, übermorgen hier zu entwickeln im nächsten Vortrage über das Wesen der Weltentwickelung.

Human Beings in the Light of Anthroposophy

I would hardly be able to give today's lecture in the form I intend if yesterday's lecture had not preceded it. Not only because this lecture is intended to be a continuation of yesterday's, but also because what anthroposophical knowledge has to say about the actual core of human nature sounds so paradoxical to external experience that it is necessary to know the secure foundation on which such insights are built. And I believe I have made it clear that, both from the point of view of the critical mind and from the point of view of conscientious research, anthroposophy can certainly compete with everything that modern times have become accustomed to considering scientific methodology and scientific thinking.

The subject of today's lecture is precisely the actual core of the human being, which also underlies the outer physical human being in a formative and directing way. As spiritual science can show, the physical human being belongs more than is usually assumed to world development as such and will have to be the subject of the next lecture in connection with the whole of world development. Even in serious circles, including serious scientific circles, people today think differently about the actual nature of the human being than was common just a few decades ago at the height of materialism, especially among the most enlightened people. But what is presented to you in this lecture as anthroposophy will perhaps be rejected more strongly than from many other quarters, precisely by those who now, in their own way, I might say, with adherence to the more materialistic spirit of science, would like to approach the spiritual-soul element in human beings. We see how people today are beginning to take an interest in finding out the real reasons why human beings can fall into certain abnormal states of mind in which they experience hallucinations and illusions, in which they are susceptible to suggestion and autosuggestion. These abnormal mental phenomena are of particular interest today because, without the forces slumbering in the soul, whose development I have spoken of, actually being unfolded, they can be investigated in the same way as an external experiment is carried out. One simply approaches such personalities who have an abnormal mental life in this way and examines the phenomena, just as one is accustomed to conducting experiments in a laboratory or physics classroom. These personalities, and some who are not subject to the corresponding abnormal states of mind, very often believe that it is precisely through such abnormal states of mind, through visionary seeing, through hallucinatory experience, that one can obtain some means of penetrating more deeply into the true essence of the human being. Yes, it is even believed that in such states one can receive a kind of revelation from real spiritual worlds. When we examine the human being today from the anthroposophical point of view, we will be in a position to shed some light on the significance of these abnormal states of mind. From the criticism I offered yesterday, you will be convinced from the outset that anthroposophical spiritual research is also critical of these phenomena in the fullest sense of the word.

Another type of phenomenon occurs when certain thoughts of personalities can undoubtedly be experienced under unusual conditions of space and time. These cases are already being discussed in very serious scientific circles today. One such phenomenon is telepathy. It is said that, without the usual sensory mediation, people in certain states of mind can develop a certain perception of thoughts, perhaps even thoughts that are taking place at a distance. There is talk of telekinesis, that is, of certain forces that can emanate from human beings and which, without the physical mediation of the human being, manifest themselves, reveal themselves, as it were, merely through their effect at a distance, so that it then seems as if the human being can develop a will without the mediation of his limbs, at a distance. Yes, even today, scientific experiments have been conducted using scientific methodology, which can be classified under the heading of teleplasticity, where material-like structures appear on or near humans, which clearly show that they consist of fine matter, of etheric substance, but that they are plastic, that they have a plastic formative power rooted in human thought, in what is present in human thought.

So we speak of telepathy, telekinesis, and teleplasticity. Anthroposophical spiritual science must again raise the critical question with regard to these phenomena: Do these phenomena really originate from what was said yesterday, that during sleep they emerge as emotional-volitional beings from the physical and etheric or formative body of the human being and remain outside from the time of falling asleep until waking up? In what manifests itself in humans as telepathy, telekinesis, as teleplasticity, are we dealing with an effect of the eternal spiritual-soul, what we have come to know as the feeling and will being, or are we perhaps only dealing with what is left behind in bed when the human being sleeps, that is, what consists of the physical body and the etheric or formative body? If we are only dealing with the latter, then these phenomena may seem wonderful, they may be strange, but they belong to what disappears with the death of the human being. For with the death of the human being, what remains when he falls asleep disappears. That which is the actual immortal, eternal essence of the human being, which withdraws from the physical and formative bodies when falling asleep, is usually also removed from the physical and etheric bodies in some way under hypnotic influence or the like when these phenomena of telepathy, teleplasticity, and telekinesis occur. So one must say: these so-called miraculous phenomena cannot point to anything connected with the eternal core of the human being. However miraculous they may be, they are bound to that which detaches itself at death and connects with the element of the earth. They can then only point to a world that also disappears from the human being when he passes through the gate of death. Anthroposophical spiritual science must therefore raise this critical objection to individual phenomena that are already widely recognized today, as well as to the phenomena I told you about yesterday, and it will depend on what anthroposophy has to say about these phenomena after it has conducted its own research into what the truly eternal core of human nature is.

Now I would like to draw your attention once again to the fact that through those mental, meditative, and volitional exercises that I spoke about yesterday and in my earlier lectures here, a state is brought about in the human being, specifically in the human being's emotional and volitional nature, which on the one hand is similar to the state of sleep, but on the other hand is radically different from it.

