From Akashic Research
The Fifth Gospel
GA 148
18 December 1913, Cologne
Translated by Steiner Online Library
The Fifth Gospel II
[ 1 ] Before I proceed with my examination of the life of Christ Jesus, I would like to make a few remarks—albeit only brief ones—about the way in which such things are discovered. Of course, the aim here is simply to characterize an extraordinarily detailed subject in just a few words. But I would still like you to have an idea of what might be called occult research, which goes to the extent of penetrating to such concrete facts as we were able to consider here yesterday, for example.
[ 2 ] To begin with, one might say the following about these matters: This research is based on readings from the Akashic Records. - In general terms, I have pointed out in the articles that appeared in the journal “Lucifer-Gnosis” under the title “From the Akashic Records” how such a reading of the Akashic Records is to be understood. Now one must be clear that the various facts of world events and world existence must be discovered in different ways, and so I would now like to express what has already been said in even greater detail, as it were. It is good to note that, fundamentally speaking, there is nothing in the universe other than consciousnesses. Apart from the consciousness of certain beings, everything else ultimately belongs to the realm of Maya or the great illusion. You can glean this fact particularly from two passages in my writings, and from others as well, but especially from two: first, from the description of the overall evolution of the Earth from Saturn to Vulcan in *Outline of Esoteric Science*, where the progression from Saturn to the Sun, from the Sun to the Moon, from the Moon to the Earth, and so on, is described—initially only in states of consciousness. That is to say, if one wishes to ascend to these great realities, one must ascend so far into the course of world events that one is dealing with states of consciousness. Thus, one can actually only describe states of consciousness when describing these realities. The same can be gleaned from another passage in a book published this summer, *The Threshold of the Spiritual World*. There it is shown how, through gradual ascent, the seer’s gaze rises from what spreads out around us as things, as processes within things, how all of this, so to speak, vanishes and melts away, is destroyed, and finally the region is reached where there are only beings in various states of consciousness. Thus, the true realities of the world are beings in various states of consciousness. The fact that we live in the human state of consciousness and do not have a full overview of realities from this state of consciousness causes that which is not reality to appear to us as reality.
[ 3 ] I have emphasized this point quite often. You need only ask yourself the following question: Is a hair—a human hair—a reality in and of itself, even in the most limited sense? Does it have an independent existence? It would be nonsense to say that a human hair has an independent existence. It only makes sense to view it as growing on the human body; otherwise, it cannot exist, it cannot exist on its own. To speak of a hair as a reality that one only perceives in everyday life, as an independent entity even in this earthly sense, is therefore perceived by everyone as nonsense, since a hair cannot arise in isolation anywhere. The individual plant is often perceived as a single being, and yet it is no more a single being than a hair. For what the hair is to the head, the plant is to the organism of the Earth, and it makes no sense at all to consider the individual plant. One must view the Earth analogously to a human being, and all plants on Earth as belonging to the Earth, just as hair belongs to the human head. Just as a single hair cannot exist on its own outside the head, so too can a plant not exist as an independent being outside the organism of the Earth. It is important to consider where one must stop when viewing a being as a being in its own right. But in the ultimate sense that human beings can attain, everything that is not rooted in consciousness is not an independent being. Everything is rooted in consciousness, and in various ways.
