The Spiritual Development of Man
GA 84
22 April 1923, Dornach
III. Man's Faculty of Cognition in the Etheric World
In the last few days I have been speaking of man's place in the Universe. On the one side we envisaged man's organisation as composed of physical body, etheric body or body of formative forces, astral body and the true ‘I’ which passes from earthly life to earthly life. At the same time I also tried to show how these members of the human being are each connected in a different way with the Universe. It can be said that the physical body is connected with all that is the physical, earthly world of the senses; man's physical body is part of that world. But when we think of the etheric body or the body of formative forces, we must understand that this belongs to quite a different kind of world, to that world which is itself etheric and of which I told you that man should experience it as coming to him from the far spaces of the cosmos. If, then, we imagine the forces of the earth spreading out in all directions and man living within these forces, which are those of the physical world, we must conceive the etheric world as coming in on all sides from the direction of the outer global shell of the universe to meet the outstreaming physical forces, and thus reaching man. It is obvious, therefore, that man's etheric body is subject to entirely different laws from those governing the physical body.—And again, when contemplating man's astral body, we perceive it to be connected with worlds that are not to be found at all in that cosmos which is contained in the Physical and the etheric, and in which we find that with our astral body we belong to the world we enter between death and a new birth.
And finally with the ‘I’ itself we belong to a world that flows as from a quickening fount through worlds which, as for instance our own world, are threefold in character. The three members of our world are the physical, the etheric, the astral. The world of the ‘I’ passes through this world and through other similarly threefold worlds. It is therefore a far more embracing world, one that we must regard as eternal as compared with the temporal.
But we must also have regard to the fact that, whenever we employ those human faculties of perception and understanding which inform us about the etheric body or the body of formative forces, the astral body and the ‘I,’ we do in fact enter into entirely different worlds. We have to change over to the sphere of active, living thinking in order to experience our etheric body. What we then have to bear in mind is that in that world everything is different from what we experience while bound to the physical world of the senses. In the first place the things and happenings we know from the aspect of the physical world appear in quite a different light in these higher worlds. As it is, the things and events encountered in the physical world are after all only final manifestations. They have their source in the higher worlds; so that we then see more into the primary origins of our surroundings in the physical world. But apart from that, when in the physical world we have, to begin with, the world well known to ordinary consciousness, where man is surrounded by the three kingdoms of nature besides his own. But when we rise to those powers of cognition—in my books I have used the expression ‘Imaginative Cognition’—which enable us to experience our own etheric body or the body of formative forces, we enter the etheric world. And we have sufficiently developed and strengthened our faculties when we have kindled the inner light and can experience ourselves, as it were, in the Second Man, in the body of formative forces; we then enter the world which, at any rate to begin with, reveals itself to us in images: the world of the Angeloi, Archangeloi and Archai.
Having broken through, as it were, into the cosmic spheres where the etheric body, the body of formative forces, becomes perceptible to us, we recognise on entering this world of flowing images that these reveal manifestations of the Beings of the third Hierarchy, the Angeloi, Archangeloi and Archai. There we are among Beings who are not with us in the physical world of the senses. The presence of these Beings reveals itself to us through the medium of qualities similar in kind to those we perceive also through our senses in the physical world.
But here, in the world of the senses, we see for instance the colours spread over the surface of things or in purely physical configurations such as the rainbow. Sounds are experienced as connected with specific objects in the physical world. In the same way, warmth and cold are felt as emanating from certain objects in the physical world of the senses. But when we regard the world in which the third Hierarchy is revealed to us, we do not have colours adhering to things, sounds reverberating from objects, and so on, but colours, sounds, warmth and cold flowing and vibrating—one can hardly say through space—but flowing and vibrating in time. Colour is not spread over the surface of things but it fluctuates and moves in waves. And by applying the faculties which enabled us to enter these worlds, we know that, just as in the physical world colour-effect suggests a material foundation, so in yonder world the floating cloud of colour, a flowing organism of colour, is the manifestation of the working and weaving of the spirit-and-soul forces of the third Hierarchy. So that the moment we behold the life-tableau of which I have spoken, which gives a clear and spontaneous picture of the whole of our life since birth, there also appears within this stream of our own life's events something of which one can. say: within the de-materialised world of flowing colours and sounds lives the third Hierarchy.
The Connection of the various Members of Man's
Being with the corresponding Worlds of the Universe
When our faculties of cognition are strong enough to rise to the level where we can observe our own astral body, that is to say, that part of us which existed before we descended into earthly life, and which we shall again carry with us when we have passed through the gate of death, then we know: this is a wider world, a world we do not find in the cosmic ether but beyond the gates of birth and death. Here we enter the wider astral world.
Things do not tally exactly with descriptions given in my book, “Theosophy,” where they are presented from a different point of view. But just as we meet the third Hierarchy when we have attained experience of our body of formative forces, so we encounter the second Hierarchy, the Exusiai, Kyriotetes and Dynamis, in the world which reveals to us our own astral body. And this second Hierarchy does not become perceptible to us in flowing colours and sounds, but it manifests itself to us by heralding and proclaiming the import of revelations of the Logos resounding and weaving through the Universe. The second Hierarchy speaks to us.
If, after having attained the necessary powers of cognition, one wants to give some Indication of how one is related to these worlds, using words which naturally no longer have meaning that is applicable in the sense-world, and yet are to some extent expressive in regard to the higher worlds, one must say: For the etheric world the inner living thinking becomes a kind of organ of touch. With living thinking we touch this world of flowing colours and so on. We must not imagine that we see the red as the eye sees the red of the senses, spread out on the surface of things; instead we sense, we ‘touch’ red and yellow and so forth; we touch the sounds, so that we can say: in the etheric world, living thinking is the element of touch in relation to what lives in the world of the third Hierarchy.
On entering that world to which in a sense our astral body belongs, we cannot speak of experiencing this astral world merely through the element of touch, but we must say: we apprehend this world as the revelation of the Beings of the second Hierarchy. Each separate manifestation presents itself to us as a member, a part of the World-Logos. Out of the deep silence resounds the voice of the Spiritual Beings. Thus, after touch: speech, communication.
And when, in the way I have indicated, sustained effort rewards us with the experience of the ‘I’ which goes from earthly life to earthly life and, between them, passes through the other lives between each death and a new birth, then we enter the spirit-world proper, the higher spirit-world. What happens in this world to begin with, is that we enter into a special relationship to our true ‘I.’ The ‘I’ we experience inwardly here in this life on earth between birth and death is, as we know, bound to the physical corporeality. We are aware of it as long as we experience ourselves in the physical body and, in a way, we are forced to practise selflessness when we rise into the etheric world and the astral world. There we have at most something like a recollection of this earthly ‘I.’
But now we find the true ‘I’ as it passes from earthly life to earthly life. Our first impression is that of an entirely different being. We say to ourselves: Here I live through this earthly existence between birth and death. Looking back I see that strip of etheric world which takes me back as far as my birth on earth. Then my vision opens into world-wide realms existing only in time, where to speak of space would be quite misleading; but in a wide perspective the world appears to me in all its fullness, as it lives and weaves between death and a new birth. Looking through and beyond the ether, the world of the third Hierarchy, and through the astral, where I was between death and a new birth as in a super-sensible world whose life is revelation of the Logos manifesting as the Cosmic Word—as my vision penetrates all this, I finally behold a being at first far remote, a being representing the essence of my previous life on earth. First, then, I see myself here in this earthly life with my present ghost-like ‘I,’ and then, looking far back through all that has just been described, I see what constitutes the essence of my previous life on earth. But at the same time I perceive how the content of the latter, as the gradually evolving ‘I,’ has been passing through the worlds I have been observing in retrospective perspective as far as my present life on earth. To begin with I do, in fact, perceive my true ‘I’ as some strange, remote being. And in this being, strange as it appears to me at first, I recognise myself.
Every word in this passage should be taken with absolute seriousness because every single word is of significance. This whole experience must culminate in the realisation that the true ‘I’ first taken to be some strange being, is indeed one's own self; that there appeared what seemed to be some other being which lived in the far distant past, but that it is, in fact, you yourself.
And then one discovers how this self has flowed from the previous existence on earth into the present earthly life, but that now, in this life, it is covered up, as it were, and could emerge only if all that befalls between going to sleep and waking were to stand revealed before the soul. It is there that all that which on its way through the astral and etheric world has reached us from our previous life on earth, continues to live and weave.
It is, you see, a world of earthly contradictions mingled with chords of heavenly harmonies in this inner process of the striving soul: earthly contradictions inasmuch as by means which are designed to meet the needs of ordinary daily life on earth, one cannot really reach one's own true ‘I.’ As it is, only the first rudiments of love live in our earthly ‘I.’ And even so, a glow is shed over life on earth through the power of love which radiates into this earthly life. But this love must grow stronger. It must gain sufficient strength to enable man to behold the etheric world and the astral world through the power of love and thus to overcome what lives in him as his lower self, as egoism—the opposite of love—to gain mastery over that which, as the antithesis of love, enables him to experience himself in earthly life as an independent ‘I.’ Love must grow so strong that one learns to ignore this earthly ‘I,’ to forget it, to disregard it. Love is the identification of one's own self with the other being. This impulse must be so strong that one ceases to heed one's own ‘I’ as it lives in the earthly body. Here then arises the contradiction, that it is precisely through selflessness, through the highest capacity for love, that one advances towards one's own true ‘I’ beckoning as it radiates through the cycles of time.
One has to lose one's earthly ‘I’ to behold one's true ‘I.’ And he who fails to accomplish this act of surrender has simply no means of finding the true ‘I.’ One could say that the true ‘I’ does not want to be sought whenever revelation of its presence is desired. If sought for, it hides. For only in love will it be found, and love is a surrender of self to the other being. For that reason the true Self must be found as if it were another being.
At the moment of coming face to face with one's true ‘I,’ one also becomes aware of what lives in a wider world, in the spiritual world itself. One meets the beings of the first Hierarchy: Seraphim, Cherubim, Thrones.
And just as there one finds again one's ‘I’—of which one has really only a reflection in earthly life—so now one finds the entire world of earthly environment in its true spiritual form. Hence one must also lose this earthly world to find the world of its primal origins, together with the true ‘I.’