Yesterday I described how the otherwise unconscious, as it were paralyzed, emotional and volitional being of the human being becomes internally illuminated and energized, how the human being can bring about states for the purpose of anthroposophical research, whereby he is outside the physical body with his emotional and volitional being, just as he is in sleep. But then they are not in a dark, gloomy world, in a world that causes unconsciousness for them; they are in a world of spiritual surroundings. And for him, the first object he can look back on will be his own physical body and his own formative body, that formative body which reflects the world back to the core of the human being who has stepped out of this physical and formative body, out of thoughts that are perceived as forces. The world of thoughts that one had previously been connected with is, in a sense, reflected back by the physical body that has remained behind, and one now gains a picture of the world not merely through the external world being reflected in the sense organs, such as the eye, and thus consciously experiencing the physical world, but one gains a picture of the spiritual basis of the world through the entire human organism, as it were, becoming a kind of single, total sense organ, which is now, however, outside of the human being, like another object.

Human beings gradually get to know this being outside themselves as they advance further and further in anthroposophical research and become stronger and stronger inwardly. I have already said that this state, into which the anthroposophical spiritual researcher brings himself, differs from everything that a person can experience as a visionary, as someone who hallucinates, as someone who is in abnormal states of mind, in that he always has the possibility of retaining his healthy, level-headed consciousness alongside his vision of the higher world. Something really happens to the person that can be called a swinging back and forth, a swinging between seeing the spiritual world and seeing the physical world. This means that the person can alternately be outside their physical body and observe in the way I have just described; but they can also return to full consciousness, to ordinary thinking, feeling, and willing, and judge what they have experienced with ordinary thinking, feeling, and willing, with the ordinary healthy prudence with which they otherwise judge their outer sensory life and ordinary life in general. In this way, the person can face what they are exploring in this manner, what appears before them as a higher experience of the soul, with complete criticality, with the criticality that they have cultivated in their life.

This alternation between states does not exist in abnormal states of mind. The visionary, the hallucinator, does not have the possibility of arbitrarily returning to his ordinary prudence, that is, to his ordinary body, through his healthy, prudent will, whenever he deems it appropriate. It is something involuntary, something subconscious, that causes him to hallucinate, to have visions in these abnormal states, and it is precisely this lack of criticism of abnormal states that must be pointed out again and again when what anthroposophical spiritual research produces is now also lumped together with what belongs to the hallucinatory, visionary being.

But by oscillating in this way between supersensible vision and the ordinary state of consciousness, one increasingly comes to look back with the powers one has developed in one's emotional and volitional being on what is now objectively outside the spiritual And by rising to imaginative consciousness, one now truly learns to recognize what one has before one as an image of another world. And the important thing is that through imaginative and inspired knowledge, as I have described in recent days, one learns to judge what it is that one now sees from the outside as the physical and formative force bodies. It is, if I may use a comparison, like someone who first has a picture in front of them and, through knowledge of perspective, learns to recognize the corresponding reality that the picture is supposed to depict. Except that what one learns in this way from an ordinary picture as the corresponding reality is only an inner soul experience, whereas the perspective to which this objective physical body, this objective image-forming body, expands with advancing spiritual research is an experience of fact. For one learns to recognize that this physical body and this image-forming body contain, and indeed are contained in the image, what the human being was before descending into the physical world through birth or, let us say, through conception. It detaches itself, as it were, from what one has before one, from what the perspective gives back into the spiritual-soul world that one went through before uniting, through conception and birth, with the physical matter that one received through one's parents and ancestors, through the physical currents of heredity on earth. And what becomes open to perception is what was the spiritual-soul environment of the human being before he descended into earthly existence; the world in which the forces are present that the human being has incorporated into the physical form handed down to him by his parents and ancestors becomes open.

One now gets to know oneself in the pre-existent state, and the peculiar thing that occurs is that in this tableau, which represents the pre-existent being of the human being, one actually sees the world basically reversed in relation to a physical perspective. In relation to a physical perspective, one sees the nearest objects clearly, and to the same extent that the objects are further away, things become less precise. This, in turn, lies in the nature of perspective vision in the spatial world. In the perspective that now arises from the human being who has been left behind, it is the other way around. What is close to physical earthly life is also close to present experience, and human beings do not know their inner selves in physical earthly life. Their physical earthly life is something that obscures their eternal core being. This nearest thing does not become spiritually visible first when one looks into the pre-existing world, but rather the more distant thing becomes visible first. And when one has ascended through the three stages that can be developed within oneself through exercises as higher stages of knowledge, in the sense that I have described in my book “How to Attain Knowledge of Higher Worlds,” , one actually arrives, through imagination, inspiration, and intuition, at a complete spiritual-soul picture of the world that leads one back to a previous life on earth.

