The Rudolf Steiner Archive

4. The Paths and Goals of Spiritual Man II

[ 1 ] When speaking of the paths and goals of the spiritual human being, one is repeatedly confronted with the question: Why should one consider following such special paths? Why does spiritual science urge us to set such goals for ourselves? — The answer we must give must become a matter of feeling and intuition for us. It has been pointed out time and again that there are forces slumbering within the human being and in human nature that strive toward development and can be unfolded. Every human being has within them, besides the human who sees and hears in the physical world, a higher human. This higher human exists as a kind of seed. Spiritual science brings this to our consciousness with ever greater urgency. It is a human of whom ordinary consciousness knows very little.

[ 2 ] We must clearly grasp the following: What we can currently perceive is our ordinary, everyday human being. But the one who slumbers within us, who is planted within us as a seed, is a spiritual human being. Whether this spiritual human being develops or not depends on our ordinary human being. We can use the powers of our ordinary human being to prepare the ground, but we can also leave it uncultivated and neglect it. Then we fail in our duty toward our spiritual human being. Through spiritual science itself, through what it can offer us in the form of teachings and insights, we can prepare the ground for this higher human being. If we transform this insight into feeling and emotion, it will give us the answer to the question: Is it not a form of higher self-interest to engage with ourselves in this way? — As long as we have not learned anything about spiritual science, it is our karma to wait. But once we have heard of the higher human being slumbering within us, it is our duty to do whatever can bring its powers to development, so that we may better fulfill our tasks in the world. We cannot therefore speak here of egoism, but only of a duty toward our spiritual human being.

[ 3 ] This is the correct attitude of the theosophist toward external life. Theosophy provides us with a number of insights gained through spiritual research. However, this does not mean that everyone who wishes to live theosophy must be a spiritual researcher. The more we are able to follow the path of our inner development, the better. But before we ourselves achieve results in the field of spiritual research, we must have others tell us about its contents. If we have considered the question long enough, external life will confirm the findings of the spiritual researchers. Once we have grasped these findings through sound logic, we are given the opportunity to ascend to higher worlds. Reason and logic are the surest guides to this end.

[ 4 ] The question may arise: How should we use this information? How should we relate to it? — Let us take the truth we refer to as the law of karma. It states that in later earthly lives we encounter events that can be traced back to earlier incarnations. The more we apply such a law of spiritual research to life, the more we will see how true it is. Just as we never find a triangle in the sensory world whose angles do not add up to 180 degrees, so the circumstances of life must always confirm what is recognized as a law in spiritual research. And if the karmic effects do not appear to us to be consistent, this will at most correspond to the slight deviation that may arise when measuring a circle with the aid of a planimeter. The result may be 361 degrees one time and 359 the next, but this does not negate the law itself. Nor is the law of gravity overturned because a jolt causes the plumb line of a falling-body apparatus to swing to one side. This merely proves that a different result is achieved when a new force is introduced.

[ 5 ] Spiritual research also shows how, in the course of life between birth and death, we encounter repetitions of earlier periods. For example, what we acquire in early childhood—between the ages of three and seven—manifests in its karmic effects in our old age. If one examines how a person was allowed to spend their early childhood, one will discover a remarkable connection with those childhood years in their old age. If, instead of having been subjected to the external constraints of certain rules, they developed healthy needs, their old age will take a different course. In many cases, however, people impose upon the child’s soul, cramming into it what they consider to be right. Yet this is not what matters; rather, the child must feel the need to do this or that of their own free will. It then turns out that a person can maintain their health in old age, preserving freshness and inner strength right into the final stage of life.

[ 6 ] However, there are even more significant connections. From people’s writings, you can learn a great deal about how their past unfolded.

[ 7 ] Between the ages of seven and fourteen, it is essential that a person not be taught to use their reason prematurely. Authority must ensure that truth appears to us as such. If we can admire the people who surround us during this stage of life, this will serve us well in the penultimate stage of our lives. Contemplating the wonders of nature and cultivating a disposition toward prayer are beneficial factors for later in life. Joyful acceptance of authority returns, transformed in a way that makes it self-evident that such a person possesses authority. The devotion that children are capable of developing during this period results in them becoming people who, without doing anything, need only be in the company of others to have a blessing-like effect. The hand that could never be folded in devotion with another will never be able to bless. Whoever has never learned to bend the knees will never be able to bless. If you have penetrated such a law, you will find it confirmed. In this way, one can already trace the effect of the law of karma within the span of a human lifetime. Thus, life provides us everywhere with evidence of a lawfulness at work in all areas.