So that we can say: What reveals itself in the spiritual world is something remembered, is touch, speech, memory; but remembrance of something which formerly one had known only in reflections, in images.
Thus, by experiencing one's human self, and with the realisation of one's own humanity, one enters into the life of the Universe in its totality. And to give a clear picture of the various members of man's being, the physical body, the etheric body, the astral body and the ‘I,’ each must also be shown in its relationship to the corresponding worlds of the Universe.
What I have now described must be well understood and taken in its full meaning before any approach to the problem of the four parts of man's nature can disclose their true significance. Here is a case in point which shows very clearly that man must not only turn his thoughts in other directions, but think in a different way if he is to rise to a true understanding of the spiritual world. He must bring to life what are really only dead images in purely physical sense-perception: his attitude of mind must change.
And here one can indeed come across some extraordinary products of modern spiritual life, which show the difficulties that have to be overcome if Anthroposophy is to enter into the souls of men.
Anthroposophy as Academic Philosophy
(“Chair-Philosophy”) Sees ItWhen the book “Occult Science:” had been published, a well-known modern philosopher took it upon himself to analyse it. He first read the chapter about the four members of man's constitution—physical body, etheric body, astral body, ‘I’—and so on. Now this book has also been read by many quite simple people but people possessed of healthy common sense. For them it had point and meaning because with healthy common-sense one can always follow a subject, just as one can understand a picture without being a painter. But to one who in these days is a much quoted philosopher, such understanding presents considerably more difficulties than It does to a naive, simple human being. As this renowned philosopher reads: physical body, etheric body, astral body, ‘I,’ he is puzzled and wonders what he can make of it all. What does it all mean? Physical body, yes, of course. Etheric body?—well, perhaps it exists. What is dense matter in the physical body may here be of finer substance, but it is still matter. He argues, therefore, that to distinguish between physical and etheric body is to draw an arbitrary dividing line between the two.—Astral body?—We know something about a soul, says this philosopher, but—astral body? In the soul we have our thinking, feeling and willing. These are functions of the physical body. If one understands the physical body one has also grasped the meaning of thinking, feeling and willing. And the ‘I’—that is only the synthesis of all this. Such was his way of arguing.
And now please observe how the renowned philosopher's critical thought was formulated.—Having taken account of what he could find in the “Occult Science:” much as one might look at a chair, he said to himself: a chair can also be divided into its parts—legs, seat, back, first, second and third part—and there is no reason why man could not be divided in the same way as a chair. Finally he grants that this will serve well enough as a classification of man's constitution, but there is really nothing remarkably new in it, as in his view the principle underlying the division of man's constitution into its four members applies equally to the chair.
When we turn to physical chemistry the matter already becomes less difficult. There one could not talk so glibly about simple division. The chemist divides water into hydrogen and oxygen, H2O; the natural scientist will not simply divide water in an abstract sense into two parts, hydrogen and oxygen.
He cannot leave it at that because he knows that hydrogen will not only combine with oxygen, as in water, but that it also combines, for instance in hydrochloric acid, with chloride. It follows that hydrogen contained in water is not only to be found there as part of water but is capable, when not forming part of water, of entering into quite different combinations. And likewise oxygen, when not forming part of water, can enter into other combinations and unite with quite different substances, as for instance, calcium, in lime. Hydrogen plus chloride can become hydrochloric acid, oxygen plus calcium becomes lime. Here one could not say: all you have to do is to divide water into its parts in the abstract, like a chair.
Man has to be considered on a still higher level. Here we have not merely a division into physical body, etheric body, astral body and ‘I,’ but man's physical body must be conceived as belonging to the earth. When a human being passes through the gate of death and leaves his physical corpse behind, the physical body turns to earth, but the etheric body rises up into the ether. The astral body leaves both and enters those worlds which are the domain of the second Hierarchy. And the I belongs to a different world again, the domain of the first Hierarchy. These four members do not merely represent a division for classification, they belong to quite different spheres of the Universe. At the same time the distinction illustrates the nature of man's being. We have here, on a much higher level, something for which one has to search already when progressing from the comparison of the chair with that of the water.
Naturally the level of mentality in our modern civilisation again presents a considerable obstacle, for the much-cited philosopher could have learned already from chemistry that it is not enough to go on talking only about abstract divisions, that one can apply them to a chair but not to water. However, in the case of this so-called philosopher, the philosophy unfortunately did not get past the chair to the water. It did not rise from the observation of life's trivialities to natural science. On the other hand, natural science does not concern itself with philosophy, so that the chemist of to-day does not think about such things at all.
It shows that in a philosophy which, from this point of view, might be called a ‘chair-doctrine,’ thinking in terms of natural science has as yet no part. Again, in chemistry, in natural science, philosophy plays no pert. Therefore it is precisely in the world of the scientist that those conditions are wanting, which can pave the way to an understanding of the deeper, inner truths of the Universe in their relation to man.
The man who undertook this critical study did in fact submit his article to me first, in manuscript. But what could I do with it? One cannot enter into a discussion with a man whose mind lacks the very first pre-requisites. I did nothing about it, but later found the article printed with all the mistakes and all the nonsense contained in such ‘chair-philosophy.’ Such are the trials of fate which Anthroposophy has to suffer on the way. One must be clear about such situations as they so often arise between Anthroposophy and its critics. It is precisely in that quarter that for the time being there is not the slightest possibility of an understanding.
And this philosopher, much quoted among philosophers, even makes certain concessions in line with ideas which are more or less popular currency in modern civilisation. For instance, he admits that there once existed a continent between Europe and America called ‘Atlantis,’ inhabited by the ancient Atlanteans, a prehistoric humanity. Then he asks the hypothetical question—I am not quoting verbatim—how is it possible that today, when we have a proper physiology and a proper psychology, anyone could conceive the idea of dividing man's being in such a way! Of course in Anthroposophy one does not do it in the way it can be done with a chair, but he thinks so. This philosopher—in his own way he is perfectly conscientious—was honestly puzzled how anyone could make such a division, or could hold such a primitive conception as compared with the knowledge a modern philosopher can command.
Well, as regards fundamental truths the modern philosopher is not in a particularly favourable position, but he thinks he is. Two days ago I explained to those who attended the Teachers' Course what modern so-called ‘psycho-analysis’ really is.
I should like to repeat that the peculiar thing about psycho-analysis is that it arises on the one side from dilettante physiology, in which the soul-forces do not reach the sphere of the spirit but remain bound to the body, while on the other hand it is based on dilettante psychology. The two do not meet. As a result, grotesque connections are being formulated when dilettantism endeavours to establish links between research work in psychology and research work in physiology. And the dilettantism is of immense proportions, and equally great in both cases. The psychiatrists' own psychological dilettantism equals in magnitude that of physical dilettantism, but when both are the same in volume and operate jointly, they multiply each other. That, according to simple arithmetic, makes the square of dilettantism. So that, seen in the true light, psycho-analysis is the square of dilettantism, because it is the product of the multiplication of dilettantism by dilettantism.
Now the problem for our much quoted philosopher amounted to this: he could not understand how anyone could conceive such a primitive idea as to divide man's being into four members as one divides a chair into three. So he advances the hypothesis that I must be a re-incarnated Atlantean. Really quite ingenious from the chair-philosophy point of view!
The Overcoming of Materialism by Knowledge attained
through living ThinkingOne can be a materialist if lack of inner strength makes it impossible for the soul-forces to seek an opening for finding the way which leads into the world of soul-and-spirit, to the archetypal origins. Nothing can be gained by trying to prove anything on crude evidence, because materialism can certainly be proved as long as the evidence of proof is taken from the physical world. That is the crucial point. To find the way from the physical, into the spiritual, inner activity is needed, not abstract reasoning. The way to true Anthroposophy is found through that inner activity in man which stimulates the search for true knowledge. And all skirmishing in attempts to prove anything is useless, because you cannot argue with a man whose proofs are based entirely on the physical world of the senses. To disprove to such a man what to him is indisputable remains an impossibility as long as he lacks that primal strength of the inner life which alone could start him on the way to finding the spiritual world.
This must be understood. One must realise that it is given to man to rise of his own free will from the physical to the spirituals that this rising into the spiritual world is not an act of sense-bound reasoning, but an act of inner, conscious human experience. It is only when one really has this vital inner experience that one becomes capable of appreciating Anthroposophy in the right perspective, as seen against the merits of merely physical methods of cognition.
Our time is sorely in need of this.—A philosophy whose analytic powers of reasoning are only applicable to such things as chairs, can hardly be expected to have a ready understanding for what are real human values. It is, however, quite competent when dealing with chair-values. But what humanity needs today is what leads man to man, to the real man, not merely to his outward appearance. In its outer aspect the appearance reflects all that is inherent in the archetype of the spiritual entity, but it does not reveal that to inner experience. For in the experience of self, man must first find and recognise himself as a being of soul-and-spirit. Thus in the last resort the way to all knowledge is bound up with knowing oneself as an image of the true Self of man.
If with the growing strength of love that level of knowledge is attained by which one recognises as one's own self what at first seems to be a strange being, and again, if one rises to the height where the earthly world is found again in the archetypal world, then one is no longer engaged in a process of gaining abstract knowledge, but in a process of living cognition.
And it is in this living process of attaining knowledge that the world reveals itself to man through his own being, and that his own being reveals itself in his experience of the outer world. Thus man becomes a being who finds himself again in the entire Universe, for knowing himself he learns to know the world and, knowing the world, he learns to know himself. In this inter-relationship between world and man there reveals itself what unites man with the Divine-Spiritual, that which makes his being aglow with the religious mood of all real higher knowledge. And finally, when earnest cognition blends with religious experience, then knowledge radiates religious emotion, and the transparency of knowledge is lifted to that sphere where faith becomes knowledge through its own inner power of cognition. The world is found in man and man in the world on the path of knowledge through the world.
(In the etheric world: through living thinking: touch.
In the astral world: through the deep silence of the soul: speech.
In the spiritual world: through re-cognition: memory.)Thus world and man become united in an all-embracing, cosmic, spiritual-divine being, in which man finds himself and the world and so for the first time rises to his true human dignity which can then also enter his religious and moral ethos and make him fully Man.