[ 4 ] Let us take a thought—that is, what we as human beings think. At first, these thoughts are in our consciousness, but they are not merely in our consciousness. They are simultaneously in the consciousness of the beings of the next higher hierarchy, the Angeloi, the angels. While we have a thought, our entire world of thought is, for example, a thought of the angels. The angels think our consciousness. And that is why you will realize that, when one ascends to clairvoyance, one must develop a different perception toward the beings of the higher worlds than in ordinary external reality. If one thinks of the physical-sensory world and earthly existence in the same way, one cannot ascend to a higher clairvoyance. One must not merely think there, but one must be thought and be aware that one is being thought. It is not exactly easy to characterize precisely what kind of sensation one has toward one’s perception there, because human words have not yet been coined for this. But one could say—to choose a comparison—that one performs all sorts of movements, and one would not observe these movements in oneself, but rather look into the eye of a fellow human being and observe there the reflection of one’s own movements, saying to oneself: When one observes this, one knows from it that one is performing this or that with one’s hands or facial expressions. One already has this feeling at the next stage of clairvoyance. One knows only in a general sense that one is thinking, but one observes oneself in the consciousness of the beings of the next higher hierarchy. One allows one’s thoughts to be thought by the angels. One must know that one does not direct one’s own thoughts in one’s consciousness, but that the beings of the next higher hierarchy direct these thoughts. One must feel the consciousness of the angels flowing through and weaving through one. Then one gains, as it were, insight into the ongoing impulses of evolution, for example into the truth of the Christ impulse, as it continues to work even now, once it has come into being. The angels can think these impulses; we humans can think and characterize them if we relate to our thoughts in such a way that we surrender them to the angels, so that they may think within us. This is attained precisely through continuous practice, as I have described in my book *How Does One Attain Knowledge of the Higher Worlds?*. From a certain point onward, one associates a feeling, a sense, with the words: Your soul is no longer thinking; it is a thought that the angels are thinking. — And as this becomes a reality for the individual human experience, one experiences within oneself, so to speak, the thoughts of the general Christ-truths or other thoughts concerning the wise guidance of Earth’s evolution.
[ 5 ] The things that pertain to the individual epochs of Earth's development—the Primordial Indian Epoch, the Primordial Persian Epoch, and so on—are conceived by the archangels. Through further practice, one comes to be not merely conceived by the angels, but experienced by the archangels. One must simply, in the course of one’s further practice, come to know: You are offering your life for the life of the archangels. - In the book *The Threshold of the Spiritual World*, these matters are described in greater detail, namely how one comes to experience—as I also spoke of in Munich—a sensation, to put it in grotesque terms, as if one were sticking one’s head into an anthill. The ants are the thoughts that are moving. While in ordinary life one thinks one is thinking one’s own thoughts, through practice one comes to realize that the thoughts are thinking within one because the Angeloi, the angels, are thinking within one. And as one continues with the practice, one gets the feeling that one is being carried by the archangels to various regions of the world and thereby gets to know these regions. Whoever describes Egyptian culture or Indian culture correctly is the one who first knows how to connect a meaning to what it means: Your soul is carried by an archangel into this or that time. — It is as if the life-sustaining forces within us knew that they maintain the life process and are carried through the organism like blood. So the seer knows: he is carried through the life process of the world by the archangels.
[ 6 ] But the things that pertain to the soul’s penetration of a single experience can only be explored once the soul attaches meaning to the words: The soul offers itself as nourishment to the primordial beginnings or Archai, the spirits of the personality. - What has just been said sounds grotesque, but it is true that one cannot explore such concrete facts as the life of Jesus of Nazareth until one attaches meaning to the words: one is eaten as spiritual nourishment and thus serves the spirits of the personality. It is something that, naturally, sounds like madness to the person who stands in the outer world today. Of course! But nevertheless, just as the morsel of bread that enters our stomach becomes our nourishment—and if it could reflect on it, it would know that it has a meaning and purpose in life by becoming nourishment through us—so too is it true that we humans have the purpose of serving as nourishment for the Archai. While we walk about here on Earth, we are at the same time beings who are continually consumed, eaten by the Archai. You will not deny that people do not know this in ordinary life, that they would call it madness if someone told them such a thing. Man is to the Archai what the grain of wheat is to you as physical human beings. But do not merely know this theoretically; rather, live toward the Archai as the grain of wheat would live if, crushed into porridge by our teeth, it passed through our palate and stomach with this awareness: I am food for man—and thus also know: I am food for the Archai, I am digested by the Archai; this is their life, which I live within them—to know this vividly means to place oneself in the consciousness of the spirits of personality, the Archai, just as it means to place oneself in the consciousness of the archangels when one knows: Your soul is carried by the archangels into this or that time — and just as it means to place oneself in the consciousness of the angels when one knows: My thoughts are thought by the angels.
[ 7 ] The states of consciousness must change if one wishes to penetrate the higher worlds through reading. It is necessary to be consumed by the spirits of the personality with knowledge if one is to explore facts that are as concrete in human development as the life of Jesus of Nazareth.
