The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Appendix to Part II

Preliminary Note:

[ 1 ] Since the crucial related idea of “creation out of nothing” does not appear in the notes on the presentations of the doctrine of the Logos in the last lecture of Part I and Part II, supplementary remarks on this subject, as given in other lectures, follow here.

From a lecture in Berlin, October 30, 1905 (in GA 93a)

[ 2 ] The course of development in the world presents itself to us in three stages: consciousness, life, and form. Consciousness, in its various forms, is expressed in the seven planets: Saturn, Sun, Moon, Earth, Jupiter, Venus, and Vulcan. On each planet, it passes through seven kingdoms of life, and each kingdom of life passes through seven states of form.

[ 3 ] Our physical Earth is one such state of form, the fourth state of form or globe within the fourth kingdom of life of the fourth planet or state of consciousness. Let us now consider the Earth as it is today and ask ourselves: What are we doing here? — We take the objects out in space, initially in the mineral kingdom, and form works of art from them. Here we combine; we form a whole out of details. This is creation within form. Now, something new can also arise in another way, namely in a manner similar to how, for example, stems, leaves, and flowers emerge from a plant root. This flower is not assembled like a machine, through combination, but must grow forth from what is already there. This is a process within life. From what is there, something new is created.

[ 4 ] In the third type of creation, that which arises from consciousness, something emerges in such a way that we can say: There was essentially nothing there before—a nothingness.

[ 5 ] Let us place ourselves at the very beginning of such a planetary evolution, right at the start of the Saturn evolution. What do we observe there? There was not yet a physical planet; not even a planet existed in the finest form of arupa; rather, we are still before the moment when Saturn first comes into being. Nothing from our planetary chain is present there yet; but the entire fruit of the preceding planetary chain is there, much like when we wake up in the morning, having done nothing yet, and merely the memory of what we did the previous day is contained in our mind. Thus, when we place ourselves entirely at the very beginning of Saturn’s development, we have in the revealing spirits the memory of a previous planetary chain, of what had been before. Now let us place ourselves at the end of the planetary chain, in the time when the volcanic stage is coming to an end. During the planetary chain, what was present as a potential at the beginning gradually came to light as creation. We thus first have an outflow of consciousness; from the content of the past, from memory, consciousness creates the new. So at the end there is something that was not there at the beginning: namely, all experiences. What was there at the beginning has flowed out into all manner of things and beings. A new consciousness has arisen at the end with a new content, a new content of consciousness. It is something that has emerged from nothing, from experiences. When we consider renewal in life, we must tell ourselves that there must be a seed that makes this possible. But the new content of consciousness at the end of a planetary evolution has indeed emerged from nothing, from experiences; no foundations are needed for this; it creates something that arises from nothing. One cannot say that when one personality looks at another, it has taken something from the other, if it subsequently carries the memory of the other personality within itself. This memory has emerged from nothing. This is a third type of creation: out of nothing. The three types of creation are therefore as follows:

[ 6 ] Combining existing parts (form)

[ 7 ] Bringing forth new forms with new life content from existing foundations (Life)

[ 8 ] Creation out of nothing (Consciousness).

[ 9 ] These are three definitions of entities that give rise to a planetary chain, that underlie a planetary chain. They are called the three Logoi. The third Logos brings forth from the combination. When something else emerges from a single substance with new life, it is the second Logos that brings it forth. But wherever we have a coming forth from nothing, there we have the first Logos. Therefore, the first Logos is often called that which is hidden within things themselves; the second Logos, the substance resting within things that creates the living from the living; and the third Logos, that which combines all that exists, composing the world from things.

[ 10 ] These three Logoi are always intertwined and interpenetrating in the world. The first Logos also experiences inner wisdom and will. In the creation of the first Logos there is experience, that is, the gathering of thoughts from nothing and then creating again according to those thoughts from nothing. Creation out of nothing, however, is not meant to imply that nothing existed at all, but rather that experiences are gained in the course of development and that something new is created in the course of becoming, so that what is there, as it were, melts away and something new is created out of experience.