[ 8 ] Of course, circumstances may arise that obscure the law. In physics, for example, we are familiar with the law of falling bodies. Let us imagine an object that, at any given moment, moves through space without support, entirely on its own. As a result of the aforementioned law, this object will approach the Earth with increasing speed until it strikes the Earth. The object will move toward the center of the Earth according to very specific laws; it will fall. Let us further imagine that the object in the process of falling is suddenly struck by a horizontally directed blow. The naive observer, who expects the arrival of the object falling vertically due to the law of gravity at the relevant point on Earth, will wait in vain in this case. The object does not arrive. Does this mean the law of falling has been suspended? Not at all. The horizontal impact has merely introduced a new force, and under its influence the object now moves in a curve that corresponds entirely, in accordance with the laws of physics, to the result of gravity and the subsequently added force, toward the Earth. At the point where the object strikes the ground under these circumstances, its fall is regarded by any observer as something entirely random and unpredictable. But this is not the case. The lawfulness is complete and incorruptible.

[ 9 ] The same applies fully to the law of karma, although we can rarely trace it in all its complex and intricate effects. That is why human beings are always inclined to doubt their karma. But no matter how much external Maya confuses us, we should allow ourselves to be guided only by what has become law within our soul. Many who wish to develop the spiritual powers within themselves will not find it easy, for physical life constantly intrudes. It takes only a minor obstacle in our existence for us to be easily led, through misjudgment, to commit acts of insult, for example, without thinking of the consequences of our actions. We strike a person and do not realize that we have raised our hand against ourselves, for this blow will strike us back in due time. The law of karma is at work everywhere. Everything that befalls us in life occurs under the law of karma. But merely viewing this law as a doctrine, as a theory, does not yet make us theosophists.

[ 10 ] There are two attitudes we must adopt if we wish to work on our spiritual self. On the one hand, we must tell ourselves: Everything about us can be even more perfect; there is no limit to our ascent. — At every moment, the feeling of imperfection must spur us on to want to climb higher and higher on the ladder of perfection, which has no highest rung. We must constantly keep this before our minds; otherwise, we will not make any progress in our work on our spiritual self. On the other hand, we should tell ourselves: A second step is necessary. — At every moment we should feel that an infinite possibility for perfection lies within us. We should make our hidden self as great as possible. This is an apparent contradiction, and one must feel it as such. Development lies between these two points: the feeling of one’s own imperfection and the striving to make the hidden self as great as possible.

[ 11 ] Anyone who strives to be a mystic, who delves into their own inner self, who seeks to advance through inner contemplation, must pass through the first stage. They must cultivate humility. The best rule a mystic can set for himself is this: to regard everything that confronts him within himself as imperfect as possible, and to completely set aside his own personality. For whoever descends into his own inner self must be prepared to experience terrible things. Stories of tragic experiences unfold in the inner world of the person who ventures into the depths of their own being. A Tauler, an Eckhart, a Paul can bear witness to this. And what help did they seek against these dangers? Paul says: Not I, but Christ in me will act. - Take the Master, the Ideal, with you, but realize at the same time that egoism must be driven out. Not everything should be felt, willed, and conceived by one’s own ego. One’s unworthy ego had to be driven out. This feeling is very similar to the sense of shame experienced by the ordinary person. To want to be someone else, to want to organize something else into one’s own soul—that is the path of mysticism.

[ 12 ] And what does the path of occultism entail? The path of the occultist leads into the outer world. If a person wishes to follow the occult path, he must live in such a way that he gradually learns to endure the higher world when he has stepped out of his body during sleep. He must cultivate a sense of perfecting himself in the infinite. But here, too, a danger confronts him, just as it does the mystic when he descends into his own inner self. We have been permitted to name the dangers that befall the mystic; the mystic himself reports on them. Nothing is said about the paths of the occultist. Everyone must familiarize himself with this danger.

[ 13 ] When we look within ourselves, it would be tragic if we had not learned to perceive ourselves as a unity that pervades our entire being. This ability to hold onto that unity is torn apart by every passion that overwhelms us. Anger, envy, and hatred destroy our ability to focus on that unity. And the worst thing is when we have not learned to concentrate, when we are driven here and there. We must learn to feel ourselves as a unity, steadfast and uninfluenced.

