Donate books to help fund our work. Learn more→

The Rudolf Steiner Archive

a project of Steiner Online Library, a public charity

Richard Wagner and Mysticism
GA 92

2 December 1907, Nuremberg

It is not the aim of Spiritual Science merely to satisfy curiosity or a greed for knowledge but to be a spiritual impulse penetrating deeply into the culture of the present and immediate future. It will begin to dawn upon us that this is indeed the mission of Spiritual Science when we realise that its impulse has already made itself felt in the form either of clear or vague premonitions, in various domains of modern life. To-day we shall consider how an impulse akin to that of Spiritual Science lived in one of the greatest artists of our time. In speaking of Richard Wagner, I certainly do not mean to imply that he was fully conscious of this impulse. It is so meaningless when people say: ‘You tell us all kinds of things about Richard Wagner, but we could prove to you that he never thought of them in connection with himself.’ Such an objection is so patent that even those who think as we do could raise it. I am not suggesting for a moment that the impulse of which we shall speak lived in Richard Wagner in the form of definite ideas. Whether or not one is justified in speaking of it, is quite another matter. Detailed evidence in support of this point would lead us too far, but a comparison will show that our method of approach is fully justified. Does a botanist not think about a plant and try to discover the laws underlying its growth and life? Is not this the very thing that helps him to understand its nature? And will anyone deny him the right to speak about the plant from this aspect just because the plant itself is not conscious of these laws? There is no need to reiterate the generalisation that ‘an artist creates unconsciously.’ The point at issue is that the laws which help us to understand the achievements of an artist need not be consciously realised by him any more than the laws of growth are consciously realised by the plant. I say this at the outset in order to clear away the above-mentioned objection.

Another stumbling-block which may crop up now-a-days, is connected with the word ‘Mysticism’ itself. Quite recently it happened that somebody used the word among a small group of people, whereupon a would-be learned gentleman remarked: “Goethe was really a Mystic, for he admitted that very much remains obscure and nebulous in the sphere of human knowledge.” He showed by this remark that he associated ‘Mysticism’ with all ideas about which there is something nebulous and vague. But true Mystics have never done this. Precisely to-day we hear it said in academic circles: ‘To such and such a point clear cognition can attain; from that point onwards, however, we grope blindly among the secrets of Nature with vague feelings, and Mysticism begins.’ But the opposite is the case! The true Mystic enters a world of the greatest possible clarity—a world where ideas shine into the depths of existence with a light as radiant and clear as that of the sun. And when people speak of obscure feelings and premonitions this simply means that they have never taken the trouble to understand the nature of Mysticism. In the first centuries of Christendom the word Mathesis was not used because this kind of experience was thought to be akin to mathematics but because it was known that the ideas and conceptions of a Mystic can be as lucid and clear as mathematical concepts. Men must have patience to find their bearings in the domain of true Mysticism, and it is purely in this sense that the word will be used here in connection with the name of Richard Wagner.

And now let us speak of what is really the fundamental conviction of everyone who is a true student of Spiritual Science.—It is that behind the physical world of sense there is an invisible world into which man can penetrate. This, too, is the attitude of Mysticism. Did Wagner himself ever express this conviction? Most certainly he did! And the significant thing is that he expressed it from the musician's point of view, indicating thereby that to him music or art was far more than a mere adjunct to existence, was indeed the most essential element of life. He speaks in a wonderful way about symphonic music. He regarded symphonic music as a veritable revelation from another world, a revelation by which the threads of existence are elucidated far better than by logic. And from his own experience he knew that the convictions which arise in a man when he listens to the speech of symphonic music are so firmly rooted in his being that no intellectual judgment can prevail against them. Such words as these were not uttered at random; they were indications of a deep and profound theory of knowledge.

And now let us see whether we can explain these words of Wagner in the light of the conviction that is characteristic of Mysticism. Again and again we find Mystics describing the nature and mode of their knowledge in definite terms. They say: In the act of knowledge, man uses his intellect when he endeavours to understand the laws of the natural and spiritual worlds. But there is a higher mode of knowledge.—Indeed, the true Mystic realises that this higher kind of knowledge is much more reliable than any intellectual judgment. Curiously enough it is invariably characterised by an image—which is, however, more than an image. Those who really know what they are talking about, speak of music. The ‘Music of the Spheres’ spoken of in the old Pythagorean Schools was no mere figure of speech, in spite of what superficial philosophy may say. The Music of the Spheres is a reality, for there is a region of the spiritual world in which its melodies and tones can be heard. We are surrounded by worlds of spirit, just as a blind man is surrounded by the world of colour which he does not see. But if a successful operation is performed upon his eyes, colour and light are revealed to him. It is possible for the faculty of spiritual sight to awaken in a man. When his higher senses open, the higher world will emerge out of the darkness. To the surrounding spiritual world that lies near us, we give the name of the astral world, or world of light, while a higher, purely spiritual world is designated as that of the ‘Music of the Spheres.’ It is a real world into which man can enter through a higher birth. Initiates speak openly of this world. We are reminded here of certain words of Goethe, albeit they are generally thought to be mere fantasy. Indeed our interpretation of these words will be put down as inartistic because of the current opinion that so far as intelligence and reason are concerned, a poet must necessarily be vague and indefinite. But a poet as great as Goethe does not use phrases; and if there were no deeper underlying truth, he would be using a phrase when he writes:

“The sun with many a sister-sphere
Still sings the primal song of wonder, ...”

These words are either an indication of deeper truth or mere phraseology, for the physical sun does not ‘sing.’ It is unthinkable that a poet with Goethe's deep insight would use such an image without reason. As an Initiate, Goethe knew that there is indeed a world of spiritual sound and he retains the image.

To Richard Wagner the tones of outer music were an expression, a revelation of an inner music, of spiritual sounds and harmonies which pervade the created universe. He felt the reality of this music and stated it in words. On another occasion he said something similar in connection with instrumental music (Eine Pilgerfahrt zu Beethoven): “The primal organs of creation and of nature are represented in the instruments. What these instruments express can never be defined in clear, hard-and-fast terms, for once again they convey to us those archetypal moods arising from chaos in the first days of creation, when as yet there was no human being to receive them into his heart.”

Such words must not be analysed by the intellect. We should rather try to live into their mood and atmosphere and then we shall begin to realise how deeply Wagner's soul was steeped in Mysticism. To a certain extent Wagner was aware of his particular mission in art. He was not one of those artists who think they must ‘out’ with everything that happens to be living in their soul. He wanted to realise his destined place in evolution and he looked back to a far remote past when as yet art had not divided into separate branches.

Here we reach a point which was constantly in Richard Wagner's mind when he realised his mission, a point too, upon which Nietzsche meditated deeply, and tried to characterise in The Birth of Tragedy. We shall not, however, go into what Nietzsche says, because we are here concerned with Mysticism as such, and Mysticism can tell us more about Richard Wagner than Nietzsche was able to do. The study of Mysticism carries us back to very early stages in the evolution of humanity—to the Mysteries. What were the Mysteries?

Among all the ancient peoples there were Mystery-centres. These centres were temples as well as institutes of learning and they existed in Egypt, Chaldea, Greece and many other regions. As centres alike of religion, science and art, they were the source of new impulses in the culture of the peoples.

And now let us briefly consider the nature of the Mysteries. What were the experiences of those to whom the hidden teachings were revealed after certain trials and tests had been undergone? They were able to realise the union of religion, art and science—which in the course of later evolution were destined to separate into three domains. The great riddles of the universe were presented to those who were admitted to the rites enacted in the Mysteries. The rites and ceremonies were connected with the secrets of spiritual forces from higher worlds living in the minerals and plants, reaching a stage of greater perfection in the animal and finally to self-consciousness in the human being. The whole evolution of the World-Spirit was presented in the form of ritual to the eyes of the spectators. And what they saw with their eyes, they also heard with their ears. Wisdom was presented to them through colour, light and sound and to such men the laws of the universe were not the abstract conceptions they have become to-day. Cosmic laws were presented in a garb of beauty—and art arose. Truth was expressed in the form of art, in such a way that men's hearts and souls were attuned to piety and devotion. External history knows nothing of these things and indeed repudiates them. But that matters not.—Just as in the ancient Mysteries, religion, science and art were one, so were the arts which later on broke off along their several paths. Music and dramatic representation were part of one whole, and when Wagner looked back to primeval times he realised that although the arts had once been indissolubly united, they had been forced into divergence as a result of the inevitable course taken by evolution. He believed that the time had now come for a re-union of the arts, and with his great gifts set himself the task of bringing about this re-union in what he termed an “all-comprehensive work of art.” He felt that all true works of art are pervaded by a mood of sanctity and are therefore verily acts of religious worship. He felt too, that streams which had hitherto been separated were coming together in his spirit, there to give birth to his musical dramas. To him, there were two supreme artists: Shakespeare and Beethoven. He saw in Shakespeare the dramatist who, with marvellous inner certainty, staged human action as it unfolds in outer happenings. He saw in Beethoven the artist who was able to express with the same inner certainty experiences which arise in the depths of the heart but do not pass over into deed. And then he asked himself: ‘Is this not evidence of a severance that has taken place in human nature in the course of the development of art?’ Man's inner and outer life is directed and controlled by himself; he is aware of desires and passions which rise up and die down again within him and he expresses in action what he feels and experiences in his inner being. But a cleft arose in art. Richard Wagner found passages in Shakespeare's plays which gave him the impression: There is something at this point which had perforce to remain unexpressed, for between this action and that action there is something in the human heart which acts as a mediator, something that cannot pass over into this kind of dramatic art. Again, when human feeling would fain express itself in a symphonic whole, it is doomed to inner congestion if a musician must limit himself to tones. In Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, Wagner felt that the whole soul of the composer is pressing outwards and as it becomes articulate is striving to unite that which in human nature is in reality one and undivided but has been separated in art. Wagner felt that his own particular mission lay in this same direction, and out of this feeling was born his idea of a comprehensive work of art in which the inner life of a human being could express itself outwardly in action. That which cannot be expressed dramatically, must be contained in the music. That which the music cannot express must be contained in the drama.—Richard Wagner was striving to synthesise the achievement of Shakespeare on the one side and of Beethoven on the other. This was the idea underlying all his work—an idea that had arisen from profound insight into the mysteries of human nature. Herein he felt his call.

A way into the inner depths of human nature was thus opened up for art. Richard Wagner could not be a dramatist of everyday life, for he felt that it must once again be possible, as it was in the Mysteries, for the deepest and most sacred experiences to be expressed in art. When he tells us in his own words that symphonic music is a revelation of an unknown world, that the instruments represent primal organs of creation, we can well understand why in his musical dramas he feels it necessary to express much more than the physical part of man's being. Towering above this physical man is the ‘higher man.’ This ‘higher man’ surrounds the physical body like a halo and is much more deeply connected with the sources of life than can be expressed in outer life. It was just because Richard Wagner's aim was to give expression to the higher nature of the human being that he could not draw his characters from everyday life. And so he turned to the myths, for the myths portray Beings far greater than physical man can ever be. It is quite natural that Wagner's stage characters should be mythological figures, for he was thus able to express cosmic laws and the deeds of Beings belonging to an unknown world through the dramatic action and the music—albeit in a form not always understood. I can only give a few examples here, for to enter into every detail would lead too far. But it is everywhere apparent that in the depths of his being, Richard Wagner was connected with the teachings of Spiritual Science.

Now what does Mysticism tell us with regard to the relation of one human being to another? To outer eyes, men stand there, side by side; in the physical world they work upon each other when they speak together or when one becomes dependent on another. But there are also much deeper relationships between them. The soul living in the one man has a deep, inner relationship with the soul living in the other. The laws manifested on the surface of things are the most unimportant of all. The deep laws which underlie the soul are spun from the one man to the other. Spiritual Science reveals these laws, and, as an artist, Richard Wagner recognised and knew of their existence. Therefore he uses themes in which he is able to show that laws far deeper than the outer eye can perceive are working between one character and another.

This urge to reveal the mysterious connections of life is apparent in one of Wagner's earliest works. Do we not feel that something is happening invisibly between the Dutchman and Senta, and are we not reminded of another mysterious influence in the medieval legend entitled Der arme Heinrich, when miracles of healing follow the sacrifice of a virgin? Such images as these are the expressions of truth deeper than the superficial doctrines of conventional erudition. There is a deep reality in a sacrifice made by one being for the sake of another. These mystic threads—unfathomable by the superficial intellect—express one aspect of the universal soul, albeit this universal soul must be thought of as a reality, not as a vague abstraction. Wagner is expressing a profound truth when he uses the image of one human being sacrificing himself for another.

I shall here repeat certain teachings of Spiritual Science which will help you to understand these things. We know that the world evolves and that in the course of its evolution certain beings are continually destined to be thrust down. There is a law of which we learn in Spiritual Science, namely, that every stage of higher evolution is connected with a fall. Later on, compensation is made, but for every saint, a sinner must arise. Strange as this may appear it is nevertheless true, because the necessary equilibrium has to be maintained. Every ascent involves a descent and this implies that at a later stage, the powers of the being who has ascended in evolution must be used for the redemption of the other. If there were no such co-operation between beings, there would be no evolution. Thus is the flux of evolution maintained. And a picture of one human being sacrificing himself for another reminds us of the mysterious link that is created by the ascent of the one and the descent of the other. Such truths can only be expressed with the greatest delicacy. Richard Wagner realised and understood the mysterious thread that binds soul to soul, and when we study the fundamental features of his works we find that the mystical life is the source of them all.

And now when we turn to his most famous work—the Nibelung—we shall see out of what depths of spiritual scientific wisdom it was created. But first we must consider certain things which are explained by Spiritual Science, however contradictory they may be of the views of modern science.