Just as a physical perspective is limited in the distance, so too is the image of the world that one has experienced in a pre-existing state limited by a past earthly life that is revealed through intuition. When anthroposophical spiritual science speaks of repeated earthly lives, this is neither something fantastical nor something deduced logically, but something attained through knowledge, something that presents itself to true spiritual vision. This spiritual vision must first be brought forth from the depths of the soul. One then gains a positive insight into the fact that the forces of being that were in the human being between death and a new birth have formed and been imprinted in the physical body and in the etheric or formative body of the human being.

This explains how one has developed from a spiritual world into the physical world. And into the physical body, which one carries as a tool, so to speak, not merely as a covering, and into the etheric body, which contains the living forces that underlie the organs, metabolism, and growth, into this physical body and etheric body, which then appears before us as objectivity for spiritual vision, the essential core of the soul is formed, as it has developed through a spiritual-soul world since the last death until this birth. One learns to recognize what a human being leaves behind when he emerges as a feeling-will being from his physical and etheric bodies as, in a sense, the last thing to which the human being has longingly inclined himself from the spiritual world, after he has, in a sense, grown old in the spiritual world and died to the spiritual world in the life between death and new birth. Just as human beings find their physical bodies withering at a certain age as they approach old age and death, so too do they find the spiritual-soul being in which they then find themselves withering away in the spiritual world.

This withering manifests itself in a longing for the physical world, for physical embodiment. And so what lives in the physical body of the human being, what lives in the etheric body, is, in a sense, the last phase of life up in the spiritual world. We leave our past behind when we step out of our physical body in sleep as emotional-volitional beings. And what do we take with us? As we become aware that we are leaving our past behind, we also become aware that what we experience unconsciously from falling asleep to waking up is that part of the human being that now passes through the gate of death and enters a spiritual-soul world. The part of the human being that could not submerge itself in the physical body and the etheric body, that remains, so to speak, leaves every night when we fall asleep and now passes through the gate of death again as a being of feeling and will. Thus, eternity is guaranteed to human beings through this real insight.

And if we now look back at what a certain science, which has remained on the surface, is incomprehensibly striving for today in terms of knowledge through the investigation of phenomena such as telepathy, teleplasty, and telekinesis, we see that these phenomena are in fact bound to what constitutes the human being's past, what perishes with his death, and therefore cannot represent anything of the real supersensible world, but only the forces that are connected with the human being in this sensory earthly world.

If we imagine what descends from our pre-existing being through conception and birth to physical embodiment, we will understand that it now takes in and incorporates into its form those forces and materials that are passed on through the stream of heredity, but also those that are absorbed in the course of life through food, breathing, and everything else that humans receive from the outside world. For humans are, in their full inner being, only in the entity that descends from pre-existing existence to physical embodiment. They integrate themselves, enveloping themselves in physical matter already in the womb, and later through breathing, eating, and so on.

What humans integrate in this way only enters into a relationship with the actual essence of humans in a normal state, through the mediation that the physical body and the etheric body have with the feeling-will being of humans in the waking state. There is a normal connection between the human being's feeling-will being and its thinking power, which, as we have seen, is bound to the formative body, as well as to the physical body.

Let us now assume that by placing the human being in a hypnotic state, the feeling and will being is removed from the physical and etheric bodies. We then have before us the human being, the hypnotized human being, as a mere formative force body and physical body with all that he has now absorbed in physical substances and physical forces from the earthly outer world. These physical substances now have all kinds of interactions with the environment; they carry these into the human being. What can act from these substances themselves comes to the fore when the feeling-will being is out of the physical body and the etheric body. So, as anthroposophical research shows, we are not actually dealing with anything that belongs to the eternal core of the human being, but with something that is incorporated into this eternal core from the outside world in the past. The same can happen when a person is subject to any kind of pathological condition. In a normal state, a person feels any diseased organ through pain, nausea, or the like. This is the case when the feeling-will being is correctly connected to the physical body and the etheric body. But if the physical body or the etheric body is largely deformed by disease, then the disease of any organ, some inner member, the spiritual-soul, the feeling-will being of the human being sinks deeper into the animal, into the physical nature than is the case in normal consciousness, where only memories are reflected back. When the organs are healthy, the human being only submerges to a certain degree into his physical body. But if the organs are somehow diseased — often only one organ — then the human being, with his spiritual-soul being, not only submerges to the point of feeling pain when the disease takes the corresponding form, but he submerges even deeper. He connects himself with his spiritual-soul being to the organism. Whereas the human being is otherwise connected to his feeling-will being only through his senses and his nervous system, he now becomes connected to the lower animal organs and the vegetative organs, and thus reaches the unfree states of hallucination and visionary experience. It can be seen that hallucinations and visionary experiences, like other states, are entirely bound to the physical and etheric bodies of the human being, and that they can therefore only represent experiences that disappear with the death of the human being, experiences that cannot shed light on the supersensible world in which the human being finds itself between death and a new birth. However, it is true and has been confirmed by research that it is also possible for human beings to perceive thoughts of a certain significance in a mediumistic state, so that one can sometimes be amazed at the ingenious thoughts that come out of trance, i.e., also out of a kind of hypnotic state, which would be impossible for human beings in their ordinary consciousness.