Die Menschliche Erkenntnisfähigkeit in der Ätherischen Welt
In diesen letzten Tagen versuchte ich den Menschen hineinzustellen in das ganze Universum, so daß man auf der einen Seite die Gliederung des Menschen erkennt nach dem physischen Leib, dem ätherischen oder Bildekräfteleib, dem astralischen Leib und dem eigentlichen Ich, das von Erdenleben zu Erdenleben geht. Zugleich aber versuchte ich darauf hinzuweisen, wie die Glieder der menschlichen Wesenheit, jedes in anderer Weise, zusammenhängen mit dem Universum. So kann man sagen, hängt der physische Leib des Menschen zusammen mit alledem, was physisch-sinnliche irdische Welt ist. Dieser physische Leib des Menschen gehört also der physisch-sinnlichen Welt an. Wollen wir aber an den ätherischen oder Bildekräfteleib herangehen, dann müssen wir uns bewußt sein, daß dieser eigentlich einer ganz andersartigen Welt angehört, daß er derjenigen Welt angehört, die selbst ätherisch ist, und von der ich Ihnen gesagt habe, daß eigentlich der Mensch sie empfinden muß als aus den Weiten des Kosmos an sich herankommend. Wenn man also sich etwa vorstellt: Die Kräfte der Erde verbreiten sich von der Erde aus nach allen Seiten, und der Mensch lebt innerhalb dieser Kräfte, die die Kräfte der physischen Welt sind, dann müssen wir uns vorstellen, daß die ätherische Welt von allen Seiten, von der ganzen Kugelschale des Weltalls, des Kosmos ausgeht und gegen die physischen Kräfte, diesen also entgegenkommend, an den Menschen herantritt. Dadurch ist der Ätherleib des Menschen ja ganz anderen Gesetzmäßigkeiten unterworfen als der physische Leib. Und wiederum, wenn wir an den astralischen Leib des Menschen herangehen, dann finden wir diesen zusammenhängend mit Welten, die wir nun überhaupt in jenem Kosmos nicht antreffen, der im Physischen, der im Ätherischen beschlossen ist, in dem wir leben zwischen Geburt und Tod, sondern wir finden, daß wir mit unserem astralischen Leibe einer Welt angehören, die wir betreten zwischen dem Tode und einer neuen Geburt.
Und endlich mit dem Ich selbst gehört man einer Welt an, welche wie eine Strömung durch Welten durchgeht, die, wie zum Beispiel unsere Welt, wiederum dreigliedrig sind. Unsere Welt ist dreigliedrig: physisch, ätherisch, astralisch. Die Welt des Ich geht durch diese Welt hindurch und durch andere ähnliche dreigliedrige Welten. Sie ist also eine viel umfassendere Welt. Sie ist eine Welt, die wir überhaupt bezeichnen müssen als die Welt des Ewigen gegenüber dem Zeitlichen.
Nun ist sie aber außerdem so, daß wir, wenn wir an diejenigen Wahrnehmungs- und Erkenntnisfähigkeiten des Menschen herantreten, welche uns bekanntmachen mit dem ätherischen oder Bildekräfteleib, dem astralischen Leib und dem Ich, daß wir dann eigentlich immer ganz andere Welten betreten. Wir müssen in die Sphäre des aktiven Denkens, des erlebten Denkens übertreten, wenn wir an unseren Ätherleib herankommen wollen. Wir müssen uns nur vorstellen, wie ja dann alles, was um uns als Welt ist, anders ist, als solange wir innerhalb der physisch-sinnlichen Welt sind. Vor allem nehmen sich die Dinge und Vorgänge, mit denen wir aus der physischen Welt bekannt sind, ganz anders aus in diesen höheren Welten. Wir haben ja nur die letzten Wirkungen an den Dingen und an den physischen Vorgängen in der physischen Welt um uns. Diese Dinge und diese Wirkungen sind aber in den höheren Welten begründet. Wir sehen also dann gewissermaßen dasjenige, was ursprünglicher ist von diesen Dingen, als das, was uns in der physischen Welt vorliegt. Aber abgesehen davon: Wenn wir in der physischen Welt sind, so haben wir ja zunächst jene Welt, die dem gewöhnlichen Bewußtsein gut bekannt ist, die Welt, in der der Mensch umgeben ist von den drei Naturreichen und von seinem eigenen Reiche; wenn wir aber aufsteigen zu denjenigen Erkenntniskräften — ich habe sie in meinen Büchern die imaginative Erkenntnis genannt —, durch die wir gewahrwerden unseren eigenen ÄÄther- oder Bildekräfteleib, dann betreten wir eben die ätherische Welt. Und wenn wir uns so weit erkraftet haben, wenn wir uns innerlich so durchleuchtet haben, und uns gewissermaßen in dem zweiten Menschen, in dem Bildekräfteleib erleben, dann treten wir auch ein in die Welt, die sich uns wenigstens zunächst in ihren Bildern offenbart, in die Welt der Angeloi, Archangeloi, Archai.
Es ist so, daß, wenn man gewissermaßen durchbricht in diejenige Weltsphäre, in der der Ätherleib oder Bildekräfteleib für uns ansichtig wird, dann innerhalb der flutenden Bilderwelt, in die man da eintritt, die Offenbarungen jener Wesenheiten erscheinen, die der dritten Hierarchie angehören: Angeloi, Archangeloi, Archai. Wir sind also da von Wesenheiten umgeben, die in der physisch-sinnlichen Welt nicht um uns sind. Die Art, wie wir von diesen Wesenheiten umgeben sind, ist eine solche, daß sie uns erscheint in den Qualitäten, möchte ich sagen, die auch hier in der Sinneswelt durch unsere Sinne uns gegeben sind.
Aber hier in der Sinneswelt sind zum Beispiel die Farben so, daß sie über die Oberfläche der Dinge hingebreitet sind oder daß sie uns in einer bloß physischen Konfiguration, wie zum Beispiel am Regenbogen, erscheinen. Es sind ‚die Töne so, daß sie für uns zusammenhängend erscheinen mit diesen oder jenen Dingen der physisch-sinnlichen Welt. Es sind auch Wärme und Kälte zum Beispiel so, daß sie ‘von diesen oder jenen Dingen der physisch-sinnlichen Welt ausgehen. Betrachten wir diese Welt, in der uns die dritte Hierarchie erscheint, dann haben wir nicht an den Dingen haftende Farben, nicht von den Dingen her klingende Töne und so weiter, sondern wir haben, man kann nicht einmal sagen, durch den Raum, sondern in der Zeit flutende Farben, flutende Töne, vibrierendes Warmes und Kaltes. Das ist nicht über die Oberfläche der Dinge hingespannt; was farbig ist, sondern das fluktuiert, das wellt. Nur weiß man einfach durch diejenigen Kräfte, durch die man sich in diese Welten versetzt hat, daß ebenso, wie man in der physischen Welt hinter dem Farbigen etwas Materielles vermutet, daß, wenn man irgendeine flutende Farbenwolke, einen flutenden, man kann schon sagen, Farbenorganismus in dieser Welt erblickt, darinnen ein Geistig-Seelisches waltet und webt, das zur dritten Hierarchie gehört. In dem Augenblicke also, wo dem Menschen jenes Lebenstableau erscheint, von dem ich gesprochen habe, das anschaulich zeigt, wie in einem Momente überschaubar, was wir durchlebt haben seit unserer Geburt, in diesem Augenblick lebt auch in dieser Strömung unserer eigenen Lebensereignisse drinnen dasjenige, von dem man sagen kann: Innerhalb der von der Materie freigewordenen flutenden Farben-, Tonwelt und so weiter, lebt nun die dritte Hierarchie.
Wenn wir uns dann durch die Kraft unseres Erkenntnisvermögens aufschwingen dazu, unseren eigenen astralischen Leib zu überblicken, also das, was von uns vorhanden war, ehe wir zum Erdendasein heruntergestiegen sind, was wir wiederum an uns tragen werden, wenn wir durch die Pforte des Todes geschritten sind, dann wissen wir: das ist eine weitere Welt, aber eine Welt, die wir auch nicht im Äther des Kosmos finden, die hinter dem Tor der Geburt und des Todes liegt. Es ist eine weitere Welt, die wir da betreten. Es ist die Welt des Astralischen.
Die Dinge fallen nicht genau zusammen mit dem, was ich in meiner «Theosophie» beschrieben habe; da ist die Sache von einem anderen Gesichtspunkte aus charakterisiert. Aber ebenso, wie wir die dritte Hierarchie treffen, wenn wir uns zu unserem Bildekräfteleib hinauf organisieren, ebenso treffen wir in dieser Welt, in der für uns ansichtig wird unser eigener astralischer Leib, die zweite Hierarchie: Exusiai, Kyriotetes, Dynamis. Und diese zweite Hierarchie erscheint uns jetzt für den wirklichen Anblick nicht in flutenden Farben, in flutenden Tönen, sondern sie erscheint uns so, daß sie uns einzelne Bedeutungen innerhalb des die Welt durchwellenden Logos verkündet und offenbart. Sie spricht zu uns.
Will man andeuten, wie man sich zu diesen Welten verhalten kann nach Erlangung der entsprechenden Erkenntniskräfte, will man das so andeuten, daß man Worte, an die man gewöhnt ist, zu diesen Andeutungen verwendet, Worte, die natürlich dann nicht mehr ihre ursprüngliche Bedeutung für die Sinneswelt haben, aber aus denen man doch etwas entnehmen kann für dieses Verhältnis zu den höheren Welten, so muß man sagen: Für die Ätherwelt wird das innerlich lebendige Denken eine Art Tastorgan. Mit dem innerlich lebendigen Denken berühren wir diese flutende Farbenwelt und so weiter. Wir dürfen uns nicht vorstellen, daß das so ist, daß wir das Rot so ähnlich sehen, wie wir das Rot der Sinne sehen, das über die Dinge hingespannt ist, gewissermaßen mit einem Auge sehen, sondern wir spüren, berühren Rot und Gelb und so weiter. Wir berühren die Töne. So daß wir sagen können: In der Ätherwelt ist das lebendige Denken Berührung dessen, was in der Welt der dritten Hierarchie lebt.
