The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Pneumatosophy II

[ 1 ] It may seem to some, particularly within our own circles, to be somewhat superfluous that, in discussing these important topics during these lectures at our annual meeting, I should also take into account what contemporary science and scholarship have to say on the matters in question, and what—as is the case here—has also been said about them in other periods of human development by those who are in turn recognized by our contemporary scholarship. Not that in any way a detailed bridge is to be built here to this scholarship I have alluded to. Such a bridge is perhaps entirely unnecessary within our circles, unnecessary indeed for the very reason that the vast majority of those individuals who enter our circles have, from the depths of their souls and hearts, a certain longing for and connection to spiritual life, and do not actually come to us in order to have these spiritual worlds , but rather to get to know in a concrete form that which their heart and soul urges them toward, so that to many among us, an appeal to today’s scholarship might well seem highly superfluous. Another reason that might be put forward for such consideration of scholarship may not apply entirely, though perhaps to some extent. It is the argument that one might say the theosophist finds himself in a position where he must bear witness to his worldview before people in the outer world, and that it is therefore necessary for him to have, so to speak, in the manner of thinking outside of spiritual science, something that gives him the ability to refute objections and offer affirmations for this spiritual-scientific worldview. However, we have also often discussed that it is only possible to a very limited extent to convince those who are today opponents of the spiritual-scientific worldview with any kind of proof. Worldviews are fundamentally based—insofar as people are opponents of this spiritual-scientific worldview—not on proofs, but on habits of thought. And for those whose habits of thought simply cannot engage with the spiritual scientific way of viewing the world, one will certainly not be able to reach them with evidence at first. So the reason just described cannot, at least not to any significant degree, apply to the presentation of such matters—which, incidentally, are raised only sparingly—but the presentation of matters such as those discussed yesterday is intended within our circles primarily to correct the confusion that might otherwise arise in individuals within our circles if they have to hear time and again: Your worldview is not based on any justifiable foundation, particularly not on a scientific one. —These things are set forth not primarily to refute opponents, or to bear witness to the spiritual-scientific worldview before these opponents, but so that the Theosophist may increasingly feel that his worldview stands on firm ground that is also secure in the face of everything that recognized science has to say, so that the Theosophist himself may not be led astray. To say in any detail everything that ought to be said today—that is, to engage in a debate with officially recognized science—would require a great deal of time. But if, in the course of these lectures—which could indeed become important for our overall worldview—this or that reference is occasionally made to external scientific rigor, these references are intended to serve no other purpose than to evoke a sense that there are indeed ways and means of engaging with this science, and that one stands on solid ground when one advocates spiritual science. Thus, the intention is to point more toward the manner in which one might engage with it, were one to have the time and opportunity, rather than to suggest that such an engagement could be presented in even an approximately comprehensive sense.

[ 2 ] When we speak today of a science of external physicality, of the external corporeality of the body, then certain contradictions within such a science may be possible, and certain doubts may arise. But such a science has one advantage: that the object—external corporeality—of this science is not disputed. But when one speaks of the science of the soul, or, as we examined this field from a certain perspective last year, of psychosophy, then one does indeed enter into realms where there are even people who, so to speak, dispute the object—the soul itself. And in our present day, one is thus confronted not only with the materialistic world, but also with a certain kind of psychology that seeks to be a “science of the soul without a soul,” as the term has been coined. Yesterday we cited examples from Aristotle and from a contemporary expert on Aristotle to illustrate a scientific approach that would not even consider denying the object of the soul—indeed, one that engages with the object we call the soul in a very astute manner. And regarding Aristotle himself, one must truly say—even from the few hints given yesterday—that there can be no question of a denial of the spirit in his work. But we have seen in the example of Brentano’s psychology how a sharp mind of our time, precisely in the description of the individual faculties of the soul, stops short of what we must call the spirit. Therefore, with regard to pneumatosophy or the science of the spirit, one stands on ground where, from a certain perspective, not only are this or that law of this science or the descriptions of the inner being denied, but where the object itself is also denied. The spirit is, after all—as can be inferred from what was said yesterday—a highly controversial fact for many people. Therefore, we must first seriously address the question: Why is it that the spirit as such can be such a highly controversial fact for people?

