The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Sixth Lecture

[ 1 ] Yesterday we attempted to examine a planetary system and how it depends on the various spiritual beings of the three hierarchies, which are, as it were, superimposed one upon the other, and which we have sought to describe in the course of our lectures so far. We have gained a mental image of all that is involved in a planet, and we have seen how the planet acquires its form—that is, its complete shape—through the activity of the spirits of form. We have also seen that the inner life, the inner mobility of the planet, is an effect of the activity of the spirits of movement. That which we may call the lowest consciousness of the planet—which we can compare to the consciousness present in the human being within his astral body—we must attribute to the spirits of wisdom. Those impulses through which the planet is not fixed in space but changes its position within space—we must attribute them to the spirits of will or the Thrones. That which integrates the planet into its entire system, whereby it does not, so to speak, follow its own path in space, but moves in such a way that its impulses of motion are in harmony with the impulses of motion of the entire planetary system to which it belongs—that which, in other words, regulates the individual motion of a planet in relation to the entire planetary system—this is an effect of the Cherubim. And finally, what we might call the inner spiritual life of the planet, through which the planet, as it were, enters into connection with the other celestial bodies, just as a human being enters into connection with other human beings through language, we attribute to the Seraphim. Thus, we must consider a context within the planet in which that which comes from the Spirits of Form is present only as a kind of core; in contrast, there arises for each planet something like a spiritual atmosphere—we might also say something like an aura—in which the spirits of the two higher hierarchies, which stand above the Spirits of Form, dwell.

[ 2 ] Now, however, if we wish to properly understand everything we discussed in the last lecture—and which I have just attempted to summarize in a few sentences—we must familiarize ourselves with other mental images, mental images that we will most easily grasp if we start with the beings of that hierarchy which, so to speak, lies immediately above, toward the spiritual world, and which is adjacent to human beings—in other words, if we start with the beings of the third hierarchy. We have said that these beings of the third hierarchy are characterized by the fact that what is perception in human beings is revelation in them, and what is inner life in human beings is spiritual fulfillment in them. Even in those beings who stand one step higher in the world’s hierarchy than human beings themselves—in the angels, the Angeloi—we find this peculiarity: that they actually perceive what they reveal from within themselves, and that when they turn inward, they do not have something as independent and self-contained as humans do, but rather they feel the forces and beings of the higher hierarchies above them light up and spring forth within them; in short, they feel fulfilled and inspired by the Spirit of the higher hierarchies, by the beings above them. Thus, what we call an independent inner life in human beings is actually not present in these beings. If they wish to develop their own being, if they wish to think, feel, and will—as it were—in the same way as human beings, then everything is immediately revealed outwardly; not as with human beings, who can enclose their thoughts and feelings within themselves and leave their impulses of will unacted upon. What lives as thoughts within these beings—insofar as they produce these thoughts themselves—is at the same time their outward revelation. And if they do not wish to reveal themselves, they can do nothing other than turn inward, only to be filled within by the world that stands above them. Thus the world that stands above them lives within these beings; or, when they live themselves, they manifest themselves outwardly as objective entities.

[ 3 ] These beings, therefore, cannot conceal anything within themselves that is a product of their own thoughts or feelings, for everything they develop within themselves would be revealed to the outside world. As we mentioned in one of the previous lectures, they cannot lie, so that the mental images they imagine or feel would not correspond to the external world. They cannot have any mental image within themselves that would not correspond to the external world, for the mental images they have within themselves are precisely the ones they perceive in their manifestation. But now let us suppose that these beings were to feel the urge to deny their own nature; what would then be revealed? Now, in the case of the beings we have designated as angels, archangels, and spirits of the ages or Archai, we find that everything that is revealed to them, everything they can perceive, is, so to speak, their own being. If they were to wish to lie, they would have to develop within themselves something that does not correspond to their own being. Every lie would be a denial of their nature, but that means nothing other than a numbing, a destruction of their own being. But let us suppose that these beings nevertheless felt the urge to experience within themselves something that they do not immediately reveal outwardly—then they would simply have to assume a different nature.

