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Necessity and Freedom
GA 166

25 January 1916, Berlin

Lecture I

Now that we can be together again, it will be my task in the coming days to speak about important but rather difficult aspects of human and world existence, and we shall certainly not be able to reach any conclusion about these in this lecture; we can only make a beginning. As we proceed we will see how tremendously important these very questions are if we are to connect ourselves inwardly with the soul-stirring events of our times. If I had to summarize in a few words what I am going to speak about, I would say “necessity in world events and in human actions” and “human freedom in these two domains.”

There is hardly anyone who is not more or less intensely concerned with these problems, and perhaps there are hardly any events on the physical plane that urge us as strongly to deal with these questions as the ones that are at present overshadowing the peoples of Europe and reverberating in their souls. If we look at world events and our own actions, feeling, willing, and thinking within these events, considering them for the moment in conjunction with what we call divine cosmic guidance, wisdom-filled cosmic guidance, we see that this divine guidance is at work everywhere. And if we look at something that has happened and that perhaps we ourselves have been involved in, we can ask afterwards “Was the reason for this event we were involved in so much a part of wise cosmic guidance that we can say it was inevitable for it to happen as it did, and we ourselves could not have acted differently in it?” Or, looking more toward the future, we could also say “At some time in the future one or another thing will happen in which we believe we may be playing a part. Ought we not assume of the wise world guidance we presupposed that what happens in the future will also come about inevitably or, as we often say, is predetermined?” Can our freedom exist under such conditions? Can we resolve to use the ideas and skills we have acquired to intervene in some way? Can we do anything to alter things through the way we intervene if we do not want them to happen in the way they would be bound to happen without our intervention?

If we look back on the past, we tend to have the impression that everything was inevitable and could not have happened differently. If we look more toward the future, we have the impression that it must be possible for us to intervene in the course of events with our own will as much as we can. In short, we will always be in a conflict between supposing an absolute and all-pervading necessity on the one hand and necessarily assuming that we are free on the other. For without this latter assumption we cannot maintain our world view and would have to accept the fact that we are like cogs in the huge machine of existence, governed by the forces ruling the machine to the point where even the duties of the cogs are predetermined.

As you know, the conflict between choosing one thing or the other runs to some extent through all our intellectual endeavors. There have always been philosophers called determinists who supposed that all the events we are involved in through our actions and our willing are strictly predetermined, and there have also always been indeterminists who supposed that, on the contrary, human beings can intervene in the course of evolution through their will and their ideas. You know too that the most extreme form of determinism is fatalism, which clings so firmly to the belief that the world is pervaded by spiritual necessity as to presuppose that not one single thing could possibly happen differently from the way it was predetermined, that human beings cannot do other than submit passively to a fate that fills the whole world just because everything is predetermined.

Perhaps some of you also know that Kant set up an antinomian chart on one side of which he wrote a particular statement and always set its opposite on the other side.1Immanuel Kant, 1724-1804, German philosopher of the Enlightenment. For his antinomian chart see his book Critique of Pure Reason published in 1781. For example, on one side stood the assertion “In terms of space the world is infinite,” and on the other side “In terms of space the world is finite.” He then went on to show that with the concepts at our disposal we can prove one of these just as well as the other. We can prove with the same logical exactitude that “the world is infinite with regard to both space and time” or that “the world is finite, boarded-up, in terms of space and that it had a beginning in time.”

The questions we have introduced also belong among the ones Kant put on his antinomian chart. He drew people's attention to the fact that one can just as well prove positively, in as proper and logical a way as possible, that everything that happens in the world, including human action, is subject to rigid necessity, as one can prove that human beings are free and influence in one way or another the course of events when they bring their will to bear on it. Kant considered these questions to be outside the realm of human knowledge, to be questions that lie beyond the limits of human knowledge, because we can prove the one just as easily and conclusively as the other.

Our studies of the last few years will actually have more or less given you the groundwork to get to the bottom of this strange mystery. For it certainly is a mysterious question whether human beings are bound by necessity or are free. It is a puzzling matter. Yet it is even more puzzling that both these alternatives can be conclusively proved. You will find no basis at all for overcoming doubt in this sphere if you look outside of what we call spiritual science. Only the background spiritual science can give will enable you to discover something about what is at the bottom of this mysterious question.

This time we will deal with our subject in very slow stages. I would just like to ask in anticipation, “How is such a thing possible that human beings can prove something and also prove its opposite?” When we approach a matter of this kind, we are certainly made aware of certain limits in normal human comprehension, in ordinary human logic. We meet with this limitation of human logic in regard to other things too. It always appears when human beings want to approach infinity with their concepts.

I can show you this by means of a very simple example. As soon as human beings want to approach infinity with their intellects, something occurs that can be called confusion in their concepts. I will demonstrate this in a very simple way. You must just be a little patient and follow a train of thought to which you are probably not accustomed. Suppose I write these figures on the blackboard one after the other, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and so on. I could write an infinite number of them: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, etc., couldn't I? I can also write a second column of figures; on the right of each number I can put double the number, like this:

1

2

2

4

3

6

4

8

5

10

6

12

and so on.

Again I can write an infinite number of them. Now you will agree with me that each number in the right-hand column is in the left-hand column too. I can underline 2, 4, 6, 8, and so on. Look at the left column for a moment; an infinite series of numbers is possible. This infinite series contains all the numbers included in the right column. 2, 4, 6, and so on are all there. I can continue underlining them. If you look at the figures that are underlined, you will see that they are exactly half of all the numbers together because every other one is underlined. But when I write them on the right-hand side, I can write 2, 4, 6, 8, and so on into infinity. I have an infinite number both on the left and on the right, and you cannot say that there are fewer on the right than on the left. There is no doubt that I am bound to have just as many numbers on the right as on the left.

And yet, as every other number would have to be crossed out on the left to make the left column the same as the right, the infinite number on the left is only half the infinite number on the right. Obviously I have just as many numbers on the right as on the left, namely an infinite number, for each number on the right has one corresponding to it on the left—yet the amount of numbers on the right cannot but be half that of the numbers on the left.

There is no question about it, as soon as we deal with infinity, our thinking becomes confused. The problem arising here also cannot be solved, for it is just as true that on the right there are half as many numbers as on the left as it is true that there are exactly as many numbers on the right as on the left. Here you have the problem in its simplest form.

This brings us to the realization that our concepts cannot actually be used where infinity is concerned, where we go beyond the sense world—and infinity does go beyond the sense world. And do not imagine this to apply only to unlimited infinity, for you cannot use your concepts where limited infinity is concerned either, as the same confusion arises there.

Suppose you draw a triangle, a square, a pentagon, a hexagon and so on. When you reach a construction with a hundred sides, you will have come very close to a circle. You will no longer be able to distinguish the small lines very clearly, especially if you look at them from a distance. Therefore you can say that a circle is a polygon with an infinite number of sides. If you have a small circle there are an infinite number of sides in it; if you have a circle twice the size, you still have an infinite number of sides—and yet exactly twice as many!

So you do not need to go as far as unlimited infinity, for if you take a small circle with an infinite number of sides and a circle twice the size with an infinite number of sides, then even in the realm of visible, limited infinity you can encounter something that throws your concepts into utter confusion. What I have just said is extremely important. For people completely fail to notice that there is only a certain field where our concepts apply, namely the field of the physical plane, and that there is a particular reason why this has to be so.

You know, at a place where people are attacking us rather severely—which is now happening in many places from a great many people—a pastor gave a speech opposing our spiritual science, and thinking it might be especially effective, he concluded with a quotation from Matthias Claudius.2Matthias Claudius, 1740-1815, German poet. This quotation says roughly that human beings are really poor sinners who cannot know much and ought to rest content with what they do know and not chase after what they cannot know. The pastor picked this verse out of a poem by Matthias Claudius because he thought he could charge us with wanting to transcend the sense world—after all, had not Matthias Claudius already said that human beings are nothing but sinners who are unable to get beyond this world of the senses?

“By chance,” as people say, a friend of ours looked up this poem by Matthias Claudius and also read the verse preceding it. This preceding verse says that a person can go out into the open and, although the moon is always a round orb, if it does not happen to be full moon, he sees only part of the moon even though the other part is there. In the same way there are many things in the world people could become aware of if only they looked at them at the right moment. Thus Matthias Claudius wanted to draw attention to the fact that people should not confine themselves to immediate sense appearance and that anyone who allows himself to be deceived by this is a poor sinner. In fact, what the good pastor quoted from Matthias Claudius reflected on himself.

The sense world—if we happen not to be just like that pastor—at times makes us aware that wherever we look we should also look in the opposite direction and adjust our first view accordingly. However, the world of the senses cannot supply this immediate adjustment with regard to what transcends the sense world. We cannot just quote the other verse. That is why human beings philosophize away and, of course, are convinced of the truth of their speculations, for they can be logically proved. But their opposite can also be logically proved. So let us tackle the question today, “Why is it that when we transcend the sense world our thinking gets so confused?” And we will now look at the question in a way which will bring us closer to an answer. How does it happen that two contradictory statements can both be proved right? We will find this has to do with the fact that human life is in a kind of central position, a point of balance between two polar opposite forces, the ahrimanic and the luciferic.

You can of course cogitate on freedom and necessity and imagine you have compelling evidence that the world contains only necessity. But the compelling force of this argument comes from Ahriman. When we prove things in one direction, it is Ahriman who leads us astray, and if we prove their opposite, we are misled by Lucifer. For we are always exposed to these two powers, and if we do not take into account that we are placed in between them, we shall never get to the bottom of the conflicts in human nature, such as the one we have been considering.

It was actually in the course of the nineteenth century that people lost the feeling that throughout the world order there are, besides a state of equilibrium, pendulum swings to the right and the left, a swing toward Ahriman and a swing toward Lucifer. This feeling has been totally lost. After all, if you speak nowadays of Ahriman and Lucifer, you are considered not quite sane, aren't you? It was not as bad as this until the middle of the nineteenth century, for a very clever philosopher, Thrandorff, wrote a very nice article here in Berlin in the middle of the nineteenth century in an attempt to refute the argument of a certain clergyman.3K. F. E. Thrandorff, 1782-1863. Wrote an open letter entitled “The Devil—No Dogmatic Bogy” to a preacher in Berlin in 1853. This clergyman let it be known—and it should be alright to say this in our circles—that there is no devil and that it is really a dreadful superstition to speak of one. We speak of Ahriman rather than of the devil. The philosopher Thrandorff spoke out against the clergyman in a very interesting article, “The Devil: No Dogmatic Bogy.” As late as the middle of the 1850s he tried as it were to prove the existence of Ahriman on a strictly philosophical basis.

In the course of the public lectures I am to give here in the near future I hope I can speak about this extinct part of human spiritual life, about an aspect of theosophy that completely disappeared in the middle of the nineteenth century. Right up to that time people had still spoken about these things, even if they called them by other names. The feeling for these things has now been lost, but basically it was there in a delicate form right into the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, until it had to recede into the background for a while in the natural course of things. We know of course, as I have often emphasized, that spiritual science does not in the slightest way deny the great value and significance of progress in the natural sciences. But this progress in science would not have been possible unless the feeling for this opposition between Ahriman and Lucifer, which can be discovered only on a spiritual level, had been lost. It now has to emerge again above the threshold of human consciousness.

I would like to give you an example of how things stood in regard to Ahriman and Lucifer in the days when people had only a feeling left that there are two different powers at work. Here is an example to illustrate this.

In the old town hall in Prague there is a remarkable clock that was made in the fifteenth century. This clock is really a marvel. At first sight it looks like a sort of sundial, but it is so intricately constructed that it shows the course of the hours in a twofold way: the old Bohemian and the modern way. In the old Bohemian way the hours went from 1 or rather from 0 to 24, and the other way only to 12. At sunset the pointer or gnomon—and there was a shadow there—always pointed to 1. The clock was so arranged that the pointer literally always indicated 1 at sunset. That is to say, despite the varying times of sunset the hand always showed 1.

In addition to this, the clock also showed when sun or moon eclipses occurred. It also showed the course of the various planets through the constellations, giving the planetary orbits. It really was a wonderful construction and even showed the movable festivals, that is to say, it indicated on what day Easter fell in a particular year. It was also a calendar, giving the course of the year from January to December, including the fact that Easter is movable. A special pointer showed on what day Easter fell, despite it being movable, and it also showed Whitsun.

This clock, then, was constructed in the fifteenth century in an extraordinarily impressive way. And the story of how it was constructed has been investigated. But apart from this story—and the documents are there for you to read, with lots of descriptions—there is a legend that also aims at giving an account of the marvelous quality of this clock: first regarding its wonderful construction, and then regarding the fact that the man who was gifted enough to make such a clock always wound it up as long as he lived. After his death nobody could wind it, and they searched everywhere for people who could put it in order and get it going. As a rule they only found people who damaged it. Then someone would be found who said he could sort it out and did so, yet time and again the clock went wrong.

These facts grew into a kind of folk tale, which runs as follows: Once upon a time through a special gift from heaven a simple man acquired the ability to make this clock. He alone knew how to look after it. The legend attaches great significance to the fact that he was only a simple man who acquired this ability through special grace; that is to say, he was inspired by the spiritual world. But it came about that the governor wanted to keep this clock specially for Prague and prevent any other town from having one like it. So he had the inspired clockmaker blinded by having his eyes plucked out. Thus the man withdrew from the scene. But just before his death he begged once more to be permitted a moment in which to set the clock to rights again, and according to the legend he used this moment to make a quick manipulation and put the clock into such disorder that nobody could ever put it right again.

At first sight this seems a very unpretentious story. But in the way the story is constructed there is a sure feeling for the existence of Ahriman and Lucifer and the balance between them. Think how sensitively this story has been formed. The same sensitive construction can be found in countless such folk tales; it grows out of this same sure feeling for Lucifer and Ahriman. The story begins with the position of equilibrium, doesn't it? Through an act of grace from the spiritual world the man acquires the ability to construct an extraordinary clock. There is no trace of egotism in it, though anybody can give way to egotism. It was a gift of grace, and he really did not build the clock out of egotism. Nor was there any intellectuality in it, for it is expressly stated that he was a simple man. This whole description of the skill being an act of grace with no trace of egotism, and of his being a simple man who was free of intellectuality, was in fact given in order to indicate that there was no trace of Ahriman and Lucifer in this man's soul, but that he was entirely under the influence of divine powers that were good and progressive.

Lucifer lived in the governor. It was out of egotism that he wanted to keep the clock exclusively for his own town, and this was why he blinded the clockmaker. Lucifer is placed on the one side. But as soon as Lucifer is there, he always allies himself with his brother Ahriman. And because the man has been blinded, this other power acquires the capacity to attack from outside through skillful manipulation. That is the work of Ahriman.