[ 8 ] Perhaps the remarks I have made have, to some extent, served to illustrate just how different this occult research is from research into the external world. For you can certainly reflect on this image, and it provides you with valid points of reference: You can imagine yourself as a grain of wheat being ground into porridge, being crushed between the teeth, to get an idea of what is quite analogically correct when it comes to reading in the consciousness of the Archai. There, too, one must be spiritually crushed and must feel it. That is to say, higher research is not possible without inner tragedy, without inner suffering. Research in the higher worlds cannot be attained in such a purely abstract way that it does not hurt—as research in the physical world proceeds—if it is to be more than mere fantasy. Hence the efforts I made yesterday: to steer clear of abstract concepts and abstract descriptions in the portrayal of the life of Jesus. Do you remember what I primarily drew your attention to as what really matters? I said: Such was the life of Jesus of Nazareth between the ages of twelve, eighteen, twenty, and up to thirty. - What is described there is not so much what matters. What matters is to gain a living sense of what the soul of Jesus went through by experiencing what has been described, to feel the pain of loneliness, the infinite pain of standing alone with primordial truths for which there were no ears to hear. I wanted to point out the emotional life of Jesus of Nazareth. I wanted to describe the threefold great shared suffering of humanity during the period from the twelfth to the thirtieth year. It is not so much by your recounting the events I have tried to hint at—to yourselves or to others— but rather by first forming a conception that deeply moves and shakes your soul—a conception of what this man, Jesus of Nazareth, had to suffer until he could approach the Mystery of Golgotha, so that the Christ impulse might flow into the development of the Earth.
[ 9 ] This evokes a vivid conception of this Christ impulse, in that one must reawaken this suffering, and must describe the facts relating to such matters as those now under consideration, by attempting to bring these sensations to mind. You can see this from the nature of Akashic research, which I have attempted to characterize in a few words. The more one succeeds in feeling within oneself these surging, undulating, and weaving sensations of a being such as Jesus of Nazareth, the more one penetrates into such mysteries.
[ 10 ] What follows in this life of Jesus—I need not describe it, for it has often been spoken of—is that, through the baptism by John in the Jordan, the Christ-being entered the three sheaths of Jesus of Nazareth, after they had been spiritualized by the life of the Zarathustra-I within them, that is, a being descended from the realm of the spiritual world and was destined to remain in a human body for three years, bound to a human body. It is important that we realize what this actually means. For, fundamentally speaking, this event differs quite considerably from all other events in the development of the Earth. And at the very moment when we now approach the event through which the Christ-being entered the physical body of Jesus of Nazareth, we are approaching something that is actually no longer merely a human matter of Earth’s development. One must also realize this. _
[ 11 ] One can view this matter from a human perspective. Then one says: There once was a human being, just as we have described him. He took in the Christ-essence, the Christ-impulse. - But one can also view the matter quite differently, although the considerations one must make in doing so must be rather abstract; but that does not matter. After our preparation in spiritual science, we will be able to form some understanding of it.
[ 12 ] Let us suppose that we were not sitting among human beings as human beings, contemplating the Mystery of Golgotha, but rather that we were sitting among the higher hierarchies as a being of the higher hierarchies, contemplating the Mystery of Golgotha. In a spiritual sense, this change of perspective is entirely possible. This can be compared, for example, to the following: If we have a mountain before us, with a village situated at its mid-height, one can see the village from below, but one can also view it from the summit of the mountain. It is quite natural that one usually views the Mystery of Golgotha from the human standpoint. But one can also ascend into the sphere of the higher hierarchies. How would one then speak of the Mystery of Golgotha? One would have to say: When the Earth began its evolution, the beings of the higher hierarchies had certain intentions regarding humanity. They wished to guide earthly evolution in a specific way. But into this intended guidance of humanity’s earthly affairs, Lucifer first intervened. So while one looks down upon Earth’s development as a being of the higher hierarchies, considering how to guide human destinies—Lucifer alters the direction of this development, which one had intended to guide in a different form.
