The Waking of the Human Soul and the Forming of Destiny
GA 224
28 April 1923, Prague
I. The Waking of the Human Soul and the Forming of Destiny
When, out of that existence which is called the pre-earthly, the human being first grows through the germinal state into the physical-earthly life, we then see how in his physical existence the spiritual nature, which is at first hidden, begins to assert itself Out of the physical body; how the child sleeps, as it were, into the physical-earthly world. We see that the life of the child in its relation with the surrounding world is still a kind of dreaming; that it only gradually awakes. Threefold, however, do we find is that which the child manifests at especially conspicuous points in the stages of this awaking. Indeed, something of this threefoldness is observed with that intimate joy, that devoted love, with which one who is in the full sense a human being always observes a child. But the full significance of this threefoldness really becomes clear to one only when it is possible through spiritual science to observe the spiritual life in the physical-corporeal existence. This threefoldness is the learning to walk, learning to speak, learning to think. You know that the human being passes through this threefoldness in an age like the springtime of life. Such is this meaningful order of occurrence. We shall soon see why it must be this meaningful succession. It can, as a matter of fact, be different, but the succession according to nature is just this.
Learning to walk is something which, in an utterly one-sided manner, points to a series of things that the child achieves at the same time. The child enters into the world in such a way that it is in a state of equilibrium utterly unlike that in which it later moves about in the world. There is associated with this at the same time the right use of the arms and the right placing of the human organism in a posture suitable for man in his relation with the world, in the capacity for movement in relation with the world suitable for the human being, in the capacity for movement suited to the human being in the earthly existence. This is what the child must first learn. Out of what the human being acquires in the mobility of his organism there proceeds what adapts him to the equilibrium of the solid, the fluid, the gaseous. In all of this lies the basis for something else. While the human being is undertaking all this activity—learning to walk, learning balance, learning to use the arms and hands and fingers—these movements, which take place in his entire system, are working upward into the system which is the basis for human speech. This tenses the muscles, causes the blood to flow, exercises an influence upon the etheric body, works over into those physical, etheric, astral organs of breathing, proceeds further exerting a certain plastic activity in the brain. One might say that it passes beyond into those organs which, out of the inner human being, bring about speaking through imitation of the surroundings. Language is the transposition of movement and transposition of balance. One who can bring reality into cognition through beholding the actuality of the soul-spiritual sees how dexterity—not the achieved, but the striving that the child must exercise in order to gain the dexterity practiced by the hand in grasping—works onward into the melodious element of language. What is rhythm in language comes to expression in the manner in which the feet are set down in the movement of walking. It is of much significance to observe whether the child, in learning to walk, steps on the heel, the ball of the foot, or the toes. Out of speech there grows what darts forth out of the human being as childish thinking. Walking, speaking, thinking,—all of this evolves out of that dim, dreamy state of consciousness. When the human being is born, and is not yet able to do these things, the force is none the less within the child in the last after-effects of its presence in the pre-earthly existence. Spiritual science can show us how this exists in the pre-earthly life. The earliest sounds of language are not such as manifest thinking, but proceed out of bodily comfort or discomfort.
How did walking, speaking, thinking appear in the pre-earthly life? Thinking, as it flows out of the child,—one who observes the manifestation of this thinking, as he traces it backward, finds that it disappears in an indefinite darkness. It emerges again in the very last period before the earthly birth. There one sees the human spirit-soul being in spiritual intercourse with that host of Beings described in my Occult Science as Angels. This is an intercourse which may be described by saying that thoughts are not being conceived and expressed abstractly, but that a living stream of thought is flowing here and there from one Being to another: there is living intercourse with the Angels. Out of what has flowed into the human soul in the form of a force, there develops something which is slept through, as it were, during the germinal life but later becomes manifest as the force of thinking, conceiving. This we possess in order to enter rightly into intercourse with human beings. Just think what we should be if we were not thinking beings, what we should be as human beings together! All that we are as human beings together results from the fact that we are thinking beings. Here on this earth we mutually understand one another in the relation of man to man by means of the thinking which we express in speech. This manner in which we understand one another here by means of thinking,—this we have acquired out of the pre-earthly intercourse with the Angels. This intercourse which we there practice with the Angels can be practiced also with other human beings who are there in the pre-earthly existence. This takes the form of direct speaking in thoughts. Loftier, however, is the intercourse with the hierarchy of the Angels, since this affords not only satisfaction for the soul but a force which reappears in the thinking that the child acquires in the third stage of his earthly life.
Let us consider now the second stage, that of language. This is not so completely bound up with the sense-nerve system as is thinking. Speaking is bound up with the breast system, man's rhythmic system, with that which comes to expression in breathing, in blood circulation. When that which there struggles out of the child, imitating in language the outer world, is traced back to the pre-earthly life, we find that these forces are acquired out of intercourse he is permitted to experience during the pre-earthly existence with the second hierarchy, that of the Archangels, those Beings who rule over peoples, Beings with this responsibility for the very reason that they have the relation with human beings which we have just described. These forces acquired by the human being in relation with the Archangels sink down into night and come again to manifestation in the forces of the earthly life of speech, by means of which we have mutual understanding with other human beings. Without language, what should we be as human beings in mutual association if we could not pour forth in the coarser vibration of the air, which manifest speech, the ether vibrations of thought? That our rhythmic system becomes the bearer of a denser manifestation,—this force we receive from the Hierarchy of the Archangels. And thus can we follow this process as we go back to the pre-earthly existence; we can say not only in abstract ways that man lives there among spiritual Beings, but can declare in an entirely specific manner what this or that class of Beings has bestowed upon us for the life on earth. We thank these spiritual Beings—that is, we place ourselves in a right relation with these Beings—when we say: For my thinking, I thank the Angels; for language, I thank the Archangels.
