The Rudolf Steiner Archive

10. The Forerunner and Herald of the Christ Impulse: The Spirit of Christ and Its Manifestations—A Pentecost Message

[ 1 ] Today calls for an introduction to our reflections. For it is the day that we in the Theosophical Movement call the “White Lotus Day,” which annually reminds us of the departure from the physical plane of Mrs. Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, the founder of the Theosophical Movement in modern times. And it likely takes only a slight touch to strike a chord that surely exists in every soul present here today, to evoke feelings and emotions of admiration, reverence, and gratitude toward that individuality which dwelt on Earth in Madame Blavatsky and once again sharpened humanity’s gaze toward the ancient sacred mysteries of mankind, from which everything necessary for spiritual development—in terms of forces and impulses—has always emerged for humanity. By comprehending the task of the modern age, H. P. Blavatsky was able to present the mystery wisdom accessible to her in a popular form, such that this popular form differs from the manner in which mystery wisdom has previously flowed into human work and creation through secret channels and currents. This is precisely the significance of the modern age in this regard: that what was previously accessible only to a few must now be presented in a more general form. And to have been the first to act in accordance with this trend of the modern age—that was Madame Blavatsky’s mission. In doing so, she directed human attention toward something that was, in fact, sacred at all times to those who knew of it. That this is so is to be made clear right at the outset of our present consideration by presenting the poetry of a thinker whom the great mass of the educated knows—or rather does not know—only as a dry, conceptual thinker, merely as a builder and architect of far, far-removed conceptual constructs. But that this thinker possessed within himself, as the warmest feeling, that which he seemingly gave only in crystalline structures of ideas, and that ideas alone are not the garment for that which springs from his heart, he shows us in a poem which he addresses precisely to the sacred mysteries.

[ 2 ] Hegel—who might be called the thinker of Europe—has become so well known to the modern educated public that even today one can still find many of his unopened books in libraries; he has left us a work of poetry written with passion. I am referring to the poem “Eleusis,” which is now to be recited here by Miss von Sivers. With this poem, rooted in Central European culture, we wish to pay our tribute to the memory of H. P. Blavatsky.

“Eleusis”

To Hölderlin

Around me, within me, dwells peace. For busy people
Never-tiring worry sleeps. They give me freedom
And leisure. Thanks to you, my
Liberator, O Night! — With a white misty veil
The moon traces the uncertain boundaries
Of the distant hills. The bright strip of the lake
Across the way twinkles kindly.
It banishes the memory of the day’s tedious clamor,
As if years lay between it and now.
Your image, beloved, steps before me,
And the joy of days gone by. Yet soon it gives way
The sweeter hopes of reunion.
Already I envision the scene of the long-awaited, fiery
Embrace; then the scene of questions, of the more secret,
Of mutual scrutiny,
To see what in my friend’s bearing, expression, or disposition
Has changed since that time; — the joy of certainty,
Of finding the old bond’s fidelity, even firmer, more mature,
The bond no oath has sealed:
To live by free truth alone,
Peace with the statute,
That governs thought and feeling, never, never to yield!
Now the mind negotiates with sluggish reality,
Which easily carried me over mountains and rivers to you.
But a sigh soon announces their discord, and with it
The sweet dream of fantasy flees.

My eye rises to the vault of the eternal sky,
To you, O shining star of the night!
And all desires, all hopes
Forgetfulness flows down from your eternity.
The mind loses itself in the vision,
What I called “I” fades away.
I surrender myself to the immeasurable.
I am in it, am everything, am only it.
Strange to the recurring thought,
It dreads the infinite, and in wonder
It cannot grasp the depth of this vision.
Imagination brings the eternal closer to the senses.
It weds it to form. — Welcome, you,
Sublime spirits, lofty shadows,
From whose brows perfection shines,
He does not shrink. I feel that it is also my home
The radiance, the solemnity that surrounds you.

