The Rudolf Steiner Archive

First Lecture

Ladies and gentlemen!

[ 1 ] You have asked me to discuss the Gospel of John in this series, in relation to the other three Gospels. This means that the view has taken root among you that the way of thinking inherent in the theosophical worldview encompasses much that can contribute to an understanding of Christianity. These lectures will demonstrate that this is indeed the case, and that the Gospels—especially the Gospel of John—have a special mission for humanity in our time. In particular, they will show how Christianity has gradually developed from distant periods of time, how it has a long future ahead of it, and how theosophy, through the insights it is called upon to reveal, opens up a new field of research regarding the Gospels.

[ 2 ] In fact, when we consider the stance taken by the leaders of the modern spiritualist movement toward the Gospels, we can only describe it as increasingly dismissive. This might be understandable if no other sources besides those known to date had come to light.

[ 3 ] What, then, do the Gospels have to offer the person who approaches them? They are meant to provide enlightenment, an explanation of the great event that has taken place in the development of humanity: the Christ event. But when people today approach the Gospels for this purpose, they find no satisfactory account of this event. Instead of a single account, they find four, and they find differences and contradictions in the Gospels. For example: Matthew and Luke recount [the story of Jesus’ childhood in different ways].

[ 4 ] And so one says: That doesn't add up, that can't be right; and so our modern criticism attempts to show that [gap in the transcript].

[ 5 ] It is well known how, under the influence of this view, the authority of the Gospels is gradually waning, and how people increasingly believe they can distill a kind of common foundation from the four Gospels, and how certain radical circles are even inclined to reject the whole thing. The Gospel that speaks most deeply to our hearts has fared particularly badly in this regard. It is said: In the first three Gospels, a historical core can be found. The Gospel of John, however, differs so greatly from the others that one must believe it was written much later and is of no significance. In other circles, while the Synoptic Gospels are attributed a certain historical significance, it is believed that the Gospel of John is a kind of hymn through which the early Christians sought to express their faith in Christ.

[ 6 ] From a purely historical perspective, we might ask: Did the people of the first centuries of Christianity actually hold the Gospels in their hands, and did they truly study them? The answer is: Even in the Middle Ages, the Gospels were not read—that is, studied—as widely as they have been for the past few centuries. It was only the printers who made it possible for all people to read the Word of the Gospel.

[ 7 ] If we go back to earlier centuries, we find that only a few people had access to the Gospels, and that these few were the most learned and knowledgeable: the leaders and teachers. Strangely enough, however, they took no offense at the contradictions that arise between the individual Gospels. And if we were to describe the prevailing sentiment that these differences evoked, it was a deep sense of gratitude that there was not just one document, but four. It was only when the Gospel became more popular that the contradictions were discovered; only then did people begin to take offense at the contradictions.

[ 8 ] Can it really be that, in the first centuries after Christ, these learned and highly sophisticated experts on Christianity lacked the insight, reason, and understanding to recognize the contradictions? No, that cannot be the case. There must be another explanation for this significant fact.

[ 9 ] When we try to look into the souls of the first confessors of Christianity, we must find that they felt, with regard to the Mystery of Christ, that this was something which human beings cannot readily understand; and therefore they told themselves that it was good that four painters had depicted what they themselves understood of it. For example, if we photograph this desk from this side, someone else can photograph it from the opposite side; we then have two photographs of it. In the same way, one can photograph the desk from the other two sides. We thus have four pictures of the desk. Anyone who assembles a complete picture from these four images can say that they know what the desk looks like.

[ 10 ] This is how four individuals have described the great Christ event to us, and one must take these four images together. In this way, one can gradually rise to a complete understanding of the event.

[ 11 ] The question then arises: How can there be four different accounts? What does each Gospel seek to convey about the great event of Christ? Each Gospel proceeds from the premise that this event cannot be understood through external knowledge, and that it is necessary to view it from the standpoint of an initiate. Each Gospel is written from the standpoint of the seer.

[ 12 ] In pre-Christian times, there were four types of initiation, four types of seership. And only when one considers that there were four types of initiation can one understand that each Gospel was written on the basis of a particular initiation.

