The Temple Legend
GA 93
Part I
5. The Mystery known to Rosicrucians
4 November 1904, Berlin
We have spoken about various legends which contain esoteric truths in the pictures which they present. These were given to man in this form at a time when he was not mature enough to receive the truths directly. These pictures took hold of man's ‘causal’ body — that part of man which bore the germ of his future Higher Manas — and thus made him ready to understand the truths directly in a future incarnation.
I would like now to show one such legend as this which dates back only a few centuries and is still extant today in many versions. It is the following.
At the beginning of the fifteenth century 1
At the beginning of the fifteenth
century ...
In the original notes this was given as fourteenth
century. Rudolf Steiner sometimes reckoned centuries as the Italians do
(Quattrocento = fifteenth century). In a handwritten document from 1907,
however, Rudolf Steiner writes: ‘In the first half of the
fifteenth century Christian Rosenkreutz. ...’ etc. (Letters and
Documents 1901–1925). a personality appeared in
Europe who had been initiated into certain secrets in the East. This was
Christian Rosenkreutz. 2 Christian Rosenkreutz is a personality of the
fourteenth to fifteenth centuries, not considered historical by modern
investigators, who became known through two legendary anonymous
writings: Fama Fratemitatis and Confessio Fraternitatis,
published in Cassel in 1614 and 1615 respectively, in which it is stated
that Christian Rosenkreutz was of German aristocratic descent and lived
from 1378 to 1484. The name first became known through an anonymous
handwritten document of 1604, which appeared in 1616 under the title:
Chymische Hochzeit: Christian Rosenkreutz, Anno 1459, whose
author, Johann Valentin Andreae, was declared by Rudolf Steiner to have
been inspired by Christian Rosenkreutz himself. According to Rudolf
Steiner, Christian Rosenkreutz was a real historical
personality.
See: A Commentary on the Chymical Wedding of
Christian Rosenkreutz, Michael Press, 1965. Chymical Wedding of
Christian Rosenkreutz, E. Foxcroft translation of 1690, Camphill
Village Trust, 1969. A Christian Rosenkreutz Anthology, compiled
and edited by Paul M. Allen, Rudolf Steiner Publications, Blauvelt, New
York, 1968. The Chymical Wedding of Christian Rosenkreutz. A
Commentary by E.E. Pfeiffer, The Mercury Press. By the time
this incarnation of Christian Rosenkreutz had come to an end, he had
initiated about ten other people into such matters as he himself had
learned through initiation — in so far as this was possible among
Europeans at that time. This small brotherhood called itself
‘Fraternitae Rosae Crucis’, the Brotherhood of the Rose
Cross. This small group of people then gave a certain legend to a
larger, more exoteric fraternity, through whom it then became generally
known to the world.
Christian Rosenkreutz himself had revealed certain deep secrets of
the Mysteries to those people who were sufficiently prepared to receive
them. But, as I said, there were not more than ten in this small circle,
consisting of initiated Rosicrucians. What was taught by Christian
Rosenkreutz could not be imparted to many people, but it was embodied in
a kind of myth. 3 It is
worth noting that Rudolf Steiner here attributes the origin of the
Temple Legend to Christian Rosenkreutz in the fourteenth and fifteenth
centuries, but he never mentions how it came to be transferred to the
Freemasons. Among Freemasons themselves its origin remains obscure.
It is generally accepted that it arose in the eighteenth century,
because that is the time of its first appearance in literature. Even
though it is suspected that it formed a part of masonic knowledge at
an earlier period, this cannot be proved from documents. For this
lecture, too, Rudolf Steiner seems to have made use of the account given
by Charles William Heckethorn in his Secret Societies, viz:
Quotation from Vol. I. Book VIII, Ch. 1.
The Legend of the Temple
Ancestry of Hiram Abiff.
Solomon, having determined on
the erection of the Temple, collected artificers, divided them into
companies, and put them under the command of Adoniram or Hiram Abiff,
the architect sent to him by his friend and ally Hiram, King of Tyre.