[ 3 ] The obvious answer to this is, of course, that human beings perceive the body—or the physical realm in general—through their external senses. And with all the force with which facts that are involuntarily present to human beings take effect, with all that force the external physical facts act upon human beings, and they are not in a position to deny what these facts reveal. Human beings are in a somewhat similar situation with regard to the soul as well. For they do indeed experience what flows within their soul: feelings, images, impulses of the will, and all that which arises as a matter of fate from the course of these soul experiences—their sufferings and joys, pleasures and pains, and so on. And anyone who does not wish to claim from the outset that everything he experiences in this way is nothing, or perhaps at most a kind of foam on the surface of physical facts, cannot help but acknowledge the soul in a certain sense—at least with regard to its reality. But the spirit is, after all—even if it is there, as one might say—something supernatural, something not immediately perceptible; and this alone suggests that the denial of the spirit might be relatively obvious.

[ 4 ] The point is that, strictly speaking, any search for the spirit might seem somewhat surprising if this spirit were, in fact, to belong exclusively to the supersensible world and did not enter at all into the world in which we ordinarily live. After all, in the field of spiritual science, we engage in research into the spiritual world, and we emphasize often enough that the facts we present about the spiritual world essentially stem from a human perspective that can only be brought about through a certain self-cultivation, through a certain self-education, through meditation, concentration, and so on, so that the facts of the spiritual world are not given to human beings from the outset, but can only be attained by the human being rising to a higher level of knowledge than that which they possess in everyday life. Thus it might seem as though this spiritual world were entirely hidden from the outer world and could only come into consideration for human beings at all once they had completely transcended their ordinary cognitive faculties and ascended to a different level of cognition. If this is the case, then one must indeed raise the question: How does a person come to long for a world, to yearn for a world that, in essence, reveals itself to them in no way whatsoever as they go about their daily lives?

[ 5 ] In essence, only the believer—not the scientist—can feel truly prepared to counter this objection. The believer, however, will be able to counter this objection by arguing that the spiritual world has revealed itself through its revelations, which have come down from it in the course of human development, so that human beings can obtain their knowledge of the spiritual world through these revelations from the supersensible realm. But if a person is not inclined to acknowledge such revelations from the supersensible, to surrender to such a belief, well, then there is actually little else to say at first, other than what has just been stated, so that the scientist may come to the conclusion, even if he is quite good-natured in his own way: There may well be a spiritual world; but for the time being we have no reason to take it into account, for it gives no indication of its existence in the external world.