Let us go back now to the first thing that the child learns: to walk, learning a balanced posture. There is more connected with this than is usually thought. Connected with it is the bringing about by the ego of a specific physical process which changes man from a creeping to a walking being. It is the ego that erects the human being; the astral body that is at work within the feeling for speech in the erect being; the etheric body that permeates all of this with the force of thinking. But all of these work into the physical body. When we consider the animal, which has its back parallel with the surface of the earth, its action, its walking, its behavior—everything that proceeds out of the astral—is utterly unlike these things in man, who is a being with volition acting out of his upright, vertical nature. What comes about in man, taking place in the ego, astral body, etheric body,—all of this is in the physical body a sort of combustion process. Here is a point where our physical science, if it was desirous of fulfilling itself, would be able to discover its union with Anthroposophy. It must be said that the combustion processes in man are altogether different from those in the animal. When the flame of the organic being works horizontally, it destroys what comes out of conscience; there cannot work into this what is derived from the moral out of conscience. The fact that, in the case of the human being, these processes are streamed through by the conscience is due to the fact that the flame of volition in man is perpendicular to the earth. Within this striking in of the moral, of the nature of conscience, the child places himself just as into the external posture of balance. Together with the learning to walk, there darts into man the moral human nature—indeed, the religious permeation of the nature of man. These are truly lofty forces which are there at work when the child passes over from the creeping to the walking movement. These forces, if we follow them back through the darkness of the child's consciousness, lead us to a still loftier association of man with the Beings whom we call the Primal Forces, the Archai. Everything through which the human being has passed in the pre-earthly life is here reactivated. If to the prayer-like formula, for my thinking I thank the Angels, for language I thank the Archangels, we wish to attach a third unit, we must say: For my being placed within the earthly existence according to physical and moral forces, I thank the Archai—who have been endowed with this power by still loftier Beings.
And now we can answer the question for ourselves: How is it that the human being, who possessed a brilliant consciousness before birth, brings with him here a dull consciousness? Indeed, into this consciousness there dips down what we can combine under the concepts of walking capacity, speaking capacity, thinking capacity, which we have received into ourselves from the higher Hierarchies to be transformed by us. We see thus that what makes us human beings, that through which we are human beings among human beings, manifests our connection with the loftier divine-spiritual worlds. Into these divine-spiritual worlds we enter again and again in a certain way during our earthly existence. The truth is that we must say to ourselves: For the real nature of man, the state of sleep, out of which dreams come into play, is at least just as significant as the waking state. When man passes over from the waking state to the state of sleep, these three capacities that have been acquired in the manner described begin to grow silent: conceiving, speaking, action all grow silent. But we see then that, as thinking grows silent when we fall asleep, the human being, in the same degree in which thought disappears from his consciousness, comes near to the Angels, and, as his speaking capacity comes to an end, he approaches the Archangelic Beings. In the degree to which the human being has entered into complete stillness, he passes through the quieting of his activity into proximity with the Primal Beings, the Archai.
What is important, however, is that we should enter during the sleeping state in a worthy manner into proximity with these three hierarchies: that we come close to the Angels, Archangels, Archai in a worthy way during the state of sleep. Here is the point at which one would have to speak in a special manner to the human beings of the present time; for the manner in which we enter into proximity with the Angels depends very much upon the manner of one's thinking during the waking state. The manner in which man uses worthily his speaking forces determines whether he comes worthily near to the Archangels; the way in which man uses rightly his capacity for movement and his moral sense determines whether he comes worthily near to the Archai.
We are living in a time when the human being is no longer willing to have in his thinking anything extending beyond the physical world, when he desires to be stimulated by the external world. A pure, self-sustained thinking, such as I recommended more than thirty years ago in my Philosophy of Freedom as the foundation for moral intuition,—such thinking, unfortunately, is sought but little at present and but little cultivated in children. But through such thinking, which Goethe and Schiller would still have called idealistic thinking,—through such thinking one breaks free from the mere waking world in earthly existence and retains something for the sleeping state. So much power do we possess for approaching the Angels during sleep as there is idealism in our thinking. And just as helpless are we for the steps we must take toward the Angels as materialism is at work in our thinking. In the same sense it is to be observed that those persons fall victims to Ahrimanic elemental spirits—to which then their thinking is forced to turn—who do not, through idealism developed during the waking state, find the forces for drawing near to the Angelic Beings. It is so very beautiful when the child has learned to think so directly, in a manner of which human beings no longer form any conception! The thinking of the child just after it has learned to think is filled with spirituality. It is wonderful to see how—up to the time when they have been nibbled at by materialism—children upon sleeping move immediately as if on wings toward their Angelic Being, how united they become during sleep with the Angelic Beings. Thus we may say that we seek during sleep—but only through idealism, through spiritualizing the realm of thoughts—those worlds out of which we have evolved in order to learn to think here as human beings together with human beings.
And when we consider language, idealism in one's disposition has the same significance for intercourse during sleep with the Archangels as idealism in thinking has for association with the Angels. The person who is able, when addressing his words to another person, to stream good will into these words, a good mood that passes over into the soul of the other person, which does not pass by the other person but penetrates into him with the interest that one may have for a human being,—that mood which may be called an idealistic mood of good will, it is this that, when astral body and ego have passed over into sleep, gives to language the melodious sound. This gives to astral body and ego, which also share in language, the capacity to come near to the Archangelic Beings, whereas it is the unsocial, egotistic attitude of mind which scatters these forces in the realm of the Ahrimanic elemental beings. Thus the human being, when he falls asleep, and has not used language in the right, idealistic manner, really dehumanizes himself.
Such is the situation likewise when our actions, our conduct is such as to be humanly friendly, but is also fully aware that the human being is not only that entity living in flesh, but in his inner nature is a spiritual being, for out of this awareness arises respect for the other person likewise as a spiritual being. It is out of action based upon this attitude that we gain for the sleeping state the power that brings us in the right manner close to the Archai, whereas, if we are not in a condition to perform humanly kind actions, if we are aware of our own nature only as bodily, the corresponding forces are then scattered in the realm of Ahrimanic elemental Beings: we alienate ourselves from the very nature of man.
Thus the human being brings three kinds of gifts out of the pre-earthly existence, but it is in this way that he connects these again in a threefold manner with his primordial form between sleeping and waking, while he remains unconscious, but returns again and again into proximity with these Beings. This, then, is just as we here on earth have to form our association with other human beings out of three sources: the source of thought, of speech, of action. Thus are we during sleep in a threefold relation with the spiritual world: with the Angels, with the Archangels, with the Primal Forces.