According to mythical tradition, the ancestry of the builders of the
mystical temple was as follows: One of the Elohim, or primitive genii,
married Eve and had a son called Cain; whilst Jehovah or Adonai, another
of the Elohim, created Adam and united him with Eve to bring forth the
family of Abel, to whom were subjected the sons of Cain, as a punishment
for the transgression of Eve. Cain, though industriously cultivating the
soil, yet derived little produce from it, whilst Abel leisurely tended
his flocks. Adonai rejected the gifts and sacrifices of Cain, and
stirred up strife between the sons of the Elohim, generated out of fire,
and the sons formed out of the earth only. Cain killed Abel, and Adonai
pursuing his sons, subjected to the sons of Abel the noble family that
invented the arts and diffused science. Enoch, a son of Cain, taught men
to hew stories, construct edifices and form civil societies. Irad and
Mehujael, his son and grandson, set boundaries to the waters and
fashioned cedars into beams. Methusael, another of his descendants,
invented the sacred characters, the books of Tau and the symbolic T, by
which the workers descended from the genii of fire recognised each
other. Lamech, whose prophecies are inexplicable to the profane, was the
father of Jabal, who first taught men how to dress camels' skins; of
Jubal, who discovered the harp; of Naamah, who discovered the arts of
spinning and weaving; of Tubal-Cain, who first constructed a furnace,
worked in metals, and dug subterranean caves in the mountains to save
his race during the deluge; but it perished nevertheless, and only
Tubal-Cain and his son, the sole survivors of the glorious and gigantic
family, came out alive. The wife of Ham, second son of Noah, thought the
son of Tubal-Cain handsomer than the sons of men, and he became
progenitor of Nimrod, who taught his brethren the art of hunting, and
founded Babylon. Adoniram, the descendant of Tubal-Cain, seemed called
by God to lead the militia of the free men, connecting the sons of fire
with the sons of thought, progress, and truth.
Hiram,
Solomon, and the Queen of Sheba.
By Hiram was erected a
marvelous building, the Temple of Solomon. He raised the golden throne
of Solomon, most beautifully wrought, and built many other glorious
edifices. But, melancholy amidst all his greatness, he lived alone,
understood and loved by few, hated by many, and among others by Solomon,
envious of his genius and glory. Now the fame of the wisdom of Solomon
spread to the remotest ends of the earth; and Balkis, the Queen of
Sheba, came to Jerusalem, to greet the great king and behold the marvels
of his reign. She found Solomon seated on a throne of gilt cedar wood,
arrayed in cloth of gold, so that at first she seemed to behold a statue
of gold with hands of ivory. Solomon received her with every kind of
festive preparation, and led her to behold his palace and then the grand
works of the temple; and the queen was lost in admiration. The king was
captivated by her beauty, and in a short time offered her his hand,
which the queen, pleased at having conquered this proud heart, accepted.
But on again visiting the temple, she repeatedly desired to see the
architect who had wrought such wondrous things. Solomon delayed as long
as possible presenting Hiram Abiff to the queen, but at last he was
obliged to do so. The mysterious artificer was brought before her, and
cast on the queen a look that penetrated her very heart. Having
recovered her composure, she questioned and defended him against the ill
will and rising jealousy of the king. When she wished to see the
countless host of workmen that wrought at the temple, Solomon protested
the impossibility of assembling them all at once; but Hiram, leaping on
a stone to be better seen, with his right hand described in the air the
symbolical Tau, and immediately the men hastened from all parts of the
works into the presence of their master; at this the queen wondered
greatly, and secretly repented of the promise she had given the king,
for she felt herself in love with the mighty architect. Solomon set
himself to destroy this affection, and to prepare his rival's
humiliation and ruin. For this purpose, he employed three
fellow-craftsmen, envious of -Hiram, because he had refused to raise
them to the degree of masters, on account of their want of knowledge
and their idleness. They were Fanor, a Syrian and a mason; Amru, a
Phoenician and a carpenter; and Metusael, a Hebrew and a miner. The
black envy of these three projected that the casting of the brazen sea,
which was to raise the glory of Hiram to its utmost height, should turn
out a failure. A young workman, Benoni, discovered the plot and revealed
it to Solomon, thinking that sufficient. The day for the casting
arrived, and Balkis was present. The doors that restrained the molten
metal were opened, and torrents of liquid poured into the vast mould
wherein the brazen sea was to assume its form. But the burning mass ran
over the edges of the mould, and flowed like lava over the adjacent
places. The terrified crowd fled from the advancing stream of fire.
