The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Second Lecture

[ 1 ] The observations we made here last time may still seem somewhat incomprehensible—or perhaps even troubling—to some, given the way they were presented at the time. But as we delve into this or that topic today, things will begin to make more sense to us.

[ 2 ] What was it, exactly, that we took to heart on that last branch evening? It was, in a sense, something similar for the whole being of the human being to what a person accomplishes when, for example, they find themselves in this or that situation in life where they must reflect on past experiences and events, or are called upon to recall past experiences or events. Memory, after all, is a human soul experience that, for ordinary consciousness, is initially known only in connection with the soul life that unfolds between birth and death, or more precisely—as we have often stated—for a period that actually begins only in the later years of childhood and extends until death. For we know that, for ordinary consciousness, we can only remember up to a certain point in our childhood, and that we can learn about what preceded that solely through parents or older relatives and acquaintances. When we consider the period of human life just characterized in this way, we speak of “memory” in relation to the soul life during this period. It is, of course, not possible here to go into greater detail regarding the meanings of the words “memory” or “recall”; nor is that necessary for our purposes. We need only first make it clear to the soul that everything designated by these words includes precisely the act of recalling past experiences or events. What we considered last time was, in a sense, something similar to this act of recall; only this similarity should now not apply merely as that memory that enters into our ordinary life, but it should lead us, as it were, as a higher, expanded memory beyond the present incarnation to a kind of certainty that we have existed in other earthly lives prior to this one. And as we mentioned last time, with regard to this higher process, it should be like recalling something experienced in ordinary life. If we create a mental image of a person who needs something he has learned at an earlier time in his present life, and who then attunes his soul to bring up from its depths what he learned there, in order to view it with his present perspective—if we vividly picture this process of recollection, we see in it an activity that belongs to our ordinary memory. What was mentioned last time are activities of the soul. But these activities of the soul should lead to something similar occurring within us in relation to past earthly lives, just as what occurs in the soul in relation to this earthly life when we feel something we have experienced earlier welling up in our memory. Therefore, you must not regard what was said last time as if that were already all that could lead us into past earthly lives, or as if it were, above all else, that which could now, from the outset, evoke a correct mental image of the way we were in past earthly lives. It is merely an aid, just as recollection is also an aid for bringing up what has sunk into the depths of the soul’s life. Let us briefly summarize what we have considered regarding such recollection in relation to past lives. This can best be done in the following way.

[ 3 ] With a certain degree of self-awareness, we notice certain things in our lives that make us realize: “This has affected me.” When some unfortunate event befalls us and we don’t quite understand why it had to happen, yet we still tell ourselves: “You are actually quite a reckless person; it’s no wonder that this happened to you”—then there is at least a glimmer of understanding as to why something like this has befallen us. But there are numerous other experiences that enter our lives, and we cannot form a mental image of them as being connected to our soul forces and abilities. In everyday life, we tend to speak of these as coincidences. We speak of coincidences when we fail to see how the events that strike us as blows of fate are connected to our inner soul state or other factors. Attention has also been drawn to other experiences. These are those soul experiences in which we, so to speak, through what we call our ordinary ego, tear ourselves away from a certain life situation into which we have actually been placed. An example given is when someone has been destined by their parents or close relatives for a particular profession or life situation, yet they feel an overwhelming urge to break free from it and pursue something else. When we look back on such things later in life, we say to ourselves: We were placed in a life situation, but we tore ourselves out of it through our impulse of will, through our sympathies and antipathies. — So it is of such, as it were, reversals of that into which we have been placed that has been spoken.

