Evil and the Power of Thought
GA 207
23 September 1921, Dornach
Translator Unknown
If an an oriental sage of early times, who had been initiated into the Mysteries of the ancient East, were to turn his glance towards modern Western civilisation, he might perhaps say to its representatives: “You are living entirely in fear; your whole mood of soul is governed by fear. All that you do, as well as all that you feel, is saturated with fear and its reverberations in the most important moments of life. And since fear is closely related to hatred, so hatred plays a great part in your whole civilisation.”
Let us make this quite clear. I mean a sage of the ancient Eastern civilisation would speak thus if he stood again to-day among Western people with the same standard of education, the same mood of soul, as those of his own ancient time. And he would make it plain that in his time and his country civilisation was founded on a quite different basis. He would probably say: “In my days, fear played no part in civilised life. Whenever we were concerned to promulgate a world-conception and let action and social life spring from it, the main thing was joy—joy which could be enhanced to the point of a complete giving of oneself in love to the world.” That is how he would put it, and in so doing he would indicate (if he were rightly understood) what were from his point of view supremely important constituent factors and impulses of modern civilisation. And if we knew how to listen to him in the right way, we should gain much that we need to know in order to find a starting point for trying to get a grip on modern life.
In fact, an echo of the ancient civilisation still persists in Asia, even though strong European influences have been absorbed into its religious, æsthetic, scientific and social life. This ancient civilisation is in decline, and when the ancient oriental sage says, “Love was the fundamental force of the ancient oriental culture,” then it must certainly be admitted that but little of this love can be traced directly in the present. But one who is able to discern it can perceive even now, in the phenomena of decline of the Asiatic culture, the penetration of this primeval element of joy—delight in the world and love for the world.
In those ancient times there was in the Orient little of what was afterwards required of man when that word resounded which found its most radical expression in the Greek saying, “Know thyself!” This “Know thyself” entered the historical life of man only when the early Greek civilisation set in. The old eastern world-picture, wide-ranging and light-filled, was not yet permeated by this kind of human knowledge; it was in no way orientated towards directing man's glance into his own inner being.
In this respect man is dependent on the circumstances prevailing in his environment. The ancient oriental civilisation was founded under a different influence from the sun's light, and its earthly circumstances were also different from those of Western civilisation. In the ancient East, man's inner glance was captured by all that he experienced in the surrounding world, and he had a special motive for giving over his entire being to it. It was cosmic knowledge that wove in the ancient oriental wisdom, and in the world-conception that owed its origin to this wisdom. Even in the Mysteries themselves—you can infer this from all you have been hearing for many years—in all that lived in the Mysteries of the East there was no fulfilment of the challenge, “Know thyself!” On the contrary—“Turn your gaze outwards towards the world and endeavour to let that approach you which is hidden in the depths of cosmic phenomena!”—that is how the precept of the ancient Oriental civilisation would have been expressed.
The teachers and pupils of the Mysteries were compelled, however, to turn their glance to the inner being of man when the Asiatic civilisation began to spread westwards; as soon, indeed, as Mystery colonies were founded in Egypt and in North Africa. But particularly when the Mysteries began to develop their colonies still further to the west—a special centre was ancient Ireland—then the teachers and pupils of the Mysteries coming over from Asia were faced, by virtue of the geographical features of the West and its entirely different elemental configuration, with the necessity of cultivating self-knowledge and a true inner vision. And simply because these Mystery pupils, when still living in Asia, had acquired knowledge of the outer world and of the spiritual facts and beings lying behind the outer world—simply by the strength of this fact, they were now able to penetrate deeply into all that exists in man's innermost being.
Over there in Asia all this could not have been observed and studied at all. The inward-turning glance would have been paralysed, so to speak. But by means of all that the men of the East brought to the Western Mystery centres, their gaze having long been directed outwards so as to penetrate into the spiritual worlds, they were now enabled to pierce through into man's inner being. And it was only the strongest souls who could endure what they perceived.
We can indeed realise when an impression was produced by this self-knowledge on the teachers and pupils of the Oriental Mysteries if we repeat a precept which was addressed to the pupils over and over again by the teachers who had already cultivated that vision of man's inner being, a precept which was to make clear to them in what mood of soul this self-knowledge was to be approached. The precept I mean is frequently quoted. But in its full weight it was uttered only in the older Mystery colonies of Egypt, North Africa and Ireland as a preparation for the pupil and as a reminder for every Initiate in regard to the experiences of man's inner being. The precept runs thus: “No-one who is not initiated in the sacred Mysteries should learn to know the secrets of man's innermost being; to utter these secrets in the presence of a non-Initiate is inadmissible; for the mouth uttering these secrets then lays the burden of sin upon itself; likewise does the ear burden itself with sin when it hearkens to those secrets.”
Time and again this precept was uttered from out of the inner experience to which a man, prepared by Oriental wisdom, was able to attain when he penetrated, by virtue of the terrestrial configuration of the West, to the knowledge of man. Tradition has preserved this precept, and to-day it is still repeated—without any understanding of its intrinsic nature—in the secret orders and secret societies of the West which, externally, still have a great influence. But it is repeated only from tradition. It is not uttered with the necessary weight, for those who use it do not really know what it signifies. Yet even in our own time this word is used as a kind of motto in the secret societies of the West: “There are secrets concerning man's inner being that can be transmitted to men only within the secret societies; for otherwise the mouth uttering them is sinful, and the ear hearing them is likewise sinful.”
We should be aware that in the course of time many men in Western countries (I am not speaking of Central Europe) learn to know in secret societies what has been handed down as tradition from the researches of the ancient wisdom. It is received without understanding, although as an impulse it often flows into action. In later centuries after about the middle of the 15th century—the human constitution became such as to make it impossible to see these things in their original form; they could be understood only intellectually. Ideas about them could be picked up, but a true experience of them could not be attained, though individuals had some inkling of it.
Such men have sometimes adopted strange forms of outer life, as for instance Bulwer Lytton, the author of “Zanoni.” What he became in his later life can be understood only if one is aware of how he received, to begin with, the tradition of self-knowledge, but how, too, by virtue of his individual constitution, he was also able to penetrate into certain mysteries. Thereby he became estranged from the ordinary ways of life. Precisely in him one can observe what a man's attitude towards life becomes when he admits into his inner experience this different spiritual world; not only into his thoughts, but into his whole soul. Many facts must then be judged by other than conventional standards.
Of course, it was something quite outlandish when Bulwer travelled about, speaking of his inner experiences with a certain emphasis, while a young person who accompanied him played a harp-like instrument, for he needed to have this harp-music in between the passages of his talk. Here and there he appeared in gatherings where everything else went on in a quiet formal, conventional way. He would come on in his rather eccentric garb and sit down, with his harp-maiden seated in front of his knees. He would speak a few sentences; then the harp-maiden would play; then he would continue his talk, and the maiden would play again. Thus something coquettish in a higher sense of the word—one cannot help characterising it in this way at first—was introduced into the conventional world where Philistinism has made such increasing inroads, above all since the middle of the 15th century.
Men have little idea of the degree of Philistinism into which they have grown; they have less and less idea of it just because it comes to seem natural. They see something as reasonable only in so far as it is in line with what is “done.” But things in life are all interconnected, and the dryness and sleepiness of modern times, the relation human beings now have to one another, belongs to the intellectual development of the last few centuries. The two things belong together. A man like Bulwer, of course, did not fit into such a development; one can quite well picture to oneself people of older times travelling about in the world accompanied by a younger person with some pleasant music. One needs only to perceive the distance between one attitude of soul and another; then such a thing will be seen in the right light. But with Bulwer it was because something lit up in him that could no longer exist directly in the immediate present, but appeared only as a tradition in the modern intellectual age.
We must, however, recover the knowledge of man that lived in the Mystery colonies of which I have spoken. The average man to-day is aware of the world around him by means of his sense-perceptions. What he sees, he orders and arranges in his mind. Then he looks also into his own inner being. The sense-perceptions received from outside, the ideas developed therefrom, these ideas as they penetrate within becoming transformed by impulses of feeling and of will, together with all that is reflected into consciousness as memories—here we have what forms the content of the soul, the content of life in which modern man lives and out of which he acts. At most he is led by a false kind of mysticism to ask: “What is there really in my inner being? What does self-knowledge yield?” In raising such questions he wants to find the answers in his ordinary consciousness. But this ordinary consciousness gives him only what originated in external sense-perceptions and has been transformed by feeling and will. One finds only the reflections, the mirror-pictures, of external life, when looking into one's inner being with ordinary consciousness; and although the outer impressions are transformed by feeling and will, man is still unable to tell how feeling and will are actually working. For this reason he often fails to recognise what he perceives in his inner being as a transformed reflection of the outer world, and takes it, perhaps, as a special message from the divine eternal world. But this is not so. What presents itself to the ordinary consciousness of modern man as self-knowledge is only the transformed outer world, which is reflected out of man's inner being into his consciousness.
If man really and truly desired to look into his innermost being, then he would be obliged—I have often used this image—to break the inner mirror. Our inner being is indeed like a mirror. We gaze on the outer world. Here are the outer sense-perceptions. We link conceptions to them. These conceptions are then reflected by our inner being. By looking into our inner being we get only to this mirror within. We perceive what is reflected by the memory-mirror. We are just as unable to penetrate into man's inner being with ordinary consciousness as we are to look behind a mirror without breaking it. This, however, is precisely what was brought about in the preparatory stage of the ancient way of Eastern wisdom so that the teachers and pupils of the Mystery colonies that came to the West could penetrate directly through the memories into the innermost being of man. Out of what they saw they afterwards uttered those words which were meant to convey that one must be well prepared—above all in those ancient times—if one desired to direct one's glance to the inner being of man. For what does one then behold within?
There, one perceives how something of the power which belongs to perception and thought, and is developed in front of the memory-mirror, penetrates below this memory-mirror. Thoughts penetrate below the memory-mirror and work into the human etheric body—into that part of the etheric body which forms the basis of growth, but which is equally the source of the forces of will. As we look out into the sunlit space and survey all that we receive through our sense-perceptions, there radiates into our inner being something which on the one hand becomes memory-ideas, but also trickles through the memory-mirror, permeating it just as the processes of growth, nutrition and so on permeate us.