[ 6 ] However, an objection to this has also been raised by idealist or spiritual-philosophical circles, and it has been raised time and again over the course of history. Indeed, a large part of the recognition of the spiritual world by certain philosophers rests precisely on the fact that this objection is taken seriously in response to the first objection. It consists in saying: But surely human beings can go beyond the world that is initially accessible through external perception. Human beings can build a world of truth within themselves, and they could never be satisfied—simply because they are human—with what the world of external perception can offer them. —Thus, human beings build a world of truth within themselves. And when one then examines this world seriously, one sees what in it already transcends all that is physical. One then cites the ideas about the world that human beings bring forth, the grand, comprehensive perspectives that can never enter into human beings merely through the external senses, and which must therefore be given to them from a source other than the senses. Thus one easily sees in the very fact of the world of truth a circumstance that can provide the conviction that: Human beings are participants in a spiritual world, for they live with their truth within that spiritual world. Naturally, a philosopher such as Hegel, for example, would recognize in this a sufficient ground—in response to the objection outlined—for the justification of a spiritual world to which thinking, insofar as it is free from sensibility, also belongs. Philosophers who, by their very nature, are initially capable of recognizing the complete independence of the world of truth from the rest of the world will find in this independence of the world of truth, in this self-movement of the spirit when it moves within truth, sufficient justification for the very assumption of a spirit. And then one could say: There will be enough people in the world for whom the existence of truth, the concrete existence of truth, the true world of ideas, is proof of the spirit. Indeed, one can say in a certain sense that something similar is found in Aristotle himself, that he too holds the belief: Man lives in his concepts, in his ideas, in what Aristotle calls the Nous (Nus), the intellect, in a spiritual world; and because this spiritual world exists within man, it is thereby present, and it is thereby sufficiently grounded. And one may then also draw conclusions about other beings and facts of the spiritual world from what one can recognize within this spiritual world as such when one moves within it. Thus Aristotle draws his conclusions about the deity, about the immortality of the soul, and arrives at such results as we were able to mention yesterday. Hegel, the modern philosopher, speaks of a self-movement of the spirit and by this means the “self-movement of concepts,” which in its lawfulness has nothing to do with what the external world is for human beings; he means by this what the self-activity of the spirit is; and in the existence of this self-activity of the spirit, the spirit proves itself as such, reveals itself, manifests itself. More recent attempts, such as Rudolf Eucken’s—which, to be sure, cannot be regarded as particularly ingenious from the perspective of spiritual science—speak in turn of a self-comprehension of the spirit and thus of a self-proof of spiritual life. But upon closer examination, one cannot arrive at any proof of the spirit by this path. And it is of the utmost importance that the theosophist know this, for the reason that he himself may have an idea of how difficult it fundamentally is to come to terms with all that is taught by the external world, including philosophy, when it comes to proving the spirit as such. People still take this far too lightly. For the existence of truth as such needs to prove nothing to the spirit. For let us suppose—and I wish to mention something here only briefly and thus almost by way of comparison, which, if it were to be thoroughly expounded, would have to be presented in a very long series of lectures—let us suppose that there really were nothing other than the corporeal, the outer physical world. This external world, with its forces or, as it has now become fashionable to say, with its energies, manifests itself in what we call the mineral world; it becomes more complex—that is, it does not enrich itself with a new energy, but merely becomes more complex in the plant world and the animal world. And let us imagine that it ultimately manifests itself in such a way that, through the pure combination and pure interaction of all the energies present in the physical world, it builds up the human being, constructs the human being in such a way that, through this construction of the human body from the energies of physical nature, the human being is enabled to let his world of thought sprout within the complex instrument of his brain, which now—just like physical processes—forms itself within the physical body. Let us suppose for a moment that we were to take seriously this statement by several materialists—which to many seems extraordinarily crude—that the brain secretes thoughts just as the liver secretes bile. Let us take it seriously for a moment. Let us assume that this human brain were constructed from purely inorganic, physical energies in such a complex way that, through its activity, it would give rise to what appears to the human being as his spiritual life. Let us therefore assume for a moment that the materialists are right, that there is no such thing as the spiritual. Would it still be possible, in the sense of these materialists, to speak of a world of truth—that is, of the world of truth as it appears, for example, in Hegelian philosophy as the “self-movement of concepts”?

[ 7 ] You can see that raising this question is by no means insignificant. For the answer to this question already implies that materialism, if only an affirmative answer to this question could somehow be obtained, could explain even a philosophy such as Hegel’s by its own means—which means nothing other than that it could reject all philosophies calling themselves idealistic or spiritualistic! One need only—and this is precisely what can only be hinted at and could only be clearly expounded in many lectures—imagine that what emerges from the complex human brain as thoughts—insofar as this world of truth, this world of thoughts, is indeed thoughts—is nothing more than reflections of the external world, reflections of the external physical world. You can place an object in front of a mirror: the mirror reflects an image of that object back to you. The image resembles the object. It is not the object, but it is produced by the purely material processes within the mirror. And you need admit nothing more than that you are dealing with a mere image that has no reality; then you have no need to prove the reality of the mirror image. So you need only adopt the materialist standpoint and say: There is really nothing but the external physical energies that combine to form the human brain and produce a kind of mirror for the external world, and everything that is reflected as thoughts are merely images of the external world—then you have no need to prove the mind. For the only [supernatural] element, thoughts, are merely images of the external world. And just as one need not prove the reality of a mirror image, so too does one need not prove the reality of thoughts. There will then be little that can be done in response to people who come forward and say: But there are also concepts that cannot be derived from external perception, for a circle never appears to us as we know it in geometry, nor does a triangle, nor indeed any mathematical truths. - But here one can say again: We see them as images that arise in our minds. They do not exist out there, but many individual instances occur as approximations, and from these arises what appears as abstract concepts. - In short, we must do away with the objection that human beings generate the supersensible truth within themselves—that it is supersensible is true, that cannot be denied—but the materialist can certainly do away with it. Truth as such, then, would thus be no objection to materialism.