[ 4 ] The point is not that we should consider every possible thing when recalling such memories, but only those things that have truly affected us at some point in our lives. If, for example, someone has never felt a calling within themselves, or had no reason to become a sailor, then such a volitional impulse naturally does not come into consideration at all for the reflections we made last time, but only those where we have truly brought about a kind of turning point in our destiny; that is, situations in life in which we have, as it were, brought about a reversal of our life’s course. And do not take this to mean that, according to the principles we have developed, this reflection on one’s past experiences should lead to a repentant return; so that, when we recall such things later in life and come to the realization that we have torn ourselves away from them, we should now return in repentance and place ourselves once again in what we were placed in at the time and did not remain in. It is not a matter of practical consequences, but of reflecting on where such turns of events have occurred. And then it is a matter of bringing about, in the most energetic way, the following inner experience in relation to such things of which we say: “It happened to come upon us”—and: “We were placed within it, but we broke free”—

[ 5 ] We tell ourselves: I create a mental image of what I did not want back then, from which I tore myself away, as something into which I would have thrown myself with the strongest impulse of will. So, what was repulsive to us—and because it was repulsive, we tore ourselves away from it—we should picture it in our minds in such a way that we say to ourselves: I want to try, as an experiment, to surrender to the mental image that I wanted that with all my might, and I want to picture in my mind a person who would have wanted such a thing with all their might. — And regarding those things we have said are mere coincidences, let us also create a mental image, just for the sake of argument, of us bringing them about. Let us suppose that the memory has only once occurred to us: here or there a brick might have fallen on our shoulder and caused us quite a bit of pain. Let us indulge in the mental image: we would have climbed up onto the roof, loosened the brick there so that it would have to fall down the next moment, and then we would have run down quickly so that the brick would then have to fall on us. The point here is not that these are grotesque mental images, but rather what we hope to achieve with them.

[ 6 ] Now let us truly put ourselves in the mind of a person of whom we have constructed such an image, as if they had intended everything that has merely “happened” to us, and had desired everything from which we have torn ourselves away. However, nothing happens in the soul if one performs such an exercise two, three, or four times, but a great deal happens if one does so in connection with the countless experiences one will find if one seeks them out. If one does this again and again and creates a quite vivid mental image of a person who would have wanted everything that we did not want, then one will find that this image of a person, which one has summoned before one’s soul, will not let us go, that it makes a very strange impression on us, as if it were actually something that has something to do with us. If one acquires a certain subtlety in this way with regard to such self-examination, one will soon come to discern the similarity that exists between such a mood and such an image that one has constructed there, and such a mental image that one has summoned from memory, in which one senses how it arises as a recollection. The difference is only that in the ordinary process of memory, in which one brings such a mental image up from the soul, one is dealing primarily with mental images; whereas what comes alive in our soul when we perform the exercises mentioned is something akin to a feeling, something more connected to our moods than to our images. We feel a strange connection to this image. The image itself matters less; but the feelings we have make an impression similar to that of memory images. And when we then repeat something like this again and again and again, experience shows that—as if by some inner self-evidence—the realization arises, one might say, that the image one has constructed there becomes something, just as a memory image also becomes clearer and clearer, whereas at first, when one recalls it arbitrarily, it is brought up dimly from the depths of the soul. So it is not a matter of what one imagines there, but that the mental image is transformed, that it becomes something else. A process takes place similar to when someone tries to recall a name, and they hesitate and hesitate and have a vague sense of it, and then they say: Nuss—baumer—, but they then have a feeling that it isn’t quite right, and then, for reasons they themselves cannot fathom, the correct name—perhaps: Nussdörfer—joins in. Just as the names “Nußbaumer” and “Nußdörfer” construct each other here, so too will the image adjust itself, will change, and in contrast to this, the feeling arises: You have attained something there that lies within you, and which, through the way it lies within you and relates to the rest of your emotional life, clearly shows you: these things cannot have been within you in this present incarnation! From this it then becomes clear with great inner clarity that something like what lies within us lies in the past. We must now only grasp that we are dealing here with a kind of memory that can be developed in the human soul; a memory that must be designated by a different name in contrast to ordinary memory. Ordinary memory could be described as “conceptual memory”; but this type of memory we are now considering should actually be called a kind of “emotional and sensory memory.” That this has a certain validity can be seen from the following considerations.

