The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Third Lecture

[ 1 ] At the beginning of the Gospel of Mark, we are introduced to the great figure of John the Baptist. The significance of how John the Baptist is introduced in the Gospel of Mark, and how he is contrasted with Christ Jesus himself, was already pointed out yesterday. If one allows the Gospel of Mark to take effect in its simplicity, one immediately gains a profound impression of the figure of John the Baptist. When we then delve into the background of Spiritual Science concerning this figure, John the Baptist appears to us, so to speak, in his full stature. I have often discussed how we must understand John the Baptist—even in the sense of the Gospel itself, for we know that this is clearly stated in the Gospel—as a reincarnation of the prophet Elijah (see Matt. 11:14). From a perspective of Spiritual Science, therefore, in order to truly grasp the deeper basis for the foundation of Christianity and the Mystery of Golgotha, we must view the figure of John the Baptist precisely against the backdrop of what we encounter in the prophet Elijah. At this point, I shall only briefly indicate what this is all about; for I spoke in somewhat greater detail about the prophet Elijah on the occasion of the last general assembly of the German Section of the Theosophical Society in Berlin.

[ 2 ] Everything that Spiritual Science and occult research have to say about the prophet Elijah is, in fact, fully confirmed by what is written in the Bible itself, whereas a casual reading of the relevant chapters about Elijah in the Bible undoubtedly leaves much unexplained. I would like to draw attention to just one point.

[ 3 ] We read in the Bible that Elijah, as it were, challenges the entire entourage and all the people of King Ahab, under whose rule he lives, by pitting himself against the priests of Baal, his adversaries; that he, as it were, sets up two altars, has the priests of Baal place their sacrificial animal upon one, then places his own sacrificial animal upon his altar, and then demonstrates how futile all the claims made by his opponents against the priests of Baal are, because nothing of spiritual greatness is evident in the god Baal, whereas the greatness and significance of Yahweh or Jehovah is immediately evident in Elijah’s sacrifice. It is a victory that Elijah wins over the followers of Baal. Then, curiously, it is told how Ahab has a neighbor, Naboth, who owns a vineyard; how Ahab, the king, wants to acquire this vineyard, but Naboth refuses to sell it to him because it is sacred to him as the inheritance of his fathers. Now we find two facts in the Bible. On the one hand, we are told that Jezebel, the queen, becomes Elijah’s enemy and declares that she will ensure that Elijah is killed just as his opponents, the priests of Baal, were killed through his victory at the altar. But as the Bible tells us, this death at Jezebel’s hand does not occur; instead, something else happens. Naboth, the king’s neighbor, is invited to a kind of penitential feast to which the other nobles of the state are summoned, and on the occasion of this feast he is murdered at Jezebel’s instigation (1 Kings 18–21).

[ 4 ] So we can say: The Bible seems to tell us that Naboth is murdered by Jezebel; but Jezebel does not announce that she intends to murder Naboth, but rather that she intends to murder Elijah. So these things do not fit together at all. This is where occult research comes in and reveals the facts: that in Elijah we are dealing with a comprehensive spirit that, as it were, moves invisibly throughout the land of Ahab, but that this spirit at times takes up residence in the soul of Naboth, as it were, permeating the soul of Naboth, so that Naboth is the physical personality of Elijah, and that when we speak of the personality of Naboth, we are speaking of the physical personality of Elijah. Elijah is the invisible figure in the sense of the Bible; Naboth is his visible imprint in the physical world. I have described all this in detail in the lecture “The Prophet Elijah in the Light of Spiritual Science.” But if we immerse ourselves in the entire spirit of the Elijah work and allow the whole spirit of Elijah, as presented to us in the Bible, to work upon our souls, then we can say: In Elijah, the spirit of the entire ancient Hebrew people meets us at once. Everything that animates and permeates the entire ancient Hebrew people is contained in the spirit of Elijah. We can address him as the national spirit of the ancient Hebrew people. He is too great—as Spiritual Science shows us—to be able to dwell entirely within the soul of his earthly form, within the soul of Naboth. He hovers around it, as it were, like a cloud, but he is not only in Naboth; rather, he moves about like a natural element throughout the entire land and works through rain and sunshine. This becomes clear indeed when we take the entire description, which begins with the fact that drought and aridity prevail, but how, through what Elijah commands in relation to the divine-spiritual worlds, a remedy is found for the drought and aridity and all that was then the distress of the land. He works like a natural element, like a law of nature itself. And one might say: The best way to understand what works in the spirit of Elijah is to let Psalm 104 take effect upon oneself, with its entire description of Yahweh or Jehovah as the nature deity who works through everything. Now, of course, Elijah is not to be identified with this deity himself; he is the earthly image of this deity; he is that earthly image which is at the same time the folk-soul of the ancient Hebrew people. This spirit of Elijah is a kind of differentiated Jehovah, a kind of earthly Jehovah, or—as it is expressed in the Old Testament—like the face of Jehovah.