The nature of our link in association with these Beings is of determinative significance when we pass through the portal of death. For it is possible to know through spiritual vision that one is able to draw ever nearer to the Angels, the Archangels, the Beings of the Archai. But it is something which may become extremely bad for future human beings if they surrender themselves wholly to the Ahrimanic elemental Beings, if materialistic thinking, speaking, action become ever more habitual. Thanks to the spiritual world, however, human souls of the present time—at least as to most persons—have such an inheritance of a good mood in thinking, speaking and action that the materialism of the present time cannot degrade everything. Very materialistic persons do not possess out of the contemporary life on earth much that can render possible approach to the hierarchies, yet out of the life of the past there flows forth what brings them there. Yet humanity may very easily meet with a different reward if a spiritual conception of life is not acquired. The idealizing of thinking, speaking and action provides man with the possibility of creating in a certain way new connections with the three classes of divine-spiritual Beings—the Angels, the Archangels, the Archai—and this man needs for the time between death and a new birth. Otherwise, in a far future time, if he has not had a connection in the present time with the Angels, he must be born as a being crippled in thinking; if he has not entered into a union with the Archangels, as a man without language; if he has not had a connection with the Archai, as a being crippled in limbs and in moral impulses. It is within the power of mankind on earth, through materialism in civilization and culture, to drag the whole of earthly humanity down to ruin, or through spiritualizing to lift humanity to a loftier height, such as I described in my Occult Science as the Jupiter existence of the earthly beings.
It is simply true that Anthroposophy is not a theory: every word, every thought passes over into our whole spiritual human nature. We cannot do otherwise than to possess the thought: you are truly a crippled person if you do not possess the right relation with the Higher Beings. This gives us the right sense of responsibility in a moral relation with the spiritual world, and it is out of this that there comes about in man a right sense of responsibility in relation also with the physical world. Only thus does it arise. When you consider what thus occurs to the human being, how through idealism in his thinking he enters into proximity with the Angels, how through his words, through the idealistic attitude expressed in his speaking, he enters into proximity with the Archangels, how through the idealism embodied in his actions he draws near to the Archai—how during sleep he struggles upward to the three Hierarchies—you will then find intelligible what anthroposophical research discloses to us: that the constitution of human destiny is woven in this way. All of this we carry through the portal of death, and it later becomes conscious. After death we must form our thoughts in association with the Angels; it is through the disposition of mind we possess that we must acquire our concepts after death. The manner in which we take our place through language in the midst of mankind gives us the capacity, the power, to enter into association with the Archangels. Through the manner in which we use our limbs must we gain the possibility of possessing self-consciousness after death through association with the Archai. Thus do we enter livingly within and thus is that woven which develops into a clearer power of consciousness between death and a new birth.
If we now observe the child during the earliest years of life, we behold the preceding earthly existence in its after effects. We see not only into the preceding pre-earthly life, but also the preceding life on earth, and thus only does one gain a view for the entire life on earth. One observes the child, how it learns to walk, to use its arms; one observes whether it steps on the ball of the foot or on the heel. Not only does one notice how it directs its physical look, but how still earlier actions are carried out with delicacy, with tenderness, with a pitying heart, how this gives to the child in this life a firm tread, how an insecure, wavering step is the outcome of brutish, pitiless action in the previous life. Every step taken by the child, the striving for this or that forming of the tread, reveals to us how this forming is the outcome of the previous life on earth. We learn to recognize the physical as the image of what is living in the child as a moral impulse out of the previous life on earth. The most impressive thing that can be observed is the learning to walk. Human freedom comes about through the fact that man is born with his destiny as little interfered with as whether he has light or dark hair.
The primary measure of destiny is expressed in the learning to walk. In learning to speak, something else is really indicated. This also is in relation with the pre-earthly existence, but it is difficult to describe. Since it is difficult to characterize, I shall express this in popular language. When the human being passes through the portal of death, he has in a certain way formed his nature morally. Always during the sleeping state he has been weaving his own being, and what he has then woven he himself begins to see. What a person is, comes to manifestation in his learning to walk. When he has passed through the portal of death, he enters in the right manner into association with the Angels, Archangels, Archai, but something further is added to this which the person receives from the second group of the hierarchies. These stream into this person, as an additional, more impersonal karma, that which places him in his next life within a specific language, integrates him within a certain body of people. Individual destiny is connected with what the person is in relation with the Archai. Capacity for speaking we receive from the Archangels. But what language we learn,—this is received from far loftier Beings: the Exusiai, Dynamis, Kyriotetes.
When we consider thinking, conceiving, this is in relation, as I have shown, with the Angels; these Beings can bestow upon man the gift of thinking. This capacity, however, man achieved first in the earth period of evolution; he did not possess it during the Moon period. In this way there comes about a development for the Angels themselves; they enter thus into relation with the Seraphim, Cherubim, Thrones. They have gained in this way the capacity for a direct association with the Thrones, Cherubim, Seraphim, and these do not bestow a capacity which is to be shared only within a single human group, but one to be shared by the whole of humanity. Thinking is really something belonging in common to the whole of humanity. For this reason is logic identical over the whole earth. Walking, in which personal destiny is expressed, we receive from the Archai, out of their own forces. The capacity for speaking is received by the human being from the Archangels, but these are directed in this by the second group of the hierarchies. It is from the Angels that the human being receives the gift of thinking, but these bestow this upon man under the influence of the highest hierarchies.
Thus are things woven in the cosmic order, and man is understood only when he is clearly seen in this relation of being interwoven with the cosmic order. In this way one understands, not only the single person, but also the nature of a living or dying branch of language, a deficient or a perfect capacity for thinking. Man exists on earth in a certain dualistic relation. He sees entities and sees them in a certain dependency under natural laws. In relation with these, man comes to a consciousness of his own relation with the Godhead. Here on this earth there is no relation between the physical and the moral cosmic order. But, when we look back into the life before birth and that after death, we then enter into a world where these two realms are merged into one. Moreover, a human being cannot determine rightly what he himself is unless he is in a position to see truly into himself as a spiritual being. Man does not acquire a unitary world view unless he can see beyond birth and death, if he does not look into the higher worlds. In order to understand his entire, total being, man needs a consciousness permeated by knowledge of his connection with the spiritual world.