Ha! If now the gates of your sanctuary were to burst open,
O Ceres, who once reigned in Eleusis!
Drunk with inspiration, I would now feel
The thrills of your presence,
Understand your revelations.
I would interpret the lofty meaning of the images, hear
The hymns at the gods’ feasts,
The lofty sayings of their council. But your halls have fallen silent, O Goddess!
The circle of gods has fled to Olympus
Away from the desecrated altars,
Fleeing from the grave of desecrated humanity
The genius of innocence that conjured them here.
The wisdom of your priests is silent. No sound of the holy consecrations
Has reached us, and in vain does
The researcher’s curiosity seek more than love
For wisdom. They possess the seekers and despise you.
To master them, they dig for words,
In which your lofty spirit would be imprinted.”
In vain! They catch only a little dust and ash,
In which your life will never return to them again.
Yet even amidst decay and lifelessness, they took pleasure
In the eternally dead, the contented! — In vain! There remained
No sign of your feasts, no trace of an image.
To the son of consecration, the abundance of lofty teachings,
The depth of inexpressible feeling was far too sacred,
That he should deign to honor their dry symbols.
Even the thought does not grasp the soul,
Which, beyond time and space, immersed in a sense of infinity
Forgets itself and now awakens to consciousness once more.
Whoever would even speak of this to others,
Even if he spoke with the tongues of angels, would feel the poverty of words.
He dreads having conceived the sacred as so small,
Having made it so small through them, that speech seems a sin to him,
And that he tremblingly seals his lips.
What the consecrated one thus forbade himself, a wise
Law forbade the poorer spirits from making known,
What they saw, heard, and felt on that holy night.
Lest even the better ones be disturbed in their devotion by the clamor of their own folly
; their hollow verbiage
might provoke them against the Holy One Himself, lest this
be trampled into the mire, so that one might
memory, lest it
become a plaything and merchandise of the sophists,
whom he sold for a pittance,
the cloak of the eloquent hypocrite, or even
the rod of the joyful boy, and thus become so empty
in the end that he would find the roots of his life
From foreign tongues would have the root of his life.
Your sons, goddess, carried it sparingly,
Not your honor in the streets and markets; they kept it
In the inner sanctuary of the breast.
Therefore you did not live on their lips.
Their lives honored you. In their deeds you still live.

This night, too, I heard you, holy deity.
The lives of your children often reveal you to me,
I often sense you as the soul of their deeds!
You are the lofty spirit, the faithful faith,
That does not waver in a deity, even if all else perishes.

[ 3 ] I feel in complete harmony with the individuality of H. P. Blavatsky, especially on this day, when a few words—one might say—of the full, clear truth about her are spoken. It was her nature, when she was completely herself, to want above all else to be true. Therefore, we honor her best by turning our grateful thoughts toward her and speaking a few words of the purest truth.

[ 4 ] H. P. Blavatsky, in particular, demonstrated in her wholeness and individuality the inner strength and powerful momentum inherent in that spiritual movement we call the Theosophical Movement. To substantiate this, one need only refer to H. P. Blavatsky’s first major work, *Isis Unveiled*. To the casual reader, this book truly gives the impression of a chaotic work in which everything is in disarray. But if someone picks up this work who knows that there is an ancient wisdom, guarded within the Mysteries, which has indeed been preserved through many ages from profane eyes, and who knows that this wisdom was not prepared in outward human works but in secret societies, then that person will indeed still find chaos in the book, but also something else. For the first time, they will find a work that boldly and courageously presents certain secrets of the Mysteries to the profane world. And whoever understands these things will find that so much has been interpreted correctly, in a way that only initiates could have interpreted it. The chaotic impression remains, and it can be explained by the following rational observation: The outer personality of H. P. Blavatsky, insofar as she was embodied in her physical body, with her intellect, as well as her personal traits, her sympathies and antipathies—she shows us, in the manner in which *Isis Unveiled* is written, that she could by no means have produced from her personality, from her own soul, that which she had to give to the world. She communicates things that she herself could not have understood at all, and if one follows this line of thought further, it serves as proof that higher, spiritual individualities used the body and personality of H. P. Blavatsky to communicate that which was necessary, that which had to flow into humanity. Precisely because one cannot attribute to Blavatsky what she gave—precisely that is living proof that those individualities associated with the Theosophical Movement, the Masters of Wisdom and the Harmony of Feelings, found an instrument in her. Those who see clearly in these matters know that these things did not originate with her, but flowed through her from high spiritual individualities. Of course, there is no opportunity today to speak about these things in detail.

