The Mystery of Death
GA 159
21 February 1915, Bremen
3. Spiritual Science and the Mystery of Death—Deeper Relations of European History
What spiritual science calls the mystery of death faces us in our times so significantly. Everything is in close or more distant interrelation with them. Above all, through spiritual science we receive not only the basic conviction, but the basic knowledge of the world in the physical body and of the world, into which we enter through the gate of death. However, this world is always alive also in the sensory life and surrounds us. It is only not recognizable for the human being engaged in the sensory life, because he does not have the necessary attention for it. If such drastic events flow through the time which demand so manifold sacrifices of the human beings as they surround us now, we must be woven with our whole souls in it. Hence, it is obvious to inform you about some matters by means of spiritual science.
We want to turn our glance to fields of life that show us how humankind has come to something fatefully illogical concerning its surroundings because of the materialistic way of thinking. We hear, for example, in the way usual today the individual nations accusing each another: I have not wanted the war; it is you who has incited it.—The question is legitimate and one can now already answer it—for the facts speak clearly—where the external causes are. But for the spiritual-scientific seer it is different. In this question he has to realise that the war is basically the last phase in the course of events, or at least a later phase of matters that were there already before. One commits a mistake in the judgment also with illness processes where one often still speaks of such, whereas these are already health processes, which must take place to recover. The external processes, which take place to paralyse the illness and to recover, have happened before and are not to be observed. The war also is an apparent illness process. It is an effort of humankind to come beyond certain processes which were there before. The illness lies already before in the really unhealthy relations between the peoples. If anyone investigates the external causes with reason, he ignores the internal ones. In the area where we are crowded together like in a fortress and are surrounded with a ring, it must seem reasonable to especially raise the question which the internal causes are, or of which kind the single cause is by which this encirclement was caused. One speaks of such an encirclement for the last years, for the last decades, but if you look at the great connections, it begins much sooner. It sounds peculiar, but one can give the year 860 A. D.—not 1860, but 860. For such a long time, the process is going on, which finds expression now in a way we can call the most dreadful war of humankind, since it inhabits the earth.
In the deeper interrelation of European history one finds the extremely strange fact that in Central Europe something of spiritual substance was crowded together. If anyone investigates this deeper interrelation, he sees that it was crowded together there for a particular purpose. It concerns not the external determinations of blood or race, but the fact that something like a spiritual substance permeates the world. Something like a snake-shaped ring contracts in Central Europe coming down from the distant north. Two currents of the east and west go to the south and meet forming a ring. From a centre, the Normannic tribes move in the 9th century down who are related by blood to so many things that later exist in Central Europe. But they push their way into the Romance element, which comes from Southern Europe, and flow together with it. In 860, they stand in front of Paris; there the Normans were overpowered by the Romance people. The western France came into being from that. More than the Angles and Saxons could bring to the British islands, the Normans brought back from France to England. In the east, the Normannic people moved down, they got from the north to the Volga and the Black Sea into the Slavic regions. Later the Tartar current coalesces. The Slavic element overpowers the Normans and gives them the Christian religion in its eastern form. They become Slavic as “Ros”—they are called in Finland that way—nothing has remained except the name Russia. This name is of Germanic origin. The name Rurik has the same origin.
About these relations one has rather doubtful views. In the west of Europe many people speak that the French are appointed to resurrect the old Celtic element in a kind of Renaissance. One has the idea that in Central Europe are mainly Teutons and that in the west the Celtic element predominates. However, it is vice versa, in the French population is much more Teutonic blood, in Central Europe is more Celtic blood, this is true. Thus maya stands against truth. Only the inhabitants of the west are completely overpowered by the Romance element. In the east the Norman and with them the Teutonic elements are overpowered by the foreign race element. Still today there a religion prevails that is foreign to the Russian folk-soul.1From Symptom to Reality, third of nine lectures (Berlin, 1918), volume 185 of Steiner's Collected Works (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1976) Thus the people in Central Europe are encircled as it were. The Romance element reaches to Constantinople, and on the other side the Slavic Normans reach to Constantinople as well. There we have the snake, the ring.
If we consider that what was crowded together there spiritually, we get the view that it has an especially important task. Yesterday, I have only indicated it, but, nevertheless, I have spoken of the fact that here a certain familiar contact of the folk-soul with the individual soul should take place and just thereby the nicest blossoms are produced with the best relatives. The ego should immediately be seized, not the single members of the soul like in the West, should be immediately living in the ego. From that arises—this would already have to be clear to the exoteric consideration—that in Central Europe basically complete hostility could never hold sway against idealism that always a certain tendency to the spiritual world was there to a high degree. When we began our spiritual movement, karma ordained that we had to act at first in association with the British movement. But externally everything was only a symptom of that what had to happen internally with a certain necessity. If we consider what the theosophical movement represents, from which we had to separate, you will notice that there the cultural life has split in two parts. The external life takes a purely materialistic way, and the spiritual element is coupled to it. They always fall apart.
Compare to that which must be our spiritual life for us. As in the organism the head cannot be thought without body, our spiritual life grows out of the general cultural life. You only need to start with Tauler, Eckhart, Angelus Silesius, then with Herder, Lessing, everywhere we have to develop what should become higher spiritual culture. We cannot couple our spiritual view to anything, we must have it as an organism, must raise it. We have to discover internally that the return of Christ is a spiritual affair. Hence, we cannot make the slightest concession. We are able to look at Christ as a figure only with the spiritual eye, approach Him with the internal experience. In the West that had to be dogmatised and materialised. People could not imagine it differently, as that He would come in the physical body. Hence, the absurd idea to present Christ in the body on the salver.2the Indian boy Krishnamurti was propagated as the reincarnated Christ by Annie Besant, the president of the Theosophical Society (Adyar). This happened in connection with what was encircled there.
Hence, the question must touch us objectively: how has the Central European civilisation to relate to the future culture?—Truth is something general, but it is something different how it arises. In the Central European civilisation are the springs for the whole spiritual culture of the future. We have to find the way from the German idealism to the spiritual culture. For that is necessary that here in the centre an ego-culture is founded. You can see that easily on the esoteric field. The human ego has to enkindle itself in the outside world, there only it is awake and realises internally. Thus the ego-culture of Central Europe is aroused from without. You need to look only at the last events, the standardisation of the German being. It is typical that the German empire was founded in 1871 on foreign ground. So many examples could be given that also show in the external events that there is an ego-culture in Central Europe.
It seems reasonable to ask: which meaning do the deaths have for the spiritual world?—Countless human beings go in the prime of life through the gate of death. At first the connection of ego, astral body, etheric body with the physical body is separated. The physical body is handed over apparently to the earth, the etheric body to the etheric world; astral body and ego go on. However, this must strike us: are the etheric bodies of the human beings of normal age going through the gate of death different from those of the young men? As to the physical body one understands this, as to the etheric one will understand it now. The etheric body could still have supplied the physical body for decades, and could have worked on it. It goes with these unused forces through the gate of death, coalesces there with the folk-soul, and the work of the folk-soul will be impregnated in future with the unused forces of these etheric bodies. It is our task to understand that. Human beings will be there who will know: the folk-soul is an active element. Only if one knows that the unused etheric bodies will work as a spiritual force in concrete way in the spiritual world, then one can understand what takes action really. The consciousness of this concrete relationship with the spiritual world will be important. Thereby, namely by creation of such a consciousness of the spiritual world, spiritual science becomes more and more life in the souls and does not only remain doctrine. The human being knows that he is in a spiritual aura as he knows here that the air is in his surroundings. Like he distinguishes clean and dirty air here, he will feel good and bad spirits, experiencing and feeling the spiritual aura.