Hiram, calm, like a god, endeavoured to arrest its advance with
ponderous columns of water, but without success. The water and the fire
mixed, and the struggle was terrible; the water rose in dense steam and
fell down in the shape of fiery rain, spreading terror and death. The
dishonoured artificer needed the sympathy of a faithful heart; he sought
Benoni, but in vain; the proud youth perished in endeavouring to prevent
the horrible catastrophe when he found that Solomon had done nothing to
hinder it.
Hiram could not withdraw himself from the scene of
his discomfiture. Oppressed with grief, he heeded not the danger, he
remembered not that this ocean of fire might speedily engulph him; he
thought of the Queen of Sheba, who came to admire and congratulate him
on a great triumph, and who saw nothing but a terrible disaster.
Suddenly he heard a strange voice coming from above, and crying,
“Hiram, Hiram, Hiram!” He raised his eyes and beheld a
gigantic human figure. The apparition continued: “Come, my son,
be without fear, I have rendered thee incombustible; cast thyself into
the flames.” Hiram threw himself into the furnace, and where
others would have found death, he tasted ineffable delights; nor could
he, drawn by an irresistible force, leave it, and asked him that drew
him into the abyss: “Whither do you take me?” “Into
the centre of the earth, into the soul of the world, into the kingdom of
great Cain, where liberty reigns with him. There the tyrannous envy of
Adonai ceases; there can we, despising his anger, taste the fruit of the
tree of knowledge; there is the home of thy fathers.” “Who
then am I, and who art thou?” “I am the father of thy
fathers, I am the son of Lamech, I am Tubal-Cain.”
Tubal-Cain introduced Hiram into the sanctuary of fire, where he
expounded to him the weakness of Adonai and the base passions of that
god, the enemy of his own creature whom he condemned to the inexorable
law of death, to avenge the benefits the genii of fire had bestowed on
him. Hiram was led into the presence of the author of his race, Cain.
The angel of light that begat Cain was reflected in the beauty of this
son of love, whose noble and generous mind roused the envy of Adonai.
Cain related to Hiram his experiences, sufferings, and misfortunes,
brought upon him by the implacable Adonai. Presently he heard the voice
of him who was the offspring of Tubal-Cain and his sister Naamah:
“A son shall be born unto thee whom thou shalt indeed not see, but
whose numerous descendants shall perpetuate thy race, which, superior to
that of Adam, shall acquire the empire of the world; for many centuries
they shall consecrate their courage and genius to the service of the
ever ungrateful race of Adam, but at last the best shall become the
strongest, and restore on the earth the worship of fire. Thy sons,
invincible in thy name, shall destroy the power of kings, the ministers
of the Adonai's tyranny. Go, my son, the genii of fire are with
thee!” Hiram was restored to the earth. Tubal-Cain before quitting
him gave him the hammer with which he himself had wrought great things,
and said to him: “Thanks to this hammer and the help of the genii
of fire, thou shalt speedily accomplish the work left unfinished through
man's stupidity and malignity.” Hiram did not hesitate to test the
wonderful efficacy of the precious instrument, and the dawn saw the
great mass of bronze cast. The artist felt the most lively joy, the
queen exulted. The people came running up, astounded at this secret
power which in one night had repaired everything.
One day the
queen, accompanied by her maids, went beyond Jerusalem, and there
encountered Hiram, alone and thoughtful. The encounter was decisive,
they mutually confessed their love. Had-Had, the bird who filled with
the queen the office of messenger of the genii of fire, seeing Hiram in
the air make the sign of the mystic T, flew around his head and settled
on his wrist. At this Sarahil, the nurse of the queen, exclaimed:
“The oracle is fulfilled. Had-Had recognises the husband which the
genii of fire destined for Balkis, whose love alone she dare
accept!” They hesitated no longer, but mutually pledged their
vows, and deliberated how Balkis could retract the promise given to the
king. Hiram was to be the first to quit Jerusalem; the queen, impatient
to rejoin him in Arabia, was to elude the vigilance of the king, which
she accomplished by withdrawing from his finger, while he was overcome
with wine, the ring wherewith she had plighted her troth to him. Solomon
hinted to the fellow-craftsmen that the removal of his rival, who
refused to give them the master's word, would be acceptable unto
himself; so when the architect came into the temple he was assailed
and slain by them. Before his death, however, he had time to throw the
golden triangle which he wore round his neck, and on which was engraven
the master's word, into a deep well. They wrapped up his body, carried
it to a solitary hill and buried it, planting over the grave a sprig of
acacia.