[ 5 ] Viewed in this light, the fact that the same Spirit who dwells in Elijah and Naboth now reappears in John the Baptist becomes particularly clear to us. How does it work in John the Baptist? First of all, in the sense of the Bible and specifically in the sense of the Gospel of Mark, it works through what baptism is. What is this baptism in truth? For what purpose is it actually performed by John the Baptist on those who allow themselves to be baptized? Here we must consider a little what was truly brought about in the baptized through this baptism. — The baptized were immersed in water. This always triggered in them what has often been described as occurring when a person experiences a shock—such as that caused by a sudden threat of death—for example, when falling into water and nearing drowning, or during a fall in the mountains. This causes a loosening of the etheric body. The etheric body partially leaves the physical body, and the result is that something then occurs that always happens to a person immediately after death: a kind of review of the last life. This is a well-known fact that is often described, even by contemporary materialist thinkers. But something similar also occurred during John’s baptism in the Jordan. People were immersed in the water. This was not a baptism as it is practiced today, but John’s baptism caused the etheric body of the people to loosen, and the people saw more than they could comprehend with their ordinary intellect. They saw their life in the spirit and also the influences on this life in the spiritual realm. And they also saw what the Baptist taught: that the old age had come to an end and that a new age must begin. In the clairvoyant observation they were able to make for a few moments while being immersed during the baptism, they saw: humanity has arrived at a turning point in evolution; what people had in ancient times, when they were bound to the group soul, is in the process of complete extinction; entirely different conditions must come into being. This is what they saw in their liberated etheric body: a new impulse, new qualities must come upon humanity.

[ 6 ] That is why John’s baptism was a matter of insight. “Change your mindset; do not merely look back to where it might still be possible to turn your gaze, but look toward something else: the God who can reveal himself in the human self has drawn near; the realms of the divine have drawn near.” The Baptist did not merely preach this; he made them realize it by administering baptism to them in the Jordan. And those who were baptized knew from then on, through their own clairvoyant observation—even if it lasted only a short time—that the Baptist’s words expressed a fact of world history.

[ 7 ] When we consider this connection, the spirit of Elijah—which was also at work in John the Baptist—appears to us in its true light. Then it becomes clear to us that in Elijah we have the spirit of the Jewish people, the spirit of the Old Testament people. What kind of spirit was that? In a certain sense, it was already the spirit of the “I”; but it did not appear as the spirit of the individual human being, rather, in Elijah it appeared as the spirit of the entire people. It was the undifferentiated spirit. What was later to dwell in an individual human being was, as it were, in Elijah still the group soul of the ancient Hebrew people. It was still in the supersensible worlds what was to descend as the individual soul into every single human breast as the Johannine era approached. It was not yet in every human breast. It could not yet live in Elijah in such a way that it entered into the individual personality of Naboth, but only in such a way that it hovered around the individual personality of Naboth. It manifested itself in Elijah-Naboth only more precisely than it did, in essence, in every single member of the ancient Hebrew people. That this spirit, which hovered, as it were, over humanity and its history, was now to enter more and more into every single individual breast—that was the great fact that Elijah-John himself now announced, as it were, while baptizing the people: What until now existed only in the supersensible world and worked from within it, you must now take into your souls as the impulses that have come from the realms of heaven down into the human heart. — The spirit of Elijah himself shows how it must now enter human hearts in multiplied form, so that people may gradually take in the impulse of Christ in the course of world history. That was the meaning of John’s baptism: that Elijah was ready to prepare the way for the Christ. That was contained in the very act of John’s baptism in the Jordan. “I will make room for him; I will prepare the way for him in the hearts of human beings; I will no longer merely hover above humanity, but will enter into human hearts so that he, too, may enter.”

[ 8 ] If that is the case, what can we expect? If this is the case, there is nothing more natural than that we can expect to see, in John the Baptist, a certain reappearance of what we have already observed in Elijah—that is, how in the magnificent figure of the Baptist it is not merely this individual personality that is at work, but that which is more than this individual personality, which hovers around this individual personality like an aura, but whose influence extends beyond this individual personality, something that lives like an atmosphere among those within whom the Baptist also works. Just as Elijah worked like an atmosphere, so we can also expect that Elijah will work again like an atmosphere as John the Baptist. Indeed, we can even expect something else: that this spiritual entity of Elijah, which is now bound to John the Baptist, will continue to work spiritually even when the Baptist is no longer there, when he has departed. And what does this spiritual entity seek? Well, it seeks to prepare the way for the Christ. We can therefore say: It is possible that John the Baptist departs as a physical person, but that his spiritual being remains like a spiritual atmosphere on the ground, in the region where he worked, and that this spiritual atmosphere precisely prepares the ground on which Christ can now carry out his work. We can expect this. And what we can thus expect is best expressed by saying, perhaps: John the Baptist has departed, but what he is as the spirit of Elijah remains, and it is into this that Christ Jesus can best work; it is here that he can best pour out his words; in the atmosphere that has remained, in the atmosphere of Elijah, it is here that he can best carry out his deeds. This is what we can expect. And what is told to us in the Gospel of Mark?