Only this is the right fruit of spiritual science. We see it if we consider events that are close to us and can teach us. One of them just happened in the place of our construction. In this case it was a child whose etheric body was unused. The forces are there; somebody who beholds them who knows how to behold them sees that they have gone over into the aura of our Dornach construction and live in it. This is an example I am responsible for. The etheric body which belongs with its forces more to the community is really working on. Since that time it tries to do something by means of inspirations nearby the construction. These are supporting forces.
Such matters are obvious to us, we can be taught through them how mysterious the connections are in the spiritual world. Just in the last time we experienced in the karma of our society that dear friends have died off. What I said in the Vienna cycle3Inner Nature of Man and Life Between Death and Rebirth, eight lectures (Vienna, 1914), Steiner's Collected Works volume 153 about the life between death and new birth became completely clear just in some of these souls. One of these souls has found so surely the way into our movement when the physical body was already worn-out. Since it was in our movement, it was a being whose soul faced me like through a body that had become bright and transparent as glass. After death the picture of this soul, as it was already before, grew together with that which it presented after. I was not able to help myself to give the obituary which shows that I was so surely together with this soul. The following words made themselves audible for about three days, after death had occurred:
You came to us.
The gentleness of your being
Spoke out of the calm strength of your eyes—
Calmness of your soul
Flowed in the waves
With which your glances
Carried your internal weaving
To things and human beings;—
And the soul penetrated your voice
Which revealed—more through the kind of word
In its eloquent manner—
What was working as a secret
In your lovely soul
Than it was contained in the word;
However, without saying a word
It revealed itself
To the compassionate love of human beings—
This being that told of noble, calm beauty
Of the world-soul's creation
To receptive feeling.
The consciousness is dampened after death, just because a flooding consciousness is there. This happens by the review you have on death first—not in the case of suicide,—as it were a solar point. That belongs to the most beautiful, highest experiences. You resume it there, you say to yourself: there you have lived,—and you orientate yourself that way in the spiritual world.
Our friend was out of the stage of the etheric review, so that I spoke to the present, but not yet conscious being. Then a moment of consciousness occurred as a result of the heat, and she saw the cremation. Time there becomes space.
The events in the physical and spiritual worlds correspond to each other. In such a case, calling does not return like an echo from the spiritual world, but converts itself to an answer, giving the gist, from the not yet conscious soul. By such examples we recognise feeling and feel recognising the spiritual world. The result must be to experience the reality of the spiritual world. It is especially important to get this definite feeling in our time, so that the physical welfare and the mental welfare arise for the whole humankind out of the seriousness of the present. For always the big, significant world events were, also for a superficial knowledge, the clear expression for the fact that there are not only sensory beings, but that the spiritual beings are working into the sensory world.
It is difficult to break through the veil which separates the physical and spiritual worlds. This makes self-knowledge difficult to the greatest possible extent; one imagines that as something too easy. It is sometimes difficult already in the external physical sense. The significant philosopher Ernst Mach4Ernst Mach (1838–1916), Austrian physicist and philosopher—not Ferdinand Maack, otherwise, I would not have spoken of a significant philosopher—gave a grotesque example of it. Mach describes in one of his works that when he was a young man a disagreeable countenance struck him once in a mirror of a shop-window, which he had immediately to recognise as his own to his dismay. He experienced something similar later again. While getting into a bus he saw a man with an ugly face who met him from the other side, and recognised only afterwards that he had seen himself in the mirror. The human being is still even more uncertain about the being or form of the soul. People do not dream of what one has to do to get self-knowledge. In the subsoil of the soul, maya has often large dimensions. A human being has the impulse of cruelty; he lives together with people whom he torments every now and then et cetera. He looks for an external cause for it; he often uses an ingenious gift of invention to veil the structure of his soul. I myself knew somebody who spoke repeatedly how many great sacrifices his activity demanded. But I had to say that it was only a lust of his soul, which he satisfied. When he spoke of sacrifices that way, only egoism stood behind that. Real self-knowledge is only accessible if one advances in spiritual science gradually, in so far as he experiences by himself what is in the world.
There are chatting people in the world who organise chat hours. Apparently, that is even the case when men go to their sundowners. If they are asked, why they chat, people have all kinds of important reasons for that. But if we glide with our hand over velvet or silk, we have a feeling of pleasure. While somebody is chatting, his etheric body knocks perpetually against the air set in motion, and in doing so it is stroked. This is nothing bad. You understand what goes forward with chatting, only if you know that the human being has an etheric body.
Humankind goes towards a time when it must face such matters more and more. Spiritual science must arouse the consciousness for it more and more. Then people who state today in their materialistic mind that everything spiritual is daydreaming will look as if anybody wanted to say where the air is, is nothing at all. Like one discovers that the air is real, humankind will find out that the spirit is something real. If you consider the biggest mystery, Christ's Death and Resurrection, you may believe that Christ, after he has gone through the Mystery of Golgotha, would have worked on humankind particularly by means of teaching. However, what people knew about Christ was the least.
The theologians have quarrelled, but very few understood something right. Only a part of historical events happens in the consciousness. An example of that is the battle between Maxentius and Constantine at the Milvian Bridge on the 28th October 312 A. D., which was decided not by some external circumstances, but by effects of non-physical kind. With an army which was far stronger than that of his adversary Constantine Maxentius had to defend Rome. Questioning the Sibylline Books he got the advice to lead his troops out of Rome and then he would destroy the enemies of Rome that way. He was still encouraged in that by a dream. Also Constantine had a dream that his soldiers should bear banners with the monogram of Christ instead of the old field signs. Thus it happened, and the army of Maxentius, which had been led out of Rome contrary to reason, was defeated by the weaker armed forces of Constantine, and Maxentius himself found his death on the run. The Christ Impulse had here worked in the subconsciousness of the people.
The impulse lives in the subconsciousness, as if ships go on the sea, but the important matters would take place in submarines. An important point in time is again in the 15th century. At that time, the Maid of Orleans intervened in the course of history in such a way that everything that happened later was determined through it. The whole map of Europe would be different, also the spiritual life if the English had won. The Maid was a servant of St. Michael. Schiller was deeply touched by the figure of the Maid of Orleans: “the world likes to blacken the beaming.” Whereas Voltaire vented his rage against her, even Shakespeare could not understand her, Anatole France pressed her down into the materialistic view, all Western people of intellect did not understand her, and Schiller embodied this sublime figure in his drama.