[ 7 ] Consider that, in fact, our ordinary memory—our ordinary capacity for recollection—provides a kind of imaginative memory. Just think for a moment about how some particularly painful event that may have deeply distressed you twenty years ago resurfaces in your memory. Perhaps this event plays out vividly in your mind with all its details, but you no longer feel the pain you experienced back then in the same way; in a certain sense, it has been erased from the mental image of the memory. Of course, there are varying degrees, and it can happen that something has affected a person so deeply that new and more intense pain arises again and again whenever they recall the experience. But the general statement just made still holds true, so that we can see that, for the present incarnation, our memory is a mental recollection, while the feelings experienced or even the impulses of the will do not reappear in the soul with the same intensity—at least not in a way that could be compared to the original. You need only bring to mind a characteristic example, and you will see how great the difference is between the mental image that arises in memory and what remains in ordinary life in the present incarnation of the feelings and impulses of the will that were experienced. You need only think of something like a person writing his memoirs. Let us suppose, for example, that Bismarck had reached the point in writing his memoirs where he was preparing for the Austro-Prussian War of 1866, and imagine what might have been going on in Bismarck’s soul at that infinitely critical juncture, when he steered and guided events against a world of prejudices and against a world of impulses of will. And now do not form a mental image of how all of this lived in Bismarck’s soul back then, but rather that everything he experienced at the time under the immediate impression of events has sunk into the depths of his soul, and think of the fading that must have occurred in the feelings and impulses of the will that were present when he carried out the matter, compared to the time when he wrote down his memoirs. No one will be unclear about the difference between the conceptual aspect of the matter and that which belongs to the feelings and impulses of the will.

[ 8 ] Anyone who has already gained some familiarity with anthroposophy will also understand when it is said—as has often been said here from other perspectives— that our mental images—that is, our memory-based mental images—are that aspect of our soul life which, when stimulated from the outside by the external world in which we live here in the physical body, actually have significance only for this particular incarnation. We have always cited, based on anthroposophical principles, the great truth that of all the mental images, of all the concepts we acquire by perceiving this or that through our senses, of this or that we have to fear or hope for in life — that is to say, not with regard to emotional impulses, but to mental images — that all this, everything we have in our life of mental images, will very soon have vanished once we have passed through the gate of death. For mental images belong to that which flows away in physical life; they belong to that which remains the least. But anyone who has already considered the laws of reincarnation and karma from any angle at all—I have mentioned this here as well—can easily understand that our mental images, insofar as we acquire them in life, which flows away in relation to the external world or to the things of the physical plane, are expressed in language, and that we can therefore think of speech as connected in a certain way with the life of the imagination. Now everyone knows that one must learn to speak a particular language in each individual incarnation. For while it is quite clear that a whole number of present-day college students were incarnated in ancient Greece, learning Greek is not made any easier for anyone by the fact that they can remember how they spoke Greek in their previous incarnation. Language is indeed an expression of the life of imagination, and the fate of language is similar to that of the life of imagination; so that the mental images that live within us in relation to the physical world—and even the mental images we must gain regarding the higher worlds—are in a certain sense always colored by the impressions of the physical world. Only when we can see through this outer covering do we see what the mental images can reveal about the higher worlds. But what we can gain here in the physical world in the form of immediate mental images is also, in a certain way, bound to the life between birth and death. For after death we do not form mental images in the way we form them here, but rather we see the mental images; there they are our perceptions; there they are present just as colors or sounds are present in the physical world. Whereas in the physical world what a person brings to mind through mental images is actually taken along only in the form of physical matter—a fact that is easily overlooked—in the disembodied state we have mental images before us just as we have colors or sounds before us here*. Of course, a person cannot see red or blue as they see them here with their physical eyes; but what they do not see here, about which they form mental images here, is then present to them just as red or green or any sound is here. Whereas in the physical world, what we come to know purely through imagination—or rather, conceptually in the sense of the *Philosophy of Freedom*—can only be seen through the veil of the life of the imagination, for the disembodied soul it is present just as the physical world is for ordinary consciousness.