[ 8 ] Now we find ourselves on solid ground: this truth, whose existence—since the supernatural cannot be denied—appears to countless individuals as sufficient proof of the existence of a spiritual world, or at least as an indication of a spiritual world, is in fact not even proof of the spiritual world. For this truth is indeed supernatural; but it need not be real! It need only be a collection of images; then no one needs to accept its reality. Thus we must hold fast to this: Possession of truth is no proof of the reality of a spiritual world! And as human beings strive toward truth and weave and live within it, they can never approach the spirit, for they must always object that truth may be merely a reflection of the external physical world. Now one might say: But then one can hardly still believe that there is anything anywhere in the vast world that can lead human beings, as they are in everyday life, to acknowledge a spirit! - And when people like Feuerbach, the 19th-century philosopher, come along and say: Well, what were the gods, or what was a god to humanity? People simply experience within themselves the contents of their souls, their thoughts, and project them out into the world. They make that their god! — then it is easy to prove the unreality of the divine world, because it is merely the outward projection of the unreal world of thought. Aristotle does this incorrectly, Feuerbach argues, in that he derives proof of the existence of a god from the existence of the human world of thought, the world of the intellect, and from its objectivity, by saying: “Man possesses this intellect in his soul; the same applies to things.” This presupposes that the all-pervading “Nus” is present everywhere in things. But as he describes it, it is merely the projected human intellect. Yet if it is merely a reflection, then there is no basis on which to ground anything. |

[ 9 ] This is how clearly the expert in spiritual science must view these matters. He must be able to say to himself with such clarity: The paths usually taken to arrive at an understanding of the spiritual world from the outside prove to be rather fragile. - And upon closer inspection, they prove to be quite fragile.

[ 10 ] Should we then admit that there is absolutely no way to become convinced of the existence of the spirit world before entering it through a clairvoyant? It might almost seem that way. It might seem as if only those people who either look into the spiritual world as clairvoyants or who believe the clairvoyants are justified in speaking of the spiritual world. It might seem that way; but that is not the case. And here we come to the question: The external world as such, with its material content, initially points us—if we do not already know of it—to no spiritual world. Nor does the inner world of truth point us to a spiritual world, for it could be a mirror image of the external, purely physical world. Do we then have anything at all besides what is sketched out here? Yes, we have something, and that is error! For one must not forget anything in the world if one is to have a comprehensive understanding of the world. Alongside truth, human beings also have error. Now, error—you will say—cannot, of course, lead to truth, and it would be a most peculiar thing to start from error. But I have not at all said that—because we have seen that it is fruitless to stand on the ground of truth—we now wish to stand on the ground of error. For that would hardly reduce the number of opponents if, in order to perceive the reality of the spiritual world, we were now to stand on the ground of error. But error is not to be cited here as something from which we proceed in order to recognize the truth; that would be not only folly but an absurdity. Yet one thing cannot be denied regarding error: it is there, it exists in the world, it is real. And above all: it can arise in human nature and come into being within it. Now, if the external world has created a mirroring apparatus in the brain and reflects itself, and the truth content is the sum of the mirror images, then of course error could still arise in a person instead of truth, in that the person might be likened to a false mirror or to a mirror that produces caricatures of what is outside. If we take a mirror that produces a caricature instead of a correct image, it reflects incorrectly. So error could be explained relatively easily by saying that it is possible because our organ, which is constructed from the external world, reflects incorrectly. One can explain truth as a reflection and can also explain error as a reflection. But there is one thing that cannot be done: the correction, the transformation of error into truth, cannot be explained as a mirror image. For no matter how hard you try to persuade a mirror that shows a caricature of an external object to transform this caricature into a correct image of its own accord, it remains as it is. It shows the false image and persists in its error.

[ 11 ] The decisive factor is that human beings are not bound to remain in error, but are capable of overcoming error and moving toward the truth! That is what matters. In this way, human beings demonstrate that, in the fact of truth, there is indeed a reflection of external reality; but in the transformation of error into truth, it becomes clear that error as such is not a reflection of external reality. In other words, this means that error, when it exists, has no right to exist in the world that initially surrounds us. Truth has its right to exist in the world that initially surrounds us, and to accept truth we need to accept nothing other than the existence of an external physical world. To accept an error, it is not enough for something to be reflected from the external world; rather, there must be something present that does not belong to the external world, something that has no direct connection to the external world. If the sensible is reflected in truth as a supersensible image, then when the sensible is reflected as error, a cause for the error must arise other than that which lies within the sensible itself. What, then, are we looking at when we observe that the error is there? We are looking at a world that is not limited to the sensory world, the external world of physical facts! The error can only originate in a supersensory world; it can only come from a supersensory world.