It was necessary that the Maid of Orleans went through a kind of unaware initiation to fulfil her historical mission. It concerned an initiation as it is described to us in the legend of Olaf Åsteson. Such initiations, for which certain karmic conditions were necessary, could take place in the time of the thirteen nights between the 25th December and 6th January. If the external light has the slightest strength, an inner enlightenment is possible. Thus Olaf Åsteson had real spiritual experiences in the sleeping state during thirteen nights, which he then reports before the portal of a church, as it is shown in the Dream Song. Also the Maid of Orleans spent thirteen nights as it were in the sleeping state, namely in the body of her mother. In the last time before birth the human being is especially accessible to unaware influences from the spiritual world. On the 6th January the Maid of Orleans was born. During this day all the inhabitants of her birthplace gathered because something quite unusual was to be felt in the aura of the village. It was the birth of the Maid of Orleans, to whom the Christ Impulse was implanted just before she saw the physical sunlight.
The proper purpose of all our attempts and that what depends on us is to gain a living connection between the physical and spiritual worlds. People will recognise that the time of twilight of this war means a turn of an era. Human beings should know that the souls of those who have sacrificed themselves are working on and that this war has the task to close the materialistic age.
It is necessary that souls are there who send thoughts into the spiritual world like extending arms and bring down the consciousness from the spiritual world, souls conscious of spirit. The more such souls conscious of spirit send their thoughts upwards—a lot depends on the fact that our spiritual atmosphere is penetrated by such thoughts,—the more the fruits which come from the sacrificial deaths can mature. Thus we summarise our consideration in the words:
From the courage of the fighters,
From the blood of the battles,
From the grief of the bereaved,
From the nation's sacrifices
Will grow up the fruits of spirit
If souls aware of spirit turn
Their senses to the spirit land.
Die Geisteswissenschaft Und Die Rätsel Des Todes - Tiefere Zusammenhänge Der Europäischen Geschichte
Was man in der Geisteswissenschaft die Todesrätsel nennt, das tritt uns in unseren Zeiten so ganz besonders bedeutungsvoll entgegen. Alles ist mit ihnen in nahem oder fernerem Zusammenhang. Vor allen Dingen empfangen wir durch die Geisteswissenschaft nicht nur die Grundüberzeugung, sondern die Grunderkenntnis über die Welt im physischen Leib und über die Welt, in die wir durch die Pforte des Todes eintreten. Aber diese Welt ist im Grunde genommen auch im sinnlichen Leben immer lebendig und umgibt uns, nur ist sie für den durch das Sinnenleben gebundenen Menschen nicht erkennbar, weil er nicht die nötige Aufmerksamkeit für sie hat. Wenn solche einschneidenden Ereignisse durch die Zeit wallen, die so mannigfaltige Opfer von den Menschen erfordern, wie sie uns jetzt umgeben, so müssen wir mit unserer ganzen Seele darin einverwoben sein. Da ist es naheliegend, manche Dinge aufklärend aus der Geisteswissenschaft vorzuführen.
Wir wollen den Blick auf Gebiete des Lebens lenken, auf denen sich zeigt, wie die Menschheit durch die materialistische Denkweise zu einer verhängnisvollen Unlogik hinsichtlich dessen, was sie umgibt, gekommen ist. Wir hören zum Beispiel in der heute gewohnten Weise die einzelnen Völker einander vorwerfen: Ich habe den Krieg nicht gewollt, du bist es, der ihn angestiftet hat. — Die Frage ist an sich berechtigt und läßt sich jetzt schon beantworten — denn die Tatsachen sprechen klar -, wo die äußeren Ursachen liegen. Aber für den geisteswissenschaftlichen Betrachter ist es anders. In dieser Frage muß er sich klar sein darüber, daß der Krieg im Grunde genommen eine letzte Phase im Laufe der Ereignisse ist, oder wenigstens eine spätere Phase von Dingen, die schon vorher da waren. Man begeht einen Fehler im Urteilen auch bei Krankheitsprozessen, wo man oft noch von solchen spricht, während es schon Gesundheitsprozesse sind, die vorgehen müssen, um zu gesunden. Die äußerlichen Prozesse, die erfolgen, um die Krankheit zu paralysieren, um zu gesunden, haben sich vorher abgespielt, sind nicht zu bemerken. Der Krieg stellt auch einen scheinbaren Krankheitsprozeß dar. Er ist eine Anstrengung der Menschheit, über gewisse Vorgänge hinauszukommen, die vorher da waren. Die Erkrankung liegt schon vorher in den wirklich ungesunden Beziehungen der Völker untereinander. Wenn man mit dem Verstand die äußeren Ursachen erforscht, so übersieht man die inneren. Auf dem Gebiet, wo wir wie in einer Festung zusammengedrängt und mit einem Ring umschlossen sind, muß es naheliegen, besonders die Frage aufzuwerfen, welches die inneren Gründe sind, oder welcher Art der einzelne Grund ist, wodurch diese Einkreisung hervorgerufen wurde. Man spricht von einer solchen Einkreisung für die letzten Jahre, für die letzten Jahrzehnte, aber wenn man die großen Zusammenhänge betrachtet, beginnt sie viel, viel früher. Es klingt sonderbar, aber man kann das Jahr 860 angeben - nicht 1860, sondern 860. So lange spielt der Prozeß, der jetzt in einer Weise zum Ausdruck kommt, die man als den furchtbarsten Krieg der Menschheit bezeichnen kann, seit sie die Erde bewohnt.
Im tieferen Zusammenhang der europäischen Geschichte findet man das höchst Merkwürdige, daß in Mitteleuropa etwas von geistiger Substanz zusammengedrängt wurde. Wenn man diesen tieferen Zusammenhang untersucht, so sieht man, daß es da zu einem besonderen Ziel zusammengedrängt worden ist. Es handelt sich nicht um die äußeren Bestimmungen des Blutes, der Rasse, sondern darum, daß etwas die Welt wie eine geistige Substanz durchzieht. Wie in einem schlangenförmigen Ring, vom äußersten Norden herunterkommend, zieht sich etwas in Mitteleuropa zusammen. Ringförmig gehen zwei Strömungen von Ost und West nach Süden und treffen wieder ringförmig zusammen. Aus einem Zentrum rücken im 9. Jahrhundert die normannischen Stämme herunter, die dem Blut nach mit so vielem verwandt sind, was später in Mitteleuropa ist. Aber sie drängen sich in das romanische Element hinein, das von Südeuropa her kommt; mit dem fließen sie zusammen. 860 stehen sie vor Paris, da werden die Normannen von den Romanen überwältigt. Daraus entsteht das westliche Frankreich. Mehr als die Angeln und Sachsen nach den britischen Inseln bringen konnten, brachten die Normannen aus Frankreich nach England zurück. Im Osten rücken die normannischen Menschen hinunter, sie dringen vom Norden her gegen die Wolga und das Schwarze Meer in das Slawentum hinein. Später geht der tartarische Strom hinein. Das Slawentum überwältigt die Normannen rassenmäßig und bringt ihnen die christliche Religion in ihrer östlichen Form. Sie werden slawisiert als «Ros» — so werden sie in Finnland genannt -, es ist nichts davon geblieben außer dem Namen Rußland. Dieser Name ist germanischen Ursprungs. Den gleichen Ursprung hat der Name Rurik.
