The Rudolf Steiner Archive

First Lecture

[ 1 ] The Revelation of John tells us what will happen in the course of time. The Apocalypse is written in images. These images are expressions of the manifestation of the eternal world spirit, revealing the highest mysteries. These highest secrets are to be written down by John, who beholds them.

[ 2 ] First, there are seven churches, symbolically referred to as seven candlesticks and seven stars. The stars are the watching geniuses of the churches.

[ 3 ] In a second vision, John sees around a chair on which the Spirit of God is seated, the four apocalyptic animals, the lion, the cow, the man, and the eagle. Twenty-four elders sit around the chair of the Spirit of God. “And I saw in the right hand of him who sat on the throne a book written inside and on the back, sealed with seven seals.” (Rev. 5:1) The Lamb opens the book. The book contains what is symbolically expressed in the four apocalyptic horsemen when the first four seals are opened; when the fifth seal is opened, the martyrs appear—those who have risen to knowledge and life in the Spirit. When the sixth seal is opened, there is a terrible earthquake. But with the seventh, the revelation also becomes audible: the seven trumpets sound. Mysterious images are then revealed, for example, a being whose legs are like two pillars; one foot stands on the sea, the other on the earth. “And I saw another mighty angel coming down from heaven, clothed with a cloud, and a rainbow was upon his head, and his face was as it were the sun, and his feet as pillars of fire, and he had a little book open in his hand.” (Rev. 10:1-2) The secret of this book must be swallowed up by John. Then a woman appears, clothed with the sun, with the moon at her feet.

[ 4 ] And it continues: “And I stood on the sand of the sea, and saw a beast rise up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, and on his horns ten crowns, and on his heads the names of blasphemy.” (Rev. 13:1) The sound of the trumpet accompanied this. An image shows us the victory of good over evil. A beast appears, which in a certain sense represents the evil principle. It is the beast with seven heads and ten horns.

[ 5 ] Then a beast with two horns appears, which is similar to the lamb and is to appear in the future. Only those who have wisdom will recognize it. “And I saw another beast rising out of the earth; and he had two horns like a lamb, and he spoke as a dragon. And he exercises all the authority of the first beast before him... And it causes all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hand or on their foreheads, so that no one can buy or sell unless he has the mark, that is, the name of the beast or the number of his name. Here is wisdom! Let the one who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man, and his number is 666.” (Rev. 13:11 and 16-18)

[ 6 ] Furthermore, it is revealed how all enemies will be eliminated: Michael binds the dragon, the evil elements; then a new world comes into being.

[ 7 ] In the first centuries of Christianity, this was prophesied and always understood as a reference to the future. Of course, the exegetes soon knew little more, but time and again, interpreters emerged, including in the Middle Ages. The year 1000 was often taken to be the time of the appearance of the beast. The further time progressed, the more nonsensical the explanations became, especially in the 19th century. The old explainers were regarded as children who could still believe in visions of the future. The Apocalypse was seen as a historical document, as if it had all already happened when John wrote it down. There had been wars even after the advent of Christianity, so they could have been expressed by John through the red horse. The white horse could then symbolize the martyrs. Earthquakes, which John describes when opening the sixth seal, had just occurred in Asia Minor at that time. And locust plagues were not difficult to prove either. However, for the interpreters, the place of the two-horned beast was a real cross. Someone had heard something about how to read numbers; this had leaked from occultism. How do you read numbers? Every letter also means a number; esotericists wrote in numbers when they wanted to hide something. For each number, you had to put the right letter, be able to read the letters, and then also know what the word that came out meant. Who, then, is the beast whose number is 666? The explainers said it must be something from the past. The letters were written in Hebrew—but incorrectly—in place of the numbers: the result was “Nero.” The horns were then associated with the generals or enemies of the Romans, for example, the Parthians. However, if it had been written correctly [from right to left] with Hebrew letters [and also read from right to left], the following would have come out: 60 ס Samech, 6 ו Waw; but 600 was written by the esotericists as 200 + 400: 200 ר Resch + 400 ת Taw. This results in: 666 סורת Sorat. Sorat is also the corresponding word in Greek. Sorat has meant “demon of the sun” since ancient times. Every star has its good spirit — its intelligence — and its evil spirit — its demon. The adversary of the good forces of the sun was called Sorat. Christ was always the representative of the sun, namely the intelligence of the sun. Sorat is therefore the adversary of Christ Jesus. The sign for Sorat looks like this:

[ 8 ] The sign of the intelligence of the sun is:

[ 9 ] This is also the occult sign of the lamb. The lamb receives the book with the seven seals. “And I saw, and behold, in the midst of the throne and of the four living creatures, and in the midst of the elders, stood a Lamb as though it had been slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of God sent out into all the earth.” (Rev. 5:6) The seven corners of the sign are called “horns.” But what do the “eyes” mean? — In occult schools, the seven eyes are written as the signs of the seven planets. The seven eyes mean nothing other than the seven planets, and the names of the planets designate the spirits that are incarnated in them as intelligence. “Saturn” is the name of the Saturn soul. The names of the planets are the seven planetary spirits that surround the earth and influence human life. The Lamb, Christ, contains all seven. Christ is the Alpha and the Omega; the seven planets relate to him as the limbs to the whole body. The intertwining of the lines of the sign wonderfully represents the interaction of the seven planets. From Saturn one ascends to the Sun, from there down to the Moon, then to Mars, Mercury, and so on. The same is expressed in the names of the seven days of the week: Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. Christ is the ruler of all these spheres; they are only part of his actions, he connects them all. In Rosicrucian schools, a lamb is often painted as a symbol of solar intelligence.