[ 12 ] That is, for the moment, a conclusion. Now let us see what parapsychological research has to say—not to prove anything, but to shed light on the matter—regarding this peculiar position of error in the external world. Let us suppose that we were so contemptuous of ourselves as to, initially out of a purely inner impulse, out of sheer caprice, conceive an idea that we know for certain is an error. Let us suppose, then, that we arbitrarily conceive an error. At first glance, this may not seem like a very desirable act: to arbitrarily conceive an error. But in a higher sense, it can be a very useful act. Namely, whoever actually carries this out—conceiving an error arbitrarily—will, if they do so with the necessary energy, with the necessary care, and with frequent repetition, notice that this error is already something quite real in the soul, in their soul. They will notice that this error is already having an effect. Through the error that we think arbitrarily—and about which we are clear that it is an error—we prove nothing, we clarify nothing for ourselves. But it works within us. Indeed, this effect is quite significant for the reason that we are not disturbed by any prospect of truth when we know we are thinking an error. We are truly at one with ourselves when we arbitrarily conceive an error. And one need only continue this process long enough to see that it is precisely through this that one arrives at what we have always described in spiritual science—in “How Does One Attain Knowledge of the Higher Worlds?” for example—as the summoning of forces hidden within the soul, forces that were not there before. The constant surrender to external truth does not lead very far in relation to what is now meant, but the arbitrary allowing of error to take hold within oneself can indeed lead to the emergence of certain hidden soul forces.

[ 13 ] What I have just said should not actually be taken as a rule. That is why you will find the following omitted in my book *How Does One Attain Knowledge of the Higher Worlds?*—and rightly so: that one should simply think as many falsehoods as possible, repeatedly and at random, with great vigor, in order to bring forth hidden soul forces. — But in a certain other sense, the matter is nevertheless somewhat similar to what is described there. It is explained that we must not, however, proceed from a gross and clumsy error, but that we must fulfill two conditions. We must, however, form a concept that does not correspond to any external reality. Take the concept that is repeatedly recommended: the concept of the Rose Cross. If one considers it one-sidedly from the standpoint of external reality, it is a mistaken concept, an error. No red roses grow on a black, dead tree trunk. But it is a symbolic image, an allegorical image. Although it does not directly express any truth, it symbolizes a truth; thus, compared to purely external sensory truth, it is an erroneous image, yet not entirely so, because it does symbolize something meaningful and spiritually valid. When we meditate on the Rose Cross, we surrender to a concept that is an error in relation to external material truth, thus fulfilling the condition that we voluntarily accept an error into our soul. But we do not surrender ourselves to an ordinary error. For we do fulfill quite specific conditions by surrendering ourselves not to the ordinary error, but to the symbolic, the meaningful idea. And this brings us to the second condition. That is, we must fulfill certain other prerequisites when we thus surrender ourselves to meditation, concentration, and so on. If you delve into the full spirit of what is expounded in my book *How to Attain Knowledge of the Higher Worlds* or in the second part of *An Outline of Esoteric Science*, you will see that a certain state of the soul is necessary in order to devote oneself to meditation and so on in the right way. Certain moral qualities of the soul are specified there that must be present if what is to take place is to occur in the proper manner. Why, then, is this stated as a condition? Why are certain moral qualities required so that a person may devote themselves to such a symbolic—that is, in the external sense, false—representation?