[ 9 ] It is highly significant that what I have just stated is alluded to twice in the Gospel of Mark. The first time it is said: “Immediately after John’s arrest, Jesus went to Galilee and began there to preach the gospel of the kingdom” (1:14). John had thus been arrested, which means that his physical presence was initially prevented from acting on its own; but the figure of Christ Jesus enters the atmosphere he had created. And the same thing occurs significantly a second time in the Gospel of Mark, and it is magnificent that it occurs a second time. One need only read the Gospel of Mark correctly. If you proceed to the sixth chapter, you will hear the full account of how King Herod had John the Baptist beheaded. But it is very curious: people speculated about many things after John’s physical person had not only been arrested but removed by death. To some, it seems that the miraculous power through which Christ Jesus works comes from the fact that Christ Jesus himself is Elijah—or one of the prophets. But Herod, out of his troubled conscience, has a very strange premonition. When he hears of all that has happened through Christ Jesus, he says: “John, whom I had beheaded, has been raised.” (6:16) Herod senses that, now that John is gone as a physical personality, he is all the more present. He senses that his atmosphere, his spirituality—which is none other than the spirituality of Elijah—is present. Herod, out of his tormented conscience, perceives how John the Baptist, that is, Elijah, is present. But then something strange is hinted at: how Christ Jesus came, specifically to the region where John the Baptist had worked, after the latter had met his physical death. There is a remarkable passage here that I ask you to pay special attention to; it must not be skimmed over. For in the Gospel, the words are not merely rhetorical flourishes; the evangelists do not yet write in a journalistic style. Something very significant is being said here. Christ Jesus steps among the crowd of those who were the followers and disciples of John the Baptist, and this is expressed in a phrase that must be taken into account: “And when he came out, he saw a great crowd,” which can only refer to John’s disciples, “and he had compassion on them...” Why compassion? Because they had lost their master, because they stood there without John, of whom it is said that they had recently carried his beheaded body to the grave. But it is stated even more precisely: “...for they were like sheep without a shepherd, and he began to teach them many things.” (6:34) One cannot point more clearly to the fact of how he teaches the disciples of John. He teaches them because the spirit of Elijah is still at work among them, which is at the same time the spirit of John the Baptist. Thus, at a significant point in the Gospel of Mark, it is again pointed out with dramatic force how the Spirit of Christ Jesus enters into what the Spirit of Elijah-John has prepared. But all this is only a central point around which other, very significant elements are grouped. I would like to draw attention to just one more thing.

[ 10 ] I have often hinted at how the spirit of Elijah-John continued to influence world history through its impulses. And since we are gathered here as anthroposophists and are permitted to discuss occult facts, the matter may be addressed. I have often suggested that the soul of Elijah-John reappears in the painter Raphael. This is one of those facts that can really draw attention to how the metamorphosis of the soul takes place precisely through the great impact wrought by the Mystery of Golgotha. Because in the post-Christian era such a soul also had to work through the medium of the individual personality in Raphael, that which in ancient times was so all-encompassing, so universal, appears, one might say, in a personality as differentiated as Raphael’s. Can one not sense that this aura-like presence of Elijah-John is also present in Raphael, that there is something in Raphael similar to what is in the other two, of which one can say: it is too great to enter into the individual personality; it surrounds the individual personality, so that the revelations received by this physical personality appear as illuminations? This is certainly the case with Raphael.