The thought-forces penetrate first through the etheric body, and the etheric body, permeated in this way by the thought-forces, works in a very special manner on the physical body. Thereupon a complete transformation sets in of that material existence which is within the physical body of man. In the outer world, matter is nowhere completely destroyed. This is why modern philosophy and science speak of the conservation of matter. But this law of the conservation of matter is valid only for the outer world. Within the human being, matter is completely dissolved into nothingness. The very being of matter is destroyed. It is precisely upon this fact that our human nature is based: upon being able to throw back matter into chaos, to destroy matter utterly, within that sphere which lies deeper than memory.
This is what was pointed out to the Mystery pupils who were led from the East into the Mystery colonies of the West, and especially of Ireland. “In your inner nature, below the powers of memory, you bear within you something that works destructively, and without it you would not have developed the power of thought, for you have to develop thought by permeating the etheric body with thought-forces. But an etheric body thus permeated with thought-forces works on the physical body in such a way as to throw its matter into chaos and to destroy it.”
If, therefore, a person ventures into this inner being of man with the same frame of mind with which he penetrates as far as memory, then he enters a realm where the being of man has an impulse to destroy, to blot out, that which exists there in material form. For the purpose of developing our human, thought-filled Ego we all bear within us, below the memory-mirror, a fury of destruction, a fury of dissolution, in respect of matter. There is no human self-knowledge which does not point with every possible emphasis towards this inner human fact.
For this reason, whoever has had to learn of the presence of this centre of destruction in the inner being of man must take an interest in the development of the spirit. With all intensity he must be able to say to himself: Spirit must exist, and for the sake of the maintenance of the spirit matter may be extinguished.
It is only after one has spoken to mankind for many years of the interests connected with spiritual scientific investigation that one can draw attention to what actually exists within man. But to-day we must do so, for otherwise man would consider himself to be something different from what he really is within Western civilisation. Enclosed within him he has a fiery centre of destruction, and in truth the forces of decline can be transformed into forces of ascent only if he becomes conscious of this fact.
What would happen if men should not be led by Spiritual Science to this awareness? In the developments of our time we can see already what would happen. This centre which is isolated in man, and should work only within him, at the one single spot within, where matter is thrown back into chaos, now breaks out and penetrates into human instincts. That is what will happen to Western civilisation; yes, and to the civilisation of the whole Earth. This is evidenced by all the destructive forces appearing to-day—in the East of Europe, for instance. It is a fury of destruction thrust out of the inner being of man into the outer world; and in the future man will be able to find his bearings in regard to what thus penetrates into his instincts only when a true knowledge of the human being once again prevails, when we become aware once more of this human centre of destruction within—a centre, however, which must be there for the sake of the development of human thought. For this strength of thought that man needs in order that he may have a world-conception in keeping with our time—this strength of thought, which must be there in front of the memory-mirror, brings about the continuation of thought into the etheric body. And the etheric body thus permeated by thought works destructively upon the physical body. This centre of destruction within modern Western man is a fact, and knowledge merely draws attention to it. If the centre of destruction is there without any awareness of it, this is much worse than if man takes full cognisance of it, and from this conscious standpoint enters into the development of modern civilisation.
It was fear that seized upon the pupils of these Mystery colonies when they first heard of these secrets. This fear they learnt to know thoroughly. They became thoroughly acquainted with the feeling that a penetration into man's innermost being—not frivolously in the sense of a nebulous mysticism but undertaken in all sincerity—must arouse fear. And this fear felt by the ancient Mystery pupils of the West was overcome only by disclosing to them the whole weight of the facts. Then they were able to conquer by consciousness what arose in them as fear.
When the age of intellectualism set in, this same fear became unconscious, and as unconscious fear it still exists. Under all manner of masks it works into outer life. It belongs, however, to our time to penetrate into man's inner being. “Know thyself” has become a rightful demand. It was by a deliberate calling forth of fear, followed by an overcoming of it, that the Mystery pupils were directed to self-knowledge in the true way.
The age of intellectualism dulled the sight of what lay in man's inner being, but it was unable to do away with the fear. Thus it came about that man was and still is influenced by this unconscious fear to the degree of saying, “There is nothing at all in the human being that transcends birth and death.” He is afraid of penetrating deeper than this life of memory, this ordinary life of thought which maintains its course, after all, only between birth and death. He is afraid to look down into that which is eternal in the human soul, and from out of this fear he postulates the doctrine that there is nothing at all outside this life between birth and death. Modern materialism has arisen out of fear, without men having the slightest idea of this. The modern materialistic world-conception is a product of fear and anxiety (Angst).
So this fear lives on in the outer actions of men, in the social structure, in the course of history since the middle of the 15th century, and especially in the 19th century materialistic world-conception. Why did these men become materialists—why would they admit only the external, that which is given in material existence? Because they feared to descend into the depths of man.
This is what the ancient Oriental sage would have wished to express from out of his knowledge by saying: “You modern Westerners live entirely steeped in fear. You found your social order upon fear; you create your arts out of fear; your materialistic world-conception has been born from fear. You and the successors of those who in my time founded the ancient Oriental world-conception, although they have come into decadence now—you and these men of Asia will never understand one another, because after all with the Asiatic people everything sprang ultimately from love; with you everything originates in fear mixed with hate.”
These are strong words indeed, but I prefer to try to place the facts before you as an utterance from the lips of an Oriental sage. It will perhaps be believed that he could speak in such a manner if he came back, whereas a modern man might be considered mad if he put it all so radically! But from such a radical characterisation of things we can learn what we really must learn to-day for the healthy progress of civilisation. Mankind will have to know again that intelligent thinking, which is the highest attainment of modern times, could not have come into existence if the life of ideas did not arise from a centre of destruction. And this centre must be reckoned with, so that it may be kept safely within and not pass over into our outer instincts and thence turn into a social impulse.
One can really penetrate deeply into the connections of modern life by looking at things in this way. Thus the realm that manifests as a centre of destruction lies within, beyond the memory-mirror. But the life of modern man takes its course between the memory-mirror and the outer sense-perceptions. Just as little as man, when he looks into his inner being, is able to see beyond the memory-mirror, so far is he from being able to pierce through all that is spread out before him as sense-perceptions; he cannot see beyond it. He adds to it a material, atomistic world, which is indeed a fantastic world, because he cannot penetrate through the sense-images.
But man is no stranger to this world beyond the outer sense-images. Every night between falling asleep and awakening he enters this world. When you sleep, you dwell within this world. What you experience there beyond the sense-images is not the atomistic world conjectured by the visionaries of natural science. What lies beyond the sphere of the senses was in fact experienced by the ancient Oriental sage in his Mysteries. It can be experienced only when one has devotion for the world, when one has the desire and the urge to surrender oneself entirely to the world. Love must permeate the act of cognition if one desires to penetrate beyond the sense-perceptions. And it was this love that prevailed especially in the ancient oriental civilisation.
Why must one have this devotion? Because if one sought to pierce beyond the sense-perceptions with one's ordinary human Ego, one might be harmed. The Ego, as experienced in ordinary life, must be given up, if one wants to penetrate beyond the sense-perceptions. How does this Ego originate? It is brought into existence by man's capacity to plunge into the chaos of destruction. This Ego must be tempered and hardened in that realm which lies within man as a centre of destruction. And with this Ego one cannot live on the far side of the outer sense-world.
Let us picture to ourselves the centre of destruction in man's inner being. It extends over the whole human organism. If it were to spread out over the whole world, what would then live in the world through man? Evil. Evil is nothing else but the chaos thrust outside, the chaos which is necessary in man's inner being. And in this necessary chaos, this necessary centre of evil in man, the human Ego must be forged. This human Egohood cannot live beyond the sphere of the human senses in the outer world. That is why the Ego-consciousness disappears in sleep, and when it figures in dreams it is often as though estranged or weakened.
The Ego which is forged in the centre of evil cannot pass beyond the realm of the sense-perceptions. Hence to the ancient oriental sage it was clear that one can go further only by means of devotion and love, by a surrender of the Ego; and that on penetrating fully into this further region one is no longer in a world of Vana, of weaving in the habitual, but rather in the world of Nirvana, where this habitual existence is dissolved.
This interpretation of Nirvana, of the sublimest surrender of the Ego, as it occurs in sleep and as it existed in fully conscious knowledge for the pupils of the ancient oriental civilisation—it is this Nirvana that would be pointed out to you by such an ancient sage as I placed hypothetically before you. And he would say: “With you, since you had to develop Egohood, everything is founded on fear. With us, who had to suppress Egohood, everything was founded on love. With you, there speaks the Ego that desires to assert itself. With us, Nirvana spoke, while the Ego flowed out into the world in love.”
One can formulate these matters in concepts and they are then preserved in a certain sense, but for humanity at large they live in feelings and moods, permeating human existence. And through such feelings they bring about a living difference to-day between the East and the West. In the West, men have a blood, a lymph, that is saturated by an Egohood tempered in the inner centre of evil. In the East men have a blood, a lymph, in which lives an echo of the longing for Nirvana.
Both in the East and in the West these things escape the crude intellectual concepts of our time. Intellectual understanding draws the blood from the living organism, turns it into a preparation, places it under a microscope, looks at it and then forms ideas about it. The ideas thus arrived at are infinitely crude even from the point of view of ordinary experience. That is all one can say about it. Do you think that this method touches the subtly graded differences of the people who sit here next to one another? The microscope, of course, gives only crude ideas about the blood, the lymph. Subtle shades of difference are to be found even among people who have come from the same milieu. But these shades of difference naturally exist much more emphatically between the men of the East and those of the West, although only a crude idea of them can be had by modern thinking.
All this comes to expression in the bodies of the men from Asia, Europe and America, and in their relation to one another in outer social life. With the crude understanding that has been applied in the last few centuries to the investigation of external nature we shall not be able to tackle the demands of modern social life; above all we shall not be able to reach an adjustment between East and West. But this adjustment must be found.
In the late autumn of this year (1921) people will be going to the Washington Conference, and discussions will take place there about matters which were summed up by General Smuts, the Minister of Africa, with his instinctive genius. The evolution of modern humanity, he said, is characterised by the fact that the seed-ground for cultural activities, which has hitherto been in the regions bordering the North Sea and the Atlantic Ocean, is now moving to the Pacific. The culture of the countries situated round the North Sea has gradually spread throughout the West and will become a world culture. The centre of gravity of this world culture will be transferred from the North Sea to the Pacific.