[ 5 ] One might now ask the question—and it is often asked: Why did those exalted beings choose Madame Blavatsky specifically as their instrument? Because she was, after all, the most suitable. Why was not one of the learned gentlemen who studied comparative religion chosen as this instrument? We need only consider the greatest and most venerable expert on Eastern religious systems, the great Max Müller, and we will see from his own statements why he was unable to proclaim what had to be communicated through the human instrument of Madame Blavatsky. He had a peculiar opinion regarding what H. P. Blavatsky taught about Eastern religious wisdom; he said: If one sees a pig grunting somewhere on the street, one does not find that at all strange, but if a person walks down the street grunting like a pig, then one finds that very strange. So it should be said: whoever does not distort what the Eastern religious system is in the sense of Max Müller is like a person who grunts like a pig. Moreover, there does not seem to be much logic in the comparison, for what reason would one have to be particularly astonished when a pig grunts; whereas when a human grunts, that is already an art—not everyone can do it. This comparison is therefore somewhat flawed, but the fact that it could be made at all shows that Max Müller was not the right person for the task.

[ 6 ] Thus, a figure had to be chosen who was not particularly intellectually gifted, and this naturally had all sorts of drawbacks. As a result, Madame Blavatsky brought all the sympathies and antipathies of her strongly passionate character into the great message. Now, she had a strong antipathy toward the worldview that flows from the Old and New Testament documents; she had a strong antipathy toward the Hebrew and Christian elements. But one thing is necessary to recognize the primordial wisdom of humanity in its pure, original form, and that is to face the revelations coming from the higher worlds with complete emotional balance. Antipathy and sympathy form a kind of fog before our inner eye. Thus it came to pass that Madame Blavatsky was increasingly driven to see a fog before her, and could clearly perceive only that which had passed through the so-called purely Aryan traditions. She saw this in its spiritual depths with particular clarity, but it made her one-sided, and so it came to pass that in her second major work, *The Secret Doctrine*, she presented the mighty, ancient Aryan primordial religion in a one-sided manner. One must not seek the Mystery of Sinai and Golgotha in Madame Blavatsky, for she harbored antipathy toward it. Therefore, she was drawn toward forces that could convey with great power and clarity all that is non-Christian. This is to be found in the wondrous “Dzyan” stanzas that Madame Blavatsky communicated in “The Secret Doctrine.” But this also pushed her away from the path of initiation in the physical world, which does emerge in “Isis Unveiled,” but only in fragmented rays. In “The Secret Doctrine,” however, Madame Blavatsky could only present—because she was subject to a one-sided initiation—this one-sided current, which was guided by that non-Christian worldview. Thus, “The Secret Doctrine” became a unique book containing the greatest revelations that humanity could receive at that time. There are things in it that are also highlighted in another text: in the letters of the “Masters of Wisdom and Harmony of Feelings,” the so-called Master Letters. There, too, one finds something of the greatest magnitude that has been revealed to humanity. But there are also other sections in The Secret Doctrine. There are, for example, detailed accounts of the theory of mass. Precisely those who, out of a correct understanding, count the Dzyan stanzas and the Master Letters among the highest things communicated to humanity, get the impression from the extensive sections on the theory of mass that they originate from someone who suffered from a writing mania, who simply wrote down whatever came to mind and could not put the pen down. And there are other sections where a deeply passionate nature speaks on scientific matters without possessing precise knowledge of the subject. Thus, the “Esoteric Doctrine” is a jumbled book of things that should be discarded, but also of things of the highest wisdom. This becomes understandable when one compares it with the explanation of a profound expert and close acquaintance of Madame Blavatsky. He says: Madame Blavatsky was actually a threefold being. First, she was the small, unattractive woman, with illogical thinking, a passionate character, who was always annoyed by something; she was good-natured, loving, and compassionate, but by no means what one would call a gifted woman. Secondly, when the great truths spoke through her, she was a disciple of the great Masters: then her features and gestures changed; then she was a different person; then the spiritual worlds spoke through her. Then there was a third aspect, which was a regal presence: awe-inspiring, towering above all else. This was in those rare moments when the Masters themselves spoke through her and revealed themselves in her words and writings. — Those who are inspired by a sense of truth will always carefully distinguish, even in Madame Blavatsky’s works, what is at stake. No greater service could be rendered to Madame Blavatsky, upon whom we focus our attention today, than to recognize her in the light of truth; no greater service could be rendered to her than to guide the Theosophical Movement in the light of truth.