[ 13 ] Now, looking further down at human evolution, one realizes: Not everything that happens down there is due to us. Lucifer is constantly interfering. Because Lucifer interfered—and later Ahriman joined in as well—there is an alien element in human development that stands in contrast to the actions of the higher hierarchies. In a certain sense, one could put it this way: these beings of the higher hierarchies said to themselves, “To a certain degree, the earthly realm is lost to us. There are forces within it that are drawing this earthly realm, along with human souls, away from us.”
[ 14 ] The guidance provided by the higher hierarchies takes place in such a way that they are involved in this guidance step by step, according to their powers, beginning with the lowest. The affairs of Earth’s evolution are managed in such a way that, although the higher beings are active all the way up to the highest levels, they have certain matters handled by their servants—the angels, archangels, and archai—so that these beings are the first to intervene in evolution.
[ 15 ] We place ourselves, I said—in all humility, of course—in the council of the higher hierarchies, not in the council of men. We can then say: There are our messengers, the angels, archangels, and archai; they could carry out our commands just as well if there were no foreign forces at work in the earthly realm. — And then the great counsel of the gods emerges, leading to a result something like the following: Because we were unable to prevent Lucifer and Ahriman from interfering in earthly evolution, our servants—the angels, archangels, and archai—have thereby lost the ability, from a certain point in time onward, to do for humanity what ought to be done in accordance with our will. —And this point in time was precisely that in which the Mystery of Golgotha took place.
[ 16 ] As this moment drew near, the gods of the higher hierarchies had to admit to themselves: We are losing the ability for our servants to intervene in human souls. Because we were unable to prevent Lucifer and Ahriman, we are only able to act through our servants up to this point. Then forces will arise in human souls that can no longer be directed by the angels, archangels, and archai. Human beings will be lost to us through the forces of Lucifer and Ahriman.
[ 17 ] That was indeed—if we may put it that way—the “mood in heaven” as the moment approached that marks the beginning of the new era. The great “fear” of the gods was that, from a certain point onward, their servants would no longer be able to provide sufficiently for humanity. You will not misunderstand the expression, for you have been prepared by spiritual science to recognize that expressions take on a different meaning and emotional significance when used to characterize the higher worlds.
[ 18 ] This fear of the gods was growing; it became more and more and more agonizing—if we may put it that way—in the heavens. Then the decision was made to send down the Sun Spirit, to sacrifice him, saying to themselves: From now on, he shall choose a different fate than sitting in the council of the gods; he shall enter the realm where human souls live. We sacrifice this Sun Spirit. Until now, he lived among us, in the spheres of the higher hierarchies; now he enters the Earth’s aura through the gate of Jesus.
[ 19 ] This was the state of affairs among the gods when the Mystery of Golgotha took place; this is how the matter appears from above. We are therefore dealing with a matter concerning the gods who guide the Earth, not merely with a human affair. The matter can be viewed in such a way that one does not merely ask: What must happen for humanity so that it does not lose its way on the slippery slope? — but from the other side, one could ask: What must we gods do to create a balance for what has happened, since we had to allow Lucifer and Ahriman into the evolution of the Earth?
[ 20 ] And now one can begin to grasp that the Mystery of Golgotha is something more than merely an earthly affair; that it is a matter of the gods, an event of the divine world. Truly, even more significant for the gods than it was for human beings to receive the Christ was the fact that they had to give the Christ to the earth.
[ 21 ] And what, after all, is the true understanding of the Mystery of Golgotha, other than recognizing it as the central event of the Earth? — That by looking upon the Mystery of Golgotha, one sees it as a matter of the gods; that the gods open a window to heaven there, that they conduct their affairs for a time before the eyes of human beings, and that human beings can witness this divine affair! One must learn to feel this by looking upon the Mystery of Golgotha—that it is as if one were standing before the ever-closed house of heaven, and as if one were passing by a window at this point and were allowed to look through this window into what was otherwise always invisible behind the walls of the gods’ dwelling.
