The Search for the New Isis, Divine Sophia
GA 202
23 December 1920, Dornach
I. A Christmas Lecture
Christianity commemorates in three yearly festivals that Being Who, for the Christian, gives earth-life its meaning, and from Whom the strongest force of this earth-life radiates.
Of these three festivals Christmas makes the greatest demand on our feeling, and seeks as it were to make this feeling inward. The Easter festival makes its chief demand on what we call human understanding, human comprehension; and Whitsuntide on what is termed human will.
Basically we only grasp what is contained in the Christmas Mystery through inwardising and deepening of that feeling which makes present to us our entire human being, our worth and dignity as man. Only when we can feel in the right way and with sufficient inwardness what man is in the whole cosmos, are we able rightly to appreciate the mood of Christmas. Only when we can attain to the full understanding of that wonder which is contained in the Easter Mystery—the wonder of the resurrection—shall we rightly value the Easter Mystery; and only when we perceive something in the festival of Whitsuntide which helps to develop our will-impulse, do we perceive in the right light what Whitsuntide should be.
Christ Jesus is related to the Father principle of the world, and this is represented for us by the Christmas festival. Christ Jesus is related to what we call the Son principle, and this is represented by the Easter Mystery; while the relation of Christ to that which undulates and weaves through the world as spirit is made present to us in the Whitsuntide Mystery.
We see nature around us, and we see also that man enters into his physical existence through the forces of this same nature. We know through our study of Spiritual Science that we do not rightly regard nature if we only pay attention to its external physical features. We know that divine forces permeate it and we only become aware of our origin from nature in the true sense of the word when we perceive this divine element that weaves and works within it In this we perceive the Father principle of nature. All that permeates nature as the divine is the Father principle in the sense of the old religions and also in the sense of a rightly understood Christianity—whether it be the flowers of the field that we observe, and how they grow, or the roll of the thunder and the flash of the lightning; or whether we watch the sun in its path across the heavens or gaze upon the shining stars; or whether again we listen to the brooks and the streams rushing along—when we become aware of what is revealed so mysteriously in this external revelation of nature as the origin of all ‘becoming,’ then we are at the same time aware of what places us as men within this world through the mystery of physical birth.
But just in this mystery of physical birth there always remains something inexplicable as regards the nature of man as long as we do not bring it into connection with what may be inwardly experienced in the commemoration of the Christmas Mystery—in commemoration of the childhood which entered into humanity with the Jesus boys.
What does the presence of these Jesus boys say to us? It tells us nothing less than that in order to be fully human it does not suffice merely to be born, that is, merely to be here in the world through those forces which, as the forces of physical birth, bring all beings including man into existence. This holy Christmas Mystery tells us, as we look at the childhood of Christ, that the true human being in us cannot merely be born, but that in the innermost part of the soul it must be born anew; that man must in the course of his life experience something within his soul which alone makes him fully man. And what he should experience can only come to pass when it is brought into connection with that childhood which entered into earth evolution at Christmas time.
As we look upon this Jesus-child we must say to ourselves: “Only through the fact that this Being came down amongst men in the course of human evolution does it first become possible for man to be truly man in the full sense of the word, that is, to connect what he receives through birth with what he can experience above and beyond him as a result of a feeling of devoted love towards that Being Who descended from spiritual heights that He might, through great sacrifice, unite Himself with human existence.”
For many men of the early Christian centuries it was a great experience to gaze on the entrance of the Christ Being into earth evolution. It made evident to them, as it were, man's two-fold origin—his physical and his spiritual origin. It is a birth through which Jesus passes—it is to a little earth-born child the Christian looks when he thinks of Jesus in the world's Holy Night. Yet he says to himself: “What is born here is something different from the rest of mankind, it is a Being through whom the rest of humanity can receive what they cannot receive through physical birth.” Our feeling is deepened when we understand in the right sense and with the right love what is signified in the words: “We must be born twice; the first time through the forces of nature, the second time reborn through the forces of Christ Jesus.”
This is our communion with Christ Jesus; it is this which through Christ Jesus first gives us the full consciousness of our human worth and human character. If we are able, or have the desire, to form a judgment as to the course of development in the centuries, then we must ask the question: “Has this feeling about the birth of Christ Jesus always maintained this depth?” As we look around the world, my dear friends, we cannot say that the same inwardness of feeling concerning the Christmas Mystery is experienced today as it was experienced even five or six centuries ago in Europe.
Think of the Christmas tree—how beautiful it is, and in what a graceful way it appeals to the heart. But the Christmas tree is not something ancient, it is scarcely two centuries old—it became naturalised comparatively quickly within the countries of Europe, but it is only in recent times that it has adorned the Christmas festival What does it actually represent? I might say it represents the beautiful, lovable, more sympathetic side of that which in another way, a way which is less sympathetic and less fair, appears before the soul in modern human development. We may seek ever so deeply to discover the impulses out of which the Christmas tree has originated in what are really quite modern times, and we shall find mysterious and secret feelings out of which the Christmas tree has come, but these secret feelings all tend in the direction of seeing the Christmas tree as a symbol for the Tree of Paradise. What does this signify? It signifies that the feelings which people once experienced as they directed their gaze to the crib and the mystery of the birth of Christ Jesus at the beginning of our era are no longer there, such feelings have become more and more strange to us. It means that for modern humanity, this being born again within the soul has in a sense been lost and modern humanity desires to look back from the Christmas tree that displays the Cross to the origin of earth humanity which knows nothing as yet of the Christ, to the natural starting point of human existence—from Christ back to Paradise, from the festival of Christmas day on the 25th to the festival of Adam and Eve on the 24th day of December. This has become something beautiful, since humanity's origin in Paradise is also beautiful, but it is a diversion from the real birth-mystery of Christ Jesus. This regard for the Christmas tree has preserved all depth and inwardness of feeling and it comforts those who are men of good will as they look at the Christmas tree out of the inwardness of the human heart; it comforts them concerning that other aspect which in modern times has led men away from the Christ mystery to the primal natural forces of birth in human evolution.
Christ Jesus appeared amongst a people who worshipped Jahve or Jehovah, that Jehovah-God who is connected with all that is natural existence, who lives in thunder and lightning, in the motion of the clouds and stars, in the springs and rushing streams, in the growth of plants, animals and men. Jahve is that God who can never, if man is connected with Him alone, give man his completeness, for He gives man the consciousness of his natural birth, with an intermixture of course of a spiritual element which is not merely natural; but He does not give man the consciousness of his rebirth which he must attain through something which cannot be given him by means of natural physical forces. So we see how modern humanity is led away and diverted from Christ Jesus for Whom there is no distinction of class, nation or race, but for Whom there is only a single humanity. We see how the thoughts and feelings of modern humanity have been led aside to that which has already been overcome by the birth of Jesus Christ; to that which lies at the basis of man's origin through the forces of nature and which is connected with the differentiation of men into classes, nations and races. And if it was the one Jehovah that the Jews worshipped when Christ came, then the modern nations have returned to many Jehovahs. For what is worshipped today—even if it is no longer described by the ancient name—the powers to which men do worship when they divide themselves up into nations and make war on each other as nations—they are Jehovahs. We see the nations fighting each other in bloody wars—each at certain moments calling upon the name of Christ—in reality, however, it is not Christ on Whom the nations call, but only Jehovah, not the one Jehovah but a Jehovah. The people have simply returned to him and have forgotten how great a step forward was taken when the Jehovah principle gave place to the Christ principle.
In a beautiful way does the Christmas tree lead us back to man's origin; in an ugly and hateful way does the national Jehovah principle lead us back. In reality that which is only a Jehovah, through an unconscious lie, is often addressed as Christ, and the name of Christ is thus misused. Terribly is the name of Christ misused at the present time, and we shall not acquire the real depth of feeling that is necessary today in order rightly to experience the Christian mystery again unless we see clearly that the way to this feeling concerning Christ Jesus must be sought. We need a new understanding of what has been traditionally handed down about the birth of Christ Jesus.
It was to two kinds of people, my dear friends, who were nevertheless representatives of our ONE humanity, that Christ Jesus was announced at the Christmas festival. First he was announced to the poor uneducated shepherds of the field who had absorbed nothing of culture but were quite simple men both in intellect and heart And then it was also announced to the wise men from the East, that is, from the land of wisdom. To them it was announced through the highest summit of their wisdom, through their ability to read the stars. Thus Jesus Christ was announced to the simple shepherd hearts and the highest wisdom of the three Magi from the East. And most deeply significant is this double contrasted announcement of Christ Jesus. On the one side to the simple shepherds, and on the other side to the wisest of the world.
And how was Christ Jesus announced to the simple shepherds of the field? With the soul's eye they saw the light of the Angel Their clairvoyance and clairaudience were awakened. They heard the deepest words which for them signified the future meaning of earth life: “The Divine is revealed in the heights and there shall be peace among men on earth who can be of good will.” Out of the depths of the soul arose the capacity by which in the Holy Night the poor simple shepherds without any kind of wisdom experienced feelingly what was being revealed to the world; out of the perfection of that wisdom that could reach even to the Mystery of Golgotha, out of the finest observation of the course of the stars this revelation came to the wise men of the East, to the Magi, the same revelation. In the one case it is read within the human heart, the heart of the poor simple shepherd, and it penetrates to the deepest point within the human heart; it is there that they became clairvoyant and the heart reveals to them by its clairvoyant power the coming of the Saviour of mankind. The others looked up to the breadths of heaven, they knew the mystery of the widths of space and the evolution of time; they had attained a wisdom by which they could experience and solve the mysteries of space and time. The Christmas Mystery was revealed to them. Our attention is directed to the fact that what lives in man's innermost soul and what lives in the widths of space flow from the same source. And both, in the way they had been developed up to the Mystery of Golgotha, were already in a declining condition. The clairvoyance that emerged from the quickened human heart, that of the shepherds, to whom we are told the announcement came, was still strong enough to perceive the voice that proclaimed: “The Divine is revealed in the heights, in heaven, and peace shall be on earth among men of good will.” We might say that the last remnants of this clairvoyance through inner piety were still present in the shepherds whose karma, or destiny, had brought them together to that place where Christ was born. And from that primeval holy wisdom which first flourished in the post-atlantean times among the original Indians, then especially among the Persians, and again was transplanted among the Chaldeans, and of which at all events the last remnants were present among those whom we find as the three Magi from the East, out of this primeval holy wisdom which comprehended the world of space and time—out of this wisdom, through its representatives who had raised themselves to the highest point, was the Christmas Mystery again revealed.