[ 11 ] This creation occurs, comparatively speaking, as follows: Someone looks at another person and commits the image to memory. If he were creatively gifted like the First Logos, he could say to himself: Yes, I have seen NN, and I also know the concept of the inverse of NN. I can also form a negative image of him: So where there is black, there is white, and vice versa. In this way, he has created a completely new entity from the experience of the object and its negative. He could endow this with life. It would be a new entity that did not exist before. Now let us suppose that someone does this with many people, and those many people were to perish; then the observer would be able to create a new world based on his experiences.

[ 12 ] By observing the world, one constantly sees the three Logoi interacting with one another. Let us create a mental image of the workings of the three Logoi in relation to humanity within our planetary system. Let us imagine the point at the beginning of Saturn’s evolution, when nothing yet existed. What happens there? Everything that existed before is, as it were, poured out. All things that were there before are poured out. What arises in this way would be the very first outpouring of substance from the sum of past experiences. Everything that was previously absorbed is poured out in the form of substance. This also contains the substance from which humanity later arises. This substance is initially present merely as substance. This outflow must then be continuously built up and combined. This combination of the outflowing substance is a new creation. This is initially a work of the third Logos; following the outflow of the substance, therefore, a work of the third Logos.

[ 13 ] What does this mean for human beings? For human beings, it means that, first of all, all the parts that will eventually form their physical body are brought together. Back then, on Saturn, human beings were like automatons. If a word had been spoken into them at that time, they would have repeated it. Forms of beings are created. This is called the work of the Third Logos, and it continues into the Solar Age, when human beings also receive the etheric body—life. This is the work of the Second Logos. Now let us move on to the Earth Age. There, human beings themselves acquire consciousness—that is, the ability to gather experiences from nothingness. This is the work of the First Logos. The human being on Saturn receives that which is form within them from the third Logos. The human being on the Sun receives that which is life within them from the second Logos. The human being on Earth receives that which becomes consciousness within them from the first Logos.

[ 14 ] The concept of consciousness must become a little clearer to us. To do this, we must fully work out the concept of consciousness on a specific plane. Man is conscious, but the question is knowing where his consciousness is. Man is now conscious on the physical plane when we speak of waking consciousness. But waking consciousness could also be on the astral plane. If a creature’s life is on the physical plane and its consciousness is on the astral plane, then it is an animal.

[ 14 ] In humans, consciousness is localized in the head. In animals, for example in a tiger, consciousness is on the astral plane. It creates a certain point of contact outside the head through which it acts upon the tiger. When the tiger feels pain, the pain also passes over to the astral plane. The organ for this in the tiger is located in front of the head, at the place where the forehead is in humans. In humans, this point is already enclosed within the head and filled with the forebrain; consciousness has been captured by the brain and the frontal skull and is therefore on the physical plane. In the tiger, and indeed in all animals, the focal point of consciousness lies in front of the head, in the astral, where it enters the astral world. With plants, it is different again. If we could trace their consciousness, moving from top to bottom, we would always emerge at the tip of the root. If we then followed the line of growth, we would arrive at the center of the Earth. There lies the focal point of all sensations, the point where the consciousness of plants is absorbed. It stands in direct connection with the mental world. The entire plant world has its consciousness in the mental realm. In the entire mineral world, consciousness is located in the highest realms of the mental world, on the Arupa plane. The stones possess their consciousness in such a way that if we were to seek that point, we would find it as a kind of solar atmosphere. When we work with the mineral world on Earth—when we tap stones—every single action stands in a certain relationship to this solar atmosphere. There, one senses what the human being is doing here. So we have a series of beings on the physical plane, whose consciousness, however, lies on different planes.