But does this contradict what has just been said? It does not contradict it, because not only the physical body can, in a sense, act in space without physical mediation in the manner described, but also the image-forming body. Now it happens that even quite normal people, but especially those who have certain genius-like abilities, produce something within themselves in the way of thoughts and imaginative images that is not exhausted in the formative body, but because it goes beyond normal human life, also acts beyond the human being, as it were beyond his skin, in the general world ether, which we will learn about in the next lecture.

One can already say that what continues to resonate in the general world ether is, for example, artistic thoughts that go beyond normal human life in a — if I may use the expression — superhuman experience and creation. There are such thoughts floating around. And those who have prepared themselves for this through meditation, through the exercises of will that I spoke about yesterday and the day before, know that human beings do not only bring about what they bring about in the world through their physical achievements. They know that thoughts that are not necessary for the maintenance of individual life — for this, thoughts are necessary that then transform into forces of growth — communicate with the general world ether. And when the etheric body of the human being is in a kind of pathological state, when it is deformed or becomes mediumistic through a trance state, then what does not penetrate into the normal state of the human being, the swirling world of thoughts, can indeed penetrate into the de-spiritualized and de-soul-ed human being who manifests himself as a medium. And if, for example, a person who has died has communicated such thoughts to the general world ether through something, and these come to light through a medium, then one might believe that one is really hearing the thoughts, the present thoughts of the dead person, when in fact one is only hearing the echo of the thoughts that the living person emitted before his death.

This is what a healthy spiritual scientific critique must always bear in mind: whether one is dealing with echoes of thoughts, or whether one is actually penetrating the supersensible world, to which man belongs after his death and before his birth, by developing genuine supersensible powers. If one is dealing with telepathy, this is nothing more than an ethereal transmission of thoughts with the senses switched off. If one is dealing with telekinesis, certain forces arising from food and other physical matter in the altered physical body are stimulated to act through space without physical mediation. Humans consist of only about ten percent solid matter; ninety percent is fluid, but they also consist of finer matter, up to the etheric matter. And with those materials that he radiates in a certain way, he can, especially when he, as I have indicated, through diseased organs, through pathological conditions, submerges his spiritual-soul too deeply into his animal nature, his thoughts accompany the radiations. Then teleplasticity also arises. He can then form what he radiates in fine materiality, and this thought-formed can also be radiantly illuminated. Plastic forms arise, as they are depicted in the always scientifically based works of Schrenck-Notzing and others, without one having to think of deception or illusion. But one is never dealing with anything other than the effects of the part of the human being that perishes in death. One is not dealing with anything that leads into the truly supersensible world. One is led into this real supersensible world when, through the systematic training of the normal soul faculties and while maintaining ordinary consciousness, one comes to an observation outside one's body with one's feeling-will being, and thereby surveys one's past in the physical and etheric bodies, what one has radiated from a spiritual world, and what intervenes in a formative way in physical and etheric matter. And since one sees what lies further away, I would say, first of all, and only gradually what lies closer, one sees into it up to the boundary, up to the point where the death of the previous life lies. Therefore, as I have done in my “Theosophy,” one can describe what a person experiences after death based on this observation of pre-existing life. One then really describes a perspective, I would say, in the opposite direction to the one one has before one. And so everything I have described about the conditions of human beings after death is described entirely on the basis of those visions which are attained in the way I described yesterday and again today.

One can say that human beings cannot experience anything of the higher worlds except what they have first developed in earnest striving for knowledge. Through the power of thought, as I characterized it yesterday, one must bring about the possibility of stepping outside one's body in a conscious state and then looking back at the physical body. This can only be achieved through this power of thought. But one must now learn to distinguish: what one has from one's previous life, one has through observation. What one will be in the future, one has through inner experience. Therefore, as sparse as these inner experiences are compared to what one has before one as a powerful supersensible tableau from one's pre-existing life, the pre-existing life can truly be the content of a developed science. But what a person learns about the future will depend very much on how they can strengthen themselves inwardly in their eternal emotional and volitional being outside their body. And you can already observe this emotional and volitional being in its development through physical life on earth and in its maturation toward a higher state after death. If one observes in such a way that one observes what otherwise unconsciously withdraws from the human body during sleep in a more youthful state of existence and then in a more mature state of existence, differences become apparent. What withdraws from the physical body during sleep as the emotional and volitional being in younger people contains more of the thought-like. It becomes apparent that what the human being harbors within themselves as thoughtfulness resonates unconsciously within them. As the human being grows older, he no longer carries so much of the thinking aspect out of the physical body through the gateway of sleep, but rather carries more of what lies in the powers of his character, in the powers of his developed will impulses, out into the outer world through the gateway of sleep. Therefore, one can say that from a being that carries more thought content, one develops in the spiritual-soul realm through earthly life into a being that shows more of the echo of the character of the human being in the spiritual-soul realm. Essentially, one does not actually pass through the gate of sleep with one's thoughts. One leaves one's thoughts behind when falling asleep; they shine on the physical body. The thoughts that animated us in earthly life between birth and death are also left behind there. We learn to recognize them as the outer thought force of the world; we later come to know them as an outer world after death. We pass through the gate of sleep primarily with what has become our character, what has become our inner moral formation. And every phase that one now really wants to interpret correctly in that perspective into pre-existing life must be attained for knowledge through the training of normal soul forces.