[ 7 ] It was only natural that the Theosophical Movement began with an individual orientation; but it has become important and necessary to introduce another current into this Theosophical Movement. It has become necessary to add to the current of the Theosophical Movement what has flowed from occult sources through the Rosicrucian tradition since the 14th century and what was hidden from Madame Blavatsky.

[ 8 ] Thus, we have certainly fulfilled the purpose of the Theosophical Movement today by not only acknowledging the Eastern creeds and worldviews, but also by adding the worldviews that have found their expression in the revelations from Sinai and in the Mystery of Golgotha. And perhaps one question may be raised today: Does the breadth and comprehensive understanding of the true impulse that should lie at the heart of the Theosophical Movement in adding to H.P. Blavatsky’s worldview that which could not be given to it at its outset, or does this breadth lie in elevating a highly questionable special opinion to the status of a dogma and seeking to designate this as breadth, as the comprehensiveness of the Theosophical Movement? For my part, I say openly: I know that we would be sinning against the spirit of H.P. Blavatsky, who is in the spiritual world today, if we were to follow the latter course. I know that one does not sin against this spirit, but rather does justice to it, when one does what it wants today: when one adds to the Theosophical Movement that which it was unable to give while in the earthly body. And I know that I am speaking to you not only not against, but in full harmony with Madame Blavatsky, when I say: I would like one thing, that our Western current assert itself within this Theosophical Movement. — Various insights and truths have been added in recent years. Now let us suppose—let us really suppose—that in fifty years everything would have to be corrected; let us suppose that, as things stand today, not a single stone of our spiritual edifice could remain upon another; that occult research would have to rectify everything from the ground up over the next fifty years—all of this would lead me to characterize it only in such a way that I would have to say: It may be so, but one thing will remain of what we seek here, and that this may remain is the main aim of our Western Theosophical Movement. Let that one thing be that it will be said that there was a Theosophical Movement which, in the field of occultism, sought to uphold nothing other than that which arose from the clearest, purest sense of truth. — That is our aspiration: that this may one day be said. It is better that things which are still questionable remain unsaid than that we should in any way deviate from what can be justified before all spiritual powers in the purest sense of truth.

[ 9 ] But this leads to something else, namely, that here and there someone feels compelled to ask: Why do you reject this or that which appears in the Theosophical Movement? That is not tolerant! — Others may associate tolerance with a different concept, but we use these terms in such a way that we feel obligated to protect humanity from that which cannot stand up to the pure sense of truth. Let them distort what we do; we will not waver; we will seek to fulfill our task by rejecting everything we must reject if we are to serve what has just been stated. Therefore—but only when something comes into disharmony with our sense of truth—we reject it. We know of no other reasons, no other feelings. We will not, indulging in trite platitudes, speak of the equality of opinions, of brotherhood, and so on; we will know that even love among people can only flourish if it is sincere and true. This desire to be inspired by the pure sense of truth—let this be said today, especially on this festive day.

[ 10 ] Because new insights have been gained in this way, various things have come to light that can contribute to an understanding of the mysteries of the universe. These things are not said to cast any great culture or religious movement of humanity into the shadow of another. How often has it been mentioned that, when we look at the first post-Atlantean epoch with its spiritual culture of the holy Rishis, we find within this first post-Atlantean cultural period something that was spiritually higher than anything that followed. Nor do we have any intention of doing Buddhism an injustice; we are simply highlighting its merits; we know that it has given humanity things that Christianity will only have to attain in the future. But it is immensely significant that we repeatedly point out the difference that arises precisely between Eastern and Western culture.

[ 11 ] Eastern culture speaks only of those individualities that have undergone development through various incarnations. For example, Eastern culture speaks of the Bodhisattvas and describes them as individualities that progress more rapidly through human evolution. However, it focuses only on that which passes from incarnation to incarnation as an individuality, and on the fact that in a particular incarnation such a Bodhisattva becomes a Buddha. Then, when such a Bodhisattva has become a Buddha—which he can only achieve on Earth—he has reached a point where he no longer needs to descend into a physical body. Thus, the further back we go, the more we focus on the individuality and the less emphasis is placed on the specific incarnation. We speak much more of the Buddha as a stage, as a dignity that other Bodhisattvas also attain in the course of their lives, than of the historical Buddha, Prince Shuddhodana.