Our remote ancestors lived in a region lying to the West of Europe, between Africa and America. Science itself is gradually beginning to admit the existence of a continent there in the far past—a continent to which we give the name of Atlantis. Atlantis was the home of our ancient forefathers whose form was very unlike our own. As I say, science is already beginning to speak of old Atlantis. An article on Atlantis appeared in a magazine entitled Kosmos, issued under the direction of Haeckel. True, it only spoke of animals and plants and omitted all mention of human beings, but Spiritual Science is able to speak with greater clarity of what natural science is only now beginning to surmise.

In old Atlantis, the atmosphere was quite different from the atmosphere around us to-day. There was no division of water and the sun's rays in the air. The air was permeated with vapours and clouds. Sun and moon were only seen through a rainbow-haze. Moreover man's life of soul was entirely different. He lived in a far more intimate relationship with Nature, with stone, plant and animal. Everything was immersed in cloud-masses. In very truth the Spirit of God brooded over the face of the waters! The wisdom that lived on among the descendants of the Atlanteans was possessed in abundance by the Atlanteans themselves. They understood all that was living in Nature around them; the rippling brooks were not inarticulate but the actual expression of Nature's wisdom. Wisdom streamed into the men of Atlantis from everything in their environment, for those ancient forefathers of ours were possessed of dull, instinctive clairvoyance. Instead of objects in space, colour-phenomena arose before them. They were endowed with clairvoyant powers. Wisdom was there in the mists and clouds and they perceived it with these powers. Such things can, of course, only be indicated here in the briefest outline. As evolution proceeded, the mists condensed into water, the air grew clearer and clearer, and man began, very gradually, to develop the kind of consciousness he has to-day. He was shut off from outer Nature and became a self-contained being. When all men live in close connection with Nature, wisdom is uniform among them, for they live and breathe in a sphere of wisdom. This gives rise to brotherhood, for each man perceives the same wisdom, each man lives in the soul of the other. When the cloud-masses condensed into water, man emerged with the beginnings of Ego-consciousness; the central core of his being was felt to lie within himself, and, when he met another Ego-being, he began to make claims on him.—Brotherhood gave way to the struggle for existence.

Legends and myths are not the phantasies they are said to be by erudite professors. What are legends and myths, in reality? They represent the last echo of the ancient clairvoyant experiences of men. It is nonsense to say that the myths are merely records of struggles between one people and another. Learned professors speak of the ‘poetic folk-phantasy,’ but it is they who are indulging in phantasy when they say that the ‘Gods’ were simply poetical allusions to clouds. That is the kind of nonsense we are expected to believe! But even nowadays it is quite easy to understand the real origin of myths.—The legend of the ‘Noonday Woman’ is still familiar in many regions. This legend is to the effect that when labourers stay out in the fields at noon and fall asleep instead of returning to their homes, a figure of a woman appears and puts a question to them. If they cannot answer within a given time, the woman slays them. This is obviously a dream which comes to a man because he is sleeping out of doors with the full heat of the sun pouring down upon him. Dreams are the last vestige of ancient clairvoyant consciousness.—The example given indicates that legends do indeed originate from dreams. And the same is true of the Germanic myths. For the most part these are myths which originated among the last stragglers of the Atlanteans. The old Germanic peoples looked back to the ages when their forefathers lived away yonder in the West and wandered towards the East in the times when the mists of Atlantis (Nebel-land) were condensing and giving rise to the floods now spoken of as the Deluge, when the air was becoming pure and clear and waking consciousness beginning to develop. The ancient Germanic peoples looked back to the ‘Land of Mists,’ to ‘Nifelheim.’ They knew that they had left Nifelheim and had passed into a different world, but they also knew that certain Spiritual Beings had remained behind at the spiritual level of those times. And they said that such Beings had retained the characteristics and qualities of Nifelheim while sending their influences down into a later age, that they were ‘Spirits’ because they did not live a physical existence.

We can never understand such marvellous interweavings by reference to pedantic text-books. We must rather have an eye to the interweaving of phantasy and clairvoyant faculties, of legend and myth. Nor should we divest these ancient legends of the magic dew upon them.

The ancient Germanic peoples looked back to the time when the mists of Nifelheim were condensing, and they conceived the idea that the water from these same mists was now contained in the rivers in the North of Central Europe. It seemed to them that the waters of the Rhine had flowed out of the mists of old Atlantis. In those ancient times wisdom came to men from the rippling of brooks and the gushing of springs. It was a wisdom that was common to all, a wisdom from which the element of egoism was entirely absent. Now the age-old symbol of a wisdom that is common to all is gold. This gold was brought over from Nifelheim. What became of the gold? It became a possession of the human Ego. The universal Wisdom, once bestowed by Nature herself now became a wisdom flowing from the Ego into human deeds and confronting them as a separate independent power in each individual. Man had built a ‘Ring’ around himself and the Ring changed brotherhood into the struggle for existence among human kind. The element of wisdom common to all men in earlier times lived in water, and the last vestige of this water flowed in the Rhine.

Now just as human beings have developed Ego-consciousness, so too must the Nibelungen. The Nibelungen knew that they possessed the old universal wisdom and they now forged the Ring which thence-forward surrounded them as the Rising of Egoism. This shows, albeit in brief outline, how true realities stream into the world of phantasy and imagination. Gold represents the remaining vestige of the ancient wisdom flowing through the mists; the wisdom-filled Ego builds the Ring which gives rise to the struggle for existence.—Such is the deeper truth underlying the myth of the Nibelungen.

This was a theme which Richard Wagner could reproduce in the form of dramatic action and in the tones of a music expressing the invisible world behind the world of sense. And so he wrote a modern version of the Nibelung myth and in his picture of this whole process of evolution we feel how the new Gods who rule over mankind have come forth from the ancient Gods.

And now think once again of old Atlantis.—Clouds and mists, wisdom sounding from all creation.—As time went on, the Gods could no longer work through a wisdom possessed uniformly by all men; they could work only by means of commandments and decrees. When Wotan, one of the new Gods has to fulfil his covenant to deliver up Freia, since he himself is now entering into the sphere of Ego-wisdom symbolised by the Ring, a figure personifying ancient, primordial consciousness appears before him—a personification of the Earth-consciousness wherein all men were enveloped in the days of Atlantis.

This consciousness is represented in the figure of Erda:

“My musing is the ruling of wisdom;
For when I sleep I dream,
And all my dreams are sovereign wisdom.”

A great cosmological truth is contained in these words, for all things were created by this wisdom as it lived in the springs and brooks, rustled in the leaves and swept through the wind. It was this all-embracing consciousness out of which individual consciousness was born and it was verily sovereign wisdom.

This wisdom was mirrored in the ancient clairvoyant faculties of man, in an age when his consciousness was not confined within the boundaries of his skin. Consciousness flowed through all things. One could not say: here is Ego-consciousness and there is Ego-consciousness.

“All that the depths conceal,
All that pervades the hills and vales,
Water and air, is known to thee.
Thy breath doth blow throughout creation;
Thy mind is there wherever knowledge dwells:
All, it is said, is known to thee.”

All is known to Erda in this consciousness. And so step by step, we can see how through his intuition Wagner was able to draw upon amounts of primordial wisdom and express this in the Nibelung myth.

And now let us consider the time of transition from the old phase of evolution to the new.—Again let it be repeated, however, that Richard Wagner's achievement was not the outcome of any conscious realisation on his part.—The old Atlanteans were possessed of a consciousness of brotherhood in the truest sense of the word. This was followed by the transition to Ego-consciousness. And now think of the beginning of the Rhinegold. Is not the coming of this Ego-consciousness expressed in the opening notes themselves, in the long E flat on the organ? Do we not feel here that individual consciousness is emerging from the ocean of consciousness universal? In motif after motif we find Richard Wagner expressing in the tones of music a world that stands behind the physical world, using the instruments verily as if they were the primal organs of Nature.

And now, if we turn to Lohengrin, what do we find? Lohengrin is the emissary of the ‘Holy Grail.’ He comes from the citadel of the Initiates, where a higher wisdom has its home. The legend of Lohengrin is connected with a universal tradition which indicates that the Initiates send down their influences into human life. We must always turn to legends for enlightenment in regard to significant turning-points in evolution, for the truths they contain are deeper than those recorded in history. Legends show us how the forces and influences of Initiates intervene in the course of history and they are not to be regarded as accounts of happenings in the outer world.

The time of transition from the universal clairvoyant consciousness to individualised Ego-consciousness was of the greatest significance, and we find it set forth in the Lohengrin myth. It is an age when the new spirit emerges from the old. Two ‘Spirits of an Age’ confront one another. Elsa, the feminine principle, represents the soul who is striving for the highest. Conventional interpretations of Goethe's words in the Chorus Mysticus at the end of his Faust are terribly banal, whereas in reality they emanate from the very depths of Mysticism:

“The Eternal Feminine leads us upwards and on.”

The human soul must be quickened by those mighty events through which new principles find their way into evolution. What enters thus into evolution is represented in the Initiates who come from mysterious lands. Spiritual Science speaks of advanced individualities and again and again one is asked: Why do these individualities not reveal themselves? But if they were to do so, the world would enquire about their civic name and rank. This is of no significance in regard to one who is working from spiritual worlds, for the position of an Initiate whose mission is to proclaim the mysteries of existence is so sublime that to ask about his birth, name, rank or calling, is meaningless. To put such questions shows such a lack of understanding of his mission that parting is inevitable.

“Ne'er shalt thou ask
Nor yearn to know,
Whence I have come
And what my name and nature”

These words of Lohengrin might be spoken by all those whose consciousness transcends that of the everyday world, when they are questioned about their name and rank. This is one of the notes struck in Lohengrin, where the clear, true influences of Mysticism are apparent in music and drama alike.

Now there is a certain profound mystery bound up with humanity and it is depicted symbolically in a myth. When at the beginning of our evolution Lucifer fell from the ranks of those Spirits who guide humanity, a precious stone dropped from his crown. This stone was the cup from which Christ Jesus drank with His disciples at the Last Supper and in which the Blood flowing on Golgotha was received. The cup passed to Joseph of Arimathea who brought it to the West. After many wanderings it came into the hands of Titurel through whom the Citadel of the Grail was founded. The cup was guarded by the “holy love-lance,” and the legend says that all who looked upon it took something of the Eternal into themselves.

And now let us think of the mystery contained in this myth as a parallelism of the progress of human evolution, as indeed it is known to be by those who understand the mysteries of the Grail. In the earlier phases of evolution on the earth, all love was bound up with the blood. Men were united by the blood-relationship. Marriage took place between those who were united by the blood-tie. The point of time from whence onwards marriage took place between those who were not of the same kith and kin marked an important turning-point in the life of the peoples. Consciousness of this truth is expressed in many sagas and myths. To begin with, as we have said, love was bound up with blood-kinship and later on, the circle within which human beings were joined by marriage grew wider and wider. This was the one stream in evolution: love that is dependent upon uniformity of flesh and blood.

But later on, a different principle began to hold sway—the principle of individual independence. In the age preceding that of Christendom these two streams were present: the stream expressed in love bound up with the blood-tie, and the principle of independence, freedom. The former represented the power of Jehovah, whose name means “I am the I am,” and the latter the Luciferic principle of independence. Christianity was to bring into the world a love that is independent of blood-kinship. The words of Christ are to be interpreted thus: He who forsakes not father and mother—that is to say, he who cannot substitute for a love that is bound up with flesh and blood, a love that flows from soul to soul, from brother to sister, from a man to all men—he “cannot be my disciple.”

A stone falls from Lucifer's crown and this stone becomes the holy cup wherein the Christ-Principle is united with the Lucifer-Principle. Knowledge of this mighty impulse developed the power of the Ego in the Knights of the Grail. And to those who were pupils in the Mysteries of the Holy Grail the following teaching was given:—(I will give in simple dialogue form what the pupils of the Grail were made to realise step by step. Many people will say: This is unheard of! None the less it is truth but truth that will be subjected to the same fate as those emissaries who were sent from civilised States to the courts of barbarians—as Voltaire relates. First, unworthy treatment and then, afterwards, recognition and acknowledgment.) This, then, was said to the pupils of the Grail: ‘Look at the plant. Its flower may not be compared with the human head. The flower, with its male and female organs of fertilisation, corresponds to the sexual system in man. It is the root of the plant that corresponds to the human head.’ Darwin himself once rightly compared the root of the plant with the head of man. The human being is a plant reversed. He has accomplished the complete turn. In chastity and purity the plant stretches out its calyx towards the light, receiving its rays, receiving the ‘holy love-lance,’ the ‘kiss’ which ripened the fruit. The animal has turned only half-way.—The plant, whose ‘head’ bores into the earth, the animal with its spine in the horizontal direction, and the human being with his upright posture and his upward gaze—these together form the cross. To the pupils of the Grail it was further said: ‘Verily, Plato spoke truly when he said that the World-Soul lies crucified in the Body of the World. The World-Soul, the soul pervading plant, animal and man, lives in bodies which, together, represent the cross.’ This is the original signification of the cross—All other interpretations are meaningless.

In what sense has man accomplished the complete turn? According to the insight of true Mysticism, the plant has the consciousness of sleeping man. When he is asleep, the human being is, in a sense, like a plant. He has acquired the consciousness that is his to-day by having permeated the pure plant-body with desires, with the body of passions. Thereby he has risen higher on the path to self-consciousness. But this has been achieved at the cost of permeating pure plant-substance with desire.

The pupils of the Grail were told of a state to which man would attain in the future. Possessed of clear, alert consciousness, his being would be purified, the substance of his body would become as pure and chaste as that of the plant, and his organs of reproduction transformed. The idea living in the minds of the Knights of the Grail was that the man of the future will have powers of reproduction not filled with the element of desire but as chaste and pure as the calyx which turns towards the ‘love-lance’—the rays of the sun. The Grail Ideal will be fulfilled when man brings forth his like with the purity and chastity of the plant, when he brings forth his own image in the higher calyx and becomes a creator in the Spirit. This ideal was known as the Holy Grail the transformed reproductive organs which bring forth the human being as purely and as chastely as the word is brought forth to-day by the waves of air working through the larynx.

