The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Sixth Lecture

[ 1 ] Theosophy is a practical view of life in the most eminent sense. The light it sheds on the question of education will be of profound benefit to humanity long before it comes to clairvoyance; one can already be convinced that there is truth for life in Theosophy long before one approaches direct perception.

[ 2 ] After birth, humans enter a new life, and their various bodies develop in very different ways and at different times. Educators should take this into account. It is completely different from the first to the seventh year, completely different in the second seven years, from the seventh to the fifteenth or sixteenth year, later for boys, earlier for girls. Development after the age of fifteen, or, let us say, after puberty, is different again. One can only truly understand human development when one considers the different ways in which the various parts of the human being develop.

[ 3 ] From birth to the age of seven, parents and educators really only need to consider the child's physical body. Through birth, the physical body has become free for its environment. Before birth, it forms part of the mother's organism. Throughout the period of gestation, the life of the mother and that of the human embryo are intertwined. The mother's physical body envelops the child's physical body, which means that it is still inaccessible to the physical outside world. This only changes after birth. The child can only receive impressions from other beings in the physical world once it is born. However, this does not mean that the etheric and astral bodies are accessible to the outside world. Between the ages of one and seven, the outside world cannot yet influence the etheric and astral bodies because both are still involved in the development of the child's own physical body. All their activity is directed toward the inner physical body; they work on its development. Around the age of seven, the etheric body begins to become open to external impressions. Only then can one influence the etheric body. Between the ages of seven and fourteen, however, one should not yet influence the astral body, because this damages it by depriving it of the opportunity to work inwardly. It is best to leave the etheric and astral bodies completely undisturbed during the first seven years, trusting that everything will develop naturally during this time.

[ 4 ] How can we best influence people during the first seven years? By training the sense organs. Everything that affects them from outside is significant. Everything that people see and hear during the first seven years affects them through the sense organs. But it is not through teaching or verbal instruction that we influence the sensory organs, but through example, through role models. We must offer the child something for their senses; this is more important than anything else in the first seven years. The child sees how people behave in their environment; they see it with their own eyes. Aristotle rightly says: Man is the most imitative of all living beings. This is especially true in the first seven years. Never again is a person as susceptible to imitation as in these first seven years. That is why it is so important to influence the activity of the senses during this time, to try to elicit it and stimulate it to activity. This is why it is so misguided to give a child a so-called “beautiful” doll in early childhood; this prevents the inner forces from coming into play. A naturally developed child will reject it anyway and prefer to stick to a piece of wood or something similar that stimulates the imagination and fantasy to engage in its own inner activity.

[ 5 ] No special teaching method needs to be applied to the etheric and astral bodies, but it is extremely important that the higher influences that pass from the physical environment without consciously affecting them are favorable. It is very important that at this age, people are surrounded by noble, generous, and warm-hearted people with good thought forms. These impress themselves upon the inner working parts of the being. The example set, including in feelings and thoughts, is therefore the most important educational tool. It is not what one says, but how one is that influences the child in the first seven years. Because of the extraordinary subtlety of these parts of the being, the child's environment must refrain from all impure, immoral thoughts and feelings.

[ 6 ] In the period from the seventh to the fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth years, that is, until puberty, the etheric body is born just as the physical body becomes accessible to the environment at birth. So one must work on the etheric body. The etheric body is the bearer of memory, lasting habits, temperament, inclinations, and lasting desires. Therefore, when it becomes free, one must above all take care to develop these qualities; one must work on habits, on memory, on everything that is to give the human being a lasting foundation of character. If care is not taken during this period to ensure that certain habits run like a thread through their character, they will become like a will-o'-the-wisp, unable to stand firm against the storms of life. And now one must work on the memory; later, after this period, it will be difficult to absorb what is to be taken in as memory material. In particular, the sense of art will also awaken during this period, especially for art that has a lot to do with the vibrations of the etheric body, namely music. If talents are present for this, care must be taken during these years to develop them. The parable has an effect during this period; it is wrong to try to develop judgment at this stage. Our time sins greatly in this respect. Care should be taken to ensure that the child learns as much as possible through parables; the memory must be filled with content, and the power of comparison must be exercised through sensory images. Examples of great people from world history must be presented to the child, but one must not say that this is good or that is bad, for that would influence the power of judgment. One cannot present enough images that affect the etheric body, or comparisons with the great things in the world, to the child. It is very useful to work a lot with symbols. This is the time when meaningful fairy tales and stories that depict human life in images have a powerful effect. This makes the etheric body flexible and supple and gives it lasting impressions. How grateful Goethe must have been to his mother for telling him so many fairy tales during this time!