[ 14 ] This is yet another of those things that must certainly be taken into account. It generally leads to nothing good if one merely devotes oneself to meditation, concentration, and so on, without seeking that overall state of mind which has, after all, been sufficiently described. Experience shows, in fact, that if a person lacks the foundation of such a state of mind as has just been described, the world that is then opened up to them through the awakening of hidden soul forces is truly a world that has a destructive, dissolving effect on human life rather than a healing, developmental one. What is presented as meditation, concentration, and so on will have a healing effect and further develop what is already there into a higher existence only if it grows out of the foundation of such a state of mind as has just been indicated. Experience shows this. And it amply demonstrates the pathological phenomena that befall those who, rather than from the foundation of such a state of mind, seek to ascend to a higher world through meditation and the like out of mere curiosity, passion, or the like. Such people do indeed take in a reality; for error is a reality. It also works in the soul. It is a reality that is not contained in the external world as it is initially given to us through the senses. Such people do indeed take a supersensible force, a supersensible entity, into their soul. Error, with its powers and its very being, is a real, active force; yet it cannot have its foundation in the external sensory world. But it must not act in this way. This supersensory power must not act unless one stands on a special foundation—the foundation of a sound state of mind. This can be for no other reason than that one says: We have indeed attributed a supersensible force to error; but this supersensible force, when it manifests itself as error, is certainly not a good force. It can only become a good force when it is rooted in the soil of a good state of mind.

[ 15 ] Translate this into the language often used in spiritual science to discuss such matters. It is said there: Human beings can come to know a supersensible world because they learn to recognize error. So they do not need to ascend artificially into the supersensible world, for it reaches into the human being by sending them into error. And that has an effect. But it is not a good world that the human being comes to know there. They must bring a good world from another side into a state of soul from which error can first take effect in the soul in the right way. If I were to clothe what is meant by this in a kind of paradox, I would have to say: People already come to know the supersensible world within the sensible world, for they have error there. — So they first come to know the devil without the supersensible world; they come to know that which is not good, and which also reveals itself as nothing good, manifests itself as nothing good. So there would be good reason for someone to have once said: “The little people never sense the devil, even if he had them by the collar.” For the devil is there, just as surely as error is there. Or if we want to put it in our own words, we can say: Human beings come to know the Luciferic forces. They first come to know the supersensible world in the form of Luciferic forces. And they can only escape this by adopting an ostrich-like policy, by burying their heads in the sand and refusing to acknowledge this world. They can certainly do that, but that does not make the matter go away. That is precisely the point, and what would have to be elaborated upon in a large number of lectures if one wanted to offer more than a sketchy outline: that through the existence of error in the outer world, inner proof is provided for the supersensible, but initially for the Luciferic supersensible, which is an adversary of human nature. If, upon entering the supersensible world, a person does not possess the necessary moral disposition of the soul due to the error arbitrarily introduced into their thinking, they fall prey to Lucifer.

[ 16 ] Is there a particular reason to speak specifically about these things? Yesterday we cited Aristotle’s statement that, in addition to what a human being inherits from the lineage of parents and ancestors, God bestows upon them that which constitutes their supersensible nature; that is, God creates the supersensible aspect for every human being entering the sensory world in conjunction with the parents. And, if you recall what was said at the end yesterday, we could not at all come to terms with this Aristotelian assertion. We had to find all sorts of things in it that are incompatible with this Aristotelian assertion itself. Now, of course, our dear friend Dr. Unger has quite rightly demonstrated and clearly proven the validity of the contradiction in the world. But I would now have to engage in lengthy arguments again if I were to prove to you that a contradiction must be recognized as unjustified where a person makes a claim that then leads to consequences which refute his own claim. That would be the case with Aristotle. For if God were to create the supersensible aspect of the human being, and if this were to enter the physical world, this would, as is evident from its own development, result in an unsatisfied state among all those human beings who live in the supersensible realm after death. It would have to be assumed that God created human beings for the purpose of dissatisfaction. This cannot be correct, even in Aristotle’s sense. We cannot possibly concede to any philosopher that what comes into being through the line of inheritance from human beings is connected to what is given directly by a God from within the human being as its supersensible part. For, first of all, this is based on a proof derived from truth. Aristotle seeks only to provide a proof derived from truth. But this is not possible, as we have seen. For the existence of truth proves nothing regarding the supersensible world, so that from the outset, proof from truth is of no use for the supersensible world. The second point is this: If we assume that man is created by a god in his supersensible part when he enters the physical world, then it would be inexplicable that he could pass into an imperfect state after death. Thus, what was presented yesterday as an Aristotelian assumption is equally impossible. Aristotle simply did not take into account that the next supersensible realm, which is given to human beings and which proves to be very powerful, indeed, can prove effective in relation to immediate human experience—is the supersensory Luciferic principle, and that we can only come to terms with this if, in the genesis of the supersensory human being, we first allow the Luciferic principle access, that is, let the Luciferic principle participate, so to speak, insofar as we look up from the human being, as he is in the physical world, toward the supersensory world. Thus, the human being cannot simply descend from a God. He must descend not only from a God, but from a God in conjunction with the Luciferic principle! And here we stand on ground that—as I ask you—you may well take to heart for the reason that, due to the fact just touched upon, which has caused the Western peoples, in the face of any assumption of a spiritual world, one might say, has unconsciously permeated their sensibilities, these Western peoples have, even to this day, in their scholarly insights, been unable to attain an open-mindedness toward what we call reincarnation, the repeated earthly lives.