And now let us see how this sublime ideal lived on the heart and soul of Richard Wagner.—In the year 1857, on Good Friday, he was standing on the balcony of the summer-house at the Villa Wesendonck and as he looked out over the landscape he saw the budding of the early spring flowers. The sight of the young plants revealed to him the mystery of the Holy Grail, the mystery of the coming-to-birth of all that is implicit in the image of the Holy Grail. All this he felt in connection with Good Friday and in the mood that fell upon him the first idea of Parsifal was born. Many things happened in the intervening period but the feeling remained in him and out of it he created the figure of Parsifal—the figure in whom knowledge is sublimated to feeling, the figure who having suffered for others, becomes “a knower through compassion.” And the Amfortas-mystery portrays how human nature in the course of evolution has been wounded by the lance of defiled love.

Such, then, is the mystery of the Holy Grail. It must be approached with the greatest delicacy; we should try to get at the whole mood and feeling and let the ideas in their totality stand before our souls. Wherever we look we find that as an artist and as a human being, Richard Wagner's achievements were based upon Mysticism. So clear, so full of mystical feeling was his realisation of his mission that he said to himself: The art which is living in me as an ideal must at the same time be divine worship. He realised that the three streams (religion, science, art) converge into one another and he desired to be a representative of this re-union. Out of his insight was born that feeling which though mystical in essence is yet clear as daylight and which lived in all the great masters. It lived, too, in Goethe who wrote: “The man who overcomes himself breaks that power which binds all beings.” When this urge to give freedom to the Ego, to penetrate into world-mysteries pulsates through all a man's forces and faculties, then he is a Mystic—in every domain of life. No matter whether his activities in the outer world are connected with religion, science or art—he works through to the point of unification. Goethe was trying to express this mystery of man as a whole and complete being, when he clothed the secret of his own soul in the words: “He who has science and art has religion too. He who has not these twain, let him think he has religion!”

Richard Wagner und sein Verhältnis zur Mystik

Die Theosophie oder Geisteswissenschaft soll nicht irgend etwas Einseitiges, nur die menschliche Neugier oder Wißbegierde Befriedigendes sein, sondern sie soll eine geistige Strömung darstellen, die berufen ist, tiefer einzugreifen in alles das, was wir Kultur der Gegenwart und der nächsten Zukunft nennen. Wir werden ein Gefühl davon bekommen, daß Theosophie zu dergleichen berufen sein kann, wenn wir sehen, wie das, was durch sie pulsiert, im Grunde genommen nicht nur in ihr liegt, sondern sich als mehr oder weniger deutliche Ahnung in unserer Zeit schon kundgibt auf den verschiedensten Gebieten.

Heute soll uns die Art und Weise beschäftigen, wie in einem der größten Künstler der neueren Zeit ein ähnliches Element lebte wie in dem, was wir Theosophie, Geisteswissenschaft, nennen. Nicht soll jemand glauben, daß alles das, was ich über diesen bedeutenden Künstler der neueren Zeit, über Richard Wagner, zu sagen haben werde, ihm etwa auch im deutlichen, verstandesmäßigen Bewußtsein gelebt habe. Billig wäre der Einwand, der etwa erhoben werden könnte: Du erzählst allerlei Dinge in Anknüpfung an Richard Wagner, aber wir können nachweisen, daß er das niemals über sich selbst gedacht hat. - Diesen Einwand kann jeder, der Richard Wagner betrachtet wie wir heute, leicht selbst machen. Keinesfalls soll behauptet werden, daß das, was gesagt werden soll, als ausgesprochene Ideen in Richard Wagner gelebt hat. Etwas anderes ist es, ob man ein Recht hat, dies auszusprechen. Es würde zu lange dauern, wollte ich Ihnen in einer ausführlichen Darlegung dieses Recht hier ableiten. Aber ein Vergleich, ein Bild kann uns dahin führen, die Berechtigung dieser Betrachtungen nachzuweisen. Denkt nicht der Botaniker über die Pflanze nach? Sucht er nicht die Gesetze, nach denen sie wächst und lebt? Versteht er nicht dadurch das Wesen der Pflanze oder sucht es zu verstehen? Und darf irgend jemand deshalb, weil die Pflanze nicht selbst diese Gesetze in ihrem Bewußtsein hat, dem Botaniker das Recht absprechen, über sie in dieser Weise zu reden? Wer dieses Bild tiefer verfolgt, wird sehen, wie sich das, was heute gesagt werden soll, ebenso zu dem Künstler verhält. Nicht als ob hier etwa die allgemeine Phrase wiederholt werden sollte, der Künstler schaffe unbewußt. Aber die Gesetze, durch die man bei einer gewissen Weltbetrachtung den Künstler versteht, die brauchen ebensowenig von dem Bewußtsein des Künstlers ausgesprochen zu sein wie ein Pflanzengesetz von der Pflanze. Das sei vorausgesetzt, weil sonst der eben charakterisierte Einwand gemacht werden könnte.

Ein anderer Einwand, der in der Gegenwart sehr leicht aufkommen kann, knüpft an an das Wort «Mystik». Vor kurzem wurde einmal in einem kleinen Kreise von einem Menschen das Wort «Mystik» ausgesprochen, und ein etwas gelehrter Herr sagte: Goethe war eigentlich auch ein Mystiker, er hat es ja zugegeben, daß vieles in der Welt der menschlichen Erkenntnis dunkel und nebelhaft bleibe. - Der Mann hat damit gezeigt, daß er unter Mystik, wenn die Menschen sie betreiben, alle diejenigen Vorstellungen versteht, die etwas Nebelhaftes, Unklares, Dunkles haben. Niemals hat ein wahrer Mystiker dasjenige unter Mystik verstanden, was unklar ist und was man nur mit allgemeinen Gefühlen umfassen und ahnen könnte. Wir können es heute geradezu erleben, daß in gelehrten Kreisen gesagt wird: Bis zu diesem Punkt reicht unsere klare Erkenntnis, von da ab aber beginnt das allgemeine Gefühl, sich in die Naturgeheimnisse hineinzuversenken, da beginnt die Mystik. - Im Gegenteil: Der wahre Mystiker sieht darin das Allerklarste, das, was mit den sonnenhellsten Begriffen in die Tiefen des Daseins hineinleuchten soll. Und wenn jemand von dem Dunkel der Mystik spricht, von allerlei Ahnungen, so bedeutet das nichts anderes, als daß die Menschen sich niemals die Mühe gegeben haben, für sich das zur Klarheit zu bringen, was die Mystik klar gibt. In den ersten Jahrhunderten des Christentums nannte man das «Mathesis», nicht weil es Mathematik hätte sein sollen, sondern weil das, was die Mystik aufbaut an Ideen und Vorstellungen, so klar durchsichtig sein soll für den Menschen wie die Begriffe der Mathematik. Es muß der Mensch nur Geduld haben, sich wirklich hineinzufinden in das, was wahre Mystik ist. Nur in dieser Art sei das Wort «Mystik» mit dem Namen Richard Wagner in Zusammenhang gebracht.

Nun wollen wir charakterisieren, was zunächst die Grundüberzeugung eines jeden Geisteswissenschaftlers ist. Das ist, daß es hinter unserer physisch-sinnlichen Welt eine unsichtbare Welt gibt und daß der Mensch imstande ist, in diese unsichtbare Welt einzudringen. Das, was in dieser Voraussetzung liegt, schließt die mystische Gesinnung ein.

Hat Wagner eine solche Überzeugung für sich ausgesprochen? Ja, er sprach sie deutlich aus! Und was das Wichtigste ist, er sprach sie aus von seinem Gesichtpunkte als Musiker aus, damit andeutend, daß ihm Musik, Kunst mehr wert war als bloße Beigabe zum Dasein, daß sie ihm das wichtigste Lebenselement war. Da, wo er über die symphonische Musik spricht, sagt er wunderbare Worte über die Kunst. Er sagt, alle symphonische Musik erscheine wie eine Offenbarung aus einer andern Welt heraus, die uns in einer ganz anderen Weise über Zusammenhänge des Daseins aufkläre, als uns die Logik aufklären kann, und daß es das Wunderbarste sei, wenn wir die Überzeugungen, die aus diesen symphonischen Sprachelementen zu uns dringen, in uns aufnehmen; dann geben sie uns eine Sicherheit des Gefühls, gegen welche das Verstandesurteil über die Welt nicht aufkommen kann.

Man muß diese Worte nur nicht als gelegentlich hingeworfen nehmen, sondern man muß sie als etwas hinnehmen, was vom tiefsten Ernste einer großen menschlichen Erkenntnis heraus etwas charakterisieren will. Können wir, an die Grundüberzeugungen der Mystik anknüpfend, diese Worte deuten? Ja! Wenn Sie einmal forschen, wie Mystiker öfter die Art und Weise charakterisieren, wie sie erkennen, dann finden Sie zum Beispiel das folgende Wort, das nicht ein beliebig erfundenes Wort ist, sondern ein Wort, das Sie immer wieder als eine Art technischen Ausdruck der Mystiker finden können. Die Mystiker sagen: Im gewöhnlichen menschlichen Erkennen wendet sich der Mensch an seinen Verstand, um die Gesetze der Natur und der Geisteswelt zu erkennen; aber es gibt eine höhere Art des Erkennens, da knüpfen wir nicht Begriff an Begriff nach Verstandesart, sondern da weben sich die Vorstellungen zusammen wie geistige Musik; das ist eine andere Art des Erkennens. - Der wahre Mystiker kennt die größere Sicherheit dieses Erkennens, als sie beim Verstandesurteil vorhanden ist auf diesem Gebiet. Und merkwürdig! Ein jeder Kenner würde Ihnen diese Art der Erkenntnis dadurch charakterisieren, daß er das Bild - es ist mehr als ein Bild ! - von der Musik heranzieht. Es ist nicht bloß ein Bild, wenn in der alten pythagoreischen Schule gesprochen wird von der Sphärenmusik. Eine flache Schulphilosophie hält diese Sphärenmusik für ein Bild, für einen Vergleich mit irgend etwas. Derjenige aber, der weiß, um was es sich handelt, weiß auch, daß diese pythagoreische Sphärenmusik eine Wirklichkeit ist und daß es eine Ausbildung des Geistes gibt, wo die Klänge dieser Musik zu hören sind.

Öfter schon ist ausgesprochen worden, daß wir umgeben sind von Welten geistiger Art, die wir nur zunächst nicht sehen können, so wie der Blinde umgeben ist von der Welt der Farbe, die er nicht sieht. Wenn seine Augen operiert werden, so dringen Glanz und Farbe und Licht an ihn heran, die ihm zuvor nicht zugänglich waren. Solch eine Eröffnung eines geistigen Sehvermögens gibt es. Nur darauf kommt es an, daß man die höheren Sinne öffnet, dann tritt die höhere Welt aus dem Dunkel heraus; und wir bezeichnen die nächste der uns umgebenden Welten als Lichtwelt oder Astralwelt, und die noch höhere als die eigentliche geistige Welt der Sphärenklänge. Das ist eine wahre Wirklichkeit, zu der der Mensch geboren werden kann in einer Art von höherer Geburt, so wie der Blindgeborene sehend werden kann, wenn er operiert wird.

Diejenigen, die eingeweiht sind, sprechen unverhüllt von dieser Welt. Wir brauchen uns nur an Worte Goethes zu erinnern. Freilich werden viele das für etwas Phantastisches halten, was nun gesagt wird. Sie werden es sogar für unkünstlerisch halten, derlei Dinge zu sagen, weil sie den Dichter möglichst so im Unbestimmten schwimmen lassen wollen in bezug auf das Verständnis seines Werkes. Aber ein großer Dichter wie Goethe sagt nicht Phrasen, wenn er Besonderes charakterisieren will, indem er sagt: «Die Sonne tönt nach alter Weise ...». Das ist entweder Hindeutung auf Tieferes, oder es ist Phrase, da ja die physische Sonne nicht tönt. Und ein Dichter, der aus der Anschauung heraus arbeitet wie Goethe, dem darf man eine solche Phrase nicht zumuten. Goethe als Eingeweihter weiß, daß es eine solche tönende Welt, eine geistig tönende Welt gibt, und er bleibt im Bilde. Als er den Faust nach seinen Irrgängen, die im ersten Teil geschildert sind, hinaufentrückt sein läßt in die geistige Welt, da heißt es wiederum:

«Tönend wird für Geistesohren
schon der neue Tag geboren»

Goethe bleibt völlig im Bilde, wenn er die geistige Welt charakterisieren will.

Für Richard Wagner waren die Töne der äußeren Musik ein Ausdruck, eine Offenbarung einer inneren Musik, der Welt eines geistigen Klanges der durch die Welt pulsierenden Harmonie. Das empfand, das fühlte er. Das hat er selbst nicht nur einmal gesagt. Wo er die einzelnen Instrumente charakterisiert, da heißt es:

«In den Instrumenten repräsentieren sich die Urorgane der Schöpfung und der Natur; das, was sie ausdrücken, kann nie klar bestimmt und festgesetzt werden, denn sie geben die Urge fühle selbst wieder, wie sie aus dem Chaos der ersten Schöpfung hervorgingen, als es selbst vielleicht noch nicht einmal Menschen gab, die sie in ihr Herz aufnehmen konnten.»

Man muß solche Worte nicht mit dem Verstande pressen; man muß versuchen, sie mit ihrer ganzen Stimmung in sich aufzunehmen, dann fühlt man, wie Richard Wagners ganze Seele eingetaucht war in das, was man wahre, echte Mystik genannt hat.