Thus the power for good is placed between Lucifer and Ahriman. You can find a sensitive construction like this in many of the folk tales, even the simplest of them. But it was possible for this feeling of the intervention of Ahriman and Lucifer in life to get lost at a time when a sense had to gain ground that positive and negative electricity, positive and negative magnetism, and so on, are the basic forces of the material world. This feeling for perceiving the world spiritually had to withdraw in order for scientific investigation to flourish.

We shall now look at how Ahriman and Lucifer intervene in what human beings call knowledge, in what people call their relation to the world in general, in a way that leads to the very confusion we were speaking about. This confusion is especially evident in the questions we have introduced. Let us take a simple hypothetical example. I could just as well have taken this from great world events as from everyday occurrences. Let us suppose that three or four people are preparing to go out for a drive. They plan to travel, let us say, through a mountain pass. This pass has overhanging rocks. The people are ready for the drive and intend setting out at an arranged time. But the chauffeur has just ordered another mug of beer which is served a bit too late. He therefore delays the departure by five minutes. Then he sets out with the party. They drive through the ravine. Just as they come to the overhanging rock it breaks loose, falls on top of the vehicle, and crushes the whole party. They all perish, or perhaps it was only the passengers who were killed and the chauffeur was spared.

Here we have a case in point. You could ask whether it was the chauffeur's fault, or whether the whole thing was governed by absolute necessity. Was it absolutely inevitable that these people should meet with this disaster at that precise moment? And was the chauffeur's tardiness just part of this necessity? Or could we imagine that if only the chauffeur had been punctual, he would have driven them through the mountain pass a long time before the rock fell, and they would never have been hit by it?

Here in the midst of everyday life you have this question of freedom and necessity which is intimately connected with “guilty” or “innocent.” Obviously, if everything is subject to absolute necessity, we cannot say that the chauffeur was guilty at all from a higher point of view, as it was entirely inevitable that these people met their death.

We meet this problem in life all the time. It is, as we have said, one of the most difficult of questions, the kind of question in which Ahriman and Lucifer interfere most easily when we try to find a solution. Ahriman is the one who appears first when this question is being tackled, as we shall see.

We will have to approach this question from a different angle if we want to get at an answer. You see, if we set about solving a question like this by starting with the thought “I can easily follow the course of events: the boulder fell—that happened,” and then ask “Is this actually based on necessity or freedom? Could things have happened differently?” we are only looking at the external events. We are looking at the events as they happen on the physical plane. Now people follow this approach out of the same impulse that leads them, if they have a materialistic outlook, to stop short at the physical body when contemplating the human being. Anyone who knows nothing about spiritual science will stop short at the physical body nowadays, won't he? He will say “The human being you see and feel is what exists.” He does not go beyond the physical body to the etheric body. And if he is a thoroughly pig-headed materialist, he will jeer and scoff when he hears people saying there is a finer, etheric body underlying the dense physical body. Yet you know how well-founded the view is that among the members of the human being the etheric body is the one most closely associated with the physical body, and in the course of time we have become accustomed to knowing that we must not just speak of the human physical body but also of the human etheric body, and so on.

Some of you, however, may not yet have asked yourselves “What kind of world is that other world outside the human being, the world in which the ordinary world events occur?” We have of course spoken of a number of things in this connection. We have said that to begin with when we perceive the external events of the physical plane with our senses, we have no idea that wherever we look there are elemental beings; it is exactly the same when we first look at the human being.

Human beings have an etheric body, which we have often also called an elemental body. Outside in nature, in external physical happenings in general, we have a succession of physical events and also the world of elemental existence. This runs absolutely parallel: the human being with a physical and an etheric body, and physical processes with events of the elemental world flowing into them. It would be just as one-sided to say that external processes are merely physical as to say that a human being has a physical body only, when we ought to be saying that he also has an etheric body. What we perceive with our physical senses and physical intellect is one thing. But there is something behind it that is analogous to the human etheric body. Behind every external physical occurrence there is a higher, more subtle one.

There are people who have a certain awareness of such things. This awareness can come to them in two different ways. You may have noticed something like the following either in yourself or in other people. A person has had some experience. But afterwards he comes to you and says—or it may be something you experienced and you may say, “Actually I had the feeling that while this experience was taking place externally, something quite different was happening to me as well, in a higher part of my being.” This is to say, deeper natures may feel that events not taking place on the physical plane at all can yet have an important effect on the course of their life. First, such people know something has happened to them. Others go even further and see things of this kind symbolically in a dream. Someone dreams he experiences this or that. He dreams, for instance, that he is killed by a boulder. He wakes up and is able to say, “That was a symbolic dream; something has taken place in my soul life.” It can often be proved true in life that something took place in the soul that was of far greater significance than what happened to the person on the physical plane. He may have progressed a stage higher in knowledge, purified part of his will nature, or made his feelings more sensitive or something of that kind.

In lectures given here recently I drew attention to the fact that what a person knows with his I is actually only a part of all that happens to him, and that the astral body knows a very great deal more, though not consciously. You will remember my telling you this. The astral body certainly knows of a great deal that happens to us in the supersensible realm and not in the realm of the senses. Now we have arrived from another direction at the fact that something is continually happening to us in the supersensible realm. Just as in the case of my moving my hand, the physical movement is only part of the whole process and behind it there is an etheric process, a process of my etheric body, so every physical process outside me is permeated by a subtle elementary process that runs parallel with it and takes place in the supersensible realm. Not only beings are permeated by a supersensible element, but so is the whole of existence.

Remember something I have repeatedly referred to and which even seems somewhat paradoxical. I have pointed out that in the spiritual realm we often have the opposite of what exists on the physical plane, not always, but often. Thus if something is true here for the physical plane, the truth with regard to the spiritual aspect can look quite different. Not always, as I say. But I have counted many cases over the years where one would have to say that on the spiritual level there is exactly the opposite result from what one would expect to happen on the physical plane.

With regard to supersensible occurrences running parallel with those of the sense world, this is occasionally, in fact very often, the case. So let us examine it. If we see a party of people setting off by coach and taking a drive, and a piece of rock falls and crushes them, that is the physical occurrence. Parallel with this physical event, that is to say, within it in the same way as our etheric body is within us, there is a supersensible occurrence. And we have to recognize that this may be the exact opposite of what is happening here on the physical plane. In fact it is very frequently the exact opposite.

This can also create great confusion if we do not watch out. For instance, the following may happen. If someone has acquired atavistic clairvoyance and has a kind of second sight, he or she may have the following experience: Supposing a party of people is setting out on a journey, but at the last moment one of the party decides to stay behind, the person who has second sight, let us say. Instead of going with the others, that person stays behind and after a while has a vision. In this vision any event can appear to that person. He or she could of course just as well see the party being hit by boulders as see, for instance—and this can be a matter of disposition—that some especially good fortune happens to them. He or she could very well see the party having a very joyful experience, and might subsequently hear that the party had perished in the way I described.

This could happen if the clairvoyant were not to see what was happening on the physical plane—which he might very well have seen—but had seen what was happening as a parallel event on the astral plane: for the moment these people left the physical plane they may well have been called to something special in the spiritual world, something that filled them with an abundance of new life in the spiritual world. In short, the clairvoyant person may have seen an event of the supersensible worlds going on in exactly the opposite direction, and this absolutely contradictory event could be true. It might really be the case that here on the physical plane a misfortune exists that corresponds in the supersensible world to some great good fortune for those same souls.

Now someone who thinks he is smarter than the wise guidance of the world (and there are such people) might say, “If I ruled the world, I would not do it in such a way that I call souls to happiness in the spiritual world and at the same time shower them with misfortune here on the physical plane. I would do it better than that!” Well, all one can say to people like that is, “Surely one can understand that here on the physical plane people can easily be misled by Ahriman. But cosmic wisdom always knows better.” It could be a matter of the following: The task awaiting the souls in the spiritual world requires their having this experience here on the physical plane, so that they can look back, so to speak, to this physical event of their earthly lives and gain a certain strength they need. That is to say, for the souls who experience them these two occurrences, the physical and the spiritual one, may necessarily belong together.

We could quote hypothetical examples of all kinds, showing that when something takes place here on the physical plane there exists, as it were, an etheric body of this event, an elemental, supersensible event belonging to it. We must not merely generalize like pantheists do and stop short at the general statement that there is a spiritual world underlying the physical, but we must give concrete examples. We must be aware that behind every physical occurrence there is a spiritual occurrence, a real spiritual occurrence, and both together form a whole.

If we follow the course of events on the physical plane, we can say that we get to the point where we link together the events of the physical plane by means of thoughts. And as we watch things happen on the physical plane we actually reach the point of finding a “cause” for each “effect.” That is how things are. People everywhere look for the cause belonging to each effect. Whenever anything has happened, people always have to find the cause of it. But this means finding the inevitability. If you look with sufficient pedantry at the simple example I chose, you could say, “Well now, this party had gathered and had fixed their departure for a definite time. But if I follow up why the chauffeur was tardy, I will go in several directions. First of all, I may look at the chauffeur himself and consider how he was brought up and how he became tardy. Then I will look at the various circumstances leading to his getting his mug of beer too late. All I will be able to find in this way is merely a chain of causes. I will be able to show how one event fits in with the others in such a way that the affair could not possibly have happened otherwise. I will gradually come to the point where I completely eliminate the chauffeur's free will, for if we have a cause for every effect, this includes everything the chauffeur does as well.” The chauffeur only wanted another mug of beer, didn't he, because he had probably not been thrashed sufficiently when he was young. If he had been thrashed more often—and it is not his fault that he was not—things would not have turned out as they did. Looking at it this way we can base the whole thing on a chain of cause and effect.

This has to do with the fact that it is only on the physical plane that we can use concepts. For just consider: if you want to understand something, one thought must be able to follow from another, that is to say, you depend on being able to develop one thought out of another. It lies in the nature of concepts that one follows from the other. That must be so.

Yet, what can be clearly and necessarily linked together through concepts on the physical plane immediately changes as soon as we enter the neighboring supersensible world. There we have to do not with cause and effect but with beings. This is where beings are active. At every moment one or another being is working on or withdrawing from a task. There it is not at all a matter of what can be grasped by concepts in the usual sense.

If you tried using concepts for what is happening in the spiritual world, the following could happen. You might think, “Well, here I am. Certainly I am far enough advanced to perceive that something spiritual is happening. At one moment a gnome approaches, then a sylph, and soon afterwards another being. Now all the beings are together. I will do my best to fathom what the effects will have to be.” On the physical plane this is sometimes easy to do, of course. If we hit a billiard ball in a certain direction, we know which way the other one will go, because we can calculate it. Yet on the spiritual plane it may happen that when you have seen a being and now know “Ah, that is a gnome, he is setting out to do something and will do such and such; he is joining forces with another being, thus the following is bound to happen,” you think you have figured it all out. But the next moment another being appears and changes the whole thing, or a being you were counting on drops out and disappears and no longer participates. There, everything is based on beings. You cannot link everything together with your concepts in the same way as you can on the physical plane. That is quite impossible. There, you cannot explain one thing following from the other on the basis of concepts. Things work together in an entirely different manner in the spiritual world, in the series or stream of spiritual happenings running parallel with physical happenings.

We must become familiar with the fact that underlying our world there is a world we must not only assume to be spiritual in comparison to ours, but we must also assume its events to be connected with each other in a totally different way than those in our world. For we can do nothing at all in the spiritual world, in the actual reality of this spiritual world, with the way we are used to explaining things in the world of our concepts.

Thus we see that two worlds interpenetrate; one of them can be grasped with concepts and the other cannot, but can only be perceived. I am pointing to something that goes very deep, but people are not aware how deep it goes. Just consider for a moment that if someone were to believe he could prove everything, and that only what has been proved is true, the following could happen. That person could say, “As a matter of fact, everything has to be proved, and what has not been proved is unacceptable. Therefore everything that happens in the course of the history of the world must be capable of being proved. So I only need to think hard and I am bound to be able to prove, for instance, whether the Mystery of Golgotha took place or not.” Indeed, people are so very inclined nowadays to say that if the Mystery of Golgotha cannot be proved, the whole thing is nonsense and there never was such an event.

And what do people think of proofs? They think that one starts with one definite concept and proceeds from this to the next one, and if it is possible to do this right through, the matter is proved. But no world other than the physical functions according to this kind of proof. This reasoning does not apply to any other world. For if we were able to prove that the Mystery of Golgotha had to take place of necessity, and this could be concluded from our concepts, it would not have been a free deed at all! Christ would then have been compelled to come down to the earth from the cosmos simply because human concepts prove and therefore dictate it. However, the Mystery of Golgotha has to be a free deed, that is to say, it has to be just the kind of deed that cannot be proved. It is important that people come to realize this.

It is the same thing, after all, when people want to prove either that God created the world or that he did not. There, too, they proceed from one thought to another. But “creating the world,” at any rate will have been a free deed of a divine being! From this it follows that we cannot prove the Creation as following of necessity from our series of concepts; rather, we have to perceive it to arrive at it.

So we are saying something of tremendous importance when we state that the very next world to ours—which, as a supersensible world, permeates ours—is not organized in a way we can penetrate by means of our concepts and their conclusiveness, but that there a kind of vision comes into its own in which events are arranged in a totally different way.

Today I would just like to add a few words about the following. When I was here at Christmas, I drew your attention to the fact that in our time especially, such contradictory things are emerging, that they are quite confusing for human thinking. Just imagine, a book has just been published by the great scientist Ernst Haeckel called Thoughts about Eternity,4Ernst Haeckel, 1834-1919, German scientist and philosopher. Adherent of Monism. I have already mentioned it earlier. These Thoughts about Eternity contain exactly the opposite of what many other people have concluded as a result of living through recent world events. Just think, there are many people today (we shall come to speak of this fact in its particular connection with our present studies, but today I just wanted to give an introduction) who have experienced a deepening of their religious feelings just because world events are having such a terribly overwhelming effect on their souls; for they say, “Unless there is a supersensible world underlying our physical world, how can we explain what is happening in our time?” Many people have rediscovered their feeling for religion. I do not need to describe their train of thought; it is obvious and can be discerned in so many people.

Haeckel arrives at a different train of thought. He explains in his recently published book that people believe in immortality of the soul. However, he says, current events prove clearly enough that any such belief is ridiculous, for we witness thousands of people perishing every day for no reason at all. With these events in mind, how can any sensible person imagine that there can be any talk about the immortality of the soul? How is it possible for a higher world order to stand behind things of this sort?