For us, however, in the 5th culture epoch, both ways are in decline. For humanity in general, that which led to clairvoyance in the poor shepherds, as well as that which led the Magi from the East to the penetration of the mysteries of space and time is no longer livingly active. We must find the human being, the man who depends on himself. As men we must pass through the being forsaken by God in order—in this forsakenness and loneliness—to find freedom. But we must find our way back to a union with that which on the one side was the highest wisdom of the Magi of the East, and on the other side was announced to the shepherds through a deepened insight of the heart.
All forces, my dear friends, develop further. What has become of that which the Magi of the East understood through the development of their intellect which was still clairvoyant? What has become of their astrology? Their kind of astronomy? We cannot understand human evolution if we do not look into such things. Today it has become cold and gray mathematics and geometry. Today we see the abstract forms that are taught in schools as geometry and mathematics. This is the last remnant of that which in the living radiance of the cosmic light was mastered by that ancient wisdom which led the three Magi of the East to Christ. The outer wisdom has become the inner theories of space and time. And whilst the Magi of the East, through their understanding of the mysteries of space, were able in vision to reckon “In this night will the Saviour be born,” our astronomy, which is the successor to that astrology, can only reckon the future eclipses of the sun and moon and similar things. And whilst the poor shepherds of the field out of the inwardness of their hearts were raised to that which certainly stood in close relationship to them, namely, the vision of the Christmas Mystery, and the hearing of the heavenly announcement, there has only remained to present-day humanity the perception of external nature. This perception of external nature through the senses represents the last transformation of the simplicity of the shepherds, just as our reckoning of future eclipses of sun and moon is the last successor of the wisdom of the Magi.
The shepherds of the field were equipped with something. They were equipped with depth of heart, with deep feeling whereby, through clairvoyance, they came to the vision of the Christmas Mystery. Our contemporaries are equipped with the telescope and microscope. But no telescope or microscope will lead to the solution of man's deepest riddle as did the hearts of the poor shepherds. No foresight through calculation of sun and moon eclipses and so on will lead man to comprehend the necessary course of the world as did the star-wisdom of the Magi of the East. How all human differences flow together into a single human feeling when we realize that what the shepherds of the field, without wisdom, experienced through the piety of their hearts is the same as what stimulated the Magi of the East as the highest wisdom! In a wonderful way both facts are placed side by side in the Christian tradition.
We have practically lost both ways by which an understanding of the birth of Christ revealed itself to man. We have gone back, from the crib and the Holy Night, to the tree of paradise. We have gone back from a Christ Who belongs to the whole of humanity to the national gods which are just so many Jehovahs and no Christ For just as truly as that which reveals itself in the deepest nature of man is something common to all men, so truly is that which is revealed through all the widths of space and the mysteries of time, something common to all men.
My dear friends, there is something in the depths of man's heart that speaks of nothing else than of what is purely human and dissolves all differences. And it is just within these depths that we find the Christ And there is a wisdom which extends far beyond all that can be discovered concerning single spheres of world existence, a wisdom that is able to grasp the world in its unity, even in space and time. And this again is the star-wisdom that leads to Christ We need to have again in a new form that which led on the one hand the shepherds of the field, and on the other hand the Magi of the East to find the way to Christ In other words we need to deepen our external perception of nature through what the heart can develop as spiritual perception of nature. We must learn once again out of the piety of the human heart to approach all that to which in modern times the microscope, telescope, roentgen-rays apparatus and such instruments are applied. Then will the growing plant, the rushing stream, the murmuring spring, the lightning and thunder from the clouds, not merely speak to us in an indifferent way. There will speak to us from the flowers of the field, from the lightning and thunder of the clouds, from the shining stars and the radiant sun, there will, as it were, stream into our eyes and into our hearts, as the result of all our observation of nature, words that proclaim nothing else than this: “The divine is revealed in the heights of heaven, and peace shall be among men upon earth who are of good will.” The time must come when our observation of nature sets itself free from the dry, prosaic, non-human method pursued in the laboratories and clinics of today. The time must come when our observation of nature must be irradiated by such life so that the life which can no longer exist in the way it did for the shepherds of Bethlehem will nevertheless be able to speak to us through the voices of the plants and animals, from stars and springs and rivers. For the whole of nature utters what was uttered by the Angel: “The Divine is revealed in the heavenly heights and there can be peace among men on Earth who desire to be of good will”
What the Magi possessed through an outer observation of the stars we need to obtain by an awakening of our inner life. Just as we must, once more, listen outwards into nature and hear the Angels singing as it were from external nature, so must we be able through Imagination, Inspiration and Intuition to bring forth an astronomy, a solution of the world riddle, out of the inner nature of man. It must be a spirituality, a Spiritual Science created out of the inner being of man. We must found that which is really man's true nature. And the real nature of man must speak to us of the world's ‘becoming’ through the mysteries of Saturn, Sun, Moon, Earth, Jupiter, Venus and Vulcan. We must feel the arising of a whole Cosmos within us. All that man can experience as insight into the deepest mysteries of the world has been reversed since the Mystery of Golgotha.
There is an ancient way of presenting the spheres of heaven, which was already known to the Persian Magi. They looked up towards the heavens and saw with their physical eyes the constellation of the Zodiac which is called the Virgin (Virgo), and by means of spiritual vision they projected into the constellation of the Virgin that which physically is only perceptible in the constellation of the Twins (Gemini). This wisdom has been preserved. It is by this wisdom that man can perceive, can experience, the consonance between the constellation of the Virgin and the constellation standing at right angles to it, in quadrature, the Twins. This was represented in such a way that in place of the constellation of Virgo, the Virgin was depicted not only with the ear of corn, but also with the child. But this child in fact represents the Twins. It is the representative of the two Jesus children. This was an astrological conception especially at the time of the ancient Persians.
Then came a different time, the time of the Egypto-Chaldean development. Then it was the constellation of the Lion that was looked up to in the same way that the Persians regarded the constellation of the Virgin. But now, in quadrature to the Lion stood the Bull, and there arose the Mithras religion, the worship of the Bull, because into the constellation of the Lion was projected that of the Bull.
Then came the time when Cancer, the Crab, played the same role in the Greco-Latin period as the Virgin among the Persians, and the constellation of the Ram was seen in quadrature standing, as it were, within the constellation of the Crab. After that came the reversal After that matters took a different path. Up to the Greco-Latin time, until the Mystery of Golgotha, astronomy was something that could be attained as external science, and human understanding was of such a nature that in gazing out into space and the mysteries of the star-world, the secrets of space and time were discovered; also in experiencing the human inner life through the piety of the heart, a vision of the inner mysteries was possible. In the Greco-Latin time these relations were reversed. That which formerly could be experienced inwardly had ever more and more to be experienced by beholding outer nature.
My dear friends, with respect to nature's revelation we must be as pious as the shepherds were in their hearts. Just as they came to spiritual vision in their inner world, we must come to a spiritual vision in nature. And on the other side we must find the way of Cancer the Crab; we must come to an astronomy inwardly, so that by the inner powers of vision we may awaken the course of the world that leads through the Saturn, Sun, Moon, Earth, Jupiter, Venus and Vulcan periods. An astronomy from within where formerly there was an external astronomy—a piety in the observation of nature where formerly there was the kind of piety possessed by the shepherds of the field. If we can deepen what today is so unspiritual in our observation of nature, if on the other side we can render creative what today is so prosaically experienced in mere mathematical and geometrical pictures, if we can raise mathematics again through inner experience to that glory which the ancient astronomy had, if we can deepen our observation of nature to that heart's depth and piety which the shepherds of the field had, if we can inwardly experience what the Magi experienced from the stars, if in directing our gaze to outer nature we can be as pious as were the shepherds of the field, then, through piety in outer observation of nature and through a loving pursuit of world-events with our hearts, we shall again find the way to the Christmas Mystery just as the shepherds of the field through inner piety and the Magi from the East through an outer wisdom found their way to the crib.
The way must be found again to the Christmas Mystery. We must become as pious with regard to nature as the shepherds were in their hearts; we must in our inward vision become as wise as were the Magi in their observation of planets and stars in space. We must develop inwardly what the Magi developed outwardly. We must in our intercourse with the outer world develop what the simple shepherds of the field developed in their hearts; then we shall find the way, the right way, to a deepened experience of Christ, to a loving comprehension of Christ; and then we shall find the way to the Christmas Mystery. Then we shall be able with right thoughts and with right feelings to place the crib beside the original tree of paradise which does not only speak to us of how man enters the world through nature-forces but of how he can only become conscious of his full humanity by re-birth.
Anyone speaking of the Christmas Mystery today must make a demand upon mankind that reaches into the future. We live in serious times and we must see clearly that we need again to become man in the true sense. We have not yet attained to the inwardness of the Magi wisdom nor to the piety which from the shepherds flowed into the outer world. The social question that confronts humanity is terribly urgent. Fearful things have come about in recent years and the social problem becomes ever more and more threatening; only those who are asleep in their souls can overlook this fact Europe as regards its culture, threatens to become a heap of ruins. Nothing can raise it from its chaotic condition unless men find it possible once again to develop a true, a real humanity in their common life. They will not be able to do this unless their feeling is deepened and made inward by an observation of nature in which they are as pious as the shepherds of the field when through their inner forces they received the Angel's revelation of God above and peace on earth beneath. Only with these forces can the social life be mastered. This will happen when the secrets of space and time are so understood inwardly that men comprehend the nature of the world-spirit as a unity just as the one sun is beheld by the Chinese and by the Americans and by the Middle European. It would be absurd if the Chinese demanded a sun for themselves, the Russians another sun, the Middle European another, the French another, and the English yet another. Just as the sun is a unity, so is the Sun-Being that bears humanity a unity. If we look out into the widths of space we find there the challenge to a unification of humanity. The spiritual that lies open to our view without does not speak of the differentiation of humanity or of discord; neither does what speaks in the inmost depths of our being. To the shepherds of the field, the voice they were able to hear by the power of their hearts announced that the Godhead was revealed in the widths of the world spaces and that by receiving the divine within one's own soul peace can be among men of good will. This must again be proclaimed to modern humanity from the whole circumference of nature. To the Magi from the East, the secrets of the stars told that here on earth Christ Jesus is born. This must be proclaimed to modern humanity from out of what can begin to be revealed in the deep places of the human heart.