[ 7 ] So, the later you start to encourage judgment in children, the better. But the child asks “Why.” These questions about how and why should not be answered with abstract explanations, but with examples, with symbols. And how infinitely important it is to find the right symbols! When the child asks about life and death, about the transformations of human beings, one can show them the example of the caterpillar and the chrysalis; making it clear to them how the butterfly rises from the chrysalis, as it were, to a new life. Such parables for the highest questions can be found everywhere in nature. However, authority is particularly important for children at this age. But it must not be forced authority; rather, the teacher must gain authority in a completely natural way so that the child believes before knowledge can develop. Therefore, theosophical pedagogy demands not only intellectual knowledge, pedagogical principles, and insights from the educator, but also that people be chosen who, through their natural aptitudes, promise to become authorities. Does this seem harsh? But how could one not introduce it, since the future of humanity depends on it! This is precisely the perspective for a great cultural task of theosophy.

[ 8 ] When a person enters the third seven years, the time of sexual maturity, the astral body becomes free, and judgment, criticism, and immediate relationships with other people depend on it. Just as feelings between people awaken, so do feelings for the rest of the environment; then the human being is mature enough to begin to understand. The personality is revealed with the astral body; then one must draw out one's own judgment from within the human being. Nowadays, people are challenged to criticize far too early. Seventeen-year-old critics are common, and how many write and judge things that are completely immature for humanity! One must be twenty-two to twenty-four years old before one can judge for oneself; anything else is absolutely impossible. From the age of fourteen to twenty-four is the time when a person will learn best from the world, when everything around them becomes a lesson. In this way, they grow to complete maturity in life.

[ 9 ] These are the great principles of education. Countless details arise from them. The Theosophical Society will publish a book for teachers and mothers, showing how from the first to the seventh year of life the example, from the seventh to the fourteenth year of life authority, and from the fourteenth to the twenty-fourth year of life independent judgment must work on the human being.

[ 10 ] This should serve as an example of how Theosophy seeks to fulfill its cultural task, how it is able to intervene at every turn in the real practical tasks of life.

[ 11 ] Another example of practical Theosophy is the consideration of the great law of karma. It is a law that actually makes life understandable to human beings. The law of karma is not merely a theoretical law or something that merely satisfies our thirst for knowledge. No, at every turn it is something that gives life the power to act and security, that makes everything incomprehensible comprehensible.

[ 12 ] First of all, the law of karma answers a big question in life: How does our destiny come about? Why do children have such different circumstances at birth? For example, we see a child born into wealth, perhaps with great talents, surrounded by the most careful love. And we see another child, born into misery and poverty, perhaps with few talents or abilities, so that it seems predestined to achieve nothing; or even with great abilities, but which perhaps cannot be developed. These are the riddles of practical life, and only theosophy provides an answer to them. Human beings must have answers to these questions if they are to stand strong and hopeful in life. And how does the law of karma answer these questions?

[ 13 ] We have seen that human beings live through repeated lives on earth. The child is not being born on this earth for the first time; it has been here many times before. Everything in the world outside is connected by cause and effect; everyone recognizes that. The great law of cause and effect therefore prevails in nature, and this law, applied to the spiritual, to the spiritual world, is the law of karma.

[ 14 ] How does this law work in the outside world? If we take a ball, heat it up, and then place it on a wooden board, it burns a hole in the wood. If we heat another ball, throw it into water first and then place it on the board, it will not burn a hole in the wood. The fact that I throw the ball into the water is significant for what the ball does afterwards. The ball has an experience, as it were, and what it does before and after this experience is different. Thus, the effect depends on the cause. This is an example from inanimate nature, and it is the same throughout the world. Animals that migrate into dark caves lose their sight. If the animal in a later generation could think about it: Why don't I have eyes? – it would have to say to itself: The migration of my ancestors into these caves is the cause of my fate. — Thus, the experience of the past is the fate of the future. This is how things are connected according to cause and effect. The closer we get to humans, the more individual the whole thing becomes. Animals have a species soul, and the fate of a group of animals is linked to the group soul. Humans, on the other hand, have an individual self. This individual ego suffers a similar fate to the group soul of animals. Just as the entire species of animals transforms, so too does the individual ego transform from one life to the next. Cause and effect are perpetuated from one life to the next. What I experience today has its cause in my previous life, and what I do today shapes my fate for the next life. The cause of different births does not lie in this life; nothing is owed now. The cause lies in the previous life. Humans have prepared their own fate today in their previous life.