From a lecture in Stuttgart, September 15, 1907 (in GA 101)

[ 17 ] But first, let us examine what involution and evolution mean. Let us consider a plant, a fully developed plant with roots, leaves, stem, flower, fruit—in short, with all the parts a plant can possibly have. That is one aspect. And now consider the tiny seed from which the plant can grow again. Anyone looking at the seed sees only a small grain, but within this small grain the entire plant is already contained; it is, so to speak, enclosed within it. Why is it there? Because the seed is taken from the plant, because the plant has placed all its powers into the seed. That is why occultism distinguishes between the two processes: one consists in the seed uncoiling and unfolding into the whole plant—evolution; the other consists in the plant folding itself up so that its form, as it were, creeps back into the seed—involution. So when any being that has many organs develops in such a way that nothing of these organs is visible anymore, that they have shrunk down to a small part, this is called involution, and the spreading out, the unfolding, is called evolution. This duality alternates everywhere in life, but always only in the manifest. You can observe this not only in plants, but also in the higher realms of life. Consider, for example, the development of European spiritual life from Augustine to Calvin and beyond the Middle Ages. If you let your gaze wander over the spiritual life of that era, you will see a certain mystical depth in Augustine himself. No one will read his writings, especially his *Confessions*, without sensing how deeply intimate this man’s emotional life was. And as we move further forward in time, we encounter such a remarkable figure as Scotus Eriugena, a monk who hailed from Scotland and was thus also called the Scottish John, who lived at the court of Charles the Bald. He fared poorly within the Church; legend has it that his fellow monks tortured him to death with pins. Of course, this is not to be taken literally; but it is true that he was tortured to death. A magnificent book was written by him: “De divisione naturae” — “On the Division of Nature” — which displays tremendous depth. Further on, we find the mystics of the so-called German Pfaffengasse, where this emotionalism seized entire masses of people. It was not only the leaders of the clergy, but also the people; the men who worked in the fields or in the smithy—they were all seized by that emotional sensibility, which manifested itself as a trend of the times in this way. Further back we find Nicolaus Cusanus, who lived from 1400 to 1464. And so we can trace this period back to the end of the Middle Ages; we always find that depth of feeling, that intimacy, which spread across all circles. If we now compare this period with the later one that succeeded it—the one that begins in the 16th century and extends up to our own time—then we notice a tremendous difference. At the starting point we see Copernicus, who, through a comprehensive idea, brings about a renewal of spiritual life; who incorporates this idea into humanity in such a way that today anyone who believes otherwise is considered a fool. We see Galileo, who discovered the laws of the pendulum from the oscillations of a church lamp in Pisa. Thus we can trace the course of time step by step; everywhere we would find the stark contrast to the Middle Ages. Feeling diminishes more and more, intimacy fades; reason and intellectuality come to the fore more and more, people become ever wiser and more intelligent. Here, two epochs follow one another, each of exactly opposite character. Spiritual Science provides us with the explanation for both epochs. There is an occult law that states that it must be so. From the time of Augustine to Calvin, the epoch was one of mystical evolution and intellectual involution, and since then we have been living in a time of intellectual evolution and mystical involution. What does this mean? From Augustine to the 16th century was a time of the outward unfolding of the mystical life; it was out in the open then. But something else was present only in a germinal state at that time: the intellectual life. It was like a seed, so to speak, hidden in the spiritual soil, to unfold gradually after the 16th century. Intellectual life was thus in involution at that time, just as the plant is inside the seed. Nothing in the world can come into being unless it was first in such a state of involution. Since the 16th century, intellectuality has been in evolution, while mystical life has receded; it is in involution. And now the time has come when this mystical life must emerge again, when it must be brought back to unfolding, to evolution, through the theosophical movement.