Mankind stands face to face with this change. But men still talk in such a way that their speech savours of the old crude ideas and nothing essential is reached—although it must be reached if we are really to go ahead. The signs of the times stand with menacing significance before us and their message is: Until now only a limited trust has been needed between men, who in fact were all secretly afraid of one another. Their fear was masked under all sorts of other feelings. But now we need an attitude of soul that will be able to embrace a world civilisation. We need a confidence which will be able to bring into balance the relationship between East and West. Here a significant and necessary perspective opens out. The assumption to-day is that economic problems can be handled quite on their own account—the future position of Japan in the Pacific, or how all the trading peoples on earth may have free access to the Chinese market, and so on. But these problems will not be settled at any conference until men become aware that all economic activities and relations presuppose the trust of one man in another. In future this trust will be attained only in a spiritual way. Outer civilisation will be in need of spiritual deepening.
Erster Vortrag
[ 1 ] Ich werde am Sonntag in dem Vortrage, den ich dann zu halten habe, Ihnen hier an dieser Stelle eine Übersicht geben über das, was sich durch den Stuttgarter Kongreß und sonst auf dem Gebiete der anthroposophischen Bewegung innerhalb Deutschlands in den letzten Wochen zugetragen hat. Heute wollen wir einiges durchsprechen, was sich an mancherlei anschließt, was wir hier schon betrachtet haben, und wodurch wir den Zusammenhang herstellen können zwischen den folgenden Tagen und demjenigen, was wir hier behandelt haben, bevor ich nach Deutschland abgereist bin.
[ 2 ] Wenn ein orientalischer Weiser alter Zeit - wir müßten, um dasjenige zu betrachten, was ich hier sagen will, allerdings in sehr alte Zeiten der orientalischen Kultur zurückgehen -, wenn ein solcher orientalischer Weiser, der eingeweiht war in die Mysterien des alten Morgenlandes, seinen Blick wenden würde auf die heutige abendländische, die westliche Zivilisation überhaupt, so würde er, diese Zivilisation beurteilend, vielleicht zu den Angehörigen dieser westlichen Zivilisation sagen: Ihr lebt eigentlich ganz von der Furcht. Eure ganze Seelenverfassung ist von der Furcht beherrscht. Alles, was ihr tut, aber auch alles, was ihr empfindet, ist durchtränkt in den wichtigsten Augenblicken des Lebens und in seinen Auswirkungen durch die Furcht, und da die Furcht außerordentlich verwandt ist mit dem Haß, so spielt der Haß eine große Rolle in eurer ganzen Zivilisation.
[ 3 ] Verstehen wir uns recht, meine lieben Freunde. Ich meine, so würde, wenn er heute wiederum mit demselben Bildungsgrad, mit derselben Seelenverfassung unter den westlichen Menschen stehen würde, ein Weiser der alten orientalischen Kulturwelt sprechen, und er würde bemerklich machen, wenn er auf diese Dinge zu reden käme, daß allerdings in seinen Zeiten und auf seinem Territorium aus ganz anderen Untergründen heraus die Zivilisation begründet worden ist. Er würde wahrscheinlich sagen: Zu meinen Zeiten spielte die Furcht im Zivilisationsleben eigentlich keine Rolle. Zu meiner Zeit - wenn es sich darum handelte, eine Weltanschauung herauszutragen in die Welt und daraus Tat und soziales Leben zu machen - spielte die Hauptsache die Lust, die sich steigern konnte zur völligen Hingabe an die Welt, die sich steigern konnte zur Liebe.
[ 4 ] Das würde er so empfinden, und dadurch würde er von seinem Standpunkte aus hinweisen, wenn er richtig verstanden würde, auf allerwichtigste Ingredienzien, auf allerwichtigste Impulse in dem heutigen Zivilisationsleben. Und verstünden wir es, ihn in richtiger Weise zu hören, dann würde uns dadurch vieles gegeben sein, was wir eigentlich brauchen, um den Punkt zu finden, von dem ausgegangen werden muß in der Erfassung des Lebens der Gegenwart.
[ 5 ] Im Grunde ist es doch so, daß drüben in Asien, wenn auch starke europäische Einflüsse in das religiöse, in das ästhetische, in das wissenschaftliche, in das soziale Leben aufgenommen worden sind, der Nachklang herrscht der alten Zivilisation. Diese alte Zivilisation ist ja in Dekadenz, im Niedergange, und wenn der alte orientalische Weise sagt: Die Liebe war die Grundkraft der alten orientalischen Zivilisation -, so muß allerdings gesagt werden: Davon ist ja in der Gegenwart unmittelbar wenig zu bemerken. Aber wer zu sehen vermag, sieht selbst in den Niedergangserscheinungen der asiatischen Kultur durchaus diesen Einschlag eines ursprünglichen Elementes der Lust, der Freude, der Liebe an der Welt und zur Welt.
[ 6 ] Es gab im Oriente wenig von dem in alten Zeiten, was dann von den Menschen gefordert worden ist, seit ihnen erklungen ist das Wort, das am radikalsten zum Vorschein kam durch den griechischen Spruch: «Erkenne dich selbst!» Dieses «Erkenne dich selbst!», es trat eigentlich erst in der Zeit, als die ältere griechische Kulturentwickelung da war, in das menschliche geschichtliche Leben ein. Die umfassende, lichtvolle altorientalische Weltanschauung, sie war noch nicht durchdrungen von einer solchen Art von Menschenerkenntnis; sie war überhaupt nicht eigentlich darauf gerichtet, den Blick nach dem Inneren des Menschen zu wenden. Der Mensch ist ja in dieser Beziehung abhängig von den Verhältnissen, die in seiner Umwelt herrschen. Die altorientalische Kultur wurde einfach begründet unter einer anderen Wirkung des Sonnenlichtes auf die Erde, unter einer anderen Einwirkung der irdischen Verhältnisse selbst als die spätere westliche Kultur. Der innere Blick des Menschen wurde im alten Oriente, man möchte sagen, gefangengenommen von dem, was den Menschen als Welt umgab, und er hatte besondere Veranlassung, sich mit seinem ganzen Inneren hinzugeben an die Welt. Welterkenntnis war es, was in der alten orientalischen Weisheit und in der Auffassung der Welt durch diese altorientalische Weisheit blühte. Und auch in dem, was im alten Oriente in den Mysterien selbst lebte — Sie können das entnehmen aus alledem, was seit vielen Jahren nach dieser Richtung zu Ihnen gesprochen worden ist -, war nicht enthalten eine eigentliche Befolgung der Forderung «Erkenne dich selbst!». Richte den Blick in die Welt, versuche, an dich herankommen zu lassen, was in den Tiefen der Welterscheinungen verborgen ist! - das würde man viel eher als eine Forderung der altorientalischen Kultur aufstellen können. Aber genötigt wurden die Mysterienlehrer und Mysterienschüler, den Blick nach dem Inneren des Menschen zu lenken, als die asiatische Zivilisation sich mehr nach dem Westen hin ausbreitete. Schon als die Mysterienkolonien in Ägypten durch Nordafrika hindurch begründet wurden, aber namentlich als dann die Mysterien mehr nach dem Westen hin - eine besondere Stätte war ja das alte Irland - in Mysterienkolonien sich entfalteten, da trat an die Mysterienlehrer und die Mysterienschüler, die von Asien herüberkamen, einfach durch die geographischen Verhältnisse des Westens und damit durch die ganz andere elementarische Ausgestaltung der westlichen Welt die Notwendigkeit heran nach der Selbsterkenntnis des Menschen, nach einer wirklichen Innenschau. Und durch das, was sich diese Mysterienschüler in Asien schon erobert hatten an äußerer Welterkenntnis, an Erkenntnis der geistigen Tatsachen und Wesenheiten, die der äußeren Welt zugrunde liegen, einfach dadurch konnten sie nunmehr tief eindringen in dasjenige, was eigentlich im Inneren des Menschen vorhanden ist.
[ 7 ] Man hätte das in Asien drüben gar nicht beobachten können. Es würde gewissermaßen der nach innen gerichtete Blick gelähmt worden sein. Aber mit dem, was man durch den nach außen gerichteten Blick, der in die geistige Welt hineindrang, mitbrachte nach den westlichen Mysterienkolonien, konnte man nun hineinschauen in das menschliche Innere. Und eigentlich nur die stärksten Seelen konnten wirklich, man möchte sagen, zunächst aushalten, was da im menschlichen Inneren zu erblicken war. Menschliche innere Wesenheit kam eigentlich zunächst zum Bewußtsein der Menschheit in diesen vom Oriente ausgehenden und in westlichen Gebieten begründeten Mysterienkolonien. Man merkt eigentlich, was diese Selbsterkenntnis des Menschen für einen Eindruck machte auf diese orientalischen Mysterienlehrer und Mysterienschüler, wenn man ein Wort wiederholt, das immer wieder von den Lehrern, die schon diesen Blick nach dem Inneren des Menschen gehabt hatten, an die Schüler gerichtet worden ist und durch das ihnen klargemacht werden sollte, in welcher Art von Seelenverfassung menschliche Selbsterkenntnis eigentlich aufzufassen ist.
[ 8 ] Das Wort, das ich meine, wird viel zitiert. Es wurde aber nur mit seinem vollen Gewichte in den älteren Mysterienkolonien Ägyptens, Nordafrikas, Irlands ausgesprochen zur Vorbereitung für den Schüler, zur Beachtung für den Eingeweihten überhaupt gegenüber den innermenschlichen Erlebnissen. Das Wort, das da ausgesprochen wurde, das ist: Keiner, der nicht eingeweiht ist in die heiligen Mysterien, sollte die Geheimnisse des Menscheninneren erfahren, denn vor einem Uneingeweihten diese Geheimnisse auszusprechen, ist unstatthaft; es macht sich dann der Mund sündhaft, der diese Geheimnisse ausspricht, und es wird sündhaft das Ohr, das diese Geheimnisse hört!
[ 9 ] Oftmals ist dieses Wort ausgesprochen worden aus innerem Erleben heraus, aus dem, was eben ein durch orientalische Weisheit vorbereiteter Mensch erfahren konnte, wenn er durch die irdischen Verhältnisse des Westens zur Menschenerkenntnis vordrang. Der Tradition nach hat sich dieses Wort erhalten, und heute wird es - allerdings in seinem innersten Wesen unverstanden - in den Geheimorden und Geheimgesellschaften des Westens, die aber nach außen hin eigentlich einen großen Einfluß haben, immer wiederholt. Aber es wird eben aus der Tradition heraus wiederholt. Es wird nicht mit dem nötigen Gewichte ausgesprochen, denn man weiß eigentlich nicht, was man damit sagen soll. ‚Aber auch jetzt ist es durchaus so, daß in den Geheimorden des Westens, von denen ich oftmals gerade an dieser Stätte gesprochen habe, dieses Wort wie eine Devise gebraucht wird: Es gibt Geheimnisse über das menschliche Innere, die dürfen nur innerhalb der Geheimgesellschaften dem Menschen mitgeteilt werden, denn es ist sonst eben sündhaft der Mund, der sie ausspricht, sündhaft das Ohr, das sie hört.