[ 12 ] In the West, however, things are different. We have developed a culture in which we do not speak at all of the individuality that passes from one life to the next; rather, Western culture has come to value the individual personality. We speak of Socrates, Plato, Caesar, Goethe, Spinoza, Fichte, Raphael, Michelangelo, and conceive of them as single incarnations. We do not speak of the individuality that passes from incarnation to incarnation, but of the personality; we speak only of a Socrates, a Plato, a Goethe, and so on—we speak only of a single expression that this individuality has found. Western culture was destined to bring the individual personality to the fore, to shape it in a fresh and distinctive way, and to disregard that which passes through from life to life as individuality. Now, however, we are once again on the verge of gradually recognizing how the eternal individuality passes through the individual personalities. Now we are witnessing how humanity is striving to look toward that which lives from personality to personality. This will mean a new inspiration for the human soul, a light bringing new understanding that will spread over human souls. What is to come, how the individual human personality will be understood, we can see in a single example.

[ 13 ] Let us turn our attention to a figure such as the prophet Elijah. First, we consider the prophet Elijah in and of himself. The essential point, however, regarding the prophet Elijah, is that he prepared us in a certain way for the Mystery of Golgotha. That he pointed out that the Yahweh impulse is something that can only be understood and grasped in the ego. He was not able to point to the full significance of the human ego; he is an intermediate stage in the recognition of the ego between the Mosaic idea of Jehovah and the Christian idea of Christ. Thus the prophet Elijah appears to us as a mighty herald, as a forerunner of the Christ impulse, of that which took place through the Mystery of Golgotha. And in this he appears to us as great and mighty.

[ 14 ] And now let us move on and consider another figure. From a Western perspective, we are accustomed to viewing him as a single individual. Let us consider John the Baptist. The Western perspective presents him as a limited individual. But we come to know him as the herald of Christ himself; we come to know him as he lived as the forerunner of Christ, as the one who first spoke the words: “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” — He pointed entirely to that which was to become an impulse through Golgotha: that a whole, divine being can be found within the human ego, that the Christ-ego is to enter into the human ego more and more, and that the impulse for this is near. Now, through Spiritual Science knowledge, we learn that what the Bible also suggests is true: that the same individuality that lived in the prophet Elijah lived in John the Baptist. So that the one who was to be the herald for the Christ, having lived out his life as Elijah, returns as John the Baptist and once again becomes the herald for the Christ, as was appropriate for his time. Now these two figures are united for us. Eastern culture took a different approach: it focuses directly on the individualities and neglects the individual personality.

[ 15 ] If we now turn our gaze further, we find that unique figure of the Middle Ages who was born—as if to outwardly indicate that she stands in a special relationship to the spiritual world—on Good Friday in the year 1483, and who passed away in the prime of life at the age of thirty-seven, having had such a powerful impact through what he gave to humanity: the figure of Raphael. He was born on Good Friday, as if to suggest that he is connected to what is celebrated on Good Friday. What can the Western mind, in the sense of Spiritual Science, learn from the figure of Raphael? If we contemplate this figure through the lens of Spiritual Science, we can discover that he contributed more to the spread of Christianity, to the living in of an interdenominational Christianity into the hearts and minds of people, than all the theological interpreters, than all the cardinals and popes of his time. Before Raphael’s gaze may have stood what is written in the Acts of the Apostles: how one steps among the Athenians and says—even the gesture is depicted there—: “Men of Athens, you have offered sacrifices to gods in outward signs. But there is a knowledge of that God who lives and works in all life.” This is the Christ who passed through death and rose again, and who thereby gave humanity the impulse toward resurrection. — Some did not listen, and others found it strange. In Raphael’s mind, this became the painting we find today in the Vatican, which bears the misnomer “The School of Athens.” In reality, it depicts the figure of Paul instructing the Athenians on the fundamental nature of Christianity. Here Raphael has presented something that appears as a herald of a Christianity standing above denominations. This has been little understood so far; the deep meaning of this painting has not yet dawned on people.