Drei Etappen Des Erwachens Der Menschlichen Seele
Heute möchte ich esoterisch einiges hinzufügen dem, was ich gestern im öffentlichen Vortrag sprechen durfte. Geradezu eine Art esoterischer Ergänzung soll es sein, was ich heute zu Ihnen sprechen möchte. Wenn der Mensch aus jenem Dasein, das ich gestern das vorirdische genannt habe, zuerst durch das Keimesleben hereinwächst in das physisch-irdische Dasein, so sehen wir, wie in diesem physischen Dasein das Geistig-Seelische, das im Anfang verborgen ist, sich aus dem physischen Leibe heraus geltend macht, wie das Kind gleichsam hereinschiäft in die physische Erdenwelt. Wir sehen, daß das Leben des Kindes im Verhältnis zur Umwelt geradezu noch eine Art Träumen ist, daß es allmählich erst erwacht. Dreierlei aber finden wir, das an besonders hervorragenden Punkten die Stufen dieses Erwachens darstellt. Von diesem Dreierlei wird einiges mit jener innigen Freude beobachtet, mit jener hingebungsvollen Liebe, mit der man das Kind, wenn man ein voller Mensch ist, immer beobachtet. Aber die volle Bedeutung dieser Dreiheit geht einem eigentlich erst auf, wenn man durch Geisteswissenschaft das geistig-seelische Leben im physischleiblichen Dasein beobachten kann. Diese Dreiheit ist das Gehenlernen, das Sprechenlernen und das Denkenlernen. Sie wissen, in einem wie frühen Lebensalter der Mensch diese Dreiheit durchmacht. So ist nämlich die sinngemäße Reihenfolge. Wir werden gleich sehen, warum diese sinngemäße Reihenfolge so sein muß. Sie kann anders sein, das Naturgemäße ist aber doch diese Reihenfolge.
Das Gehenlernen ist etwas, was nur in ganz einseitiger Weise auf eine Reihe von Dingen hinweist, welche sich das Kind zugleich aneignet. Das Kind tritt ja so in die Welt, daß es in einer ganz andern Gleichgewichtslage darin ist als derjenigen, in der es sich später in der Welt bewegt. Zugleich ist damit der richtige Gebrauch der Arme verknüpft, auch die richtige Einstellung des menschlichen Organismus in die Lage, die dem Menschen gegenüber der Welt die entsprechende ist, in die dem Menschen entsprechende Bewegungsfähigkeit im irdischen Dasein. Das ist, was das Kind zunächst lernen muß. Aus dem, was sich da der Mensch an Beweglichkeit aus seinem Organismus aneignet, fließt, was ihn einordnet in die Gleichgewichtslage gegenüber dem Festen, Flüssigen, Gasförmigen. In alledem liegt die Grundlage, der Boden für etwas anderes. Indem der Mensch diese ganze Betätigung vornimmt, das Gehenlernen, das Gleichgewicht, die Arme und Finger gebrauchen lernt, wirken jene Bewegungen, die in seinem ganzen System sich vollziehen, herauf in dasjenige System, das der menschlichen Sprache zugrunde liegt. Das spannt die Muskeln an, das bewegt das Blut, übt einen Einfluß auf den ätherischen Leib des Menschen aus, überträgt sich auf jene physischen, ätherischen, astralischen Organe der Atmung, das setzt sich fort, übt eine gewisse plastische Tätigkeit an dem Gehirn aus. Man möchte sagen, es überträgt sich auf diejenigen Organe, die aus dem Menscheninneren durch Nachahmung seiner Umgebung die Sprache herausbringen. Die Sprache ist umgesetzte Bewegung und umgesetztes Gleichgewicht des Menschen. Wer sich aus der Anschauung des Geistig-Seelischen die Wirklichkeit zur Erkenntnis bringen kann, sieht, wie im melodiösen Element der Sprache weiterwirkt die Geschicklichkeit - nicht die fertige, sondern die Anstrengung, die das Kind machen muß, um jene Geschicklichkeit zu erwerben, die unsere Hand beim Greifen ausübt. Was Rhythmus der Sprache ist, drückt sich aus in der Art, wie die Füße aufgesetzt werden, in den Gehbewegungen. Es ist sehr bedeutungsvoll zu beobachten, ob das gehenlernende Kind zuerst mit den Fersen, den Ballen oder den Zehen auftritt. Aus der Sprache wächst heraus, was aus dem Menschen herausschießt als kindliches Denken. Gehen, Sprechen, Denken: aus jenem dumpfen, traumhaften Bewußtseinszustand entwickelt sich das heraus. Wenn der Mensch geboren worden ist und das noch nicht kann, so ist diese Kraft doch im Kinde vorhanden in der letzten Nachwirkung, so wie sie im vorirdischen Dasein vorhanden ist. Geisteswissenschaft kann uns zeigen, wie das im vorirdischen Dasein vorhanden ist. Die ersten Sprachlaute sind nicht solche, welche Denken wiedergeben, sondern gehen hervor aus dem körperlichen Wohl- oder Mißbehagen.