I have already explained this to you in the previous lecture: When a person strengthens their thinking, their thought life, through meditation and concentration on this thought life, so that they can live in thoughts as they would otherwise only live in sensory images, so that their inner thought life becomes as powerful, as lively, as intense as the soul life would otherwise be when devoted to sensory impressions, then the person arrives at imaginative knowledge. And through this inner life of thought, strengthened to the point of pictoriality, the human being now does not see before him the tableau of memories of the earthly life that has just passed, extending up to this point of experience, but he surveys everything that the image-forming body has organized in this physical earthly organism. In a powerful tableau, as a first supersensible experience, they look back on their own earthly life up to this point in their life, back to their childhood.

I have already mentioned in previous lectures that this tableau that the human being experiences is somewhat similar to what serious natural scientists are already talking about today, because it has been sufficiently researched that this occurs when the human being is close to a mortal danger from which it is very difficult to escape. When a person is close to drowning, for example, they experience in a large tableau what the etheric, temporal image-forming body is: they are overlooked. The same is overlooked in supersensible cognition, and the same is represented in the first experience after death through the correct interpretation of the perspective I have described to you of pre-existing life. One recognizes there that when a person passes through the gate of death, they perceive for a very short time, which is only measured in days — about as long as a person can endure without sleep for several days, depending on their constitution — a kind of tableau that allows them to survey their last earthly life as if in a web of thoughts, but one that is pictorial. One gains such an overview of one's earthly life for a short time after passing through the gate of death. I would say that, without any emotional or volitional involvement, purely in a kind of passive overview, one has this earthly life before one, and in the way I have described, one gets to know this first state after death. One must first become acquainted with it through supersensible knowledge, through meditation and concentration, and so on. But if one wants to interpret correctly what follows this tableau of past earthly life in the life after death, one needs another kind of practice.

In earthly life and also in ordinary science, human beings usually surrender themselves passively to the outer world with their thoughts, their feelings, and also their emotional and volitional impulses. They move forward with the outer world. They experience yesterday, followed by today in the later period, and tomorrow in a later period. And what human beings develop as inner reflections of thoughts, feelings, and will in their soul life also follows on from the external passage of time as a continuous natural experience. This provides, I would say, a certain support for ordinary thinking and ordinary feeling. But one cannot strengthen human thinking to the degree needed for supersensible research if one only passively surrenders to the external passage of time in this way. One must do other exercises: one must try, if I may put it this way, to think backwards. That is, when the day is over, one can let it pass before one's soul — not in thoughts, nor with criticism, but in images, as if one were seeing again what one has seen during the course of the day — as in the imagination, but from evening to morning, in reverse order. One must acquire a certain practice in such backward visualizations. For it is relatively easy to visualize larger sections backward, but to do so one must visualize long, really, I would say, atomistically small sections backward to forward, really visualize the course of the day's life in reverse. One can then move on to other exercises, perhaps with the help of, say, unraveling a drama from the fifth act backwards to the first act, or feeling melodies inwardly from back to front, hearing them mentally and spiritually, as it were. And one can then come to perceive the memories of life — which is now something different from the tableau described — in such a way that one really conjures up one's life from the present moment, by bringing up from memory what one has gone through, in reverse and in a pictorial-imaginative way before the soul. By doing such exercises, one breaks away from the external passage of time. The deeply ingrained habit of following the external passage of time with one's thinking, feeling, and sensing must be overcome. And through powerful backward thinking, you are enabled to make use of a much greater, stronger power of thought than you need for merely passive thinking. It is precisely through this backward thinking that the power of thought is significantly strengthened.

And then one discovers something that certainly sounds paradoxical to ordinary consciousness, to ordinary perception. But just as one sees the sensory world with the ideas that flow in the course of time, so one gradually sees the spiritual world when one has detached one's thinking in this way from its bondage to the external course of time. And through this, one gains a further ability. This gives one the opportunity to observe further experiences and, from the perspective I have described, to correctly interpret what follows the tableau of life that one experiences for a few days after death. One now observes how, after the tableau of life, the human being, now moving backwards in their experience, goes through life once again in very real imagery. In a sense, the human being experiences the soul world before the spirit world. And faster than they lived here between birth and death, they live backwards after death until birth. They go through this life backwards. The ability to see through this is acquired through the exercises in backward thinking mentioned above. And now one gets an idea of how, in this backward-running soul life after death, the human being experiences everything he went through here in earthly life in the physical body. Only now they experience it spiritually, and they can see everything that has impaired their moral progress. Precisely during these backward-running times, they can review what they must now wish for their life to be different from a higher point of view. They can see how moral defects have held them back in their perfection. But since he now experiences all this vividly, it does not remain just a thought. In the soul life, which in this way runs backwards, I would say, develops backwards in the soul life, the thought does not remain abstract, for abstract thoughts have been left behind in death; it develops as a power of thought. And it develops as the impulse to make amends in some way in the next earthly life, to experience in some way the opposite of the facts that now, so to speak, confront the soul. Something develops in the soul that then appears in the next earthly life as the subconscious longing to approach this or that in life. It is precisely in this backward life for everything one has gone through in earthly life that the longing develops to experience another fact in the next earthly life that compensates for this. And so, in this backward development, one experiences the seed of what one unconsciously brings through the next birth, which can be described in the following way.