So sieht Richard Wagner seine ganze künstlerische Sendung an. Er ist kein Künstler, der bloß das, was zufällig in der Seele lebt, herausoffenbaren will. Er will die Notwendigkeit des Platzes empfinden, an dem er steht in der Entwicklung. Er sieht zurück in urferne menschliche Vergangenheit, in eine menschliche Vergangenheit, wo es noch nicht gab, was man vereinzelte Kunst nennt. Hier berühren wir einen tiefen Punkt, der Richard Wagner fortwährend beschäftigte, wenn er seine Mission empfand, jenen Punkt, über den Nietzsche so tief nachdachte und den er versuchte, in seiner Schrift «Die Geburt der Tragödie aus dem Geiste der Musik» zu charakterisieren. Wir wollen dem aber nicht nachgehen, was Nietzsche geschrieben hat, wir wollen uns vielmehr an die Mystik anlehnen, denn die weiß mehr zu sagen, als was Nietzsche über Richard Wagner zum Bewußtsein zu bringen vermochte. Sie weist uns zurück in Urzustände menschlicher Entwicklung.

Was waren die Mysterien? Bei allen Völkern des Altertums gab es Mysterienstätten, die man ebensogut Tempel wie Schulen nennen kann, bei den Ägyptern, bei den Griechen und so weiter. Überall war das Mysterium die Grundlage einer späteren Kultur, und im Mysterium waren enthalten zugleich Religion, Wissenschaft und Kunst. Versetzen wir uns einmal skizzenhaft in das Wesen eines solchen Mysteriums. Was erlebte da derjenige, der nach gewissen Proben zugelassen wurde, um die Geheimnisse zu erlauschen? Er erlebte etwas, was später in der Entwicklung in getrennten Zweigen hervortrat, in Einzelheiten: Religion, Kunst und Wissenschaft, die wie drei Stämme hervortraten, waren im Mysterium in ihrer Wurzel eins. Denken Sie sich als Zuschauer und Zuhörer des Mysteriums! Nehmen wir den Fall, wie im Mysterium das Rätsel der Welt dem Menschen vorgeführt wurde. Vorgeführt wurde da, wie die geistigen Kräfte herunterstiegen, wie sie leben im Mineral, in der Pflanze, wie sie vollkommener werden im Tiere und wie sie im Menschen selbstbewußt werden. Der ganze Gang des Weltengeistes stellte sich so dar, daß die Augen das alles sehen konnten. Und das, was die Augen sahen, die Ohren hörten, in Farbe, in Licht, in Ton, das war Weisheit, Wissenschaft. In abstrakter Vorstellung wie heute nahmen diese Leute nicht das auf, was die Weltgesetze enthalten. Darstellung war es: Sie sahen es vorgehen. Die Darstellung war zugleich schön. So entstand die Kunst. Die Wahrheit wurde gegeben in der Form der Kunst. Und so war sie drinnen in der Kunst, daß das menschliche Gemüt religiös gestimmt wurde und in Anbetung niedersank.

Das ist im Urzustand jeder großen Kultur vorhanden gewesen. Die äußere Geschichte weiß nicht viel davon und leugnet dies. Das macht aber nichts. In zwanzig Jahren wird sie solches nicht mehr leugnen. Und ebenso wie in den Urmysterien diese drei vereint waren, so war die Kunst, so waren diejenigen Künste, die dann später getrennte Wege machten, ein Ganzes. Musik und dramatische Darstellung waren zu Einem vereint, und Wagner sah zurück auf eine Urzeit, wo die Künste vereinigt waren, um eine Gesamtheit zu ergeben. Es war ihm klar, daß wegen des notwendigen Ganges der Menschheitsentwicklung diese Künste getrennte Wege gehen mußten. Nunmehr glaubte er aber in seiner Zeit die Epoche gekommen, wo wieder die Vereinigung stattfinden müsse. Er glaubte sich berufen, auf dem Gebiete seines Könnens eine Vereinigung der getrennten Strömungen zu bewirken in dem, was er ein Gesamtkunstwerk nannte. Er fühlte, daß das wahre Kunstwerk etwas von religiösen Durchhauchungen haben müsse. So war ihm das Kunstwerk zugleich religiöser Dienst. Das alles müssen wir uns in seinem Gefühle denken, nachempfinden. Wenn wir im einzelnen seinen Gedanken nachgehen, so werden wir das wiedererkennen. So sah er das dramatisch-musikalische Werk in seinem Geiste sich zusammenfügen aus getrennten Strömungen. Für ihn waren zwei große Künstler Shakespeare und Beethoven. Er sah in Shakespeare den Dramatiker, der mit wunderbarer innerer Geschlossenheit die menschlichen Handlungen auf die Bühne brachte, so wie sie sich ausleben in äußeren Vorgängen. Er sah in Beethoven den Künstler, der mit derselben wunderbaren inneren Geschlossenheit darzustellen vermochte, was sich im Innern der Brust abspielt, was nicht in die äußere Aktion übergeht, in die Geste. Und nun sagte er sich: Da ist etwas, das können wir ganz genau verfolgen, das aber unausgesprochen bleiben muß. Denn da ist zwischen einer Handlung und einer anderen etwas, was in der menschlichen Brust als Vermittler dasteht, was aber nicht übergehen kann in diese Art von dramatischer Kunst. Und wenn das Innere des menschlichen Empfindens symphonisch sich auslebt, dann muß es gleichsam stecken in sich selbst, wenn der Musiker angewiesen ist, in Tönen zu bleiben. Wir sehen es, wie in der Neunten Symphonie Beethovens das, was innerlich in der Seele lebt, heraus sich drängt und Sprache wird zuletzt, vereinigen will das, was in der Kunst nur getrennt ist, in der Menschennatur aber zusammengehört, in ein Ganzes.

Das war Wagners Gefühl von seiner Mission. Daraus entstand seine Idee von dem Gesamtkunstwerk, das den ganzen Menschen in der Kunst hinstellen soll. Es soll so dastehen, wie er sein Inneres durchlebt, und er soll die Möglichkeit haben, das, was so innerlich lebt, hinaustreten zu lassen als Handlung. Was nicht äußerlich dramatisch sein kann, wird der Musik gegeben. Was die Musik nicht ausdrücken kann, geht in die äußere Dramatik hinein. Richard Wagner stellt dar die Synthesis zwischen Shakespeare und Beethoven. Das ist der Grundgedanke Richard Wagners - ein Grundgedanke, der tief aus der innersten Menschennatur herausgeholt ist. So fühlte er seine Mission. Nun aber war damit der Kunst ein Weg gewiesen hinein ins Innerste der Menschennatur. Richard Wagner durfte kein Alltagsdramatiker bleiben. Es mußte möglich sein, das Tiefste, was der Mensch erleben kann, mit den höchsten Mitteln in der Kunst hinzustellen - wie einst im Mysterium.

Wenn wir sehen, wie Wagner in der symphonischen Musik sieht die Offenbarung einer unbekannten Welt, wie er sieht Urorgane der Schöpfung in den Instrumenten, dann sind wir bald dabei, wie er die Notwendigkeit fühlt, in seiner Musikdramatik mehr zu enthüllen, als was hier vom Menschen in dieser physischen Welt lebt. Das ist nur ein Teil der menschlichen Natur. Überspannend diesen Teil ist der höhere Mensch, der in jedem menschlichen Innern lebt, der weit mehr ist, als was sich äußerlich ausleben kann. Dieser höhere Mensch, der wie in umfassender Glorie den gewöhnlichen Menschen umschwebt, steht mit den Quellen des Lebens in tieferen Zusammenhängen, als es äußerlich klar werden kann. Weil Richard Wagner an die höhere Natur des Menschen anknüpfen will, kann er nicht Alltagsmenschen brauchen, er muß zu denen greifen, die im Mythos gegeben sind. Da werden die Menschen hingestellt, wie sie über sich hinauswachsen, weit größer werden wollen und sind, als der Mensch des physischen Planes sein kann und will. So hängt es wiederum mit der Mission Richard Wagners zusammen, daß er hinausgeht über den Alltagsmenschen und den Mythos auf die Bühne bringt. Im Mythos muß Richard Wagner zu gleicher Zeit - wenn auch nicht verstandesmäßig - die tieferen Weltengesetze, die Gesetze und Wesenheiten der unbekannten Welt durchleuchten lassen durch die dramatische Handlung, durch das musikalische Element. Und das tut er.

Wir können natürlich nicht alle Einzelheiten berühren, nur einzelne Beispiele können wir herausgreifen. Überall wird sich zeigen, wie er im tiefsten Wesen zusammenhängt mit dem, was uns die Geisteswissenschaft über die Welt zu sagen hat. Was hat uns die Mystik zum Beispiel über das Zusammenleben der Menschen zu sagen? Für die äußere Betrachtung stehen die Menschen nebeneinander; sie sieht Menschen auf Menschen wirken in der physischen Welt, wenn sie zu einander sprechen, von einander abhängig werden. Aber es gibt tiefere Zusammenhänge in der menschlichen Natur. Das, was als Seele in der einen Brust lebt, hat tief verborgene Verwandtschaft mit dem, was als Seele in der anderen Brust lebt. Und die Gesetze, die die Oberfläche zeigt, sind nur die unbedeutendsten. Was als tiefes, der Seele zugrunde liegendes Netz von Gesetzen gilt, geht von Mensch zu Mensch. Das enthüllt die Geisteswissenschaft. Das erahnt der Künstler. Daher greift er zu den Stoffen, bei denen er zeigen kann, wie ein tieferes Gesetz von Mensch zu Mensch wirkt, als das, was das äußere Auge sehen kann.

Gleich in einem seiner ersten Werke zeigt uns Richard Wagner diesen Drang, geheimnisvolle Zusammenhänge zu zeigen. Oder fühlen wir nicht so etwas, was im Unsichtbaren waltet zwischen Mensch und Mensch, wenn der Holländer uns mit Senta entgegentritt? Werden wir nicht erinnert an wunderbare Zusammenhänge im «Armen Heinrich», wo das Opfer einer reinen Jungfrau eine gesundende Wirkung hat? Wir müssen solche Bilder als Ausdruck einer tieferen Wahrheit nehmen. Da ist etwas, wahrer als die oberflächliche Wahrheit der gewöhnlichen Gelehrsamkeit. In dem Opfer, das ein Mensch für den andern bringen kann, liegt etwas Wirkliches. In diesem mystischen Bande, das für den oberflächlichen Verstand nicht erfaßbar ist, kommt das zum Beispiel zum Ausdruck, wenn man von der Allseele spricht, bestimmt spricht. Da ist es enthalten, was sich im Bilde tiefster Wahrheit ausdrückt, wenn der eine Mensch für den anderen etwas tut.

Ich spreche hier nun etwas aus, was die Geisteswissenschaft Ihnen zeigen kann, um Sie hinzuführen zu der Grenze, wo dies etwas ersichtlich werden kann. Wir wissen, daß sich die Welt entwickelt und wie im Laufe der Entwicklung immer Wesen abgestoßen werden. Es ist ein Gesetz, das uns die Geisteswissenschaft lehrt, daß jede Höherentwicklung verbunden ist mit einem Hinunterstoßen. Später findet ein Ausgleich statt. Für jeden Heiligen muß ein Sünder entstehen. Das fordert das notwendige Gleichgewicht. Wahr ist es, so sonderbar es klingt. Das ist, wie wenn eine Flüssigkeit aus zweien zusammengemischt ist. Wenn man die eine rein bekommen will, so muß die andere trüber werden. So ist es mit dem Aufstieg. Mit jedem Aufstieg ist ein Abstieg verknüpft. Das bedingt, daß das Wesen, das aufgestiegen ist, seine Kraft dazu verwendet, um das andere, niedere Wesen zu erlösen. Gäbe es dieses Zusammenwirken von Wesen nicht, dann gäbe es in der Welt keine Entwicklung. Dadurch wird die Entwicklung in Fluß gebracht. Und wenn wir sehen, wie ein Mensch sich für den anderen hinopfert, da werden wir erinnert an ein solches geheimnisvolles Band, das entstanden war dadurch, daß ein Wesen sich hinauf-, das andere sich hinunterentwickelt hat. Nur zart hindeuten kann man auf so etwas. So ist Richard Wagner schon mitten drinnen in jenem geheimnisvollen Band, das von Seele zu Seele sich zieht.

Wenn wir die verschiedenen Werke ansehen, so finden wir, daß Richard Wagner immer aus mystischem Leben die Grundtatsachen geschöpft hat. Wollen wir gleich herangehen an sein Mittelpunktswerk, an die Siegfried-Dichtung, an die Nibelungen-Dichtung. Wollen wir sehen, wie tief sie herausgeschöpft sind aus der Weltenweisheit, so müssen wir anknüpfen an etwas, was die Theosophie zur völligen Klarheit bringt, so widersprechend es der heutigen Wissenschaft auch ist. Unsere weit zurückliegenden Vorfahren bewohnten ein Landgebiet, das gelegen hat im Westen von Europa, zwischen Afrika und Amerika. Sogar die Naturwissenschaft kommt nach und nach schon darauf, daß da einstmals Land war, ein Land, das wir die Atlantis nennen. Da lebten unsere uralten Vorfahren, die freilich ganz anders gestaltet waren. Wie gesagt, heute fängt schon die Naturwissenschaft an, von dieser alten Atlantis zu reden. In einer Zeitschrift, «Kosmos», herausgegeben unter der Ägide Haeckels, wurde ein Aufsatz darüber veröffentlicht. Da ist freilich nur die Rede davon, was für Tiere und Pflanzen da gelebt haben. Daß der Mensch auch gelebt hat, davon ist noch nicht die Rede.