My dear friends, we need a new path. Once again the voice sounds to us: “Change your hearts and minds, look in a new way on the course of the world.” When we look rightly on the course of the world and consider the way of the humanity to which we ourselves belong, then we discover the path to that Mystery which could be revealed to the shepherds as well as to the cultured sages, and that will be revealed to our hearts and in our external beholding of the world. When we have sufficiently deepened our inner and outer perception of the world, when we are able to do this and find the inner Magi-wisdom that leads us just as the outer Magi-wisdom led the sages of the East, as well as the outer wisdom that leads us to that piety by which the shepherds of the field were also led, then we shall be able again with the right inner feeling to perceive what lies in this mystery, namely, that for all without distinction—as formerly He appeared among men, put away as it were from humanity, turned out in the solitude—for all, there is born that which thereafter became the Christ.
We must find again the Jesus Christmas Mystery, and we must find it by cultivating all that within ourselves of which we have spoken today. We must find the Christmas light within ourselves as the shepherds did the Angel's light in the field; and as the Magi of the East, so must we find the star through the power of that which is true Spiritual Science. Then will be opened for us the only way to the content of the Christmas Mystery. We shall recognise it again and it will remind us of humanity's rebirth.
Yes, my dear friends, it is for this we must work—that the Christmas Mystery be born again among men. Then we shall rightly understand the mystery of the rebirth of the human being. This is what has been communicated to us in a singular manner. For in a gospel that is not recognised by the Church it is related that the Jesus-child spoke to His Mother immediately after His birth in definite words. We certainly approach the Child in the crib today in the true way when we rightly hear the words which He wishes to speak to us: “Awaken the Christmas light within you, and the Christmas light will then also appear to you and to your fellow-men with you in the world outside.”
If we look into the deepest inner secrets of man, there too we find the same demand.
Dreizehnter Vortrag
[ 1 ] In drei Jahresfesten gedenkt die Christenheit desjenigen Wesens, das für sie dem Erdenleben seinen Sinn gibt, von dem ausstrahlt die stärkste Kraft dieses Erdenlebens. Von diesen drei Festen stellt das Weihnachtsfest die größten Anforderungen an unser Empfinden; es will gewissermaßen unser Empfinden am meisten verinnerlichen. Das Osterfest stellt die größten Anforderungen an dasjenige, was wir menschliches Verständnis, menschliches Begreifen nennen; das Pfingstfest an dasjenige, was wir menschliches Wollen nennen. Und im Grunde genommen begreift man das, was im Weihnachtsmysterium liegen soll, nur durch die Verinnerlichung, durch die Vertiefung desjenigen Empfindens, das uns unsere ganze menschliche Wesenheit, unseren Wert und unsere Würde als Menschen vergegenwärtigt.
[ 2 ] Nur wenn man das, was im Weltenall Mensch ist, in der rechten Weise und innig genug empfinden kann, wird man jener Stimmung gerecht, welche die wahre Weihnachtsstimmung sein soll. Nur wenn man jenes Wunder zu seinem völligen Verständnis bringt, das im Ostermysterium enthalten ist, das Wunder der Auferstehung, dann wird man diesem Ostermysterium gerecht, und nur wenn man in dem Pfingstfest etwas sieht, was Kraft bedeutet zur Entwickelung unserer Willensimpulse, was unseren Willen hinaushebt über die bloßen Erdeninstinkte, dann sieht man im rechten Lichte dasjenige, was das Pfingstfest sein soll.
[ 3 ] Zu den Vaterprinzipien des Weltenalls steht in Beziehung der Christus Jesus: dies vergegenwärtigt uns das Weihnachtsfest. Zu dem, was man gewohnt worden ist das Sohnesprinzip zu nennen, steht der Christus Jesus in Beziehung: das vergegenwärtigt uns das Ostermysterium. Zu demjenigen, was die Welt durchwallt und durchwebt als Geist, steht der Christus in der Art in Beziehung, wie es uns das Pfingstmysterium vergegenwärtigt.
[ 4 ] Indem wir die äußerliche Natur um uns sehen, sehen wir durch die Kräfte dieser Natur auch den Menschen in sein physisches Dasein hereintreten. Wir wissen aus alldem, was uns aus der Geisteswissenschaft kommen kann, daß wir diese Natur nicht im rechten Sinne betrachten, wenn wir sie nur ihren physisch-sinnlichen Äußerlichkeiten nach ansehen. Wir wissen, daß göttliche Kräfte die Natur umweben, und wir werden unseres Ursprungs aus der Natur nur dann uns im wahren Sinne des Wortes bewußt, wenn wir auf dieses die Natur durchwallende und durchwebende Göttliche hinsehen können. Dann blicken wir auf zu den Vaterprinzipien der Natur. Alles, was die Natur als Göttliches durchwallt und durchwebt, sind uns Vaterprinzipien im Sinne älterer Religionen und auch im Sinne des richtig verstandenen Christentums. Ob wir gewahr werden, wie das Blümchen auf dem Felde wächst, ob wir gewahr werden, wie aus der Wolke der Donner rollt und der Blitz zuckend niederschießt, ob wir die Sonne über den Himmel gehen und die Sterne leuchten sehen, ob wir die Quellen und den Strom rauschen hören —- wenn wir das, was in diesen äußeren Offenbarungen des Naturdaseins sich geheimnisvoll als der Ursprung alles Werdens zeigt, gewahr werden, dann werden wir auch dessen gewahr, was uns selber durch das Mysterium der physischen Geburt in diese Welt hereinstellt.
[ 5 ] Aber dieses Mysterium der physischen Geburt, es bleibt in Ansehung des Wesens des Menschen immer etwas Unerklärliches, wenn wir es nicht verbinden können mit dem, was wir durch ein inniges Empfinden erleben im Gedenken des Weihnachtsmysteriums, im Gedenken der Kindheit, die durch die Jesusknaben in die Menschheit gekommen ist. Was sagt uns das Dasein dieser Jesusknaben? Es sagt uns nichts Geringeres, als daß zum vollen Menschsein es nicht genügt, bloß geboren zu werden, bloß also durch diejenigen Kräfte in der Welt anwesend zu sein, die als physische Geburtskräfte alle Wesen und auch den Menschen ins Dasein führen. Dieses heilige Weihnachtsmysterium, es besagt uns im Anblicke der Kindheit Christi, daß das wahre Menschsein in uns nicht einfach geboren werden kann, sondern daß es im Innersten der Seele neugeboren werden muß, daß der Mensch im Laufe seines Lebens innerhalb seines seelischen Daseins etwas erfahren muß, was ihn erst zum vollen Menschen macht. Und dieses, was er da erfahren soll, kann er nur erfahren, wenn er es im Zusammenleben mit dem erfährt, was in der Kindheit am Weltweihnachtsfest in die Erdenentwickelung hereingezogen ist.
[ 6 ] Wir blicken auf Jesu Kindheit und müssen uns sagen: Nur dadurch, daß dieses Wesen im Laufe der Menschheitsentwickelung unter die Menschen getreten ist, ist der Mensch im vollen Sinne des Wortes erst fähig, Mensch zu sein, das heißt, zu verbinden das, was er durch die Geburt empfängt, mit dem, was er über sich selbst empfinden kann durch alles dasjenige, was er an hingebungsvoller Liebe fühlt zu dem Wesen, das aus geistigen Höhen herabgestiegen ist, um sich mit dem Menschendasein durch das große Opfer zu verbinden.
[ 7 ] Es war für viele Menschen der ersten christlichen Jahrhunderte ein großes Erleben, das Hereingehen des Christus-Wesens in die Erdenentwickelung anzuschauen. Es wurde ihnen gewissermaßen dadurch des Menschen zweifacher Ursprung gegenwärtig, sein physischer und sein geistiger Ursprung. Eine Geburt ist es, durch die Jesus geht. Auf ein erdengeborenes Kindlein sieht der Christ, indem er zur Weltenweihnacht nach dem Jesus hinsieht, aber er sagt sich: Ein anderes Wesen, als es die übrigen Menschen sind, wird da geboren, ein Wesen, durch das die anderen Menschen eben dasjenige bekommen können, was sie durch die bloße physische Geburt nicht bekommen können. — Und unser Empfinden vertieft sich, wenn wir das Wort im rechten Sinne und mit der rechten Liebe verstehen: Zweimal geboren müssen wir sein, das eine Mal durch die Kräfte der Natur, das andere Mal wiedergeboren durch die Kräfte des Christus Jesus. Das ist unsere Gemeinschaft mit dem Christus Jesus, das ist dasjenige, was uns durch den Christus Jesus erst das volle Bewußtsein unseres Menchenwertes und Menschencharakters beibringt. Und indem wir aus der Entwickelung der Jahrhunderte eine Lehre ziehen, müssen wir uns fragen: Ist dieses Empfinden gegenüber der Geburt des Christus Jesus immer gleich tief geblieben? Wir können nicht sagen, wenn wir uns in der Welt umsehen, daß wir auch in der heutigen Zeit jene Innigkeit des Empfindens gegenüber dem Weihnachtsmysterium besitzen, die selbst noch vor fünf bis sechs Jahrhunderten in Europa vorhanden war.
[ 8 ] Sehen Sie, der Christbaum ist etwas Schönes, etwas, das in sehr anmutendem Sinne zu unserem Gemüte spricht. Aber der Christbaum ist nicht etwas Altes, der Weihnachtsbaum ist kaum zwei Jahrhunderte alt. Er hat sich verhältnismäßig schnell in europäischen Gegenden eingebürgert, aber er ist doch erst in der neueren Zeit zum Schmucke des Weihnachtsfestes entstanden. Was stellt er uns denn eigentlich dar? Er stellt uns die schöne, die liebenswürdige, sympathische Seite desjenigen dar, was auch in einer anderen Weise, in einer weniger sympathischen, in einer weniger anmutigen Weise uns in der neueren Menschheitsentwickelung vor die Seele tritt. Man mag noch so tief forschen nach den Impulsen, aus denen der Weihnachtsbaum in der neueren, neuesten Zeit eigentlich hervorgegangen ist, man wird nur geheimnisvolle Empfindungen finden, aus denen der Weihnachtsbaum entstanden ist. Aber diese geheimnisvollen Empfindungen tendieren alle dahin, daß wir im Weihnachtsbaume doch etwas zu sehen haben wie ein Symbolum des Paradiesesbaumes. Was aber besagt uns dieses? Es besagt uns, daß die Menschen doch immer fremder und fremder geworden sind demjenigen, was sich ihrer Empfindung darbot, als diese Empfindung sich richtete hin nach der Krippe, nach dem Geburtsmysterium des Christus Jesus, nach dem, was im Beginne unserer Zeitrechnung sich zugetragen hat; daß der neueren Menschheit dieses Wiedergeborenwerden des Menschen in der Seele in einer gewissen Weise abhanden gekommen ist und diese neuere Menschheit von dem Christus-Baum, der das Kreuz darstellt, zurückblicken will nach jenem Ursprunge, der noch nichts weiß von dem Christus: nach dem Ursprunge der Erdenmenschheit selber, nach dem natürlichen Ausgangspunkte des Menschheitswerdens, von Christus ab zurück zum Paradiese, von der Feier des Weihnachtstages, des 25. Dezembers, zu der Feier des Adam- und Eva-Festes, des 24. Dezembers.