This usually eludes everyday consciousness, but it nevertheless lives in human beings. However, even with common sense alone, one can observe something that is then confirmed by supernatural research: how one approaches some important, decisive fact of life.

Let us assume that in one earthly life, at the age of thirty or thirty-five, we encounter another earthly human being in whom we find — I want to mention a truly decisive event — a life partner with whom we want to spend the rest of our lives, and we find that our souls are in harmony. The outwardly materialistic person calls this a coincidence. But deeper minds — and there are plenty of them, as history shows — have given this some thought: if we look back from this decisive event in our lives to what came before, and before that, and before that, then the course of our lives leading up to this event appears very systematic. And we sometimes find that what we experience in life is a fact that now intervenes in our lives, like the organic conclusion of what appears to be a plan. If one has first constructed such a plan hypothetically, and then sees through what has been constructed hypothetically, constructed up to birth, with what is the development of supersensible powers of cognition through meditation, backward thinking, and will development, as I have described, then one does indeed come to say to oneself: What you have hypothetically constructed may sometimes really be only a fantasy image, but it is not always so. Rather, it sometimes proves to be of the utmost importance for decisive facts in life that human beings carry within themselves a subconscious longing from birth, and that from this longing, which they may interpret very differently in different periods of their lives, they take the first step, the second step, all the steps that ultimately lead them to the event that they imagined in embryonic form in that past life after death, and which now carries us through our new earthly life as an indefinite longing, so that we unconsciously create our own destiny. In this way, we come to recognize what we find as fate in earthly life, or as it has been called in the ancient instinctive clairvoyant wisdom of the Orient: karma. We learn to recognize this fate, on which all our happiness and unhappiness, our pleasure and our suffering in life depend, by seeing the successive earthly lives.

Of course, people will then very soon be inclined to say: Yes, but what about freedom? Then people are guided and directed by fate! What about human freedom? — Yes, people actually only arrive at this solution to the question of fate when they have seriously wrestled with the problem of freedom. And at this point, because it certainly has objective significance, I would like to add a personal note. At the beginning of the 1890s, I wrote my Philosophy of Freedom. This Philosophy of Freedom set itself the task of securing precisely the experience, the fact of freedom. I attempted to characterize the consciousness of freedom as something absolutely certain from what humans experience within themselves. And so what I later attempted to present as a partial solution to the question of destiny, as I have now outlined it, was conceived by me in harmony with what I have presented as human freedom. Anyone who studies this book, my “Philosophy of Freedom,” will find, however, that I was compelled not to speak first of freedom of the will, but of the freedom of what is experienced in thought, namely in thought free from sensuality, in pure thought, but in that thought which appears consciously in the human soul as a moral ideal, and which attains the strength that can have a motivating effect on the will of man. We can speak of human freedom when we speak of those actions of human beings that are shaped by their free thinking, where human beings, through moral self-education, come to the point where their instincts, drives, emotions, and temperament do not influence them to act, but only their devoted love for an action. In this devoted love for an action, what emerges from the ideal strength of pure moral thought can develop. That is a truly free action.

Now, through spiritual science, we come to the conclusion that thinking as such, this thinking which underlies moral free action, remains in the reflective physical body during sleep, that this is something that human beings experience between birth and death, which makes earthly life valuable simply through this incorporation of the impulse of freedom, if it were not already infinitely valuable. We will talk about this in the next lecture. Man becomes free in the one physical life on earth, where he develops thought as such, where thought loses the plasticizing power it still has in the etheric body, and where it is developed as pure thought in the consciousness that is alive. I was therefore compelled to present something very daring in this Philosophy of Freedom at the beginning of the 1890s. I had to present moral impulses as ethical ideals and had to say: they do not come to human beings from the physical world, they do not come to human beings from nature, they come to human beings through intuition. And I spoke at that time of “moral imagination.” And why that? I said at that time in my Philosophy of Freedom: these moral motives flow into human beings from the spiritual world, but initially only as images. They receive them as intuition from the spiritual world.