[ 10 ] Man muß ja sagen: So, wie sich die Zeiten entwickelt haben, so lernen manche Menschen — nicht der mitteleuropäischen, aber der westlichen Länder - in ihren Geheimgesellschaften mancherlei, was als Tradition sich aus alten Weisheitsforschungen erhalten hat. Es wird unverstanden aufgenommen, obwohl es eigentlich vielfach als ein Impuls ins Handeln hineindringt. Es war ja durchaus so, daß in den neueren Jahrhunderten, eigentlich schon seit der Mitte des 15. Jahrhunderts, die Konstitution des Menschen eine solche wurde, die wiederum unmöglich machte, diese Dinge in ihrer ursprünglichen Gestalt zu sehen. Man konnte sie nur intellektuell aufnehmen. Man konnte Begriffe davon bekommen, aber man konnte nicht zu dem eigentlichen Erleben vordringen. Nur Ahnungen haben einzelne Menschen gehabt. Durch Ahnungen allerdings sind dann manche Menschen in jene Regionen des Erlebens eingedrungen, um die es sich da handelt. Und solche Menschen haben manchmal sonderbare äußere Lebensformen angenommen, wie zum Beispiel Lord Bulwer, der den «Zanoni» geschrieben hat. So wie er in seinen späteren Lebensjahren geworden ist, das ist ja nur zu begreifen, wenn man weiß, wie er zunächst die Tradition der menschlichen Selbsterkenntnis aufgenommen hat, wie er aber durchaus durch seine besondere individuelle Konstitution fähig war, schon in gewisse Mysterien einzudringen. Dadurch aber entfernte er sich von der Naturgemäßheit des Lebens. Gerade an ihm kann man sehen, wie der Mensch dem Leben gegenüber sich dann verhält, wenn er im Inneren eben diese andersgeartete geistige Welt nicht bloß in Begriffen aufnimmt, sondern in die ganze Seelenverfassung, eben in das innere Erleben. Man muß dann manches anders beurteilen, als es nach dem Maßstabe der gewöhnlichen Philisterei geschehen kann. Es ist ja natürlich etwas Ungeheuerliches, wenn Bulwer herumgezogen ist so, daß er mit einer gewissen Emphase seine inneren Erlebnisse ausgesprochen hat, dann aber bei sich hatte eine jüngere weibliche Gestalt, die ein harfenartiges Instrument spielte, und immer dieses Spiel des harfenartigen Instrumentes zwischen den einzelnen Passagen seiner Rede brauchte. Er erschien da oder dort in den Gesellschaften, in denen es ja sonst formell ganz philisterhaft herging; er erschien aber niemals allein. Da erschien er in seiner etwas absonderlichen Tracht, setzte sich, und vor seinen Knien saß dann gewissermaßen sein Harfenmädchen, und wenn er sprach, dann sprach er einige Sätze, dann wiederum spielte das Mädchen, dann setzte er fort, dann spielte das Mädchen wieder. So stellte er etwas in einem höheren Sinne Kokettes — so muß man es zunächst aussprechen — in die gewöhnliche Welt des menschlichen Philisteriums hinein, jenes Philisteriums, in das die Menschheit ja immer mehr hineinwuchs, besonders seit der Mitte des 15. Jahrhunderts.
[ 11 ] Es weiß die Menschheit von dem Grade der Philistrosität, in den sie hineingewachsen ist, nicht viel, und immer weniger weiß sie davon, weil diese ein Naturgemäßes wird. Man sieht nur das als vernünftig an, wie man sich nun eben jetzt «benimmt». Aber die Dinge im Leben hängen zusammen, und die moderne Trockenheit und Schläfrigkeit, die moderne Art, von Mensch zu Mensch sich zu verhalten, gehört als Folge zu der intellektualistischen Entwickelung der letzten Jahrhunderte. Beide Dinge gehören zusammen. Solch ein Mensch wie Bulwer paßt da natürlich an sich nicht hinein. Man kann es sich ja durchaus als ein Mögliches vorstellen, daß die älteren Menschen in der Welt herumgehen und von den jüngeren mit einer angenehmen Musik begleitet werden. Man muß nur den Abstand der einen Seelenverfassung von der anderen im richtigen Lichte sehen, dann wird einem so etwas doch auch im richtigen Lichte erscheinen können. Aber es war bei Bulwer so, weil in ihm etwas aufleuchtete, was so unmittelbar nicht da sein konnte in der modernen intellektualistischen Zeit, sondern nur als Tradition.
[ 12 ] Aber kennenlernen muß man wiederum, was Menschenerkenntnis war.in den Mysterienkolonien, auf die ich hingewiesen habe. Der gewöhnliche Mensch der heutigen Zeit sieht um sich herum die Welt durch die äußeren physischen Sinneseindrücke. Er kombiniert das, was er sieht, mit seinem Verstande. Und er sieht dann auch in sein Inneres hinein. Im Grunde genommen ist das die Welt, die der Mensch überschaut, und aus der heraus er auch handelt. Die Sinneseindrücke, die er von außen empfängt, das, was er aus diesen Sinneseindrücken als Vorstellungen entwickelt, das, was dann von diesen Vorstellungen nach dem Inneren hinein durch Gefühlsimpulse, Willensimpulse umgewandelt wird und was dann wiederum als Erinnerungen des Lebens zurückstrahlt in das Bewußtsein, das ist der Inhalt der Seelenverfassung, der Inhalt des Lebens, in dem der Mensch in der Gegenwart webt, aus dem heraus er handelt. Der Mensch der Gegenwart fragt eigentlich höchstens mit falscher Mystik: Was ist da eigentlich in dem Inneren drinnen? Was ergibt sich der Selbsterkenntnis? — Indem er eine solche Frage aufwirft, will er sich die Antwort geben aus seinem gewöhnlichen Bewußtsein heraus. Aber aus diesem gewöhnlichen Bewußtsein kommt nichts anderes, als was eigentlich aus den äußeren Sinneseindrücken entstanden und durch Gefühl und Wille umgewandelt ist. Die Reflexe, die Spiegelbilder des äußeren Lebens findet man, wenn man auf die Weise des gewöhnlichen Bewußtseins nach dem Inneren hineinschaut. Und wenn auch die äußeren Eindrücke durch Gefühl und Wille umgewandelt sind — der Mensch weiß ja nicht, wie Gefühl und Wille eigentlich wirken, und so sieht er sehr häufig das, was er da in seinem Inneren sieht, weil es umgewandelt ist, nicht an als das Spiegelbild der äußeren Welt, sondern als eine besondere Verkündigung einer göttlichen Welt, einer ewigen Welt und dergleichen. Das ist es aber nicht. Es ist das, was dem gewöhnlichen Bewußtsein für den heutigen Menschen als Selbsterkenntnis erscheint, nur die umgewandelte Außenwelt, die aus seinem eigenen Inneren in sein Bewußtsein hinein sich spiegelt. Würde der Mensch in sein Inneres wirklich hineinschauen wollen, dann müßte er - ich habe das Bild schon öfter hier gebraucht — das, was der innere Spiegel ist, zerbrechen.
[ 13 ] Unser Inneres ist ja wirklich wie ein Spiegel. Wir schauen die Außen welt an. Hier sind die äußeren Sinneseindrücke. Daran knüpfen wir Vorstellungen. Dann werden diese Vorstellungen von dem Inneren gespiegelt. Wir kommen, indem wir nach dem Inneren hineinschauen, nur zu diesem Spiegel im Inneren (siehe Zeichnung Seite 20, rot). Wir sehen das, was in dem Erinnerungsspiegel zurückgeworfen wird (rote Pfeile). Wir können mit diesem gewöhnlichen Bewußtsein geradesowenig in das Innere des Menschen hineinschauen, wie man, ohne ihn zu zerbrechen, hinter den Spiegel schauen kann.
[ 14 ] Das aber war gerade bewirkt worden durch die Vorbereitung im alten orientalischen Weisheitswesen, daß diese Lehrer und Schüler der nach dem Westen hin getragenen Mysterienkolonien scharf hinter die Erinnerungen in das Innere des Menschen hineinschauen konnten. Und aus dem heraus, was sie da erblickten, sprachen sie diese Worte, die darauf hindeuteten, daß sie eigentlich begreiflich machen wollten, wie man, insbesondere in jenen alten Zeiten, gut vorbereitet sein mußte, wenn man den Blick in dieses Innere des Menschen richten wollte.
[ 15 ] Was sieht man denn da im Inneren des Menschen? Da sieht man, wie da allerdings von der Kraft des Wahrnehmens und Denkens, die sich entwickelt vor dem Erinnerungsspiegel, etwas hineindringt bis unter den Erinnerungsspiegel. Die Gedanken dringen unter diesen Erinnerungsspiegel hinunter und wirken in dem menschlichen Ätherleib, in demjenigen Teil des menschlichen Ätherleibes, der dem Wachstum, der aber auch der Entstehung der Willenskräfte zugrunde liegt. Indem wir hinausblicken in den sonnendurchhellten Raum, indem wir überblicken alles das, was uns aus den Sinneseindrücken kommt, strahlt etwas in unser Inneres, das ja allerdings auf der einen Seite zu den Erinnerungsvorstellungen wird, das aber doch durchsickert durch den Erinnerungsspiegel; was uns ebenso durchdringt, wie uns durchdringen, sagen wir, die Vorgänge der Ernährung, des Wachstums und so weiter. Die Gedankenkräfte durchdringen ja zunächst den Ätherleib, und dieser von den Gedankenkräften durchdrungene Ätherleib, der wirkt in einer ganz besonderen Weise nun auf den physischen Leib. Da entsteht im physischen Leib eine vollständige Umwandelung des materiellen Daseins, das im physischen Leib des Menschen ist. In der Außenwelt wird Materie nirgends vollständig zerstört. Daher sprechen die neuere Philosophie und Naturwissenschaft für die Außenwelt von der Erhaltung der Materie. Aber dieses Gesetz der Erhaltung der Materie gilt nur für die Außenwelt. Im Inneren des Menschen wird Materie vollständig zurückverwandelt in das Nichts. Vollständig wird die Materie da in ihrem Wesen zerstört. Unsere Menschennatur beruht gerade darauf, daß wir in der Lage sind, tiefer als die Erinnerung in ihr gespiegelt wird, die Materie in das Chaos zurückzuwerfen, die Materie vollständig zu zerstören.