Wovon die Naturwissenschaft auch schon etwas ahnt, davon erzählt die Geisteswissenschaft klar. In dieser alten Atlantis war eine ganz andere Atmosphäre, waren ganz andere Verhältnisse. Das, was wir heute kennen als Verteilung von Wasser und Sonnenschein in der Luft, war damals noch nicht vorhanden. Da drüben im fernen Westen war die Luft dauernd mit Wasserdampf, mit Nebelmassen erfüllt. Sonne und Mond waren nur zu sehen mit regenbogenförmigen Höfen. Ganz anders war das Leben der Seele. Die Menschen lebten so, daß sie in viel innigerem Bunde standen mit der Natur, mit Stein, Pflanze und Tier. Eingebettet waren sie in die Nebelmassen. Wahr ist das Wort: Der Geist der Gottheit schwebte, brütete über den Wassern. - Denn das, was in Nachklängen erhalten ist bei den Völkern, die die Nachkommen der Atlantier sind, war in hohem Maße der Fall bei den Atlantiern: sie verstanden alles um sich herum. Das Rieseln der Quelle war nicht unartikuliert, es war der Ausdruck der Weisheit der Natur. Weisheit hörte der Mensch aus allen Dingen seiner Umgebung, denn diese Umgebung bewirkte, daß dieser alte Vorfahre dumpfer Hellseher war. Er nahm nicht wahr, was sich im Raume ausdehnte, sondern Farbenerscheinungen. Hellseherische Kräfte hatte er. Weisheit webte in den Nebeln, und diese Weisheit nahm er mit seinen dumpfen Kräften wahr. Nur andeuten kann man das. Die Entwicklung bestand darin, daß die Nebel sich in Wasser niederschlugen, die Luft immer reiner wurde. Damit entwickelte der Mensch sich zum heutigen Bewußtseinszustande. Er wurde abgeschlossen von der äußeren Natur, er wurde ein abgeschlossenes Wesen in sich selbst. Wenn der Mensch noch im Bunde mit der Natur ist, dann ist die Weisheit eine einheitliche, dann lebt er wie in einer Weisheitssphäre; und dies begründet eine gewisse Bruderschaft, denn jeder nimmt die gleiche Weisheit wahr, jeder lebt in der Seele des anderen. Mit dem Hinabsteigen der Nebelmassen trat der Mensch hinein in das egoistische Bewußtsein, in das IchBewußtsein, wo jeder Mensch in sich den eigenen Mittelpunkt fühlte, wo ein Mensch dem anderen entgegentrat und für sich seine Sphäre in Anspruch nahm. Die Bruderschaft geht über in Daseinskampf.

Sagen und Mythen sind nicht das, was man am grünen Tisch als phantastische Theorien auslegt. Was sind Sagen und Mythen? Es sind die Überbleibsel alter hellseherischer Erlebnisse der Vorfahren. Das ist eine Tatsache. Unsinn ist es, wenn heute behauptet wird, irgendein Mythos bedeute einen Kampf eines Volkes mit einem anderen. Die Gelehrten sprechen von dichtender Volksphantasie; sie sollten das Volk nur kennenlernen, ob es Wolken umdichtet zu Göttergestalten. Das macht man den Leuten vor; das ist Phantastik, Träumerei. Wie Mythen entstehen, davon können sie sich heute noch überzeugen. Heute noch gibt es lebende Sagen. Zum Beispiel in verschiedenen Gegenden gibt es die Sage von der Mittagsfrau. Sie erzählt uns: Wenn irgendwelche Landleute des Mittags auf dem Felde bleiben, anstatt die Feldarbeit zu unterbrechen und nach Hause zu gehen, dann kommt die Mittagsfrau und gibt ihnen Fragen auf. Können sie sie nicht beantworten bis zu einer gewissen Stunde, dann würgt sie sie. - Wer würde da nicht das Bild eines Traumes sehen, der den Menschen draußen befällt, wenn er in der Sonnenhitze liegen bleibt. Der Traum ist der letzte Rest des damaligen Bewußtseins. Da sehen wir, wie heute noch die Sage aus dem Traum heraus entsteht.

So sind alle die germanischen Sagen und Mythen entstanden, die uns erhalten geblieben sind. Das sind zum großen Teil noch Sagen und Mythen, die entstanden sind bei den letzten Nachzüglern der Atlantier. So erinnerte sich der alte Germane der Zeit, da seine Vorfahren drüben im Westen saßen - sie sind nicht von Osten gekommen -, wie sie nach Osten zogen in der Zeit, als die Nebel des atlantischen Nebellandes sich verdichteten und jene Fluten bildeten, die als Sintflut bekannt sind, wie die Luft rein wurde und das heutige klare Tagesbewußtsein sich bildete. Zurück schaute der alte Germane nach dem Nebelland, nach Nifelheim, und er sagte: Fortgeschritten sind wir aus dem alten Nifelheim zu der jetzigen Welt. - Aber es gibt gewisse geistige Wesen, die sind zurückgeblieben auf der geistigen Stufe, die damals die richtige war; das sind die, die mit ihrem ganzen Verstehen den Charakter, die Natur des alten Niflheim, des Nibelungenheimes, sich bewahrt haben, die hereinragen in unsere Zeit, die «Geister» geworden sind, weil sie nicht physische Leiber haben jetzt. Wunderbare Verwebungen haben wir da vor uns. Nirgends dürfen wir hier pedantisch zu Werke gehen. Wir müssen berücksichtigen, wie ineinanderweben Phantasie und hellseherisches Vermögen, Sage und Tatsache. Nicht abstreifen dürfen wir den Tau, den sie haben müssen. Man erinnert sich, wie die Nebel hinuntersanken, und da kam die Vorstellung, als ob diese Nebel hinuntersänken und die Flüsse gebildet hätten im Norden des mittleren Europa. Im Rheinwasser sah man etwas wie Zurückgebliebenes aus den Nebeln der alten Atlantis hinunterfließen. Wie war der Fortgang? Weisheit hat der Mensch aus dem Rieseln der Quellen vernommen. Das war eine Weisheit, die gemeinsam war, das gemeinschaftliche Element, das den Egoismus ausschloß. Für die Weisheit ist nun ein uraltes Symbolum das Gold. Herübergebracht wurde dieses Gold vom alten Niflheim. Was wurde jetzt aus diesem Golde? Daraus wurde ein Besitztum des menschlichen Ich. Was früher gemeinschaftliche, von der Natur zugeraunte Weisheit gewesen war, war jetzt aus menschlicher Urteilskraft, aus dem Ich herausfließende Weisheit, der der Mensch als selbständiges Wesen gegenübertrat. Jetzt bildete der Mensch einen «Ring» um sich herum. Durch diesen Ring wurde die alte Bruderschaft der Menschen in einen Kampf der Menschen untereinander verwickelt. Weisheit als gemeinschaftliches Element, das lebte in den großen Sagen früherer Zeiten in den Wassern, der letzte Rest im Rhein. Dahinein war diese Weisheit versenkt.

Aber die Menschen haben sich entwickelt zum egoistischen Bewußtsein. Auch die Nibelungen mußten sich zum Ich-Bewußtsein entwickeln. Sie rissen das an sich, was gemeinschaftlich war und formten den Ring, der als Ring des Egoismus sie umgibt. Da sehen wir - in einer etwas skizzenhaften Sprache angeschlagen -, wie hereinfließen die wahren Tatsachen in die Welt der Phantasie und wie das Gold, der Überrest der alten Weisheit, die durch den Nebel gewallt ist, wie das weisheitsvolle Ich den Ring um sich konstruiert, wodurch der Kampf ums Dasein entsteht. Das ist die tiefere Grundlage des Mythos vom Nibelungenhort.

Das ist etwas, wo Richard Wagner einen Ausdruck finden konnte in der großen dramatischen Handlung und in den Tönen seiner Musik, die eine unsichtbare Welt zum Ausdruck bringt, die hinter der sichtbaren ist. So hat er in einer modernen Form den Nibelungen-Mythos umgeschaffen und gab uns diesen ganzen Werdegang in seiner Nibelungen-Dichtung. Wir fühlen, wie die neuen Götter, die die Menschheit regieren, ihren Übergang gefunden haben von den alten Göttern.

Denken wir uns nochmals in die alte Atlantis hinein: Nebeldünste, wo überall die Weisheit aus allen Dingen sprach. Da müssen Mächte walten zwischen den Menschen, die jetzt nicht mehr durch gemeinsame Weisheit lenken, sondern durch Verträge und Gebote, und die selbst die Götter durch Verträge festgelegt haben. Das stammt ab von urweisheitsvollem Bewußtsein. Da, wo der neue Gott Wotan an wichtiger Stelle steht, wo Fafner die Freia zurückgeben soll, da, wo Wotan selbst angekränkelt ist von der Ich-Weisheit, von dem Ring, da trat das uralte, heilige Bewußtsein der Menschheit nochmals vor ihn hin, das Erdenbewußtsein, das die Menschen einhüllte, als die Atlantis noch lebte. In der Erda wird uns dies damalige Bewußtsein, in das alles eingebettet war, geschildert: ihr Schlaf ist Träumen, ihr Träumen Sinnen, ihr Sinnen waltendes Wissen. - Eine kosmologische Wahrheit steckt darinnen. Diese Weisheit ist in allem, hat alles geschaffen. Sie lebt in der Quelle, rauscht in den Blättern, weht im Winde. Da findet sie das menschliche Ich darinnen. Da war sie ein allumfassendes Bewußtsein, aus dem alles Einzelbewußtsein geworden ist: waltendes Wissen. Das alte Hellsehen war ein Abbild dieses waltenden Wissens. Da war der Mensch nicht eingeschlossen in die Haut. Das Bewußtsein hat alles durchdrungen. Da konnte man nicht sagen, das IchBewußtsein ist da und dort - es war in allem eingebettet. Wunderbar ist das angedeutet aus Wagners Intuition heraus:

Bekannt ist dir
Was die Tiefe birgt,
Was Berg und Tal,
Luft und Wasser durchwebt,
Wo Wesen sind
Weht dein Atem;
Wo Hirne sinnen
Haftet dein Sinn:
Alles, sagt man,
Sei dir bekannt.

Alles weiß Erda durch dieses Bewußtsein. Und so können wir Schritt für Schritt überall sehen, wie uns wie ein Abdruck der Urwelt-Weisheit das erscheint, was Wagner aus seiner Intuition hineingenommen hat in den Nibelungen-Mythos.

Versetzen wir uns einmal hier - noch einmal soll wiederholt werden, daß Richard Wagner selbst das nicht verstandesbewußt vollzogen hat - in den Zeitpunkt des Übergangs der alten Entwicklung in die neue. Drüben in Atlantis war ein Bruderschaftsbewußtsein. Es folgt der Übergang zum Ich-Bewußtsein, der Einschlag der Selbständigkeit in die Menschennatur. Und jetzt versetzen wir uns an den Anfang des «Rheingoldes». Hören wir nicht den Einschlag des Ich-Bewußtseins in den ersten Tönen, in dem langen Akkord in Es-Dur? Und vernehmen wir nicht, wie aus dem allgemeinen Bewußtsein dieses Sonderbewußtsein auftaucht? So könnten wir Motiv um Motiv belebt finden durch Wagners eigene Erkenntnis, daß sich in den musikalischen Tönen eine hinter den Erscheinungen der Welt stehende Welt offenbaren lasse, daß er selbst durch seine Praxis die Instrumente benützt als Urorgane der Natur. Nicht möchte ich Ihnen Richard Wagner als einen Menschen hinstellen, der unbestimmte Mystik verkörpert hat. Sein künstlerisches Schaffen ist eingetaucht in das Wesen der klaren Mystik.

Wenn wir von dieser Dichtung übergehen zu einer anderen Dichtung, zum «Lohengrin», wie erscheint uns da das Hereinspielen dessen, was Mystik zu geben vermag? Lohengrin ist der Sendbote des heiligen Gral, der von der Stätte der Eingeweihten kommt, wo höhere Weisheit waltet. Die Lohengrin-Sage knüpft an die Sagen an, die uns überall begegnen, die das Hineinspielen der Eingeweihten in die gewöhnliche menschliche Wesenheit anzeigen. An wichtigen Punkten der Entwicklung werden wir überall hingewiesen auf die Sage, die tiefer ist als die Geschichte. Wir werden darauf hingewiesen, wie solche Kräfte der Eingeweihten eingreifen in den Gang der Geschichte. Nicht eine Aufeinanderfolge äußerer Tatsachen gibt sie.

Das war eine wichtige Zeit, jener Übergang aus dem allgemeinen Bewußtsein zu dem Einzelbewußtsein. Diesen Umschwung will der Lohengrin-Mythos charakterisieren. Wir sehen, wie es die Zeit ist, in der ein neuer Geist sich losringt aus dem alten. Zwei Zeitengeister stehen gegeneinander. In den zwei Frauen, die im Streit liegen, sind sie dargestellt. Elsa, das Weibliche, ist immer das, was uns die nach dem Höchsten ringende Seele darstellt. Nicht jene banalen Auslegungen gelten von Goethes Worten im «Chorus mysticus»: «Das Ewig-Weibliche zieht uns hinan»; aus tiefster Mystik ist das herausgeschrieben. Die Seele muß sich befruchten lassen von den großen Ereignissen, durch die neue Prinzipien in die Entwicklung hineinkommen. Was hineinkommt, wird dargestellt in den Eingeweihten, die von wichtigen Stätten herkommen. Hier spricht die Geisteswissenschaft von vorgeschrittenen Individualitäten. Man wird immer gefragt: Warum zeigen sich diese nicht? — Würden sie sich zeigen, man würde sie nicht anerkennen. Man würde sie fragen nach ihrem gewöhnlichen bürgerlichen Namen und Stand. Das ist aber für den, der aus den geistigen Welten heraus wirkt, das Unbedeutendste. Denn der, welcher als Eingeweihter die Geheimnisse zu künden hat, der ist so weit erhaben über das, was Geburt, Name, Stand, Beruf ist, daß es Unsinn ist, ihn darum zu fragen. Wo solche Fragen an ihn herantreten, ist das Verständnis für seine tiefe Mission so weit entfernt, daß Trennung eintreten muß.