[ 4 ] What I have just described to you—the denial of the nature of the beings of the third hierarchy, the adoption of a different nature—actually happened; it occurred over the course of time. We will see in the course of these lectures why it had to happen, but let us first draw attention to the fact that it did happen, that among the beings of the third hierarchy there were indeed some who developed a desire to have inner experiences that they did not need to reveal outwardly—that is, they developed a desire to deny their nature. What has come about for these beings as a result? Something has come about that the other beings, who retain their nature within the third hierarchy, cannot have: the beings of the third hierarchy cannot have inner independence, as human beings do, for example. If they wish to live within themselves, they must immediately fill themselves with the spiritual world that stands above them. This was the desire of a certain number of beings of this third hierarchy: to develop within themselves something that does not immediately confront them in the outer world as perception—that is, as a revelation of their own being. This necessitated the denial of their own nature and the adoption of a different nature. In order to develop their own life and inner independence, a number of beings of the third hierarchy had to give up and deny their nature. They had to, so to speak, bring about within themselves that certain inner experiences would not be revealed outwardly. Let us now ask ourselves: What were the reasons that might have moved these beings to develop such a desire within themselves? If we consider the nature of the beings of the third hierarchy in light of revelation and spiritual fulfillment, we realize that these beings are actually entirely placed in the service of the beings of the higher hierarchies, that they actually have no life of their own. Angels have no independent life; their life is revelation, is there for the whole world, and as soon as they do not reveal themselves, the life of the higher hierarchies shining into them is present within them. What moved a number of them to deny their nature was a sense of power, a sense of independence, a sense of freedom. At a certain time, a number of beings of the third hierarchy were seized by the impulse, the urge, not merely to be dependent on the beings of the higher hierarchies, but to develop an independent life within themselves. This accomplished an extraordinary amount for the entire evolution of the planetary system to which we initially belong. For these beings, whom we might call the rebels of the third hierarchy, have accomplished nothing less than preparing humanity’s own independence—the possibility that human beings might now develop an independent life for themselves, one that does not manifest itself directly outwardly, but can be an inner life independent of external manifestation.

[ 5 ] I am deliberately using so many words to describe the relationship at issue here. I am using so many words because it is extremely important to define exactly what is being discussed. The point is that an impulse arose in a number of beings of the third hierarchy to develop independent inner vitality. Everything else was merely a result, merely a consequence of this impulse. But what was this result? This result was, in essence, something terrible: the denial of one’s own being, untruth, and lies.

[ 6 ] You see, the point is for you to understand that the spirits of the third hierarchy, having acquired this impulse, did not do what they subsequently did in order to lie, but for the sake of developing a life of their own, but with this development of an independent life, they had to accept the consequence of becoming spirits of untruth, spirits of the denial of their own beings—in other words, spirits of falsehood. Just as when someone, let us say, has to make a journey on foot that lasts through a rainy day, they must necessarily accept the fact that they will have to endure the rain and get wet, even though they had no intention of doing so, so too did the spirits in question by no means undertake any action with the aim of sinking into untruth. Their action stems from the intention to develop inner life and inner activity, and the result, the consequence of this, was that they simultaneously became spirits of untruth.

[ 7 ] All those spiritual beings, then, who have come into being in this way—as a second category alongside the spirits of the third hierarchy—through the denial of their inner nature, are called in occultism the Luciferic spirits. The concept of the Luciferic spirits essentially consists in the fact that these spirits seek to develop an independent inner life. The question now is simply: what did these spirits have to do to achieve their goal? We have just seen what they had to develop as a consequence. What they had to do to reach their goal—to develop an independent inner life—will become clear to us through another line of thought. What, then, did these spirits wish to overcome? They wished to overcome the spiritual fulfillment with the substance of the higher hierarchies. They did not wish to be filled merely with these beings of the higher hierarchies, but with their own being. They could do this only by, instead of filling themselves with the spirit of the higher hierarchies and, as it were, leaving open the free view toward the higher hierarchies, cutting themselves off, separating themselves from the beings of the higher hierarchies, in order to thereby procure their own substance from the substance of the higher hierarchies.

[ 8 ] We can form a clear mental image of what this is all about if we consider the following. We can imagine the beings of the third hierarchy symbolically depicted in such a way that they reveal their own nature outwardly, as it were, like their skin, so that every time they develop inner thought or feeling, a revelation arises like a flash of their being. At the moment when they do not reveal themselves, they take in that which flows into them as the light of the higher hierarchies; then they fill themselves with the spirit of the higher hierarchies and, as it were, open their entire being toward these higher hierarchies. The spiritual beings of the third hierarchy, of whom I have now spoken to you, do not wish to be filled with spirit, nor to be connected with the spiritual substance of the hierarchies. They desire an independent spiritual life. They therefore sever themselves, they split off, so that above them is the being of the higher hierarchies. There they sever the connection and split off as independent beings, thereby receiving their own light within themselves by, as it were, robbing that which was only meant to fill them and ascend to the higher hierarchies. They rob this for themselves, fill themselves with it within, and thereby develop an independent aspect. This is now a mental image that can provide us with insight into processes in the cosmos, without which we would be completely unable to comprehend a star system—or indeed the very existence of the stars—as we know them as human beings with physical consciousness. Without these mental images, one cannot comprehend the life of the stars, the life of the celestial bodies.