[ 22 ] In the same way, the person with a genuine occult sensibility feels a sense of awe toward the Mystery of Golgotha, like someone creeping around a house that is locked up tight, only sensing what is happening inside. But in one place there is a window through which he can witness a small glimpse of what is happening inside. Such a window onto the spiritual world is, for human beings, the Mystery of Golgotha. This is how we must perceive what happened there when the Christ-being descended into the body—or rather, into the three sheaths—of Jesus of Nazareth. We must allow ourselves to be permeated ever more deeply by this idea that, through the Mystery of Golgotha, we are spectators of a divine affair.
[ 23 ] When speaking of such things, words must be used in a different way than in everyday life. One must speak of something like the “anxiety,” the “fear” of the gods regarding the moment that was then to be fulfilled in the evolution of the Earth through the Mystery of Golgotha. One must use the words in a transformed way for the most sacred and spiritual matter of humanity. It is infinitely easy for all those in the world who are only all too ready, out of folly, frivolity, vanity, or other reasons, to belittle what is meant in the most sacred sense. One need do nothing more than twist any word, however it is coined, to suit one’s own exoteric purposes. And one has the ability to turn such a thing—which has been wrung from the human soul—into its opposite, if it is spoken merely out of the inner compulsion to proclaim the truths of the spiritual world, which are so difficult to wrest from the soul. One reverses them by finding them ridiculous, devilish, satanic, when the necessary frivolity, the necessary levity, is present in the souls. This is all too widespread in souls in our time. And all too little is the vigilance of those who ought to guard the treasure of the sacred spiritual truths that are meant to enter the hearts of people precisely in our time.
[ 24 ] How great is the desire for convenience when it comes to nourishing one’s spirit! How often must one witness things that are truly lamentable! If there is even a slight departure from materialism to speak of the spirit, people are easily satisfied by this, because it requires no effort on their part—especially no effort of the mind. One should feel that, by participating in the spiritual contemplation of the most sacred matters of Earth’s development, one bears a responsibility toward the treasures of knowledge pertaining to the spiritual world. The frivolity of our time in this area is so great, and it takes it so lightly. You will see it pop up here and there again and again, but perhaps you will only notice it in all its abhorrence if you are vigilant enough and your hearts are sufficiently inflamed for the most sacred of spiritual truths. Perhaps you will then be able to assess it and thereby be good guardians of the spiritual treasures that we are all called to guard together.
[ 25 ] Perhaps the easiest place to speak such a serious word is when one must point to something as important as this: that the Mystery of Golgotha is not merely a human affair, but a divine affair, and that we are looking into this divine affair as through a window. But precisely what happens with such a characterization is that it will be distorted in such a way that I do not wish to speak of it here at all. Then perhaps the time will come for all of you when you must reflect on the truth that we must reinterpret words for the sensory world if we wish to apply them to the supersensory world, and that it is easy to interpret them in a different sense.
[ 26 ] Popular Christianity expressed what I have just alluded to with the words: The Father sacrificed his Son for humanity! - These words also convey, in a popular way, to human hearts that are open to feeling, what can truly be said: The Mystery of Golgotha is a matter for the gods!
[ 27 ] And if we take together what I have said, we will be able to form an idea of what took place in the event we refer to as the baptism of John in the Jordan. This was followed by what is also hinted at in the Gospels: the temptation. From the perspective of the Akashic Records, we might say: After Jesus of Nazareth had taken the Christ-essence into himself, he had to go into solitude. And in solitude he now had visionary experiences, which are described with approximate accuracy in the words of the clairvoyant Gospel writers. One can express it in a similar way; it need only be indicated that the Christ-being was now truly connected with the three bodies of Jesus of Nazareth. That is to say, it had descended from the spiritual heights and was now bound to the capacities of the three bodies. It would therefore be wrong for anyone to imagine that Christ, simply because he belonged to a higher world from which he had descended, could have immediately beheld that higher world or gained insight into it. That is not the case. Anyone who finds this incomprehensible should consider what it means to be a clairvoyant. Who is a clairvoyant? You are all clairvoyants! All of you! There is no one who is not a clairvoyant. Why does he not see clearly? Because he has not developed the faculties to make use of the powers that are in all human beings. It is not a matter of whether we have abilities, but of whether we can use them.