Kommen wir dann in die Welt hinein, der unser eigener astralischer Leib gewissermaßen angehört, so können wir nicht mehr von dieser astralischen Welt sagen, daß wir sie nur berühren, sondern wir müssen sagen: Diese Welt verstehen wir als Offenbarung der Wesen der zweiten Hierarchie. Jede einzelne Äußerung verstehen wir als ein Glied, als einen Teil des Weltenlogos. Durch das tiefe Schweigen kommt die Sprache der Geistwesen. Also nach der Berührung die Sprache, die Mitteilung.
Und wenn wir uns in der Art, wie ich das gestern angedeutet habe, hindurchringen zum Erleben des Ich, das von Erdenleben zu Erdenleben geht, und dazwischen die anderen Leben durchmacht zwischen dem Tode und einer neuen Geburt jeweilig, dann betreten wir eine Welt, die die eigentliche Geistwelt ist, die höhere Geistwelt. In dieser Welt ist es ja zunächst so, daß wir in ein ganz besonderes Verhältnis zu unserem wahren Ich kommen. Dasjenige Ich, das wir hier erleben innerlich im Erdendasein zwischen Geburt und Tod, das ist ja an die physische Leiblichkeit gebunden. Das ist wahrnehmbar für uns, solange wir uns in der physischen Leiblichkeit erleben, und wir werden in einer gewissen Weise zur Selbstlosigkeit gezwungen, wenn wir aufsteigen in die Ätherwelt, in die astralische Welt. Da haben wir höchstens etwas wie eine Erinnerung dieses Erden-Ichs.
Aber wir finden dann das wahre Ich in der angedeuteten Weise, wie es von Erdenleben zu Erdenleben geht. Wir finden dieses wahre Ich so, daß es uns zunächst vorkommt wie ein ganz anderes Wesen. Wir sagen uns: Hier stehe ich innerhalb dieses Lebens zwischen Geburt und Tod im irdischen Dasein. Ich blicke zurück durch das Stück Ätherwelt, das mir erscheint, bis zu meiner Erdengeburt hin. Dann blicke ich weiter durch in Welten, in weite Gefilde, die eigentlich nur zettliches Dasein haben, wo vom Raume zu sprechen im Grunde genommen ein Unding ist; aber es erscheint mir wie eine weite Perspektive die Welt mit all ihrem Inhalt, wie sie um uns herum lebt zwischen dem Tode und einer neuen Geburt. Indem ich durch den Äther hindurchschaue, durch die Welt der dritten Hierarchie, indem ich durch das Astralische hindurchschaue, in dem ich war zwischen dem Tode und einer neuen Geburt wie in einer in der Offenbarung des Logos lebenden, wie sich selbst durch die Weltensprache offenbarenden übersinnlichen Welt, indem ich durch das alles hindurchschaue, schaue ich endlich hin zu einem zunächst weit von mir entfernten Wesen, zu demjenigen, was mein Lebensinhalt im vorigen Erdenleben war. Da erscheint mir zunächst die Sache so, daß ich mir sage: Ich stehe eben hier im irdischen Leben mit meinem jetzigen gespensterartigen Ich, und dann sehe ich weit zurück durch alles das hindurch, was ich eben bezeichnet habe, auf den Inhalt meines vorigen Erdenlebens. Aber ich schaue zugleich, wie der als sich loswindendes Ich durchgegangen war durch die Welten, durch die ich wie perspektivisch hindurchgeschaut habe, bis in mein gegenwärtiges Erdenleben herein. Ich schaue zunächst wirklich mein lebendes wahres Ich wie ein fremdes fernes Wesen. Und ich erkenne mich wieder in diesem mir zunächst erscheinenden gleichsam fremden Wesen.
In diesem Satze müßte eigentlich jedes Wort ganz intensiv genommen werden, denn jedes einzelne Wort hat in diesem Satze eine ganz besondere Wichtigkeit. Zu dem ganzen Erleben gehört es, daß man sich aus der Wahrnehmung des eigenen Ich wie eines zunächst Fremden durchringt dazu, daß man sich sagt: Das, was dir da zunächst als Fremdes erschienen war, das bist du ja selbst. Dir ist es so erschienen, als ob in ferner Vergangenheit ein anderes Wesen gelebt hätte, aber du bist es ja selbst.
Und dann wird man gewahr, wie dieses Selbst eben hergeströmt ist vom vorigen Erdendasein in dieses Erdenleben herein, wie es aber jetzt gewissermaßen in diesem Erdenleben zugedeckt ist, und nur erscheinen würde, wenn all die Ereignisse, die zwischen dem Einschlafen und Aufwachen vorkommen, vor die Menschenseele hintreten würden. Da drinnen webt und lebt weiter dasjenige, was aus dem vorigen Erdenleben, durch Astral- und Ätherwelt durchströmend, bis zu uns gelangt ist.
Sehen Sie, es liegt eine Welt von irdischen Widersprüchen und himmlischen Einklängen in diesem Sichdurchringen: Irdische Widersprüche so, daß man durch alles dasjenige, was man zunächst für das alltägliche Leben hier auf Erden hat, im Grunde genommen an dieses eigene wahre Ich nicht herangelangen kann. In diesem Erden-Ich lebt eigentlich nur das erste Rudiment der Liebe. Und schon dadurch ist dem Leben auf Erden ein Glanz verliehen, daß die Kraft der Liebe in dieses irdische Leben hereinstrahlt. Aber diese Liebe muß gesteigert werden. Diese Liebe muß so gesteigert werden, daß der Mensch fähig wird, durch die Steigerung der Liebe die Ätherwelt und die Astralwelt wahrzunehmen, und damit eigentlich dasjenige, was als sein Ich, als der Egoismus, als das Gegenteil der Liebe in ihm lebt, was im Leben als das Gegenteil der Liebe ihm die Möglichkeit gibt, als eigenes Ich sich zu empfinden innerhalb des Erdenlebens, das zu überwinden. Die Liebe muß so stark werden, daß man lernt, dieses Ich der Erde zu übersehen, es zu vergessen, nicht mehr achtend auf es hinzuschauen. Liebe ist das Aufgehen des eigenen Wesens in dem anderen. Das muß so stark sein, daß man des eigenen Ichs, wie es im irdischen Leibe lebt, nicht mehr achtet. Dann tritt der Widerspruch auf, daß man gerade durch Selbstlosigkeit, durch höchste Liebefähigkeit an das eigene wahre Ich herandringt, das in der Ferne der Zeiten dann uns entgegenleuchtet.
Man muß schon sein Erden-Ich verlieren, um sein wirkliches wahres Ich in der Anschauung zu bekommen. Und derjenige, der nicht diese Hingabe entwickeln würde, der kann eben an dieses wahre Ich nicht herankommen. Man möchte sagen: Das wahre Ich will nicht gesucht sein, wenn es erscheinen soll, wenn es sich offenbaren soll; und es verbirgt sich, wenn es gesucht wird. Denn es wird nur in der Liebe gefunden. Und Liebe ist Hingabe des eigenen Wesens an das fremde Wesen. Daher muß das wahre Ich wie ein fremdes Wesen gefunden werden.
Und in demselben Augenblicke, in dem man eintritt in dieses Ansichtigwerden des eigenen wahren Ichs, wird man zugleich ansichtig dessen, was nunmehr in einer weiteren Welt lebt, in der eigentlichen Geistwelt. Man trifft zusammen mit den Wesen der ersten Hierarchie: Seraphime, Cherubime, Throne.
Und geradeso, wie man da sein Ich wiederfindet, von dem man eigentlich nur einen Abglanz hier im irdischen Leben hat, so findet man für die ganze Welt der irdischen Umgebung deren wahre Geistgestalt. Man muß auch diese irdische Welt verlieren für diese Erkenntnis, um deren wahre Ursprungswelt zugleich mit unserem wahren Ich zu finden.
So daß man sagen kann: Was sich in der Geistwelt offenbart, ist Wiedererkennen, Berührung, Sprache, Wiedererkennen, aber Wiedererkennen von etwas, das man eigentlich vorher nur im Abglanz, im Abbild kennengelernt hat.
So lebt man sich, indem man den eigenen Menschen erlebt, mit der Erkenntnis des eigenen Menschen in die Totalität des Universums hinein. Und vollständig dargestellt ist diese Gliederung des Menschen im physischen Leib, Ätherleib, astralischen Leib und Ich eigentlich nur dann, wenn man zugleich schildert, wie diese einzelnen Glieder der Menschennatur mit den entsprechenden Welten des Universums zusammenhängen.
Das, was ich eben jetzt dargestellt habe, das muß gut verstanden und durchschaut werden, wenn man auf dasjenige kommen will, was da zugrunde liegt, wenn man überhaupt an die Aufzählung dieser vier Glieder der menschlichen Natur herantritt. Das ist schon durchaus einer derjenigen Punkte, wo sich recht deutlich zeigt, daß der Mensch nicht nur anderes denken muß, wenn er zur Wahrheit der geistigen Welt aufsteigen will, sondern daß er in anderer Art denken muß. Er muß das ganze Denken, das eigentlich nur ein Bildhaft-Totes ist innerhalb der bloß sinnlich-physischen Anschauung, in ein Lebendiges überführen.
Und da kann man aus der Kultur der Gegenwart, aus dem Geistesleben der Gegenwart etwas ganz Besonderes erleben, was einem zeigt, welche Hindernisse zu überwinden sind, wenn Anthroposophie in die Seele der Menschen einziehen soll.