[ 9 ] You see, I have now tried to suggest to you how certain beings of the third hierarchy become entirely different beings: Luciferic spirits. What happens to the beings of the third hierarchy cannot, of course, occur in the same way with the beings of the other hierarchies, but something similar does take place with them as well. What happens to the beings of the other hierarchies—especially when we apply this to the study of the spirits of form—gives us a mental image of how a planetary system actually forms.

[ 10 ] At the end of yesterday’s discussion, we saw that what our eyes first perceive in a planet originates from the spirits of form. But to put it this way is not yet entirely accurate. For when you look at a planet—say, Mars, Saturn, or Jupiter—out there in outer space, as you see it with your physical eyes or through a telescope, the form it presents to you does not necessarily contain the spirits of form. Let us consider, for example, the outermost planet, which for a long time was regarded as the outermost planet of our solar system as well. Later, as we shall see, Uranus and Neptune were added, but for now let us consider Saturn as the outermost. If we look at Saturn with the physical eye, then out there in space—I will disregard the ring—we have a kind of luminous sphere. For the occultist, for the one who follows the spiritual processes in the cosmos, this sphere that is seen out there is not what the occultist calls Saturn—mind you—but for the occultist, Saturn means something entirely different. For the occultist, Saturn is that which fills the entire space bounded by Saturn’s apparent elliptical orbit. You know that astronomy describes a path of Saturn, which it conceives as Saturn’s path around the Sun. We will not go into that further now, but if you take this common mental image as a guide, imagine the Sun here in the center, and describe the outer circle as Saturn’s path as assumed by astronomy, then everything that lies within Saturn’s orbit, within Saturn’s ellipse, is Saturn for the occultist. For the occultist, it is not merely what the physical eye sees as Saturn’s outermost physical matter, not merely what shines there in the sky, is Saturn; rather, the occultist knows—the occult gaze teaches us—that there actually exists a kind of accumulation of substance extending from the Sun to Saturn’s orbit, so that when we take in all of this with the occult gaze up to this orbit of Saturn, we have a kind of ethereal filling throughout the entire space (broad hatching). You must imagine what lies within this orbit as filled with etheric substance, though not spherical, but rather such that we are dealing with a sort of strongly flattened sphere, with a lens. So if we were to look at this from the side, and if we had the Sun here, we would have to draw the occultist’s Saturn as follows: a completely flattened sphere, and here would be what is to be designated as the physical Saturn.

[ 11 ] We will understand even better what this is all about if we now consider a mental image that we can similarly derive from occult science regarding Jupiter. Isn’t it true that conventional physical astronomy calls Jupiter that luminous body which it, let’s say, has orbiting the Sun as the second (inner circle)? For the occultist, that is not Jupiter, but rather everything that lies within Jupiter’s orbit (closer hatching). Viewed from the side, we would have to draw Jupiter such that, if we hatch Saturn to this extent, we could hatch Jupiter somewhat more tightly. And what the astronomer describes is merely a body that lies, so to speak, at the very edge of the true occult Jupiter. What I am saying here are not mere theoretical concepts or fantasies, but the fact is that, although not gross physical matter, a fine etheric substance fills the space within Saturn’s orbit in its lenticular, flattened spherical form, as is drawn here. And it is likewise a fact that this second, smaller space for Jupiter is truly filled with a different etheric substance, which permeates the first, so that only here between the two orbits is there simple etheric substance, whereas inside there are two etheric substances interlocked, mutually permeating one another. And now we ask: What do the spirits of form do in this entire arrangement? Well, that spirit of form which underlies Saturn—which delimits—gives form to this etheric substance here, which we call Saturn in the occult sense. This outermost lens, then, has been shaped in its formation by the spirit of Saturn, which is a spirit of form. Likewise, the lens of Jupiter is shaped by the Spirit of Form assigned to Jupiter, and the lens of Mars by the Spirit of Mars, which is a Spirit of Form.