[ 28 ] The Christ Being possessed all manner of abilities, but within the three bodies of Jesus of Nazareth, it possessed only those abilities that corresponded to the three bodies, the three physical forms of Jesus of Nazareth. That is why they had to be prepared so meticulously, for the abilities of these three bodies were indeed high abilities that meant more than the corresponding abilities of all other people on Earth. But Christ was bound to them, just as truly as your clairvoyant abilities are bound to the organs you possess but are not yet able to use. This was made possible by the abilities that the Zarathustra soul had left behind in the three bodies of Jesus of Nazareth, so that now the Christ made use of these Zarathustra abilities in their remnants within the three bodies in order to first confront a being whose purpose was to shake up all the pride and arrogance of which a human soul is capable. Christ Jesus confronted this being.
[ 29 ] At that moment, he sensed the effect this being was having on him through the inner language of the visions: what is described in the Bible with the words: “All the kingdoms you see around you”—these were the kingdoms of the spiritual world—“can be yours, if you acknowledge me as the Lord of this world!” If one takes pride and arrogance to the highest degree and enters the spiritual world with this pride, then within that spiritual world—because arrogance floods everything—one can come into possession of Lucifer’s world kingdom, provided one leaves everything else behind except arrogance. As a human being, however, one is not constituted for this; one would be heading toward a terrible fate.
[ 30 ] Christ Jesus was faced with this possibility. And now two images arose in his soul: one that corresponded to the experience he had had on the way to the Jordan with the man I described to you yesterday as the desperate one. And before Jesus of Nazareth stood once more the figure who had approached the Desperate One in the dream. He saw this figure again as the one who said: Recognize me as the Lord of the World. - Then he also recognized in the figure the one he had seen as Lucifer at the gates of the Essenes. Through this, he now knew that Lucifer was speaking to him, and—he repelled his attack. He defeated Lucifer.
[ 31 ] Then two beings approached him in a second attack, and the impression he received again corresponded roughly to what is described in the Bible. He was told: Show all your fearlessness, your strength, what you are capable of as a human being, by hurling yourself down from the heights and not fearing harm. — In such a case, everything in the human soul is to awaken in terms of a sense of power and courage, which, however, can also make a person reckless. Two figures stood before him. Because Jesus had had the impression before the gates of Essau that it was Lucifer and Ahriman who were fleeing, and because he had the impression that the being who had revealed himself as Death to the leper he had met on the way to the Jordan was concealed within one of these figures, he now recognized Lucifer and Ahriman. Thus, what he had experienced on that journey was relived. He repelled this attack as well. He defeated Lucifer and Ahriman!
[ 32 ] Then Ahriman approached once more. And now what Ahriman said to Christ Jesus as a kind of temptation was something that can be rendered in the words of the Bible: “Turn these stones into bread to show Your power.” But now it was the case that Christ Jesus could not fully respond to what Ahriman demanded. He was able to repel the first and second attacks: the attack by Lucifer alone and the attack by Lucifer and Ahriman together, who paralyzed one another. But now he could not repel Ahriman’s attack. The fact that Ahriman’s attack could not be entirely repelled retained significance for the effectiveness of the entire Christ impulse on Earth.
[ 33 ] I must describe, in somewhat popular, even almost trivial terms, what this means: Turn these stones into bread, so that they may become food for the people. — At first, due to the influence of the higher hierarchies, Ahriman cannot be completely vanquished for the remainder of Earth’s development up to the time of the Volcano. It will never be impossible to overcome the inner temptation of Lucifer through purely spiritual effort: the desires, cravings, and passions that rise from within, the pride, arrogance, and hubris that well up. When Lucifer attacks humanity alone, he can be overcome by spiritual means. Even when Lucifer and Ahriman, together, attack humanity from within, victory can be achieved through spiritual means. But when Ahriman acts alone, he immerses his influence in the material events of Earth’s evolution. There, he cannot be completely vanquished. Ahriman, Mephisto, Mammon—these terms are, after all, synonymous—they are embedded in money, in everything connected with external, natural egoism. Since it is always necessary for something of an external, materialistic nature to be mixed into human life, human beings must reckon with Ahriman. If the Christ were to truly help humanity on Earth, he had to allow Ahriman to remain active. Ahriman, the material, must continue to act until the end of Earth’s evolution. Through the Christ, the power of Ahriman had to remain undefeated. Ahriman was not completely defeated. Christ must consent to continue fighting Ahriman until the end of Earth’s evolution. Ahriman had to remain.