[ 16 ] If we consider Raphael’s other paintings, we must say: Of what the popes and cardinals of that time accomplished and gave to humanity, truly nothing remains. Raphael’s work at that time has such an impact that it truly comes alive only today. Just how little he was understood in earlier times can be seen from the fact that Goethe did not admire the Sistine Madonna in Dresden; for he had heard from the museum official what was the general opinion at the time: that the expression on the face of the infant Jesus was somewhat vulgar, that the two angels below could only have been added by a bungler, and that the Madonna herself, as we see her, could not have been painted by Raphael; she must have been overpainted. — We can go through the entire literature of the 18th century and find hardly anything about Raphael; even Voltaire does not mention him.

[ 17 ] And today! Today people may be Protestants or Catholics or anything else, yet Raphael’s paintings speak to all hearts. One can see how, in the Sistine Madonna, a great cosmic mystery imprints itself upon human hearts, and in the future we will be able to build upon this—when humanity is led toward an interdenominational, broad, and all-encompassing Christianity, which Spiritual Science already represents today— one will be able to build upon the fact that something as wonderfully mysterious as the Sistine Madonna has worked upon human minds. I have often pointed out that when a person looks into a child’s eyes, they can know that something is looking out from the child’s eyes that did not come into being through birth, something that reveals the depths of the human soul. Anyone who looks at the children in Raphael’s Madonna paintings sees that what looks out from their eyes is the divine, the hidden, the superhuman—that which is still connected to the child in the first days after birth. This can be observed in all of Raphael’s depictions of children, with the exception of one. One cannot interpret one image of a child in this way, and that is the infant Jesus in the Sistine Madonna. Anyone who looks into this child’s eyes knows that more than what can be in a human being is already looking out from the eyes of this child. Raphael made this distinction: in this one child of the Sistine Madonna, something lives that experiences something purely spiritual, something Christ-like, in advance.

[ 18 ] Thus Raphael is a herald who proclaimed the spiritual Christ, whom Spiritual Science has rediscovered. And through Spiritual Science we learn that it is now once again the same individuality that lived in Elijah and John the Baptist who also lived in Raphael. And we come to understand that the world in which he existed as John the Baptist is resurrected in Raphael through his hinting at his relationship to the historical Christ event by being born on Good Friday.

[ 19 ] Here we find the third heraldic figure after Elijah and John the Baptist. Now we begin to understand many of the questions that the far-sighted must raise when we look upon the figure of John the Baptist. He dies a martyr’s death before the events of Golgotha draw near; he belongs to the dawn of the Mystery of Golgotha, the time of prophecies and foreshadowing—as it were, the time of rejoicing—but he does not belong to the time of lamentation and suffering. If this mood now carries over into the personality of Raphael, is it not understandable that Raphael paints Madonnas and images of children with such great devotion? Do we not understand why he paints no Betrayal of Judas, no Carrying of the Cross, no Golgotha, no Mount of Olives? The paintings of this kind must have been commissioned; they truly do not express Raphael’s essence. Why do precisely these images not lie within Raphael? Because, like John the Baptist, he no longer participated in the Mystery of Golgotha.

[ 20 ] And then, when one considers the figure of Raphael, who has lived through the centuries and still lives today, and now turns one’s gaze to what remains of his works and what has already been destroyed, and when one considers that everything that exists in the material world must follow the path of transience, then one knows full well that what lives in these paintings will be absorbed into the souls of people before they fade away. Reproductions will indeed be around for many centuries, but that which can only give a mental image of Raphael’s personality, of what Raphael was, of what he himself created—that will shatter, that will turn to dust; his works will be gone. And nothing earthly, nothing on our earth, is capable of preserving that.

[ 21 ] Spiritual Science, however, makes it clear to us that what lives in Raphael as individuality—that which she has worked out—lives on, and that what she has worked out reappears with her. And when we learn that this very same individuality reappears in the poet Novalis, and when we consider Novalis’s first proclamation, which appears like the dawn of a new, living Christ-idea, then we say to ourselves: Long before what Raphael accomplished disappears from the outer world, long before that, the individuality of this personality is back again to give, in a new form, what it has to give to humanity. How good it was that for a time Western culture considered only the distinct personality, that we have already learned to love a personality through its individual life! How infinitely enriched our spirit now becomes when we learn how the eternal aspect of the human being passes from personality to personality! And no matter how different these personalities may seem to us, we will find understanding somewhere through what spiritual knowledge can give us in terms of concrete facts about human reincarnation and karma. It is not so much the general concepts and teachings, but precisely that which can shed light on the individual, that will be of benefit to humanity. Then many things that can only be attained through intuitive vision and occult research can be linked to these matters; then we can finally turn our gaze to the Mystery of Golgotha itself, and remember that in the thirtieth year of the life of Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ-being entered into him and passed through the Mystery of Golgotha.