[ 15 ] Now one might say: But doesn't that depress humans and rob them of all hope? — And yet the law of karma is the most comforting law for life. For as true as it is that nothing is without cause, it is equally true that nothing remains without effect. Even if I am born into poverty and misery, even if I have few abilities: what I do must have its effect, and what I acquire through diligence and morality will have its certain effect in subsequent lives. If it can depress me that I have earned my fate myself, it can also uplift me that I can shape my own fate for the future. Those who accept this law in their thoughts and feelings will see what strength and security they gain in life. It is not so important to understand the law in detail; that comes only at the higher levels of clairvoyant knowledge. It is much more important to view the world in the spirit of this law and to live according to it. If one does this earnestly over the years, then this law will communicate itself to one's feelings. It proves itself through application.

[ 16 ] Now someone may object: That would make us pure fatalists! Everything that happens to us is our own doing, but we cannot change it; so it is best to do nothing. If I am lazy, that is simply my karma. — Or one might say: There is a law of karma that says we can achieve favorable effects for our later life. I will start to be good in my future life; for now, I want to enjoy myself. I have time, I will come back to earth later; then I will start. Another person says: I will not help anyone anymore, because if they are poor and miserable and I help them, then I am interfering with their karma. He deserves what he is suffering; he must take care himself to change his karma.

[ 17 ] All these things are gross misunderstandings. The law of karma says: Everything good I have done in life will have its effect, as will everything bad, so that there is a kind of account in the book of life with a debit and a credit side. You can take stock at any moment. If I now close the books and take stock, the result is my destiny. At first glance, this seems somewhat rigid and immovable, but that is not the case. A correct comparison with the account book shows the following: every new transaction changes the balance sheet, and every new deed changes destiny. The merchant cannot say: Every new transaction upsets my balance sheet, so I cannot do anything. Just as the merchant is not prevented by his account book from doing new business, so man is not prevented from entering a new fact in his book of life. And if the merchant is in dire straits and says to his friend, “Give me a thousand marks so that I can get myself out of this difficult situation,” and the friend replies, “But that would interfere with your account book,” then this answer would be nonsense. It would be equally nonsensical if I did not want to help in order to avoid coming into conflict with the law of karma. Nothing prevents a person who firmly believes in the law of karma from alleviating all misery and hardship. On the contrary, if one did not believe in it, one would have to doubt whether the help would be effective at all; but as it is, I know for certain that the help will have the right effect. This is the comforting, active side of the law of karma. One should not look so much at the past side of the law of karma as at the future. One may well look back on what has happened and bear the karma, but above all one must work hard because one has to lay a foundation for the future.

[ 18 ] Christian clergy often raise the objection: Your theosophy is not Christianity, because it attributes everything to self-redemption. You say that man must work out his karma all by himself. If man can work out his karma himself, then there is no place for Christ Jesus, who suffered for all mankind. The theosophist says, I don't need anyone. — This is a misunderstanding on both sides. They do not consider that free will is not restricted by the law of karma. Theosophists must understand that they cannot rely solely on self-help and self-development if they believe in karma. They must know that others can help them; and then we will easily find the true union of the law of karma with the central fact of Christianity. This harmony has always existed; Christian esotericism knows the law of karma.

[ 19 ] Let us imagine two people, one of whom is in misery because of his karma, and the other who helps him because he has the power to help; the former has improved his karma. Does this abolish the law? On the contrary, it is confirmed; it is precisely through the law of karma that help can be effective.

[ 20 ] If one is more powerful, he can help two or three or four if they need it; and if one is even more powerful, he can help hundreds or thousands and influence their karma in a favorable way. And if someone is as powerful as Christianity imagines Christ Jesus to be, he helps all of humanity at a time when all of humanity needs help. And this does not render the law of karma ineffective; on the contrary, the deed of Christ Jesus on earth becomes effective precisely because one can rely on karma.

[ 21 ] The Redeemer knows that through karma, the work of redemption really becomes accessible to all. Yes, this deed was done precisely by building on the law of karma, as a cause for the future glorious effect, as a seed for the later harvest, as a help for those who allow the blessings of redemption to work on them. The deed of Christ Jesus is only conceivable at all through the existence of the law of karma; the testament of Christ Jesus is precisely the doctrine of karma and reincarnation. It does not say: Everyone must bear the consequences of their deeds – but rather: The consequences of the deed must be borne, no matter by whom. When theosophists claim that they do not understand the unique act of Christ Jesus for all humanity, they simply do not understand karma. The same is true of priests who claim that karma interferes with salvation. The reason why Christianity has so far placed less emphasis on this law and also on the idea of reincarnation lies in the development of humanity and will be discussed in more detail later.

[ 22 ] The world does not consist of individual selves, each of which stands alone, but rather there is a great unity, a great brotherhood in the world. And just as here in physical life one brother or friend can stand in for another, so too, in a much deeper sense, in the spiritual world.