[ 10 ] We determine time according to the movement of the stars. Was the method of calculating time always the same as it is now? Important things have changed. If we look back a little into the past, we see the Atlantean culture before the time of the great flood on Earth. It was preceded by the Lemurian age. If we go back even further, the Earth, Sun, and Moon were still united in a single body. At that time, time had to be determined differently than it is now. Day and night were also completely different. In Lemuria, it was once like it is today at the North Pole for the entire Earth: half a year of night and half a year of day. When the sun, moon, and Earth were still one, this united mass moved in the sky. Occult teachings were already able to calculate this movement at that time, just as we calculate time according to the sun today. The sun moves across the sky through the signs of the zodiac. 800 years before Christ, the sun stood in the sign of Aries. Christ was first worshipped under the sign of the cross, at the foot of which lies a lamb; it was not until the 6th century that the cross with Christ on it appeared. Before that, the bull was worshipped, in whose sign the sun stood at that time, and even further back, the twins, especially in Persia. But the animals, the billy goats that form Donar's team, also signify the same thing. Before that, Cancer was worshipped, and so on.

[ 11 ] Before the Lemurian era, the sun, moon, and earth, united as one body, moved forward in the sense of the zodiac. After that, it was possible to measure time. That is why the twelve signs of the zodiac were referred to as the celestial clock and were also drawn as such.

[ 12 ] A planet alternately undergoes a pralaya, a cosmic night, and a manvantara, a cosmic day, just as we experience day and night. During the pralaya, the planet passes through the signs of the zodiac just as it does during a manvantara; that is why the twelve signs of the zodiac are counted twice, just as we count 2 times 12 = 24 hours. The hours symbolize the signs of the zodiac. The united sun, moon, and earth also moved through the cosmic days and nights according to the celestial clock. Then came the separation. But man was not the same as he is today; the soul came down gradually, and gradually man developed from a generic being into an individual. If the generic souls of humans had been gathered together during the Lemurian and Atlantean periods, something very strange would have been perceived in the aura of these people. The aura of humans is constantly changing; like all astral beings, it is in perpetual motion. The generic souls were reflected in animal forms, for example in sphinxes and so on. The ancient Atlantean and Lemurian generic souls are also constantly changing, but they express themselves in four different ways. This fourfold nature of the human generic souls is referred to as the four apocalyptic animals: lion, cow, human, eagle. These four animals represent the lower human being, and the lamb symbolizes the human being in its perfection—that is, the fifth animal.

[ 13 ] Twice twelve stars and four animals were once the rulers of the world. Great cosmic powers animated the signs of the zodiac and the four animals. The 24 elders of the Apocalypse are the two times twelve stars of the world clock that once ruled. The development of man can be represented in this figure (see drawing on page 23).

[ 14 ] The lowest point represents bright daytime consciousness. In pre-Lemurian times, humans possessed a dim clairvoyance. At that time, humans were closer to the divine than they are today. Then they conquered daytime consciousness. Humans will take this with them in their further development when they come closer to the divine again and become clairvoyant. Each point on the descending line corresponds to a point on the ascending line. If we could live backwards, we would see all the things that we will see in the future in a different, clairvoyant way. In the future, we will see the twelve planetary spirits again, and the sun, moon, and earth will one day be reunited. “And the sun was black as sackcloth, and the moon became as blood,” and so on. (Rev. 6:12)

[ 15 ] When the soul once descended from the bosom of the Deity, it found a human animal on earth; these human animals looked grotesque, they still had to be transformed, overcome; in the future, such an animal will also have to be overcome. This is what the beast with two horns means.

[ 16 ] Only those who explain the Apocalypse from its entire context can understand it correctly. The Apocalypse is a cosmic explanation of the world. The writer was an initiate. He pointed to world laws that prevail from the beginning to the end, from Alpha to Omega.

[ 17 ] We should allow the sacred symbols given to us in the Apocalypse to work on us. The sign of solar intelligence, for example, should not remain a mere sign for us; we should immerse ourselves in it until we feel that it is no longer a dead sign, but flowing life. The signs should be gateways for us from the physical to the spiritual world. Then we will have fulfilled our duty: to bring the physical and spiritual worlds into connection with each other.