Hiram not having made his appearance for seven days,
Solomon, against his inclination, but to satisfy the clamour of the
people, was forced to have him searched for. The body was found by three
masters, and they, suspecting that he had been slain by the three
fellow-craftsmen for refusing them the master's word, determined
nevertheless for greater security to change the word, and that the first
word accidentally uttered on raising the body should thenceforth be the
word. In the act of raising it, the skin came off the body, so that one
of the masters exclaimed “Macbenach!” (the flesh is off the
bones!) and this word became the sacred word of the master's degree. The
three fellow-craftsmen were traced, but rather than fall into the hands
of their pursuers, they committed suicide and their heads were brought
to Solomon. The triangle not having been found on the body of Hiram
it was sought for and at last discovered in the well into which the
architect had cast it. The king caused it to be placed on a triangular
altar erected in a secret vault, built under the most retired part of
the temple. The triangle was further concealed by a cubical stone, on
which had been inscribed the sacred law. The vault, the existence of
which was only known to the twenty-seven elect, was then walled
up. Since it was first given out in the fifteenth century,
it has often been repeated and explained in the various brotherhoods. It
was told in larger brotherhoods, but was interpreted only in intimate
circles.
This is the approximate content:
There was a time when one of the Elohim created a human being whom he called Eve. That Elohim united himself with Eve and she gave birth to Cain. After this, another Elohim, named Yahveh, created Adam. Adam also united himself with Eve and from this union came Abel.
Thus we see that Cain is a direct descendant of the gods, but Abel is a descendant of Adam and Eve who are human.
Now the myth proceeds:
The sacrifices which Abel made to Yahveh were pleasing to him, but the sacrifices brought by Cain did not please him because the birth of Cain was not ordained by him. The result was that Cain committed fratricide. He killed Abel and for this he was excluded from communion with Yahveh. He went away into distant lands and founded his own race there.
Adam again united himself with Eve and from this union came Seth, also mentioned in the Bible, who took over the role of Abel. Thus we have two generations of mankind: the race of Cain, who was a descendant of Eve and one of the Elohim, and the other race which had human parentage and was brought into existence at the command of Yahveh.
Among the descendants of Cain are all those who have been creators of art and science, as, for instance, Methuselah, the inventor of the Tau script, and Tubal-Cain, who taught the use and working of metal ores and iron. In this line of descent, stemming from the Elohim, were all those who trained themselves in the arts and sciences.
Hiram also descended from the race of Cain, and he was the inheritor of all that had been learned by the others of his line in technology and art. He was the most significant architect we can imagine.
Out of Seth's line came Solomon, who excelled in everything which came from Yahveh. He was endowed with the wisdom of the world and all the attributes of calm,clear, objective wisdom. This wisdom can be expressed in words which go straight to the human heart and can uplift a person, but it is unable to produce anything tangible of a technical nature, in art or science. It is a wisdom which is a directly inspired gift of God and not attained from below through human passions welling up from the human will — that would be the wisdom pertaining to the sons of Cain, a legacy of the other Elohim, not Yahveh. They are the hardworking industrious ones who seek to accomplish everything through their own efforts.
Solomon now decides to build a temple and calls upon Hiram, the descendant of Cain, to be his master builder. It was at the time when Balkis, the Queen of Sheba, was visiting Jerusalem because she had heard of the wisdom of Solomon. And she was certainly impressed and charmed by the exalted and clear wisdom and beauty of the King when she first arrived, and when he made love to her she consented to be his bride. Now she heard about the temple which was being built and she desired to make the acquaintance of the master builder, Hiram. When she first met him she was captivated merely by his glance. As a result, a certain mood of jealousy arose between Hiram and Solomon and the latter wished to do something or other against Hiram, but he was dependent upon him for the completion of the temple.