But in this way, I would say, one arrives at the other pole of what one experiences here in the physical world. If one looks out into the natural world with common sense and scientific training, one discovers necessity everywhere. If one looks into the world of moral impulses, one discovers freedom, but freedom at first only in mere thought, in pure thinking, in intellectual intuition. And at first one does not know how forces enter into the will, because one sees these moral intuitions unconsciously. On the one hand, you have nature, to which you belong by acting, and on the other hand, you have your moral experience, and if you have nothing else at first but natural science, the possibility of attributing reality to these moral intuitions, of attributing world-creating forces to them, disappears. One experiences nature, as it were, in all its rough density, in its necessity. One experiences freedom, but one experiences it in the finely woven thought impulses, reduced to pictoriality, which one knows, because they cannot belong to nature, because they are experienced in free activity, and I have indicated in my “Philosophy of Freedom” that they come from the spiritual world. But something must now intervene between these intuitions, which are thoroughly pictorial, unreal, and only become real through moral life, and what one has as objective knowledge of the natural order. And here imagination and inspiration intervene, arising in the manner I have described. And then intuition also becomes something else. Then what at first appeared only in pure thought becomes, as it were, condensed into a spiritual reality. In this intuition, newly acquired through imagination and inspiration, we now learn to recognize not our present self, but the self that passes through repeated earthly lives and carries our destiny through these repeated earthly lives in the way I have described. We are unfree in that we have lived through repeated earthly lives and thereby shaped our destiny. But we can always weave free actions into this fabric of destiny in our individual earthly lives. Precisely because we experience moral impulses in pictorial intuitions — not as realities, but as something to which we can freely commit ourselves — we can weave freedom into the fabric of destiny in our individual earthly lives. And so, by being carried through fate from one earthly life to another, we do not become any less free than we would be if we were to be carried by ship from Europe to America. There, we are indeed determined in our future by the decisions we make here in Europe. But we are free beings within certain limits at all times, and as long as we are over in America, we can move freely. Thus we carry destiny from one earthly life to another. But into the world of facts that we experience in repeated earthly lives, we can bring what springs from freedom in individual earthly lives.

And so we see that those who struggle with the problem of freedom, who see the problem of freedom solved by contemplating the moral ideas that can initially only be grasped in moral imagination, but which strive from the spiritual world into the physical world of human beings, that those who acquire an understanding of freedom in this way have thereby prepared themselves to understand what is destined, which intervenes in human life as a kind of necessity.

Once one has reached this intuition, once one has understood how to interweave fate and freedom, and thereby further strengthened those powers that one has acquired through meditation, concentration, backward thinking, and so on, then one can also look at what presents itself in perspective, or interpret it further. What now follows this backward life is a life in a purely spiritual realm, in which one now lives in anticipation of the following earthly life. And in this spiritual realm, one experiences, I would say, in the opposite way to here in earthly life. Here in earthly life, one experiences in such a way that what is within us can initially only be seen inwardly in images. In ordinary consciousness, we do not experience the inner life of human beings, but in waking consciousness we experience the outer world. In a sense, we see the outer world as the space surrounding our own center, in the sphere of space. The human being is within themselves, the outside world is outside them. In the time between death and a new birth, this view is reversed: the human being merges with what was their outside world here. They experience what was their outside world here as an inner world. And what is closed to them here, the inner nature of human beings, they now experience as the outside world. The human being with his inner self becomes the world for the life between death and new birth, and the world becomes the self. And in experiencing what is now higher than what we have here in the world around us — for the human being is the crown of creation, he carries within himself a higher realm than the environment — he thus has a more valuable world within himself between death and a new birth. And what they experience as their world, but which is actually the mysterious world of the human inner being, they experience creatively. In the spiritual world, they creatively experience the forces in community with higher spiritual beings, by whom we are surrounded as spiritual-soul human beings, just as we here as physical human beings are surrounded by the three kingdoms of nature, by animals, plants, and minerals. In communion with these spiritual beings, one experiences the forces from which one gradually not only shapes one's destiny, the seed of one's destiny, but from which one forms the model in the spiritual-soul world, but the real model, the spiritual-soul being, which then, after a certain time, longs to reincarnate what it initially formed as a model, but alive, alive in a thought-powerful way. Because it must now be connected with a physical body, because it can only attain its completion in a physical body, this spiritual-soul being feels the urge, the longing, to incarnate again here on earth. From the spirit comes that which, as our pre-birth or pre-conception existence, connects with the physical body. One will only get a proper idea of the way in which the human being as a physical being is formed here on earth — we will discuss this in more detail the day after tomorrow — when one realizes that what is formed in the mother's body is only something that takes up the actual essence of the human being from a higher world.

Natural science has a certain dream, which consists in the idea that one day it will be possible to investigate the cells, and indeed the most perfect cells, the reproductive cells, the germ cells of the human embryo, in terms of their complex chemical composition. Anthroposophical spiritual science approaches the same problem with completely different means and from completely different perspectives. And it comes to indicate, as it were, the direction in which one must search for what is forming in the mother's body as the germ cell of the human embryo. Here one is not dealing with a more complex chemical compound, but in truth with the chaotic becoming of matter. It is not a highly complex chemical compound or a molecular structure, but a becoming chaotic, a chaotic whirling together of what is structured in a lawful manner in the crystal, in the chemical molecule. Matter in the germ cell is not developed into a further regularity, but is pushed down into chaos, and from the corresponding matter, from the matter becoming chaotic, there arises that which can now take up what is descending: the supersensible human being coming from spiritual worlds. And only then will one understand what develops as a physical human being, when physical research is brought to the point where one can see how the physical human germ, precisely because it has returned matter to chaos, becomes capable of receiving the spiritual-soul germ that descends from pre-existence. Only in this way can one understand how, through conception and up to birth, that which descends from the spiritual-soul worlds connects with that which has dematerialized in the germ at the beginning of embryonic growth. Anyone who really looks at the formation of the embryo in a meaningful way can already read from this physical formation of the embryo what I have presented to you today, while embryonic development always remains a mystery if one is unable to look at it in this way.