Nie sollst du mich befragen,
Noch Wissens Sorge tragen,
Woher ich kam der Fahrt.
Noch wie mein Nam’ und Art.

Diese Worte Lohengrins könnte jeder von denen sagen, die nicht in der gewöhnlichen Welt allein leben, wenn Sie nach Namen und Stand befragt werden. Das ist eine der Noten, die angeschlagen sind im «Lohengrin», wo hereinleuchtet wahre, klare Mystik in das musikalisch-dramatische Leben.

Die Menschheit besitzt ein tiefes Geheimnis, ein Mysterium, das in der Welt waltet. Sinnbildlich dargestellt ist es in einem Mythos, der tief verstanden werden muß: Als der Geist, der im Anfang unserer Entwicklung abgefallen ist von den die Menschheit leitenden Geistern, als Luzifer abgefallen ist, da fiel aus seiner Krone ein Stein, und aus diesem wurde eine Schale geformt, jene Schale, aus welcher der Christus Jesus mit seinen Jüngern das Abendmahl genommen hat, jene Schale, in welcher das Blut aufgenommen worden ist auf Golgatha von Joseph von Arimathia; dieser brachte sie in das Abendland. Nach vielen Wanderungen kam die Schale in die Hände Titurels, durch den die Gralsburg gegründet worden ist. Er hat sie aufbewahrt, zusammen mit der heiligen Liebeslanze. Die Sage berichtet, daß alle, die in die Schale hineinblicken, ein Ewiges in sich aufnahmen.

Fassen wir noch einmal das ganze Geheimnis dieses Mythos: ein Zusammenklang mit den Fortschritten der Menschheitsentwicklung, wie ihn sich die, die vom Geheimnis des Grals wissen, vorstellen. Sie sagen: Als die Menschheitsentwicklung auf der Erde begann, war alle Liebe noch gebunden an das Blut. Die Blutsverwandtschaft war es, die die Menschen verband. Wir finden da kleine Stämme und finden, daß in diesen die Nahehe herrscht. Später erst kam die Fernehe. Der Zeitpunkt, von dem an herausgeheiratet werden darf aus dem Stamm, bildet einen wichtigen Übergang im Leben eines jeden Volkes.

In den Sagen und Mythen ist das Bewußtsein davon erhalten. Zuerst war also die Liebe gebunden an die Blutsverwandtschaft; dann wurden die Kreise weiter und weiter, innerhalb welcher man sich heiratete. Das ist der eine Strom der Entwicklung: die Liebe, die gebunden ist an die Gleichheit und Gemeinschaft von Fleisch und Blut. Dann wird ein anderes Prinzip maßgebend, das die Selbständigkeit einpflanzt. In jener alten Zeit, die dem Christentum vorangegangen ist — so sagten die Gralsritter -, waren diese zwei Strömungen: die Blutbruderschaftsliebe und das Freiheitsprinzip, das, was in dem Menschen waltet als Selbständiges, als Luziferisches, die Macht des Jahve, dessen Name bedeutet: Ich bin, der ich bin. - Mit dem Christentum sollte in die Welt gebracht werden eine Liebe, die unabhängig ist von Blutbruderschaft. So ist der Ausspruch Christi zu deuten: Wer nicht verlässet Vater und Mutter, der kann nicht mein Jünger sein. - Das heißt: Wer nicht an die Stelle einer Liebe, die an Blut und Fleisch gebunden ist, zu setzen vermag die allgemeine Menschenliebe, die von Seele zu Seele geht, von Mensch zu Mensch überhaupt, die sich allmählich herausbilden muß, der kann nicht mein Jünger sein.

So sehen wir, daß der Krone Luzifers entfällt die Schale. Sie verbindet mit dem Luzifer-Prinzip das Christus-Prinzip. In dieser Erkenntnis wird den Gralssrittern die große Kraft, die sie mit IchLeben durchdringt. Diesen Sinn finden wir in der Sage vom heiligen Gral. Und denen, die Schüler des heiligen Gral waren, wurde folgendes klargemacht. Ich will in einfacher Weise in Dialogform hinstellen, was den Gralsschülern in langen Übungen allmählich klargemacht worden ist. Manche werden sagen, das sei unglaublich. Aber mit der Wahrheit ist es so, wie mit den Gesandten der zivilisierten Staaten an den Höfen der Barbaren - wie es Voltaire erzählt: Sie müssen sich erst unwürdige Behandlung gefallen lassen, ehe sie anerkannt werden.

Dem Gralsschüler wurde also gesagt: Sieh dir die Pflanze an. Man kann nicht die Blüte mit dem Kopf des Menschen vergleichen; sie entspricht mit ihren männlichen und weiblichen Befruchtungsorganen der Geschlechtsseite des Menschen. Die Wurzel entspricht dem Kopfe. - Schon Darwin hat in einem Vergleich richtig darauf hingewiesen, daß die Wurzel dem Kopfe des Menschen entspricht. Der Mensch ist die umgekehrte Pflanze: Er hat die volle Wendung vollzogen. Keusch streckt die Pflanze ihren Kelch dem Lichte entgegen, aufnehmend die Strahlen, die heilige Liebeslanze, empfangend den reinen Kuß, unter dem die Frucht sich bildet. Die Wendung ist halb vollzogen beim Tier. Die Pflanze, die sich mit dem Kopf in die Erde bohrt, das Tier mit dem waagrechten Rückgrat und der Mensch mit seinem aufrechten Gang, den Blick nach oben gerichtet (es wird an die Tafel gezeichnet). Diese drei verbunden, geben das Kreuz. Sieh hin, wurde dem Schüler gesagt, wie Plato die Wahrheit kündet, wenn er sagt, daß die Weltseele ausgespannt, gekreuzigt liegt auf dem Weltenleib. - Die Weltseele, die Seele, die durch Pflanze, Tier und Mensch geht, findet sich in den Leibern, die das Kreuz darstellen. Das ist die ursprüngliche Bedeutung des Kreuzes. Alles Übrige ist Rederei.

Was hat es bewirkt, daß der Mensch diese Umkehrung vollzogen hat? Wenn wir die Pflanze betrachten, so sehen wir: Für den wahren Mystiker hat die Pflanze denjenigen Bewußtseinszustand, den der schlafende Mensch hat. Wenn er schläft, hat der Mensch den Wert einer Pflanze. Der Mensch hat sein heutiges Bewußtsein dadurch errungen, daß er den reinen, keuschen Pflanzenleib durchdrungen hat mit Begierde, mit dem Leidenschaftsleib. Er ist dadurch in gewisser Weise höher gestiegen zum Selbstbewußtsein, aber erkauft hat er dies mit dem Durchdringen der reinen Pflanzensubstanz mit Begierden und Trieben. Und nun malte man vor dem Schüler einen Zukunftszustand des Menschen aus, einen Zustand, wo der Mensch sein helles Bewußtsein erhalten haben wird, aber wiederum geläutert, gereinigt zurückgekehrt sein wird zur reinen Substanz wie die Pflanze. Er hat sich dann zurückerrungen die reine, keusche Natur. Das Organ der Fortpflanzung wird umgebildet. Man stellte sich vor im Sinne des Gralsritters, daß der Mensch der Zukunft Organe haben wird, die der Fortpflanzung so dienen werden, daß sie nicht von Begierde durchdrungen sein werden, sondern rein und keusch sein werden wie der Pflanzenkelch, der sich hinwendet zu der Liebeslanze, dem Sonnenstrahl. So wird verwirklicht sein das Ideal des Grals, wo der Mensch in reiner Keuschheit, gerade wie die Pflanze, hervorbringen wird seinesgleichen, wo er wieder erzeugt sein Ebenbild in dem höheren reinen Kelch, wenn der Mensch Schaffender im Geiste sein wird. Dieses reale Ideal nannte man den heiligen Gral, die umgewandelten Reproduktionsorgane des Menschen, die so rein und keusch den Menschen hervorbringen, wie heute der Kehlkopf das Wort hervorbringt, das die Wellen der Luft bewirkt.

Und nun wollen wir versuchen zu zeigen, wie in Richard Wagners Gemüt dieses große Ideal nachlebte. Es war im Jahr 1857, da stand er am Karfreitag im Gartenhaus der Villa der Frau Wesendonck auf dem Balkon und sah hinaus, wie die ersten Pflanzen hervorkamen. Er hat diesen denkwürdigen Moment aufgezeichnet. Er empfand in dem Hervorsprießen der jungen Pflanzen das ganze Geheimnis des heiligen Gral, des Geborenwerdens alles dessen, was verbunden ist mit der Vorstellung vom heiligen Gral. Er empfand das im Zusammenhang mit dem Karfreitag. Wunderbare Stimmung überkam ihn. Da schoß der erste Gedanke seines «Parsifal» in ihm auf. Es ist nun viel hineingefallen in die Zeit, die darauf folgte. Aber die Empfindung ist geblieben. Aus ihr heraus formte er die Gestalt seines Parsifal, jene Gestalt, in welcher das Gefühl zum Wissen erhoben wird, wo man durch das Mitfühlen wissend, «durch Mitleid wissend» wird. Und die ganze Entwicklung, wie die menschliche Natur verwundet wird durch die unreine Lanze - das tritt uns im Amfortas-Geheimnis entgegen. Wir sehen, wie da aufleuchtet das mystische Geheimnis vom heiligen Gral.

Nicht mit groben Händen darf man so etwas anfassen. Man muß das ganze Gefühl verfolgen und die Begriffe in ihrer Totalität vor die Seele hinstellen. So sehen wir überall, wie Richard Wagner vielleicht nicht mystisch gedacht hat, aber wie er als Künstler und Mensch alles, was er tat, mystisch darlegte. Darauf kommt es an.

Nicht eine Theorie sollen wir in der Geisteswissenschaft empfangen, sondern etwas, was unmittelbares Leben wird. In diesem Sinn empfand Richard Wagner klar seine Sendung, so klar, so mystisch, daß er sich sagen konnte: Eine solche Kunst, wie sie in mir als Ideal lebt, muß wieder ein göttlicher Dienst sein. - Er hat empfunden wiederum das Zusammenfließen der drei Strömungen und wollte selbst ein Sendbote des Zusammenwirkens sein. Aus seiner mystischen Erkenntnis geht das hervor, was doch als mystisch-klares Fühlen in allen großen Meistern gelebt hat und was wir empfinden, wenn wir die großen Meister in ein Verhältnis bringen mit und zu der Mystik. Goethe hat es empfunden. Dann wird der Mensch wieder gesund, fühlt etwas von dem, wodurch er sein Selbst überwindet, wenn er das durchlebt, was in den «Geheimnissen» steht:

Von der Gewalt, die alle Wesen bindet,
befreit der Mensch sich, der sich überwindet.

Wenn diese Stimmung des Loskommens vom Ich, des Sichhineinlebens in die Weltengeheimnisse durch alle Kräfte pulsiert, dann ist der Mensch Mystiker auf allen Gebieten. Ob äußerlich religiös oder wissenschaftlich oder künstlerisch - er ringt sich zusammen zur Einheit im Sinne der einheitlichen Menschennatur. Das ist, was Goethe als das Geheimnis eines jeden ganzen Menschen aussprechen wollte, als er sein eigenes Seelengeheimnis zusammenfaßte in die Worte:

Wer Wissenschaft und Kunst besitzt, hat auch Religion.
Wer jene beiden nicht besitzt, der habe Religion.

Richard Wagner and his Relationship to Mysticism

Theosophy or spiritual science should not be something one-sided, merely satisfying human curiosity or thirst for knowledge, but should represent a spiritual current that is called upon to intervene more deeply in everything we call the culture of the present and the near future. We will get a sense of how theosophy can be called upon to do this when we see how what pulsates through it is not only found within it, but is already manifesting itself in our time as a more or less distinct intuition in a wide variety of fields.

Today we will concern ourselves with the way in which an element similar to what we call theosophy, spiritual science, lived in one of the greatest artists of modern times. No one should believe that everything I have to say about this important artist of modern times, Richard Wagner, was also lived by him in clear, intellectual consciousness. It would be easy to raise the objection that you are saying all sorts of things about Richard Wagner, but we can prove that he never thought this about himself. Anyone who looks at Richard Wagner as we do today can easily raise this objection. In no way am I claiming that what I am about to say lived as explicit ideas in Richard Wagner. It is another matter whether one has the right to say so. It would take too long to derive this right for you in a detailed explanation here. But a comparison, an image, can lead us to prove the validity of these considerations. Does not the botanist think about the plant? Does he not seek the laws according to which it grows and lives? Does he not thereby understand the essence of the plant or seek to understand it? And can anyone, because the plant itself is not conscious of these laws, deny the botanist the right to talk about it in this way? Anyone who pursues this image more deeply will see how what is to be said today applies equally to the artist. This is not to repeat the common phrase that the artist creates unconsciously. But the laws by which we understand the artist in a certain view of the world need no more be expressed by the artist's consciousness than a plant law needs to be expressed by the plant. This must be assumed, because otherwise the objection just characterized could be raised.