Über diese Zusammenhänge hat man recht bedenkliche Ansichten. Im Westen Europas sprechen viele davon, die Franzosen seien dazu berufen, das alte Keltentum in einer Art Renaissance wieder aufleben zu lassen. Man hat die Vorstellung, in Mitteleuropa seien vorzugsweise Germanen, im Westen wiege das Keltentum vor. Aber es ist umgekehrt, in den Franzosen ist viel mehr Germanenblut, in Mitteleuropa ist mehr Keltenblut, das ist die Wahrheit. So steht die Maja gegen die Wahrheit. Nur sind die Bewohner des Westens ganz überwältigt von dem Romanentum. Im Osten ist das Normannentum und damit das Germanentum überwältigt durch das fremde Rassenelement. Dort herrscht noch heute eine der russischen Volksseele völlig fremde Religion. So sind die Menschen in Mitteleuropa wie in einem Kessel eingekreist. Die Romanen reichen bis Konstantinopel, und auf der andern Seite die slawisierten Normannen ebenfalls bis Konstantinopel. Da haben wir die Schlange, den Ring.
Wenn wir das, was da geistig zusammengedrängt wurde, ins Auge fassen, so bekommen wir die Anschauung, daß es eine besonders wichtige Aufgabe hat. Ich habe es gestern nur angedeutet, aber ich habe doch davon gesprochen, daß hier ein gewisser vertrauter Umgang der Volksseele mit der einzelnen Seele stattfinden soll und gerade dadurch die schönsten Blüten bei den besten Angehörigen hervorgebracht werden. Unmittelbar das Ich sollte ergriffen werden, nicht die einzelnen Seelenglieder wie im Westen, unmittelbar lebendig sollte es im Ich sein. Daraus geht hervor - das müßte schon der exoterischen Betrachtung klar sein —, daß in Mitteleuropa im Grunde niemals völlige Feindschaft gegen den Idealismus herrschen konnte, daß immer eine gewisse Hinneigung zur geistigen Welt in intensivstem Maße stattfand. Als wir unsere geistige Bewegung begannen, hat es das Karma gefügt, daß wir das zunächst im Verein mit der britischen Bewegung tun mußten. Aber äußerlich war alles weitere nur ein Symptom von dem, was sich innerlich mit einer gewissen Notwendigkeit abspielen mußte. Wenn wir ins Auge fassen, was die theosophische Bewegung ist, von der wir uns trennen mußten, so wird auffallen, daß dort das Kulturleben in zwei Teile gefallen ist. Das äußere Leben nimmt einen rein materialistischen Gang, und daran ist das spirituelle Element gekoppelt. Sie fallen immer auseinander. Vergleichen wir damit, was unser spirituelles Leben uns sein muß. Wie im Organismus der Kopf nicht ohne Leib gedacht werden kann, so wächst unser spirituelles Leben aus dem allgemeinen Kulturleben heraus. Man braucht nur anzufangen bei Tauler, Eckart, Angelus Silesius, dann bei Herder, Lessing, überall müssen wir herausentwickeln, was höhere geistige Kultur werden soll. Wir können nicht unsere spirituelle Anschauung ankoppeln, wir müssen sie als Organismus haben, müssen sie dazu erheben. Wir müssen innerlich die Entdeckung machen, daß die Wiederkunft des Christus eine geistige Angelegenheit ist. Daher können wir nicht die geringste Konzession machen. Wir können dem Christus als Gestalt nur mit dem geistigen Auge, mit dem inneren Erleben nahetreten. Im Westen mußte materialisiert, dogmatisiert werden. Die Leute konnten es sich nicht anders vorstellen, als daß er im physischen Leibe kommen würde. Daher die groteske Idee, den Christus im Leib auf dem Präsentierteller herumzureichen. Das geschah im Zusammenhang mit dem, was da eingekreist wurde.
Daher muß uns objektiv die Frage berühren: Wie muß sich das mitteleuropäische Kulturwesen zu der Kultur der Zukunft verhalten? -— Die Wahrheit ist eine allgemeine, aber wie sie entspringt, ist etwas anderes. In der mitteleuropäischen Kultur liegen die Quellen für die ganze spirituelle Kultur der Zukunft. Wir müssen den Weg finden aus dem deutschen Idealismus in die spirituelle Kultur hinein. Dazu ist nötig, daß hier in der Mitte eine Ich-Kultur begründet werde. Auf okkultem Felde kann das leicht gesehen werden. Das Ich des Menschen muß sich an der Außenwelt entzünden, da erst wacht es auf und wird sich innerlich bewußt. So wird die Ich-Kultur Mitteleuropas von außen angefacht. Man braucht nur die letzten Ereignisse zu betrachten, die Vereinheitlichung des deutschen Wesens. Es ist charakteristisch, daß das Deutsche Reich im Jahre 1871 auf fremden Boden gegründet wurde. So viele Dinge könnten angeführt werden, die auch in den äußeren Ereignissen zeigen, daß in Mitteleuropa Ich-Kultur herrscht.
Es liegt nahe, zu fragen: Welche Bedeutung haben die Todesopfer für die spirituelle Welt? — Unzählige Menschen gehen in der Blüte ihrer Jugend durch die Pforte des Todes. Zunächst trennt sich der Zusammenhang zwischen Ich, Astralleib, Ätherleib vom physischen Leib ab. Der physische Leib wird scheinbar der Erde übergeben, der Ätherleib der ätherischen Welt, Astralleib und Ich gehen weiter. Aber das muß uns auffallen: Verhält es sich bei Menschen normalen Alters mit dem ätherischen Leib, der durch die Pforte des 'Todes geht, nicht anders als bei den jetzt hinübergehenden Jugendlichen? Für den physischen Leib begreift man das, für den ätherischen wird man es jetzt begreifen. Der hätte noch jahrzehntelang den physischen Leib versorgen, an ihm arbeiten können. Er geht mit diesen unverbrauchten Kräften durch die Pforte des Todes, vereinigt sich da mit der Volksseele, und die Arbeit der Volksseele wird in Zukunft durchimprägniert sein mit den unverbrauchten Kräften dieser ätherischen Leiber. An uns wird es sein, Verständnis dafür zu haben. Menschen werden da sein, die wissen werden: Die Volksseele ist ein aktives Element. Erst wenn man weiß, daß die unverbrauchten Ätherleiber wirken werden als spirituelle Kraft in konkreter Weise in der geistigen Welt, dann kann man verstehen, was real vorgeht. Wichtig wird das Bewußtsein dieses konkreten Zusammenhanges mit der geistigen Welt sein. Dadurch, nämlich durch Erzeugung eines solchen Bewußtseins von der geistigen Welt, wird die Geisteswissenschaft immer mehr etwas Lebendiges werden in den Gemütern und nicht nur Lehre bleiben. Der Mensch weiß, daß er in einer geistigen Aura ist, wie er hier weiß, daß die Luft in seiner Umgebung ist. Wie er hier frische und verbrauchte Luft unterscheidet, so wird er gute und böse Geister empfinden, erlebend empfinden die geistige Aura.