These shocking events seem to Haeckel to prove his dogma that one cannot speak of immortality of the soul. Here we have antinomy again: A large proportion of humanity is experiencing a deepening of religious feeling, while the very same events are making Haeckel tremendously superficial where religion is concerned.

All this is connected with the fact that nowadays people are unable to understand the relationship between the world accessible to their senses and their brain-bound intellect and the supersensible world underlying it. No sooner do they approach these things than their thinking gets confused. Yet despite all the disillusionment it brings, our time will certainly in one way also bring about a deepening of people's souls, a turning away from materialism. It will be necessary that knowledge of the way supersensible events complement happenings in the world of the senses arise from a pure activity of the soul devoting itself to an impartial exploration of the world. It is necessary that there should be at least a small number of people who are able to realize that all the pain and suffering being experienced at present on the physical plane are, from the point of view of the whole of human evolution, only one side and that there is also another side, a supersensible side.

We have drawn your attention to this supersensible aspect from various points of view, and we will speak of still further ones. But when peace returns to Europe's blood-stained soil, we will again and again experience the need for a group of people capable of hearing and sensing spiritually what the spiritual worlds will then be saying to humanity in times of peace. And we must never tire of impressing the following lines upon our hearts and souls, for it will be proved over and over again how deeply true they are:

Out of the courage of the fighters,
Out of the blood of battles,
Out of the grief of the bereaved,
Out of the peoples' deeds of sacrifice
There shall arise spirit fruit
If only souls, in spirit-mindfulness,
Will reach out to the spirits' realm.

Erster Vortrag

Es wird in diesen Tagen, da wir wieder zusammensein können, meine Aufgabe sein, über wichtige, allerdings etwas schwierige Fragen des menschlichen und des Weltenlebens zu sprechen, über Fragen, deren Betrachtung ja selbstverständlich nicht mit diesem Vortrage abgeschlossen, sondern im Gegenteil nur eingeleitet werden kann. Es wird sich im Verlaufe dieser Betrachtung ergeben, wie unendlich wichtig gerade diese Fragen auch sind mit Bezug auf ein seelisches Sich-Verbinden mit den großen, die Menschheit heute so bewegenden Ereignissen. Wenn ich zunächst in zwei abstrakten Worten das zusammenfassen sollte, wovon ich in dieser Zeit zu Ihnen sprechen soll, so könnte ich das zusammenfassen in die zwei Worte: «Notwendigkeit des Welt- und Menschengeschehens» und «Freiheit des Menschen innerhalb des Welt- und Menschengeschehens.»

Es gibt im Grunde genommen kaum einen Menschen, der sich nicht mehr oder weniger intensiv gerade mit diesen Fragen beschäftigt, und es gibt vielleicht kaum Ereignisse auf dem physischen Plane, welche die Beschäftigung mit diesen Fragen so nahelegen als diejenigen, die jetzt über Europas Völker hin durch die Seelen der Menschen Europas hindurchziehen. Wenn wir das Weltgeschehen und unser eigenes Handeln, Fühlen, Wollen und Denken innerhalb des Weltgeschehens betrachten und es betrachten zunächst im Zusammenhange mit dem, was wir die göttliche, die weisheitsvolle Weltenregierung nennen, so sagen wir uns, diese weisheitsvolle Weltregierung waltet in allem. Und wenn wir auf irgend etwas hinblicken, was geschehen ist, in das wir vielleicht selber hineingestellt gewesen sind, dann können wir hinterher die Frage aufwerfen: War das, was geschehen ist, in das wir selber hineingestellt waren, innerhalb der ganzen weisheitsvollen Weltenregierung so begründet, daß wir sagen können, es war notwendig, es habe nicht anders geschehen können, und wir selber haben nicht anders innerhalb dieses Geschehens handeln können? Oder aber können wir sagen, wenn wir mehr auf das Zukünftige blicken: Es wird sich in dieser oder jener zukünftigen Zeit dieses oder jenes abspielen, von dem wir glauben, daß wir vielleicht hineingestellt sein könnten? Müssen wir nicht etwa annehmen gegenüber der von uns vorausgesetzten weisheitsvollen Weltenregierung, daß dasjenige, was in der Zukunft geschieht, auch notwendig, oder, wie man oftmals sagt, vorhergesehen sei? Kann aber dabei unsere Freiheit bestehen? Können wir uns vornehmen, daß wir irgendwie eingreifen wollen durch die Ideen, durch die Geschicklichkeiten, die wir uns erworben haben? Kann durch die Art, wie wir eingreifen, dasjenige geändert werden, wovon wir vielleicht wollen, daß es nicht in der Weise eintritt, wie es eintreten müßte, wenn unser Eingreifen nicht geschieht?

Wenn der Mensch mehr zurückblickt auf das Vergangene, dann hat für ihn mehr Eindruck die Idee, alles sei notwendig gewesen, es hätte nicht anders geschehen können. Wenn der Mensch mehr auf die Zukunft hinblickt, dann hat für ihn mehr Eindruck die Idee, es müsse möglich sein, daß er selber, der Mensch, da wo es ihm gegönnt ist, mit seinem Willen eingreifen könne. Kurz, der Mensch wird immer in eine Art von Zwiespalt kommen zwischen der Annahme einer unbedingten Notwendigkeit, die durch alle Dinge geht, und auf der anderen Seite der notwendigen Voraussetzung der Freiheit, ohne die er eigentlich nicht bestehen kann in seiner Weltanschaung, weil er sonst annehmen müßte, daß er wie eine Art Rad in dem großen Räderwerk des Daseins eingewoben sei, welches durch die dieses Räderwerk durchwaltenden Mächte so bestimmt ist, daß auch die Verrichtungen eben seines Rad-Daseins vorausgenommen sind.

Sie wissen ja auch, daß der Zwiespalt, sich für das eine oder für das andere zu entscheiden, gewissermaßen durch alles Geistesstreben der Menschheit durchgeht, daß es immer Philosophen gegeben hat, man nennt sie Deterministen, die annahmen, daß alles Geschehen, in das wir mit unserem Handeln, mit unserem Wollen eingesponnen sind, streng vorausbestimmt sei, daß es Indeterministen gegeben hat, welche das Gegenteil annahmen: daß der Mensch eingreifen kann durch sein Wollen, durch seine Ideen, in den Gang der Entwickelung. Sie wissen auch, daß das äußerste Extrem des Determinismus der Fatalismus ist, der so streng an einer die Welt durchwaltenden geistigen Notwendigkeit festhält, daß er voraussetzt, daß nichts, gar nichts irgendwie anders geschehen könne, als es eben vorausbestimmt ist, und daß sich der Mensch nur passiv zu fügen habe in das Fatum, das über die Welt ergossen ist dadurch, daß eben alles vorausbestimmt ist.

Vielleicht wissen einige von Ihnen auch, daß Kant eine Antinomientafel aufgestellt hat, in der er immer auf die. eine Seite eine bestimmte Behauptung, auf die andere Seite deren Gegenteil gestellt hat, zum Beispiel auf die eine Seite die Behauptung: «Die Welt ist dem Raume nach unendlich», auf die andere Seite die Behauptung: «Die Welt ist dem Raume nach endlich», und daß er dann gezeigt hat, daß man das eine ebensogut wie das andere mit den dem Menschen zur Verfügung stehenden Begriffen beweisen kann. Man kann in demselben Sinne streng beweisen: Die Welt ist dem Raume oder der Zeit nach unendlich -, oder: Die Welt sei dem Raum nach endlich, begrenzt, mit Brettern verschlagen, der Zeit nach habe sie einen Anfang genommen.

Zu diesen Fragen, die Kant in die Antinomientafel geschrieben hat, gehört auch diese, die wir eben berührt haben. Er hat also gewußt und hat die Menschen darauf aufmerksam gemacht, daß man ebenso streng beweisen kann, richtig streng beweisen so, wie man nur streng logisch beweisen kann, daß alles Weltengeschehen einschließlich des Menschengeschehens einer starren Notwendigkeit unterliege, wie man beweisen kann nun wiederum genau so streng, daß der Mensch ein freies Wesen ist und daß er die Dinge, in die er mit seinem Wollen eingreift, durch sein Wollen irgendwie bestimmt. Kant hielt diese Fragen eben für das menschliche Erkenntnisvermögen für unentscheidbar, für Fragen, die über die Grenze des menschlichen Erkenntnisvermögens hinausgehen, weil man das eine ebensogut wie sein Gegenteil streng beweisen kann mit menschlichen Mitteln.

Nun haben Sie bereits in den Auseinandersetzungen, die wir die Jahre her gepflogen haben, gewissermaßen die Grundlagen, um hinter dieses merkwürdige Rätsel, das da vorliegt, zu kommen. Denn man möchte doch wirklich sagen: Rätselhaft ist schon die Frage, ob denn der Mensch nun in eine Notwendigkeit eingesponnen ist oder ob er frei ist. Rätselhaft ist diese Frage. Aber noch rätselhafter ist doch ganz gewiß dasjenige, daß man beides streng beweisen kann. Sie werden nicht Grundlagen finden, überhaupt auf diesem Gebiet über den Zweifel hinauszukommen, wenn Sie diese Grundlagen suchen außerhalb dessen, was wir Geisteswissenschaft nennen. Nur innerhalb dieser Grundlagen, die die Geisteswissenschaft geben kann, kann man etwas erfahren über dieses Geheimnis, über dieses Rätsel, das den genannten Fragen eigentlich zugrunde liegt.

Wir werden diesmal recht langsam in unseren Betrachtungen vorwärtsschreiten. Vorwegnehmend möchte ich nur sagen: Wie kommt es denn überhaupt, daß so etwas sein kann, daß der Mensch eine Sache und deren Gegenteil beweisen kann? Da werden wir doch, wenn wir überhaupt an eine solche Sache herangeführt werden, etwas aufmerksam gemacht auf eine gewisse Beschränktheit des gewöhnlichen menschlichen Begriffsvermögens, der gewöhnlichen menschlichen Logik. Aber wir werden noch bei manchen anderen Dingen auf diese Beschränktheit der menschlichen Logik hingewiesen. Sie tritt immer überall da auf, wo der Mensch mit seinen Begriffen an das Unendliche heran will.

Ich kann Ihnen das an einem sehr einfachen Beispiele zeigen. Sobald der Mensch mit seinen Begriffen an das Unendliche heran will, tritt etwas ein, was man nennen kann: eine Verwirrung in den Begriffen. Ich will es Ihnen an einem sehr einfachen Beispiel klarmachen. Sie müssen mir nur etwas geduldig in einem Ihnen sonst vielleicht ungewohnten Gedankengange folgen. Denken Sie sich, ich schriebe auf die Tafel hintereinander die Zahlen: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 und so weiter. Ich könnte, nicht wahr, in die Unendlichkeit schreiben: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 und so weiter. Nun kann ich eine zweite Reihe von Zahlen aufschreiben: von jeder der Zahlen, die ich aufgeschrieben habe, rechts daneben das Doppelte, also:

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Nun kann ich wieder ins unendliche schreiben. Aber Sie werden mir zugeben: jede Zahl, die rechts steht in der Reihe, ist auch in der linken Reihe vorhanden. Ich kann unterstreichen 2, 4, 6, 8 und so weiter. Sehen Sie sich jetzt einmal die linke Zahlenreihe an: es sind unendlich viele Zahlen möglich. In diesen unendlich vielen Zahlen stecken genau die Zahlen, die rechts stehen in der rechten Reihe: 2, 4, 6 und so weiter stecken drinnen. Ich kann immer mehr unterstreichen. Wenn Sie die unterstrichenen Zahlen nehmen in der linken Reihe, so sind diese unterstrichenen Zahlen jedesmal genau die Hälfte aller Zahlen. Jede zweite ist unterstrichen. Wenn ich sie aber jetzt rechts schreibe, so kann ich: 2, 4, 6, 8 und so weiter ins unendliche fortschreiben. Ich habe links eine Unendlichkeit und rechts eine Unendlichkeit, und man kann nicht sagen, daß ich rechts weniger Zahlen habe als links. Es ist gar keine Frage, daß ich rechts genau so viele Zahlen haben muß wie links. Und dennoch: da alle Zahlen links durch Ausstreichen entstehen können, ist die linke Unendlichkeit nur die Hälfte von der rechten Unendlichkeit. Es ist ganz klar: ich habe rechts genau so viele Zahlen, nämlich unendlich viele, wie links, denn zu jeder Zahl rechts gehört je eine Zahl links - und dennoch kann die Anzahl der Zahlen rechts nur die Hälfte sein von dem, was die Anzahl links ist.

Es ist gar keine Frage, daß, sobald man ins Unendliche übergeht, man mit dem Denken in die Verwirrung kommt. Die Frage, die sich da ergibt, ist jetzt auch nicht aufzulösen, denn es ist ebenso wahr, daß rechts halb so viele Zahlen wie links, wie es wahr ist, daß rechts genau so vielen Zahlen stehen wie links. Hier haben Sie das in der allereinfachsten Weise.

Dadurch wird der Mensch schon in einer gewissen Weise darauf geführt, sich für seine Begriffe zu sagen: Also darf ich sie eigentlich nicht fürs Unendliche anwenden, für dasjenige, was über die Sinneswelt hinausgeht - und das Unendliche geht über die Sinneswelt hinaus -, ich darf sie nicht auf das Unendliche anwenden. Glauben Sie, nicht bloß auf das unbegrenzt Unendliche, sondern Sie können sie auch auf das begrenzte Unendliche nicht anwenden, denn im begrenzten Unendlichen ergibt sich dieselbe Verwirrung.

Denken Sie sich, Sie zeichnen ein Drei-, Vier-, Fünf-, Sechseck und so weiter. Wenn Sie beim Hunderteck angekommen sind, dann werden Sie schon einem Kreis sehr nahe sein. Sie werden die kleinen Linien nicht mehr gut voneinander unterscheiden können, insbesondere wenn Sie weit weggehen. Sie können daher sagen: Ein Kreis ist ein Vieleck von unendlich vielen Seiten. Wenn Sie einen kleinen Kreis haben, sind unendlich viele Seiten darinnen; wenn Sie einen doppelt so großen Kreis haben, sind auch unendlich viele Seiten darinnen - und doch genau doppelt so viel! Sie brauchen also nicht zum unbegrenzten Unendlichen zu gehen, sondern wenn Sie einen kleinen Kreis nehmen, der unendlich viele Seiten hat, und einen doppelt so großen Kreis, der unendlich viele Seiten hat, können Sie da schon in dem überschaubaren Unendlichen auf etwas stoßen, was Ihnen Ihre Begriffe vollständig verwirrt. Dieses, was ich eben gesagt habe, ist außerordentlich wichtig. Denn die Menschen beachten gar nicht, daß sie ein gewisses Feld nur haben, nämlich das Feld des physischen Planes, für die Begriffe, die anwendbar sind, und daß dies so sein muß aus einem gewissen Grunde.