Another objection that can easily arise in the present day is linked to the word “mysticism.” Recently, in a small circle, someone used the word “mysticism,” and a somewhat learned gentleman said: Goethe was actually also a mystic; he admitted that much in the world of human knowledge remains dark and foggy. This man showed that by mysticism, when practiced by human beings, he understood all those ideas that have something nebulous, unclear, and dark about them. A true mystic has never understood mysticism to mean something that is unclear and can only be grasped and intuited with general feelings. We can see this today in learned circles, where it is said: “This is the limit of our clear knowledge; beyond that point, general feelings begin to delve into the secrets of nature, and mysticism begins.” On the contrary, the true mystic sees in this the clearest thing of all, that which is supposed to shine with the brightest rays of the sun into the depths of existence. And when someone speaks of the darkness of mysticism, of all kinds of premonitions, it means nothing other than that people have never taken the trouble to bring to light for themselves what mysticism makes clear. In the first centuries of Christianity, this was called “mathesis,” not because it was supposed to be mathematics, but because what mysticism builds up in ideas and concepts should be as clear and transparent to human beings as the concepts of mathematics. Human beings need only have patience to really find their way into what true mysticism is. Only in this sense can the word “mysticism” be associated with the name Richard Wagner.

Now let us characterize what is the basic conviction of every spiritual scientist. It is that behind our physical, sensory world there is an invisible world and that human beings are capable of entering this invisible world. What lies in this assumption includes the mystical attitude.

Did Wagner express such a conviction? Yes, he expressed it clearly! And what is most important is that he expressed it from his point of view as a musician, thereby indicating that music and art were more valuable to him than mere additions to existence, that they were the most important elements of his life. When he talks about symphonic music, he says wonderful things about art. He says that all symphonic music appears like a revelation from another world, which enlightens us in a completely different way about the connections of existence than logic can enlighten us, and that it is the most wonderful thing when we take in the convictions that come to us from these symphonic elements of language and absorb them into ourselves; then they give us a security of feeling that cannot be countered by the judgment of reason about the world.

These words should not be taken as something said in passing, but must be accepted as something that, from the deepest seriousness of a great human insight, seeks to characterize something. Can we interpret these words by drawing on the fundamental convictions of mysticism? Yes! If you investigate how mystics often characterize the way they perceive, you will find, for example, the following word, which is not a randomly invented word, but a word that you will find again and again as a kind of technical expression used by mystics. Mystics say: In ordinary human cognition, people turn to their intellect to recognize the laws of nature and the spiritual world; but there is a higher form of cognition, in which we do not link concepts together in an intellectual manner, but rather the ideas weave themselves together like spiritual music; this is a different kind of cognition. The true mystic knows the greater certainty of this knowledge than that which is available to the intellect in this field. And strangely enough, every expert would characterize this kind of knowledge by drawing on the image—it is more than an image!—of music. It is not merely an image when the ancient Pythagorean school speaks of the music of the spheres. A shallow school philosophy considers this music of the spheres to be an image, a comparison with something else. But those who know what it is also know that this Pythagorean music of the spheres is a reality and that there is a training of the mind where the sounds of this music can be heard.

It has often been said that we are surrounded by worlds of a spiritual nature that we cannot see at first, just as the blind man is surrounded by the world of color that he cannot see. When his eyes are operated on, brightness, color, and light that were previously inaccessible to him come to him. Such an opening of spiritual vision exists. It is only a matter of opening the higher senses, then the higher world emerges from the darkness; and we call the next world surrounding us the light world or astral world, and the even higher one the actual spiritual world of the sounds of the spheres. This is a true reality into which human beings can be born in a kind of higher birth, just as a person born blind can see when they undergo an operation.

Those who are initiated speak openly about this world. We need only remember the words of Goethe. Of course, many will consider what is now being said to be something fantastical. They will even consider it unartistic to say such things, because they want to leave the poet as vague as possible with regard to the understanding of his work. But a great poet like Goethe does not use phrases when he wants to characterize something special by saying, “The sun sounds in the old way...” This is either an allusion to something deeper, or it is a phrase, since the physical sun does not sound. And a poet who works from observation, as Goethe does, cannot be expected to use such a phrase. Goethe, as an initiate, knows that there is such a sounding world, a spiritually sounding world, and he remains within the picture. When he allows Faust, after his wanderings described in the first part, to ascend into the spiritual world, it says again:

"For spiritual ears,
the new day is already being born with a sound.”

Goethe remains completely within the picture when he wants to characterize the spiritual world.

For Richard Wagner, the sounds of external music were an expression, a revelation of an inner music, the world of a spiritual sound, of the harmony pulsating through the world. That is what he felt, that is what he experienced. He said so himself, not just once. Where he characterizes the individual instruments, he says:

“The instruments represent the primordial organs of creation and nature; what they express can never be clearly defined or determined, for they reproduce the primal feelings themselves, as they emerged from the chaos of the first creation, when there were perhaps not even human beings who could take them into their hearts.”

One must not try to squeeze such words with the intellect; one must try to absorb them with all their mood, then one feels how Richard Wagner's whole soul was immersed in what has been called true, genuine mysticism.

This is how Richard Wagner sees his entire artistic mission. He is not an artist who merely wants to reveal what happens to live in his soul. He wants to feel the necessity of the place where he stands in development. He looks back to the distant human past, to a human past where there was not yet what we call isolated art. Here we touch on a profound point that constantly preoccupied Richard Wagner when he felt his mission, that point which Nietzsche pondered so deeply and which he attempted to characterize in his work The Birth of Tragedy from the Spirit of Music. However, we do not want to pursue what Nietzsche wrote; rather, we want to draw on mysticism, for it has more to say than Nietzsche was able to bring to consciousness about Richard Wagner. It points us back to the primordial states of human development.

What were the mysteries? All ancient peoples had mystery centers, which could just as well be called temples or schools, among the Egyptians, the Greeks, and so on. Everywhere, mystery was the foundation of a later culture, and mystery contained religion, science, and art at the same time. Let us sketch out the essence of such a mystery. What did those who were admitted after certain trials experience in order to hear the secrets? They experienced something that later emerged in separate branches in the course of development: religion, art, and science, which emerged as three branches, were one at their root in the mystery. Imagine yourself as a spectator and listener of the mystery! Let us take the case of how the mystery of the world was presented to human beings in the mystery. What was presented there was how the spiritual forces descended, how they live in minerals, in plants, how they become more perfect in animals, and how they become self-conscious in human beings. The entire course of the world spirit was presented in such a way that the eyes could see everything. And what the eyes saw and the ears heard, in color, in light, in sound, was wisdom, science. These people did not perceive the laws of the world in abstract ideas as we do today. It was a representation: they saw it happening. The representation was also beautiful. This is how art came into being. Truth was given in the form of art. And it was so embedded in art that the human mind was filled with religious feeling and sank down in worship.

This has been present in the original state of every great culture. External history does not know much about this and denies it. But that does not matter. In twenty years, it will no longer deny it. And just as these three were united in the original mysteries, so art, so those arts that later went their separate ways, were a whole. Music and dramatic performance were united, and Wagner looked back to a primeval time when the arts were united to form a whole. It was clear to him that, due to the necessary course of human development, these arts had to go their separate ways. Now, however, he believed that the time had come when they must be reunited. He believed himself called upon to bring about a union of the separate currents in the field of his ability in what he called a Gesamtkunstwerk, or total work of art. He felt that the true work of art must have something of a religious inspiration. Thus, for him, the work of art was at the same time a religious service. We must think and feel all this in his feelings. If we follow his thoughts in detail, we will recognize this again. Thus he saw the dramatic-musical work coming together in his mind from separate currents. For him, Shakespeare and Beethoven were two great artists. He saw in Shakespeare the dramatist who, with wonderful inner coherence, brought human actions to the stage as they are lived out in external events. He saw in Beethoven the artist who, with the same wonderful inner coherence, was able to portray what goes on inside the breast, what does not pass into external action, into gesture. And now he said to himself: There is something here that we can follow very precisely, but which must remain unspoken. For there is something between one action and another that stands in the human breast as a mediator, but which cannot be transferred into this kind of dramatic art. And when the inner life of human feeling is expressed symphonically, it must, as it were, remain within itself if the musician is instructed to remain within the realm of sound. We see this in Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, where what lives inwardly in the soul pushes itself out and ultimately becomes language, seeking to unite in a whole what is separate in art but belongs together in human nature.

This was Wagner's sense of his mission. From this arose his idea of the Gesamtkunstwerk, the total work of art, which is supposed to represent the whole human being in art. It should stand there as he experiences his inner life, and he should have the opportunity to let what lives so inwardly step out as action. What cannot be dramatic on the outside is given to music. What music cannot express goes into the external drama. Richard Wagner represents the synthesis between Shakespeare and Beethoven. This is Richard Wagner's fundamental idea – a fundamental idea that is drawn from the deepest core of human nature. This is how he felt his mission. But now art had been shown a way into the innermost core of human nature. Richard Wagner could not remain an everyday dramatist. It had to be possible to portray the deepest experiences of human beings using the highest means of art – as once in mystery plays.

When we see how Wagner sees the revelation of an unknown world in symphonic music, how he sees the primordial organs of creation in the instruments, then we soon understand how he feels the need to reveal more in his music dramas than what lives here in the physical world. That is only one part of human nature. Overarching this part is the higher human being who lives within every human being, who is far more than what can be expressed outwardly. This higher human being, who surrounds ordinary human beings in comprehensive glory, is connected to the sources of life in deeper ways than can be clearly seen outwardly. Because Richard Wagner wants to connect with the higher nature of man, he cannot use everyday people; he must turn to those who are given in myth. There, people are presented as they rise above themselves, wanting to become and being far greater than the human being on the physical plane can be and wants to be. This is again connected with Richard Wagner's mission to go beyond everyday people and bring myth onto the stage. In myth, Richard Wagner must at the same time—though not intellectually—allow the deeper laws of the world, the laws and essences of the unknown world, to shine through the dramatic action and the musical element. And that is what he does.

Of course, we cannot touch on all the details; we can only pick out individual examples. Everywhere it will become apparent how he is connected in his deepest essence with what spiritual science has to say about the world. What, for example, does mysticism have to say about human coexistence? From an external perspective, people stand side by side; we see people influencing each other in the physical world when they talk to each other and become dependent on each other. But there are deeper connections in human nature. What lives as a soul in one breast has a deeply hidden kinship with what lives as a soul in another breast. And the laws that appear on the surface are only the most insignificant ones. What is considered to be a deep network of laws underlying the soul passes from person to person. This is revealed by spiritual science. The artist senses this. That is why he turns to materials with which he can show how a deeper law works from person to person than what the outer eye can see.

Right from one of his first works, Richard Wagner shows us this urge to reveal mysterious connections. Or do we not feel something that reigns invisibly between people when the Dutchman confronts us with Senta? Are we not reminded of wonderful connections in “Armer Heinrich,” where the sacrifice of a pure virgin has a healing effect? We must take such images as expressions of a deeper truth. There is something truer than the superficial truth of ordinary scholarship. There is something real in the sacrifice that one human being can make for another. This mystical bond, which cannot be grasped by the superficial mind, is expressed, for example, when one speaks of the universal soul. It contains what is expressed in the image of deepest truth when one human being does something for another.

I am now expressing something that spiritual science can show you in order to lead you to the boundary where this can become apparent. We know that the world is evolving and that, in the course of this evolution, beings are always being repelled. It is a law taught by spiritual science that every upward development is connected with a downward thrust. Later, a balance is restored. For every saint, a sinner must arise. This is necessary for balance. Strange as it may sound, it is true. It is like when two liquids are mixed together. If you want to get one pure, the other must become cloudier. So it is with ascent. Every ascent is linked to a descent. This means that the being that has ascended uses its power to redeem the other, lower being. If this interaction between beings did not exist, there would be no development in the world. This sets development in motion. And when we see one person sacrificing themselves for another, we are reminded of such a mysterious bond that has arisen through one being developing upwards and the other downwards. One can only hint at such a thing. Richard Wagner is already in the midst of this mysterious bond that stretches from soul to soul.

When we look at his various works, we find that Richard Wagner always drew the fundamental facts from mystical life. Let us approach his central work, the Siegfried cycle and the Nibelungen cycle. If we want to see how deeply they are drawn from world wisdom, we must take up something that theosophy brings to complete clarity, however contradictory it may be to today's science. Our distant ancestors inhabited a land area that was located in the west of Europe, between Africa and America. Even natural science is gradually coming to the conclusion that there was once a land there, a land we call Atlantis. Our ancient ancestors lived there, although they were of course very different in appearance. As I said, natural science is already beginning to talk about this ancient Atlantis. An article about it was published in a magazine called Kosmos, published under the auspices of Haeckel. Of course, it only talks about the animals and plants that lived there. There is no mention yet of the fact that humans also lived there.

What natural science already suspects, spiritual science tells us clearly. In this ancient Atlantis, there was a completely different atmosphere, completely different conditions. What we know today as the distribution of water and sunshine in the air did not yet exist at that time. Over there in the far west, the air was constantly filled with water vapor, with masses of fog. The sun and moon could only be seen with rainbow-shaped halos. The life of the soul was completely different. People lived in a much more intimate union with nature, with stones, plants, and animals. They were embedded in the fog. It is true to say that the spirit of the deity hovered and brooded over the waters. For what has been preserved in echoes among the peoples who are the descendants of the Atlanteans was very much the case with the Atlanteans themselves: they understood everything around them. The trickling of the spring was not inarticulate; it was the expression of the wisdom of nature. Man heard wisdom in all things around him, for this environment caused this ancient ancestor to be a dull clairvoyant. He did not perceive what extended in space, but rather color phenomena. He had clairvoyant powers. Wisdom wove in the mists, and he perceived this wisdom with his dull powers. One can only hint at this. The development consisted in the mists condensing into water and the air becoming purer and purer. In this way, human beings developed to their present state of consciousness. They became cut off from external nature and became closed beings within themselves. When human beings are still in union with nature, wisdom is unified, and they live as if in a sphere of wisdom; and this establishes a certain brotherhood, for everyone perceives the same wisdom, everyone lives in the soul of the other. With the descent of the fog masses, humans entered into egoistic consciousness, into ego-consciousness, where each person felt their own center within themselves, where one person confronted another and claimed their own sphere for themselves. Brotherhood turns into a struggle for existence.