Now came the following: The temple was almost complete. Only one thing was still lacking, which was to have been Hiram's masterpiece; that was the Molten Sea, which was to represent the ocean cast in bronze and was to have adorned the temple. All the necessary mixtures of ores had been prepared by Hiram in a most wonderful manner, ready to be cast. Now, however, three apprentices got to work, whom Hiram had found so lacking in skill that he had been unable to promote them to become masters. They had therefore sworn to be revenged on him and desired to prevent the casting of the Molten Sea. A friend of Hiram, who got to know about these plans, confided them to Solomon, so that he should prevent their realisation. But Solomon, through jealousy, did nothing to stop them, because he wished to destroy Hiram. The result was that Hiram had to look on while the whole casting disintegrated due to the addition of a wrong ingredient in the mixture by the three apprentices. He tried to quench the bursting flames by pouring water over them, but this only made matters worse. Just as he was on the point of despairing about the work ever being completed, Tubal-Cain, his ancestor, appeared to him and told him that he should not hesitate to cast himself into the fire, as he was invulnerable to the flames. Hiram did as he was advised and came to the centre of the earth. He was led by Tubal-Cain to Cain, who there resided in a condition of pristine divinity. Hiram was thus initiated into the Mystery of Fire and into the secret of bronze casting, receiving from Tubal-Cain a hammer and a Golden Triangle which he was able to carry with him as a pendant round his neck. Then he returned and was able to complete the casting of the Molten Sea and to put everything in order again.
Hereupon the Queen of Sheba consented to become Hiram's bride. He, however, was set upon by the three apprentices and murdered. But before he died, Hiram managed to throw the Golden Triangle into a well. As no one knew where he had disappeared, a search was made. Even Solomon was afraid and was anxious to find out what had happened. It was thought that the ancient Master Word could be betrayed by the apprentices, and therefore another one was devised. The first word to be spoken when Hiram was discovered should be the new Master Word. At last Hiram was found and was able to utter a few last words. He said: ‘Tubal-Cain had promised me that I shall have a son who will be the father of many descendants who will people the earth and bring my work — the building of the Temple — to completion.’ Then he pointed to the place where the Golden Triangle was to be found. This was then collected and brought to the Molten Sea and both were preserved together in the Holy of Holies. They are only to be discovered by those who can understand the meaning of the legend of the Temple of Solomon and its Master Builder Hiram.
Now we shall proceed from the recounting of the legend itself to its interpretation.
This legend portrays the destiny of the third, fourth and fifth Post-Atlantean cultural epochs. The Temple is the Temple of the Occult Societies, that is to say, what is being built up by the whole of mankind belonging to the fourth and fifth cultural epochs. And the Holy of Holies is the place where these Occult Societies have their abode. The latter are aware of what is meant by the Molten Sea and the Golden Triangle.
We are dealing, therefore, with two races of mankind: with those who, like Solomon, are in possession of divine wisdom and with those of the Race of Cain, who are conversant with fire and know how to make use of it. This fire is not physical fire, but the fire of wishes, desires and instincts which bums in the astral world.
Who, then, are the Sons of Cain? In the sense of this legend, the Sons of Cain are the sons of those Elohim who, during the Moon Epoch, were a little retarded in their role of Elohim. We are dealing with Kama, astrality, during the Moon Epoch. This Kama, or fire, was penetrated with wisdom at that time. But there were two kinds of Elohim. The one kind of Elohim did not remain static with the union of wisdom and fire; they went further. And during the creation of man they were no longer filled with desires and so they were able to endow their creation with calm and clear wisdom. That is the essential Jahve — or Jehovah — religion, the wisdom of which is quite without personal desire. The other Elohim, those in whom wisdom was combined with the fire of the Moon Epoch, created the Sons of Cain.
Therefore, in the case of the Sons of Seth, we find representatives of the religious type of human being with detached wisdom, and in the case of the Sons of Cain, we find those who possess an impulsive nature, who are capable of flaring up and showing enthusiasm for wisdom. These two types are creative within all races of mankind and in all periods of history. Out of the desire life of the Sons of Cain, all arts and the sciences originate; out of the Seth-Abel current, all detached piety and wisdom, lacking enthusiasm, has its origin.
These two types were always present and continued thus until the fourth Post-Atlantean cultural epoch.