[ 22 ] When people say today that the Christ-essence can no longer incarnate in a physical body, it must be said that this has never actually been claimed. For even back then, the physical body was the vessel of Jesus of Nazareth into which the spiritual Christ-essence descended. It is not as with other individualities, who build their own bodies; rather, the Christ-Essence descended into the body that Jesus of Nazareth had prepared only later. However, it then merged with him. So we cannot really speak of a physical incarnation of the Christ in this case. These are things that are self-evident to the expert.

[ 23 ] But now we know that through this Christ impulse something has come to Earth, something has flowed into humanity that benefits all of humanity by radiating out into human cultures. So that what passed through death is like a seed that multiplies and can enter into and sprout within the individual souls of human beings. Since we now know that the Christ Being, who passed through death and thereby sank into the Earth, was received by the body of Jesus of Nazareth, we ask ourselves: What will become of this when the Earth has reached its goal, its end? — The Christ, who approached from beyond the Earth and united with it, will be the reality on Earth at its goal; he will be the Spirit of the Earth. He is indeed already that now, but then human souls will be permeated by him, and human beings will form a whole with him.

[ 24 ] Now let us ask something else. We have learned that we must regard human beings in their physical form on Earth as maya. This form, which appears before us as the outer form of the human body, is an illusion that vanishes with death. It will not remain—the outer form of the physical body—any more than the physical bodies of plants, animals, and minerals will remain. The physical bodies will pass into that which scatters, that which becomes cosmic dust. That which one sees—the physical Earth—will have completely vanished; it will no longer be there. And the etheric bodies? They have a purpose only as long as they have physical bodies to renew; they, too, will no longer exist. When the Earth has reached its goal, what will then remain of all that the human being sees? Nothing more, absolutely nothing will remain—nothing of the human being itself, nothing of the other beings of the remaining kingdoms of nature. When the spiritual is free, nothing of matter will remain but formless dust, for only the spirit is real. But one thing will then have become real—something that was not previously united with the Earth, with which human souls will unite—one thing will then be real: the Christ Spirit. It will be the only reality that can remain of the Earth.

[ 25 ] But how does this Spirit of Christ come to possess its spiritual forms? The forms through which it will then continue to work?

[ 26 ] He descended into the earthly sphere as an impulse, as it were the soul of the Earth, during the Mystery of Golgotha. Even the Christ Being must form something that could be called its sheaths. From what does such a being take its sheaths? It does not happen as it does with human beings, but Christ, too, will have a kind of spiritualized physical body, a kind of etheric body, and a kind of astral body. What will these bodies consist of?

[ 27 ] These are matters that can only be hinted at for the time being. Through his baptism in the Jordan, Christ did indeed descend into the physical form of Jesus of Nazareth. He used this form; in it he lived, in it he shared the Last Supper with his disciples, in it he endured Gethsemane, in it he was reviled and mocked, and in it he underwent the Mystery of Golgotha. Then he rose again and has since lived as a spiritual being connected to the Earth; he creates for himself something similar to what the human being has in his physical form. Gradually, over the course of the epochs, something takes shape around the original, purely spiritual Christ impulse that descended in the baptism of John—something akin to an astral body, an etheric body, and a physical body. All these bodies are formed from forces that must be developed by humanity on Earth. What forces are these?