[ 16 ] Das war es, worauf der Mysterienschüler gewiesen wurde, der vom Oriente in die Mysterienkolonien namentlich Irlands und des Westens überhaupt geführt worden ist: In deinem Inneren, unter dem Erinnerungsvermögen, da trägst du als Mensch etwas in dir, was auf Zerstörung ausgeht, und hättest du das nicht in dir, so hättest du dein Denken nicht entwickeln können, denn du mußt dein Denken dadurch entwickeln, daß die Denkkräfte den Ätherleib durchdringen. Aber ein Ätherleib, der von den Gedankenkräften durchdrungen wird, wirkt auf den physischen Leib so, daß er dessen Materie in das Chaos zurückwirft, zerstört.
[ 17 ] Wenn der Mensch daher mit derselben Gesinnung, mit der er bis zur Erinnerung vordringt, sich einläßt auf dieses menschliche Innere, dann tritt er ein in die Region, wo das Menschenwesen zerstören will, wo das Menschenwesen auslöschen will, was da ist. Wir alle tragen unter unserem Erinnerungsspiegel, gerade zum Behufe der Entwickelung des menschlichen gedankenvollen Ich, die Zerstörungswut, die Auflösungswut der Materie gegenüber. Es gibt keine menschliche Selbsterkenntnis, die nicht auf dieses innere menschliche Faktum in aller Intensität hinweist.
[ 18 ] Daher muß derjenige, welcher hingewiesen werden soll auf diesen im Inneren des Menschen befindlichen Zerstörungsherd, Interesse haben an der Entwickelung des Geistes. Er muß sich mit aller Intensität sagen können: Der Geist muß bestehen, und um des Bestandes des Geistes willen darf das Materielle ausgelöscht werden. — Erst nachdem zur Menschheit jahrelang wiederum von den Interessen gesprochen wird, die mit dem geisteswissenschaftlichen Forschen zusammenhängen, kann aufmerksam gemacht werden auf das, was sich eigentlich im Inneren des Menschen befindet. Aber es muß auch heute darauf aufmerksam gemacht werden, denn ohne das würde sich der Mensch immer für etwas anderes halten, als er gerade innerhalb der westlichen Zivilisation ist. Der Mensch ist innerhalb der westlichen Zivilisation die Umhüllung eines Zerstörungsherdes, und eigentlich können die Niedergangskräfte in die Aufgangskräfte nur übergeführt werden, wenn der Mensch sich bewußt wird, daß er die Umhüllung eines Zerstörungsherdes ist.
[ 19 ] Was würde geschehen, wenn der Mensch durch Geisteswissenschaft nicht auf dieses Bewußtsein hingeführt würde? Nun, wir sehen bereits in der Entwickelung der heutigen Zeit, was geschehen würde. Das, was gewissermaßen isoliert, abgesondert im Menschen ist und nur im Menschen wirken sollte, diese einzige Stelle haben sollte, wo Materie in ihr Chaos zurückgeworfen wird, das dringt heraus, das dringt in die äußeren menschlichen Instinkte. Das wird überhaupt westliche und Erdenzivilisation werden. Das zeigt sich in alledem, was an zerstörungswütigen Kräften heute zum Beispiel im Osten Europas und so weiter auftritt. Das ist die aus dem Inneren in das Äußere hineingeworfene Zerstörungswut, und der Mensch kann sich in der Zukunft gegenüber dem, was da eigentlich in seinen Instinkt übergeht, nur zurechtfinden durch etwas, was in ihm sein muß, wenn wiederum wirkliche Menschenerkenntnis eintritt, wenn wir wiederum aufmerksam gemacht werden auf diesen menschlichen Zerstörungsherd im Inneren, der aber da sein muß um der Entwickelung des menschlichen Denkens willen. Denn jene Stärke des Denkens, die der Mensch haben muß, damit der Mensch seine der heutigen Zeit angemessene Weltanschauung haben kann, diese Stärke des Denkens, die da vor dem Erinnerungsspiegel sein muß, die bewirkt die Fortsetzung des Denkens in den Ätherleib hinein, und dieser vom Denken durchdrungene Ätherleib, der wirkt eben in dieser Weise zerstörend auf den physischen Leib. Es ist einmal in dem modernen Menschen des Westens dieser Zerstörungsherd. Die Erkenntnis macht nur darauf aufmerksam. Und viel schlimmer ist es, wenn der Herd da ist, ohne daß der Mensch mit seinem Bewußtsein darauf hinweisen kann, als wenn der Mensch mit vollem Bewußtsein von diesem Zerstörungsherd Kenntnis nimmt und sich von diesem Gesichtspunkte aus in die moderne Zivilisationsentwickelung hineinbegibt.
[ 20 ] Was die Schüler, die von diesen Geheimnissen zuerst gehört haben in diesen Mysterienkolonien, von denen ich gesprochen habe, zuerst befallen hat, war Furcht. Die haben sie gründlich kennengelernt. Gründlich kennengelernt haben sie die Empfindung, daß in das menschliche Innere hineinzuschauen — nicht unehrlich im Sinne einer nebulosen Mystik, sondern ehrlich hineinzuschauen -, Furcht einflößen muß, furchterregend ist. Und diese Furcht, sie wurde bei den alten Mysterienschülern des Westens nur dadurch vertrieben, daß man diese Schüler auf das ganze Gewicht der Tatsachen hingewiesen hat. Dann haben sie das, was da als Furcht entstehen muß, durch das Bewußtsein überwunden.
[ 21 ] Als dann die intellektualistische Zeit heraufkam, da wurde diese Furcht unbewußt, und als solche unbewußte Furcht wirkt sie weiter. In allen möglichen Maskierungen wirkt sie im äußeren Leben. Es war aber einfach angemessen der modernen Zeit, in das menschliche Innere hineinzuschauen. «Erkenne dich selbst!», wurde eine richtige Forderung. Die Mysterienschüler wurden geradezu durch das Heraufrufen der Furcht, auf das dann die Überwindung dieser Furcht folgen konnte, in der richtigen Weise auf die Selbsterkenntnis gewiesen. Die intellektualistische Zeit trübte den Blick für das, was im menschlichen Inneren ist; aber sie konnte nicht die Furcht fortschaffen. Und so kam es, daß der Mensch selbst bis zu dem Grade unter dem Eindrucke dieser unbewußten Furcht stand und steht, daß er sagte und sagt: Es gibt überhaupt nichts im Menschen, was hinausliegt über Geburt und Tod. Er fürchtet sich, tiefer hinunterzuschauen als in dieses Erinnerungsleben, in dieses gewöhnliche Gedankenleben, das ja seine Gesetzmäßigkeit nur zwischen Geburt und Tod hat. Er fürchtet sich, hinunterzublicken in das eigentliche Ewige der Menschenseele, und aus dieser Furcht heraus begründet er die Lehre: Es gibt überhaupt nichts als dieses Leben zwischen Geburt und Tod. — Der moderne Materialismus ist aus der Furcht entstanden, ohne daß er im geringsten eine Ahnung davon hat. Ein Furcht- und Angstprodukt selbst ist diese moderne materialistische Weltanschauung.
[ 22 ] So lebt diese Furcht in den äußeren Handlungen der Menschen, in der sozialen Gestaltung, im geschichtlichen Werden seit der Mitte des 15. Jahrhunderts, so lebt sie insbesondere im 19. Jahrhundert in der materialistischen Weltanschauung. Warum wurden die Leute Materialisten, das heißt, wollten nur gelten lassen das Äußere, im materiellen Dasein Gegebene? Weil sie sich fürchteten, in die Untergründe des Menschen hinunterzusteigen.
[ 23 ] Das hätte aus seiner Erkenntnis heraus der alte orientalische Weise ausdrücken wollen, indem er gesagt hätte: Ihr Abendländer der Gegenwart lebt ja ganz aus der Furcht heraus. Ihr begründet eure sozialen Ordnungen aus der Furcht heraus, ihr treibt eure Künste aus der Furcht heraus. Ihr habt eure materialistische Weltanschauung aus der Furcht heraus geboren. Ihr und die Nachfolger derjenigen, wenn sie auch in die Dekadenz gekommen sind, die einstmals zu meiner Zeit die altorientalische Weltanschauung begründet haben, ihr und diese Menschen Asiens, ihr werdet euch niemals verstehen können, denn bei den Asiaten ist doch schließlich alles aus der Liebe entsprungen; bei euch entsteht alles aus der Furcht, die mit dem Haß verwandt ist.
[ 24 ] Gewiß, solches klingt radikal, aber ich versuche es eben dadurch vorzubringen, daß ich es gerade einem altorientalischen Weisen in den Mund lege. Man wird vielleicht glauben, daß er so sprechen könnte, wenn er wieder aufstehen würde, während man vielleicht den Menschen der Gegenwart für närrisch ansehen würde, wenn er so radikal diese Dinge hinstellen würde. Aber lernen kann man doch gerade aus der radikalen Charakterisierung dieser Dinge, was wir heute für den gesunden Fortgang der Zivilisation eben lernen müssen. Die Menschheit wird wieder wissen müssen, daß das, was gerade die höchste Errungenschaft der neueren Zeit bildet, das verstandesmäßige Denken, gar nicht da sein könnte, wenn nicht das Vorstellungsleben im Inneren aus einem Zerstörungsherd aufstiege, den man erkennen muß, damit man ihn im Inneren hält, damit er nicht in die äußeren Instinkte übergeht und zu sozialen Impulsen werde.
[ 25 ] Man kann da schon tief in die Zusammenhänge des Lebens der neueren Zeit hineinsehen, wenn man diese Dinge überschaut. Die Welt also, die sich als ein solcher Zerstörungsherd ankündigt, sie liegt im Inneren jenseits des Erinnerungsspiegels. Aber das Leben des gegenwärtigen Menschen verläuft zwischen demjenigen, was dieser Erinnerungsspiegel gibt, und dem äußeren Sinneswahrnehmen. Und ebensowenig wie der Mensch hinunterblicken kann in sein eigenes Inneres bis jenseits des Erinnerungsspiegels, ebensowenig kann er das durchstoßen, was sich da außen ausbreitet als Sinneswahrnehmungen. Er dichtet eine materielle atomistische Welt hinzu, die eben eine phantastische Welt ist, weil er nicht durchstoßen kann durch diese Sinnesvorstellungen.