[ 13 ] What, then, is an initiate? It is a person whose powers of perception are not limited to the outer world, and who has developed their spiritual faculties to the point where they can glimpse into the spiritual worlds.

[ 14 ] Now, in human beings, one can develop only what is already present within them in the form of latent capacities. Three fundamental powers are distinguished in human beings: the power of thought, the power of feeling, and the power of will. In ordinary human life, these three powers are developed only to a certain degree. In an initiate, they were greatly enhanced through the so-called mysteries. However, since it was found that in any one person all three powers could be developed equally only to a certain degree, those to be initiated were divided into three classes according to their aptitudes, in which only one of the three powers was particularly developed. Thus, in the Egyptian, Persian, and Greek Mysteries, it was said: We train certain people in such a way that the power of thought becomes particularly strong /gap in the transcript] up to the point of clairvoyance [gap in the transcript], while in other people the power of will [gap in the transcript].

[ 15 ] In ancient times, there were three groups of initiates:

the initiates of thought — the “sages,”
the initiates of feeling — the “therapists” or the “healers,”
the initiates of will — the “magicians.”

[ 16 ] These initiations were one-sided, but it was precisely by [renouncing] and relinquishing the other powers that an initiate was able to develop the highest powers in his own field. The sage had a broad overview of the world; he could explore the spiritual world and knew its laws; the healer cured people—not through external means, but with the help of his spiritual and psychic powers; and the magician mastered the physical world and knew its laws.

[ 17 ] To link these three categories of initiates, a fourth category was established. These were individuals whose personalities were not as highly developed, but in whom all three forces worked together in harmony: the harmonious people. Whenever an important decision had to be made, it was always to them that one turned.

[ 18 ] There lies a deep mystery here. What was the reasoning behind turning to those who had not yet advanced as far in terms of their individual powers? In the ancient mystery schools, it was known that everything can be found in nature. Wasps invented paper long ago, for their nest is the true paper. Thus, the wasp embodies the wisdom that humanity later attained. Wisdom also resides within human beings, and through it they become masters of the forces of nature. But there is more of the divine in the less initiated than in the more initiated. The “human” initiate was the fourth class of initiates.

[ 19 ] We encounter these four categories of initiates in the four Gospels. Each initiate can now explore the great reality from a certain perspective: the sage—John—from one aspect of the Christ event; the magician—Mark—from another; and the healer—Luke—from yet another. The harmonious human being, Matthew, has an overview of the whole. Wisdom extends far beyond, high above everything that human beings can attain. That is why John has as his symbol the eagle, which soars high above earthly events. And the healer—what powers does this person seek to develop? Not external means, but [he worked] as a psychic healer [developing] the powers of self-sacrificing love. To the extent that a person sheds selfishness and is able to sacrifice themselves for others: The capacity for sacrifice—that is the essence of the healer in the psychic realm; when a person is so developed that they give everything for another human being, then they are a healer. So says the evangelist Luke. Hence the tradition that the Gospel of Luke was written by a physician. Hence Luke’s symbol: the sacrificial bull, that is, the personality of the self-sacrificing human being. Finally, the magician strives to develop the powers of the will, according to the evangelist Mark; his symbol is the lion. Hence the lion is associated with the writer of the Gospel of Mark. Where these three powers work together in harmony, there we have the human being. The human being is associated with Matthew as a symbol.

[ 20 ] That is why Christians were so grateful that there were four Gospels.

[ 21 ] What is the Christ Event? A convergence of all previous philosophies and religious movements of humanity. In Palestine, all earlier movements of humanity converged; and depending on the nature of the initiation of one evangelist or another, they found expression in the Gospels.

[ 22 ] What were the main currents of spiritual life in pre-Christian times? First, there was a current that had reached a powerful peak and come to a conclusion shortly before Christ: the ancient wisdom of the holy Rishis in India. They taught a wisdom that existed before our physical world came into being: the primordial tradition of human tradition, the ancient memory of a wisdom from which the world flowed. According to this “ancient wisdom,” the Rishis said to themselves: “What lives within me is but a symbol of the primordial wisdom that created these images from within itself; all we see is but a reflection of the ancient wisdom, of prehistoric spirituality, a looking back upon the divine world; the outer world is but illusion, Maya; human beings are called to descend into the physical world.”