[ 9 ] In the physical world, there are people who actually consider what the senses perceive to be everything. And what can only be made clear through a concept—such as the way in which everything the senses can provide is encompassed, say, by the concept of “lamb,” or how it is encompassed by the concept of “wolf”—that is, what unravels the material—can even be denied by those who wish to accept only sensory impressions. We can say: A person can form a mental image in their imagination of everything they see in a lamb, and can likewise form a mental image of everything they see in a wolf. Now, a common view tries to suggest to people that what can be formed conceptually is to be regarded merely as a “mere concept.” But if, for example, we were to lock up a wolf and feed it nothing but lambs for a long time, so that whatever else it may have eaten before is now gone, and it is filled with nothing but lamb matter, no one would be able to believe that the wolf has thereby become a lamb. Therefore, we must say: It is evident that what unravels the sensory impression—the concept—is a reality. Yet it is not denied: that which forms the concept dies. But what lives in the wolf, what lives in the lamb, what is inside there, what cannot be seen with physical eyes—that is seen, perceived in the life between death and new birth.

[ 10 ] So when it is said that mental images are bound to the physical body, no one should conclude from this that a person would be without mental images—or, rather, without the content of those mental images—in the life between death and a new birth. Only that which the mental images give form to disappears. What we have as our life of imagination, as we experience it here in the physical world, therefore has significance only for life in this incarnation. And I have also already mentioned that, in connection with the realization that this life of imagination—which applies to the sensory world in an incarnation—is valid only for that incarnation, Friedrich Hebbel once sketched out a nice plan for a drama in his diary. He had the idea that Plato, reincarnated, would be in a high school class and would certainly make the worst impression on the teacher and receive the worst grades, because the teacher doesn’t understand Plato at all! This is also an indication of how Plato’s intellectual edifice, which lived within him as thought, does not carry over in this form into the next incarnation.

[ 11 ] To form a reasonable understanding of these matters, one must view the inner life of the human being from a certain perspective. One must ask oneself: What kind of content do we carry within our inner lives?

[ 12 ] The first of these are our mental images. The fact that these mental images, combined with feelings, can lead to impulses of the will does not prevent us from speaking of a distinct life of mental images within our soul. For even if there are people who, one might say, can barely contain themselves at the mere mental image of something—who, when they imagine something, are powerfully stirred by sympathy or antipathy, thus immediately transitioning to other soul impulses—this does not prevent the life of imagination from being separated from other contents of the soul.

[ 13 ] The second thing we carry around in our inner life is our emotional experiences. These arise within us in a wide variety of ways. There is the well-known contrast in emotional life that can be described as sympathy and antipathy, which we feel toward things, or, to put it more clearly: love and hate. Then there are the feelings that can be described as those that cause a certain arousal, and again those that cause a certain tension and relaxation. These cannot be lumped together with the feelings of sympathy and antipathy. For a psychological impulse that can be called tension, excitement, and relaxation is something different from what is merely expressed in sympathy or antipathy. But one would have to speak at length if one wanted to characterize the various types of emotional content. This also includes those that can be described as feelings for the beautiful and for the ugly, which stand out as a very special kind of emotional content, which cannot be compared to mere feelings of sympathy and antipathy, or at least cannot be lumped together with them. Then, too, we could describe the feelings we have for good and evil as a special category. This is not the time to explain how the inner experience we have of a good or evil act is something entirely different from the feeling of sympathy or antipathy toward a good or evil act—that we love the good act and hate the evil one. Thus, feelings present themselves to us in the most varied forms, and we can distinguish them from mental images.

[ 14 ] A third type of soul experience consists of volitional impulses, the life of the will. This, too, must not be conflated with what we might call emotional experiences—those that, by the very nature of how we experience them, must or can remain confined within our inner life. Part of a volitional impulse is that it expresses itself in the soul: You shall do this, you shall not do that. — For one should learn to distinguish between the mere feeling one has of what appears to be good or evil in oneself or in another, and what arises in the soul beyond this feeling when we are compelled to do good and refrain from evil. Judgment may remain at the level of feeling; but volitional impulses are something else. And although there are transitions between the life of feeling and volitional impulses, one should not simply lump them together, if only on the basis of ordinary observation of life. In human life, transitions are everywhere. Just as there are people who never arrive at a pure mental image but always immediately express what they love or hate, who are constantly tossed back and forth because they cannot separate their feelings from their mental images, so there are also others who, when they see something, cannot refrain from moving on to something that corresponds to a volitional impulse, to an action, even if this action is not at all justified. This, too, leads to nothing good; it then manifests as a compulsion to steal, as kleptomania, and so on. There is no orderly relationship between the feelings and the volitional impulses. But in truth, these things must be distinguished in the strictest sense. Thus, in our inner life, we live within our mental images, within our emotional experiences, and within our volitional impulses. We have made such observations on numerous occasions; one cannot do without them if one wishes to take the whole human being into account.