[ 11 ] There is a piece of evidence for this fact—one that, while appearing personal, is nonetheless quite remarkable—an evidence whose elements I have already hinted at in Munich. However, I would like to discuss the matter here, not only to elucidate the personality of the Baptist, but the entire being of Elijah-John, and I would therefore also like to discuss the further development of the soul of Elijah-John in Raphael. Anyone who wishes to honestly and sincerely engage with what Raphael was must already have very special feelings about it. I have drawn attention to the modern art historian Herman Grimm and said that he was able to produce a biography of Michelangelo with a certain ease, but that he undertook the task three times in order to produce a kind of biography of Raphael. And because Herman Grimm was not an ordinary “scholar”—such a person, of course, can handle anything—but a universal human being who was sincere in his heart regarding what he sought to grasp and explore, he had to admit to himself, whenever he had once again produced something that was supposed to be a “Life of Raphael,” that it was, after all, not a life of Raphael. So he had to start over again and again, and he was never satisfied with his work. Shortly before his death, he attempted once more—as is contained in his posthumous works—to approach Raphael in order to grasp him as his heart wished to grasp him, and the title that the new treatise was to bear is already characteristic: “Raphael as a World Power.” For it seemed to him that if one approaches Raphael sincerely, one cannot describe him at all unless one can portray him as a world power, unless one can see through to that which works its way through the entire history of the world. It is quite natural that a modern writer, one might say, chooses his words with a certain uneasiness when he is to describe as frankly and freely as the Evangelists did. Even the best writer feels embarrassed to set to work in this way; yet the figures he has to describe often wrest the appropriate words from him. It is very remarkable how Herman Grimm speaks of Raphael in the first chapters he wrote shortly before his death. It is truly the case that one can sense in his heart something of the relationship to a figure such as Elias-Johannes when he speaks of Raphael, saying: “/p”

“If Michelangelo were miraculously summoned back from the dead to live among us again, and I were to encounter him, I would step aside in reverence to let him pass; but if Raphael were to cross my path, I would follow behind him, hoping to catch a few words from his lips. With Leonardo and Michelangelo, one can limit oneself to recounting what they once were in their day; with Raphael, one must proceed from what he is to us today. A gentle veil has settled over those others, but not over Raphael. He belongs to those whose growth is far from over. It is always conceivable that future generations of people will exist to whom Raphael will present new enigmas.” (“Fragments,” Vol. II, p. 171.)

[ 12 ] Herman Grimm describes Raphael as a world power, as a spirit that strides through the centuries, through the millennia, as a spirit that has no place within a single human being. But we read other words in Herman Grimm as well, which, as I said, spring from the sincerity and honesty of his soul. And they are as if someone were trying to express that Raphael possesses something like a great aura that surrounds him, just as the spirit of Elijah surrounded Naboth. Could one put it any other way than as Herman Grimm writes:

“Raphael is a citizen of world history. He is like one of the four rivers that, according to the beliefs of the ancient world, flowed from Paradise.” (“Fragments,” Vol. II, p. 153.)

[ 13 ] This could almost have been written by an evangelist, and one could almost write about Elijah in this way. That is to say, even the modern art historian, if he feels honestly and sincerely, can sense something of the great world impulses that have passed through the ages. Truly, one needs nothing else to understand modern Spiritual Science than to turn to the soul and spiritual needs of people who strive with all their longing toward what is true in the evolution of humanity.

[ 14 ] This is how John the Baptist stands before us, and it is good if we sense him this way when we open the Gospel of Mark, when we read the first words, and then again in chapter six. The Bible is not a book meant to function like a work of modern scholarship, where one, so to speak, quite “clearly” — for that is how it is presented to people, telling them exactly what they are to read. The Bible conceals many of the mysterious truths it has to proclaim behind its compositional structure, behind the magnificent, occult interplay of composition and artistry. And so it also conceals many things behind this occult interplay of composition and artistry, particularly with regard to the figure of the Baptist. I would like to draw your attention to something here that you might be inclined to dismiss as merely an intuitive or emotional truth, but from which you can see that, if one acknowledges truths other than those of the intellect, the Bible does indeed contain an inner revelation of how the spirit or soul of Elijah relates to the spirit or soul of John the Baptist. Let us see to what extent this is the case, and, as briefly as possible, allow a passage from the Old Testament’s description of Elijah to take effect upon us.

“Elijah set out and went to Zarephath. When he came to the city gate, there was a widow gathering sticks. He called to her and said, ‘Please bring me a little water in a jar so I may drink.’

But as she went to get it, he called to her and said, ‘Please bring me a morsel of bread as well.’

She said, “As the Lord your God lives, I have no bread, only a handful of flour in the jar and a little oil in the jug. And behold, I have gathered a log or two and am going in to prepare a meal for myself and my son, that we may eat and die.”

Elijah said to her, “Do not be afraid; go and do as you have said; but first make me a small cake from it and bring it out to me; afterward you shall make some for yourself and your son.”

For thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: The flour in the jar shall not be used up, and the oil in the jug shall not run dry until the day the Lord sends rain upon the earth.

She went and did as Elijah had said. And he ate, and she also, and her household for a time.

The flour in the jar was not used up, and the oil in the jug did not run dry, according to the word of the Lord that he had spoken through Elijah.” (1 Kings 17:10–16.)