[ 17 ] Just as I have explained to you today—that human beings should actually believe in the devil far more readily than in any other supernatural being, that the devil is actually quite close to them—people in earlier times did not grapple with this at all. But they felt the very same thing that I have now expressed to you in ideas. They felt that alongside the divine, the Luciferic is present. And they felt something else as well, the validity of which will, however, only become clear to us in the course of these lectures: they did indeed feel that along with what confronts us in the human being’s outer physicality, there is also a spiritual element present, a divinely created element. And they could not reconcile the recognition of the outer human physical being on the physical plane with the assumption that humanity descends from the divine-supernatural or, indeed, from a supernatural source. They could not come to terms with this. For Western man, there was a very different difficulty than, for example, for the Buddhist, who finds it easy, given his entire way of thinking and feeling, to accept the doctrine of reincarnation. For it is, one might say, innate to him that the outer physical body actually represents a kind of denial of the divine, that the outer physical body represents a kind of fall from the divine, and that the striving to be freed from the outer physical body and to ascend to worlds for which the outer physical body has no significance is justified. But Aristotle stands there differently—and the disciples of the Buddha, for example, stand there differently. Aristotle stands before the world with his supersensory worldview, saying: We pass through the gate of death, taking our supersensory part with us through the gate of death, but must then look down upon what we were in the body, and our development in the supersensory world depends on this life in an earthly body. Nothing there is useless. The Deity has led us into a body because it was necessary for our overall development. It could not have given us this development if it had left us bodiless. - In other words: Aristotle places value on the experiences of external physical life. Here it is not a matter of concepts and abstractions, but of sensory content. The Buddhist adherent does not possess such sensory content as Aristotle understands it. I have often explained how he lacks it. He truly has a sense that human beings have passed through ignorance, which led them into contact with the sensory world; that when human beings have come to the sensory realm, they have arrived there through something from which they must free themselves. Thus, in Buddhism there is the feeling that a human being is truly human only when they have shed everything that belongs to the sensory realm. Aristotle, as a member of the spiritual life of the West, could not feel in a Buddhist way, just as no one standing within the spiritual life of the West can truly feel in a Buddhist way. He can convince himself of it, he can acknowledge the Buddhist view, it may even please him immensely, but this always happens with a denial of the soul’s innermost nature.

[ 18 ] But this is part of what it means to be a Westerner: to recognize the divine in the sensory world, the sensuous that has been spiritualized and deified. And even if Western man, under the influence of Buddhism, were to deny the spirituality of the sensory realm—even for a brief time—it lives on in the minds and will always be present. And in Aristotle, it was precisely this emphasis on the outwardly physical that lived on—not for its own sake, but as a necessary stage, as a necessary prerequisite for the overall evolution of humanity. This emphasis on the external physical realm always lived on in Western people, right up into the 19th century. And this is one of the reasons why outstanding minds of the West could not come to terms with reincarnation. The sense of the legitimacy of the Luciferic principle on the one hand, and the recognition of the Divine even in external, sensory existence on the other, worked together, so to speak, and this generated feelings of the kind I wish to share with you regarding a man who truly belongs to the most spiritual personalities of the West. I would like to demonstrate this feeling to you through the significant philosopher Frohschammer. You will find it described in his work on the philosophy of Thomas Aquinas. There he presents a very detailed examination of his own philosophy in relation to Thomism and, in one passage, expresses his views in his own way on the possibility of what we call reincarnation. In this regard, Frohschammer must certainly be regarded as a representative of the Western worldview—that is, as a thinker through whom we can recognize how difficult it became in past centuries to acknowledge that which must constitute a fundamental tenet of our Pneumatosophy: the doctrine of reincarnation. Frohschammer says:

[ 19 ] “As originating from God, the human soul can only be regarded as a product or work of divine imagination; for in this case, the human soul, like the world itself, must indeed come from divine power and activity (since nothing can come from mere nothingness), but this power and activity of God must act not only as a model for creation, but also as a formative force in its realization and preservation; that is, as a formative power (not merely of a formal, but also of a real nature), and consequently as imagination—that is, as a power or potency immanently active in the world and sustaining it through continuous creation, thus as world imagination—as has already been discussed earlier.”

[ 20 ] I would like to note here that Frohschammer also wrote a book titled *Imagination as the Fundamental Principle of the World Process*, in which he—much like Hegel with the Idea and Schopenhauer with the Will—presents imagination itself as the creative principle of the world.

[ 21 ] “As for the doctrine of the pre-existence of souls (souls that are regarded either as eternal or as created in time, but all at once from the very beginning), which, as noted, has been revived in recent times and is considered suitable for resolving all manner of psychological problems— it is connected with the doctrine of the transmigration of souls and the imprisonment of souls in earthly bodies.”

[ 22 ] This was written in 1889, and I have already indicated in the Karlsruhe Cycle that there were, in fact, always adherents of the doctrine of repeated earthly lives even in the 19th century. Frohschammer knows this, of course, and that is why he goes on to say:

[ 23 ] “According to this, then, at the time of conception, there would be neither a direct divine creation of souls nor a creative production of new human natures—body and soul—by the parents, but only a new union of the soul with the body, that is, a kind of incarnation or immersion of the soul into the body—at least a partial one, so that it is partly encompassed and bound by the body, partly protruding beyond it and asserting a certain independence as spirit, yet unable to break free from it until death severs the union and brings liberation and salvation to the soul (at least from this union). In its relationship to the body, the human spirit would then resemble the poor souls in purgatory, as they are usually depicted by amateurish painters on votive tablets: as bodies half-submerged in the blazing flames, but with the upper part (as souls) protruding and gesticulating! Just consider what position and significance would be accorded, under this view, to the sexual distinction, the nature of the human species, marriage, and the parental relationship to children! The sexual dichotomy would be nothing but a device for imprisonment, marriage an institution for carrying out this “noble” task, parents—in relation to their children’s souls—the henchmen tasked with restraining and imprisoning them, and the children themselves owing this miserable, arduous captivity to their parents, while having nothing else in common with them! Everything connected to this relationship was based on wretched deception! And likewise everything in humanity connected to the sexual dichotomy! What a role the sexual relationship plays! How deeply it determines the thoughts and aspirations of human beings! What longing does it arouse, what joy does it radiate, for what physical and spiritual delights is it the source! And how is it the subject of inexhaustible artistic, especially poetic, creation! And now this contrast is to be merely a device for the embodiment and imprisonment of poor souls, who are thereby exposed to earthly misery, succumbing to the toils, passions, temptations, and dangers of this earthly existence, and at best extending only a part of their being into an afterlife or, as they say, are transcendental (actually transcendent)! The significance of this sexual relationship, accordingly, does not lie in the fact that a constant renewal and rejuvenation takes place, corresponding to the springtime of existence, but rather in the opposite of that. And the longing that would underlie it, and the delight that emanates from it, would not be grounded in the satisfaction of the highest creative urge, as one might think, but springs from a sad striving to imprison new souls in physical forms that obscure and alienate the greatest part of their self.”

[ 24 ] You see, this is a person who speaks sincerely and honestly, speaking from the spiritual life of his time. And we have good reason to familiarize ourselves with the difficulties that the worldviews of past centuries in the West faced, in order to recognize what must be the fundamental nerve of our own worldview. And especially when we come to such important problems as those in these lectures, it will not be unnecessary to realize that all those who wish to approach spiritual science—and we can say that they wish to approach it honestly—face great difficulties. And it is one of the tasks of theosophists not to be reckless, but to fully acquaint themselves with the difficulties faced by those who, having grown out of Western cultural life, wish to rise to the life of the spirit as it presents itself to us in spiritual science in general, and in particular in what we might call pneumatosophy.