[ 34 ] As human beings, we can overcome the inner attacks of Lucifer—the attacks of both Lucifer and Ahriman. The struggles in the material outer world must be fought out until the end of Earth’s evolution. Therefore, Christ had to keep Ahriman in check, but allow him to exist alongside him. This is why it was possible for Ahriman to remain active on Earth alongside Christ during the three years that Christ worked in the body of Jesus of Nazareth, and why he then entered the soul of Judas and worked within that soul to bring about the betrayal of Christ. What happened through Judas is connected to the not entirely resolved question of the temptation following the event at the Jordan.
[ 35 ] Only little by little, slowly and gradually, did the Christ-essence unite with the three bodies. This process took three years. At first, it was only loosely connected, and only gradually did it press itself into the three bodies. It was not until the moment of death that a true permeation of the three bodies by the Christ-being took place. And compared to all the suffering and pain that Jesus of Nazareth, as I have described to you, experienced in the three stages of his development, what Christ now suffered is infinitely greater, as he gradually, over the course of three years, gained the ability to fully immerse himself in the three human bodies. That was a continuous pain, but a pain that in turn transformed into love and love and love. And then came the following: When we look at the way Christ Jesus lived among his closest disciples in the first, second, and third years, it differs from year to year. In the first year, as I said, Christ was only loosely connected to the body of Jesus of Nazareth. It happens constantly that the physical body is here or there, while the Christ-being wanders about in the meantime. Where the other Gospels recount that the Lord appeared to his disciples here or there, the physical body was at a different location, while the Christ wandered about in the spiritual realm throughout the land.
[ 36 ] That was in the beginning. Then the Christ-essence became more and more united with the body of Jesus of Nazareth. And later, when Christ walked among his closest disciples, they were so intimately connected with him that he, so to speak, did not live apart from them. The more he became one with his body, the more he became one with the innermost being of his disciples. Now he traveled through the land in the company of his disciples. Sometimes he spoke through this disciple, sometimes through that one—through the intimate communion, as he became one with the others—so that when they traveled through the land, it was no longer Christ Jesus alone who spoke, but one of the disciples; yet Christ spoke through him. And with such power did he identify with the disciples that the facial expression of the disciple through whom Christ spoke changed so much that anyone from the crowd listening from the outside, looking at the one who was speaking, had the feeling that this was the Master. The other, however, who was Christ, withdrew so completely into himself that he looked, as it were, just as usual. Thus he spoke now through this one, now through that one, as he traveled through the land. This was the secret of his activity during the final period of the three years.
[ 37 ] And when he went about with his disciples and seemed increasingly dangerous to his enemies, they would say: How can we track him down? We can’t possibly arrest the whole crowd, can we? For when you single out the one who is speaking, you never know whether you’ve got the right one or the wrong one. If you grab the wrong one, the right one gets away. You never knew whether the person standing before you was actually the right one. That was the great fear! You knew that sometimes one person spoke, sometimes another, and the right one was unrecognizable because he took on the ordinary form of someone else.
[ 38 ] There was something wonderful about this group. That is why it was necessary for a betrayal to take place. For the way the story is usually told is not how it actually happened. What would it mean, after all, that Judas had to kiss the one who was the right one? According to the usual account, it would not have been difficult to capture Jesus of Nazareth. The kiss would have made no sense unless someone who knew exactly which one was the right one had to point him out to those who did not know. But for the reason indicated, the enemies did not know who the right one was.
[ 39 ] It was only when the great sufferings were immediately upon him, when the Mystery of Golgotha took place, that a complete union of the Christ-being with the bodies of Jesus of Nazareth was established. Then what happened is beautifully described in the other Gospels. Above all, for the seer’s gaze, which, in the manner of the Akashic Records, focuses on what happened at that time, it is certainly a fact that, while Christ hung on the cross, the earth in the vicinity of Golgotha was darkened as if by a solar eclipse. I cannot say whether it was a solar eclipse or a powerful cloud eclipse, but a darkness such as is otherwise observed during a solar eclipse surrounded the event of the Mystery of Golgotha.