[ 12 ] But now we ask: Where, exactly, is the spirit of form corresponding to Saturn, or the one corresponding to Jupiter, or the one corresponding to Mars? If we wish to speak of a place where these spirits are, where is that place? Yes, in the ordinary sense of the word, one cannot speak of it; rather, one can only say: These spiritual beings, whom we call the spirits of form, act as forces within the etheric substance I just mentioned, but they all have a common center, and this common center is nothing other than the Sun. So if we seek the actual place from which the spirits of form act—the spirit of Saturn, the spirit of Jupiter, the spirit of Mars, and so on, including the spirit of form corresponding to the Earth—if we seek the point of action, the starting point from which these spirits of form act, we find it in the Sun. That is to say, these spirits of form corresponding to our planets are, as it were, a college, a committee of spirits, which has its seat in the Sun and, from the Sun, delimits certain etheric substances, etheric masses, so that what we have now called “occult Saturn,” “occult Jupiter,” and so on comes into being. Now we ask ourselves: What would it be like if only these spirits of form were at work?

[ 13 ] Well, the whole point of the considerations we have made can show you that, strictly speaking, these physical planets would not exist if these spirits of form were acting alone. They would, so to speak, have their seat where they form a college, in the Sun, and we would have the planetary spheres all around it up to the sphere of Saturn, for there would be, so to speak, concentric spheres, flattened spherical shells, as occult planets: the outermost spherical shell of the thinnest etheric substance, the next of somewhat denser, and the innermost of the densest etheric substance. Thus, if these spirits of form were to act alone, the physical planets would not be there, but rather spherical accumulations of etheric mass, which would be bounded by what physical astronomy today calls the planetary orbits. Now, however, within the cosmos there also correspond to the spirits of form such spiritual beings who likewise form a kind of rebellion against their own class. Just as we find among the beings of the third hierarchy the Luciferic spirits who, in order to create that independent inner life, sever themselves from the spiritual substance of the higher hierarchies, so too do we find that within the category of the spirits of form there are those who sever themselves, who do not participate in the further development of the spirits of form, but who undergo their own development. These spirits of form oppose the normal spirits of form; they stand in opposition to them. And now the following occurs:

[ 14 ] Let us suppose that we have here, at this point, the center of the spiritual college of the spirits of form; it would be the spirit of form that acts upon Saturn that would bring about this etheric sphere, so that through this spirit of form such a flattened etheric sphere would come into being. At an outermost point of this etheric sphere, the rebel—who is a kind of Luciferic spirit of form—now acts in opposition to this spirit of form, which works from the center of the Sun. He acts against it from the outside in. So that we have the normal Spirit of Form acting outward from the Sun, centrifugally; this brings about the occult Saturn, which is to be regarded there as a mighty etheric sphere with its center in the Sun. At the periphery, an abnormal spirit of form acts in from outer space, having severed itself from the beings of the normal spirits of form; and through the interaction of that which acts in from outer space and that which acts out from the Sun, an invagination arises here that ultimately becomes a true constriction, and that is the physical planet Saturn. So that we must create a mental image of the situation in which the eye sees the physical planet Saturn, in which two forces are interacting: the one, normal force of the Spirit of Form, which acts outward from the Sun, and, opposing it at a specific point, the separated Spirit of Form. This creates an invagination there; the ether is invaginated, and this invagination is what the physical eye perceives as the physical Saturn. And the same applies to the physical Jupiter and the physical Mars.