[ 26 ] Aber der Mensch ist nicht fremd dieser Welt jenseits der äußeren Sinnesvorstellungen. Er dringt jede Nacht zwischen dem Einschlafen und Aufwachen in diese Welt hinein. Wenn Sie schlafen, sind Sie in dieser Welt drinnen. Was Sie da erleben, das ist jenseits der Sinnesvorstellungen, nicht die von den Phantasten der Naturwissenschaft aufgestellte atomistische Welt. Aber was da jenseits der Sinnessphäre ist, das erlebte wiederum gerade der altorientalische Weise in seinen Mysterien. Das aber kann man nur erleben, wenn man Hingabe hat an die Welt, wenn man den Drang und den Trieb hat, sich ganz hinzugeben an die Welt. Da muß Liebe in der Erkenntnis walten, wenn man hinter die Sinneseindrücke kommen will.
[ 27 ] Diese Liebe in der Erkenntnis hatte insbesondere die alte orientalische Zivilisation. Und warum muß man diese Hingabe haben? Man muß diese Hingabe haben, weil, wenn man mit dem gewöhnlichen menschlichen Ich hineinkommen wollte in die Welt jenseits der Sinne, man Schaden nehmen würde. Man muß sein Ich, wie man es gewöhnlich hat, aufgeben, wenn man in diese Welt jenseits der Sinne eindringen will. Dieses Ich, wodurch entsteht es? Dadurch, daß das Menschenwesen in ein Chaos der Zerstörung eintauchen kann, bildet sich dieses Ich. Dieses Ich muß gestählt und erhärtet werden in derjenigen Welt, die im Inneren des Menschen als die Welt eines Zerstörungsherdes ist. Mit diesem Ich kann man nicht jenseits der Sphäre der äußeren Sinneswelt leben.
[ 28 ] Stellen wir uns schematisch den Zerstörungsherd im Inneren des Menschen vor (siehe Zeichnung, rot). Er ist über den ganzen menschlichen Organismus ausgebreitet. Was ich da schildere, ist intensiv, nicht extensiv aufzufassen, aber ich werde es schematisch zeichnen. Da ist der Zerstörungsherd, da ist die menschliche Hülle. Wenn das, was im Inneren ist, über die ganze Welt verbreitet würde, was würde in der Welt leben durch den Menschen? Das Böse! Das Böse ist nichts anderes, als das nach außen geworfene, im Inneren des Menschen notwendige Chaos. Und in diesem Chaos, in dem, was im Menschen sein muß, aber auch in ihm bleiben muß als ein Herd des Bösen, in dem muß das menschliche Ich, die menschliche Egoität erhärtet werden. Diese menschliche Egoität kann nicht jenseits der menschlichen Sinnessphäre in der Außenwelt leben. Daher verschwindet das Ich-Bewußtsein im Schlafe, und wenn es auftritt in den Träumen, so erscheint es sich oftmals fremd oder geschwächt. Das Ich, das da in dem Herd des Bösen im Inneren eigentlich erhärtet wird, das kann da nicht hinein jenseits der Sphäre der Sinneserscheinungen. Daher die Anschauung des altorientalischen Weisen, daß man nur durch Hingabe, durch Liebe, durch Aufgabe des Ich da eindringen kann, und daß, wenn man ganz eindringt, man nicht lebt in einer Welt des Vana, des Webens in dem Gewohnten, sondern in der Welt, wo dieses gewohnte Dasein verweht ist, Nirvana ist. Auf diese Auffassung des Nirvana, des höchstgesteigerten Hingebens des Ich, wie es im Schlafe vorhanden ist, wie es in vollbewußter Erkenntnis vorhanden war für die Schüler der altorientalischen Zivilisation, würde anspielen solch ein altorientalischer Weiser, wie ich ihn sprechend hypothetisch vor Ihre Seele hingestellt habe. Und er würde eben sagen: Bei euch ist alles, weil ihr die Egoität ausbilden mußtet, auf die Furcht gegründet. Bei uns, weil wir die Egoität unterdrücken mußten, war alles auf Liebe gegründet. Bei euch spricht das Ich, das sich geltend machen will. Bei uns sprach das Nirvana, indem das Ich sich in die ganze Welt liebend ausgoß.
[ 29 ] Faßt man diese Dinge in Begriffe, so sind sie da in einer gewissen Weise konserviert, aber sie leben in der Welt der Menschheit als Empfindungen, als Gefühle fluktuierend, und sie durchdringen das menschliche Dasein. Und in solchen Gefühlen und Empfindungen machen sie das aus, was auf der einen Seite heute im Oriente, was auf der anderen Seite im Okzident lebt. Im Okzident haben die Menschen ein Blut, haben die Menschen einen Lymphsaft, der durchtränkt ist von der Egoität, die erhärtet ist in dem inneren Herde des Bösen. Im Orient haben die Menschen ein Blut, eine Lymphe, in denen die Nachklänge leben des Nirvanasehnens.
[ 30 ] In ihrem Bewußtsein gehen die Menschen des Orients und des Okzidents im groben heutigen Vorstellen über diese Dinge hinweg, denn das Vorstellen des Intellekts hat etwas Grobes. Das Vorstellen des Intellekts drängt darnach, irgendwie dem lebendigen Organismus Blut abzuzapfen, es zum Präparat zu machen, das dann unter die Lupe zu nehmen und dann anzuschauen, da sich Vorstellungen zu machen. Die Vorstellungen, die man dadurch bekommt, sie sind schon für das gewöhnliche Erleben unendlich grob. Das ist es, was man da auf diese Weise überhaupt sagen kann. Glauben Sie, daß das die feinnuancierten Unterschiede zwischen den Menschen trifft, die, sich benachbart, hier nebeneinander sitzen? Das Mikroskop gibt natürlich nur grobe Begriffe von Blut, von Lymphe. Feinnuancierte Unterschiede sind schon vorhanden unter den Menschen, die aus denselben Milieuverhältnissen heraus entstanden sind. Aber diese Nuancierungen sind natürlich in intensivster Weise vorhanden zwischen den Menschen des Orients und des Okzidents, was heute der Verstand ja nur ganz grob vorstellen kann.
[ 31 ] So lebt es in den Leibern der Menschen Asiens, Europas und Amerikas und wie sie sich zueinander verhalten, so lebt es im äußeren sozialen Leben sich aus. Mit jenem groben Verstande, der in den letzten Jahrhunderten dazu dienlich war, die äußere Natur zu erkennen, werden wir die Anforderungen des neueren sozialen Lebens nicht bezwingen können, werden wir insbesondere nicht den Ausgleich finden können zwischen dem Orient und dem Okzident. Aber der muß gefunden werden.
[ 32 ] Im Spätherbst gehen die Menschen zur Washingtoner Konferenz, und da soll über dasjenige verhandelt werden, was, ich möchte sagen, aus einer instinktiven Genialität heraus der General Smuts, der Südafrikaminister Englands, gesagt hat: Es ist einmal die Entwickelung der neueren Menschheit dadurch charakterisiert, daß der Ausgangspunkt der Kulturinteressen, der bisher in der Nordsee und im Atlantischen Ozean war, übertragen wird nach dem Stillen Ozean. Aus der Kultur der um die Nordsee herum liegenden Gebiete, die sich allmählich im Westen ausgedehnt hat, wird eine Weltkultur. Der Schwerpunkt dieser Weltkultur wird aus der Nordsee nach dem Stillen Ozean fortgetragen.
[ 33 ] Vor dieser Veränderung steht die Menschheit. Aber die Menschen reden heute noch so, daß dieses Reden aus den alten groben Begriffen heraus erfolgt und kein Wesenhaftes getroffen wird, das aber getroffen werden muß, wenn wir wirklich vorwärtskommen wollen. Die Zeichen der Zeit stehen bedrohlich und bedeutsam vor uns und sagen uns: Bisher brauchte man nur ein eingeschränktes Vertrauen zwischen Menschen, die sich eigentlich alle voreinander im geheimen fürchteten. Diese Furcht maskierte sich nur in allerlei andere Gefühle. Aber nunmehr brauchen wir eine Seelenverfassung, die eine Weltkultur wird umspannen können. Wir brauchen ein Vertrauen, das die Gegensätze zwischen Orient und Okzident ausgleichen kann. Da eröffnen sich bedeutsame Perspektiven; die brauchen wir. Die Menschen glauben heute nur über wirtschaftliche Fragen verhandeln zu dürfen, über die Stellung, die Japan im Stillen Ozean haben wird, über die Art und Weise, wie man China wird gestalten müssen, damit ein offenes Tor für alle übrigen kommerziellen, Handel treibenden Völker der Erde geschaffen werde und so weiter.
[ 34 ] Meine lieben Freunde, diese Fragen werden auf keiner Konferenz der Erde entschieden, bevor den Menschen nicht bewußt wird, daß zum Wirtschaften Vertrauen von einem Menschen zum anderen gehört. Und dieses Vertrauen, es wird in der Zukunft nur auf geistige Art errungen werden können. Die äußere Kultur wird die geistige Vertiefung brauchen. Ich wollte heute auf das, was in dieser Richtung hier oftmals geltend gemacht worden ist, wiederum von einer anderen Seite hindeuten. Wir werden morgen in diesem Sinne dann weiter sprechen.
First Lecture
[ 1 ] In the lecture I am to give here on Sunday, I will provide you with an overview of what has happened in recent weeks at the Stuttgart Congress and elsewhere in the field of the anthroposophical movement within Germany. Today we want to discuss a few things that follow on from what we have already considered here, and which will enable us to establish a connection between the coming days and what we dealt with here before I left for Germany.
[ 2 ] If an ancient Oriental sage — we would have to go back to very ancient times of Oriental culture in order to consider what I want to say here — if such an Oriental sage, who was initiated into the mysteries of the ancient Orient, were to turn his gaze to the present-day Western world, he would see that the Christian religion has been completely destroyed. admittedly in the very distant past of Oriental culture — if such an Oriental sage, who was initiated into the mysteries of the ancient Orient, were to turn his gaze to today's Western civilization, he would perhaps say to the members of this Western civilization, judging it: You actually live entirely in fear. Your entire soul is dominated by fear. Everything you do, but also everything you feel, is steeped in fear at the most important moments of life and in its effects, and since fear is closely related to hatred, hatred plays a major role in your entire civilization."