Wie hat sich nun Gehen, Sprechen, Denken ausgenommen im vorirdischen Dasein? Wer die Äußerungen dieses Denkens sieht, so wie es ausfließt aus dem Kinde, indem er es rückläufig betrachtet, dem verschwindet es in einem unbestimmten Dunkel. Es taucht ihm erst wieder auf in der letzten Zeit vor der irdischen Geburt. Da schaut man die geistig-seelische Wesenheit des Menschen in einem geistigen Verkehr mit jener Schar von Wesenheiten, die ich beschrieben habe in meiner «Geheimwissenschaft im Umriß» als Angeloi. Es ist ein Verkehr, der sich so charakterisieren läßt, daß man sagt: Da werden Gedanken nicht abstrakt gedacht und ausgesprochen, sondern es fließt ein lebendiger Gedankenstrom hin und her von Wesenheit zu Wesenheit; ein lebendiger Verkehr mit den Angeloi entsteht. Aus dem, was in die menschliche Seele an Kraft eingeflossen ist, entwickelt sich etwas, was vom Menschen wie verschlafen wird im Keimesleben, das sich aber später auftretend als Kraft des Denkens, des Vorstellens zeigt. Und wir haben dieses, um zum richtigen Verkehr mit den Menschen zu kommen. Denken Sie, was wir wären, wenn wir keine denkenden Wesen wären, was wir wären als Menschen untereinander! Alles, was wir als Menschen untereinander sind, sind wir dadurch, daß wir denkende Wesen sind. Hier auf der Erde verständigen wir uns als Mensch zu Mensch durch das Denken, das wir in die Sprache hineinlegen. Diese Art, wie wir uns hier durch das Denken verständigen, diese Art haben wir aus dem vorirdischen Verkehr mit den Engeln. Da können wir allerdings jenen Verkehr, wie mit den Engeln, auch mit den andern Menschen pflegen, die im vorirdischen Dasein sind; das nimmt sich aus wie eine unmittelbare Gedankensprache. Erhaben darüber ist aber der Verkehr mit der Hierarchie der Engel, denn der gibt nicht nur Befriedigung für die Seele, sondern Kraft, die wiedererscheint im Denken, welches das Kind auf der dritten Stufe seines irdischen Lebens sich aneignet.
Sehen wir nun auf die zweite Stufe, auf die Sprache. Sie ist nicht so sehr gebunden nur an das Sinnes-Nervensystem wie das Denken. Die Sprache ist gebunden an das Brustsystem, das rhythmische System des Menschen, an das, was sich auslebt in der Atmung, in der Blutzirkulation. Wenn wir das, was sich da dem Kind entringt, die äußere Welt nachahmend in der Sprache, zurückverfolgen bis in das vorirdische Dasein, dann finden wir, daß der Mensch diese Kräfte aus jenem Verkehr hat, den er im vorirdischen Dasein pflegen durfte mit der zweiten Hierarchie, den Erzengeln, den regierenden Wesenheiten der Volksstämme, die diese Aufgabe haben, eben weil sie mit dem Menschen die Beziehung haben, die jetzt gekennzeichnet wurde. Diese Kräfte, die der Mensch bekommt im Verkehr mit den Erzengeln, sie tauchten unter in die Nacht und kommen erst wieder zum Vorschein in den Kräften des irdischen Sprachlebens, durch das wir uns mit andern Menschen verständigen. Was wären wir als Menschen untereinander ohne Sprache, wenn wir nicht das Ätherische der Gedankenwellen hineingießen könnten in die gröberen Luftwellen, die die Sprache vermitteln! Die Kräfte, die bewirken, daß unser rhythmisches System der 'Träger einer dichteren Offenbarung wird, haben wir von der Hierarchie der Archangeloi. Und so können wir das verfolgen, indem wir zurückgehen zum vorirdischen Dasein. Wir können nicht nur im Abstrakten sagen, der Mensch lebt da zwischen geistigen Wesenheiten-, sondern wir können in ganz bestimmter Form sagen, was uns diese oder jene Art von Wesen für eine Gabe für das Erdenleben verliehen hat. Wir danken diesen Geistwesen, das heißt, wir setzen uns zu diesen Wesenheiten in ein richtiges Verhältnis, wenn wir sagen: Für mein Denken danke ich den Angeloi, für die Sprache danke ich den Archangeloi.
Gehen wir nun zurück zum ersten, was das Kind lernt: zum Gehen, zum Lernen der Gleichgewichtshaltung. Damit ist mehr verbunden, als man gewöhnlich denkt. Verbunden ist damit das Heraufholen eines ganz bestimmten physischen Vorganges durch das Ich, der den Menschen aus dem kriechenden zu einer gehenden Wesen macht. Das Ich ist es, das den Menschen aufrichtet, der Astralleib ist es, der in die Sprachempfindung hineinwirkt in dem aufrechten Wesen, der ätherische Leib ist es, der das alles mit Denkkraft durchdringt. Sie wirken aber alle hinein in den physischen Leib. Wenn wir das Tier betrachten, das sein Rückgrat parallel zur Erdoberfläche hat, so ist das Tun, das Sich-Bewegen, Handeln, alles, was aus dem Astralen hervorgeht, etwas ganz anderes als beim Menschen, der als ein wollendes Wesen aus seiner aufrechten, senkrechten Natur heraus handelt. Was beim Menschen Zustände sind, die sich so im Ich, Astralleib und Ätherleib abspielen, das ist im physischen Leibe eine Art Verbrennungsprozeß. Hier ist der Punkt, wo unsere physische Wissenschaft, wenn sie sich wird vervollkommnen wollen, den Zusammenschluß mit Anthroposophie wird finden können.
Man muß sagen: Die Verbrennungsprozesse beim Menschen sind ganz andere als beim Tier. Wenn die Flamme des organischen Wesens horizontal wirkt, vernichtet sie das, was aus dem Gewissen kommt, es kann nicht hereinwirken, was aus dem Moralischen kommt vom Gewissen. Daß sie beim Menschen durchströmt wird vom Gewissen, beruht darauf, daß die Willensflamme beim Menschen senkrecht auf dem Erdboden steht. In diesen Einschlag des Moralischen, des Gewissenhaften, versetzt sich das Kind ebenso wie in die äußere physische Gleichgewichtslage. Mit dem Gehenlernen schießt in den Menschen hinein die moralische Menschennatur, ja sogar das religiöse Durchsetztsein der Menschennatur. Das sind wahrhaft erhabene Kräfte, die da einwirken, wenn das Kind übergeht aus der kriechenden in die gehende Bewegung. Diese Kräfte, wenn wir sie zurückverfolgen durch das Dunkel des Kindesbewußtseins, sie führen uns zu einem noch höheren Umgang des Menschen mit den Wesenheiten, die wir Urkräfte, Archai nennen. Das alles wirkt nach, was der Mensch im vorirdischen Dasein durchgemacht hat. Wenn wir der gebetsartigen Formel: Für mein Denken danke ich den Angeloi, für die Sprache danke ich den Archangeloi - hinzufügen wollen ein drittes, so müssen wir sagen: Für mein Hineingestelltsein in das irdische Dasein nach physischen und moralischen Kräften danke ich den Archai, die es von noch höheren Wesenheiten haben.