[ 15 ] What do we read in this account of Elijah? We read of Elijah’s arrival at a widow’s house and a remarkable multiplication of bread. Because the spirit of Elijah is present, there is no need, even though there is little bread. The bread multiplies, as we read, the moment the spirit of Elijah enters the widow’s home. Through the spirit of Elijah, what is depicted here as the multiplication of bread—as a gift of bread—comes to pass. We could say: The fact that the appearance of Elijah brings about a multiplication of bread shines forth from the Old Testament.

[ 16 ] And now let us read the sixth chapter of the Gospel of Mark. It begins by recounting how Herod had John beheaded, and how Christ Jesus then came to John’s followers. And now let this chapter sink into our souls.

“And when he came out, he saw a large crowd, and he had compassion on them, for they were like sheep without a shepherd; and he began to teach them many things.

And as it was already getting late, his disciples came to him and said: ‘This is a desolate place, and it is already late; send them away so that they may go into the surrounding villages and buy themselves something to eat.’

But he replied to them, ‘You give them something to eat.’ And they said to him, ‘Are we to go and buy two hundred denarii’ worth of bread and give it to them to eat?’

But he said to them, “How many loaves do you have? Go and see.” And after they had found out, they said, “Five, and two fish.”

And he ordered them all to sit down in groups on the green grass.

And they sat down in groups of a hundred and of fifty.

And he took the five loaves and the two fish, looked up to heaven, blessed and broke the loaves, and gave them to the disciples to set before them; he also divided the two fish among them all. And they all ate and were satisfied ...» (6:34–42).

[ 17 ] You know the story: a multiplication of loaves, once again through the spirit of Elijah-John. The Bible does not speak clearly, in the sense that we today call “clear”; but the Bible embeds what it has to say within its structure. And anyone who knows how to evaluate emotional truths will want to rest with their feelings on the one passage where it is spoken of how Elijah comes to the widow and multiplies the bread, and where the reborn Elijah then leaves the physical body and Christ Jesus, in his atmosphere and in a new form, undertakes what is to be interpreted as a multiplication of bread.

[ 18 ] This is how the inner progression works in the Bible. This is how the inner connections work. They point out to us how, fundamentally, everything that speaks of a “compilation of Bible fragments” is merely empty scholarship, and how, through a true understanding of the Bible, it is possible for us to recognize the unifying Spirit throughout the entire Bible, regardless of who this unifying Spirit is. Thus we see John the Baptist standing before us.

[ 19 ] It is very curious, then, how John the Baptist himself is once again placed within the work of Christ Jesus. Twice, then, we are given to understand that it is actually Christ Jesus who enters the aura of the Baptist, entering there where the physical personality recedes more and more into the background and finally departs entirely from the physical plane. But then, precisely through the simple Gospel of Mark, it is indicated to us in very clear words how different everything now becomes through the entry of Christ Jesus into the element of Elijah-John, how a completely new impulse thereby enters the world.

[ 20 ] To understand this, one must now take in the entire account given in the Gospel from the moment Christ appears after the arrest of John the Baptist to speak of the divine kingdoms, on the one hand, up to the point where the murder of John by Herod is mentioned, and then again in the chapters that follow. If we take all these narratives that are before us up to the story of Herod, we find that, when we consider them in their true character, they all aim to truly reveal to us the essence of Christ Jesus. It was already pointed out yesterday how this essential nature of Christ Jesus works, namely in such a way that he is not only recognized by human beings, but is also recognized by the spirits by which the demonic beings are possessed, so that the supersensible beings also recognize him. This first strikes us as sharp and striking. But then we are confronted with the fact that what dwells in Christ Jesus is, after all, something different from what dwelt in Elijah-Naboth, in that the spirit of Elijah could not fully enter into Naboth.

[ 21 ] The point of the Gospel of Mark is to tell how Jesus of Nazareth is wholly absorbed into it, how the earthly personality is entirely filled with what Christ is, and how what is recognized as the universal human self is at work within it. What is it, then, that is so terrifying to the demons who hold people in their power when Christ confronts them? It is this: that they must say to him, “You are the one who bears God within you,” that they recognize him as a divine power in the personality, which compels the demons to reveal themselves to it and to step out of the people through the power of that which resides in the individual personality of the human being (1:24; 3:11; 5:7). Thus, in the first chapters of the Gospel of Mark, this figure is brought out so distinctly, who in a certain way stands in contrast to Elijah-Naboth and also to Elijah-John. While what was animating could not dwell fully in them, this animating force is fully contained in Christ Jesus. Therefore, although a cosmic principle lives within him, Christ Jesus also stands before other human beings—including those he heals—as a completely individual, singular human personality.