[ 15 ] We have now attempted to cite a few points that may suggest to us that the life of the imagination is something bound up with the single incarnation between birth and death. After all, we see how we enter into life and acquire the life of imagination. This is not the case with the life of feeling, nor with the life of the will. Anyone who were to claim that this is the case could be thought never to have reasonably observed a child’s development. One need only observe a child when it is still quite immature in terms of its mental images—how it cannot at all connect its mental images with the environment, how it, on the other hand, has distinct sympathies and antipathies, and how it experiences fluctuating impulses of will. And the decisiveness with which these impulses of will arise even led a philosopher, Schopenhauer, to believe that a person’s character manifests itself in such a way that it cannot be changed at all during life. That is not correct; it can be changed. But it is true that when we enter physical life, we must say: The situation with feelings and impulses of will is by no means the same as with mental images; rather, we enter into incarnation with a very specific character of our emotional experiences and impulses of will. Upon proper consideration, we might already suspect that in our feelings and impulses of will we possess something we have brought with us from previous incarnations. But summarize this as an emotional memory in contrast to the conceptual memory within a single life. One cannot manage in practical terms if one accepts only a conceptual memory. Everything we develop in our conceptual life cannot lead us to anything that could evoke an impression which, if we understand it correctly, tells us: There is something within you that entered this incarnation with you through birth. Here we must go beyond the realm of mental images; here, reflection must become something else. And here we have outlined what reflection will now become. How do we reflect? We reflect in such a way that we do not merely create mental images: That happened by chance in our life, we encountered that, we were in a life situation, we left that, and so on. — We must not remain with the mental images, but we must make them alive and active, as if the image of a personality were standing before us who willed this, who willed this in our desires, impulses of will, emotional experiences, and so on. We must immerse ourselves in that will. So, it is a very different kind of immersion than that which comes into play as immersion into the life of the imagination in memory; it is an immersion into other soul forces, if the expression may be used.

[ 16 ] This practice—of, so to speak, willfully, desirably, and eagerly developing a content of the soul—which has always been known and applied in all occult schools and in all occult practice—can be well justified by what we know from anthroposophical or other insights regarding mental images, emotions, and wills; it can be understood and explained through them. So let us clearly state that we must develop, within the specific contents of the life of feeling and the life of will, something that is, so to speak, similar to memory images, but does not remain at the level of mere mental images; that through this we will be able to develop a different kind of memory—namely, a kind of memory that gradually leads us beyond the life enclosed between birth and death in a single incarnation.

[ 17 ] It must be emphasized that the path described here is an absolutely good and safe one—but it is one that requires self-denial. It is easier, for whatever external reasons, to imagine that in a previous incarnation one was Marie Antoinette, Mary Magdalene, or the like. But it is more difficult to arrive, in the manner described, from what is present in the soul—from what is truly present—at an image of what one was. It is, first of all, quite demanding because one is usually bound to be quite disappointed. But if someone were to say that all of this might simply be something we are imagining, one must reply: But one can also imagine things regarding one’s memories that are not true. — None of these things constitute an objection. A kind of criterion for distinguishing imagination from fantasy exists only in life.