Und nun können wir uns die Frage beantworten: Wie kommt es, daß der Mensch, der ein Helligkeitsbewußtsein hatte vor der Geburt, dann ein dumpfes Bewußtsein hereinbringt? Ja, darin taucht dasjenige unter, was wir zusammenfassen können unter den Begriff Geh.kräfte, Sprachkräfte, Denkkräfte, die wir von den höheren Hierarchien hereinbekommen haben, um sie zu verwandeln. Wir sehen daher, wie das, was uns zu Menschen macht, wodurch wir Menschen unter Menschen sind, uns im Zusammenhang mit den höheren göttlich-geistigen Welten zeigt. Diese göttlich-geistigen Welten betreten wir während des irdischen Lebens in gewisser Weise immer wieder von neuem. Es ist so, daß wir uns sagen müssen: Für die eigentliche Wesenheit des Menschen ist der Schlafzustand, aus dem ja die Träume hervorspielen, zum mindesten von einer ebenso großen Wichtigkeit wie der Wachzustand. Wenn der Mensch aus dem wachen Zustand in den Schlafzustand übergeht, beginnen ja gerade diese drei Fähigkeiten zu schweigen, die sich der Mensch in der geschilderten Weise angeeignet hat. Es schweigt das Vorstellen, das Sprechen und Tun. Da sehen wir allerdings, wie der Mensch, indem das Denken schweigt, wenn wir einschlafen, in demselben Maße, in dem seine Gedanken aus seinem Bewußtsein schwinden, in die Nähe der Angeloi kommt, und wie er, wenn die Sprechfähigkeit aufhört, in die Nähe der Archangeloiwesenheiten kommt. In dem Maß, wie der Mensch vollständiger Ruhe hingegeben ist, kommt er durch Stillegung seines Tuns in die Nähe der Archaiwesen, der Urkräfte.
Um was es sich aber handelt, das ist, daß wir in würdiger Weise in die Nähe dieser drei Hierarchien kommen gerade im schlafenden Zustand; daß wir in würdiger Weise in die Nähe der Angeloi, Archangeloi und Archai kommen. Hier ist der Punkt, wo man insbesondere reden müßte zu den Menschen der Gegenwart, denn es hängt da sehr viel davon ab, wie das Denken während des Wachens sich gestaltet, wie wir in die Nähe der Angeloi kommen. Es hängt ab von der Art, wie der Mensch seine Sprachkräfte in würdiger Weise gebraucht, ob er in würdiger Weise in die Nähe der Archangeloi kommt. Von der Art, wie er in richtiger Weise seine Bewegungsfähigkeit und seinen moralischen Sinn gebraucht, hängt ab, ob er in würdiger Weise in die Nähe der Archai kommt.
Wir leben in einer Zeit, wo die Menschen nicht mehr gerne in ihrem Denken etwas haben möchten, was über die physische Welt hinausgeht, wo sie angeregt sein wollen durch die äußere Welt. Ein selbständiges, reines Denken, wie ich es als Grundlage für moralische Einsicht in der «Philosophie der Freiheit» schon vor dreißig Jahren gefordert habe, sucht man und erzeugt man bei den heutigen Kindern leider recht wenig. Aber durch ein solches Denken, das noch Goethe und Schiller ein idealistisches genannt hätten, reißt sich der Mensch los von der bloßen Wachenswelt im irdischen Dasein und behält etwas übrig für den Schlafzustand. So viel Kräfte haben wir, um uns im Schlafe den Angeloi zu nähern, als Idealismus in unserem Denken ist. Und so viel Ohnmacht haben wir zu den Schritten, die wir machen müßten zu den Angeloi hin, als Materialismus in unserem Denken wirkt. Es ist in demselben Sinne zu bemerken, wie jene Menschen während des Schlafes ahrimanischen Elementarwesen verfallen, zu denen sich dann ihr Denken wenden muß, die nicht durch Idealismus, den sie im Wachen entwickeln, die Kräfte finden, in die Nähe der Angeloiwesenheiten zu kommen. Es ist ja so schön, wenn das Kind so unmittelbar denken gelernt hat in einer Weise, von der sich die meisten Menschen gar keine Vorstellung mehr machen! Das Denken des Kindes, unmittelbar nachdem es denken gelernt hat, ist voller Geistigkeit. Es ist wunderbar zu sehen, wie bis zur Zeit, wo sie angefressen werden vom Materialismus, Kinder im Schlafe geradezu wie im Fluge ihren Angeloiwesen entgegengehen, wie sie verbunden werden mit den Engelwesen während des Schlafes. So können wir sagen: Im Schlafe suchen wir, aber nur durch den Idealismus, durch Vergeistigung der Gedankenwelt, jene Welten auf, aus denen wir uns herausentwickelt haben, um hier als Menschen unter Menschen das Denken zu erlernen.
Und wenn wir die Sprache betrachten: gerade dieselbe Bedeutung, die der Idealismus der Gedanken hat für den Verkehr mit den Angeloi, hat der Idealismus der Gesinnung für den Verkehr des Menschen während des Schlafes mit den Archangeloiwesen. Derjenige Mensch, der in seine Worte hineinzugießen vermag, wenn er sie an einen andern richtet, Wohlwollen, gütige Gesinnung, die sich hinüberlebt in die Seele des andern, die nicht an den Menschen vorübergeht, sondern mit dem Interesse, das man für den Menschen haben kann, auf ihn eingeht, jene Gesinnung, die man als idealistisch-wohlwollende Gesinnung bezeichnen kann, die ist es, die auch der Sprache den Wohllaut gibt. Wenn Astralleib und Ich in den Schlaf übergegangen sind, gibt sie dem astralischen Leib und dem Ich, die auch an der Sprache beteiligt sind, die Kraft, in die Nähe der Archangeloiwesen zu kommen, während die unsoziale, egoistische Gesinnung es ist, die diese Kräfte zerstreut in die Welt der ahrimanischen Elementarwesen; so daß der Mensch, wenn er in den Schlaf kommt und er die Sprache nicht in idealistischer, richtiger Weise gebraucht hat, sich eigentlich entmenscht.