Legends and myths are not what are interpreted as fantastic theories at the green table. What are legends and myths? They are the remnants of ancient clairvoyant experiences of our ancestors. That is a fact. It is nonsense to claim today that any myth signifies a struggle between one people and another. Scholars speak of poetic folk imagination; they should get to know the people, whether they transform clouds into gods. That is what people are told; it is fantasy, daydreaming. You can still see for yourself today how myths arise. Legends are still alive today. For example, in various regions there is the legend of the midday woman. It tells us that if any country folk remain in the fields at midday instead of interrupting their work and going home, the midday woman comes and asks them questions. If they cannot answer her by a certain hour, she strangles them. Who would not see in this the image of a dream that befalls people when they lie in the heat of the sun? The dream is the last remnant of the consciousness of that time. Here we see how, even today, legends arise from dreams.

This is how all the Germanic legends and myths that have come down to us originated. For the most part, these are still legends and myths that arose among the last remnants of the Atlanteans. This is how the old Germanic man remembered the time when his ancestors lived in the West—they did not come from the East—how they moved eastward at the time when the mists of the Atlantic mist land thickened and formed the floods known as the Flood, how the air became clear and today's clear daytime consciousness was formed. The old German looked back at the misty land, at Nifelheim, and said: We have advanced from the old Nifelheim to the present world. But there are certain spiritual beings who have remained behind at the spiritual level that was right at that time; these are the ones who, with all their understanding, have preserved the character and nature of the old Niflheim, the home of the Nibelungs, who have entered our time and become “spirits” because they no longer have physical bodies. We have wonderful interweavings before us. Nowhere here must we proceed pedantically. We must take into account how fantasy and clairvoyance, legend and fact are interwoven. We must not brush away the dew that they must have. One remembers how the mists sank down, and there came the idea that these mists sank down and formed the rivers in the north of central Europe. In the waters of the Rhine, something like remnants of the mists of ancient Atlantis could be seen flowing down. How did it continue? Man gained wisdom from the trickling of the springs. This was a wisdom that was shared, the communal element that excluded egoism. Gold is now an ancient symbol of wisdom. This gold was brought over from ancient Niflheim. What became of this gold? It became the possession of the human ego. What had previously been communal wisdom whispered by nature was now wisdom flowing from human judgment, from the ego, which man faced as an independent being. Now man formed a “ring” around himself. Through this ring, the old brotherhood of men became embroiled in a struggle among themselves. Wisdom as a communal element lived in the great sagas of earlier times in the waters, the last remnant in the Rhine. This wisdom was sunk into it.

But humans developed an egoistic consciousness. Even the Nibelungs had to develop an ego consciousness. They seized what was communal and formed the ring that surrounds them as a ring of egoism. Here we see – in somewhat sketchy language – how true facts flow into the world of fantasy and how gold, the remnant of ancient wisdom that has passed through the mist, how the wise ego constructs the ring around itself, giving rise to the struggle for existence. This is the deeper foundation of the myth of the Nibelungen hoard.

This is something that Richard Wagner was able to express in the great dramatic action and in the tones of his music, which express an invisible world behind the visible one. In this way, he recreated the Nibelungen myth in a modern form and gave us this entire development in his Nibelungen poetry. We feel how the new gods who rule humanity have found their transition from the old gods.

Let us imagine ourselves back in ancient Atlantis: misty clouds, where wisdom spoke from all things. There must be powers ruling among humans, who are no longer guided by common wisdom, but by contracts and commandments, which even the gods themselves have laid down in contracts. This stems from a consciousness full of primordial wisdom. Where the new god Wotan stands in an important position, where Fafner is to return Freia, where Wotan himself is afflicted by ego-wisdom, by the ring, there the ancient, sacred consciousness of humanity once again appeared before him, the earth consciousness that enveloped people when Atlantis was still alive. In Erda, this consciousness of that time, in which everything was embedded, is described to us: their sleep is dreaming, their dreaming is thinking, their thinking is ruling knowledge. There is a cosmological truth in this. This wisdom is in everything, has created everything. It lives in the source, rustles in the leaves, blows in the wind. There it finds the human ego within itself. There it was an all-encompassing consciousness from which all individual consciousness arose: ruling knowledge. The ancient clairvoyance was a reflection of this ruling knowledge. Man was not enclosed in his skin. Consciousness permeated everything. One could not say that the ego-consciousness was here or there—it was embedded in everything. This is wonderfully hinted at in Wagner's intuition:

You know
What lies in the depths,
What interweaves mountain and valley,
Air and water,
Where beings are,
Your breath blows;
Where minds ponder,
Your mind adheres:
Everything, they say,
Is known to you.

Erda knows everything through this consciousness. And so we can see step by step everywhere how what Wagner took from his intuition and incorporated into the Nibelungen myth appears to us like an imprint of the wisdom of the primeval world.

Let us place ourselves here—once again, it must be repeated that Richard Wagner himself did not accomplish this consciously—at the moment of transition from the old development to the new. Over in Atlantis, there was a sense of brotherhood. This was followed by the transition to ego-consciousness, the impact of independence on human nature. And now let us place ourselves at the beginning of “The Rhine Gold.” Do we not hear the impact of ego-consciousness in the first notes, in the long chord in E-flat major? And do we not hear how this special consciousness emerges from the general consciousness? Thus we might find motif after motif enlivened by Wagner's own realization that the musical tones reveal a world behind the appearances of the world, that he himself, through his practice, uses the instruments as the primordial organs of nature. I do not wish to present Richard Wagner to you as a man who embodied vague mysticism. His artistic work is immersed in the essence of clear mysticism.

When we move from this poem to another, to “Lohengrin,” how does the influence of mysticism appear to us? Lohengrin is the messenger of the Holy Grail, who comes from the place of the initiates, where higher wisdom reigns. The Lohengrin legend ties in with the legends we encounter everywhere, which indicate the involvement of the initiated in ordinary human existence. At important points in development, we are everywhere referred to the legend, which is deeper than history. We are made aware of how such forces of the initiated intervene in the course of history. There is no sequence of external facts.

That was an important time, that transition from general consciousness to individual consciousness. The Lohengrin myth seeks to characterize this upheaval. We see how it is a time when a new spirit is breaking free from the old. Two spirits of the times stand opposed to each other. They are represented in the two women who are in conflict. Elsa, the feminine, always represents the soul striving for the highest. The banal interpretations of Goethe's words in the “Chorus mysticus” do not apply here: “The eternally feminine draws us upward”; this is written from the depths of mysticism. The soul must allow itself to be fertilized by the great events through which new principles enter into development. What enters is represented in the initiates who come from important places. Here, spiritual science speaks of advanced individualities. One is always asked: Why do they not show themselves? — If they showed themselves, they would not be recognized. They would be asked about their ordinary bourgeois names and status. But for those who work from the spiritual worlds, this is the most insignificant thing. For he who, as an initiate, has to proclaim the secrets, is so far above what birth, name, status, and profession are that it is nonsense to ask him about them. When such questions are put to him, the understanding of his profound mission is so far removed that separation must occur.

Never ask me,
Nor seek to know,
From whence I came.
Nor how my name and nature.

These words of Lohengrin could be spoken by anyone who does not live alone in the ordinary world when asked about their name and status. This is one of the notes struck in “Lohengrin,” where true, clear mysticism shines into the musical-dramatic life.

Humanity possesses a deep secret, a mystery that reigns in the world. It is symbolically represented in a myth that must be deeply understood: when the spirit that fell away from the spirits guiding humanity at the beginning of our development, when Lucifer fell, a stone fell from his crown, and from this a bowl was formed, the cup from which Christ Jesus took the Last Supper with his disciples, the cup in which the blood was collected at Golgotha by Joseph of Arimathea, who brought it to the West. After many wanderings, the cup came into the hands of Titurel, through whom the Grail Castle was founded. He kept it together with the holy lance of love. Legend has it that all who look into the bowl receive eternity within themselves.

Let us summarize once more the whole mystery of this myth: a harmony with the progress of human development, as imagined by those who know the secret of the Grail. They say: When human development began on earth, all love was still bound to blood. It was blood ties that bound people together. We find small tribes and find that close marriages prevail in them. Only later did distant marriages come about. The point in time when it became permissible to marry outside the tribe marks an important transition in the life of every people.

This awareness has been preserved in legends and myths. So, at first, love was bound to blood ties; then the circles within which people married became wider and wider. This is one stream of development: love bound to the equality and community of flesh and blood. Then another principle becomes decisive, one that instills independence. In those ancient times that preceded Christianity, according to the Knights of the Holy Grail, there were two currents: the love of blood brotherhood and the principle of freedom, that which reigns in man as independence, as Lucifer, the power of Yahweh, whose name means: I am who I am. With Christianity, a love independent of blood brotherhood was to be brought into the world. This is how Christ's saying is to be understood: “Whoever does not renounce father and mother cannot be my disciple.” - This means: Whoever cannot replace a love that is bound to flesh and blood with universal human love, which goes from soul to soul, from person to person, and which must gradually develop, cannot be my disciple.

Thus we see that the shell falls from Lucifer's crown. It connects the Lucifer principle with the Christ principle. In this realization, the Knights of the Grail receive the great power that permeates them with I-life. We find this meaning in the legend of the Holy Grail. And the following was made clear to those who were disciples of the Holy Grail. I will present in simple dialogue form what was gradually made clear to the disciples of the Grail through long exercises. Some will say that this is unbelievable. But the truth is like that of the envoys of civilized states to the courts of barbarians, as Voltaire recounts: they must first endure unworthy treatment before they are recognized.

So the Grail student was told: Look at the plant. You cannot compare the flower with the human head; with its male and female reproductive organs, it corresponds to the sexual side of the human being. The root corresponds to the head. Darwin already correctly pointed out in a comparison that the root corresponds to the human head. Man is the inverted plant: he has completed the full turn. Chastely, the plant stretches its calyx toward the light, absorbing the rays, the holy spear of love, receiving the pure kiss under which the fruit is formed. The turn is half complete in the animal. The plant burrows its head into the earth, the animal has a horizontal spine, and man walks upright, looking upward (this is drawn on the board). These three, joined together, form the cross. Look, the disciple was told, how Plato proclaims the truth when he says that the world soul lies stretched out, crucified on the body of the world. The world soul, the soul that passes through plants, animals, and humans, is found in the bodies that represent the cross. That is the original meaning of the cross. Everything else is mere talk.

What caused man to bring about this reversal? When we look at plants, we see that, for the true mystic, plants have the same state of consciousness as sleeping humans. When he sleeps, man has the value of a plant. Man has attained his present consciousness by permeating the pure, chaste plant body with desire, with the body of passion. In this way, he has risen in a certain sense to self-consciousness, but he has paid for this by permeating the pure plant substance with desires and instincts. And now a future state of man was painted before the student, a state in which man will have retained his clear consciousness but will have returned, purified, to pure substance like the plant. He will then have regained his pure, chaste nature. The reproductive organs will be transformed. In the spirit of the Grail Knight, it was imagined that the human beings of the future would have organs that would serve reproduction in such a way that they would not be permeated by desire, but would be pure and chaste like the calyx of a plant that turns toward the spear of love, the ray of the sun. Thus will the ideal of the Grail be realized, where man, in pure chastity, just like the plant, will bring forth his own kind, where he will again create his own image in the higher, pure chalice, when man becomes a creator in the spirit. This real ideal was called the Holy Grail, the transformed reproductive organs of man, which produce man as pure and chaste as today the larynx produces the word, which causes the waves of air.

And now let us try to show how this great ideal lived on in Richard Wagner's mind. It was in 1857, on Good Friday, when he stood on the balcony of the garden house of Mrs. Wesendonck's villa and looked out at the first plants sprouting. He recorded this memorable moment. In the sprouting of the young plants, he sensed the whole mystery of the Holy Grail, the birth of everything connected with the idea of the Holy Grail. He sensed this in connection with Good Friday. A wonderful mood came over him. Then the first thought of his Parsifal sprang up in him. Much has happened in the time that followed. But the feeling remained. From it he formed the figure of his Parsifal, that figure in which feeling is elevated to knowledge, where one becomes knowing through empathy, “knowing through compassion.” And the whole development of how human nature is wounded by the impure lance—this confronts us in the mystery of Amfortas. We see how the mystical secret of the Holy Grail is illuminated.

One must not touch such things with coarse hands. One must follow the whole feeling and place the concepts in their totality before the soul. Thus we see everywhere how Richard Wagner, perhaps not thinking mystically, but as an artist and human being, presented everything he did in a mystical way. That is what matters.

In spiritual science, we should not receive a theory, but something that becomes immediate life. Richard Wagner clearly understood his mission in this sense, so clearly, so mystically, that he could say: “An art such as that which lives in me as an ideal must be a divine service.” He felt the convergence of the three currents and wanted to be a messenger of their interaction. From his mystical insight emerges what has lived as a mystically clear feeling in all great masters and what we feel when we relate the great masters to mysticism. Goethe felt it. Then man becomes healthy again, feels something of what enables him to overcome his self when he lives through what is written in the “Secrets”:

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

When this mood of detachment from the ego, of living into the secrets of the world, pulsates through all forces, then the human being is a mystic in all areas. Whether outwardly religious, scientific, or artistic, he struggles to achieve unity in the sense of a unified human nature. This is what Goethe wanted to express as the secret of every whole human being when he summed up his own soul's secret in the words:

He who possesses science and art also possesses religion.
He who does not possess these two, let him have religion.