[ 15 ] Here, in this particular example, you can see how what we call the maya—the great illusion—actually comes about in individual cases. In truth, at the point where physical astronomy places a planet, there is an interaction of two forces, and it is only because there is actually a large, powerful etheric celestial body there—which is pierced by a counteracting force and turned inward on one side—that the appearance of the physical planet arises. For in truth we are actually dealing here with an invagination, and strictly speaking the matter should first be described as follows: The spirits of form extend the etheric substance from the Sun out to a certain limit; here the abnormal spirits of form act in opposition and invaginate the matter, so that a hole actually arises in the etheric substance. For in relation to the planet’s original etheric substance, there is precisely nothing where the physical eye believes it sees the planet, and the real planet is where the physical eye sees nothing. That is the peculiarity of maya: at the point where the physical planet is seen, there is a hole. You might say that this is a curious mental image, that there should actually be a hole where the physical planet is seen, for you will refer to our Earth. According to what has been explained, our Earth should actually also be a kind of flattened sphere with its center in the Sun, and it should also have such an invagination, such a kind of hole, at its outermost edge. You might say: That’s a nice idea, but we know perfectly well that we walk around on solid, massive Earth! — Likewise, we might assume that where Saturn, Jupiter, and Mars are, there must of course be massive solid bodies, not holes. And yet, even where you walk on our Earth, where you believe—in the sense of sensory perception—that you are walking on solid, massive ground, even there you are in truth walking on a hole. Our Earth itself, insofar as it is a physical accumulation of mass, is a hole in space, a borehole in space. All physical matter comes into being, in fact, through the encounter of forces that originate from the spirits of form. Thus, we have here the encounter of forces from the normal spirits of form and forces from the abnormal spirits of form. They collide. In truth, an invagination arises, and with it, at this point, a breaking of the form—but only of the form. The form breaks apart, and this indentation arises. And broken form, shattered form—that is, in truth, matter. Matter in the physical sense exists only where forms are shattered. Thus, the planets out there are also shattered forms.

[ 16 ] In our planetary system, the spirits of form have helpers, as is evident from the overall spirit of our previous considerations. They establish the boundaries, as we have just described. But above the spirits of form stand the spirits of movement, above these the spirits of wisdom, above these the spirits of will, above them the cherubim, and above the cherubim the seraphim. For all these spiritual beings, there are also those who can be compared to what we have described as the Luciferic spirits. So that at the very outer edge, where a planet is forming, we do not merely have the spirits of form working together, but rather something always takes place there such that the activity of the normal hierarchies emanates from the Sun, and that of the abnormal, the rebellious hierarchies, from the outside in.

[ 17 ] The Seraphim and the Cherubim are the hierarchies that are just as much a part of the entire interplay of forces here as the Spirits of Form. Their task is to carry the power of light outward from the center of the planetary system, from the center of the Sun. By becoming bearers of light, the beings of the higher hierarchies—the Cherubim and Seraphim—now have the same relationship to light as the forces of the Spirits of Form have to the etheric substance. Just as the forces of the normal Spirits of Form move outward and are counteracted by the abnormal ones, thereby creating a void, so too do the forces that carry the light act to fill the entire etheric space; but there the abnormal ones counteract them, so that the planet holds back the light. Just as it holds back the forces of the spirits of form, so does it hold back the light, reflects it back, and thus appears as a reflector, as a reflector of the light that the spirits we call cherubim and seraphim carry to it from the sun. Therefore, the planets also have no light of their own, because they claim for themselves the power of light that would come to them as beings if they were to open themselves to the normal cherubim and seraphim, because they envelop themselves, cutting themselves off from the whole. Every planet also possesses such constricted, isolated light. It is not correct to say that the planets have only borrowed light from the sun. Every planet has its own light; it has merely cut itself off from this light, keeps it hidden within itself, and develops it into an independent inner life of light. We shall see that they share it only with their own beings of the natural kingdoms that are on the planet in question. But the light to which they are meant to open themselves, which they are meant to receive from outside, which is brought to them from the Sun through the cherubim and seraphim—to that they close themselves off; they cast it back. Therefore, in the cosmos, they are stars that are not endowed with their own light. Thus, in the light flowing from the Sun, an inversion is effected, as it were, and the planet turns itself against the light flowing from the Sun, holds it back, and casts it back.

[ 18 ] It is precisely what we observe in the world of the stars that, to the occult eye, appears quite different from what it seems to physical astronomy. What exists for physical astronomy is nothing other than the description of a maya, and only behind this maya lies the truth; for the truth behind the material world is the spiritual world. The material world does not even exist in reality. What is called the material world is the interplay of the forces of the spiritual world.