Then came the founding of Christianity. Through it, the earlier piety, which had been bestowed on mankind from above, became passionless and detached, and was merged with the element which came to the earth through Christ — Christ, who is not only the incarnation of wisdom, but who is also love itself, a supreme being who has so purified his astral body or Kama that it has been changed into Buddhi. A pure flowing Kama which seeks nothing for itself, but turns every passion into unending devotion towards the things outside itself, is inverted Kama. Buddhi is Kama which has been changed into its opposite.
A higher kind of piety is thereby being prepared among those who are of the pious type, the Sons of Wisdom. This new kind of piety can also develop enthusiasm. It is Christian piety, which was prepared during the fourth Post-Atlantean cultural epoch. This whole stream is not yet in a position to unite with the Sons of Cain, however; they remain adversaries. Were Christianity to take hold of human beings too quickly, they would certainly become filled with love, but the individual human heart would not become involved. It would not be a piety springing from freedom. Christ would not be born within man as his brother, but only as the ruler. It is therefore necessary that the Sons of Cain are active throughout the whole of the fifth Post-Atlantean period. They are active in their initiates who build the temple of all mankind, constructed out of worldly art and worldly science.
This worldly element becomes more and more evident in the history of the fourth and fifth cultural epochs, thus making manifest the entire development of world history at the physical level. And alongside this worldly stream of materialism, the personal element of egoism is involved, which leads to the War of All against All. Even though Christianity had come into the world, it was, in a sense, a secret shared by a few. But it made people of the fourth and fifth cultural epochs aware that everyone is equal in the sight of God. That is a basic principle of Christianity, but it cannot be completely understood by man on earth so long as he is enmeshed in materialism and egoism.
The French Revolution drew its conclusion from this Christian doctrine in a worldly sense. The spiritual conception that all are equal in the sight of God was changed into the purely earthly precept that all men are equal here on earth. That is couched in even more physical terms today.
Before the outbreak of the French Revolution a personality appeared
to Madame d'Adhemar, 4 The historical basis for this lies in the work of
the writer, Etienne-Leon, Baron de Lamothe-Langon, who published the
Souvenirs sur Marie-Antoinette, Archiduchesse d’Autriche, Reine
de France, et sur la cour de Versailles par Madame la Comtesse
d’Adhemar, Dame du Palais, Paris, 1836. About fifty years
later these memoirs were rescued from oblivion by H.P. Blavatsky and her
friends. One of the very rare copies of these memoirs was to be found in
the library of H.P. Blavatsky's aunt who lived in Odessa. Henry Steel
Olcott, who founded the Theosophical Society with Blavatsky in 1875,
wrote in his Old Diary Leaves — the true story of the
Theosophical Society, 1895, Vol. 1, p. 24: ‘If Mme. de Fadeef
— H.P.B.'s aunt could only be induced to translate and publish
certain documents in her famous library, the world would have a nearer
approach to a true history of the pre-revolutionary European mission of
this Eastern Adept than has until now been available.’
The English theosophist, Isabel Cooper-Oakley, published all the parts
of the Souvenirs de Madame d’AdhemarThe Comte of Saint Germain — The Secret of
Kings, Milan, 1912. (See also note II to lecture 9 of 16th December
1904). the lady-in-waiting of Marie-Antoinette, who
prophesied all the important events of the coming strife, in order to
warn against them. It was the Count of St. Germain, 5 The spiritual identity of
Christian Rosenkreutz and the Count of Saint Germain is a result of
Rudolf Steiner's own investigations. See also the lecture of 27th
September 1911, translated in the Anthroposophical Quarterly, Vol. 5,
No. 4, (winter, 1960). the same as he who, in a former
incarnation, had founded the Rosicrucian Order. He subscribed to the
view that mankind at that time must be led in all tranquillity from a
worldly view of life to a truly Christian culture. Worldly powers,
however, desired to gain freedom for themselves by material violent
means. Christian Rosenkreutz foresaw the French Revolution as a
necessary consequence of this, but warned against it. He, Christian
Rosenkreutz, in his incarnation in the eighteenth century, as guardian
of the innermost secrets of the Molten Sea and the Golden Triangle,
appeared with the warning that mankind should develop slowly. But he
also saw what was to happen.