Das ist erst die rechte Frucht der Geisteswissenschaft. Wir sehen es, wenn wir uns naheliegende Ereignisse betrachten, die uns belehren können. Eines davon geschah gerade an der Stätte unseres Baues. In diesem Falle war es ein Kind, dessen Ätherleib unverbraucht war. Die Kräfte sind da, wer sie sieht, wer sie zu sehen weiß, der sieht, daß sie in die Aura unseres Dornacher Baues übergegangen sind und darin leben. Das ist ein Beispiel, für das ich eintrete. Der Ätherleib, der mit seinen Kräften mehr der Allgemeinheit gehört, wirkt richtig weiter. Seither versucht er, durch Inspirationen in der Nähe des Baues etwas zu tun. Das sind helfende Kräfte.
Solche Dinge liegen uns nahe, wir können uns von ihnen belehren lassen, wie geheimnisvoll die Zusammenhänge sind in der geistigen Welt. Gerade in der letzten Zeit haben wir es in unserem Gesellschaftskarma gehabt, daß uns liebe Freunde vom physischen Plan weggestorben sind. Was ich im Wiener Zyklus über das Leben zwischen Tod und neuer Geburt gesagt habe, wurde gerade an manchen von diesen Seelen ganz klar. Eine dieser Seelen hat so recht den Weg in unsere Bewegung gefunden, als der physische Leib schon mürbe geworden war. Es war ein Wesen, bei dem mir, seit es überhaupt in unserer Bewegung war, das Seelische schon entgegengetreten ist wie durch den glashell gewordenen Leib. Nach dem Tod wob sich das Bild der Seele, das vorher schon da war, zusammen mit dem, wie es nachher sich darstellte. Ich konnte nicht anders, als den Nachruf geben, der zeigt, daß ich so recht mit dieser Seele zusammen war. Die folgenden Worte machten sich hörbar etwa drei Tage, nachdem der Tod eingetreten war:
Du tratest unter uns.
Deines Wesens bewegte Sanftmut
Sprach aus Deiner Augen stiller Kraft —
Ruhe, die seelenvoll belebt,
Floß in den Wellen, Mit denen Deine Blicke
Zu Dingen und zu Menschen
Deines Innern Weben trugen; —
Und es durchseelte dieses Wesen
Deine Stimme, die beredt
Durch des Wortes Art mehr
Als in dem Worte selbst
Offenbarte, was verborgen
In Deiner schönen Seele weset;
Doch das hingebender Liebe
Teilnahmsvoller Menschen
Sich wortlos voll enthüllte —
Dies Wesen, das von edler, stiller Schönheit
Der Welten-Seelen-Schöpfung
Empfänglichen Empfinden kündete.
Nach dem Tode tritt ein Abdämpfen des Bewußtseins ein, gerade weil ein überflutendes Bewußtsein da ist. Das geschieht durch den Rückblick, den man zuerst auf den Tod hat — nicht bei Selbstmord -, gleichsam ein Sonnenpunkt. Es gehört zu dem Schönsten, Höchsten. Man knüpft da an, man sagt sich: Da hast du gelebt -, und so orientiert man sich in der geistigen Welt.
Unsere Freundin war aus dem Stadium des ätherischen Rückblicks heraus, so daß man zu dem zwar anwesenden, aber nicht bewußten Wesen sprach. Dann kam durch die Wärme ein Moment des Bewußtseins und sie sah die Feuerbestattung. Die Zeit wird da zum Raum.
Es gibt ein Korrespondieren zwischen dem, was in der physischen und in der geistigen Welt stattfindet. In einem solchen Fall kommt ein Anruf nicht wie ein Echo aus der geistigen Welt zurück, sondern wandelt sich zur sinngemäßen Antwort aus der noch nicht bewußten Seele um. Durch solche Beispiele des in uns erkennenden Gefühls, in unserem gefühlsmäßigen Erkennen der geistigen Welt, muß das Ergebnis sein, die Realität der geistigen Welt zu erfahren. Es ist besonders wichtig, dieses konkrete Gefühl in unserer Zeit zu erwerben, damit aus der Schwere der Gegenwart für die ganze Menschheit im Physischen und Seelischen Heil erwachse, denn immer sind die großen, bedeutsamen Ereignisse des Weltgeschehens auch für eine oberflächliche geistige Erkenntnis der klare Ausdruck dafür gewesen, daß wir in der sinnlichen Welt nicht nur sinnliche Wesen haben, sondern daß die geistigen Wesen hereinwirken.
Es ist schwer, den Schleier zu durchbrechen, der die physische von der geistigen Welt trennt. Das macht die Selbsterkenntnis schwer im weitesten Umfang, man stellt sich darunter oft zu Leichtes vor. Schon im äußerlich physischen Sinn ist sie manchmal schwer. Ein groteskes Beispiel dafür gab der bedeutende Philosoph Professor Ernst Mach — nicht Ferdinand Maack, ich hätte sonst nicht von einem bedeutenden Philosophen gesprochen. Mach schildert in einem seiner Werke, als junger Mensch sei ihm einmal in einem Schaufensterspiegel ein unangenehmes, widerwärtiges Gesicht aufgefallen, das er zu seiner Bestürzung gleich darauf als sein eigenes erkennen mußte. Etwas ähnliches erlebte er später nochmals. Beim Einsteigen in einen Omnibus erblickte er einen Mann mit einem häßlichen Gesicht, der ihm von der andern Seite entgegenkam, und erkannte erst nachträglich, daß er sich selbst im Spiegel gesehen hatte. Darüber, was das Wesen, die Gestalt der Seele ist, ist sich der Mensch noch viel mehr im Unklaren. Durch was man alles hindurch muß, um zur Selbsterkenntnis zu kommen, davon läßt sich der Mensch nichts träumen. In den Untergründen der Seele ist die Maja oft in großem Ausmaß vorhanden. Ein Mensch hat den Trieb zur Grausamkeit, er lebt mit Menschen zusammen, die er von Zeit zu Zeit quält und so weiter. Er sucht nach einem äußeren Grund dafür, wendet oft eine geniale Erfindungsgabe auf, um das Gefüge der Seele zu verschleiern. Ich selbst kannte jemanden, der immer wieder davon sprach, unter wie großen Opfern sich seine Tätigkeit vollzogen habe. Aber ich mußte sagen, daß es nur seelische Wollust war, die er befriedigte. Wenn er so von Opfern sprach, so stand hinter alldem nur Egoismus. Wirkliche Selbsterkenntnis ist nur erreichbar, wenn man nach und nach in der Geisteswissenschaft vorschreitet, insofern man durch sich erlebt, was in der Welt ist.
Es gibt schwatzende Leute in der Welt, die Schwatzstündchen veranstalten. Das soll es sogar unter Männern geben, die zum Dämmerschoppen gehen. Wenn sie gefragt werden, warum sie schwatzen, so haben die Leute allerlei wichtige Gründe dafür. Aber wenn wir mit unserer Hand über Samt oder Seide streichen, so haben wir ein Gefühl des Wohlgefallens. Wenn man schwatzt, stößt sich der Ätherleib fortwährend an der in Bewegung gesetzten Luft, er wird dadurch gestreichelt. Das ist nichts Böses. Man versteht das, was beim Schwatzen vorgeht, nur, wenn man weiß, daß der Mensch einen Ätherleib hat.