[ 22 ] Nowadays, people generally interpret such accounts from the past in a peculiar way. In particular, many of today’s natural scientists—monists, as they call themselves when they wish to express their worldviews—interpret such accounts in a very specific way. One might describe this sense by saying: These fine scholars, these fine natural philosophers, secretly harbor the opinion—even if they are embarrassed to voice it—that it would have been better if the Lord had left it to them to organize the world; for they would have organized it better. Take, for example, a natural scientist who swears that wisdom has only come to humanity in the last twenty years—and others, after all, count only the last five years, regarding anything prior to the last five years as superstition— he will deeply regret, in particular, that when Christ Jesus walked the earth, there was not yet modern scientific medicine with all its various remedies; for it would have been wiser, after all, if all these people—such as Simon’s mother-in-law and the others—could have been healed with the remedies of today’s medicine. For in their opinion, that would have been a truly perfect Lord God who had arranged creation according to the concepts of modern natural scientists; he surely would not have let people languish so long for modern natural science. But as it is, the world, as the Lord God arranged it, is somewhat botched compared to what a natural scientist could have achieved. People don’t say it; they’re too embarrassed to say it; but it’s there between the lines. One need only call things by their proper names, the things that are currently buzzing around among materialist natural scientists. So if one could perhaps speak with such a gentleman in private, one might well hear the opinion that, in fact, one could not help but be an atheist simply because one sees how little God succeeded in healing people at the time of Christ Jesus using the methods of modern natural science.

[ 23 ] But there is one thing people fail to consider: that they must take the word “evolution”—which they utter so often—seriously and honestly; that everything must be encompassed within evolution so that the world can reach its destination; and that one need not ask merely about the plan that modern science would devise if it were to create a world. But because people think this way, they do not fully realize that the entire constitution of the human being—the composition of the finer bodies—used to be quite different. Back then, one could not have applied the methods of natural science to the human personality. At that time, the etheric body was much more active, much more powerful even than it is today; one could act upon the physical body in a completely different way through the etheric body. And it had a completely different effect than today when—to put it quite bluntly—one healed with “feelings,” when the feeling flowed from one person to another. When the etheric body was truly still stronger and still dominated the physical body, what we call psychospiritual remedies could work in a completely different way. People were different in their constitution, so healing had to be done differently. If one does not know this, one will say as a natural scientist: We no longer believe in miracles, and what is said about these healings are simply miracles, and that must be eliminated. And if one is a modern, enlightened theologian, then one finds oneself in a very particular predicament. One would like to uphold these accounts, but one is nonetheless steeped in the modern prejudice that healing cannot occur in this way, that these are “miracles.” And then one offers all manner of explanations regarding the possibility or impossibility of miracles. There is only one thing we do not realize: that everything described up to the sixth chapter of the Gospel of Mark was not a miracle at all for that time, any more than it is a miracle today when some medicine influences this or that function of the human organism. No one back then would have thought of miracles if someone had said to a leper, stretching out his hand: “I will it; be cleansed!” The very nature of Christ Jesus, which overflowed there, was the remedy. It would no longer work today, because today the composition of the human etheric body and physical body is quite different. Back then, however, doctors healed in this way. Therefore, it is not at all something particularly noteworthy about Christ Jesus that he healed the lepers through compassion and the laying on of hands. That was a matter of course for that time. What is to be emphasized in this chapter is something quite different, and one must look it squarely in the eye.

[ 24 ] Let us take a look at the way in which, for example, doctors—both junior and senior—were trained at that time. They were trained in schools affiliated with the mystery schools, and they were given powers that flowed down from the supersensible world through them, so that the healing physicians of that time were, as it were, mediums for supersensible forces. They transmitted supersensible forces through their own mediumship, to which they were elevated in the medical mystery schools. When such a physician laid his hands on a patient, it was not his own powers that flowed forth, but powers from the supersensible world. And the fact that he could serve as a channel for the working of supersensible powers was brought about during his initiation in the mystery schools. Stories that a leper or a fever patient had been healed through such psychic processes would not have seemed particularly miraculous to people of that time. What was significant was not that healing took place, but that someone appeared who, without having been in a mystery school, could heal in this way; that someone appeared in whom the power that had formerly flowed down from the higher worlds had been placed in the heart, in the soul itself, and that these powers had become personal, individual powers. The fact had to be established that the time had come to an end, that from now on human beings could no longer be channels for supersensible forces, that this was ceasing. It had also become clear to those who were baptized by John in the Jordan that this era was coming to an end, that everything that must be done in the future must be done through the human ego, through that which is to enter into the divine, inner center of the human being, and that there stands one among humanity who, of his own accord, does what others had done with the help of the beings who dwell in the supersensible worlds and whose powers had worked down upon them.