Sehen Sie, an einem Orte, wo man uns jetzt ein bißchen scharf entgegentritt - was ja jetzt an vielen Orten der Fall ist, bei vielen Menschen -, da hielt ein Pastor eine Rede gegen unsere Geisteswissenschaft, die er schloß, weil er glaubte, daß das ganz besonders wirksam sein könnte, mit einem Ausspruche von Matthias Claudius. Dieser Ausspruch von Matthias Claudius hat ungefähr den Inhalt, daß die Menschenkinder eigentlich arme Sünder sind und gar nicht viel wissen können, und daß sie sich hübsch bescheiden sollen mit dem, was sie wissen, und nicht forschen sollen nach dem, was sie nicht wissen können, Der Mann hat diese Strophe aus einem Gedicht von Matthias Claudius gewählt, weil er gedacht hat, er könne uns das anhängen, daß wir hinauswollten über die Sinneswelt, aber schon Matthias Claudius habe gesagt: der Mensch sei doch ein eitler Sünder, der nicht hinauskann über diese Sinneswelt.

Ja, «zufällig», wie man so sagt, hat ein Freund von uns dieses Gedicht bei Matthias Claudius nachgeschaut und auch die vorhergehende Strophe gelesen. In der gleich vorhergehenden Strophe steht, daß der Mensch hinausgehen kann auf das Feld und, trotzdem der Mond immer eine volle Scheibe ist, sieht er, wenn nicht gerade Vollmond ist, bloß einen Teil des Mondes, während der andere doch da ist, und so gäbe es in der Welt sehr vieles, wovon man, wenn man es nur im rechten Augenblick anschaut, wissen könne, daß es da ist. Und da Matthias Claudius darauf aufmerksam machen wollte, daß man sich nicht beschränken solle auf dasjenige, was der Sinnenschein unmittelbar ist, sondern daß der ein armer Sünder ist, der sich durch das täuschen lasse, was der Sinnenschein unmittelbar gibt, so fiel dasjenige, was der gute Mann aus dem Matthias Claudius zitiert hat, auf ihn selbst zurück.

Die Sinneswelt - wenn wir nur nicht eben gerade so sind wie dieser Pastor -, die macht uns darauf aufmerksam zu Zeiten, daß, wo wir den Blick irgendwohin wenden, wir ihn auch auf das andere, auf die andere Seite zu lenken und die eine Seite durch die andere Seite zu korrigieren haben. In bezug auf dasjenige, was über die Sinneswelt hinaus liegt, gibt es aber nicht ein unmittelbares Korrigieren durch die Sinneswelt. Da kann man nicht gleich aufzeigen die andere Strophe, und daher stellt sich das ein, daß der Mensch dann drauflos philosophiert und selbstverständlich auch überzeugt sein muß, daß das wahr ist, denn - es ist streng logisch zu beweisen. Aber das Gegenteil ist eben auch streng logisch zu beweisen. Wir können uns nämlich heute die Frage vorlegen, und die ganzen Betrachtungen, die wir jetzt anstellen, werden dann diese Frage genauer beantworten: Woher kommt es denn, daß, wenn wir über die Sinneswelt hinausgehen, unser Denken so in Verwirrung kommt? Woher kommt denn das überhaupt, daß wir das eine und sein Gegenteil beweisen können? Wir werden finden, wie das zusammenhängt damit, daß das Menschenleben hineingestellt ist wie in die Mitte, wie in die Gleichgewichtslage zwischen zwei entgegengesetzte Kräfte, zwischen die ahrimanischen und die luziferischen Kräfte.

Gewiß, man kann über die Freiheit und Notwendigkeit nachdenken, und man kann glauben, daß zwingender Beweis ist: Es gibt nur eine Notwendigkeit in der Welt. Aber das Zwingende dieses Beweises hat nämlich Ahriman bewirkt. Auf der einen Seite, wenn man das eine beweist, ist immer Ahriman, der einen verführt; und wenn man das andere beweist, ist immer Luzifer, der einen verführt. Diesen beiden Mächten ist man nämlich immer ausgesetzt, und wenn man nicht berücksichtigt, daß man zwischen diese zwei Mächte hineingestellt ist, so wird man niemals dahinter kommen, woher solche Zwiespalte kommen in der menschlichen Natur, wie der, welcher angeschaut worden ist.

Nun ist aber allerdings sogar das Gefühl davon, daß im ganzen Weltenwalten neben der Gleichgewichtslage auch der Ausschlag des Pendels nach rechts und nach links, der ahrimanische und der luziferische Ausschlag vorhanden ist, verlorengegangen im 19. Jahrhundert. Vollständig erstorben ist dieses Gefühl. Heute gilt man ja schon im Grunde genommen für einen nicht mehr ganz geistig gesunden Menschen, wenn man von Ahriman und Luzifer spricht, nicht wahr? So schlimm ist es eigentlich erst in der Mitte des 19. Jahrhunderts geworden, denn ein sehr geistvoller Philosoph, Thrandorff, hat noch in der Mitte des 19. Jahrhunderts eine sehr hübsche Schrift geschrieben, hier in Berlin, in der er die Ausführungen eines Geistlichen zu widerlegen versuchte. Ein Geistlicher hat hier verbreitet - man darf das in unseren Kreisen hoffentlich schon sagen -, daß es keinen Teufel gibt und daß es eigentlich ein furchtbarer Aberglaube ist, von einem Teufel zu sprechen. Wir sprechen von Ahriman. Da hat der Philosoph Thrandorff gegen den Geistlichen das Wort ergriffen in einer Schrift, die sehr interessant ist: «Der Teufel - kein dogmatisches Hirngespinst.» Noch in der Mitte der fünfziger Jahre versuchte er sozusagen das Dasein von Ahriman streng philosophisch zu beweisen.

Ich hoffe, im Laufe der öffentlichen Vorträge, die ich in nächster Zeit hier halten werde, gerade auch über diesen verklungenen Ton im Geistesleben sprechen zu können, über das Theosophische, das in der Mitte des 19. Jahrhunderts völlig verschwindet. Man hat schon bis in die Mitte des 19. Jahrhunderts von diesen Dingen, wenn auch unter anderem Namen, gesprochen. Das Gefühl selbst davon ist verlorengegangen, aber dieses Gefühl war im Grunde genommen in einer feinen Weise vorhanden bis ins 14., 15. Jahrhundert herein, bis es eben auf naturgemäße Weise eine Zeitlang in den Hintergrund treten mußte. Wir wissen ja, daß Geisteswissenschaft, wie ich oft betont habe, ganz und gar nicht etwa leugnet den großen Wert und die große Bedeutung des naturwissenschaftlichen Aufschwungs. Aber daß dieser naturwissenschaftliche Aufschwung kommen konnte, das war bedingt dadurch, daß die Empfindung, das Gefühl für diesen nur im Geistigen zu findenden Gegensatz, Ahriman und Luzifer, verlorengegangen sind. Jetzt müssen sie wiederum herauftauchen über die Schwelle des menschlichen Bewußtseins. Ein feines Gefühl war vorhanden bis in das 15. Jahrhundert herein.

Ich möchte Ihnen an einem Beispiel zeigen, wie sich die Dinge gestalteten in bezug auf Ahriman und Luzifer, als schon nur mehr ein Gefühl davon vorhanden war, daß das zwei Mächte sind, die da walten. Ich möchte es an einem Beispiel erläutern:

In Prag, am Altstädtischen Rathaus, gibt es eine sehr merkwürdige Uhr, die im 15. Jahrhundert entstanden ist. Diese Uhr ist wirklich eine Art Wunderwerk. Äußerlich sieht sie sich zunächst an wie eine Art von Sonnenuhr, aber sie ist so kompliziert konstruiert, daß die Folge der Stunden auf zweifache Weise angezeigt wird, auf altböhmische Weise und nach der neueren Zeitrechnung. Die Folge der Stunden in der altböhmischen Weise ging von 1 beziehungsweise O bis 24, und die andere, spätere Zeit nur bis 12. Immer bei Sonnenuntergang stand der Schattenzeiger - es war da Schatten - auf 1. Und die Uhr war so eingerichtet, daß wirklich immer bei Sonnenuntergang der Zeiger auf 1 stand. Also trotz all der Verschiedenheit der Sonnenuntergänge stand immer der Zeiger auf 1.

Diese Uhr zeigte außerdem aber noch immer an, wenn eine Sonnen- und Mondesfinsternis eintrat. Sie zeigte auch an den Gang der verschiedenen Planeten durch die Himmelszeichen, es war ein Planetenkreis daran. Sie zeigte sogar an — sie ist wirklich wunderbar konstruiert — die beweglichen Feste. Also sie deutete an, wann Ostern in einem bestimmten Jahre war. Sie war zugleich ein Kalender. Man sah den Fortgang von Januar bis Dezember. Die Beweglichkeit von Ostern war eingeschlossen. An einem bestimmten Zeiger sah man, wann Ostern fiel, trotzdem es ein bewegliches Fest ist, ebenso Pfingsten.

Die Uhr war also außerordentlich bedeutsam konstruiert im 15. Jahrhundert. Nun ist ja die Geschichte, wie sie konstruiert worden ist, erforscht. Aber außer dieser erforschten Geschichte, die also dokumentarisch daliegt, die Sie nachlesen können - es gibt ja viele Beschreibungen davon -, gibt es eine Sage, welche versucht, nun auch das Merkwürdige zu erklären, das mit dieser Uhr vorlag, erstens, indem sie eine so wunderbare Konstruktion ist, und auf der anderen Seite das andere zu erklären, nämlich daß diese Uhr, nachdem sie von dem genialen Mann, der sie eben machen konnte, konstruiert war, immer aufgezogen wurde, solange er lebte. Nach seinem Tode konnte keiner die Sache aufziehen, und man suchte überall Leute, die sie herrichten könnten, daß sie ginge. Man erreichte in der Regel nichts, als daß die Betreffenden sie ruinierten. Dann fand sich wiederum einmal der eine oder andere, der sagte, er könne sie zusammenrichten. Er richtete sie auch her, aber die Uhr kam immer wiederum und wiederum in Unordnung.

Diese Tatsachen ergossen sich alle in eine Art von Volkssage, und diese Volkssage ist so: Ein einfacher Mann habe durch eine besondere Himmelsgabe die Fähigkeit bekommen, diese Uhr einmal herzustellen. Nur er allein konnte wissen, wie man diese Uhr behandeln muß. Die Sage legte einen großen Wert darauf, daß es ein einfacher Mann war, der durch eine besondere Gnade das erhalten hat, also Genialität, die ihm von der geistigen Welt kam. Dann aber wollte der Herrscher diese Uhr nur für Prag allein haben, und er wollte es unmöglich machen, daß diese Uhr auch irgendeine andere Stadt haben könnte. Daher ließ er den genialen Uhrmacher, der sie bereitet hatte, blenden, er ließ ihm die Augen ausstechen. Nun zog sich der Betreffende zurück. Nur vor seinem Tode erbat er sich noch einmal nur für einen Augenblick die Gnade, diese Uhr wieder in Ordnung bringen zu können, und diesen Augenblick benützte er dazu - so erzählt die Sage -, durch einen schnellen Handgriff die Uhr in Unordnung zu bringen, so daß keiner sie mehr in Ordnung bringen konnte.

Diese Sage sieht zunächst sehr anspruchslos aus. Aber in dieser Sage lebt so, wie sie konstruiert ist, ein gutes Gefühl von dem Vorhandensein von Ahriman und Luzifer und der Gleichgewichtslage zwischen beiden. Denken Sie, wie feinsinnig diese Sage gebildet ist. Man könnte in unzähligen solcher Volkssagen dieselbe feinsinnige Konstruktion finden. Sie ist nämlich mit einem guten Gefühl für Luzifer und Ahriman gebildet. Zunächst, nicht wahr, die Gleichgewichtslage: der Betreffende bekommt durch einen Gnadenakt der geistigen Welt die Fähigkeit, so etwas Außerordentliches zu konstruieren. Da ist nichts von Egoismus drinnen. Denn, nicht wahr, der Egoismus könnte über jeden kommen. Da ist eine Gnadengabe. Er hat sie wirklich nicht aus seinem Egoismus heraus gemacht. Aber es ist auch nichts von Spintisiererei dabei, denn es wird ausdrücklich gesagt, es war ein einfacher Mann. Mit dieser Beschreibung - daß man also aufmerksam machte auf einen Gnadenakt, also nichts von Egoismus, und es ist ein einfacher Mann, also nichts von Spintisiererei dabei - wollte man andeuten, daß in dem Manne, in des Mannes Seele nichts lebte von Ahriman und Luzifer, sondern daß er ganz unter dem Einflusse guter, fortschreitender göttlicher Mächte war.

In dem Herrscher lebte der Luzifer. Aus dem Egoismus heraus wollte er die Uhr für seine Stadt allein haben, und er blendete also den Mann. Da wird Luzifer auf die eine Seite gestellt. Dadurch aber, daß Luzifer da ist, verbindet er sich immer mit seinem Bruder Ahriman. Und dadurch, daß der Mann geblendet ist, bekommt der andere die Fähigkeit, von außen, durch einen geschickten Griff, zerstörend einzugreifen. Das ist das Werk Ahrimans.

Hier wird also die gute Macht zwischen Luzifer und Ahriman hineingestellt. Diese feinsinnige Konstruktion können Sie bei vielen Volkssagen, bei den einfachsten Volkssagen finden. Aber das Gefühl dafür, daß in das ganze große Leben Ahriman und Luzifer eingreifen, das konnte verlorengehen in der Zeit, in der immer mehr und mehr ein Sinn dafür aufkommen mußte, daß positive und negative Elektrizität, positiver und negativer Magnetismus und so weiter die Grundkräfte der materiellen Welt sind. Daß das naturwissenschaftliche Forschen groß werden konnte, war bedingt dadurch, daß zurücktrat selbst dieses Empfinden für das geistige Durchschauen der Welt.