[ 18 ] Thus, throughout life, involution and evolution alternate in their manifestation. But whoever stops there is looking only at the outer side. If one wishes to view the whole, a third element must be added, one that lies behind these two. What is this third element? Imagine for a moment that you are facing a phenomenon of the external world and you are reflecting on it. You are there, the external world is there, and within you your thoughts arise. These thoughts were not there before. If, for example, you form the thought of a rose, it arises only at the moment when you enter into a relationship with the rose; you were there, the rose was there; and when the thought, the image of the rose, now rises within you, something entirely new, something that did not yet exist, comes into being. This is also the case in other areas of life. Imagine Michelangelo at work. Michelangelo, after all, almost never worked from models. But let us imagine for a moment that he had assembled a group of models. Michelangelo was there, the models were there. But the mental image that Michelangelo now has of this group in his soul—that is new; that is a completely new creation. This has nothing to do with involution and evolution. This is something entirely new, arising from the interaction of a being capable of receiving with a being capable of giving. Such new creations always arise through the interaction of beings with beings. Such new creations are a beginning. Recall what we considered here yesterday: how thoughts are creative, how they can ennoble the soul, and later even work on the formation of the body. Whatever a being once thinks—the creation of thought, the creation of imagination—continues to work and exert its influence. It is a new creation and at the same time a beginning, but it entails consequences. If you have good thoughts today, these thoughts are fruitful for the distant future, for your soul follows its own path in the spiritual world. Your body returns to the elements; it decays. But even if everything from which the thought arose decays, the effect of the thought remains; the thought continues to work. Let us take the example of Michelangelo once more. His magnificent sculptures have had an uplifting effect on millions of people. But these sculptures will one day crumble to dust, and there will be generations who will see nothing more of his creations. What lived in Michelangelo’s soul before his paintings took on external form—what was first a new creation within his soul—that lives on, that remains, and that will emerge and take shape in future stages of development. Do you know why clouds and stars appear before us today? Because in times past there were beings who conceived the idea of clouds and stars. Everything arises from thought-creations, and thought is a new creation. Everything has arisen from thought, and the greatest things in the world have emerged from the thoughts of the Deity.

[ 19 ] There you have the third. In revelation, things alternate between evolution and involution. But hidden deep behind this lies the third, which alone provides fullness—a creation that is a complete new creation, which has emerged from nothing. Three things thus belong together: creation out of nothing, and then, when this becomes manifest and unfolds in time, it takes on the forms of manifestation: evolution and involution.

From a lecture in Berlin, June 17, 1909 (in GA 107)

[ 20 ] In Christian esotericism, creating from relationships is called creating in the Spirit. And creating from relationships that are right, beautiful, and virtuous is called the Holy Spirit in Christian esotericism. The Holy Spirit blesses humanity when it is capable of creating what is right or true, beautiful, and good out of nothing. But in order for humanity to become capable of creating in the sense of this Holy Spirit, it first had to be given the foundation, as is the case with all creation out of nothing. This foundation was given to humanity through the entry of Christ into our evolution. By being able to experience the Christ event on Earth, human beings became capable of ascending to creation in the Holy Spirit. Thus it is Christ himself who creates the most eminent, deepest foundation. When human beings become so grounded in the experience of Christ that this experience becomes the vehicle into which they enter to develop further, Christ sends them the Holy Spirit, and they become capable of creating what is right, beautiful, and good in the spirit of further development.

[ 21 ] Thus we see how, as it were, as the final culmination of what has been imprinted upon humanity by Saturn, the Sun, and the Moon, the Christ event has come to Earth, which has given humanity the highest gift, enabling it to live within the perspective of the future and to create ever more out of circumstances—out of that which is neither here nor there, but depends on how humanity relates to the facts of its environment—which, in the most comprehensive sense, is the Holy Spirit. This, in turn, is another aspect of Christian esotericism. Christian esotericism is connected with the deepest thought we can have regarding all development, with the idea of creation out of nothing.

[ 22 ] That is why no true theory of evolution will ever be able to abandon the idea of creation out of nothing. Suppose there were only evolution and involution; then there would be an eternal repetition, as is the case with plants; on the volcano, there would be only that which began on Saturn. But in reality, creation ex nihilo is added to evolution and involution and takes place at the very heart of our development. After Saturn, the Sun, and the Moon have passed, Christ appears on Earth as the great enriching element, which brings about something entirely new on the volcano—something that did not yet exist on Saturn. Those who speak only of evolution and involution will speak of development as if everything were merely repeating itself in a cycle. Such cycles, however, can never truly explain the development of the worlds. Only when we add to evolution and involution this creation out of nothing, which introduces something new into the existing conditions, do we arrive at a true understanding of the world.