[ 25 ] One does not even grasp the true meaning of the Bible if one portrays the healing process itself as something special. It was not yet so in the twilight of ancient times, when such healings could still take place and when it is said that Christ performs healings in the twilight of that era—but with the new powers that were to be present from then on. That is why it is shown with a complete clarity that could not really be overshadowed by anything, how Christ Jesus works entirely from human to human. Everywhere it is emphasized that he works from person to person. This could hardly be expressed more clearly than where Christ Jesus heals the woman, in the fifth chapter of the Gospel of Mark. He heals her by her coming to him, grasping his garment, and him sensing that a stream of power has gone out from him. The entire narrative is structured to show us: The woman approaches Christ Jesus; she grasps his garment. At first, he does nothing in response. She takes action: she grasps his garment. A stream of power flows out from him. How? Not because he sent it out in this instance, but because she draws it out, and he only notices it later. This is portrayed very clearly. And when he notices it, how does he express himself? “Daughter, your faith has helped you; go in peace and be healed of your affliction.” He himself first becomes aware of how he stands there, how the divine kingdom flows into his inner being and radiates from him. He does not stand there as the earlier demon healers stood before their patients. There, the patient could believe or not believe; the power that flowed from supernatural worlds through the medium of the healer poured into the sick person. Now, however, since it depended on the I, this I had to cooperate; everything became individualized. What matters is the description of this fact, not what was taken for granted back then—that one could act upon the body through the soul—but that I should enter into a relationship, a connection, with I, as the new era was to begin. Previously, the spiritual was in the higher worlds, hovering above humanity; now the realms of heaven had drawn near and were to enter into the hearts of people, were to dwell in the hearts of people as in a center. That is what matters. Thus, for such a worldview, the outer physical and the inner moral flowed together in a new way—in such a way that from the founding of Christianity until today it could only be a matter of faith, and from now on it can become a matter of knowledge.

[ 26 ] Consider an ancient patient who, in times past, stood before his doctor, his healer, as I have just described. Magical powers were drawn down from the supersensory worlds through the medium of the doctor, who had been trained for this in the mystery schools, and these powers flowed through the doctor’s body onto the patient. There was no connection to the patient’s moral state, for the entire process did not yet touch the patient’s ego. It did not matter what the patient’s moral state was, for the forces flowed down magically from the higher worlds. Now a new era dawned. The moral and physical aspects of healing came together in a new way. Knowing this helps one understand another account.

“A few days later, he returned to Capernaum, and word spread that he was at home.

A large crowd gathered, so that there was no room left, not even outside the door; and he was speaking the word to them.

And they came to him with a paralytic, carried by four men.

And since they could not get to him because of the crowd, they removed the roof where he was and lowered the stretcher on which the paralytic lay through the opening.

And when Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, “Son, your sins are forgiven.” (2:1–5)

[ 27 ] What would an old doctor have said? What did the Pharisees and the scribes expect if a healing were to take place? They would have expected an old doctor to say: “The forces entering you and your paralyzed limbs will be able to move you.” What does Christ Jesus say? “Your sins are forgiven”—that is, the moral aspect in which the ego is involved. This is a language the Pharisees do not understand at all. They cannot understand it. It seems to them like blasphemy that someone would speak this way. Why? Because, in their view, one can speak of God only in such a way that He dwells in the supersensible worlds and works down from there, and because sins can be forgiven only from the supersensible worlds. That the forgiveness of sins has something to do with the one who heals—they cannot understand that. That is why Christ goes on to say:

“Which is easier: to say to the paralytic, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Get up, take your mat, and walk’?

But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins (turning to the paralytic):

I say to you: Get up, take your stretcher, and go home!

And he got up, immediately took his stretcher, and went out in full view of everyone.” (2:9–12.)

[ 28 ] He combines the moral aspect with the magical nature of healing, thereby marking the transition from the ego-less to the ego-filled state. This is evident in every single description. This is how we must understand these things, for this is how they are presented. And now compare what Spiritual Science has to say with everything that is said in biblical commentaries about “forgiveness of sins.” You will find the strangest explanations there, but nowhere anything satisfactory, because people did not know what the Mystery of Golgotha actually was.

[ 29 ] It had to be a belief, I said. Why a belief? Because the expression of the moral in the physical does not take place within a single incarnation. When we encounter a person today, we must not, in the face of a physical infirmity, equate their moral nature with the physical in a single incarnation. Only when we go beyond the individual incarnation do we see the connection between the moral and the physical in their karma. Because karma has been emphasized little or not at all until now, we can say: Until now, the connection between the physical and the moral could only be a matter of faith. Now that the Gospel may be approached from a perspective of Spiritual Science, this becomes knowledge. Then Christ Jesus stands beside us, like an enlightened being, regarding karma, when he reveals: “I may heal him; for I see it in his personality: his karma is such that he may now rise and walk.”