Wir werden sehen, wie Ahriman und Luzifer eingreifen in dasjenige, was der Mensch Erkennen nennt, was der Mensch überhaupt sein Verhältnis zur Welt nennt, so daß gerade die Verwirrung entsteht, von der wir gesprochen haben. Insbesondere in der Frage, die wir angeregt haben, tritt uns diese Verwirrung ja ganz klar zutage. Setzen wir hypothetisch ein einfaches Beispiel. Dieses Beispiel könnte ich ebensogut von den großen Weltereignissen wie von den alleralltäglichsten Ereignissen genommen haben. Ich werde ein sehr einfaches Beispiel nehmen, könnte es aber ebensogut von dem großen Weltengeschehen hernehmen. Nehmen wir an, drei, vier Menschen richten sich her zur Ausfahrt. Sie wollen irgendeine Fahrt unternehmen durch, sagen wir, einen gebirgigen Einschnitt. Wenn man so durchfährt durch diesen Einschnitt, da ist oben ein überhangender Felsen. Die Leute haben sich hergerichtet zur Ausfahrt, wollen abfahren zu einer bestimmten Zeit. Der Kutscher aber hat sich eben noch ein Seidel bestellt, ein Krügelchen bestellt, und das wird etwas zu spät gebracht. Er versäumt um fünf Minuten die Abfahrtszeit. Dann fährt er ab mit der Gesellschaft. Sie fahren durch die Gebirgsschlucht. Gerade als sie dahin kommen, wo der überhängende Felsen ist, rutscht der Felsen, stürzt auf den Wagen und zerschmettert die ganze Gesellschaft. Sie geht zugrunde. Vielleicht - geht nur die Gesellschaft zugrunde; der Kutscher, der bleibt übrig.

Da haben wir nun solch einen Fall. Da können Sie die Frage aufwerfen: Hat der Kutscher nun die Schuld, oder herrscht da eine absolute Notwendigkeit? War es absolut notwendig, daß diese Leute in diesem Augenblicke betroffen wurden von diesem Unglücke? Und war des Kutschers Saumseligkeit nur eingesponnen in diese Notwendigkeit? Oder könnte man sich der Idee hingeben: wenn der Kutscher nur ordentlich gewesen wäre, so würden sie natürlich, da er ja, während der Felsen rutschte, längst hindurchgefahren wäre, nicht getroffen worden sein.

Da haben Sie mitten im alltäglichen Leben drinnen diese Frage nach Freiheit und Notwendigkeit, die innig zusammenhängt mit «schuldig» oder «unschuldig». Natürlich, wenn alles einer absoluten Notwendigkeit unterliegt, dann kann man von einer Schuld im höheren Sinne bei diesem Kutscher ja gar nicht sprechen, so war es eben notwendig, daß diese Menschen den T‘od erlitten haben.

Diese Frage tritt uns auf Schritt und Tritt im Leben entgegen. Sie gehört, wie gesagt, zu den schwierigsten Fragen, zu den Fragen, in die sich, wenn wir sie lösen wollen, am leichtesten Ahriman und Luzifer einmischen. Zunächst mischt sich Ahriman ein, wenn versucht werden soll, diese Frage zu lösen. Das wird sich uns im Laufe der Betrachtungen ergeben.

Nun müssen wir aber einen ganz anderen Weg einschlagen als den, an den man vielleicht gewöhnlich denkt, wenn man nahekommen will einer Lösung gerade dieser Frage. Sehen Sie, wenn der Mensch sich daran begibt, solch eine Frage zu lösen, wenn er zunächst denkt: Nun ja, das Ereignis, das kann ich verfolgen, der Felsen ist herabgestürzt, das ist geschehen -, wenn er so etwas verfolgt und sich die Frage stellt: Liegt danun Notwendigkeit oder Freiheit zugrunde? Hätte das auch anders sein können? - dann sieht er zunächst nur auf die äußeren Ereignisse. Er sieht die Ereignisse, wie sie vor sich gehen auf dem physischen Plan. Nun, dies tut der Mensch aus demselben Antriebe heraus, aus dem er zum Beispiel der menschlichen Wesenheit gegenüber, wenn er nur materialistisch gesinnt sein kann, bei dem physischen Leib des Menschen stehenbleibt. Nicht wahr, derjenige Mensch, der nichts weiß von Geisteswissenschaft, wird heute zunächst bei dem physischen Leib des Menschen stehenbleiben. Er sagt: Dasjenige, was man am Menschen sieht, erfühlt, das ist eben da. Er geht nicht vom physischen Leib über bis zum sogenannten Ätherleib. Und wenn er ein rechter, starrköpfiger Materialist ist, dann lacht er, höhnt er, wenn davon die Rede ist, daß dem dichten physischen Leib noch ein feinerer Ätherleib zugrunde liegt. Dennoch, Sie wissen, wie gut begründet diese Anschauung ist, daß zunächst dem physischen Leibe neben den anderen Gliedern der menschlichen Natur noch dieser Ätherleib zugrunde liegt, und wir haben uns im Laufe der Jahre daran gewöhnt, zu wissen, daß wir nicht bloß sprechen dürfen von des Menschen physischem Leib, sondern daß wir sprechen müssen auch von des Menschen Ätherleib und so weiter.

Vielleicht haben sich manche von Ihnen aber noch nicht die Frage vorgelegt: Wie ist es denn nun mit der anderen Welt, die außerhalb des Menschen lebt, mit der Welt, in welcher die gewöhnlichen Weltvorgänge sind? Zwar haben wir da auch von vielem gesprochen. Wir haben davon gesprochen, daß der Mensch, wenn er zunächst durch seine physischen Sinne die äußeren Vorgänge des physischen Planes sieht, ja keine Ahnung davon hat, daß wir zunächst überall da, wo wir hinschauen, auch Elementarwesen haben, daß also gewissermaßen da, wo wir hinschauen, die Sache gerade so ist, wie beim Menschen selber. Beim Menschen haben wir den Ätherleib, wir haben ihn ja früher oftmals auch elementarischen Leib genannt. In der Natur draußen, überhaupt im äußeren physischen Geschehen, haben wir die Aufeinanderfolge der physischen Ereignisse, und dann die Welt des elementarischen Daseins. Es geht das ganz parallel: Mensch - physischer Leib, Ätherleib; die physischen Vorgänge, und überall hineinerflossen in die physischen Vorgänge die Geschehnisse innerhalb der elementarischen Welt. Ebenso wahr, wie es höchst einseitig ist, wenn wir beim Menschen sagen, er habe nur den physischen Leib wir müßten sagen, er habe auch seinen Ätherleib -, können wir voraussetzen, daß es ebenso ist bei den äußeren Vorgängen: Was wir hier zunächst mit unseren physischen Sinnen und mit unserem physischen Verstand wahrnehmen, das ist das eine. Dem liegt aber etwas zugrunde, was analog ist dem menschlichen Ätherleib. Jedem äußeren physischen Geschehen liegt wirklich etwas zugrunde, was ein höheres, ein feineres Geschehen ist.

Es gibt Menschen, die haben eine gewisse Empfindung für so etwas. Auf zweifache Weise kann Ihnen diese Empfindung entgegentreten. Sie werden bei sich selber oder bei anderen Menschen schon zum Teil folgendes wahrgenommen haben: ein Mensch hat irgend etwas durchgemacht. Aber nachher kommt er zu Ihnen, oder Sie können es auch selber sein und es sich sagen: Ja, ich habe aber doch das Gefühl, daß während der Zeit, wo sich dies oder jenes jetzt äußerlich mit mir abgespielt hat, mir noch etwas ganz anderes geschehen ist; meinem feineren Menschen ist noch etwas ganz anderes geschehen. - Ich meine, sehen Sie: tiefere Naturen können ein solches Gefühl haben, daß Ereignisse, die sich gar nicht auf dem physischen Plan abspielen, doch für den Fortgang ihres Lebens wichtig sein können. Daß etwas geschehen ist mit ihnen, das ist das eine. Andere Menschen kommen sogar weiter: ihnen zeigen sich solche Dinge symbolisch im Traum. Irgend jemand träumt, daß er dies oder jenes erlebt. Zum Beispiel träumt jemand, er wäre, sagen wir, von einem Felsen erschlagen worden. Er wacht auf. Er kann sich sagen: Das ist ein symbolischer, ein sinnbildlicher Traum; mit meiner Seele ist etwas vorgegangen. Man kann oftmals im Leben bewahrheitet finden, daß da in der Seele etwas vorgegangen ist, was viel mehr ist als dasjenige, was sich eben in der äußeren Welt mit dem betreffenden Menschen auf dem physischen Plane abgespielt hat. Der Mensch kann um eine Stufe höher geschritten sein, sei es in der Erkenntnis, sei es in der Verbesserung seiner Willensnatur, sei es in der Verfeinerung seiner Gefühle und so weiter.

Ich habe in Vorträgen, die vor kurzem hier gehalten worden sind, aufmerksam gemacht, daß der Mensch mit dem, was er mit seinem Ich weiß, eigentlich nur einen Teil dessen weiß, was mit ihm vorgeht, und daß da unten der astralische Leib ein viel, viel wissenderer ist. Sie erinnern sich, wie ich darauf aufmerksam gemacht habe. Der astralische Leib weiß allerdings von vielem, was mit uns vorgeht im Übersinnlichen, was nicht im Sinnlichen vorgeht. Jetzt sind wir von einer anderen Seite darauf geführt, daß im Übersinnlichen fortwährend mit uns etwas vorgeht. So wahr, als, wenn ich eine Hand bewege, die physische Bewegung nur ein Teil des ganzen Prozesses ist und darunter ein ätherischer Prozeß liegt, ein Vorgang meines Ätherleibes, so wahr ist jeder physische Vorgang da draußen durchsetzt von einem feineren elementarischen Vorgang, von etwas, was damit parallel geht und was im Übersinnlichen verläuft. Nicht nur die Wesen sind von einem Übersinnlichen durchdrungen, sondern alles Sein ist von einem Übersinnlichen durchdrungen.

Nun erinnern Sie sich an etwas anderes, worauf ich wiederholt hingewiesen habe, was zum Teil sogar paradox erscheint. Ich habe darauf aufmerksam gemacht, wie im Geistigen oftmals das Gegenteil von dem besteht, was hier im Physischen besteht, nicht immer, aber oftmals, so daß also, wenn hier für das Physische irgend etwas richtig ist, für das Geistige die Wahrheit sich ganz anders ausnehmen kann. Ich sage: nicht immer. Aber ich habe viele Fälle im Laufe der Jahre aufgezählt, wo man sich sagen muß: im Geistigen kommt gerade das Gegenteil von dem heraus, was man hier im Physischen voraussetzen würde.

Mit Bezug auf die übersinnlichen Ereignisse, die parallel laufen den sinnlichen Ereignissen, ist es zuweilen - nun sogar sehr häufig auch so. Und nun muß gefragt werden: wenn wir sehen, eine Gesellschaft hat sich aufgemacht, in eine Kutsche gesetzt, ist gefahren, das Felsstück ist heruntergefallen, hat die Gesellschaft zerschmettert - das ist das physische Ereignis. Diesem physischen Ereignis geht parallel, in ihm drinnen, so wie unser Ätherleib in uns drinnen ist, ein übersinnliches Ereignis. Das muß man nun hinzuerkennen: das kann das genaue Gegenteil sein von dem, was im Physischen hier vorgeht. Und es ist sogar sehr häufig das genaue Gegenteil.

Es ist hier zugleich eine Quelle vieler Verirrungen, wenn man nicht achtgibt. Denn denken Sie, es kann zum Beispiel folgendes passieren. Wenn irgend jemand es zu atavistischem Hellsehen gebracht hat und eine Art second sight, eine Art zweites Gesicht hat, so kann das Folgende mit ihm geschehen : Nehmen wir an, eine Gesellschaft hat sich aufgemacht, aber im letzten Augenblicke entschließt sich jemand, der zu der Gesellschaft gehört, zurück zubleiben. Und das ist gerade, sagen wir, eine Person mit second sight, mit dem zweiten Gesicht. Sie fährt nicht mit, diese Person. Sie zieht sich zurück. Nach einiger Zeit hat sie ein Gesicht. In diesem Gesichte kann sich ihr nun vorstellen irgendein Ereignis. Es kann sich natürlich ebensogut vorstellen, daß die Betreffenden überschüttet worden sind vom Felsen, aber es könnte sich ihr auch vorstellen - das kann von der Disposition abhängen -, zum Beispiel, daß irgend etwas besonders Beglückendes für die Gesellschaft geschehen ist. Das Bild eines besonders für die Gesellschaft beglückenden Ereignisses könnte sich ergeben. Und die betreffende Persönlichkeit könnte nachher hören, daß die Gesellschaft auf die Weise, wie ich es angenommen habe, zugrunde gegangen ist. Das würde dann geschehen, wenn die betreffende Somnambule sehen würde nicht gerade das, was sich auf dem physischen Plane abspielt, was ja auch sein könnte, sondern wenn sie gesehen hätte, was sich als parallel gehendes Ereignis auf der Astralebene abgespielt hat: daß vielleicht diese Personen in dem Momente, wo sie von dem physischen Plane weggegangen sind, zu etwas Besonderem in der geistigen Welt berufen waren, und daß dieses Besondere sie auch mit einem besonderen neuen Leben für die geistige Welt erfüllt. Kurz, das nach einer genau entgegengesetzten Richtung hin gehende Ereignis der übersinnlichen Welten könnte die betreffende Persönlichkeit wahrgenommen haben, und dieses genau Entgegengesetzte könnte dasein. Es könnte in der Tat der Fall sein, daß hier auf dem physischen Plane das Unglück vor sich geht, und dieses Unglück in der übersinnlichen Welt einem großen Glück entspricht für die betreffenden Seelen.

Nun könnte jemand - und es gibt ja solche Leute -, der sich selbst für gescheiter hält als die weise Weltenregierung, sagen: Wenn ich Weltenregierer wäre, so würde ich das nicht so machen, daß ich Seelen zu einem Glück in der geistigen Welt aufrufe und sie hier auf dem physischen Plan mit einem Unglück beehre. Ich würde das besser machen! - Nun ja, solchen Menschen kann man nur immer sagen: Man kann ja begreifen, daß man hier auf dem physischen Plane eben auch von Ahriman verwirrt werden kann. Aber die Weltenweisheit weiß es doch noch immer besser. Was hier vorliegen kann, kann nämlich dieses sein: daß für die Aufgabe, die nun den Seelen erwächst in der geistigen Welt, notwendig ist dieses Erleben hier auf dem physischen Plan, daß sie immer sozusagen zurückblicken zu ihrem irdischen Leben auf dieses physische Ereignis, um aus diesem Anblicke die entsprechenden Kräfte zu gewinnen. Das heißt, es können diese beiden Ereignisse, das physische Ereignis und das geistige Ereignis, notwendig zusammengehören für die Seelen, die das durchlebt haben.