[ 3 ] Let us understand each other correctly, my dear friends. I mean, if a wise man from the ancient Eastern cultural world were to stand among Western people today with the same level of education and the same state of mind, he would point out, when he came to talk about these things, that in his time and in his territory, civilization had been founded on completely different foundations. He would probably say: In my time, fear did not really play a role in civilized life. In my time—when it came to bringing a worldview into the world and turning it into action and social life—the main thing was desire, which could increase to complete devotion to the world, which could increase to love.
[ 4 ] That is how he would feel, and from his point of view, if he were correctly understood, he would point to the most important ingredients, the most important impulses in today's civilized life. And if we understood him correctly, then we would be given much of what we actually need to find the point from which to start in understanding contemporary life.
[ 5 ] Basically, even though strong European influences have been absorbed into religious, aesthetic, scientific, and social life in Asia, the echoes of the old civilization still prevail. This old civilization is in decline, and when the old Oriental sage says, “Love was the fundamental force of the old Oriental civilization,” it must be said that there is little evidence of this in the present. But those who are able to see it can discern even in the signs of decline in Asian culture the influence of an original element of pleasure, joy, and love for the world and of the world.
[ 6 ] In ancient times, there was little in the East of what has been demanded of people since the words first rang out, most radically expressed in the Greek saying: “Know thyself!” This “Know thyself!” actually only entered human historical life during the period of the older Greek cultural development. The comprehensive, light-filled ancient Oriental worldview was not yet permeated by this kind of human knowledge; it was not actually directed toward turning the gaze inward toward the human being. In this respect, the human being is dependent on the conditions that prevail in his environment. Ancient Oriental culture was simply founded under a different influence of sunlight on the earth, under a different influence of earthly conditions than later Western culture. In the ancient Orient, the inner gaze of human beings was, one might say, captured by what surrounded them as the world, and they had a special reason to devote their whole inner being to the world. It was knowledge of the world that flourished in ancient Oriental wisdom and in the view of the world through this ancient Oriental wisdom. And even in what lived in the mysteries themselves in the ancient Orient — you can see this from everything that has been said to you in this direction for many years — there was no actual adherence to the demand “Know thyself!” Turn your gaze to the world, try to let what is hidden in the depths of world phenomena come to you! — that would be much more likely to be a demand of ancient Oriental culture. But the mystery teachers and mystery students were compelled to turn their gaze to the inner life of human beings when Asian civilization spread more toward the West. Already when the mystery colonies were established in Egypt and throughout North Africa, but especially when the mysteries spread more toward the West—an important center being ancient Ireland—in mystery colonies, the mystery teachers and mystery students who came over from Asia were confronted with the necessity of self-knowledge, of real introspection, simply because of the geographical conditions of the West and thus because of the completely different elemental structure of the Western world. And through what these mystery students had already gained in Asia in terms of knowledge of the outer world, of the spiritual facts and beings that underlie the outer world, they were now able to penetrate deeply into what actually exists within the human being.
[ 7 ] This could not have been observed in Asia. The inward gaze would have been paralyzed, so to speak. But with what they brought back to the Western mystery colonies through their outward gaze, which penetrated into the spiritual world, they were now able to look into the human inner being. And actually, only the strongest souls could really, one might say, initially endure what could be seen there in the human inner being. The inner essence of the human being actually first came to the consciousness of humanity in these mystery colonies that originated in the Orient and were established in Western regions. One can actually see what an impression this self-knowledge made on these Eastern mystery teachers and mystery students when one repeats a phrase that was repeatedly addressed to the students by teachers who already had this insight into the inner life of human beings, and which was intended to make clear to them the kind of soul state in which human self-knowledge is actually to be understood.
[ 8 ] The word I mean is often quoted. However, it was only uttered with its full weight in the older mystery colonies of Egypt, North Africa, and Ireland in preparation for the student, for the attention of the initiate in general with regard to inner human experiences. The word that was spoken there is: No one who is not initiated into the sacred mysteries should learn the secrets of the human inner being, for it is impermissible to utter these secrets to the uninitiated; the mouth that utters these secrets becomes sinful, and the ear that hears these secrets becomes sinful!
[ 9 ] This word has often been spoken out of inner experience, out of what a person prepared by Eastern wisdom could experience when he advanced to human knowledge through the earthly conditions of the West. This saying has been preserved in tradition, and today it is repeated over and over again—though its innermost meaning is not understood—in the secret orders and societies of the West, which actually have a great influence on the outside world. But it is repeated out of tradition. It is not spoken with the necessary weight, because people do not really know what it means. ‘But even now it is still the case that in the secret orders of the West, of which I have often spoken in this very place, this word is used as a motto: there are secrets about the human inner being that may only be revealed to people within secret societies, for otherwise it is sinful for the mouth to utter them and sinful for the ear to hear them.’
[ 10 ] It must be said that, as times have changed, some people—not in Central Europe, but in Western countries—learn various things in their secret societies that have been preserved as traditions from ancient wisdom teachings. It is accepted without understanding, although in many cases it actually penetrates into action as an impulse. It was certainly the case that in recent centuries, actually since the middle of the 15th century, the constitution of the human being became such that it was impossible to see these things in their original form. They could only be grasped intellectually. One could form concepts of them, but one could not penetrate to the actual experience. Only a few individuals had inklings of it. Through these inklings, however, some people penetrated into the regions of experience that are at stake here. And such people sometimes took on strange outward forms of life, such as Lord Bulwer, who wrote “Zanoni.” The way he became in his later years can only be understood if one knows how he initially took up the tradition of human self-knowledge, but how his special individual constitution enabled him to penetrate certain mysteries. However, this distanced him from the naturalness of life. In him, in particular, one can see how human beings behave toward life when they take in this different spiritual world not merely in concepts, but in their entire soul constitution, in their inner experience. One must then judge many things differently than can be done according to the standards of ordinary philistinism. It is, of course, something monstrous when Bulwer went around expressing his inner experiences with a certain emphasis, but then had a younger female figure with him who played a harp-like instrument and always needed this playing of the harp-like instrument between the individual passages of his speech. He appeared here and there in societies where everything was otherwise quite formal and philistine; but he never appeared alone. He appeared in his somewhat peculiar attire, sat down, and then his harp girl sat before him, and when he spoke, he spoke a few sentences, then the girl played again, then he continued, then the girl played again. In this way, he introduced something in a higher sense of coquetry—that is how one must initially describe it—into the ordinary world of human philistinism, that philistinism into which humanity was increasingly growing, especially since the middle of the 15th century.
[ 11 ] Humanity does not know much about the degree of philistinism into which it has grown, and it knows less and less about it because it is becoming natural. People only consider reasonable what is currently considered “proper behavior.” But things in life are interconnected, and the modern dryness and sleepiness, the modern way of behaving toward one another, is a consequence of the intellectual development of the last few centuries. The two things belong together. A person like Bulwer naturally does not fit in. It is quite possible to imagine older people walking around the world accompanied by pleasant music played by younger people. One only has to see the distance between one state of mind and another in the right light, and then something like this can appear in the right light. But it was so with Bulwer because something flashed up in him that could not be there so directly in the modern intellectual age, but only as a tradition.
[ 12 ] But one must again learn what knowledge of human nature was in the mystery colonies to which I have referred. The ordinary person of today sees the world around him through the external physical impressions of the senses. He combines what he sees with his intellect. And then he also looks into his inner self. Basically, this is the world that man surveys and from which he also acts. The sensory impressions he receives from outside, what he develops from these sensory impressions as ideas, what is then transformed from these ideas into the inner self through emotional impulses, into impulses of the will, and what then in turn radiates back into consciousness as memories of life, that is the content of the soul's constitution, the content of the life in which the human being weaves in the present, out of which he acts. The person of the present day actually asks, at most, with false mysticism: What is actually inside there? What does self-knowledge reveal? — By raising such a question, he wants to give himself the answer from his ordinary consciousness. But nothing comes out of this ordinary consciousness other than what has actually arisen from external sensory impressions and been transformed by feeling and will. The reflexes, the mirror images of external life, are found when one looks inward in the manner of ordinary consciousness. And even if the external impressions have been transformed by feeling and will, human beings do not know how feeling and will actually work, and so they very often see what they see within themselves, because it has been transformed, not as the mirror image of the external world, but as a special manifestation of a divine world, an eternal world, and the like. But that is not what it is. It is what appears to the ordinary consciousness of modern man as self-knowledge, only the transformed outer world reflected into his consciousness from his own inner being. If man really wanted to look into his inner being, he would have to break what is the inner mirror — I have used this image here before.
[ 13 ] Our inner being is really like a mirror. We look at the outer world. Here are the outer sensory impressions. We attach ideas to them. Then these ideas are reflected by the inner being. By looking inward, we only come to this mirror within (see drawing on page 20, red). We see what is reflected back in the mirror of memory (red arrows). With this ordinary consciousness, we can no more look into the inner being of a person than we can look behind a mirror without breaking it.
[ 14 ] But this had been brought about precisely by the preparation in the ancient Oriental wisdom teachings, so that these teachers and students of the mystery colonies carried to the West could look sharply behind the memories into the inner being of human beings. And from what they saw there, they spoke these words, which indicated that they actually wanted to make it understandable how, especially in those ancient times, one had to be well prepared if one wanted to look into the inner life of human beings.
[ 15 ] What can one see there within the human being? One sees how something penetrates beneath the mirror of memory through the power of perception and thinking that develops before the mirror of memory. The thoughts penetrate beneath this mirror of memory and work in the human etheric body, in that part of the human etheric body which is the basis for growth, but also for the development of the will forces. When we look out into the sunlit room, when we survey everything that comes to us from our sense impressions, something shines into our inner being, which on the one hand becomes memory images, but which nevertheless seeps through the memory mirror; which permeates us just as, say, the processes of nutrition, growth, and so on permeate us. The thought forces first permeate the etheric body, and this etheric body, permeated by the thought forces, now acts in a very special way on the physical body. This brings about a complete transformation of the material existence that is in the physical body of the human being. Nowhere in the external world is matter completely destroyed. That is why modern philosophy and natural science speak of the conservation of matter in the external world. But this law of the conservation of matter applies only to the external world. Inside the human being, matter is completely transformed back into nothingness. Matter is completely destroyed in its essence. Our human nature is based precisely on the fact that we are able to go deeper than the memory reflected in it, to throw matter back into chaos, to completely destroy matter.
[ 16 ] This was what the mystery student was shown who had been led from the Orient to the mystery colonies, namely Ireland and the West in general: Within yourself, beneath your memory, you carry something that tends toward destruction, and if you did not have this within you, you would not have been able to develop your thinking, for you must develop your thinking through the forces of thought penetrating the etheric body. But an etheric body penetrated by the forces of thought acts upon the physical body in such a way that it throws its matter back into chaos, destroys it.
