The Rudolf Steiner Archive

5. Buddhism and Pauline Christianity

[ 1 ] Today we will consider something that shows us how important it is to learn, from the messages that can be conveyed about the higher worlds, what lies ahead for humanity in the future. The mission of the spiritual science movement is connected to the significant events of the transitional period in which we live. From this we can gain the conviction that we will learn much more in the future, and that is why we seek in spiritual science precisely what we need to guide our actions. Therefore, we must know what is of particular significance for our time in terms of feeling, thinking, and willing.

[ 2 ] There is a great difference between the spiritual current that came from the Buddha and the one that came from the Christ impulse. This is not meant to be a contrast, but rather it is necessary to understand in what way each of these currents can be fruitful. The two currents must converge in the future, and Christianity must be enriched by spiritual science. Christianity first had to abandon the doctrine of reincarnation. Although it contained this doctrine in its esoteric teachings, for certain reasons related to the education of the world, it could not be incorporated into exoteric Christianity. In contrast, this doctrine was a fundamental principle of Buddhism, though there it was linked to the doctrine of suffering, which Christianity, in turn, was specifically tasked with overcoming.

[ 3 ] Once we recognize the purpose and mission of both traditions, we can also clearly see the differences between them. The main difference is most evident when we consider the distinct personalities of the Buddha and Paul.

[ 4 ] Through his enlightenment under the Bodhi tree, Gautama Buddha came to the realization and taught: This world is Maya. It cannot be regarded as real, for Maya—the great illusion—consists precisely in the belief that it is real. One must strive to be liberated from the realm of the elements; then one enters a realm that can have neither names nor things: Nirvana. Only then is one freed from the illusion. The realm of Maya is suffering. Birth, death, sickness, and old age are suffering. It is the thirst for existence that brings people into this realm. Therefore, one must free oneself from this thirst; then one no longer needs to incarnate.

[ 5 ] One might ask: How did the Great Buddha come to proclaim this teaching? The answer can only be found by examining the course of human development.

[ 6 ] Human beings were not always as they are today. In earlier times, in order to gain knowledge, humans did not rely solely on their physical bodies; rather, a kind of clairvoyant perception was widespread among all of humanity. People knew that spiritual hierarchies existed, just as we know that plants and so on exist. The power of judgment was not present; instead, one saw the creative beings themselves. This wisdom gradually faded away; but a memory of it remained. In India, Persia, and even in Egypt, there was a memory of earlier earthly lives. The human soul was then attuned in such a way that one knew: I am descended from divine beings, but my incarnations have gradually penetrated so deeply into the physical that my vision of the spiritual has been darkened.

[ 7 ] People therefore perceived the passage of time as a deterioration, as a step backward. This was especially true for those who were still able to leave their physical bodies at certain moments, as was the case even in relatively later times. Consequently, the ordinary world appeared to them as a world of illusion, as Maya, the great delusion. The Buddha merely gave voice to what lived in the souls of human beings. It was precisely that which lies in the physical-sensory world that was perceived as having dragged humanity down. From this, one wished to rise again. All blame for humanity’s descent fell upon the world of the senses.

[ 8 ] Let us compare this view with the Christ impulse and the teachings given by Paul. Paul did not call the sensory world an illusion, even though he knew just as well as Buddha that human beings have descended from spiritual worlds and that it is the urge to exist that has brought them into this world. But it is in the Christian sense that one asks: Is this urge for existence always a bad thing? Is the sensory-physical world an illusion? — According to Paul’s view, it is not the urge for existence in itself that is evil. This urge was originally good, but through the Fall of humanity, under the influence of Luciferic beings, it has become a source of misfortune for us. It was not always so, but it has become so, and has brought suffering, lies, illness, and so on. Thus, a cosmic event, as it appears in Buddha, becomes a human event in Paul.

[ 9 ] Had the Luciferic influence not intervened, human beings would have seen truth rather than illusion in the physical world. It is not the sensory world that is false, but human perception, which has been clouded by the Luciferic influence. This difference in perspective also brings about different consequences. Buddha seeks salvation in a world to which nothing sensory clings anymore. Paul says that human beings must purify their forces and their thirst for existence, because they themselves have corrupted them. Through the purification of their forces, human beings must tear away the veils that cover the truth from them, so that they may see through to that which they have covered up themselves. In place of the veil that covers, for example, the plant world, one will then see the divine-spiritual forces working behind and within the plants. When the curtain is torn, the sensory world first becomes transparent, and finally we see a realm of the spirit before us. We believed we had an animal kingdom, a plant kingdom, and a mineral kingdom before us: that was our fault. In reality, we see the hierarchies flowing toward us.