Als meine «Geheimwissenschaft» erschienen war, da machte sich ein vielgenannter Philosoph der Gegenwart über diese Geheimwissenschaft her. Nun, dieser Philosoph der Gegenwart las zunächst das Kapitel, wo von der Gliederung der menschlichen Natur in physischen Leib, ätherischen Leib, astralischen Leib, Ich und so weiter die Rede ist. Diese «Geheimwissenschaft» haben auch viele naive Menschen gelesen, die aber gesunden Menschenverstand haben. Die konnten sich dabei doch etwas vorstellen, weil die Dinge immer mit dem gesunden Menschenverstand zu verfolgen sind, geradeso wie man ein Bild verstehen kann, auch wenn man kein Maler ist. Aber bei gar manchem, der in der Gegenwart eben ein vielgenannter Philosoph ist, hapert es wesentlich mehr mit dem Verstehen als bei dem naiven Menschenkind. Denn dieser vielgenannte Philosoph, der las nun: physischer Leib, Ätherleib, astralischer Leib, Ich — ja, merkwürdig, was soll ich daraus machen? Was ist das alles? Physischer Leib, selbstverständlich; Ätherleib — nun ja, das kann ja sein; was im physischen Leib dichte Materie ist, das kann ja feinere Materie sein, aber es ist doch Materie. Also ist das doch ein willkürlicher Trennungsstrich zwischen dem physischen Leib und dem Ätherleib. Astralleib - man weiß etwas, sagte sich dieser vielgenannte Philosoph, von einer Seele, aber Astralleib? In der Seele ist Denken, Fühlen und Wollen. Das sind Funktionen des physischen Leibes. Hat man den physischen Leib begriffen, so hat man ja auch Denken, Fühlen und Wollen damit erfaßt. Und Ich — das ist ja nur die Zusammenfassung von alledem.
Und nun, sehen Sie, wie formulierte sich jetzt der kritische Gedanke dieses vielgenannten Philosophen? So formierte er sich: Er betrachtete dasjenige, was er da in der «Geheimwissenschaft» vor sich hatte, so wie man ungefähr auch einen Sessel betrachtet, und er sagte sich: Man kann ja auch den Sessel einteilen in die Beine, in den Sitz und in die Lehne, erster, zweiter, dritter Teil. So, glaubte er, kann ich nun auch den Menschen einteilen, wie man einen Sessel einteilt. Nun, da fand er: Das ist ja ganz schön zur Übersicht des Menschen, aber damit ist ja nichts besonders Neues gesagt — weil er eben meinte, wenn man den Menschen in diese vier Glieder einteile, dann sei es so, wie man einen Sessel einteilt.
Sehen Sie, in der Naturforschung ginge ja die Sache schon besser. Da könnte man nicht mehr so von bloßen Einteilungen sprechen. Denn wenn man Wasser hat, so zerlegt der Chemiker dieses Wasser in Wasserstoff und Sauerstoff, H:O; der Naturforscher wird es nicht gelten lassen, daß man das Wasser bloß abstrakt in zwei Teile einteilt, in Wasserstoff und Sauerstoff. Das kann er nicht gelten lassen, denn er weiß, der Wasserstoff braucht nicht bloß an den Sauerstoff gebunden zu sein, wie im Wasser, sondern er kann an etwas ganz anderes, zum Beispiel wie in der Salzsäure, an das Chlor gebunden sein. Also der Wasserstoff, der im Wasser ist, ist nicht nur ein Stückchen, ein Teil von dem Wasser, sondern, wenn er aus dem Wasser heraußen ist, kann er ganz andere Verbindungen eingehen. Und wiederum der Sauerstoff, wenn er aus dem Wasser heraußen ist, kann ganz andere Verbindungen eingehen, kann an ganz andere Stoffe gebunden sein, zum Beispiel an das Kalzium im Kalk. Also, es kann der Wasserstoff fortgehen und mit Chlor zusammen Salzsäure werden, der Sauerstoff kann fortgehen, mit dem Kalzium zusammen Kalk werden. Da geht es nicht, daß man sagt, du hast das Wasser bloß abstrakt einzuteilen wie einen Sessel.
Mit dem Menschen steht man auf einer noch höheren Stufe. Da hat man es nicht mit einer bloßen Einteilung zu tun, mit physischem Leib, Ätherleib, Astralleib und Ich, sondern da muß man sagen: Dasjenige, was des Menschen physischer Leib ist, das gehört zur Erde. Und wenn der Mensch durch die Pforte des Todes geht und zurückläßt seinen physischen Leichnam, dann geht der physische Leib zur Erde, der Ätherleib aber steigt zum Äther auf. Der astralische Leib aber geht von beiden weg in diejenigen Welten, wo die zweite Hierarchie drinnen ist. Und das Ich gehört wieder einer anderen Welt an, der Welt, in der die erste Hierarchie drinnen ist. Diese vier Glieder sind nicht Einteilungsglieder, diese vier Glieder gehören ganz verschiedenen Sphären des Weltenalls an. Mit der Einteilung ist zugleich auf das Wesen des Menschen hingewiesen. Da ist das auf einer weit höheren Stufe vorhanden, als dasjenige, was man schon auf dem Wege vom Sessel zum Wasser suchen muß.
Aber da ist nun natürlich innerhalb unserer gegenwärtigen Geistesentwickelung wiederum ein bedeutsames Hemmnis geschaffen, denn der vielgenannte Philosoph könnte lernen, schon bei der Chemie, daß man nicht immer nur von abstrakten Einteilungen zu reden hat, daß man das wohl beim Sessel tun kann, nicht aber beim Wasser. Aber die Philosophie des sogenannten Philosophen reichte eben nicht vom Sessel bis zum Wasser. Sie reichte nicht von der Auffassung der Lebenstrivialitäten, die nur in abstrakte Begriffe gebracht werden, bis in die Naturwissenschaft hinein. Und die Naturwissenschaft auf der andern Seite reicht wiederum nicht in die Philosophie herein. So daß der Chemiker heute überhaupt nicht nachdenkt über solche Dinge.
Also in der Philosophie, die man von diesem Gesichtspunkte aus auch eine Sessel-Lehre nennen könnte, in dieser Philosophie herrscht noch nicht naturwissenschaftliches Denken. In der Chemie, in der Naturwissenschaft, da herrscht wiederum keine Philosophie. So sind die Bedingungen gar nicht vorhanden, gerade innerhalb der Gelehrtenwelt nicht vorhanden, um an die tiefere innere Wahrheit des Universums in seinem Zusammenhange mit dem Menschen heranzukommen.
Jener Mann, der sich kritisch so an die Sache herangemacht hat, hat mir ja auch den Aufsatz zunächst im Manuskript geschickt. Aber was soll man denn anfangen mit so etwas? Man kann mit so jemandem ja nicht diskutieren; ihm fehlen ja die allerersten Vorbedingungen. Ich habe ihn liegen lassen, den Aufsatz. Dann habe ich ihn wiedergefunden, eben gedruckt mit all den Fehlern, mit all dem Unsinn eigentlich, der da in dieser Sessel-Philosophie enthalten war. Das sind eben solche Schicksals-Tücken der Anthroposophie auf ihrem Wege. Und gesehen werden muß, wie die Lage ist zwischen der Anthroposophie und dem, was oftmals kritisch sich über sie hermacht. Es ist gerade auf dieser Seite zunächst nicht die geringste Möglichkeit des Verstehens vorhanden.
Und dieser, unter Philosophen heute vielgenannte Philosoph, gibt sogar gewisse Dinge zu, die so mehr an die gewöhnlichen Vorstellungen der heutigen Zivilisation erinnern. So zum Beispiel gibt er zu, daß es einstmals eine Atlantis gegeben hat, einen Kontinent zwischen Europa und Amerika, und daß da die alten Atlantier, daß da eine Vormenschheit gelebt hat. Nun findet sich in jenem Aufsatze von ihm die Hypothese — nicht genau mit denselben Worten ausgedrückt -: Wie kommt denn jemand dazu, heute noch, wo es nun doch eine ordentliche Physiologie, eine ordentliche Psychologie gibt, den Menschen so einzuteilen? — Natürlich teilt man ihn in der Anthroposophie nicht wie einen Sessel ein, aber er glaubt das. Das entstand für diesen in seiner Art ja ganz gewissenhaften Philosophen als eine Rätselfrage: Wie kommt einer dazu, solch eine Einteilung zu machen? Das ist ja etwas so Primitives gegenüber dem, was der heutige Philosoph hat! -— Nun, der heutige Philosoph hat zwar nicht gerade besonders viel vom Gesichtspunkt der Wahrheit, aber er denkt, er habe ganz besonders viel. Ich habe vor zwei Tagen den verehrten Besuchern des Lehrerkurses einmal vorgeführt, wie man eigentlich das, was heute als sogenannte Psychoanalyse auftritt, aufzufassen hat.
Diese Psychoanalyse, ich möchte das auch hier wiederholen, hat nämlich das Eigentümliche, daß sie auf der einen Seite aus einer dilettantischen Physiologie hervorgeht, die nicht bis zum Geiste in der Seele heraufkommt, die unten stehenbleibt beim Leibe, und auf der andern Seite wiederum ausgeht von einer dilettantischen Psychologie. Die zwei kommen nicht zusammen. Und dadurch werden groteske Beziehungen aufgesucht zwischen dem, was man an Dilettantismus versucht in der Psychologie und dem, was man an Dilettantismus versucht in der Physiologie. Und der Dilettantismus ist ungeheuer groß und in beiden Fällen gleich groß. Der psychologische Dilettantismus ist bei den Psychiatern selber ebenso groß wie der physiologische Dilettantismus; wenn aber beide Größen gleich groß sind und zusammenarbeiten, so multipliziert es sich miteinander. Das ist der Dilettantismus im Quadrat, nach einer sehr einfachen Rechnung. So daß eigentlich die Psychoanalyse für eine wirkliche Anschauung eben der Dilettantismus im Quadrat ist, weil sie aus der Multiplikation des Dilettantismus mit Dilettantismus entsteht.
Da war für diesen vielgenannten Philosophen die Sache so: Er konnte sich nicht erklären, wie jemand heute dazu kommt, in so primitiver Weise, wie man einen Stuhl einteilt in drei Glieder, den Menschen in vier Glieder einzuteilen. Das konnte er sich nicht erklären. Daher stellte er die Hypothese auf, ich sei ein wiederauferstandener Atlantier. Das ist eigentlich ganz geistreich vom Standpunkte der Stuhl-Philosophie.