[ 30 ] You can see from a passage like the one just mentioned how the Bible can be understood only with the tools of modern Spiritual Science. That is our task: to show how this book, this book of the world, truly contains the deepest wisdom regarding human evolution. Once it is understood what is happening on Earth from a cosmic perspective—and we will emphasize this more and more in the course of these lectures, for the Gospel of Mark provides the occasion for this—what cosmic-terrestrial, earthly-cosmic significance this Mystery of Golgotha holds, then one will never again be able to find that what can be said in reference to the Gospels could in any way be offensive to any other religious denomination in the world. True understanding of the Bible, for the reasons cited at the end of yesterday’s lecture, and above all because true understanding of the Bible truly cannot be confined to any single denomination but must become universal, will, through its inner truth, stand on the foundation of Spiritual Science and attach equal value to all religious denominations in the world. Through this, the religions will be reconciled. And what I was able to tell you in the first lecture about that Indian who gave the lecture “Christ and Christianity”—in which, though burdened with all the prejudices of his nation, he nevertheless looked up to Christ in an interdenominational sense—appears as a beginning toward such a reconciliation. That one must strive to understand this figure of Christ—that will be the task of Spiritual Science work within the various religious denominations. For it seems to me that the task of the spiritual movement must be a deepening into the religious denominations, so that one grasps and deepens the inner essence of the individual religions.

[ 31 ] Once again, I would like to take this opportunity to mention what I have often pointed out: how a Buddhist who is also an anthroposophist will relate to an anthroposophist who is a Christian. The Buddhist will say: After the Bodhisattva became a Buddha, Gotama Buddha attained such a high level after his death that he need not return to Earth. And the Christian who is an anthroposophist will say in response: I understand this, for I myself believe it of your Buddha when I enter into your heart and believe what you believe. That is to say, to understand the other’s religion, to rise up to the other’s religion. The Christian who has become an anthroposophist can understand everything the other says. What, on the other hand, will the Buddhist who has become an anthroposophist say? He will say: I try to understand what the innermost nerve of Christianity is: that Christ is something other than a founder of a religion, that the Mystery of Golgotha is an impersonal fact, that it is not a matter of a human being, Jesus of Nazareth, standing there as a founder of a religion, but that the Christ entered into him, died on the cross, and thus accomplished the Mystery of Golgotha. And that this Mystery of Golgotha is a cosmic fact—that is what will matter. And the Buddhist will say: Now that I have grasped the essence of your religion, just as you have grasped that of mine, I will no longer misunderstand what is essential, and I will not portray the Christ as one who will be reincarnated; for what matters to you is what actually happened there. And I would be speaking strangely if I were to say that Christianity needs to be improved in any way, that if people back then had had a better understanding of Christ Jesus, they would not have crucified him after three years, that a founder of a religion should be treated differently, and so on. — For that is precisely what matters: that Christ was crucified and what happened through this death on the cross! What matters is not that one thinks: An injustice has been done, and Christianity could be improved today. No Buddhist who is an anthroposophist could speak today other than to say: I try to understand the essence of your religion in truth, just as you understand the essence of my religion.

[ 32 ] What will happen when the individual adherents of the various religious systems come to understand one another in this way, when the Christian says to the Buddhist: “I believe in your Buddha just as you believe in your Buddha”—and when the Buddhist says to the Christian: “I can understand the Mystery of Golgotha just as you yourself understand it”—what will come upon humanity when such a thing becomes widespread? Peace will come upon humanity, mutual recognition of the religions. And that must come. And the anthroposophical movement must be such a mutual, genuine understanding of the religions. And it would be contrary to the spirit of anthroposophy if a Christian who had become an anthroposophist were to say to a Buddhist: “There is no truth to the idea that Gotama, after becoming a Buddha, should not incarnate again; he must reappear in the twentieth century as a physical human being.” Then the Buddhist would say: “Do you have your anthroposophy only to mock my religion?” And instead of peace, discord would be sown among the religions. But in that case, a Christian would also have to say to a Buddhist who wanted to speak of a Christianity in need of improvement: “If you can claim that the Mystery of Golgotha is a mistake and that the Christ should return in a physical body so that things might go better for him now, then you are not striving to understand my religion; you are mocking my religion.” - But anthroposophy is not intended to mock any religious creed, whether ancient or newly established, that asserts its validity; for otherwise one would be founding a society on mutual mockery rather than on the mutual reconciliation of religions.

[ 33 ] We must take this to heart so that we may understand the spirit and the occult core of anthroposophy. And there is no better way to understand this than by extending the power and love that reign in the Gospels to our understanding of all religions. The subsequent lectures will show us that this can be achieved particularly by drawing on the Gospel of Mark.