[ 18 ] In a city in southern Germany, someone once said to me that everything presented in my *Outline of Esoteric Science* could be based on mere suggestion, just as there are very vivid suggestions that can go so far that even if someone does not drink any lemonade at all but merely creates a vivid mental image of it, they already have the taste of lemonade in their mouth. So if something like that is possible, why shouldn’t it also be possible, the person in question thought, that what is presented in “Secret Science” might also be based on suggestion? Theoretically, such an objection can be made. But life offers this consideration: If someone thinks they can use the example of lemonade to show how powerful suggestion can be, one must say that they have failed to think the example through to its conclusion, for they should try not merely to imagine the lemonade, but to quench their thirst with a merely mental image of lemonade—then they will see that it does not work. It is always a matter of seeing our experiences through to the end. But this cannot be determined theoretically; it can only be experienced in life itself. And with the same certainty with which we know that we have experienced something that emerges from the memories of life, with the same certainty do the impulses of the will emerge from the depths of the soul—impulses that we evoke over the accidental, over the unintended— and which emerge with the same necessity as an image of our former earthly life as do the memories. To those who now say that this may be imagination, we cannot provide any proof, just as one cannot theoretically provide proof for what numerous people imagine they have experienced but most certainly have not, and for what they have actually experienced. Just as one cannot provide theoretical proof for the former, there is no theoretical proof for the latter either. Thus, one is in no different situation than one is in life within a single incarnation; one is in exactly the same situation.

[ 19 ] Thus, with this, we have shown how past earthly lives shed light on the present earthly life, how we truly have the opportunity, through careful soul development, to gain for ourselves the conviction—not merely the theoretical conviction of the fact of reincarnation, but the practical conviction of the reincarnating soul-being within us, of which we truly know is something that once existed.

[ 20 ] But there are still experiences of a completely different kind that enter our lives, and we cannot say that they enter our lives in such a way that we can interpret them as memories of a previous earthly life. There are indeed such experiences in the face of which we must say: The way they present themselves to you cannot be explained by your past life! Today I will mention only one type of such experience. And I will first point to this type of experience by citing a typical example. What I cite as an example can take place in hundreds of ways, in thousands of ways; but it is precisely what takes place there that is similar to what I wish to recount as a typical example.

[ 21 ] Let us imagine a person walking somewhere in a forest who, because he is lost in thought, forgets that he is walking on a forest path that borders directly—one need only take a few steps—on a deep precipice. I want to present this scenario, which could very well happen, in this form here; the example is my own, because I am aware of a very similar case that has also been recounted elsewhere. This person does not see that there is a precipice there because he is particularly absorbed in something. Precisely because his problem interests him so much, he strides toward the abyss, but with such momentum that, had he taken just two or three more steps, it would have been impossible for him to keep his balance. He would then have had to plunge down as he moved forward, and his life would have been over. But just as he is about to stride forward, he hears a voice: “Stop!” — The voice makes such an impression on him that he stands rooted to the spot. The man thinks there must be someone there who has taken him under their wing. He realizes that his life would have been over if he hadn’t been held back in this way. He looks around and sees no one.

[ 22 ] The materialist will now say: Due to some circumstances, an auditory hallucination arose from the depths of the soul, and it was a fortunate coincidence that the person in question was saved in this way. — But it is also possible to think about the matter in a different way; at the very least, one must admit this. I merely wish to mention it today, for this other perspective can only be described, not proven. One might say to oneself: Through events in the spiritual world, your life was actually granted to you at the very moment you reached a karmic crisis. If everything had continued as before, without that event having occurred, then your life would have come to an end. But now it has been grafted onto the previous one as a kind of new life. This new life is a kind of gift, and you now owe this life of yours to the powers behind that voice! — Many, many people today could have such an experience if only they would practice true self-knowledge. For such experiences do indeed enter the lives of many, many people today. And it is not because people have not had such an experience, but because they have not paid the necessary attention to it, because they have overlooked it; for it does not always occur with the clarity just described, but in such a way that, in their ordinary inattention, people overlook it.

[ 23 ] I have occasionally described how easily people overlook things that occur right before their eyes. The following case is a typical example of how inattentive people are to what is happening around them. I knew a school inspector in a state where a law had been introduced requiring that older teachers who had not passed certain exams be re-evaluated. Now this school inspector was an exceptionally humane person and said to himself: You can certainly ask the younger teachers, who have just come from teacher’s college, anything; but to ask the older gentlemen, who have already been in the profession for twenty or thirty years—that is cruelty; you cannot ask them that way. “I’d best therefore ask them about what is in their books, from which they teach the children year after year.” — And lo and behold: most of them knew nothing of what they themselves had been teaching their students! And this was an examiner of whom one could say: he knew how to draw out of people what they knew!