Ebenso ist es, wenn wir unsere Handlungen, unser Tun in einer Weise gebrauchen, die menschenfreundlich ist, die sich aber voll bewußt ist, daß der Mensch nicht nur jenes Wesen ist, das im Fleische lebt, sondern daß der Mensch seinem inneren Wesen nach ein geistiges Wesen ist. Denn aus diesem Bewußtsein entspringt die Achtung auch der andern Menschen als Geistwesen. Aus dem Tun aus dieser Auffassung heraus gewinnen wir für den Schlafzustand diejenige Kraft, die uns in richtiger Weise in die Nähe der Archai bringt, während, wenn wir nicht in der Lage sind, menschenfreundliche Taten zu tun, wenn wir uns unserer nur als körperlicher Wesen bewußt sind, die entsprechenden Kräfte dann zerstreut werden in der Welt der ahrimanischen Elementarkräfte: wir entfremden uns der Menschennatur selber.
So bringt sich der Mensch dreierlei Gaben mit aus dem vorirdischen Dasein, so knüpft er sie aber in dreifacher Art wieder an die ursprüngliche Gestalt zwischen Einschlafen und Aufwachen an, wenn er unbewußt bleibt, aber immer wieder in die Nähe dieser Wesenheiten kommt. Es ist dann das gerade so, wie wir hier auf Erden unseren Umgang mit den Menschen aus drei Quellen zu gestalten haben, der Gedankenquelle, der Sprachquelle und der Tatquelle. So stehen wir während unseres Schlaflebens in dreifacher Beziehung zu der geistigen Welt: zu den Engeln, zu den Erzengeln und zu den Urkräften.
Was wir hier im Verein mit diesen Wesen anknüpfen, ist von maßgebender Bedeutung, wenn wir durch die Pforte des Todes gehen. Denn man kann durch Geistesschau erkennen, wie der Mensch immer näher und näher kommen kann den Angeloi-, den Archangeloi-, den Archaiwesen. Es ist allerdings etwas, was sehr schlimm werden kann für die zukünftige Menschheit, wenn sie sich ganz hingibt an die ahrimanischen Elementarwesen, wenn der Materialismus des Denkens, Sprechens, Handelns immer mehr sich festsetzen wird. Aber dank der geistigen Welt haben die Menschenseelen heute noch wenigstens für die meisten Menschen - so viel Erbschaft an guter Gesinnung des Denkens, Sprechens und Handelns, daß durch den Materialismus von heute noch nicht alles verderbt werden kann. Sehr materialistische Menschen haben aus dem gegenwärtigen Erdenleben nicht viel, um in die Nähe der Hierarchien zu kommen, doch aus dem vergangenen Leben quillt empor, was sie hinbringt. Aber die Menschheit könnte sehr leicht einen andern Lohn entgegennehmen, wenn sie: nicht eine geistige Lebensauffassung gewinnt. Die Idealisierung des Denkens, des Sprechens, des Tuns gibt dem Menschen die Möglichkeit, gewissermaßen neue Verbindungen anzuknüpfen mit den drei Arten der göttlich-geistigen Wesenheiten, den Angeloi, den Archangeloi und den Archai, die der Mensch braucht für die Zeit zwischen dem Tode und einer neuen Geburt. Sonst müßte er in einer fernen Zukunft, wenn er nicht Zusammenhang hätte mit den Angeloi in dieser Zeit, als ein gedankengelähmtes Wesen geboren werden; wenn er nicht eine Verbindung eingegangen wäre mit den Archangeloi, als ein Wesen ohne Sprache; wenn er nicht Zusammenhang hätte mit den Archai, gelähmt an Gliedern und gelähmt an moralischen Impulsen geboren werden. Die Erdenmenschheit hat es in der Hand, durch Materialismus der Zivilisation und Kultur die ganze Erdenmenschheit zugrundezurichten, oder durch Vergeistigung sie zu einer höheren Höhe emporzuheben, die ich in meiner «Geheimwissenschaft» genannt habe das Jupiterdasein des Erdenwesens.
Anthroposophie ist nicht eine Theorie. Jedes Wort, jeder Gedanke geht in unser ganzes Gedankenleben, in unser ganzes seelisches Menschenwesen über. Wir können nicht anders, als den Gedanken haben: Du bist ja ein verkrüppeltes Wesen, wenn du den richtigen Zusammenhang mit den höheren Wesenheiten nicht hast. - Das gibt uns auch ein Verantwortungsgefühl im moralischen Dasein gegenüber der geistigen Welt, und aus diesem kommt dem Menschen sein richtiges Verantwortlichkeitsgefühl gegenüber der physischen Welt. Nur daraus kommt es. Wenn Sie sich besinnen darauf, was da an dem Menschen geschieht, wie er sich durch den Idealismus in seinen Gedanken in die Nähe der Angeloi bringt, wie er durch seine Worte, durch das, was’ an idealistischer Gesinnung enthalten ist im Sprechen, in die Nähe der Archangeloi bringt, durch das, was in seinen Handlungen an Idealismus enthalten ist, in die Nähe der Archai bringt, wie er sich während des Schlafes zu den drei Hierarchien hinaufringt, dann werden Sie auch begreiflich finden, was anthroposophische Forschung uns zeigt: daß dasjenige, was des Menschen Schicksal ist, in dieser Art gewoben ist. Das alles tragen wir durch die Pforte des Todes hindurch, und später wird es bewußt. Wir müssen nach dem Tode die Gedanken gestalten im Verkehr mit den Angeloi; mit dem, was wir an Gesinnung haben, müssen wir uns die Vorstellungen nach dem Tode erwerben. Die Art und Weise, wie wir uns durch die Sprache in die Menschheit hineinstellen, gibt uns die Fähigkeit, die Kraft, mit den Archangeloi zusammenzukommen. Durch die Art und Weise, wie wir unsere Glieder gebrauchen, müssen wir uns die Möglichkeit erwerben, durch den Verkehr mit den Archai ein Selbstbewußtsein nach dem Tode zu haben. So leben wir uns hinein, und so wird dasjenige gesponnen, was sich dann ausbildet in heller Bewußtseinskraft zwischen dem Tode und einer neuen Geburt.