So könnten wir von jeder Art hypothetisch Beispiele dafür anführen, wie hier auf dem physischen Plane etwas vor sich geht und gleichsam ein ätherischer Leib dieses Ereignisses vorhanden ist, ein elementarisches, ein übersinnliches Ereignis, das dazu gehört. Wir müssen nicht nur bei der allgemeinen Behauptung der Pantheisten verharren, indem wir sagen, der physischen Welt liege eine geistige zugrunde, sondern wir müssen ins Konkrete eingehen. Wir müssen uns wirklich auch bei jedem einzelnen physischen Ereignis klar darüber sein: ihm liegt ein geistiges Ereignis zugrunde, ein richtiges geistiges Ereignis, und erst das physische und das geistige Ereignis zusammen bilden das Ganze.

Wenn man nun aber die Geschehnisse auf dem physischen Plan verfolgt, dann kann man sagen: man kommt dazu, diese Geschehnisse auf dem physischen Plan in Gedanken einzuspinnen. Und da kommt man ja wirklich dazu, wenn man auf dem physischen Plane die Ereignisse verfolgt, zu jeder Wirkung eine Ursache zu finden. Das geht schon einmal nicht anders. Überall findet man zu einer Wirkung eine Ursache. Wenn etwas geschehen ist - man wird immer die Ursache finden. Das heißt aber, man findet die Notwendigkeit. Sie könnten an dem einfachen Beispiele, das ich gewählt habe, wenn Sie mit notwendiger Pedanterie vorgehen, sich sagen: Nun ja, diese Gesellschaft war beisammen. Sie hat zwar die Abfahrt sich bestimmt gehabt für eine bestimmte Zeit. Aber wenn ich jetzt verfolge, warum der Kutscher saumselig war, so werde ich verschiedene Ursachenwege verfolgen. Zuerst, nicht wahr, werde ich mir vielleicht den Kutscher selber anschauen, werde mir anschauen, wie er erzogen worden ist, wie er saumselig geworden ist. Dann werde ich mir anschauen die verschiedene Umstände, durch die er sein Krügel zu spät bekommen hat. Ich werde da überall eine bloße Ursachenkette finden können. Ich habe aufzeigen können, wie eins in das andere so eingreift, daß die Sache sich gar nicht anders hätte entwickeln können. Ich werde nach und nach dazu kommen, den freien Willen des Kutschers ganz auszuschalten, denn wenn man zu jeder Wirkung eine Ursache hat, so schaltet sich da alles das, was der betreffende Mensch tut, auch ein. Nicht wahr, der Kutscher hat ja nur deshalb noch ein Krügel gewollt, weil er vielleicht in seiner Jugend zu wenig durchgewichst worden ist. Wenn er mehr durchgewichst worden wäre, wofür er nichts kann, so wäre das nicht so gekommen. Also man kann überall den Zusammenhang von Ursache und Wirkung finden.

Das hängt damit zusammen, daß man überhaupt nur auf dem physischen Plan mit Begriffen etwas anfängt. Denn bedenken Sie nur: wenn Sie etwas begreifen wollen, so muß ein Gedanke aus dem anderen folgen können, das heißt, Sie sind darauf angewiesen, daß Sie ein Glied aus dem anderen entwickeln können. Es liegt in der Natur des Begriffes, daß eins aus dem anderen folgt. Das muß sein.

Aber das, was sich auf dem physischen Plane überschaubar, begriffsmäßig, notwendig zusammenschließen läßt, gleich wird es anders, sobald man in die nächste übersinnliche Welt hinaufkommt. Da hat man es nicht zu tun mit Ursachen und Wirkungen, sondern mit Wesenheiten. Da greifen Wesenheiten ein. In jedem Momente greift eine andere geistige Wesenheit ein oder läßt eine Verrichtung fallen. Da hat man es gar nicht zu tun mit dem, was man so im gewöhnlichen Sinne durch Begriffe verfolgen kann. Wenn Sie nämlich das, was da in der geistigen Welt geschieht, mit Begriffen verfolgen wollten, so könnte das Folgende passieren. Sie könnten nachdenken: Nun also, da stehe ich. Gewiß, ich bin schon so weit, hineinzuschauen, daß da etwas geistig vor sich geht. Bald kommt irgendein Gnomenwesen heran, bald kommt ein Sylphenwesen heran, bald kommt ein anderes Wesen heran. Nun habe ich da die ganze Summe von Wesenheiten. Nun strenge ich mich an, die Wirkungen zu ergründen, die da herauskommen müssen. Freilich, auf dem physischen Plane geht das zuweilen leicht: wenn einer eine Billardkugel so hinstößt, so weiß er, wie die andere fliegt; er kann das herausrechnen. Aber auf dem geistigen Plane kann einem folgendes passieren: Wenn Sie gesehen haben Ihre Wesen und nun wissen: Ah, das ist ein Gnomenwesen, das schickt sich so an, das wird dies tun, das wirkt mit einem anderen zusammen, so muß dieses geschehen. - Nun haben Sie dies ergründet. Im nächsten Augenblick springt ein Wesen hervor und ändert das Ganze, oder ein Wesen, das Sie in Ihre Rechnung einbezogen haben, geht fort, verschwindet, tut nicht mehr mit. Da ist alles auf Wesenheit begründet. Da können Sie gar nicht auf gleiche Weise wie auf dem physischen Plan alles in Ihre Begriffe einspinnen. Das ist ganz unmöglich. Da gibt es nicht Erklären einer Sache nach der anderen aus dem Begriffe heraus. Ganz andere Art und Weise des Zusammenwirkens geschieht in dieser geistigen Welt, in dieser, den physischen Ereignissen parallelgehenden Folge oder Strömung der geistigen Ereignisse.

Damit muß man sich bekannt machen, daß unserer Welt eine solche zugrunde liegt, für die wir nicht nur voraussetzen müssen, daß sie unserer Welt gegenüber eine geistige ist, sondern für die wir voraussetzen müssen, daß eine ganz andere Art des Zusammenhanges in den Geschehnissen ist: daß wir mit der Art, die wir gewohnt sind für unsere Begriffswelt, mit der wir erklären und beweisen, gar nichts machen können da drinnen in der geistigen Welt, im einzelnen Konkreten dieser geistigen Welt.

So sehen wir, wie zwei Welten sich durchdringen: die eine Welt, welche in Begriffe eingesponnen werden kann, die andere Welt, welche nicht in Begriffe eingesponnen werden kann, sondern nur angeschaut werden kann. Was ich damit andeute, das geht sehr weit. Aber die Menschen sind nicht aufmerksam darauf, wie weit das geht. Denken Sie nur einmal, wenn jemand glaubt, er könne alles beweisen und nur das Beweisbare gilt, so kann er ja in den folgenden Fall kommen. Er kann sagen: Nun ja, alles muß bewiesen werden, und was nicht bewiesen ist, das gilt nicht. Also muß} man im Verlauf der Weltgeschichte alles beweisen können. Also muß ich nur meine Gedanken gründlich anstrengen, dann werde ich beweisen können müssen zum Beispiel, ob es ein Mysterium von Golgatha gegeben hat oder nicht! Und es liegt den Menschen in der heutigen Zeit so unendlich nahe, zu sagen: Wenn man nicht beweisen kann, daß es ein Mysterium von Golgatha gegeben hat, dann ist das eben ein Unsinn, dann hat es kein Mysterium von Golgatha gegeben.

Was meinen die Menschen aber von den Beweisen? Sie meinen, man geht von einem bestimmten Begriffe aus und immer zu anderen Begriffen über, und wenn das so möglich ist, dann hat man es eben bewiesen. Aber diesen Beweisen folgt keine andere Welt als nur die physische Welt. Eine andere Welt folgt dieser Beweisführung gar nicht. Denn könnte man beweisen, mit Notwendigkeit beweisen, daß ein Mysterium von Golgatha hat stattfinden müssen, würde das aus unseren Begriffen folgen können, dann wäre das ja keine freie Tat! Dann hätte ja Christus von dem Kosmos aus auf die Erde kommen müssen, weil es ihm die menschlichen Begriffe einfach beweisen, befehlen dadurch. Das Mysterium von Golgatha muß aber eine freie Tat sein, das heißt, es muß eine Tat sein, die sich eben gerade nicht beweisen läßt. Es kommt darauf an, daß man das einmal durchschaut.

Ebenso ist es ja schließlich damit, wenn die Menschen beweisen wollen, Gott habe einmal die Welt erschaffen, oder: er habe sie nicht erschaffen. Das spinnen sie auch in ihren Begriffen fort. Aber «die Welt erschaffen» wird doch wenigstens eine freie Tat der göttlichen Wesenheit sein! Woraus folgt, daß man sie nicht aus der Notwendigkeit der Begriffsfolge beweisen kann, daß man sie schauen muß, wenn man darauf kommen will.

Also, es ist etwas sehr Bedeutsames damit gesagt, daß in der nächsten Welt schon, welche die unsere als eine übersinnliche durchdringt, gar nicht diejenige Ordnung herrscht, die wir mit Begriffen und ihrer Beweiskraft durchdringen können, sondern daß da ein Schauen Platz greift, in dem eine ganz andere Ordnung zu den Ereignissen waltet.

Heute möchte ich nur noch dieses mit ein paar Worten sagen. Ich habe hier zu Weihnachten darauf aufmerksam gemacht, wie gerade in unserer Zeit solche gegensätzliche Dinge auftreten, an denen das menschliche Denken sich verwirrt. Denken Sie doch nur einmal, daß jetzt ein Buch erschienen ist von dem als Naturforscher so großen Ernst Haeckel: «Ewigkeitsgedanken». Ich habe schon darauf aufmerksam gemacht. Diese «Ewigkeitsgedanken» enthalten genau das Gegenteil von dem, wozu viele andere Menschen jetzt aus einem tiefen Mitempfinden mit den Weltereignissen kommen. Denken Sie doch, daß es heute viele Menschen gibt - wir werden über dieses Faktum gerade in unseren jetzigen Zusammenhängen noch zu sprechen haben, ich wollte heute nur eine Einleitung geben -, daß es viele Menschen gibt, die gerade aus der Tatsache heraus, die jetzt in so furchtbarer, in so überwältigender Art auf unsere Seelen wirkt, aus dieser Weltentatsache heraus wiederum zu einer Vertiefung ihres seelisch-religiösen Empfindens gekommen sind, viele Menschen, weil sie sich sagen: Läge unserer physischen Welt nicht eine übersinnliche Ordnung zugrunde, wie könnte sich dann erklären dasjenige, was in der Gegenwart geschieht? Zu einer religiösen Empfindung sind wieder viele . gekommen. Ich brauche Ihnen den Gedankengang nicht vorzuhalten; er liegt so nahe, und er ist heute bei so vielen bemerkbar.

Haeckel kommt zu einem anderen Gedankengange. Er spricht das in seinem Büchelchen aus, das eben erschienen ist: Da glauben die Menschen an Unsterblichkeit der Seele. Die gegenwärtigen Ereignisse beweisen ja klar, daß solch ein Glaube an die Unsterblichkeit der Seele eine Unmöglichkeit ist, denn wir sehen täglich Tausende durch den reinen Zufall zugrunde gehen. Wie kann denn da noch ein vernünftiger Mensch glauben, daß gegenüber solchen Ereignissen irgend die Rede von der Unsterblichkeit der Seele sein könne. Wie kann da eine höhere Ordnung drinnen sein? - Für Haeckel ist also dasjenige, was jetzt in so erschütternder Weise geschieht, ein Beweis für sein Dogma, daß man von einer Unsterblichkeit der Seele nicht sprechen könne. Da haben Sie wiederum Antinomien: ein großer Teil der Menschheit vertieft sich religiös, aber an demselben Ereignisse veroberflächlicht sich Haeckel religiös in ungeheurer Weise.

Alle diese Dinge hängen damit zusammen, daß die Menschen es heute zu keiner Klarheit bringen können über den Zusammenhang zwischen der Welt, die ihren Sinnen und ihrem an das Gehirn gebundenen Verstand vorliegt, und der Welt, die als eine übersinnliche zugrunde liegt, daß sie, sobald sie an diese Dinge herankommen, mit ihrem Denken in die Verwirrung hineinkommen. Diese unsere Zeit wird aber noch trotz allem, was sie auch an Enttäuschendem bietet, doch in gewissem Sinne eine Vertiefung der Seele bringen, doch eine Umkehr vom Materialismus bringen. Aber es wird schon notwendig sein, daß aus der reinen Anstrengung der Seele heraus, die sich der unbefangenen Forschung der Welt hingibt, daß aus dieser Anschauung herausein Wissen entsteht von der Ergänzung der sinnlichen Ereignisse durch die übersinnlichen Ereignisse, und daß wenigstens eine kleine Schar von Menschen da ist, welche vermag vorauszusetzen, daß all die Leiden, all die Schmerzen, die gegenwärtig auf dem physischen Plane durchgemacht werden, im Gesamtfortschritt der Menschheit die eine Seite einer anderen, einer übersinnlichen Seite sind.

Wir haben von den verschiedensten Seiten her auf diese übersinnliche Seite schon hingewiesen. Wir werden es noch von anderen Gesichtspunkten aus tun. Aber immer wieder wird uns das entgegentreten, daß da sein muß, wenn Europas blutgedüngter Boden wiederum Frieden haben wird, eine Schar von Menschen, welche imstande ist, zu hören, geistig zu hören, geistig zu ahnen das, was dann aus den geistigen Welten zu der wiederum den Frieden erlebenden Menschheit wird gesprochen werden. Denn es wird wahr, tief wahr sein und sich als Wahrheit bewähren, was wir jetzt oftmals und immer wieder und wiederum uns in die Seele schreiben müssen.

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.

First Lecture

Now that we are able to be together again, it will be my task to speak about important, albeit somewhat difficult questions concerning human life and the life of the world—questions whose consideration cannot, of course, be concluded in this lecture, but can only be introduced. In the course of this discussion, it will become clear how infinitely important these questions are in relation to a spiritual connection with the great events that are so moving humanity today. If I were to summarize in two abstract words what I am to speak to you about during this time, I could summarize it in the two words: “the necessity of world and human events” and “human freedom within world and human events.”

There is hardly a person who is not more or less intensively concerned with these questions, and there are perhaps hardly any events on the physical plane that suggest concern with these questions as much as those that are now sweeping through the souls of the peoples of Europe. When we look at world events and our own actions, feelings, desires, and thoughts within world events, and when we look at them first in connection with what we call the divine, wise world government, we say to ourselves that this wise world government reigns in everything. And when we look at something that has happened, something in which we ourselves may have been involved, we can ask ourselves afterwards: Was what happened, in which we ourselves were involved, so justified within the whole wise world government that we can say it was necessary, that it could not have happened any other way, and that we ourselves could not have acted differently within this event? Or can we say, when we look more to the future: Will this or that happen at this or that time in the future, which we believe we might be involved in? Must we not assume, in view of the wise world government we presuppose, that what happens in the future is also necessary, or, as is often said, foreseen? But can our freedom exist in this? Can we decide that we want to intervene in some way through the ideas and skills we have acquired? Can the way we intervene change what we perhaps do not want to happen in the way it would happen if we did not intervene?