[ 9 ] Es ist schön geworden, weil ja der Menschheitsursprung auch schön ist als Paradiesesursprung, was sich da hingestellt hat, aber es ist eine Ablenkung von dem eigentlichen Geburtsmysterium des Christus Jesus. Es hat bewahrt alle Tiefe und Innigkeit des Empfindens, dieses Hinschauen zum Weihnachtsbaume, und es tröstet dieses Hinschauen zum Weihnachtsbaume, das in jedem Jahre aus der Innigkeit des Menschengemütes bei denen auftritt, die guten Willens sind, es tröstet dieses Hinschauen zum Weihnachtsbaume über das andere, das nun in weniger sympathischer Weise in der neueren Zeit abgelenkt hat von dem Christus-Mysterium und hinführt zu den ursprünglich-natürlichen Geburtskräften der Menschwerdung.
[ 10 ] Christus Jesus ist hingetreten unter ein Volk, das den Jahve, den Jehova verehrt hat, jenen Jahvegott, der zusammenhängt mit alledem, was natürliches Dasein ist, der da lebt im Blitz und Donner, der da lebt im Gange der Wolken, der Sterne, der da lebt in dem rauschenden Quell, dem Strom, der da lebt im Wachstum der Pflanzen, Tiere und Menschen. Jahve ist derjenige Gott, der, wenn man sich mit ihm allein verbindet, dem Menschen niemals das volle Menschtum geben kann. Denn er gibt dem Menschen das Bewußtsein seiner natürlichen Geburt, allerdings mit ihrem geistigen Einschlag von Kräften, die nicht bloß natürlich sind, aber er gibt dem Menschen nicht das Bewußtsein von seiner Wiedergeburt, die er sich erwerben muß durch etwas, was ihm nicht durch natürlich-sinnlich-physische Kräfte gegeben werden kann. Und so sehen wir denn, wie abgelenkt worden ist die neuere Menschheit von dem Christus Jesus, für den es keinen Unterschied gibt der Klassen, keinen Unterschied der Völker, keinen Unterschied der Rassen, für den es nur ein einziges Menschtum gibt, wie abgelenkt worden sind die Gedanken, die Empfindungen der neueren Menschheit zu dem, was durch das Mysterium des Geborenwerdens des Christus Jesus schon überwunden war: zu dem hin, was nur zugrunde liegt den natürlichen Kräften der Menschheitsentstehung, die zusammenhängen mit der Menschheitsdifferenzierung in Klassen, in Völker, in Rassen. Und wenn es der eine Jahve war, welchen das Judenvolk verehrt hat, als der Christus Jesus ankam, so sind die neueren Völker zurückgekehrt zu den vielen Jahves! Denn das, was aus den heutigen nationalen Prinzipien heraus die Völker verehren — wenn es auch nicht mehr mit den alten Namen bezeichnet wird, was sie so verehren, daß sie sich trennen in Nationen, daß sie sich befehden als Nationen —, es sind Jahves. Und wir erleben es, daß die Völker in blutigen Kriegen miteinander kämpfen und daß ein jedes sich unter Umständen auf den Christus beruft. Es ist aber in Wahrheit nicht der Christus, auf den sich dann die Völker berufen, es ist nur ein Jahve, nicht der einige Jahve, sondern ein Jahve. Die Menschen sind bloß zu ihm zurückgekehrt. Die Menschen haben vergessen, wie ein Fortschritt darinnen lag, daß von dem Jahveprinzip zu dem Christus-Prinzip vorgeschritten worden ist. Das ist das andere.
[ 11 ] In schöner Weise führt uns der Weihnachtsbaum zurück zu dem Menschenursprung, in häßlicher Weise führt uns zurück das die Völker ergreifende Jahveprinzip. Tatsache ist, daß sie dasjenige, was nur ein Jahve ist, durch eine innere Empfindungslüge oftmals als den Christus ansprechen, also den Christus-Namen im Grunde genommen mißbrauchen. In furchtbarer Weise wird der Christus-Name in der Gegenwart mißbraucht, und wir finden nicht die wirkliche Vertiefung des Empfindens, die wir heute brauchen, um das Weihnachtsmysterium wiederum in der richtigen Weise in uns zu erfühlen, wenn wir nicht klar einsehen, wie wir wiederum den Weg suchen müssen, um diese Empfindung gegenüber dem Christus Jesus zu finden. Wir brauchen ein neues Verständnis desjenigen, was uns überliefert worden ist, auch in bezug auf die Geburt des Christus Jesus.
[ 12 ] Zweierlei Arten von Menschen, die natürlich doch nur dieselbe eine Menschheit in sich repräsentieren, wird der Christus, der Jesus angekündigt am Weltenweihnachtsfeste: den ungebildeten, armen Hirten des Feldes, die nichts in sich aufgenommen haben als den einfältigen Menschenverstand und das einfältige Menschengemüt, und verkündigt wird er den Weisen aus dem Morgenlande, das heißt aus dem Weisheitslande. Verkündigt wird er ihnen durch einen höchsten Aufstieg zu ihrer Weisheit, zu einem Lesen aus den Sternen. Bei einfachen Hirtenseelen also kündigt sich der Christus Jesus an, und in der höchsten Weisheit der drei magischen Weisen aus dem Morgenlande kündigt sich der Christus Jesus an. Es ruht der tiefste Sinn in dieser Gegenüberstellung der Ankündigung des Christus Jesus auf der einen Seite an die einfältigen Hirten, auf der anderen Seite an die Weisesten der Welt.
[ 13 ] Und wie kündigt sich der Christus Jesus den einfältigen, armen Hirten auf dem Felde an? Sie schauen mit dem Seelenauge den lichten Engel. Ihr Schauen wird wachgerufen, ihr Hellhören wird wachgerufen. Ste hören die tiefen Worte, die für sie in der Zukunft der Sinn des Erdenlebens werden sollen: Es offenbart sich der Gott in der Höhe, und es wird werden der Friede unter den Menschen auf Erden, die eines guten Willens sein können. — Aus der Tiefe der Seele steigt auf jene Fähigkeit, durch welche in der Weihenacht die armen, einfältigen Hirten ohne irgendwelche Weisheit empfindend erleben, was sich der Welt offenbart. Aus der Vollendung derjenigen Weisheit, die bis zum Mysterium von Golgatha hat erlangt werden können, aus der feinsten Beobachtung des Sternenganges ergibt sich für die Weisen des Morgenlandes, für die magischen Weisen, dieselbe Offenbarung! Die einen lesen sie im Menschenherzen, die armen, einfältigen Hirten, und sie dringen bis zum tiefsten Punkt des Menschenherzens. Da werden sie hellsichtig, da offenbart ihnen das Herz aus seiner Schauenskraft heraus das Kommen des Heilandes der Menschheit. Die anderen schauen zum ganzen weiten Himmelszelt auf. Sie kennen die Geheimnisse der Raumesweiten und der Zeitenentwickelung, sie haben eine Weisheit errungen, durch die sie diese Geheimnisse der Raumesweiten und der Zeitenentwickelung erfühlen und enträtseln können. Da offenbart sich ihnen. das Weihnachtsmysterium.
[ 14 ] Hingewiesen werden wir darauf, wie aus dem gleichen Quell dasjenige fließt, was in des Menschen Inneren lebt und das, was in den Raumesweiten lebt. Und beides war in der Art, wie es sich entwickelt hat bis zum Mysterium von Golgatha hin, schon in der Abnahme begriffen. Das Hellsehen, das aus dem belebten Menschenherzen herauskam, das bei den Hirten, auf die hingewiesen wird als auf jene, für welche die Verkündigung in Betracht kommt, noch stark genug war, um die Stimmen zu vernehmen: Es offenbart sich der Gott in der Höhe, in den Himmeln, und es wird sein Friede unter den Menschen auf Erden, die eines guten Willens sind, - man möchte sagen, die letzten Reste dieses durch innere Frommheit Hellsehendwerdens waren noch vorhanden bei den Hirten, die das Karma, das Schicksal zusammengetragen hatte an dem Orte, wo der Christus geboren worden ist. Und aus jener uralten heiligen Weisheit, die in der nachatlantischen Zeit zuerst geblüht hat bei den Ur-Indern, dann namentlich bei den Persern, dann wiederum bei den Chaldäern, die sich hereinverpflanzt hat und von der ebenfalls noch gerade die letzten Reste vorhanden waren unter denjenigen, bei denen wir suchen sollen die drei Magier aus dem Morgenlande — aus dieser uralt heiligen Weisheit, die die Welt im Raum und in der Zeit durchmaß, aus dieser Weisheit heraus, indem ihre Vertreter sich zu einem höchsten Aufschwung erhoben, offenbarte sich wiederum dieses Weihnachtsmysterium. Beides aber ist uns in der fünften nachatlantischen Zeit abhanden gekommen.
[ 15 ] Für die allgemeine Menschheit ist es nicht mehr lebendig tätig, was in den armen Hirten zum Hellsehen führte, was in den Weisen aus dem Morgenlande zu dem Durchschauen der Raumes- und Zeitengeheimnisse führte. Wir mußten den Menschen finden, den Menschen, der auf sich selbst gestellt ist. Wir mußten als Menschheit durchgehen durch die göttliche Verlassenheit, um in der Verlassenheit und Einsamkeit des Menschenseins die Freiheit zu finden. Aber wir müssen uns wiederum zurückfinden zu der Verbindung mit demjenigen, was auf der einen Seite zur höchsten Weisheit bei den Magiern aus dem Morgenlande wurde, auf der anderen Seite durch vertieftes Herzensschauen den Hirten auf dem Felde verkündet worden ist.