However, if one really wants to recognize the essence of the human being, one must obtain through supersensible research that which also belongs to the human being. For example, I have pointed out on previous occasions how, in the science of the lower kingdoms, those things that are regarded as wisdom in the study of human beings would be considered foolish everywhere else. Suppose, I said, that someone has a magnetic needle in front of them: one end points north, the other south. No one would think of saying: Only in the magnetic needle, in the space enclosed by the matter of this magnetic needle, lie the forces that cause it to point in that direction. — One regards the earth itself as a large magnet that acts on the individual magnetic needle and determines its direction. The individual magnetic needle is integrated into the whole organism of the earth. So one starts from the individual being in order to recognize the great, comprehensive whole, and also to recognize its interaction with the individual being. Only in the case of the human being does one want to recognize, by following the development of the germ cell with a microscope, what brings forth the human being solely from what is enclosed in the human skin. Just as the direction of the magnetic needle cannot be explained from the needle itself, so too will it never be possible to understand what develops in the human being unless we relate the human being to the whole world, not only to the world of space but also to the world of time, unless we go back to what is revealed to us in supersensible vision as the pre-existing being of the human being in the manner described. One learns to recognize this as that which, when human beings lay down their physical bodies here, dissolves in their etheric bodies into the world ether, and which then passes through the gate of death in order to begin a new cycle, but for the further balancing of the facts of life and for higher perfection.

Thus, when we consider the human being in itself, it initially places itself within the development of the world. And what now befalls the human being as it carries down its spiritual-soul nature belongs to the development of the world; it must be integrated into the development of the world, which we will consider the day after tomorrow. Human beings will only become understandable when what has been explained today is integrated into the becoming and being and weaving, that is, into the entire development of the world. For human beings can only recognize the world by recognizing themselves. And that which is the world is reflected in earthly life; human beings live through it after death and before birth. From it, they draw the forces that they themselves integrate into their physical body at birth or conception. The world and human beings belong together not only externally, but also internally. Human beings carry the world within themselves; the world as a totality forms the essence of human beings. Therefore, the question raised here will be partially answered today. It will receive its full answer, as far as science is currently capable of providing, in the next lecture.

In conclusion, I would like to say just a few words. I would like it to be clearly understood that what the spiritual researcher presents is based on the development of certain forces that otherwise remain unconscious to the soul, but that the spiritual researcher proceeds from an anthroposophical point of view in such a way that he clothes what he has to present from his vision in the ordinary thoughts that one otherwise has in science. He takes his thoughts with him everywhere. For that pendulum swing, that oscillation between the supersensible and the sensible world, must constantly accompany him in his research. He must always stand as his own critic alongside his higher being, which has supersensible visions. Therefore, even those who have not undergone such training can, if they are truly open-minded and apply common sense, mentally verify everything that the spiritual researcher presents. And it is actually not correct that what the spiritual researcher presents can only be verified by another spiritual researcher. It is only in the present age that people have become too accustomed to thinking bound to external materiality, to external natural consequences, and they then find that the spiritual researcher has no proof of this thinking. But anyone who sees through the whole situation sees the relationship between ordinary common sense and the methodically trained mind of science, of external science. And those who then proceed critically and examine everything that the spiritual researcher presents in their thoughts, but only impartially enough, will be able to verify it, even without having visions themselves. The spiritual researcher presents everything in such a way that it can be verified in this manner. And anyone who says that the spiritual researcher merely recounts his visions without providing evidence is like a person who is accustomed to everything he finds on earth standing on solid ground and who then asks, when a solar system is explained to him: Yes, but what does it rest on? That it rests in itself, that it supports itself freely through its own forces, he may not realize. Such a person who asks, “On what ground does a solar system stand?” is like someone who demands proof in the usual way and means the kind of proof that can only be demanded for the external sensory world, where one finds without proof what one has just perceived with the senses, what can be demonstrated through the senses.

But human thinking is not there for that alone. Thinking can also soar, not merely to find what is supported by sensory experience proven by common sense, but also what, in a sense, sustains itself internally like a spiritual planetary system. Examine in this way, applying to anthroposophical spiritual research what such self-sustaining, self-proving thinking provides, and you will find what the spiritual researcher presents to be inwardly secure, even without the so-called external supports, just as the planetary system sustains itself freely in space, and only that which is earthly and heavy needs to be supported. But it must be borne in mind that thinking must also become truly free, must become that which can sustain itself internally, if one wants to find proof through common sense of what spiritual research has to say about the nature of human beings and the nature of world evolution. That everything can be proven from this point of view, I will now, after discussing the nature of the human being, take the liberty of developing here the day after tomorrow in the next lecture on the nature of world evolution.