When people look back more on the past, they are more impressed by the idea that everything was necessary and could not have happened differently. When people look more to the future, they are more impressed by the idea that it must be possible for them, as human beings, to intervene with their will where they are allowed to do so. In short, humans will always find themselves in a kind of conflict between the assumption of an unconditional necessity that pervades all things and, on the other hand, the necessary prerequisite of freedom, without which they cannot actually exist in their worldview, because otherwise they would have to assume that they are woven into the great machinery of existence like a kind of wheel, which is determined by the powers that govern this machinery in such a way that even the actions of its wheel-like existence are predetermined.

You also know that the conflict of choosing one or the other runs through all of humanity's intellectual endeavors, that there have always been philosophers, called determinists, who assumed that everything that happens, in which we are entangled with our actions and our will, is strictly predetermined, that there have been indeterminists who assumed the opposite: that man can intervene in the course of development through his will, through his ideas. You also know that the extreme form of determinism is fatalism, which adheres so strictly to a spiritual necessity that pervades the world that it presupposes that nothing, absolutely nothing, can happen in any other way than it is predetermined, and that man must only passively submit to the fate that has been poured out upon the world by the fact that everything is predetermined.

Perhaps some of you also know that Kant drew up a table of antinomies in which he always placed a certain assertion on one side and its opposite on the other, for example, on one side the assertion: “The world is infinite in space,” and on the other side the assertion: “The world is finite in space,” and that he then showed that one can prove one just as well as the other with the concepts available to humans. In the same sense, one can strictly prove: The world is infinite in space or time—or: The world is finite in space, limited, enclosed by boards, and in time it had a beginning.

This question, which we have just touched upon, also belongs to the questions that Kant wrote in his table of antinomies. He knew, therefore, and made people aware of the fact that it can be proven just as rigorously, truly rigorously, as can be proven by strict logic alone, that all world events, including human events, are subject to rigid necessity, just as it can be proven just as rigorously that human beings are free beings and that they determine the things in which he intervenes with his will, are somehow determined by his will. Kant considered these questions to be undecidable for human knowledge, questions that go beyond the limits of human knowledge, because one can prove one thing just as strictly as its opposite with human means.

Now, in the discussions we have had over the years, you already have, so to speak, the foundations for getting to the bottom of this strange mystery that we are faced with. For one really wants to say: The question of whether human beings are caught up in a necessity or whether they are free is indeed mysterious. This question is mysterious. But even more puzzling is the fact that both can be strictly proven. You will not find any basis for overcoming doubt in this area if you seek this basis outside of what we call spiritual science. Only within the basis provided by spiritual science can one learn something about this mystery, about this enigma that actually underlies the questions mentioned above.

We will proceed very slowly in our considerations this time. I would just like to say in advance: How is it possible that something like this can happen, that a human being can prove one thing and its opposite? When we are introduced to such a thing, we become aware of a certain limitation of ordinary human understanding, of ordinary human logic. But we are also made aware of this limitation of human logic in many other things. It always arises wherever human beings attempt to approach the infinite with their concepts.

I can show you this with a very simple example. As soon as human beings attempt to approach the infinite with their concepts, something occurs that can be called confusion in the concepts. I will clarify this with a very simple example. You just need to follow me patiently through a train of thought that may be unfamiliar to you. Imagine that I write the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and so on on the board. I could write them down indefinitely: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and so on. Now I can write down a second row of numbers: to the right of each number I have written down, I write down its double, i.e.:

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Now I can write again to infinity. But you will agree with me that every number on the right is also in the left row. I can underline 2, 4, 6, 8, and so on. Now look at the left row of numbers: there are an infinite number of possibilities. These infinite numbers contain exactly the numbers that are on the right in the right-hand row: 2, 4, 6, and so on. I can underline more and more. If you take the underlined numbers in the left-hand row, these underlined numbers are always exactly half of all the numbers. Every second number is underlined. But if I now write them on the right, I can continue with 2, 4, 6, 8, and so on to infinity. I have infinity on the left and infinity on the right, and you cannot say that I have fewer numbers on the right than on the left. There is no question that I must have exactly as many numbers on the right as on the left. And yet, since all the numbers on the left can be created by crossing them out, the infinity on the left is only half of the infinity on the right. It is quite clear: I have exactly as many numbers on the right, namely an infinite number, as on the left, because each number on the right corresponds to a number on the left—and yet the number of numbers on the right can only be half of the number on the left.

There is no question that as soon as one enters the realm of infinity, one's thinking becomes confused. The question that arises here cannot be resolved, because it is just as true that there are half as many numbers on the right as on the left as it is true that there are exactly as many numbers on the right as on the left. Here you have it in its simplest form.

This leads people in a certain way to say to themselves about their concepts: So I cannot actually apply them to the infinite, to that which goes beyond the sensory world—and the infinite goes beyond the sensory world—I cannot apply them to the infinite. Believe that you cannot apply them not only to the unlimited infinite, but also to the limited infinite, because the same confusion arises in the limited infinite.

Imagine you are drawing a triangle, a square, a pentagon, a hexagon, and so on. When you reach a hundred-sided polygon, you will already be very close to a circle. You will no longer be able to distinguish the small lines from each other, especially if you move far away. You can therefore say: A circle is a polygon with an infinite number of sides. If you have a small circle, there are infinitely many sides inside it; if you have a circle twice as large, there are also infinitely many sides inside it – and yet exactly twice as many! So you don't need to go to the unlimited infinite, but if you take a small circle that has an infinite number of sides and a circle twice as large that also has an infinite number of sides, you can already encounter something in the manageable infinite that completely confuses your concepts. What I have just said is extremely important. For people do not realize that they have only a certain field, namely the field of the physical plane, for the concepts that are applicable, and that this must be so for a certain reason.

You see, in a place where we are now being confronted a little sharply—which is now the case in many places, with many people—a pastor gave a speech against our spiritual science, which he concluded, because he believed that it would be particularly effective, with a quote from Matthias Claudius. This saying by Matthias Claudius roughly means that human beings are actually poor sinners and cannot know much at all, and that they should be modest about what they know and not search for what they cannot know. The man chose this verse from a poem by Matthias Claudius because he thought he could attribute to us that we wanted to go beyond the sensory world, but Matthias Claudius had already said that man is a vain sinner who cannot go beyond this sensory world.

Yes, “by chance,” as one might say, a friend of ours looked up this poem by Matthias Claudius and also read the preceding verse. The verse immediately preceding it says that man can go out into the field and, even though the moon is always a full disc, he sees only part of the moon when it is not full, while the other part is still there, and so there are many things in the world which, if one looks at them at the right moment, one can know are there. And since Matthias Claudius wanted to point out that one should not limit oneself to what is immediately apparent to the senses, but that a poor sinner is one who allows himself to be deceived by what the senses immediately reveal, what the good man quoted from Matthias Claudius fell back on himself.

The sensory world—if we are not just like this pastor—sometimes draws our attention to the fact that when we turn our gaze somewhere, we must also turn it to the other side and correct one side with the other. However, with regard to that which lies beyond the sensory world, there is no immediate correction by the sensory world. One cannot immediately point to the other verse, and therefore it happens that people then philosophize freely and, of course, must be convinced that this is true, because it can be proven strictly logically. But the opposite can also be proven strictly logically. For we can ask ourselves the question today, and all the considerations we are now making will then answer this question more precisely: Why is it that when we go beyond the sensory world, our thinking becomes so confused? Where does it come from that we can prove one thing and its opposite? We will find how this is connected with the fact that human life is placed as if in the middle, as if in a state of equilibrium between two opposing forces, between the Ahrimanic and the Luciferic forces.

Certainly, one can reflect on freedom and necessity, and one can believe that there is compelling proof that there is only one necessity in the world. But the compelling nature of this proof has been brought about by Ahriman. On the one hand, when one proves one thing, it is always Ahriman who seduces one; and when one proves the other, it is always Lucifer who seduces one. For we are always exposed to these two powers, and if we do not take into account that we are placed between these two powers, we will never understand where such conflicts in human nature, such as the one we have seen, come from.

Now, however, even the feeling that, in the whole world order, alongside the state of equilibrium, there is also the swing of the pendulum to the right and to the left, the Ahrimanic and the Luciferic swing, has been lost in the 19th century. This feeling has completely died out. Today, you are basically considered to be mentally unsound if you talk about Ahriman and Lucifer, aren't you? It only became that bad in the middle of the 19th century, because a very spiritual philosopher, Thrandorff, wrote a very nice piece here in Berlin in the middle of the 19th century in which he tried to refute the statements of a clergyman. A clergyman had spread the idea—hopefully we can say this in our circles—that there is no devil and that it is actually a terrible superstition to speak of a devil. We speak of Ahriman. The philosopher Thrandorff took up the cudgels against the clergyman in a very interesting piece of writing: “The Devil—No Dogmatic Fantasy.” Even in the mid-1950s, he attempted to prove the existence of Ahriman in a strictly philosophical manner.

I hope that in the course of the public lectures I will be giving here in the near future, I will be able to speak about this faded tone in spiritual life, about theosophy, which disappeared completely in the middle of the 19th century. People had been talking about these things until the middle of the 19th century, albeit under a different name. The feeling itself has been lost, but this feeling was basically present in a subtle way until the 14th and 15th centuries, when it naturally had to recede into the background for a time. We know, as I have often emphasized, that spiritual science in no way denies the great value and significance of the scientific revolution. But the fact that this scientific upsurge could come about was due to the loss of the sense, the feeling for this opposition, which can only be found in the spiritual realm, between Ahriman and Lucifer. Now they must reappear above the threshold of human consciousness. A subtle feeling was present until well into the 15th century.

I would like to show you an example of how things developed in relation to Ahriman and Lucifer when there was only a feeling left that these were two powers at work. I will explain this with an example:

In Prague, at the Old Town Hall, there is a very remarkable clock that was built in the 15th century. This clock is truly a marvel. Outwardly, it looks like a kind of sundial, but it is so complicated that the hours are displayed in two ways, according to the old Bohemian time and according to the newer time reckoning. The sequence of hours in the old Bohemian way went from 1 or O to 24, and the other, later time only up to 12. At sunset, the shadow pointer—there was a shadow—always stood at 1. And the clock was set up so that the pointer always stood at 1 at sunset. So despite all the differences in sunset times, the pointer always stood at 1.

This clock also indicated when a solar or lunar eclipse was about to occur. It also showed the movement of the various planets through the signs of the zodiac; it was a planetary circle. It even indicated—it is truly wonderfully constructed—the movable feasts. In other words, it indicated when Easter was in a given year. It was also a calendar. You could see the progression from January to December. The mobility of Easter was included. A specific hand showed when Easter fell, even though it is a movable feast, as was Pentecost.

The clock was therefore of extraordinary significance in the 15th century. Now, the history of how it was constructed has been researched. But apart from this researched history, which is documented and which you can read about – there are many descriptions of it – there is a legend that attempts to explain the strange things about this clock, firstly, that it is such a wonderful construction, and secondly, namely that this clock, after it had been constructed by the ingenious man who was able to make it, always kept running as long as he lived. After his death, no one could wind it up, and people searched everywhere for someone who could fix it so that it would work. As a rule, they achieved nothing except that those concerned ruined it. Then, once again, one or the other person came along who said he could fix it. He repaired it, but the clock always broke down again and again.

These facts all poured into a kind of folk tale, and this folk tale is as follows: A simple man had received a special gift from heaven that enabled him to make this clock. Only he alone knew how to handle this clock. The legend placed great emphasis on the fact that it was a simple man who had received this special gift, this genius that came to him from the spiritual world. But then the ruler wanted this clock for Prague alone, and he wanted to make it impossible for any other city to have it. So he had the ingenious clockmaker who had made it blinded, he had his eyes gouged out. The man then withdrew. Only before his death did he ask for one last moment to be allowed to repair the clock, and he used this moment, according to the legend, to quickly tamper with the clock so that no one could ever repair it again.

At first glance, this legend seems very unpretentious. But the way it is constructed conveys a strong sense of the existence of Ahriman and Lucifer and the balance between them. Think how subtly this legend is constructed. One could find the same subtle construction in countless such folk tales. It is formed with a good sense of Lucifer and Ahriman. First of all, there is the balance: through an act of grace from the spiritual world, the person in question is given the ability to construct something extraordinary. There is nothing selfish about it. For, you see, egoism could come over anyone. This is a gift of grace. He really did not do it out of egoism. But there is also nothing of speculation in it, for it is expressly stated that he was a simple man. With this description—that attention was drawn to an act of grace, that there was no selfishness involved, and that he was a simple man, so there was no speculation involved—the intention was to imply that nothing of Ahriman and Lucifer lived in this man, in his soul, but that he was entirely under the influence of good, progressive divine powers.

Lucifer lived in the ruler. Out of selfishness, he wanted the clock for his city alone, and so he blinded the man. Lucifer is placed on one side. But because Lucifer is there, he always connects with his brother Ahriman. And because the man is blinded, the other gains the ability to intervene destructively from outside through a skillful maneuver. That is the work of Ahriman.

Here, then, the good power between Lucifer and Ahriman is placed. You can find this subtle construction in many folk tales, even the simplest ones. But the feeling that Ahriman and Lucifer intervene in the whole of life could be lost in a time when it became increasingly necessary to understand that positive and negative electricity, positive and negative magnetism, and so on, are the fundamental forces of the material world. The fact that scientific research was able to flourish was due to the fact that even this sense of spiritual insight into the world receded.

We will see how Ahriman and Lucifer intervene in what man calls knowledge, in what man calls his relationship to the world, so that the confusion we have spoken of arises. This confusion becomes particularly clear in the question we have raised. Let us take a simple hypothetical example. I could just as easily have taken this example from major world events as from the most everyday occurrences. I will take a very simple example, but I could just as easily have taken it from major world events. Let us assume that three or four people are getting ready to set off on a journey. They want to take a trip through, say, a mountainous gorge. As you drive through this gorge, there is an overhanging rock above you. The people have got ready to set off and want to leave at a certain time. But the coachman has just ordered a mug of beer, and it is brought a little too late. He misses the departure time by five minutes. Then he drives off with the passengers. They drive through the mountain gorge. Just as they reach the overhanging rock, it slips, crashes onto the carriage and smashes the whole party to pieces. They are destroyed. Perhaps only the passengers are destroyed; the coachman survives.