[ 16 ] Alle Kräfte entwickeln sich weiter. Was die Weisen aus dem Morgenlande durch die Entwickelung des noch hellsehenden Verstandes als ihre Astrologie, als ihre Art von Astronomie gekannt haben, was ist es heute geworden? Wir verstehen die Menschheitsentwickelung nicht, wenn wir nicht in solche Dinge hineinschauen. Es ist heute zur grauen Mathematik und Geometrie geworden. Wir schauen heute die abstrakten Gebilde an, die wir in der Geometrie und in der Mathematik in der Schule erhalten: das ist der letzte Rest dessen, was in lebendigem Glanze im Weltenlichte beherrscht wurde von jener alten Weisheit, welche die drei Magier aus dem Morgenlande zu dem Christus hinführte. Das äußere Schauen ist inneres Raumes- und Zeitendenken geworden. Während die Magier des Ostens fähig waren, aus ihrer Enträtselung der Raumesgeheimnisse schauend zu berechnen, in dieser Nacht wird der Heiland geboren, berechnen unsere Astronomen, die Nachfolger jener Astrologen, lediglich noch die zukünftige Sonnenund Mondenfinsternis oder ähnliches. Und während die armen Hirten auf dem Felde aus der Innigkeit ihres Herzens heraus sich zur Anschauung desjenigen, was ganz gewiß mit ihnen in Verbindung stand, zur Anschauung des Weihnachtsmysteriums, zum Hören der Himmelsverkündigung erhoben, ist dem heutigen Menschen nur das Anschauen der äußeren sinnlichen Natur geblieben. Das Anschauen der äußeren sinnlichen Natur stellt ebenso die Nachfolgeschaft der Hirteneinfalt dar, wie darstellt die Nachfolgeschaft der Weisen aus dem Morgenlande unsere Berechnung der Sonnen- und Mondenfinsternisse in der Zukunft.
[ 17 ] Die Hirten auf dem Felde waren bewaffnet mit vertieftem Herzensgefühl, wodurch sie in ihrer Hellsichtigkeit zur Anschauung des Weihnachtsmysteriums kamen. Unsere Zeitgenossen sind bewaffnet mit Teleskop und Mikroskop. Kein Teleskop, kein Mikroskop führt hin zum Begreifen desjenigen, was des Menschen tiefstes Rätsel löst, wie es das Herz der Hirten auf dem Felde getan hat. Keine Voraussicht, die sich mit den Rechnungsansätzen für Sonnen- und Mondenfinsternisse machen läßt, führt hin, den für die Menschen notwendigen Gang der Welt zu begreifen, wie das gekonnt hat die Weisheit, die Sternenweisheit der Magier aus dem Morgenlande. Wie fließt alles in der Menschheit Differenzierte zusammen in das einheitliche Menschenempfinden, wenn wir uns sagen: Was die Hirten auf dem Felde ohne alle Weisheit durch die Frömmigkeit ihres Herzens erlebten, es ist dasselbe, was die höchste Weisheit der Magier aus dem Morgenlande bewegte! -— Wunderbar werden die beiden Tatsachen in der christlichen Tradition nebeneinandergestellt.
[ 18 ] Wir haben im Grunde die beiden Wege, durch die sich das Verständnis der Christus-Geburt der Menschheit erschloß, in der neueren Zeit verloren. Wir sind zurückgekehrt von der Krippe zum Weihnachts-, zum Paradiesesbaum, wir sind zurückgekehrt von dem Christus, welcher der ganzen Menschheit gehört, zu den Volksgöttern, die eben nur viele Jahves sind, die kein Christus sind. Denn ebenso wahr, wie es ist, daß sich das, was allen Menschen gemeinschaftlich ist, in des Menschen tiefstem Wesen offenbart, ebenso wahr ist es, daß sich durch alle Raumesweiten und durch alle Zeitengeheimnisse offenbart dasjenige, was allen Menschen gemeinschaftlich ist.
[ 19 ] Es gibt in der Tiefe des Menschen etwas, das von nichts anderem spricht als nur vom Menschsein, das alle menschlichen Differenzierungen hinwegschafft. Aber erst in dieser Tiefe findet man den Christus. Und es gibt eine Weisheit, die über alles übrige hinausgeht, was über einzelne Partien des Weltendaseins gefunden werden kann, was die Welt in ihrer Einheit erfaßt auch im Raum und in der Zeit. Das aber ist zu gleicher Zeit diejenige Sternenweisheit, die zu dem Christus hinführt. Wir brauchen wiederum in einer neuen Gestalt das, wodurch auf der einen Seite die Hirten auf dem Felde, wodurch auf der anderen Seite die Magier aus dem Morgenlande den Weg zu dem Christus Jesus gefunden haben. Mit anderen Worten, wir brauchen die Vertiefung unserer äußeren Naturanschauung durch dasjenige, was das menschliche Herz entwickeln kann an geistiger Anschauung der Natur. Wir müssen wiederum finden, indem wir uns wenden an dasjenige, wofür wir in der neueren Zeit nur Mikroskope und Teleskope und Röntgenapparate und dergleichen haben, wir müssen uns gewöhnen, das wiederum durch jene Kräfte anzusehen, die aus der Frömmigkeit des menschlichen Herzens kommen. Dann werden zu uns nicht nur sprechen die gleichgültig wachsenden Pflanzen allein, der rauschende Strom, der rauschende Quell, der Blitz aus den Wolken, der Donner aus den Wolken, dann werden aus alledem, was die Blümlein auf dem Felde sagen, aus alledem, was die Blitze und die Donner aus den Wolken sagen, aus alledem, was die leuchtenden Sterne und die leuchtende Sonne sagen, aus alledem werden gleichsam wie ein Ergebnis aller Naturbetrachtung die Worte in unsere Augen, in unsere Ohren, zu unseren Herzen hinströmen, die ja auch nichts anderes ankündigen, als: Es offenbaret sich der Gott in den Himmelshöhen, und Friede soll sein unter den Menschen auf Erden, die eines guten Willens sind.
[ 20 ] Die Zeit muß kommen, wo die Naturbetrachtung herausdringt aus der trockenen, nüchternen, unmenschlichen Art der Laboratorien und Kliniken, wo die Naturbetrachtung von einem solchen Leben durchstrahlt wird, daß dasjenige, was uns nicht mehr werden kann auf die Art der Hirten von Bethlehem, uns durch die Stimmen wird, die aus Pflanze, aus Tier, aus Sternen, aus Quellen und Strömen heraus zu uns sprechen. Denn die ganze Natur, sie verkündigt dasjenige, was der Engel der Verkündigung sagt: Es offenbart sich der Gott in den Himmelshöhen, und es kann werden der Friede unter den Menschen auf Erden, die eines guten Willens sein wollen.
[ 21 ] Wir brauchen das, was den Magiern durch äußere Sternenbetrachtung geworden ist, wir brauchen es durch Erweckung unseres Inneren. Wie wir hinaushören müssen in die Natur und gewissermaßen den Engel wieder singen hören müssen aus dem äußeren Naturwesen, so müssen wir in der Lage sein, eine Astronomie, eine Lösung des Weltenrätsels aus dem Inneren des Menschen hervor zu gewinnen durch Imagination, Inspiration und Intuition. Eine Geistes- oder Geheimwissenschaft, die aus dem Inneren des Menschen geschöpft ist, die muß uns werden. Wir müssen ergründen, was des Menschen eigene Wesenheit ist. Und des Menschen eigene Wesenheit muß uns sprechen von dem Werden der Welt durch Saturn-, Sonnen-, Mond-, Erden-, Jupiter-, Venus-, Vulkangeheimnisse. Wir müssen ein Weltenall erstehen fühlen in unserem Inneren. Umgekehrt hat sich seit dem Mysterium von Golgatha dasjenige, was mit dem Menschen geschehen kann in bezug auf seine Anschauung der tiefsten Weltgeheimnisse.
[ 22 ] Es gibt eine alte Art, die Himmelssphäre darzustellen; sie war schon den persischen Magiern eigen. Sie sahen hinauf zum Himmel, sahen im Tierkreis physisch jenes Sternbild, das man die Jungfrau nennt, und sie haben geistig in dieses Sternbild hineingesehen dasjenige, was physisch nur im Sternbilde der Zwillinge zu bemerken ist. Sie hat sich erhalten, diese Weisheit, die so im Menschen lebte, daß der Mensch den Zusammenklang vernehmen, bemerken konnte zwischen dem Sternbilde der Jungfrau und dem im rechten Winkel dazu, im Quadranten stehenden Sternbilde, jenem der Zwillinge. So wurde es dargestellt, daß an die Stelle des Sternbildes der Jungfrau die Jungfrau mit dem ÄAhrenzweige, aber auch mit dem Kinde dargestellt wurde, das nur der Repräsentant der Zwillinge ist, der Repräsentant der Jesusknaben. Insbesondere war dies eine astrologische Anschauung in der Perserzeit.
[ 23 ] Es kam die andere Zeit, die Zeit der ägyptisch-chaldäischen Entwickelung. Da schaute man ebenso hin zu dem Sternbilde des Löwen, wie man hinschaute in der Perserzeit zu dem Sternbilde der Jungfrau. Aber jetzt war im Quadranten dem Löwen zugeteilt der Stier, und es entstand die Mithrasreligion, die Stierverehrung, indem man hineinschaute in das Sternbild des Löwen das Sternbild des Stieres.
[ 24 ] Und es kam die Zeit, die griechisch-lateinische Zeit, in welcher der Krebs dieselbe Rolle spielte wie die Jungfrau unter den Persern, und man sah das Sternbild des Widders, im Quadranten stehend, in das Sternbild des Krebses hinein. Da war die Umkehrung, da schlug die Sache einen anderen Weg ein. Bis in die griechisch-lateinische Zeit, bis ins Mysterium von Golgatha war Astronomie etwas, das als äußere Wissenschaft zu erreichen war, war das menschliche Erkennen so geartet, daß man hinausschaute in den Raum und die Geheimnisse der Sternenwelten, die Geheimnisse von Raum und Zeit fand, daß man hineinlebte in das menschliche Innere, und durch die Verfrommung des Herzens zu der Anschauung innerer Geheimnisse kam. In der griechisch-lateinischen Zeit drehte sich das Verhältnis um. Dasjenige, was vorher innerlich erlebt werden konnte, es mußte immer mehr durch das Anschauen der äußeren Natur erlebt werden.