[ 24 ] This is meant to be just one example of how inattentive people are to what is happening around them—even when it concerns themselves. So one need not be surprised to find a similar example, such as the one just described, in the lives of many, many people. Only through meaningful, genuine self-reflection can one encounter an event such as the one just described. And if one approaches such an event with the right spiritual devotion, then one may also arrive at a very special feeling—the feeling that life has been a gift since that day, and that, as it unfolds from that day forward, one must also live it in a special way. This is a good feeling and has a similar effect to a process of recollection, when someone says to themselves: You were at a karmic crisis; your life was over there! — When they immerse themselves in this devout feeling, something arises that initially appears in such a way that they say to themselves: This is not a recollection like those I have often experienced in life; this is something very special!

[ 25 ] In the next lecture, I will be able to tell you more in detail about what can only be hinted at today. For just as has been hinted at here, a great initiate of modern times tests those whom he considers suitable to be his followers. For the things that are meant to lead us into the spiritual world also arise from the spiritual realities occurring around us, or from a correct understanding of these realities. And such a voice, as it occurs to many people, is not to be regarded as a hallucination; for through such a voice speaks the guide whom we call Christian Rosenkreutz to those whom he selects from the rest of the crowd as those who can become his followers. Thus the call goes forth from the Individuality of whom we may yet speak as having lived in a particular incarnation in the 13th century, so that a person who experiences such a thing has a sign, a distinguishing mark, through which they can enter into the spiritual world. Perhaps not many will be able to heed such a call. But anthroposophy will work toward ensuring that people, if not now in this incarnation, then later, will heed such a call. For most people who experience something like this, the situation today is that what one might describe as: That initiate has appeared before them, designating them as those who may belong to him—has not taken place in an incarnation, but in the life between death and the present birth, so that this is an indication that something happens in the life between death and the next birth, and that we have important, indeed more important, processes there than in the life between birth and death. It may well be, and in individual cases is so, that certain people belonging to Christian Rosenkreutz were already destined for this in a previous incarnation. But for most, the destiny reflected in such an event was determined in the last life between death and new birth.

[ 26 ] Now, I am not saying this to tell a sensational story, nor even to recount this event, but for a specific reason. And I would like to draw attention to something else, based on an experience I have had quite frequently within our anthroposophical life: that things one says are easily forgotten or retained differently than one intended. This is said to happen within our anthroposophical life. For this reason, I sometimes emphasize important, essential things a few times, not to repeat myself. This is happening today as well, when I say that there are many people present who have gone through an experience such as the one described, and that they do not know it is not because it is not there, but because they do not remember it, having not paid proper attention to it. Therefore, it should be a comfort if someone has to say to themselves: I don’t find anything like that, so I don’t belong to such a select group! — Yet you can be assured that there are countless people today who have experienced something like this. I just wanted to preface this to get to the actual reason why such a thing is said.

[ 27 ] Such things are told to remind us again and again that we should find a concrete connection—not through abstract theories—between our inner life and the spiritual worlds, and that anthroposophical Spiritual Science should not be for us merely a theoretical worldview, but an inner force in our lives; that we should not merely know that there is a spiritual world and that human beings belong to it; that as we go through life, we should not merely observe the things that affect our sensory thinking, but attentively grasp the connections that show us: You are placed within the spiritual world, placed within it in this or that way. — So this concrete being placed within it, this real being placed within it for the individual—that is what we draw attention to. Theoretically, one also seeks to establish something like this from the outside, that the world can have a spiritual aspect, and that human beings are not to be viewed materialistically, but can have a spiritual aspect within themselves. Our worldview differs from this in that it presents the individual in this way: This is how you stand in connection with the spiritual worlds! — More and more we will be able to rise to such things that can show us how we must view the world in order to recognize our belonging to the spirit of the great world, the macrocosmic.