So we have such a case. You may ask the question: Is the coachman to blame, or is there an absolute necessity? Was it absolutely necessary that these people were struck by this misfortune at that moment? And was the coachman's sluggishness merely woven into this necessity? Or could one entertain the idea that if the coachman had been more careful, they would not have been hit, since he would have passed by long before the rock slid down?

Here, in the midst of everyday life, we encounter this question of freedom and necessity, which is intimately connected with “guilty” or “innocent.” Of course, if everything is subject to absolute necessity, then one cannot speak of guilt in the higher sense in the case of this coachman; it was simply necessary that these people should suffer death.

This question confronts us at every turn in life. As I said, it is one of the most difficult questions, one of those questions in which, if we want to solve them, Ahriman and Lucifer most easily interfere. First, Ahriman interferes when an attempt is made to solve this question. This will become clear to us in the course of our considerations.

Now, however, we must take a completely different path than the one we might normally think of when we want to come closer to a solution to this particular question. You see, when a person sets out to solve such a question, when he first thinks: Well, I can follow the event, the rock fell down, that happened — when he follows something like that and asks himself the question: Is there necessity or freedom underlying this? Could it have been different? — then he looks only at the external events. He sees the events as they unfold on the physical plane. Now, human beings do this out of the same impulse that causes them, for example, to remain at the level of the physical body when they are materialistic in their thinking about human nature. Isn't it true that people who know nothing about spiritual science today will initially remain at the level of the physical body of the human being? He says: What you see and feel in a human being is simply there. He does not go beyond the physical body to the so-called etheric body. And if he is a true, stubborn materialist, he laughs and scoffs when someone talks about a finer etheric body underlying the dense physical body. Nevertheless, you know how well-founded this view is, that in addition to the other members of human nature, this etheric body also underlies the physical body, and over the years we have become accustomed to knowing that we cannot merely speak of the physical body of the human being, but that we must also speak of the etheric body of the human being, and so on.

Perhaps some of you have not yet asked yourselves the question: What about the other world that lives outside of human beings, the world in which the ordinary world processes take place? We have spoken about this at length. We have said that when human beings first perceive the external processes of the physical plane through their physical senses, they have no idea that everywhere they look there are also elemental beings, that in a sense, wherever we look, things are just as they are within human beings themselves. In humans, we have the etheric body, which we have often called the elemental body. In nature outside, in the external physical world, we have the succession of physical events, and then the world of elemental existence. These run completely parallel: the human being — the physical body, the etheric body; the physical processes, and everywhere flowing into the physical processes the events within the elemental world. Just as it is highly one-sided to say that human beings have only a physical body — we would have to say that they also have an etheric body — so we can assume that the same is true of external processes: what we perceive here with our physical senses and our physical mind is one thing. But underlying this is something analogous to the human etheric body. Every external physical event is really based on something that is a higher, finer event.

There are people who have a certain sensitivity to such things. This sensitivity can manifest itself in two ways. You will have noticed the following, either in yourself or in other people: a person has gone through something. But afterwards they come to you, or you may say to yourself: Yes, but I have the feeling that during the time when this or that was happening to me outwardly, something quite different was happening to me; something quite different was happening to my finer human being. I mean, you see, deeper natures can have the feeling that events that do not take place on the physical plane can nevertheless be important for the continuation of their lives. That something has happened to them is one thing. Other people go even further: such things appear to them symbolically in dreams. Someone dreams that they experience this or that. For example, someone dreams that they have been struck by a rock. They wake up. They can say to themselves: That is a symbolic, allegorical dream; something has happened to my soul. One can often find confirmation in life that something has happened in the soul that is much more than what has just happened in the outer world with the person concerned on the physical plane. The person may have advanced one step higher, whether in knowledge, in the improvement of their will, in the refinement of their feelings, and so on.

In lectures given here recently, I pointed out that what a person knows with their ego is actually only a part of what is going on within them, and that the astral body below is much, much more knowledgeable. You will remember how I drew your attention to this. The astral body knows a great deal about what is happening to us in the supersensible realm, which is not happening in the sensory realm. Now we are led from another angle to the conclusion that something is constantly happening to us in the supersensible realm. Just as when I move a hand, the physical movement is only part of the whole process and there is an etheric process underneath, a process of my etheric body, so every physical process out there is permeated by a finer elemental process, by something that runs parallel to it and takes place in the supersensible world. Not only are beings permeated by the supersensible, but all existence is permeated by the supersensible.

Now remember something else that I have repeatedly pointed out, which in part even seems paradoxical. I have drawn attention to how in the spiritual realm the opposite often exists to what exists here in the physical realm, not always, but often, so that if something is true for the physical realm, the truth can appear quite different for the spiritual realm. I say: not always. But I have listed many cases over the years where one must say: in the spiritual realm, the exact opposite of what one would assume here in the physical realm emerges.

With regard to the supersensible events that run parallel to the sensory events, this is sometimes—indeed, very often—the case. And now we must ask: when we see that a group of people has set out, got into a carriage, driven off, and the rock has fallen down and crushed the group—that is the physical event. Parallel to this physical event, within it, just as our etheric body is within us, there is a supersensible event. We must now acknowledge that this can be the exact opposite of what is happening here in the physical realm. And it is very often the exact opposite.

This is also a source of much confusion if one is not careful. For consider, for example, that the following might happen. If someone has attained atavistic clairvoyance and has a kind of second sight, the following might happen to them: Let us suppose that a group of people has set out on a journey, but at the last moment someone who belongs to the group decides to stay behind. And let's say this is a person with second sight, with a second vision. This person does not go with the others. They withdraw. After some time, they see a face. In this vision, they can now imagine some kind of event. Of course, they could just as easily imagine that the people concerned have been buried under a rock, but they could also imagine—depending on their disposition—that something particularly happy has happened to the group. The image of an event that is particularly happy for the group could emerge. And the person in question could later hear that the company was destroyed in the way I have assumed. This would happen if the somnambulist did not see exactly what was happening on the physical plane, which could also be the case, but if she had seen what was happening as a parallel event on the astral plane: that perhaps at the moment when they left the physical plane, these persons were called to something special in the spiritual world, and that this special thing also filled them with a special new life for the spiritual world. In short, the personality in question could have perceived the event in the supersensible worlds, which was going in exactly the opposite direction, and this exact opposite could exist. It could indeed be the case that here on the physical plane misfortune is taking place, and that this misfortune corresponds to great happiness for the souls concerned in the supersensible world.

Now someone—and there are such people—who considers himself smarter than the wise world government might say: If I were the ruler of the world, I would not do this, calling souls to happiness in the spiritual world and honoring them here on the physical plane with misfortune. I would do it better! Well, to such people one can only say: It is understandable that here on the physical plane one can be confused by Ahriman. But world wisdom knows better. What may be the case here is that for the task that now arises for souls in the spiritual world, it is necessary for them to experience this here on the physical plane, so that they always look back, as it were, to their earthly life, to this physical event, in order to gain the corresponding forces from this view. This means that these two events, the physical event and the spiritual event, must necessarily belong together for the souls who have lived through them.

We could hypothetically give examples of how something happens here on the physical plane and how, at the same time, an etheric body of this event exists, an elemental, supersensible event that belongs to it. We must not merely adhere to the general assertion of the pantheists that the physical world is based on a spiritual world, but we must go into concrete details. We must be clear about this in every single physical event: it is based on a spiritual event, a real spiritual event, and only the physical and spiritual events together form the whole.

But if we follow events on the physical plane, we can say that we come to weave these events on the physical plane into our thoughts. And when we follow events on the physical plane, we really do come to find a cause for every effect. There is no other way. Everywhere you find a cause for an effect. When something has happened, you will always find the cause. But that means you find the necessity. Using the simple example I have chosen, if you proceed with necessary pedantry, you could say: Well, this society was together. It had decided on a departure time. But if I now investigate why the coachman was slow, I will pursue various causal paths. First, perhaps I will look at the coachman himself, see how he was brought up, how he became slow. Then I will look at the various circumstances that caused him to receive his mug too late. I will be able to find a simple chain of causes everywhere. I will be able to show how one thing influences another in such a way that the matter could not have developed any differently. Gradually, I will come to completely eliminate the coachman's free will, because if there is a cause for every effect, then everything that the person in question does also comes into play. Isn't it true that the coachman only wanted another mug because he was perhaps not sufficiently disciplined in his youth? If he had been more disciplined, which is not his fault, this would not have happened. So you can find the connection between cause and effect everywhere.

This has to do with the fact that we only deal with concepts on the physical plane. Just think about it: if you want to understand something, one thought must follow from another, which means that you are dependent on being able to develop one link from another. It is in the nature of concepts that one follows from another. That is how it has to be.

But what can be clearly understood, conceptualized, and necessarily linked together on the physical plane immediately becomes different as soon as one ascends to the next supersensible world. There one has nothing to do with causes and effects, but with beings. There beings intervene. At every moment, a different spiritual being intervenes or abandons an activity. There, one has nothing to do with what can be traced in the ordinary sense through concepts. For if you wanted to trace what happens in the spiritual world with concepts, the following could happen. You might think: Well, here I am. Certainly, I am already able to see that something spiritual is going on. Soon a gnome-like being approaches, then a sylph-like being, then another being. Now I have the whole sum of beings. Now I try hard to fathom the effects that must come out of this. Of course, on the physical plane this is sometimes easy: if someone hits a billiard ball, they know how the other one will fly; they can calculate it. But on the spiritual plane, the following can happen: If you have seen your beings and now know: Ah, that is a gnome being, it is preparing to do this, it will do that, it will interact with another, so this must happen. Now you have figured this out. The next moment, a being jumps out and changes the whole thing, or a being that you included in your calculations goes away, disappears, no longer participates. Everything is based on beings. You cannot spin everything into your concepts in the same way as on the physical plane. That is completely impossible. There is no explaining one thing after another based on concepts. A completely different kind of interaction takes place in this spiritual world, in this sequence or stream of spiritual events that runs parallel to physical events.

We must familiarize ourselves with the fact that our world is based on something for which we must not only assume that it is spiritual in relation to our world, but also that there is a completely different kind of connection between events: that we cannot do anything with the way we are accustomed to thinking, with which we explain and prove things, in the spiritual world, in the individual concrete details of this spiritual world.

Thus we see how two worlds interpenetrate: one world that can be woven into concepts, the other world that cannot be woven into concepts but can only be viewed. What I am suggesting here goes very far. But people are not aware of how far it goes. Just think, if someone believes that they can prove everything and that only what can be proven is valid, then they can end up in the following situation. They can say: Well, everything must be proven, and what cannot be proven is not valid. So, in the course of world history, everything must be provable. So I only have to strain my mind thoroughly, and then I will be able to prove, for example, whether or not there was a mystery of Golgotha! And it is so infinitely easy for people today to say: If you cannot prove that there was a mystery of Golgotha, then it is nonsense, then there was no mystery of Golgotha.

But what do people mean by proof? They mean that you start with a certain concept and move on to other concepts, and if that is possible, then you have proven it. But no world other than the physical world follows this proof. Another world does not follow this line of reasoning at all. For if one could prove, prove with necessity, that a mystery of Golgotha had to take place, if that could follow from our concepts, then it would not be a free act! Then Christ would have had to come to earth from the cosmos because human concepts simply prove it, command it. But the mystery of Golgotha must be a free act, that is, it must be an act that cannot be proven. It is important to understand this once and for all.

The same is true, after all, when people want to prove that God once created the world, or that he did not create it. They spin this out in their concepts. But “creating the world” must at least be a free act of the divine being! From this it follows that it cannot be proven from the necessity of the sequence of concepts, that it must be seen if one wants to arrive at it.

So, it is very significant that in the next world, which permeates ours as a supersensible world, there is not at all the order that we can penetrate with concepts and their power of proof, but that there is a place of seeing in which a completely different order prevails over events.

Today I would just like to say a few words about this. At Christmas, I drew attention to how, especially in our time, such contradictory things occur that confuse human thinking. Just think, for example, that a book has now been published by Ernst Haeckel, who is such a great natural scientist: “Thoughts on Eternity.” I have already drawn attention to this. These “Thoughts on Eternity” contain exactly the opposite of what many other people are now arriving at out of a deep sympathy with world events. Just think that there are many people today—we will have to talk more about this fact in our current context, I only wanted to give an introduction today—that there are many people who, precisely because of the fact which is now affecting our souls in such a terrible, overwhelming way, from this fact of the world, have in turn come to a deepening of their spiritual-religious feelings, many people, because they say to themselves: If there were no supersensible order underlying our physical world, how could one explain what is happening in the present? Many have come to a religious feeling again. I do not need to reproach you for this line of thought; it is so obvious and so noticeable in so many people today.

Haeckel comes to a different conclusion. He expresses this in his little book, which has just been published: People believe in the immortality of the soul. Current events clearly prove that such a belief in the immortality of the soul is impossible, for we see thousands perishing every day by pure chance. How can any reasonable person still believe that, in the face of such events, there can be any talk of the immortality of the soul? How can there be a higher order in this? For Haeckel, therefore, what is now happening in such a shocking way is proof of his dogma that one cannot speak of the immortality of the soul. Here again you have antinomies: a large part of humanity is becoming more religious, but in the same events Haeckel is becoming religiously superficial in an enormous way.

All these things are connected with the fact that people today cannot bring any clarity to the connection between the world that is presented to their senses and their intellect, which is bound to the brain, and the world that lies beneath it as a supersensible world, that as soon as they approach these things, they become confused in their thinking. Despite all the disappointments it offers, our time will nevertheless bring a deepening of the soul in a certain sense, a reversal of materialism. But it will be necessary that out of the pure effort of the soul, which devotes itself to unbiased research of the world, that out of this view a knowledge arises of the complementation of sensory events by supersensible events, and that there is at least a small group of people who are able to assume that all the suffering, all the pain that is currently being experienced on the physical plane is, in the overall progress of humanity, one side of another, a supersensible side.

We have already pointed to this supernatural side from various angles. We will do so again from other points of view. But again and again we will be confronted with the fact that, if Europe's blood-soaked soil is to have peace again, there must be a group of people who are able to hear, to hear spiritually, to sense spiritually what will then be spoken from the spiritual worlds to humanity, which will once again experience peace. For what we must now write into our souls again and again and again will become true, deeply true, and prove itself to be the truth.

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
And souls, conscious of the spirit, Will direct their minds to the realm of spirits.