[ 17 ] If, therefore, the human being, with the same attitude with which he advances to memory, engages with this human interior, then he enters the region where the human being wants to destroy, where the human being wants to annihilate what is there. We all carry within our mirror of memory, precisely for the purpose of developing the human thinking ego, a destructive rage, a rage to dissolve matter. There is no human self-knowledge that does not point to this inner human fact in all its intensity.
[ 18 ] Therefore, anyone who is to be made aware of this source of destruction within human beings must be interested in the development of the spirit. They must be able to say with all intensity: The spirit must exist, and for the sake of the spirit's existence, the material must be destroyed. Only after years of talking to humanity about the interests connected with spiritual scientific research can attention be drawn to what actually lies within the human being. But attention must be drawn to this even today, for without it, human beings would always consider themselves to be something other than what they actually are within Western civilization. Within Western civilization, human beings are the shell of a source of destruction, and the forces of decline can only be transformed into forces of growth when human beings become aware that they are the shell of a source of destruction.
[ 19 ] What would happen if human beings were not led to this awareness through spiritual science? Well, we can already see in the development of the present age what would happen. That which is, so to speak, isolated, separated within human beings and should only be active within human beings, should have this one place where matter is thrown back into its chaos, is penetrating outwards, is penetrating into the outer human instincts. This will become Western and Earth civilization as a whole. This is evident in all the destructive forces that are emerging today, for example in Eastern Europe and so on. This is the destructive rage thrown from within to the outside, and in the future, human beings will only be able to find their way in relation to what actually passes into their instincts through something that must be within them when real human knowledge returns, when we are once again made aware of this human source of destruction within, which must be there for the sake of the development of human thinking. For the strength of thinking that human beings must have in order to have a worldview appropriate to the present age, this strength of thinking that must be present before the mirror of memory, causes thinking to continue into the etheric body, and this etheric body, permeated by thinking, has a destructive effect on the physical body. This source of destruction is present in modern Western man. Knowledge merely draws attention to it. And it is much worse when this source is present without man being able to point it out with his consciousness than when man is fully aware of this source of destruction and approaches the development of modern civilization from this point of view.
[ 20 ] What first struck the students who heard about these secrets in the mystery colonies I have spoken of was fear. They got to know it thoroughly. They got to know thoroughly the feeling that looking into the human inner being — not dishonestly in the sense of a nebulous mysticism, but honestly — must be frightening, terrifying. And this fear was dispelled among the ancient mystery students of the West only by pointing out to them the full weight of the facts. Then they overcame what must arise as fear through consciousness.
[ 21 ] When the intellectual age dawned, this fear became unconscious, and as such it continues to work. It works in all kinds of guises in outer life. But it was simply appropriate to the modern age to look into the human inner life. “Know thyself!” became a legitimate demand. The mystery students were pointed in the right direction toward self-knowledge precisely by evoking fear, which could then be overcome. The intellectual age clouded the view of what is within the human being, but it could not remove the fear. And so it came about that human beings themselves were and are so deeply under the influence of this unconscious fear that they said and say: There is nothing at all in human beings that lies beyond birth and death. They are afraid to look deeper than into this life of memory, into this ordinary life of thought, which has its laws only between birth and death. He is afraid to look down into the actual eternity of the human soul, and out of this fear he establishes the doctrine: There is nothing at all except this life between birth and death. — Modern materialism arose out of fear, without having the slightest inkling of it. This modern materialistic worldview is itself a product of fear and anxiety.
[ 22 ] This fear lives on in people's external actions, in social structures, in historical developments since the middle of the 15th century, and it lives on especially in the materialistic worldview of the 19th century. Why did people become materialists, that is, why did they only want to accept the external, the material existence? Because they were afraid to descend into the depths of human nature.
[ 23 ] The ancient Oriental sage would have wanted to express this insight by saying: You Westerners of the present day live entirely out of fear. You base your social orders on fear, you pursue your arts out of fear. You have given birth to your materialistic worldview out of fear. You and the successors of those who, even though they have fallen into decadence, once founded the ancient Oriental worldview in my time, you and these people of Asia, you will never be able to understand each other, for among Asians, after all, everything springs from love; among you, everything springs from fear, which is related to hatred."
[ 24 ] Certainly, this sounds radical, but I am trying to convey it by putting it into the mouth of an ancient Oriental sage. One might believe that he could speak like this if he were to rise again, while one might consider the people of today foolish if they were to state these things so radically. But it is precisely from the radical characterization of these things that we can learn what we need to learn today for the healthy progress of civilization. Humanity will have to realize once again that what constitutes the highest achievement of modern times, intellectual thinking, could not exist at all if the inner life of imagination did not rise up from a source of destruction that must be recognized so that it can be kept within, lest it spill over into the outer instincts and become social impulses.
[ 25 ] One can already see deeply into the connections of modern life when one surveys these things. The world that presents itself as such a source of destruction lies within, beyond the mirror of memory. But the life of the present human being takes place between what this mirror of memory provides and external sensory perception. And just as human beings cannot look down into their own inner being beyond the mirror of memory, so they cannot penetrate what spreads out there outside as sensory perceptions. He invents a material, atomistic world, which is a fantasy world because he cannot penetrate these sensory perceptions.
[ 26 ] But human beings are not strangers to this world beyond external sensory perceptions. Every night, between falling asleep and waking up, they enter this world. When you sleep, you are inside this world. What you experience there is beyond sensory perceptions, not the atomistic world constructed by the fantasists of natural science. But what lies beyond the sphere of the senses was experienced by the ancient Eastern sages in their mysteries. However, this can only be experienced if one is devoted to the world, if one has the urge and the drive to give oneself completely to the world. Love must reign in knowledge if one wants to get behind the sensory impressions.
[ 27 ] This love in knowledge was particularly characteristic of ancient Oriental civilization. And why must one have this devotion? One must have this devotion because if one wanted to enter the world beyond the senses with the ordinary human ego, one would be harmed. One must give up one's ego as one normally has it if one wants to enter this world beyond the senses. How does this ego arise? It arises because the human being can plunge into a chaos of destruction. This ego must be steeled and hardened in the world that is within the human being as a world of destruction. With this ego, one cannot live beyond the sphere of the outer sensory world.
[ 28 ] Let us imagine schematically the center of destruction within the human being (see drawing, red). It is spread throughout the entire human organism. What I am describing here is to be understood intensively, not extensively, but I will draw it schematically. There is the source of destruction, there is the human shell. If what is inside were spread throughout the world, what would live in the world through human beings? Evil! Evil is nothing other than the chaos that is necessary within human beings and thrown outwards. And in this chaos, in what must be in human beings but must also remain in them as a source of evil, the human ego, human egotism, must be hardened. This human egotism cannot live beyond the human sphere of the senses in the external world. That is why the consciousness of the I disappears in sleep, and when it appears in dreams, it often seems strange or weakened. The I, which is actually hardened in the source of evil within, cannot enter beyond the sphere of sensory phenomena. Hence the view of the ancient Eastern sages that one can only penetrate there through devotion, through love, through the renunciation of the ego, and that when one penetrates completely, one does not live in a world of Vana, of weaving in the familiar, but in the world where this familiar existence is blown away, Nirvana. Such an ancient Oriental sage, as I have hypothetically presented him to your mind, would allude to this view of Nirvana, of the highest self-surrender, as it exists in sleep, as it existed in full conscious awareness for the disciples of ancient Oriental civilization. And he would say: With you, everything is based on fear because you had to develop egoism. With us, because we had to suppress egoism, everything was based on love. With you, it is the ego that wants to assert itself that speaks. With us, it was nirvana that spoke, as the ego poured itself out lovingly into the whole world.
[ 29 ] If you put these things into words, they're kind of preserved, but they live in the world of humanity as feelings, as emotions that change all the time, and they're all over human existence. And these feelings and emotions are what make up what's happening in the East today and what's happening in the West. In the West, people have blood, they have lymph, which is saturated with egoism, which is hardened in the inner core of evil. In the East, people have blood, lymph, in which the echoes of the longing for nirvana live on.
[ 30 ] In their consciousness, people in the East and West pass over these things in their crude present-day imagination, for the imagination of the intellect has something crude about it. The imagination of the intellect urges us to somehow draw blood from the living organism, to make it into a specimen, which we then examine under a magnifying glass and look at in order to form ideas. The ideas one gets in this way are already infinitely crude for ordinary experience. That is all one can say in this way. Do you believe that this applies to the subtle differences between the people sitting here next to each other? Of course, the microscope only gives a rough idea of blood and lymph. There are already subtle differences between people who have grown up in the same environment. But these nuances are, of course, most intense between people from the East and the West, which the mind can only imagine in a very rough way today.
[ 31 ] This is how it lives in the bodies of the people of Asia, Europe, and America, and how they relate to each other, this is how it lives out in external social life. With the crude intellect that has served to recognize external nature in recent centuries, we will not be able to overcome the demands of the new social life; in particular, we will not be able to find a balance between the Orient and the Occident. But this balance must be found.
[ 32 ] In late autumn, people will go to the Washington Conference, where they will discuss what I would say was said out of instinctive genius by General Smuts, the British minister to South Africa: The development of modern humanity is characterized by the fact that the starting point of cultural interests, which until now has been in the North Sea and the Atlantic Ocean, is being transferred to the Pacific Ocean. The culture of the areas around the North Sea, which has gradually spread to the West, is becoming a world culture. The center of gravity of this world culture will be carried away from the North Sea to the Pacific Ocean.
[ 33 ] Humanity is facing this change. But people today still speak in terms of old, crude concepts, failing to grasp what is essential, which must be grasped if we really want to move forward. The signs of the times stand before us, threatening and significant, telling us: Until now, all that was needed was a limited trust between people who were actually secretly afraid of each other. This fear was merely masked by all kinds of other feelings. But now we need a state of mind that can encompass a world culture. We need a trust that can balance the opposites between East and West. This opens up significant perspectives; we need them. Today, people believe that they are only allowed to negotiate economic issues, the position that Japan will have in the Pacific, the way in which China will have to be shaped so that an open door is created for all other commercial, trading peoples of the earth, and so on.
[ 34 ] My dear friends, these questions will not be decided at any conference on earth until people realize that economic activity requires trust between individuals. And this trust can only be achieved in the future through spiritual means. The outer culture will need spiritual deepening. Today I wanted to point out from another angle what has often been asserted here in this direction. We will continue tomorrow in this vein.