Die Menschheit geht einer Zeit entgegen, wo sie solchen Dingen mehr und mehr ins Antlitz schauen muß. Die Geisteswissenschaft muß immer mehr und mehr das Bewußtsein dafür erwecken. Es wird dann eintreten, daß die Menschen, die heute in ihrem materialistischen Sinn behaupten, alles Geistige sei Träumerei, sich so ausnehmen werden, wie wenn jemand sagen wollte, wo die Luft ist, sei überhaupt nichts. Wie man entdeckt, daß die Luft real ist, so wird die Menschheit entdecken, daß der Geist etwas Reales ist. Wenn man das größte Mysterium, das Mysterium von Golgatha ins Auge faßt, so kann man glauben, daß der Christus, nachdem er durch das Mysterium von Golgatha gegangen ist, auf die Menschheit vornehmlich durch eine Lehre gewirkt hätte. Aber was die Menschen über den Christus gewußt haben, das ist das Allergeringste. Die Theologen haben sich gezankt, aber die wenigsten haben etwas Richtiges verstanden. Nur ein Teil dessen, was in der Geschichte geschieht, spielt sich im Bewußtsein ab. Ein Beispiel dafür ist die Schlacht zwischen Maxentius und Konstantin an der Milvischen Brücke am 28. Oktober 312, die nicht durch irgendwelche äußeren Umstände, sondern durch Einwirkungen nichtphysischer Art entschieden wurde. Mit einem Heer, das weit stärker war als das seines Gegners Konstantin, hatte Maxentius Rom zu verteidigen. Bei Befragung der Sibyllinischen Bücher wurde ihm bedeutet, er solle seine Truppen aus Rorm herausführen; auf diese Weise werde er die Feinde Roms vernichten. Hierin wurde er noch durch einen Traum bestärkt. Auch Konstantin hatte einen Traum: ihm wurde aufgegeben, seinen Soldaten statt der alten Feldzeichen Banner mit dem Monogramm Christi vorantragen zu lassen. So geschah es, und das Heer des Maxentius, das allen Vernunftgründen zum Trotz aus Rom herausgeführt worden war, wurde durch die schwächeren Streitkräfte des Konstantin geschlagen, und Maxentius selbst fand auf der Flucht den Tod. Der Christus-Impuls hatte hier in das Unterbewußtsein der Menschen hineingewirkt.
Der Impuls lebt im Unterbewußtsein so, wie wenn auf dem Meere Schiffe fahren, aber das Wichtige sich in Unterseebooten abspielen würde. Im 15. Jahrhundert ist wieder ein wichtiger Zeitpunkt. Damals griff die Jungfrau von Orleans so in den Gang der Geschichte ein, daß alles, was später geschehen ist, davon bestimmt wurde. Die ganze Karte von Europa wäre anders, auch das geistige Leben, wenn die Engländer gesiegt hätten. Die Jungfrau war ein Michaels-Diener. Schiller war tief berührt von der Gestalt der Jungfrau von Orleans: «Es liebt die Welt, das Strahlende zu schwärzen.» Während Voltaire Gift und Galle gegen sie spie, selbst Shakespeare sie nicht verstehen konnte, Anatole France sie ins materialistische Fahrwasser herabgedrückt hat, alle westlichen Geister sie nicht verstanden haben, hat Schiller diese hehre Gestalt in seinem Drama verkörpert.
Damit die Jungfrau von Orleans ihre historische Mission erfüllen konnte, war notwendig, daß sie eine Art unbewußter Initiation durchmachte. Es handelte sich dabei um eine Einweihung, wie sie uns in der Legende von Olaf Åsteson geschildert wird. Solche Einweihungen, für die bestimmte karmische Voraussetzungen vorliegen mußten, konnten in der Zeit der dreizehn Nächte zwischen dem 25. Dezember und dem 6. Januar erfolgen. Wenn das äußere Licht die geringste Stärke hat, ist eine innere Erleuchtung am ehesten möglich. So hatte Olaf Åsteson im Schlafzustand während der dreizehn Nächte reale geistige Erlebnisse, über die er dann, wie es in dem «’Traumlied» dargestellt ist, vor der Kirchentüre berichtet. Auch die Jungfrau von Orleans hat die dreizehn Nächte gewissermaßen im Schlafzustand zugebracht, nämlich im Leibe der Mutter. In der letzten Zeit vor der Geburt ist der Mensch unbewußten Einflüssen aus der geistigen Welt besonders zugänglich. Am 6. Januar wurde die Jungfrau von Orleans geboren. An diesem Tage lief die ganze Einwohnerschaft ihres Geburtsortes zusammen, weil etwas ganz Außergewöhnliches in der Aura des Dorfes zu spüren war. Es war die Geburt der Jungfrau von Orleans, der unmittelbar, bevor sie das physische Sonnenlicht erblickte, der Christus-Impuls eingepflanzt worden war.
Das Lebendige des Zusammenhanges zwischen physischer und geistiger Welt sich zu erringen, ist das eigentliche Ziel aller unserer Bestrebungen und das, worauf es uns ankommt. Man wird erkennen, daß die Dämmerungszeit dieses Krieges eine Zeitenwende bezeichnet. Die Menschen sollen wissen, daß die Seelen derer, die sich geopfert haben, weiter wirken und daß dieser Krieg die Aufgabe hat, das materialistische Zeitalter abzuschließen.
Es ist notwendig, daß Seelen da sind, die wie sich entgegenstreckende Arme Gedanken in die geistige Welt hinaufsenden und das Bewußtsein von der geistigen Welt herabbringen, geistbewußte Seelen. Je mehr solche geistbewußte Seelen ihre Gedanken hinaufsenden - es ist viel davon abhängig, daß unsere geistige Atmosphäre von solchen Gedanken durchzogen wird -, desto mehr können die Früchte reifen, die aus den Todesopfern kommen. So fassen wir unsere Betrachtung in die Worte zusammen:
Aus dem Mut der Kämpfer,
Aus dem Blut der Schlachten,
Aus dem Leid Verlassener,
Aus des Volkes Opfertaten
Wird erwachsen Geistesfrucht
Lenken Seelen geistbewußt
Ihren Sinn ins Geisterreich.
The Spiritual Sciences and the Mysteries of Death - Deeper Connections in European History
What spiritual science calls the mysteries of death are particularly significant for us in our times. Everything is connected to them in some way, whether closely or remotely. Above all, spiritual science gives us not only a fundamental conviction but also a fundamental knowledge about the world in the physical body and about the world we enter through the gate of death. But this world is, in essence, always alive in our sensory life and surrounds us; it is only unrecognizable to people bound by their sensory life because they do not pay sufficient attention to it. When such momentous events sweep through time, demanding such manifold sacrifices from human beings as we now see around us, we must be involved in them with our whole soul. It is therefore natural to seek clarification from spiritual science.