All diese Dinge aber weisen darauf hin, daß man eben tatsächlich, will man zur wahrhaftigen Anthroposophie herankommen, sich schon entschließen muß, einiges zu überwinden. Und zu dem, was zu überwinden ist, gehört zum Beispiel das Folgende: Man lernt das Seelische, das Geistige direkt erkennen und kann dann vom Seelischen und Geistigen außerhalb des Physischen sprechen. Man spricht nicht vom Seelischen und Geistigen durch irgendwelche Schlußfolgerungen, sondern man spricht vom Seelischen und Geistigen, weil man es eben in seiner Realität betrachtet. Heute kommen dann Leute, die schon nicht mehr anders können, als das Seelische als ein inneres Bedürfnis irgendwie zuzulassen. Aber sie sagen dann, man muß aus den Wirkungen des Physischen das Seelische erschließen.
Ich sagte ja, daß für manchen von den «erleuchteten» Anthroposophen das eine Wiederholung sein wird. Also es wiederholt sich so manches, was Sie schon wissen. Zum Beispiel, daß es heute naturphilosophierende Philosophen oder philosophierende Naturhistoriker gibt, die sagen: Da gibt es eine Pflanze, die Venusfliegenfalle. Sie hat eigentümlich gestaltete Blätter und Blüten. Wenn ein Insekt in die Nähe kommt, dann schließt sie sich. Die Venusfliegenfalle fängt dieses Insekt ab und zehrt es auf. - Ja, wenn man aus solchem äußerlichen Verhalten die Seele erschließen will, sagen will, die Pflanze habe auch eine Seele, dann kann ich Ihnen etwas nennen, was dann auch eine Seele haben muß. Das ist ein gewisses, sogar von Menschen zusammengestelltes Instrument. Man gibt etwas angeräucherten Speck hinein, und es hat eine Klappe daran, die zufällt, wenn eine Maus kommt, die durch den Speck angezogen wird und sich in dieses Instrument hineinbegibt. Wenn die Klappe zufällt, so ist es ganz dasselbe, wie bei der Venusfliegenfalle, bei der Pflanze. Man kann genau ebenso auf die Seele der Mausefalle schließen, wie jener LiteraturNaturphilosoph auf die Seele der Pflanzen schließt. Aus solchen Äußerlichkeiten lassen sich eben die Dinge durchaus nicht herleiten.
Nun muß man sich aber klar sein darüber, daß hier etwas vorliegt, was überhaupt hinausgeht über die Vorstellungen vom gewöhnlichen Beweisen oder Widerlegen, die die Leute zumeist haben. Denn sehen Sie, lernt man von diesem wahren Gesichtspunkte aus den Menschen kennen, so erfährt man dasjenige, was als physische Natur sich äußert im Menschen; das wird im Erdenleben ein vollständiger Abdruck dessen, was der Mensch als geistiges Wesen ist. Und Sie können ebenso wahr, wie Sie im Siegellack das Eingravierte des Petschafts haben, im physischen Leib des Menschen überall den Abdruck finden von dem, was der Mensch geistig-seelisch ist. Was der Mensch geistig-seelisch ist, Sie können es überall nachweisen in den Windungen des Gehirnes. Und wenn Sie also sich stumpf machen wollen gegen die geistige Welt, so können Sie sagen: es ist ja alles im Physischen enthalten. Man kann, wenn man will, durchaus Materialist sein. Es fehlt einem gar nichts beim Menschen von der Natur. Man muß eben nicht nur pochen auf Beweise oder Widerlegungen nach gewöhnlichem Zuschnitt, wie sie in der Welt sonst gesucht werden, sondern man muß sich klar sein, daß man den Zug hin haben muß zum Geiste, daß man das Geistige als etwas Selbständiges erkennen muß. Dann wird man nicht leugnen, daß es ein Petschaft gibt, weil es den Abdruck im Siegellack gibt. Der Materialist sagt: Petschaft gibt’s nicht, das ist alles aus dem Siegellack heraus geworden. So kann er beweisen, daß ja im Petschaft auch nichts anderes ist: da steht Josef Müller, der steht im Siegellack; der ganze Mensch ist im Siegellack drinnen.
Man kann Materialist sein, wenn man keine Möglichkeit hat, aus den Kräften der Seele, in der Selbsterfassung des Geistig-Seelischen, den Ausgangspunkt für den Weg zu finden ins Geistig-Seelische, ins Urbild hinein. Mit den groben Beweisen ist es ja nicht getan, denn Sie können den Materialismus beweisen, wenn Sie eben mit Ihren Beweisen in der physischen Welt bleiben. Das ist es, um was es sich handelt. Es muß eine innere menschliche Tat sein, sich vom Physischen in das Geistige hineinzufinden, nicht ein abstraktes Beweisen. Zur wahren Anthroposophie kommt man eben durch eine innere menschliche Tat, die aktiv das Erkennen weiterführt. Und alle Beweise-Plänkelei nützt nichts, denn bei dem, der mit seinen Beweisen in der physisch-sinnlichen Welt stehenbleibt, klappen alle Beweise zusammen, und Sie können einem Menschen, der eben nicht aus der Urkraft des menschlichen Eigenlebens heraus den Anfang des Weges in die geistige Welt findet, seine Beweise gar nicht widerlegen.
Diesen Tatbestand muß man einsehen. Man muß einsehen, daß es in des Menschen Freiheit gegeben ist, vom Physischen in das Geistige sich zu erheben, daß es nicht eine Tat der unfreien Beweise ist, sondern eine Tat des inneren menschlichen bewußten Erlebens, dieses Aufsteigen zu den geistigen Welten. Und wenn man das wirklich innerlich erfühlt, dann erst hat man das, was man braucht, um in der richtigen Weise die Stellung der Anthroposophie zu den bloß physischen Erkenntnisarten zu durchschauen.
Das aber ist unserer Zeit so sehr notwendig. Wir können nicht von einer Philosophie, die mit Bezug auf ihre Analyse bloß anwendbar ist auf Stühle, verlangen, daß sie dasjenige, was menschenwürdig ist, wirklich begreift; sie kann nur begreifen, was sesselwürdig ist. Die Menschheit braucht aber heute das, was den Menschen zum Menschen selber hinführt, nicht bloß zu seinem Abdruck. In der Anschauung bietet der Abdruck alles, was im Urbilde in der geistigen Wesenheit drinnen ist, im Erleben aber nicht. Denn im Erleben muß der Mensch sich als geistseelisches Wesen finden. Dann findet er auch die Welt als geistseelisches Wesen. Daher ist im Grunde genommen aller Erkenntnisweg damit verbunden, daß man sich selber als das Bild des wahren Menschen erkennt.
Steigt man in der Erhöhung der Liebe so weit in der Erkenntnis auf, daß einem zunächst das eigene Ich wie ein Fremdes erscheint und man es erst wiedererkennt, und steigt man so auf, daß man die Erdenwelt in der Umwelt wiedererkennt, dann steht man nicht bloß in einem abstrakten Erkenntnisprozeß drinnen, sondern in einem lebendigen Erkenntnisprozeß.
Und in diesem lebendigen Erkenntnisprozeß ist es, daß sich die Welt dem Menschen durch sein eigenes Wesen offenbart und daß sich das eigene Wesen des Menschen in dem Erleben der Welt draußen offenbart. Da wird wirklich der Mensch ein Wesen, das sich wiederfindet im ganzen Universum, denn, sich erkennend, lernt er die Welt erkennen, und die Welt erkennend, lernt er sich erkennen. Und im Wechselverhältnis zwischen Welt und Mensch enthüllt sich dasjenige, was dann den Menschen verbindet mit dem Göttlich-Geistigen, was den Menschen innerlich durchglüht mit der religiösen Stimmung aller wirklichen höheren Erkenntnis. Und wenn so sich abrundet zuletzt das ernste Erkennen in dem religiösen Erleben, dann wird der Glanz des Religiösen dem Erkennen verliehen, und dann wird die Durchsichtigkeit des Erkennens hinaufgehoben in das Gebiet, wo der Glaube zum Wissen wird durch seine eigene innere Erkenntniskraft. Es wird gefunden die Welt im Menschen, der Mensch in der Welt, durch den erkennenden Gang durch die Welt.
Da wird Welt und Mensch zu dem einen allumfassenden kosmischen geistig-göttlichen Wesen vereinigt, in dem dann der Mensch sich und die Welt findet und dadurch erst auf steigt zu seiner wirklichen wahren Menschenwürde, die dann auch in sein religiöses, in sein sittliches Ethos wahrhaft übergehen kann und ihn zum vollen Menschen macht.
In der Ätherwelt durch das lebendige Denken: Berührung. In der Astralwelt durch das tiefe Schweigen: Sprache. In der Geistwelt: Wiedererkennen.
Human Cognitive Ability in the Ethereal World
In recent days, I have attempted to place human beings within the entire universe, so that on the one hand, one can recognize the structure of the human being according to the physical body, the etheric or formative body, the astral body, and the actual self, which passes from one earthly life to the next. At the same time, however, I have tried to point out how the members of the human being, each in a different way, are connected with the universe. Thus, we can say that the physical body of the human being is connected with everything that is the physical-sensory earthly world. This physical body of the human being therefore belongs to the physical-sensory world. But if we want to approach the etheric or formative body, then we must be aware that it actually belongs to a completely different world, that it belongs to the world that is itself etheric, and of which I have told you that human beings must actually feel it as coming to them from the vastness of the cosmos itself. So if we imagine, for example, that the forces of the earth spread out from the earth in all directions, and that human beings live within these forces, which are the forces of the physical world, then we must imagine that the etheric world emanates from all sides, from the entire sphere of the universe, the cosmos, and approaches human beings in opposition to the physical forces, that is, in opposition to them. As a result, the etheric body of the human being is subject to completely different laws than the physical body. And again, when we approach the astral body of the human being, we find it connected with worlds that we do not encounter at all in the cosmos that is enclosed in the physical, in the etheric, in which we live between birth and death, but we find that with our astral body we belong to a world that we enter between death and a new birth.
And finally, with the I itself, one belongs to a world that flows through worlds which, like our world, for example, are in turn threefold. Our world is threefold: physical, etheric, astral. The world of the I passes through this world and through other similar threefold worlds. It is therefore a much more comprehensive world. It is a world that we must describe as the world of the eternal as opposed to the temporal.