[ 10 ] That is why Paul says: Do not kill the joy of existence, but purify it, for it was originally a good thing. And this can be achieved by taking in the power of Christ. It is this power that, when it penetrates the soul, removes the darkness from the soul. The gods did not place humans on Earth in vain. It is the duty of every human being to cast off whatever prevents them from viewing this world spiritually. The conclusion to which Buddha had to arrive—Avoid incarnations!—points back to a primal wisdom of humanity. Paul, on the other hand, says: Go through the incarnations, but imbue yourselves with Christ, and in a distant future, all the illusions that humanity has conjured up will have vanished.

[ 11 ] This teaching, which attributed guilt not to the physical-sensory world but to human beings themselves, was bound to become a historical teaching. Precisely for this reason, however, it cannot be presented in its entirety at the outset; only initial impulses can be given, which one must allow to permeate one’s being. Gradually, these impulses then penetrate all areas of life. Despite the nearly two millennia that have passed since the Mystery of Golgotha, we are only now at the beginning of assimilating the Christ impulse. Entire areas of life have not yet been permeated by it, for example, science and philosophy. The Buddha was able to impart his teaching much more immediately because he drew upon an ancient wisdom that was still felt at that time. The Christ impulse must first permeate gradually. A theory of knowledge based on these facts differs sharply from that of Kant, who is completely unaware that it is precisely our knowledge that is to be purified.

[ 12 ] Paul had to teach people that work in a single incarnation is indeed of great importance. He had to, as it were, exaggerate this teaching, in contrast to the Buddha’s teaching—proclaimed relatively shortly before—that a single incarnation is worthless. One should learn to say: “Not I, but Christ in me!” That is the purified self. Through Paul, spiritual life was made dependent on this one incarnation for all time to come. Now that such an education of the souls has taken place—such that a sufficient number of people have passed through it over the past two millennia—the time has come again to teach karma and reincarnation. We must strive to restore our ego to the state in which it was before the incarnations began.

[ 13 ] It has always been said that Christ is ever present among us. “I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” But now humanity must learn to see Christ and to believe that what we see is, after all, the truth. This will come to pass in the near future, already in this century and then in the following two millennia for more and more people. How will this play out in detail? Let us ask: How do we view our planet, for example? Science describes the Earth mechanically, physically, and chemically, according to the Kant-Laplace theory and the like. But now we are facing a reversal in this field. A new perspective will emerge that will no longer derive the Earth from purely mineral forces, but from plant—that is, ethereal—forces. The plant has its roots directed toward the center of the Earth, while its upper part stands in relation to the Sun. These are the forces that make the Earth what it is. Gravity is only secondary. Plants existed before minerals, just as coal was once a plant. This will soon be discovered. Plants give the Earth its form and then provide the substance from which the mineral soil arises. Goethe provided the beginnings of this teaching in his Morphology of Plants. But he was not understood. Then people will gradually begin to perceive the etheric, because it is what is characteristic of plants. Humanity will take in the growth force of the plant kingdom, and then free itself from the forces that now prevent it from perceiving the Christ. Spiritual science is meant to contribute to this. But that is impossible as long as people believe that the ascent from the physical to the ethereal has nothing to do with the inner life of the human being. In the laboratory, it makes no difference whether one is a morally superior or inferior person. But that is not the case when dealing with etheric forces. One’s moral disposition then finds its way into the product. Therefore, it would not yet be possible for people today to develop this ability if they remain as they are. The laboratory table must first become an altar, just as it was for Goethe, who as a child lit his little altar made of natural products in the rays of the rising sun.

[ 14 ] This will come soon enough. Those who will be able to say, “Not I, but the Christ within me,” will be able to combine the plant forces in the same way that we now understand the mineral forces. What a person is inwardly interacts with what is outside, and the external world transforms for us depending on whether we see clearly or dimly. Even in this century—and increasingly so for people over the next two and a half millennia—people will come to behold the Christ in his etheric form. They will behold the etheric earth from which the plant world has sprung. But through this they will also recognize that a good inner being in a human being will exert different influences on the environment than an evil one. The one who will possess this science to the highest degree will be the Maitreya Buddha, who will come in about 3,000 years. “Maitreya” Buddha means “Buddha of Good Will.” Maitreya Buddha is the one who will make clear to humanity the importance of good will. All of this will lead to people knowing which direction they must take. Abstract ideals will be replaced by concrete ideals that correspond to ongoing development. If this does not succeed, the Earth would sink into materialism, and humanity would have to start over—either, after a great catastrophe, on Earth itself or on another planet. The Earth needs anthroposophy! Anyone who understands this is an anthroposophist.