[ 25 ] Wir müssen so fromm werden wie die Hirten in ihrem Herzen waren gegenüber den Offenbarungen der Natur. Wie diese in ihrer Innenwelt zum Geistesauge kamen, müssen wir zum Geistesauge an der Natur kommen. Und wir müssen auf der anderen Seite auch den Krebsweg machen. Wir müssen kommen zu einer Astronomie des Inneren, so daß aus den schauenden Kräften im Inneren des Menschen erweckt kann werden der Gang der Welt durch Saturn-, Sonnen-, Monden-, Erden-, Jupiter-, Venus-, Vulkanzeiten: eine Astronomie aus dem Inneren wie früher eine Astronomie aus dem Äußeren, eine Frömmigkeit an der Naturbeobachtung wie früher die Frömmigkeit nach Art der Hirten auf dem Felde. Können wir vertiefen dasjenige, was heute so ungeistig an uns herantritt in der Naturbetrachtung, können wir auf der anderen Seite schöpferisch machen, was heute so grau in bloßen mathematisch-geometrischen Bildern erlebt wird, können wir die Mathematik durch inneres Erleben zu jener Glorie wiederum erheben, welche die alte Astronomie hatte, können wir die Naturbetrachtung zu jener Herzenstiefe und zu jener Frommheit vertiefen, die die Hirten auf dem Felde erlebten, können wir durch das Innere dasjenige erleben, was die Magier aus den Sternen erlebten, können wir an dem Anblicke der äußeren Natur so fromm werden, wie die Hirten auf dem Felde gewesen sind - dann werden wir erleben durch Frommheit im äußeren Naturbetrachten, durch liebevolles Verfolgen der Weltenereignisse aus dem Inneren heraus, dann werden wir finden in einer ähnlichen Weise wiederum den Weg zum Weihnachtsmysterium, wie durch innerliches Frommwerden die Hirten auf dem Felde, durch äußeres Weisewerden die Magier aus dem Morgenlande den Weg zur Krippe gefunden haben.
[ 26 ] Der Weg zum Weihnachtsmysterium muß neu gefunden werden. Wir müssen an der Natur so fromm werden, wie die Hirten in ihren Herzen waren. Wir müssen in unserem inneren Schauen so weise werden, wie es die Magier an der Beobachtung von Planeten und Sternen im Raume und in der Zeit geworden sind. Wir müssen im Inneren entwickeln, was die Magier im Äußeren entwickelt haben. Wir müssen dasjenige in unserem Wechselverkehr mit der äußeren Welt entwickeln, was die einfältigen Hirten auf dem Felde in ihren Herzen entwickelt haben -— dann werden wir finden den Weg, den rechten Weg zu einem tiefen Empfinden des Christus, zu einem liebevollen Begreifen des Christus. Dann werden wir den Weg zum Weihnachtsmysterium finden. Dann werden wir dürfen mit rechten Gedanken und rechten Gefühlen neben den Ursprungsbaum aus dem Paradiese hinstellen die Krippe, welche uns nicht nur spricht von dem, wie der Mensch durch Naturkräfte in die Welt hereingekommen ist, sondern wie er durch Wiedergeburt erst sich seines vollen Menschseins bewußt werden kann.
[ 27 ] Wer heute von dem Weihnachtsmysterium redet, muß eine Forderung, die in die Zukunft hinein spricht, an die Menschheit stellen. Wir leben in jenen ernsten Zeiten, wo wir uns klar werden müssen, daß wir erst im rechten Sinne wiederum Menschen werden müssen. Wir haben noch nicht errungen dasjenige, was die Magierweisheit ganz verinnerlichte, was die Hirtenfrömmigkeit ganz in die Außenwelt flieBen ließ. Die soziale Frage steht vor den Toren des Menschendaseins furchtbar fordernd. Sie hat Schreckliches gebracht in den letzten Jahren; sie wird immer drohender und drohender, und nur schläfrige Seelen können das Drohende übersehen. Europa schickt sich an, ein Trümmerhaufen der Kultur zu werden. Nicht anders wird es sich aus seinem chaotischen Zustande erheben als dadurch, daß die Menschen die Möglichkeit finden, im sozialen Zusammensein wiederum echtes, wahres Menschentum zu entwickeln. Sie werden es nicht anders entwickeln, als wenn sie ihre Gefühle dadurch vertiefen und verinnerlichen, daß sie im Naturbetrachten so fromm werden können, wie die Hirten auf dem Felde waren, als ihnen durch ihre innerlichen Kräfte der Engel verkündete von der Offenbarung der Götter oben und des Erdenfriedens unten. Mit diesen Kräften allein bezwingt man auch das soziale Leben, und nur dann, wenn das, was in den Raumesweiten und in der Zeitenfolge geschaut wird, in das Innere einzieht, so daß der Mensch des Weltengeistes wahres Wesen so einheitlich sieht, wie die eine Sonne der Chinese ebenso sieht wie der Amerikaner und in der Mitte zwischen beiden der Europäer. So wie es lächerlich wäre, wenn der Chinese eine Sonne für sich in Anspruch nehmen würde, der Russe eine Sonne für sich, der Mitteleuropäer eine andere, der Franzose eine andere, der Engländer eine andere! Wie die Sonne eine einheitliche ist, so ist das die Menschen tragende Sonnenwesen ein einheitliches.
[ 28 ] Sehen wir hinaus in die Weltenweiten: wir finden die Aufforderung zur Vereinheitlichung der Menschheit. Sehen wir hinein in des Menschen tiefste, innere Geheimnisse: wir sehen die Aufforderung zur Vereinheitlichung der Menschheit. Was da draußen erscheint, auch das Geistigste, spricht nicht von der Differenzierung der Menschheit, nicht von Unfrieden; was im tiefsten Inneren spricht, spricht nicht von der Differenzierung der Menschheit, nicht von Unfrieden. Den Hirten auf dem Felde hat diejenige Stimme, die sie durch ihr Herzensgehör hörten, verkündet, daß sich aus den weiten Erscheinungen des Weltenalls die Gottheit offenbaret, und daß durch das Aufnehmen der Gottheit in die eigene Seele Friede werden kann unter den Menschen, die eines guten Willens sind. Das muß sich verkünden der neueren Menschheit aus dem ganzen Umkreis des Naturdaseins heraus. Den Magiern aus dem Morgenlande haben die Sternengeheimnisse gesagt, daß hier auf der Erde geboren ist der Christus Jesus. Das muß sich der neueren Menschheit verkünden aus dem Verfolgen desjenigen, was in ihrem Inneren sich offenbarend auftun kann.
[ 29 ] Einen neuen Weg brauchen wir. Wiederum dringt die Stimme zu uns: Ändert den Sinn, sehet in einer neuen Art hin auf den Weltenlauf! — Und wenn man in einer rechten Art hinsieht auf den Weltenlauf, wenn man ansieht den Gang der Menschheit, der wir selber angehören, dann finden wir den Weg zu demjenigen Geheimnis, das sich den Hirten ebenso offenbaren konnte wie den entwickelten Weisen, und das sich offenbaren wird unserem inneren Weltenschauen, unserem äußeren Weltenschauen. Wenn wir inneres Weltenschauen und äußeres Weltenschauen in genügender Weise vertiefen, wenn wir das können, wenn wir die innere Magierweisheit finden, die uns so weist, wie die äußere Magierweisheit die Weisen aus dem Morgenlande geführt hat, wenn wir die äußere Weisheit finden, die uns so führt in Frömmigkeit, wie die Frömmigkeit die Hirten auf dem Felde geführt hat, dann werden wir wiederum mit richtigen inneren Empfindungen hinschauen auf dasjenige, was in dem Mysterium liegt: daß für alle ohne Unterschied, wie er sonst unter den Menschen auftritt, gewissermaßen herausgestellt aus der Menschheit, hineingestellt in die Einsamkeit — geboren worden ist dasjenige, was dann zum Christus geworden ist.
[ 30 ] Wir müssen das Jesus-Weihnachtsgeheimnis wiederfinden, und wir müssen es wiederfinden, indem wir in uns all dasjenige pflegen, von dem heute gesprochen werden sollte. Wir müssen das Weihnachtslicht in uns selber finden, wie die Hirten das Engelslicht auf dem Felde, und wir müssen, wie die Magier aus dem Morgenlande, den Stern finden durch die Kraft dessen, was wahre Geisteswissenschaft ist. Dann wird sich uns der einige Weg zu dem eröffnen, was das Weihnachtsgeheimnis enthält. Wiedererkennen sollen wir es: es erinnert uns an des Menschen Wiedergeburt.
[ 31 ] Arbeiten wir daran, daß das Weihnachtsgeheimnis unter den Menschen wiedergeboren werde, dann werden wir auch das Wiedergeburtsgeheimnis von des Menschen Wesenheit im richtigen Sinne erfassen. Das ist es, was zu uns gesprochen wird in einer eigentümlichen Weise: In einem nicht von der Kirche anerkannten Evangelium wird erzählt, daß es eine Eigentümlichkeit des einen Jesusknaben war, daß er gleich nach seiner Geburt seine Mutter mit bestimmten Worten angesprochen hat. Sicherlich gehen wir heute in der richtigen Art auf das in der Krippe liegende Kind ein, wenn wir die Worte, die es heute zu uns sprechen will, in der richtigen Weise hören: Erwecket das Weihnachtslicht in euch, und das Weihnachtslicht wird euch im rechten Sinne mit euren Mitmenschen zusammen auch in der Außenwelt erscheinen.
Thirteenth Lecture
[ 1 ] In three annual festivals, Christianity commemorates the being who gives meaning to earthly life and from whom the strongest force of this earthly life radiates. Of these three festivals, Christmas makes the greatest demands on our feelings; it seeks, as it were, to internalize our feelings most deeply. Easter makes the greatest demands on what we call human understanding, human comprehension; Pentecost on what we call human will. And basically, one can only understand what lies in the mystery of Christmas through internalization, through deepening the feeling that makes us aware of our entire human nature, our value, and our dignity as human beings.
[ 2 ] Only when one can feel what is human in the universe in the right way and deeply enough can one do justice to the mood that should be the true Christmas mood. Only when we fully understand the miracle contained in the mystery of Easter, the miracle of the resurrection, can we do justice to this Easter mystery, and only when we see in the feast of Pentecost something that signifies power for the development of our will impulses, something that lifts our will above mere earthly instincts, can we see in the right light what the feast of Pentecost should be.
[ 3 ] Christ Jesus is related to the Father principles of the universe: this is what Christmas reminds us of. Christ Jesus is related to what we have become accustomed to calling the Son principle: this is brought home to us by the mystery of Easter. Christ is related to that which pervades and interweaves the world as spirit in the way that the mystery of Pentecost brings home to us.