Let us turn our attention to areas of life where it is evident how the materialistic way of thinking has led humanity to a disastrous illogicality with regard to its surroundings. For example, we hear individual peoples reproaching each other in the usual way today: I did not want the war, it is you who instigated it. The question is justified in itself and can already be answered—because the facts speak for themselves—as to where the external causes lie. But for the spiritual scientist, it is different. In this question, he must be clear that war is basically a final phase in the course of events, or at least a later phase of things that were already there before. One also makes a mistake in judgment in the case of disease processes, where one often still speaks of such processes while it is actually health processes that must take place in order to recover. The external processes that take place to paralyze the disease, to heal, have already taken place beforehand and are not noticeable. War also represents an apparent disease process. It is an effort by humanity to overcome certain processes that existed before. The disease already lies in the truly unhealthy relationships between peoples. If one investigates the external causes with the intellect, one overlooks the internal ones. In the area where we are crowded together as if in a fortress and surrounded by a ring, it must be obvious to raise the question of what the inner reasons are, or what the single reason is, that caused this encirclement. People speak of such an encirclement in recent years, in recent decades, but when one considers the larger context, it began much, much earlier. It sounds strange, but one can point to the year 860—not 1860, but 860. That is how long the process has been going on which is now expressing itself in a way that can be described as the most terrible war since mankind has inhabited the earth.
In the deeper context of European history, one finds the highly remarkable fact that something of spiritual substance has been compressed in Central Europe. If one examines this deeper context, one sees that it has been compressed toward a particular goal. It is not a matter of external determinations of blood or race, but of something that pervades the world like a spiritual substance. Like a serpentine ring descending from the far north, something is contracting in Central Europe. Two currents flow in a ring from east and west to the south and meet again in a ring. In the 9th century, the Norman tribes, who are related by blood to so much of what later became Central Europe, moved down from a center. But they push their way into the Roman element coming from southern Europe, with which they merge. In 860, they stand before Paris, where the Normans are overwhelmed by the Romans. This gives rise to western France. The Normans brought back more from France to England than the Angles and Saxons were able to bring to the British Isles. In the east, the Norman people moved southward, penetrating from the north toward the Volga and the Black Sea into Slavic territory. Later, the Tartar stream entered. The Slavs overpowered the Normans racially and brought them the Christian religion in its Eastern form. They were Slavicized as “Ros” — that is what they are called in Finland — and nothing remains of this except the name Russia. This name is of Germanic origin. The name Rurik has the same origin.
There are some rather questionable views about these connections. In Western Europe, many people say that the French are destined to revive the ancient Celtic culture in a kind of renaissance. The idea is that Central Europe was predominantly Germanic, while Celtic culture prevailed in the West. But it is the other way around: there is much more Germanic blood in the French, and more Celtic blood in Central Europe. That is the truth. Thus, Maja stands against the truth. It is just that the inhabitants of the West are completely overwhelmed by romanticism. In the East, Norman culture and thus Germanic culture are overwhelmed by foreign racial elements. There, a religion completely foreign to the Russian soul still prevails today. Thus, the people of Central Europe are encircled as if in a cauldron. The Romans extend as far as Constantinople, and on the other side, the Slavicized Normans also extend as far as Constantinople. There we have the snake, the ring.
When we consider what has been spiritually compressed there, we come to the conclusion that it has a particularly important task. I only hinted at it yesterday, but I did say that a certain familiar relationship between the national soul and the individual soul should take place here, and that this is precisely what brings forth the most beautiful blossoms in the best members of the community. The immediate ego should be seized, not the individual soul members as in the West; it should be immediately alive in the ego. From this it follows — and this should already be clear from exoteric observation — that in Central Europe there could never be complete hostility toward idealism, that there was always a certain inclination toward the spiritual world in the most intense form. When we began our spiritual movement, karma decreed that we had to do so initially in association with the British movement. But outwardly, everything else was only a symptom of what had to happen inwardly with a certain necessity. If we consider what the Theosophical movement is, from which we had to separate, we will notice that cultural life there has fallen into two parts. Outer life takes a purely materialistic course, and the spiritual element is coupled to it. They always fall apart. Let us compare this with what our spiritual life must be. Just as in the organism the head cannot be conceived without the body, so our spiritual life grows out of general cultural life. One need only begin with Tauler, Eckhart, Angelus Silesius, then with Herder, Lessing; everywhere we must develop what is to become higher spiritual culture. We cannot attach our spiritual view; we must have it as an organism, we must raise it to that level. We must discover within ourselves that the return of Christ is a spiritual matter. Therefore, we cannot make the slightest concession. We can only approach Christ as a figure with the spiritual eye, with inner experience. In the West, it had to be materialized and dogmatized. People could not imagine it any other way than that he would come in a physical body. Hence the grotesque idea of passing Christ around on a silver platter in the flesh. This happened in connection with what was encircled there.
Therefore, we must objectively ask ourselves: How must the culture of Central Europe relate to the culture of the future? — The truth is universal, but how it arises is something else. The sources of the entire spiritual culture of the future lie in Central European culture. We must find the way out of German idealism and into spiritual culture. To do this, it is necessary to establish a culture of the I here in the middle. This can be easily seen in the occult realm. The human I must be ignited by the outer world; only then does it awaken and become inwardly conscious. Thus, the culture of the self in Central Europe is fueled from outside. One need only consider recent events, the unification of the German people. It is characteristic that the German Empire was founded on foreign soil in 1871. So many things could be cited that also show in external events that a culture of the self prevails in Central Europe.
It is natural to ask: What significance do the victims of death have for the spiritual world? — Countless people pass through the gates of death in the prime of their youth. First, the connection between the ego, the astral body, and the etheric body separates from the physical body. The physical body is apparently handed over to the earth, the etheric body to the etheric world, and the astral body and ego continue on. But we must notice that in people of normal age, is it not the same with the etheric body that passes through the gate of death as with the young people who are now passing away? We can understand this in relation to the physical body, and we will now understand it in relation to the etheric body. The etheric body could have continued to nourish and work on the physical body for decades. It passes through the gate of death with these unspent forces, unites there with the soul of the people, and the work of the soul of the people will in future be permeated by the unspent forces of these etheric bodies. It will be up to us to understand this. There will be people who will know that the soul of the people is an active element. Only when we know that the unused etheric bodies will work as a spiritual force in a concrete way in the spiritual world can we understand what is really happening. Awareness of this concrete connection with the spiritual world will be important. Through the creation of such an awareness of the spiritual world, spiritual science will increasingly become something alive in people's minds and not remain merely a doctrine. People will know that they are in a spiritual aura, just as they know that the air is around them. Just as they distinguish between fresh and stale air, they will perceive good and evil spirits, experiencing the spiritual aura.
This is the true fruit of spiritual science. We see it when we consider events close at hand that can teach us something. One such event occurred recently at the site of our building. In this case, it was a child whose etheric body was unspent. The forces are there; those who see them, those who know how to see them, see that they have passed into the aura of our building in Dornach and live there. This is an example that I stand for. The etheric body, which with its forces belongs more to the general community, continues to work properly. Since then, it has been trying to do something through inspirations in the vicinity of the building. These are helping forces.
Such things are close to us; we can learn from them how mysterious the connections are in the spiritual world. Especially in recent times, we have had it in our social karma that dear friends have passed away from the physical plane. What I said in the Vienna Cycle about life between death and rebirth became very clear in some of these souls. One of these souls found its way into our movement just as the physical body had already become frail. It was a being in whom, ever since it had joined our movement, the soul had already come to meet me as if through a body that had become crystal clear. After death, the image of the soul that had been there before intertwined with the image that appeared afterwards. I could not help but write an obituary that shows how close I was to this soul. The following words became audible about three days after death:
You walked among us.