But it is also the case that when we approach those human faculties of perception and cognition that acquaint us with the etheric or image-forming body, the astral body, and the I, we actually always enter completely different worlds. We must enter the sphere of active thinking, of experiential thinking, if we want to approach our etheric body. We need only imagine how everything around us as a world is different from when we are within the physical-sensory world. Above all, the things and processes with which we are familiar from the physical world appear quite different in these higher worlds. We only have the final effects of things and physical processes in the physical world around us. But these things and these effects are based in the higher worlds. So then we see, in a sense, what is more original in these things than what is presented to us in the physical world. But apart from that: when we are in the physical world, we first have that world which is well known to ordinary consciousness, the world in which human beings are surrounded by the three natural kingdoms and by their own kingdom; But when we ascend to those powers of knowledge — I have called them imaginative knowledge in my books — through which we become aware of our own etheric or image-forming body, then we enter the etheric world. And when we have strengthened ourselves to such an extent, when we have illuminated ourselves inwardly and, in a sense, experienced ourselves in the second human being, in the formative body, then we also enter the world that reveals itself to us, at least initially, in its images, the world of the Angeloi, Archangeloi, and Archai.
It is so that when we break through, as it were, into the sphere of the world in which the etheric body or formative force body becomes visible to us, then within the flowing world of images into which we enter, the revelations of those beings belonging to the third hierarchy appear: Angeloi, Archangeloi, Archai. We are thus surrounded by beings that are not around us in the physical-sensory world. The way in which we are surrounded by these beings is such that they appear to us in the qualities, I might say, that are also given to us here in the sensory world through our senses.
But here in the sensory world, for example, colors are such that they are spread over the surface of things or that they appear to us in a purely physical configuration, such as in a rainbow. Sounds are such that they appear to us to be connected with this or that thing in the physical-sensory world. Heat and cold, for example, are such that they emanate from this or that thing in the physical-sensory world. When we look at this world in which the third hierarchy appears to us, we do not have colors attached to things, sounds emanating from things, and so on, but rather we have colors flowing through time, sounds flowing through time, vibrating warmth and coldness. This is not stretched across the surface of things; what is colorful fluctuates, undulates. But we simply know, through the forces that have transported us into these worlds, that just as we suspect something material behind the colors in the physical world, so when we see any flowing cloud of color, a flowing, one might say, organism of color in this world, a spiritual-soul force is at work and weaving within it that belongs to the third hierarchy. So at the moment when the tableau of life I have spoken of appears to the human being, vividly showing in a single moment what we have experienced since our birth, at that moment there also lives within this stream of our own life events that which we can say: Within the flowing world of colors, sounds, and so on, freed from matter, the third hierarchy now lives.
When we then use the power of our cognitive faculties to rise above and survey our own astral body, that is, what was present in us before we descended to earthly existence, what we will carry with us again when we have passed through the gate of death, then we know: this is another world, but a world that we do not find in the ether of the cosmos, that lies beyond the gate of birth and death. It is another world that we enter there. It is the world of the astral.
Things do not coincide exactly with what I have described in my “Theosophy”; there the matter is characterized from a different point of view. But just as we encounter the third hierarchy when we organize ourselves up to our image-forming body, so in this world, in which our own astral body becomes visible to us, we encounter the second hierarchy: Exusiai, Kyriotetes, Dynamis. And this second hierarchy now appears to us in real vision not in flowing colors, in flowing tones, but in such a way that it proclaims and reveals to us individual meanings within the Logos that pervades the world. It speaks to us.
If one wants to indicate how one can relate to these worlds after attaining the corresponding powers of knowledge, if one wants to indicate this by using words that one is accustomed to, words that naturally no longer have their original meaning for the sensory world, but from which one can nevertheless glean something about this relationship to the higher worlds, then one must say: For the etheric world, inner living thinking becomes a kind of tactile organ. With inner living thinking, we touch this flowing world of colors and so on. We must not imagine that we see red in the same way as we see the red of the senses, which is stretched over things, seeing with one eye, so to speak, but rather we feel, touch red and yellow and so on. We touch the tones. So we can say: In the etheric world, living thinking is touching what lives in the world of the third hierarchy.
When we then enter the world to which our own astral body belongs, so to speak, we can no longer say that we only touch this astral world, but we must say: we understand this world as a revelation of the beings of the second hierarchy. We understand every single utterance as a link, as a part of the world Logos. Through the deep silence comes the language of the spirit beings. So after the touch comes the language, the communication.
And when we struggle our way, as I indicated yesterday, to the experience of the I that goes from earth life to earth life, and in between goes through the other lives between death and a new birth, then we enter a world that is the actual spirit world, the higher spirit world. In this world, the first thing that happens is that we enter into a very special relationship with our true self. The self that we experience here inwardly in earthly existence between birth and death is bound to physical corporeality. This is perceptible to us as long as we experience ourselves in physical corporeality, and we are forced in a certain way to become selfless when we ascend into the etheric world, into the astral world. There we have at most something like a memory of this earthly self.
But then we find the true self in the manner indicated, as it passes from one earthly life to another. We find this true self in such a way that it initially appears to us as a completely different being. We say to ourselves: Here I stand within this life between birth and death in earthly existence. I look back through the part of the etheric world that appears to me, back to my earthly birth. Then I look further through worlds, through vast realms that actually only have a fleeting existence, where it is basically absurd to speak of space; but it appears to me as a vast perspective, the world with all its contents, as it lives around us between death and a new birth. Looking through the ether, through the world of the third hierarchy, looking through the astral world in which I was between death and a new birth, as if in a super-sensible world living in the revelation of the Logos, revealing itself through the language of the worlds, looking through all this, I finally look at a being that is initially far away from me, at that which was the content of my life in my previous earthly existence. At first, the situation appears to me in such a way that I say to myself: I am standing here in earthly life with my current ghostly self, and then I look far back through everything I have just described to the content of my previous earthly life. But at the same time, I see how the self that has unwound has passed through the worlds that I have looked through as if in perspective, right into my present earthly life. At first, I really see my living, true self as a strange, distant being. And I recognize myself again in this being that at first appears to me as a stranger, as it were.
In this sentence, every word should actually be taken very intensely, because every single word in this sentence has a very special importance. Part of the whole experience is that one struggles through the perception of one's own self as something initially foreign to the realization that what initially appeared to you as foreign is in fact yourself. It appeared to you as if another being had lived in the distant past, but it is in fact yourself.
And then one becomes aware of how this self has flowed in from the previous earthly existence into this earthly life, but how it is now, in a sense, covered up in this earthly life and would only appear if all the events that occur between falling asleep and waking up were to come before the human soul. Inside, that which has come to us from the previous earthly life, flowing through the astral and etheric worlds, continues to weave and live.
You see, there is a world of earthly contradictions and heavenly harmonies in this struggle: Earthly contradictions such that, through everything that one initially has for everyday life here on earth, one cannot, in essence, reach one's own true self. In this earthly self, only the first rudiment of love actually lives. And already through this, life on earth is given a splendor, that the power of love shines into this earthly life. But this love must be increased. This love must be intensified so that through the intensification of love, the human being becomes capable of perceiving the etheric world and the astral world, and thus actually overcoming that which lives in him as his ego, as egoism, as the opposite of love, which in life, as the opposite of love, gives him the possibility of feeling himself as his own ego within earthly life. Love must become so strong that one learns to overlook this earth ego, to forget it, to no longer regard it with attention. Love is the merging of one's own being with another. This must be so strong that one no longer pays attention to one's own ego as it lives in the earthly body. Then the contradiction arises that it is precisely through selflessness, through the highest capacity for love, that one approaches one's own true ego, which then shines toward us from the distance of time.
One must lose one's earthly self in order to perceive one's real true self. And those who do not develop this devotion cannot approach this true self. One might say: the true self does not want to be sought if it is to appear, if it is to reveal itself; and it hides when it is sought. For it is only found in love. And love is the devotion of one's own being to another being. Therefore, the true self must be found as a foreign being.
And at the very moment when one enters into this vision of one's own true self, one simultaneously becomes aware of what now lives in a wider world, in the actual spirit world. One encounters the beings of the first hierarchy: seraphim, cherubim, thrones.
And just as one rediscovers one's self, of which one actually has only a reflection here in earthly life, so one finds the true spiritual form of the entire world of the earthly environment. One must also lose this earthly world for this insight, in order to find its true world of origin together with our true self.
So that one can say: What is revealed in the spirit world is recognition, contact, language, recognition, but recognition of something that one has actually only known before in reflection, in image.
Thus, by experiencing one's own human nature, one lives with the knowledge of one's own human nature in the totality of the universe. And this structure of the human being in the physical body, etheric body, astral body, and I is only fully represented when one also describes how these individual members of human nature are connected to the corresponding worlds of the universe.
What I have just described must be well understood and comprehended if one wants to arrive at what lies behind it, if one approaches the enumeration of these four members of human nature at all. This is certainly one of those points where it becomes quite clear that human beings must not only think differently if they want to ascend to the truth of the spiritual world, but that they must think in a different way. They must transform their entire thinking, which is actually only a dead image within the merely sensory-physical view, into something living.
And here we can experience something very special from contemporary culture, from contemporary spiritual life, which shows us what obstacles must be overcome if anthroposophy is to enter the souls of human beings.
When my “Secret Science” was published, a much-cited contemporary philosopher attacked this secret science. Well, this contemporary philosopher first read the chapter that discusses the division of human nature into the physical body, the etheric body, the astral body, the ego, and so on. Many naive people who have common sense have also read this “Secret Science.” They were able to imagine something because things can always be understood with common sense, just as one can understand a picture even if one is not a painter. But for many who are currently well-known philosophers, understanding is much more difficult than for naive human beings. For this much-cited philosopher read: physical body, etheric body, astral body, ego — yes, strange, what am I to make of this? What is all this? Physical body, of course; etheric body — well, that may be; what is dense matter in the physical body may be finer matter, but it is still matter. So this is an arbitrary dividing line between the physical body and the etheric body. Astral body — one knows something, said this much-named philosopher, about a soul, but astral body? In the soul there is thinking, feeling, and willing. These are functions of the physical body. If one has understood the physical body, one has also grasped thinking, feeling, and willing. And I — that is only the summary of all of this.