[ 4 ] When we see the external nature around us, we also see, through the forces of this nature, human beings entering into their physical existence. We know from all that spiritual science can tell us that we do not view this nature in the right sense if we look at it only in terms of its physical and sensory outward appearances. We know that divine forces surround nature, and we become aware of our origin in nature in the true sense of the word only when we can look at this divine force that permeates and interweaves nature. Then we look up to the father principles of nature. Everything that permeates and interweaves nature as divine are father principles for us in the sense of older religions and also in the sense of correctly understood Christianity. Whether we become aware of how the little flower grows in the field, whether we become aware of how thunder rolls from the cloud and lightning flashes down, whether we see the sun moving across the sky and the stars shining, whether we hear the springs and streams rushing — when we become aware of what mysteriously reveals itself in these outer manifestations of natural existence as the origin of all becoming, then we also become aware of what brings us into this world through the mystery of physical birth.
[ 5 ] But this mystery of physical birth always remains something inexplicable in view of the nature of man, unless we can connect it with what we experience through an intimate feeling in remembrance of the mystery of Christmas, in remembrance of the childhood that came into humanity through the child Jesus. What does the existence of these Jesus boys tell us? It tells us nothing less than that to be fully human, it is not enough simply to be born, simply to be present in the world through those forces which, as physical forces of birth, bring all beings, including human beings, into existence. This holy mystery of Christmas tells us, in the light of Christ's childhood, that true humanity cannot simply be born in us, but must be reborn in the innermost part of the soul, that human beings must experience something in the course of their lives within their soul existence that makes them fully human. And what he must experience, he can only experience if he experiences it in living together with what was brought into the earth's evolution at Christmas during childhood.
[ 6 ] We look at Jesus' childhood and must say to ourselves: Only through this being's coming among human beings in the course of human evolution is man capable, in the full sense of the word, of being human, that is, of connecting what he receives through birth with what they can feel about themselves through all the devoted love they feel for the being who descended from spiritual heights to connect with human existence through the great sacrifice.
[ 7 ] For many people in the first centuries of Christianity, it was a great experience to witness the entrance of the Christ being into the earth's evolution. In a sense, this made them aware of the twofold origin of the human being, his physical and spiritual origin. It is a birth that Jesus goes through. When Christians look at the child born on earth at Christmas, they say to themselves: A being is being born who is different from other human beings, a being through whom other human beings can receive what they cannot receive through physical birth alone. — And our feeling deepens when we understand the word in its true sense and with the right love: we must be born twice, once through the forces of nature, and again through the forces of Christ Jesus. This is our communion with Christ Jesus; this is what Christ Jesus teaches us through the full consciousness of our human value and human character. And as we learn from the development of the centuries, we must ask ourselves: Has this feeling toward the birth of Christ Jesus always remained equally deep? Looking around the world, we cannot say that we still possess the same depth of feeling toward the mystery of Christmas that existed in Europe five or six centuries ago.
[ 8 ] You see, the Christmas tree is something beautiful, something that speaks to our hearts in a very charming way. But the Christmas tree is not something old; the Christmas tree is barely two centuries old. It has become established relatively quickly in European regions, but it has only emerged as a Christmas decoration in recent times. What does it actually represent to us? It represents the beautiful, lovable, sympathetic side of what also appears to us in a different way, in a less sympathetic, less graceful way, in the recent development of humanity. No matter how deeply one searches for the impulses that gave rise to the Christmas tree in recent times, one will find only mysterious feelings from which the Christmas tree originated. But these mysterious feelings all tend toward the idea that we see something in the Christmas tree like a symbol of the tree of paradise. But what does this tell us? It tells us that human beings have become increasingly alienated from what presented itself to their senses when these senses were directed toward the manger, toward the mystery of the birth of Christ Jesus, toward what what happened at the beginning of our calendar; that the newer humanity has in a certain way lost this rebirth of the human being in the soul, and that this newer humanity wants to look back from the Christ tree, which represents the cross, to that origin which still knows nothing of Christ: to the origin of the human race itself, to the natural starting point of the becoming of humanity, from Christ back to Paradise, from the celebration of Christmas Day, December 25, to the celebration of the feast of Adam and Eve, December 24.
[ 9 ] It has become beautiful because the origin of humanity is also beautiful as the origin of Paradise, which has been placed there, but it is a distraction from the actual mystery of the birth of Christ Jesus. It has preserved all the depth and intimacy of feeling, this looking at the Christmas tree, and it comforts this looking at the Christmas tree, which occurs every year from the intimacy of the human mind in those who are of good will. It comforts this looking at the Christmas tree over the other, which in more recent times has been diverted in a less sympathetic way from the mystery of Christ and leads to the original natural birth forces of human becoming.
[ 10 ] Christ Jesus came among a people who worshipped Yahweh, Jehovah, that Yahweh God who is connected with all that is natural existence, who lives in lightning and thunder, who lives in the movement of the clouds and the stars, who lives in the rushing spring, the stream, who lives in the growth of plants, animals, and humans. Yahweh is the God who, if one connects with him alone, can never give man full humanity. For he gives man the consciousness of his natural birth, albeit with its spiritual influence of forces that are not merely natural, but he does not give man the consciousness of his rebirth, which he must acquire through something that cannot be given to him by natural-sensory-physical forces. And so we see how distracted modern humanity has been from Christ Jesus, for whom there is no difference between classes, no difference between peoples, no difference between races, for whom there is only one humanity, how distracted the thoughts and feelings of modern humanity have been from what had already been overcome through the mystery of the birth of Christ Jesus: towards what lies at the basis of the natural forces of human evolution, which are connected with the differentiation of humanity into classes, peoples, and races. And if it was the one Yahweh whom the Jewish people worshipped when Christ Jesus came, then the newer peoples have returned to the many Yahwehs! For what the peoples worship out of today's national principles—even if it is no longer called by the old names, what they worship so much that they separate themselves into nations, that they fight each other as nations—is Yahweh. And we see that the peoples fight each other in bloody wars and that each one, under certain circumstances, invokes Christ. But in truth it is not Christ whom the peoples invoke; it is only a Yahweh, not the one Yahweh, but a Yahweh. People have merely returned to him. People have forgotten how much progress lay in advancing from the Yahweh principle to the Christ principle. That is the other thing.
[ 11 ] The Christmas tree leads us back to the origin of humanity in a beautiful way, while the Yahweh principle that has taken hold of the nations leads us back in an ugly way. The fact is that they often address what is only Yahweh as Christ through an inner lie of feeling, thus basically misusing the name of Christ. The name of Christ is being misused in a terrible way today, and we cannot find the real deepening of feeling that we need today in order to feel the mystery of Christmas in the right way again, unless we clearly see how we must seek the way to find this feeling toward Christ Jesus. We need a new understanding of what has been handed down to us, also in relation to the birth of Christ Jesus.
[ 12 ] Two kinds of people, who of course represent only the same humanity, are announced by Christ, who is Jesus, at the Christmas festival of the world: the uneducated, poor shepherds of the field, who have absorbed nothing but simple human understanding and simple human feelings, and he is proclaimed to the wise men from the East, that is, from the land of wisdom. He is proclaimed to them through a supreme ascent to their wisdom, to a reading of the stars. Christ Jesus announces himself to simple shepherd souls, and Christ Jesus announces himself in the highest wisdom of the three magi from the East. The deepest meaning lies in this contrast between the announcement of Christ Jesus to the simple shepherds on the one hand and to the wisest men in the world on the other.
[ 13 ] And how does Christ Jesus announce himself to the simple, poor shepherds in the field? They see the bright angel with the eye of their soul. Their vision is awakened, their clairaudience is awakened. They hear the profound words that will become the meaning of earthly life for them in the future: God reveals Himself on high, and peace will come among men on earth who are of good will. — From the depths of the soul rises that ability through which, on Christmas Eve, the poor, simple shepherds, without any wisdom, experience what is revealed to the world. From the perfection of that wisdom which has been attained up to the mystery of Golgotha, from the most subtle observation of the movement of the stars, the same revelation arises for the wise men of the East, for the magical sages! The poor, simple shepherds read it in the human heart, and it penetrates to the deepest point of the human heart. There they become clairvoyant, there the heart reveals to them, out of its power of vision, the coming of the Savior of humanity. The others look up at the whole wide canopy of heaven. They know the secrets of the expanses of space and the development of time; they have attained a wisdom through which they can feel and unravel these secrets of the expanses of space and the development of time. There the mystery of Christmas is revealed to them.
[ 14 ] We are shown how that which lives within the human being and that which lives in the expanses of space flow from the same source. And both were already in decline in the way they developed up to the mystery of Golgotha. The clairvoyance that came from the living human heart, which was still strong enough among the shepherds, who are referred to as those for whom the proclamation is intended, to hear the voices: God is revealed in the heights, in the heavens, and his peace will be upon the earth among men of good will – one might say that the last remnants of this clairvoyance, which had arisen through inner piety, were still present in the shepherds whom karma, destiny, had gathered together at the place where Christ was born. And from that ancient sacred wisdom, which first blossomed in the post-Atlantean era among the ancient Indians, then among the Persians, then again among the Chaldeans, which had been transplanted and of which the last remnants were still present among those among whom we must seek the three Magi from the East — from this ancient sacred wisdom that spanned the world in space and time, from this wisdom, as its representatives rose to their highest level, the mystery of Christmas was revealed once again. But we lost both of these in the fifth post-Atlantean epoch.
[ 15 ] For humanity in general, what led the poor shepherds to clairvoyance and the wise men from the East to insight into the mysteries of space and time is no longer alive and active. We had to find the human being who is left to his own devices. We had to pass through divine abandonment as humanity in order to find freedom in the abandonment and loneliness of human existence. But we must find our way back to the connection with that which, on the one hand, became the highest wisdom among the magi from the East and, on the other hand, was proclaimed to the shepherds in the fields through deep heart-seeing.
[ 16 ] All forces continue to develop. What did the wise men from the East know through the development of their still clairvoyant intellect as their astrology, as their kind of astronomy? What has it become today? We cannot understand human development if we do not look into such things. Today it has become gray mathematics and geometry. Today we look at the abstract structures we learn in geometry and mathematics at school: these are the last remnants of what once shone in living splendor in the light of the world, ruled by that ancient wisdom which led the three magi from the East to Christ. Outward observation has become inward thinking about space and time. While the Magi of the East were able to calculate from their unraveling of the mysteries of space that the Savior would be born on that night, our astronomers, the successors of those astrologers, merely calculate future solar and lunar eclipses and the like. And while the poor shepherds in the fields, out of the depths of their hearts, raised themselves to behold that which was most certainly connected with them, to behold the mystery of Christmas, to hear the proclamation from heaven, modern man is left with only the contemplation of external, sensory nature. Looking at the outer, sensory nature is just as much the legacy of the shepherds' simplicity as the legacy of the wise men from the East is our calculation of future solar and lunar eclipses.