That is the course taken by mankind's evolution during the fourth and fifth Post-Atlantean epochs when seen esoterically. The temple of mankind's earthly culture, the great Temple of Solomon, has already been built, but what is to crown it must still remain a secret. That could only be brought into being by an initiate. That initiate was misunderstood, betrayed, killed. The secret may not yet be revealed. It remains the possession of a few initiated Christians. It is sealed up in the casting of the Molten Sea and in the Golden Triangle. It is the same as the secret belonging to Christian Rosenkreutz, who was present in a very highly evolved reincarnation prior to the birth of Christ, and who gave utterance to a remarkable saying at that time.
Let me describe in a few words how this Christian Rosenkreutz came to repeat a certain saying at the time of the outbreak of the French Revolution. He said: ‘For they have sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind.’ 6 Quotation from Hosea 8, verse 7. See also note 7 to lecture 9 of 16th December 1904. This was said by him long before it was said by Hosea and written down. It stems, however, from Christian Rosenkreutz.
This saying: ‘For they have sown the wind, and shall reap the whirlwind’, is the leading thought for the fourth and fifth cultural epochs and can be rendered in the following way: ‘Mankind shall be made free. The incarnated Buddhi will unite himself with this your freedom and make you equal in the sight of God, but the spirit (‘wind’ means spirit = Ruach) will first become a whirlwind (the War of All against All).’
At first Christianity had to appear as the Christianity of the Cross, which had to develop through the earthly sphere, through the physical plane. But the crucifix was not the symbol of Christianity from the beginning. It was when Christianity became political that the crucified Son of God was introduced, the Son of God suffering on the Cross of the World Body. 7 See note 10 to lecture 12 of 22nd May 1905. It has remained thus to outward sight throughout the rest of the fourth epoch, and will continue to do so during the whole of the fifth epoch of our present Post-Atlantean cycle.
To begin with, Christianity is bound up with the purely materialistic culture of the fourth and fifth epochs, and the true Christianity of the future, which possesses the secret of the Molten Sea and the Golden Triangle, only exists secretly. 8 The German rendering is: exists only in between [?] (dazwischen). The sense is somewhat obscure. This Christianity has another symbol — no longer that of the crucified Son of God, but the Cross encircled by roses. This will become the symbol of the new Christianity of the sixth Post-Atlantean epoch. Out of the Mystery of the Brotherhood of the Rose Cross will arise the Christianity of the sixth cultural epoch, which will recognise the significance of the Molten Sea and the Golden Triangle.
Hiram is the representative of the initiates among the Sons of Cain belonging to the fourth and fifth epochs. The Queen of Sheba is the soul of humanity — every female character denotes the soul in esoteric terminology. She has to choose between the detached piety which does not concern itself with worldly conquest, and the masterful wisdom which is achieved through the overcoming of earthly passions and desires. She is the representative of the true human soul, taking her position between Hiram and Solomon and uniting herself with Hiram in the fourth and fifth epochs, because he is still engaged in building the Temple.
The Molten Sea is what is created when the appropriate amounts of water and molten metal are cast. The three apprentices do it wrongly, and the casting is destroyed, but when the mysteries of fire are revealed to Hiram by Tubal-Cain, he is thereby enabled to unite water and fire in the proper way. This brings the Molten Sea into being. This is what the secret of the Rosicrucians is. It is brought about when the water of calm wisdom is united with the fire of the astral world, with the fire of passion and desire. A union must be brought about which is ‘of bronze’, that is to say, is lasting and durable. It must endure into the next epoch, when the secret of the sacred Golden Triangle is added to it; the secret of Atma, Buddhi and Manas. This Triangle, with all which it entails, will form the content of the renewed Christianity of the sixth cultural epoch. That is being prepared by the Rosicrucians and then what is symbolised by the Molten Sea will be united with a knowledge of reincarnation and karma. That is the new occult teaching which will be united again with Christianity. The higher self of man, composed of Atma, Buddhi and Manas, will become an open secret when the man of the sixth epoch has become ripe enough to receive it. Christian Rosenkreutz will then no longer be required to give warning, but everything which signified strife on the outer plane will be resolved in peace through the Molten Sea and the sacred Golden Triangle.
That is the course which world history will take in the future. What was disseminated by Christian Rosenkreutz in the Temple Legend through the Brotherhood, the Rosicrucians have made into their task: to teach not merely religious piety, but also science in an external way; not merely knowledge of the outer world, but knowledge of spiritual forces, too, and from both directions to go forward into the sixth Round of evolution.