And now, you see, how did the critical thought of this much-mentioned philosopher formulate itself? It took shape as follows: he looked at what he had before him in “The Secret Science” in much the same way as one might look at an armchair, and he said to himself: one can also divide the armchair into the legs, the seat, and the backrest, the first, second, and third parts. So, he believed, I can now also divide the human being in the same way as one divides an armchair. Well, he found that this was a nice overview of the human being, but it didn't say anything particularly new — because he thought that dividing the human being into these four parts was like dividing an armchair.
You see, in natural science, things would be better. There, one could no longer speak of mere classifications. For when one has water, the chemist breaks it down into hydrogen and oxygen, H:O; the natural scientist will not accept that water is merely abstractly divided into two parts, hydrogen and oxygen. He cannot accept this because he knows that hydrogen does not only need to be bound to oxygen, as in water, but can also be bound to something completely different, for example, to chlorine, as in hydrochloric acid. So the hydrogen in water is not just a small part of the water, but when it is outside of water, it can form completely different compounds. And again, when oxygen is outside of water, it can form completely different compounds and be bound to completely different substances, such as calcium in lime. So hydrogen can leave and combine with chlorine to form hydrochloric acid, and oxygen can leave and combine with calcium to form lime. It is not possible to say that you have to classify water in an abstract way, like an armchair.
With human beings, we are on an even higher level. Here we are not dealing with a mere classification, with the physical body, etheric body, astral body, and ego, but we must say: that which is the physical body of the human being belongs to the earth. And when a human being passes through the gate of death and leaves behind their physical corpse, the physical body goes to the earth, but the etheric body ascends to the ether. The astral body, however, departs from both to those worlds where the second hierarchy is located. And the I belongs to yet another world, the world in which the first hierarchy is found. These four members are not divisions; these four members belong to completely different spheres of the universe. The division also points to the nature of the human being. It exists on a much higher level than what one must seek on the way from the chair to the water.
But now, of course, a significant obstacle has been created within our current spiritual development, because the much-mentioned philosopher could learn, even in chemistry, that one cannot always speak only of abstract divisions, that one can do so with the chair, but not with water. But the philosophy of the so-called philosopher did not extend from the chair to the water. It did not extend from the conception of the trivialities of life, which can only be expressed in abstract terms, to the natural sciences. And natural science, on the other hand, does not extend into philosophy. So that chemists today do not think about such things at all.
So in philosophy, which from this point of view could also be called an armchair doctrine, scientific thinking does not yet prevail. In chemistry, in natural science, philosophy does not prevail. Thus, the conditions are not in place, especially within the scholarly world, to approach the deeper inner truth of the universe in its connection with human beings.
The man who approached the matter so critically also sent me the essay in manuscript form at first. But what is one to do with such a thing? One cannot discuss anything with someone like that; he lacks the most basic prerequisites. I left the essay lying around. Then I found it again, printed with all the mistakes, with all the nonsense that was actually contained in this armchair philosophy. These are just some of the twists of fate that anthroposophy has to deal with on its path. And we must see how the situation stands between anthroposophy and what is often critically attacked about it. On this side, at least, there is not the slightest possibility of understanding.
And this philosopher, much talked about among philosophers today, even admits certain things that are more reminiscent of the common ideas of today's civilization. For example, he admits that there was once an Atlantis, a continent between Europe and America, and that the ancient Atlanteans, a pre-human race, lived there. Now, in that essay of his, there is a hypothesis — not expressed in exactly the same words —: How can anyone, even today, when we have proper physiology and proper psychology, still classify human beings in this way? — Of course, in anthroposophy we do not classify human beings like chairs, but he believes that we do. For this philosopher, who was very conscientious in his own way, this became a mystery: how can anyone make such a classification? This is so primitive compared to what today's philosopher has! — Well, today's philosopher does not have particularly much from the point of view of truth, but he thinks he has a great deal. Two days ago, I showed the esteemed visitors to the teachers' course how to understand what is known today as psychoanalysis.
This psychoanalysis, I would like to repeat here, has the peculiarity that, on the one hand, it arises from a dilettantish physiology that does not rise to the spirit in the soul, but remains at the level of the body, and, on the other hand, it proceeds from a dilettantish psychology. The two do not come together. And as a result, grotesque relationships are sought between what is attempted in amateurish psychology and what is attempted in amateurish physiology. And the amateurishness is enormous and equally great in both cases. Psychological amateurism among psychiatrists themselves is just as great as physiological amateurism; but when both are equally great and work together, they multiply each other. That is amateurism squared, according to a very simple calculation. So that, in fact, psychoanalysis is, for a real view, precisely amateurism squared, because it arises from the multiplication of amateurism with amateurism.
For this much-cited philosopher, the matter was as follows: He could not explain how anyone today could come to divide humans into four parts in such a primitive way as dividing a chair into three parts. He could not explain this. Therefore, he hypothesized that I was a resurrected Atlantean. This is actually quite witty from the standpoint of chair philosophy.
All these things, however, indicate that if one wants to approach true anthroposophy, one must first decide to overcome certain things. And among the things that must be overcome is the following: one learns to recognize the soul and spirit directly and can then speak of the soul and spirit outside of the physical. One does not speak of the soul and spirit through any conclusions, but one speaks of the soul and spirit because one sees them in their reality. Today, there are people who can no longer do anything but somehow allow the soul to be an inner need. But then they say that one must deduce the soul from the effects of the physical.
I said that for some of the “enlightened” anthroposophists this will be a repetition. So some of what you already know will be repeated. For example, that today there are philosophers who philosophize about nature or natural historians who philosophize who say: There is a plant called the Venus flytrap. It has peculiarly shaped leaves and flowers. When an insect comes near, it closes. The Venus flytrap catches this insect and consumes it. Yes, if you want to deduce the soul from such external behavior, to say that the plant also has a soul, then I can name something else that must also have a soul. It is a certain instrument, even one assembled by humans. You put some smoked bacon in it, and it has a flap that closes when a mouse comes along, attracted by the bacon, and enters this instrument. When the flap closes, it is exactly the same as with the Venus flytrap, the plant. One can infer the soul of the mousetrap in exactly the same way as that literary natural philosopher infers the soul of plants. Such outward appearances do not allow us to deduce anything at all.
Now, however, we must be clear that what we have here goes beyond the ideas of ordinary proof or refutation that most people have. For you see, when you get to know people from this true point of view, you experience what is expressed as physical nature in human beings; in earthly life, this becomes a complete imprint of what human beings are as spiritual beings. And just as you can find the engraving of a seal in sealing wax, you can find the imprint of what a human being is spiritually and soulfully everywhere in the physical body of the human being. What a human being is spiritually and soulfully can be found everywhere in the convolutions of the brain. And so if you want to make yourself insensitive to the spiritual world, you can say: everything is contained in the physical. If you want, you can certainly be a materialist. Human beings lack nothing from nature. One must not only insist on evidence or refutations of the usual kind, as they are otherwise sought in the world, but one must be clear that one must have an inclination toward the spirit, that one must recognize the spiritual as something independent. Then one will not deny that there is a seal, because there is an imprint in the sealing wax. The materialist says: there is no seal, it is all from the sealing wax. In this way he can prove that there is nothing else in the seal: there is Josef Müller, he is in the sealing wax; the whole person is in the sealing wax.
One can be a materialist if one has no possibility of finding the starting point for the path to the spiritual-soul realm, to the archetype, from the forces of the soul, in the self-comprehension of the spiritual-soul realm. Crude evidence is not enough, because you can prove materialism if you remain with your evidence in the physical world. That is what it is all about. It must be an inner human act to find one's way from the physical into the spiritual, not an abstract proof. True anthroposophy is reached through an inner human act that actively continues the process of recognition. And all skirmishing with evidence is useless, because for those who remain with their evidence in the physical-sensory world, all evidence collapses, and you cannot refute the evidence of a person who does not find the beginning of the path to the spiritual world out of the primal force of their own human life.
One must recognize this fact. One must recognize that it is within human freedom to rise from the physical to the spiritual, that this ascent to the spiritual worlds is not an act of unfree evidence, but an act of inner human conscious experience. And only when one truly feels this inwardly does one have what one needs to understand in the right way the position of anthroposophy in relation to merely physical types of knowledge.
But this is so necessary in our time. We cannot demand that a philosophy, which in terms of its analysis is only applicable to chairs, truly understand what is human; it can only understand what is chair-like. But humanity today needs what leads people to themselves as human beings, not just to their imprint. In contemplation, the imprint offers everything that is contained in the archetype in the spiritual essence, but not in experience. For in experience, man must find himself as a spiritual-soul being. Then he also finds the world as a spiritual-soul being. Therefore, basically, all paths of knowledge are connected with recognizing oneself as the image of the true human being.
If one ascends in the elevation of love so far in knowledge that one's own self initially appears like a stranger and one only recognizes it again, and if one ascends so far that one recognizes the earthly world in the environment, then one is not merely in an abstract process of knowledge, but in a living process of knowledge.
And it is in this living process of knowledge that the world reveals itself to the human being through his own being, and that the human being's own being reveals itself in the experience of the world outside. Here the human being truly becomes a being who finds himself in the whole universe, for in recognizing himself he learns to recognize the world, and in recognizing the world he learns to recognize himself. And in the interrelationship between the world and man, that which then connects man with the divine-spiritual is revealed, that which inwardly glows through man with the religious mood of all real higher knowledge. And when serious knowledge is finally rounded off in religious experience, then the splendor of religion is bestowed upon knowledge, and then the transparency of knowledge is elevated to the realm where faith becomes knowledge through its own inner power of cognition. The world is found in man, man in the world, through the cognitive journey through the world.
There, the world and man are united into the one all-encompassing cosmic spiritual-divine being, in which man then finds himself and the world and thereby ascends to his real true human dignity, which can then also truly merge into his religious, moral ethos and make him a complete human being.
In the etheric world through living thinking: touch. In the astral world through deep silence: language. In the spirit world: recognition.