[ 17 ] The shepherds in the fields were armed with deep feelings of the heart, which enabled them to see the mystery of Christmas in their clairvoyance. Our contemporaries are armed with telescopes and microscopes. No telescope, no microscope can lead to an understanding of what solves the deepest mystery of man, as the hearts of the shepherds in the fields did. No foresight based on calculations of solar and lunar eclipses can lead us to understand the course of the world that is necessary for human beings, as the wisdom of the Magi from the East, the wisdom of the stars, has done so skillfully. How does everything differentiated in humanity flow together into a unified human consciousness when we say to ourselves: What the shepherds in the fields experienced without any wisdom, through the piety of their hearts, is the same thing that moved the highest wisdom of the Magi from the East! — These two facts are wonderfully juxtaposed in the Christian tradition.
[ 18 ] We have basically lost the two paths through which the understanding of the birth of Christ was revealed to humanity in more recent times. We have returned from the manger to the Christmas tree, to the tree of paradise; we have returned from the Christ who belongs to all humanity to the folk gods who are merely many Yahves, who are not Christ. For just as it is true that what is common to all human beings is revealed in the deepest essence of the human being, so it is true that what is common to all human beings is revealed through all the expanses of space and through all the mysteries of time.
[ 19 ] There is something in the depths of man that speaks of nothing else but being human, that removes all human differences. But it is only in this depth that one finds Christ. And there is a wisdom that transcends everything else that can be found in individual parts of the world's existence, that encompasses the world in its unity, even in space and time. But this is at the same time the wisdom of the stars that leads to Christ. We need once again, in a new form, that which enabled the shepherds in the fields on the one hand, and the magi from the East on the other, to find their way to Christ Jesus. In other words, we need to deepen our external view of nature through what the human heart can develop in terms of spiritual perception of nature. We must find again, by turning to that for which we have in modern times only microscopes and telescopes and X-ray apparatus and the like, we must accustom ourselves to seeing again through those forces that come from the piety of the human heart. Then it will not only be the indifferently growing plants, the rushing stream, the murmuring spring, the lightning from the clouds, the thunder from the clouds that will speak to us, but then from all that the little flowers in the field say, from all that the lightning and thunder from the clouds say, from all that what the shining stars and the shining sun say, from all of this, as if it were the result of all observation of nature, words will flow into our eyes, into our ears, into our hearts, announcing nothing other than: God is revealed in the heights of heaven, and peace shall be among men on earth who are of good will.
[ 20 ] The time must come when the observation of nature breaks out of the dry, sober, inhuman nature of laboratories and clinics, when the observation of nature is permeated by such a life that what can no longer become us in the manner of the shepherds of Bethlehem becomes to us through the voices that speak to us from plants, animals, stars, springs, and streams. For all of nature proclaims what the angel of the Annunciation says: God is revealed in the heights of heaven, and there can be peace among people on earth who are of good will.
[ 21 ] We need what became apparent to the Magi through their observation of the stars; we need it through the awakening of our inner being. Just as we must listen to nature and, in a sense, hear the angels singing again from the external natural world, so must we be able to gain an astronomy, a solution to the riddle of the world, from within ourselves through imagination, inspiration, and intuition. A spiritual or secret science drawn from within ourselves must become ours. We must fathom what is the essence of the human being. And the essence of the human being must speak to us of the becoming of the world through the mysteries of Saturn, the Sun, the Moon, the Earth, Jupiter, Venus, and the volcanoes. We must feel a universe arise within ourselves. Conversely, since the Mystery of Golgotha, what can happen to human beings in relation to their view of the deepest secrets of the world has changed.
[ 22 ] There is an ancient way of representing the sphere of the heavens; it was already familiar to the Persian magi. They looked up at the sky, saw in the zodiac the physical constellation called Virgo, and spiritually saw in this constellation what can only be perceived physically in the constellation Gemini. This wisdom has been preserved, living in human beings in such a way that they could hear and perceive the harmony between the constellation of Virgo and the constellation standing at right angles to it, in the quadrant, that of Gemini. Thus it was represented that in place of the constellation Virgo, the Virgin was depicted with the ear of corn, but also with the child, who is only the representative of the Twins, the representative of the infant Jesus. This was an astrological view in particular in Persian times.
[ 23 ] Then came another time, the time of Egyptian-Chaldean development. People looked at the constellation Leo in the same way as they had looked at the constellation Virgo in the Persian era. But now the constellation Taurus was assigned to the quadrant of Leo, and the Mithraic religion arose, the worship of Taurus, by looking into the constellation Leo and seeing the constellation Taurus.
[ 24 ] And then came the Greek-Latin period, in which Cancer played the same role as Virgo among the Persians, and people saw the constellation of Aries, standing in the quadrant, in the constellation of Cancer. There was a reversal, and things took a different course. Until the Greco-Latin period, until the mystery of Golgotha, astronomy was something that could be attained as an external science. Human cognition was such that one looked out into space and found the mysteries of the starry worlds, the mysteries of space and time, that one lived into the human interior, and through the purification of the heart came to perceive inner mysteries. In the Greek-Latin period, the relationship was reversed. What could previously be experienced inwardly had to be experienced more and more through the observation of external nature.
[ 25 ] We must become as devout as the shepherds were in their hearts toward the revelations of nature. Just as they came to the spiritual eye in their inner world, we must come to the spiritual eye in nature. And on the other hand, we must also take the path of Cancer. We must come to an astronomy of the inner world, so that the course of the world through the Saturn, Sun, Moon, Earth, Jupiter, Venus, and Vulcan ages can be awakened from the powers of contemplation within the human being: an astronomy from within, as there once was an astronomy from without, a piety in the observation of nature, as there once was the piety of the shepherds in the fields. If we can deepen what today seems so unspiritual to us in our observation of nature, if we can make creative what today is experienced as so gray in mere mathematical-geometric images, if we can raise mathematics through inner experience to the glory it had in ancient astronomy, can we deepen our observation of nature to the depth of heart and piety that the shepherds in the fields experienced, can we experience through our inner being what the magi experienced from the stars, can we become as pious at the sight of outer nature as the shepherds in the fields were—then we will experience, through piety in our observation of outer nature, by lovingly following world events from within, we will find our way back to the mystery of Christmas in a similar way to how the shepherds in the fields found their way to the manger through inner piety and the Magi from the East through outer wisdom.
[ 26 ] The path to the mystery of Christmas must be found anew. We must become as devout toward nature as the shepherds were in their hearts. We must become as wise in our inner vision as the Magi became through their observation of the planets and stars in space and time. We must develop within ourselves what the Magi developed externally. We must develop in our interaction with the external world what the simple shepherds developed in their hearts in the fields — then we will find the path, the right path to a deep feeling for Christ, to a loving understanding of Christ. Then we will find the path to the mystery of Christmas. Then we will be able to place the manger next to the tree of origin from Paradise with right thoughts and right feelings, which speaks to us not only of how man came into the world through natural forces, but also of how he can only become aware of his full humanity through rebirth.
[ 27 ] Anyone who speaks of the mystery of Christmas today must make a demand of humanity that speaks into the future. We live in serious times when we must realize that we must first become human beings again in the true sense. We have not yet attained what the wisdom of the Magi fully internalized, what the piety of the shepherds allowed to flow completely into the outer world. The social question stands at the gates of human existence, demanding terrible things. It has brought terrible things in recent years; it is becoming ever more threatening, and only sleepy souls can overlook the threat. Europe is preparing to become a cultural ruin. It will not rise from its chaotic state except by enabling people to develop genuine, true humanity in social coexistence. They will not develop it in any other way than by deepening and internalizing their feelings, by becoming as devout in their observation of nature as the shepherds in the fields were when, through their inner powers, the angel announced to them the revelation of the gods above and peace on earth below. It is with these forces alone that social life is conquered, and only when what is seen in the vastness of space and in the sequence of time enters into the inner being, so that the human being sees the true nature of the world spirit as uniformly as the Chinese sees the one sun, as does the American, and the European in the middle between the two. How ridiculous it would be if the Chinese claimed one sun for themselves, the Russians another, the Central Europeans another, the French another, and the English yet another! Just as the sun is one, so is the sun-being that sustains human beings one.
[ 28 ] Let us look out into the world: we find the call for the unification of humanity. Let us look into the deepest, innermost secrets of human beings: we see the call for the unification of humanity. What appears out there, even the most spiritual, does not speak of the differentiation of humanity, nor of discord; what speaks in the deepest inner being does not speak of the differentiation of humanity, nor of discord. The shepherds in the fields heard a voice through their hearts telling them that the divinity was revealing itself through the vast phenomena of the universe, and that by accepting the divinity into their own souls, peace could come among people of good will. This must be proclaimed to the new humanity from the whole sphere of natural existence. The secrets of the stars told the magi from the East that Christ Jesus was born here on earth. This must be proclaimed to the new humanity from the pursuit of that which can reveal itself within them.
[ 29 ] We need a new path. Once again, the voice urges us: Change your thinking, look at the course of the world in a new way! — And when we look at the course of the world in the right way, when we look at the progress of humanity, to which we ourselves belong, then we find the way to that mystery which could reveal itself to the shepherds as well as to the developed sages, and which will reveal itself to our inner worldview, to our outer worldview. If we deepen our inner and outer worldview sufficiently, if we can do that, if we find the inner magician's wisdom that guides us as the outer magician's wisdom guided the wise men from the East, if we find the outer wisdom that guides us in piety as piety guided the shepherds in the fields, then we will again look with the right inner feelings at what lies in the mystery: that for all, without distinction, as it otherwise appears among human beings, in a sense lifted out of humanity and placed in solitude, there was born that which then became Christ.
[ 30 ] We must rediscover the mystery of Jesus' Christmas, and we must rediscover it by cultivating within ourselves all that should be spoken of today. We must find the Christmas light within ourselves, as the shepherds found the angelic light in the fields, and we must, like the Magi from the East, find the star through the power of true spiritual science. Then the only path to the mystery of Christmas will open up to us. We must recognize it: it reminds us of the rebirth of the human being.
[ 31 ] Let us work to ensure that the mystery of Christmas is reborn among human beings, then we will also understand the mystery of the rebirth of the human being in the true sense. This is what is spoken to us in a peculiar way: in a gospel not recognized by the Church, it is told that it was a peculiarity of the one Jesus child that he addressed his mother with certain words immediately after his birth. Surely we respond in the right way to the child lying in the manger today when we hear in the right way the words he wants to speak to us today: Awaken the Christmas light within yourselves, and the Christmas light will appear to you in the right sense together with your fellow human beings in the outer world.