[ 40 ] When the occult eye observes life on Earth during such an eclipse, all living things appear to it quite differently than when no such eclipse is taking place. The relationship between the etheric body and the physical body is quite different in plants; and in animals, too, the astral body and the etheric body appear quite differently during such an eclipse. During such a solar eclipse, conditions on Earth are quite different from when the sun is simply absent at night. Of course, this is not the case when the sky is covered with clouds in the ordinary sense, but only when a particularly dense eclipse occurs, and such an eclipse had occurred at that time. As I said, I do not yet know whether it was a solar eclipse, but what can be seen is like a solar eclipse. During this change on Earth, even in the physical sense, what we call the Christ Being passed into the living Earth aura. Through the death of Christ Jesus, the Earth had received the Christ impulse.
[ 41 ] The greatest thing that has ever happened on earth must be described in such simple words, because human language is actually incapable of conveying even an approximate sense of this greatness.
[ 42 ] Then, when the body of Jesus was taken down and laid in a tomb, it is again a true observation that a natural phenomenon occurred, much like something that enters into human moral life. A whirlwind arose, a fissure in the earth formed, which took in the body of Jesus, while the cloths were swept away from the corpse. It is startling to observe that the arrangement of the cloths, as described in the Gospel of John, truly presents itself to the beholder.
[ 43 ] These two events—the solar eclipse, the earthquake, and the powerful whirlwind—show us, at a certain point in the Earth’s development, how natural phenomena occurred simultaneously with spiritual events. Otherwise, something of this kind occurs only in living beings, such as when a movement of the hand is preceded by a decision of the will and thought. The Earth’s development proceeded in such a way that in ordinary life we deal only with mechanical facts. Only at a particular moment do we have to do—as with other facts of the Earth, but to the highest degree with this fact—with the coincidence of a spiritual fact with two physical facts.
[ 44 ] I do not believe that considering these concrete facts—which is now possible—and presenting them to a small number of souls as a kind of Fifth Gospel can undermine the grand idea we have formed, more theoretically, of the significance of the Mystery of Golgotha. On the contrary, I believe that anyone who tries to let these concrete facts sink deeper and deeper into their being will feel that what was previously presented more theoretically, more abstractly, and more conceptually about the Mystery of Golgotha is being confirmed. From the nature of these facts, one will recognize that at this point in our Earth’s development, important events in this Earth’s development will take place.
[ 45 ] Perhaps it is only through an understanding of these concrete facts that one will come to have the right feeling and spiritual nuance toward the Mystery of Golgotha, and it is this nuance of feeling that I wished to instill in your souls through what I have shared from the Fifth Gospel. Perhaps some of you who are able to participate in other cycles, or perhaps once again our friends here in Cologne, will be able to gain further insight from this Fifth Gospel. For we must say this: Quite apart from the fact that humanity today shows so little inclination to accept such facts as those just spoken of, apart from that, there was the greatest necessity for such facts to flow into the development of the Earth precisely now. That is why they are being communicated, even though it is truly difficult to speak of these things. And even though, if one were to follow one’s inclination, one would not wish to speak of them, they are being communicated out of an inner obligation, as long as they can be conveyed to human souls. They will be needed in the development of humanity. The souls that take them in now will most certainly need them for the work they have to perform in a soul-spiritual sense in the further development of humanity.
[ 46 ] You see, through our reflections we are gradually coming to know what is meant to awaken within our souls, so that we may become true members of the ongoing evolution of humanity. This, after all, is the purpose of humanity’s development on Earth: that human souls may recognize their tasks with ever greater awareness.
[ 47 ] Christ has appeared. His impulse has taken effect as a fact. For a long time, he was able to work as a reality more in the unconscious; then he had to be able to work through what had been understood up to that point. He worked through what he was, not through what had been understood. But it is becoming increasingly necessary for people to also learn to understand him, the Christ who, through the body of Jesus of Nazareth, has entered the Earth’s aura and thus into the living human process.