[ 23 ] From this cultural movement, one could learn to sacrifice the sensual and give everything in order to gain wisdom. In the person of Gautama Buddha, six centuries before Christ, this spiritual movement found its culmination and conclusion. What Buddha could give to humanity was to flow into the events in Palestine, so that it might continue to flow from there. This is depicted most clearly in the Gospel of the Healer, the Gospel of Luke.

[ 24 ] In ancient—not historical—Persian culture, we find a completely opposite cultural current, represented by Zarathustra or Zoroaster. This is best understood in the following way: The Indian said: The external world is an illusion. Zarathustra pointed out to people that this world is not worthless. “This world,” he said, “is the outward expression of a spirit. Look, for example, up at the sun. In the warmth that flows from the sun lies the physical reality of the sun. The sun is the benefactor of the entire earth. But just as the human being stands before us and behind him the spirit, the aura, so behind the body of the sun stands the solar aura, the great aura, the great spirit, Ahura-Mazdao, Ormuzd. Behind all that is physical is the solar spirit. The physical is therefore not an illusion, not Maya, but an expression of the Divine. The task of humanity is nothing other than to unravel the spiritual from this physical.

[ 25 ] “I will speak,” said Zarathustra, “of that which is the highest in the world, and no longer shall the evil forces have the power to proclaim falsehood. I will speak of the one who is everywhere in the world; of Ahura-Mazda I will speak. [Whoever does not heed my words will suffer evil when the cycle of the earth’s development] is fulfilled.”

[ 26 ] This spiritual movement, which teaches that one should work joyfully on the physical plane, has been incorporated into Christianity and continues to flow through it. It encompasses an entire cosmology and is described by Mark.

[ 27 ] The third current that has flowed into Christianity is the one that was prepared by the ancient Hebrew people. What, then, is the ancient Hebrew people’s contribution to culture as a whole? What did this people have to offer?

[ 28 ] Just as individual human beings grow, so do nations through a gradual and ongoing process of development. The four members of the human being have come into being in a very complex manner. When the child leaves the womb, only its physical birth takes place. However, this does not mean that all its bodies are complete. Until the age of seven, it is, so to speak, enclosed in its etheric womb. During the change of teeth, that is, in the seventh year, its etheric birth takes place. At fourteen, when the etheric body is fully formed, the astral birth occurs, and only after the astral body has reached full maturity at the age of twenty-one does the fourth body, the I, emerge. — The evolution of individual peoples occurs in the same way.

[ 29 ] Thus, we distinguish three major periods in Hebrew history: the first from Abraham to David; the second from David to the Babylonian Captivity; and the third from the latter period to the time of Jesus, when the “I”—as it emerges at the age of twenty-one in an individual human being—came to the fore. From this people, Jesus received his physical body as a hereditary legacy, which is described in detail in the Gospel of Matthew.

[ 30 ] Anyone who fully knows and understands Christianity also knows the pre-Christian spiritual currents that Christianity has absorbed and whose results it contains. Buddha did not cease to have an influence when he died in ancient India six hundred years before our era, and so Zarathustra, too, was ready to allow his contribution to flow into the development of Christianity.

[ 31 ] Each Gospel corresponds to a different aspect of human nature. Thus, Matthew describes primarily the physical aspect of the Christ event, Mark the etheric aspect, Luke the astral aspect, and John the aspect pertaining to the ego.

[ 32 ] The Gospel of John is a profound study of the spiritual human being; springing from the deepest initiation, this Gospel shines like a sun above the other Gospels, the great message of the spiritual human being to humanity. The Gospel of Luke is a powerful depiction of human life in the sensory world—in the world of emotions—in self-sacrificing service; the Gospel of Mark is a mighty cosmology; and the Gospel of Matthew is a philosophy of history.

[ 33 ] Thus the four Gospels converge, and thus Buddha, Zarathustra, ancient Hebrew culture, and ancient Egyptian culture reappear within Christianity. And so it is precisely from Theosophy that what external scholarship has lost will shine forth to us: the truth of the Gospels. Theosophy is here to reclaim the Gospels and show us that Christianity is not at the end, but at the beginning of its journey. Theosophy will be an instrument for bringing the hidden treasures of Christianity back into the light of day.