[ 14 ] But if, as occultists, we seek a path into the external world, we must set aside our personality, as it has just been characterized. Here, one must not seek a unity that underlies the entire external world. For when we turn toward the spiritual world, we encounter an infinite variety of beings and conditions. If the occultist were to attempt to penetrate the oneness that lies behind the entire manifested world, he would perish. Imagine a drop of a red liquid, and this drop were poured into a large basin of water. Being liquid, the drop would immediately dissolve into the mass of water; it would melt away. This is what happens to the ungrounded ego when it seeks to enter the world of Oneness. We must not dare to attempt to penetrate there alone, for we lose ourselves just as the red drop loses itself in the mass of water. When we wish to enter the astral realm, we are directed toward a multiplicity. In the face of this multiplicity, we must inquire—of the beings who stand higher than we do, of those who have themselves undergone a higher development step by step, of the hierarchies of that world. We must not try to skip anything, for it would be presumption to wish to advance straight to the Highest. We must learn step by step, with the help of the higher beings, if we wish to comprehend Oneness. The arrogance of wanting to advance to the Highest will surely lead to downfall. We must not allow ourselves to be led astray by our monotheistic conceptions into believing that, when the veil separating us from the spiritual world is drawn aside, we will see only a single divine Oneness. It is the multiplicity into which we look, and it is upon this multiplicity that we must direct our gaze.

[ 15 ] But how are we to find our way? Pythagoras said: Do not seek diversity with your eyes, ears, and senses; seek it through numbers! — Armed with numbers, we must approach diversity. Just as the mystic must pour the ideal of “higher perfection” into his inner self, so must the occultist appeal to numbers. And here one quality is absolutely necessary: certainty. We must feel secure. For when a person wavers, what is he? A will-o’-the-wisp, a flickering light, and the world is a labyrinth. We need Ariadne’s thread to find our way back. Numbers anchor us; we must keep them in sight. — If you wish to enter the spiritual world, you must step outside yourself; you must first enter the chaos of multiplicity. — How do we find the factor? Where is an organizing principle? Through the number, through the lawfulness of the number, we find it. We must penetrate the essence of the number and come to know its true value. The number alone can become our guide in the labyrinth. The number can teach us many things, and certain numbers are based on deep secrets.

[ 16 ] Let us take the number two. Everything that comes into being reveals itself through the number two. Right cannot exist without left, light cannot exist without darkness. Everything that manifests itself outwardly is governed by the number two. The number two is the number of revelation, the number of manifestation.

[ 17 ] The number three is the number of the laws governing the soul: thinking, feeling, and willing. Insofar as something is organized and structured within the soul, it is subject to the number three. Where the number three reveals itself as a law, there lies a soul-related element at its foundation. We can find the number three in countless relationships. In the three Logoi, we have the three fundamental forces that point back to something divine-psychic.

[ 18 ] With regard to all temporal matters, the number seven applies: Saturn, the Sun, the Moon, Earth, Jupiter, Venus, and Vulcan, which denote the seven successive stages of evolution.

[ 19 ] Wherever we see things working together simultaneously, we encounter the number twelve: the twelve gods, the twelve apostles, and so on. This is also connected to the reduction of the fixed stars to the twelve signs of the zodiac. The number twelve teaches us yet another principle. Let us consider materialism. Is materialism wrong? It need not be, as long as human beings do not carry it into the realm of the soul. If one wishes to be a materialist, one must pay homage to vitalism; then one learns to understand material life. However, one must adopt a different perspective for the soul and for the spirit. If we wish to comprehend the world in its fullness, we must be able to take different standpoints. We must walk the practical spiritual path.

[ 20 ] One often hears people say: “You must develop a certain system if you wish to penetrate the higher worlds.” — But that is the worst possible path to take. Instead, one must first step out of one’s own personality: from the center that this personality occupies in its existence, all the way to the horizon of our physical existence; and only here, at the horizon, should we take a specific standpoint—initially the materialistic one—and view it from within, from that single perspective, through which, as already mentioned, we come to know material life. Only then can we walk around the horizon and choose twelve different viewpoints. This is the only path that can lead to true knowledge. The practical occultist must become very selfless before he can walk around the horizon in a circle. By having to forget his personal ego twelve times, he attains unity both externally and internally.