The gentleness of your nature
Spoke from the silent power of your eyes —
Calmness, soulfully enlivening,
Flowed in the waves with which your gaze
Carried things and people
To the inner workings of your mind; —
And this being was imbued with
Your voice, which eloquently
Through the nature of the word
More than in the word itself
Revealed what was hidden
In your beautiful soul;
But that devoted love
Of compassionate people
Revealed itself wordlessly —
This being, which spoke of noble, quiet beauty
Of the creation of the soul of the world
Of receptive feelings.
After death, consciousness fades, precisely because there is an overflowing consciousness. This happens through the retrospective view one first has of death — not in the case of suicide —, like a sun point. It is one of the most beautiful and highest things. One picks up where one left off, one says to oneself: There you lived — and thus one orientates oneself in the spiritual world.
Our friend was out of the stage of ethereal reflection, so that one spoke to the being who was present but not conscious. Then, through the warmth, there was a moment of consciousness and she saw the cremation. Time becomes space there.
There is a correspondence between what takes place in the physical and spiritual worlds. In such a case, a call does not return like an echo from the spiritual world, but is transformed into a meaningful response from the soul that is not yet conscious. Through such examples of the feeling that recognizes within us, in our emotional recognition of the spiritual world, the result must be to experience the reality of the spiritual world. It is particularly important to acquire this concrete feeling in our time, so that salvation may arise for all humanity in the physical and spiritual realms from the heaviness of the present, for the great and significant events of world history have always been a clear expression, even for superficial spiritual knowledge, that we do not only have sensual beings in the sensual world, but that spiritual beings are also at work.
It is difficult to break through the veil that separates the physical world from the spiritual world. This makes self-knowledge difficult in the broadest sense; we often imagine it to be too easy. Even in the external physical sense, it is sometimes difficult. A grotesque example of this was given by the eminent philosopher Professor Ernst Mach — not Ferdinand Maack, otherwise I would not have spoken of an eminent philosopher. In one of his works, Mach describes how, as a young man, he once noticed an unpleasant, repulsive face in a shop window mirror, which, to his dismay, he immediately recognized as his own. He experienced something similar again later in life. When getting on a bus, he saw a man with an ugly face coming towards him from the other side, and only realized afterwards that he had seen himself in the mirror. Human beings are even more unclear about the nature and form of the soul. They cannot even begin to imagine what one must go through to achieve self-knowledge. In the depths of the soul, Maya is often present to a great extent. A person has the urge to be cruel, he lives with people whom he torments from time to time, and so on. He looks for an external reason for this, often using his ingenious inventiveness to conceal the structure of his soul. I myself knew someone who repeatedly spoke of the great sacrifices he had made in his work. But I had to say that it was only spiritual lust that he was satisfying. When he spoke of sacrifices, there was only selfishness behind it all. True self-knowledge can only be attained by gradually advancing in spiritual science, insofar as one experiences through oneself what is in the world.
There are talkative people in the world who organize little chats. This is even said to happen among men who go out for a drink in the evening. When asked why they chat, people give all sorts of important reasons. But when we run our hand over velvet or silk, we have a feeling of pleasure. When we chat, the etheric body is constantly bumping into the air that has been set in motion, and is thus caressed. There is nothing wrong with that. We can only understand what happens when we chat if we know that human beings have an etheric body.
Humanity is moving toward a time when it will have to face such things more and more. Spiritual science must increasingly awaken awareness of this. Then it will happen that people who today, in their materialistic sense, claim that everything spiritual is a dream, will appear as if someone were to say that where the air is, there is nothing at all. Just as we discover that air is real, so will humanity discover that the spirit is something real. When one contemplates the greatest mystery, the mystery of Golgotha, one might believe that Christ, after passing through the mystery of Golgotha, would have worked on humanity primarily through a teaching. But what people have known about Christ is the very least. Theologians have quarreled, but very few have understood anything correctly. Only a part of what happens in history takes place in consciousness. An example of this is the battle between Maxentius and Constantine at the Milvian Bridge on October 28, 312, which was decided not by any external circumstances but by influences of a non-physical nature. With an army far stronger than that of his opponent Constantine, Maxentius had to defend Rome. When he consulted the Sibylline Books, he was told to lead his troops out of Rome; in this way, he would destroy the enemies of Rome. He was further encouraged by a dream. Constantine also had a dream: he was instructed to have his soldiers carry banners with the monogram of Christ instead of the old military standards. This was done, and Maxentius' army, which had been led out of Rome against all reason, was defeated by Constantine's weaker forces, and Maxentius himself was killed while fleeing. The Christ impulse had worked here in the subconscious of the people.
The impulse lives in the subconscious, just as when ships sail on the sea, but the important things take place in submarines. The 15th century was another important moment. At that time, the Virgin of Orleans intervened in the course of history in such a way that everything that happened later was determined by it. The entire map of Europe would be different, including spiritual life, if the English had won. The Virgin was a servant of Michael. Schiller was deeply moved by the figure of the Virgin of Orleans: “The world loves to blacken what is radiant.” While Voltaire spat venom at her, even Shakespeare could not understand her, Anatole France dragged her down into materialistic waters, and all Western minds failed to comprehend her, Schiller embodied this noble figure in his drama.
In order for the Maid of Orleans to fulfill her historical mission, it was necessary for her to undergo a kind of unconscious initiation. This was an initiation, as described in the legend of Olaf Åsteson. Such initiations, for which certain karmic conditions had to be in place, could take place during the thirteen nights between December 25 and January 6. When the outer light is at its weakest, inner enlightenment is most likely to occur. Thus, Olaf Åsteson had real spiritual experiences while asleep during the thirteen nights, which he then recounted at the church door, as described in the “Dream Song.” The Virgin of Orleans also spent the thirteen nights in a state of sleep, so to speak, namely in her mother's womb. In the last period before birth, humans are particularly susceptible to unconscious influences from the spiritual world. The Virgin of Orleans was born on January 6. On that day, the entire population of her birthplace gathered because something quite extraordinary could be felt in the aura of the village. It was the birth of the Virgin of Orleans, who, immediately before she saw the physical sunlight, had been implanted with the Christ impulse.
To attain a living understanding of the connection between the physical and spiritual worlds is the real goal of all our efforts and what matters most to us. People will recognize that the twilight of this war marks a turning point in history. People should know that the souls of those who have sacrificed themselves continue to work and that this war has the task of bringing the materialistic age to an end.
It is necessary that there be souls who, like outstretched arms, send thoughts up into the spiritual world and bring down consciousness from the spiritual world—souls who are conscious of the spirit. The more such spiritually conscious souls send their thoughts upward—much depends on our spiritual atmosphere being permeated by such thoughts—the more the fruits of the victims of death can ripen. We summarize our thoughts in the following words:
From the courage of the fighters,
From the blood of the battles,
From the suffering of the forsaken,
From the sacrifices of the people
The fruits of the spirit will grow
Spirit-conscious souls will guide
Their minds into the spiritual realm.