[ 19 ] Today we have attempted to describe how such a planetary system actually comes into being. Very little is actually known about the formation of such a planetary system in the wider world, in the world of physical science, for while this physical science does indeed allow a planetary system to arise from a kind of ethereal accumulation of substance, strangely enough it overlooks the very first principle that should apply in all natural science. How often is it told to children in school—I don’t know if it happens here as well, but in Central Europe they are told—how, in the sense of the Kant-Laplacean system of the origin of the world—today these things have been somewhat revised, but when considering the principle, that is not the point—a primordial matter would have been in rotation and then the individual planetary spheres would have separated. And to make this quite vivid and quite understandable, children are shown in a small experiment how easily a planetary system can come into being. One forms a large drop from an oily substance floating on water, artfully draws a circle along the equator, and pierces it with a sheet of paper: at the top, one then inserts a needle from pole to pole, then begins to spin it, and lo and behold: a small, cute planetary system is artificially created from this drop of oil. Entirely in the spirit of the Kant-Laplacean theory of the origin of the world, small droplets break off and begin to rotate, while the larger droplet, the sun, remains in the center. What could be more natural than presenting this to young people as vivid proof that something like this could have once taken place in the vast expanse of the universe? But in doing so, one makes a huge mistake that should never be made in the natural sciences. In any experiment one conducts, one must not forget certain conditions. Anyone who forgets conditions without which an experiment cannot take place is not describing it correctly from a scientific standpoint. If you omit any essential condition, you are not describing it correctly from a scientific standpoint. The essential condition for the formation of this planetary system, however, is that the Teacher stands there and rotates; otherwise, the whole thing would not come about. So that the Kant-Laplace theory would only be possible if, at the same time, those who advocate it were to project a gigantic Teacher out into outer space who would rotate the entire etheric mass. People may not always notice small logical errors. But such fundamental errors, such logical errors, which in their effect extend across the entire concept of the world, people often do not notice. Now, there is no great Teacher out there turning the axis of the world, but there are the individual spiritual beings of the various hierarchies, who, through the interplay of their forces, bring about the distribution and also the arrangement of the motion of the individual celestial bodies. This is the response to those who might believe that the ordinary materialistic theory, as expressed in the Kant-Laplacean or later hypotheses, is sufficient to explain the world system, and that there is no need to reflect on anything else, as the occultists do. To those who, from a materialistic standpoint, object to this living interplay of the hierarchies, it must be replied: One cannot get past the fundamental logical error that must be made by all cosmological-materialistic hypotheses, for there is no way to explain a planetary system without calling upon what the occult gaze truly perceives. However, this occult vision often reveals that what must be described with the physical senses is, in truth, actually something quite different. Thus, what the eye sees is actually nothing other than the reflected light, which is reflected because the Seraphim and Cherubim carry the light of the sun out into space, and because, so to speak, Luciferic Cherubim and Seraphim oppose these beings, turning darkness outward into the substance of sunlight, because they cut off the light within and claim their own light for the planet.

[ 20 ] These ideas, which have now been expressed on the basis of occult observations and research, were first presented to his disciples in magnificent fashion by the great Zarathustra in the post-Atlantean era. Everything that radiates out from the Sun into the cosmos—in a manner similar to what we have described today regarding the beings of the higher hierarchies centered in the Sun—Zarathustra attributed to that Spirit whom he called Ahura Mazdao or Ormuzd. Every spirit that carries the forces of its being out from the center of the Sun into its periphery is confronted everywhere by the abnormal spirits of the individual hierarchies, which in their totality form the realm of Ahriman. We shall see, however, that we must still distinguish the realm of Ahriman from that of Lucifer—we shall speak of this in greater detail—also in relation to the planetary system. It should simply be noted at the conclusion of this reflection that Zarathustra symbolically alluded to this connection—of a light radiating from the Sun, that of Ahura Mazda or Ormuzd, into which the realm of Ahriman is embedded—in his own way, when he, Zarathustra, said: “What emanates from the sun, we symbolically imagine as that which the cherubim and seraphim carry forth through the light.” That which opposes all the abnormal spirits of the higher hierarchies, that which envelops them, we imagine as that which is taken in by darkness—that is, by one’s own light imprisoned within, which manifests outwardly as darkness. — Zarathustra depicted this as a realm of Angramainyu, of Ahriman. Thus we see how, originating in the Near East, precisely this teaching—which is also given to us again in a certain way today—how this view first confronts us in Zarathustra’s culture. This is what always fills us with such profound feelings regarding the development of humanity: that we ourselves arrive at certain things which, if nothing had been handed down and nothing could be observed in the Akashic Records, would be provided by today’s occult research—and which we then rediscover in the great teachers of antiquity. It is this that truly acquaints us with these great teachers of antiquity. And when we imbue ourselves with the truth that can currently be found in occult research, and when that same truth then shines out to us from the ancient teachers and leaders of humanity, only then do we develop a true relationship with these leaders of humanity. Only then do they come alive for us; only then do we understand them in the right way. Then the evolution of humanity also becomes a vast conversation conducted by the spirits—not resounding to one another in space, but enlightening and complementing one another across successive periods of time, carrying culture forward in the stream.