[ 28 ] The powers of the external sciences cannot give Christ a body; through them, one learns only about things that will have vanished in the future, that will no longer exist later on. But one thing precedes knowledge, which has an infinitely higher value for the soul than knowledge itself. This is what the Greek philosophers regarded as the beginning of all philosophy: wonder or amazement. Once we have arrived at knowledge, what has value in the soul is actually already over. People who are capable of marveling at the great insights and truths of the spiritual world imprint this feeling of wonder upon themselves, and what they imprint in this way forms, over the course of time, a force that acts as a magnet for the Christ impulse, drawing the Christ Spirit near: the Christ impulse connects with the individual human soul to the extent that the soul is capable of marveling at the mysteries of the world. Christ forms his astral body from the evolution of the Earth, from all the feelings that have lived as wonder within the individual souls of human beings.

[ 29 ] The second thing that human souls must cultivate—through which they draw the Christ impulse to themselves—is all feelings of compassion. And every time a feeling of compassion or joy is developed in the soul, this creates a force of attraction for the Christ impulse, and Christ connects with the human soul through compassion and love. Compassion and love are the forces from which Christ forms his etheric body until the end of Earth’s evolution. With regard to compassion and love, one could almost speak of a program—if one were to put it bluntly—that Spiritual Science must fulfill in the future. Materialism has today, in this field—something that has never happened on Earth before—even reduced science to a disgraceful state. The worst thing being done today is the conflation of love and sexuality. This is the worst expression of materialism, the most diabolical aspect of the present. The things being done in this field will first have to be brought to light. Sexuality and love have absolutely nothing to do with one another in their true meaning. Sexuality can be added to love, but it has absolutely nothing to do with pure, original love. Science has reached the point of disgrace by producing an entire body of literature devoted to linking these two things, which are not at all connected.

[ 30 ] A third element that enters the human soul as if from a higher world is conscience, to which the human being submits and to which he attaches a higher value than to his own individual moral instincts. It is with this that Christ connects most intimately: from the impulses of conscience within individual human souls, Christ derives his physical body.

[ 31 ] Thus, a saying in the Bible becomes very real when one knows that the Life-Body of Christ is formed from people’s feelings of compassion and love: “Whatever you did for one of the least of these my brothers, you did for me,” for Christ forms his Life-Body out of human compassion and love until the end of Earth’s evolution. Just as Christ forms his astral body out of wonder and amazement, and his physical body out of conscience, so does he form his etheric body out of the feelings of compassion and love.

[ 32 ] Why are we able to say these things now? Because a major problem will soon be solved for humanity: namely, that of portraying the Christ figure in the most diverse areas of life as he truly is. Only then will one see him as he is, when one takes into account various aspects of what spiritual research has to say; one must not look back to what happened in Palestine—for there Christ used the physical form of Jesus. When, after long immersion in the idea of Christ from Spiritual Science, one attempts to portray Christ, one will obtain a figure in whose countenance there is something that all art can strive toward, but must and will strive toward: in his face there will then be something of the victory of the forces that are only in the face over all other forces of the human form. When people will be able to form an eye that lives and radiates only compassion, a mouth that is not suited for eating, but only for speaking those words of truth that are the conscience lying on the human tongue, and if a forehead can be formed that is not beautiful and lofty, but is beautiful in the clear shaping of that which stretches forward toward what we call the lotus flower between the eyes—if all this can one day be formed, then it will be understood why the Prophet says: “He has no form or beauty.” This is not called beauty, but it is that which will triumph over decay: the form of Christ, where all is compassion, all is love, all is the duty of conscience.

[ 33 ] And so Spiritual Science passes into human feeling and human perception as a core. All the teachings that spiritual research is able to impart do not remain static; they are transformed into immediate life within the human soul. And the fruits of Spiritual Science will gradually become conditions of life that will appear as an outward embodiment of spiritual knowledge itself—this soul of the future development of humanity, as it must become.

[ 34 ] With such thoughts, I hope to have touched upon something in your soul—something that can be touched upon—when one wishes to speak to those striving in the Spiritual Science not with dry words, but rather with emotional ideas and nuances of feeling, so that these emotional nuances and ideas may live and take effect, enabling them to exist out there in the world. When such emotional nuances live in the hearts, they will be a source of warmth that radiates out to all of humanity. And those who believe in this will also believe in the effect of their beautiful feelings; they will believe that every soul feels this way—even if karma does not dictate that it be expressed outwardly—and can thereby produce invisible effects that truly bring into the world what is meant to come into the world through Spiritual Science.

[ 35 ] That is precisely the feeling I would like to evoke in you during my current visit to Cologne.