Wenn wir jetzt das Kind betrachten in den ersten Lebensjahren, so sehen wir das vorige Erdenleben nachwirken. Man sieht nicht bloß in das vorirdische Leben, sondern in das vorige Erdenleben, und da erst eignet man sich den Blick für das ganze Erdenleben an. Da sieht man dann das Kind an, wie es gehen lernt, seine Arme handhaben lernt, man beobachtet, ob es auf den Ballen oder auf den Fersen geht. Nicht bloß so sieht man es an, wie es sich dem physischen Blicke darstellt, sondern wie früher gewisse Handlungen mit Zartheit, mit Weichheit, mit mitleidsvollem Herzen ausgeführt worden sind, wie das dem Kinde in diesem Leben den festen Schritt gibt, wie ein unsicherer, tänzelnder Schritt die Folge ist eines brutalen, mitleidslosen Auftretens im vorigen Leben. Jeder Schritt, den das Kind macht, das Ringen nach dieser oder jener Gestaltung des Schrittes, verrät uns, wie diese Gestaltung die Folge eines vorigen Erdenlebens ist. Das Physische lernen wir erkennen als Abbild desjenigen, was in dem Kinde von einem früheren Erdenleben als moralischer Impuls lebt. Es ist das Großartigste, was man sehen kann, das Gehenlernen. Das Hauptmaß des Schicksals drückt sich im Gehenlernen aus. Die Freiheit des Menschen, sagte ich schon gestern, wird dadurch, daß der Mensch mit seinem Schicksal geboren wird, so wenig beeinträchtigt, wie dadurch, ob er blonde oder braune Haare hat.
Im Sprechenlernen drückt sich etwas anderes aus. Es ist das auch ein Zusammenhang mit dem vorirdischen Dasein, aber er ist schwer zu charakterisieren. Weil es schwierig auszudrücken ist, möchte ich Ihnen das in populäre Worte kleiden. Wenn der Mensch durch die Pforte des Todes geht, hat er sein Menschenwesen in einer gewissen Weise moralisch gestaltet. Er hat sein eigenes Wesen immer während des Schlafzustandes gewoben, und was er da gewoben hat, fängt er an, selber zu sehen. Wenn der Mensch durch die Pforte des Todes geschritten ist, gelangt er in der richtigen Weise in die Nähe der Angeloi, Archangeloi, Archai. Aber dazu kommt noch etwas, was der Mensch von der zweiten Gruppe der Hierarchien hat. Diese gießen in den Menschen als ein weiteres, mehr unpersönliches Schicksal dasjenige hinein, was den Menschen in seinem kommenden Leben hineinstellt in eine bestimmte Sprache, einreiht in einen bestimmten Volkszusammenhang. Das persönliche Schicksal hängt damit zusammen, was der Mensch ist im Zusammenhange mit den Archai, die Sprachfähigkeit haben wir von den Archangeloi. Welche Sprache wir aber sprechen, das haben wir von viel höheren Wesen: den Exusiai, Dynamis, Kyriotetes.
Wenn wir auf das Denken, auf das Vorstellen sehen, steht es in einem Zusammenhang, wie ich es gezeigt habe, mit den Angeloi. Diese Wesen können dem Menschen die Gabe des Denkens verleihen. Diese Fähigkeit haben sie aber erst in der Erdenzeit errungen, die hatten sie nicht in der Mondenzeit. Dabei kommt für die Angeloi selbst eine Entwickelung zustande; dadurch kommen sie selbst in die Nähe der Seraphim, Cherubim, Throne. Dadurch haben sie die Fähigkeit errungen, einen unmittelbaren Verkehr mit den Thronen, Cherubim, Seraphim zu haben, und diese verleihen nicht eine Fähigkeit, die nur einer Menschengemeinschaft erteilt wird, sondern die der ganzen Menschheit gegeben wird. Das Denken ist ja etwas, was für die ganze Menschheit gemeinsam ist. Daher die Logik, die über die ganze Welt hin die gleiche ist. Das Gehen, in dem sich das persönliche Schicksal ausprägt, haben wir von den Archai aus deren eigenen Kräften. Die Sprachkräfte hat der Mensch von den Erzengeln, aber diese richten sich dabei nach der zweiten Gruppe der Hierarchien. Von den Angeloi hat der Mensch die Denkfähigkeit, aber diese geben sie ihm unter dem Einfluß der höchsten Hierarchien.
So sind die Dinge verwoben in der Weltenordnung, und man versteht den Menschen nur, wenn man ihn in seiner Verwobenheit mit der Weltenordnung ins Auge fassen kann. So versteht man nicht nur den einzelnen Menschen, sondern das Wesen eines lebenden oder absterbenden Sprachstammes, eines mangelhaften oder vollkommeneren Denkens. Der Mensch steht auf der Erde in einem gewissen Dualismus darin. Er sieht die Wesen abhängig von gewissen Naturgesetzen. Und demgegenüber hat der Mensch ein Bewußtsein seines Zusammenhanges mit der Gottheit. Hier auf dieser Erde gibt es keine Verbindung zwischen physischer und moralischer Weltenordnung. Aber wenn wir zurückschauen in das vorgeburtliche und ins nachtodliche Leben, dann treten wir in eine Welt ein, wo diese beiden Welten in eine einzige verschmolzen sind. Der Mensch kann auch nicht richtig beurteilen, was er selbst ist, wenn er nicht in der Lage ist, sich als geistiges Wesen recht einzusehen. Der Mensch kommt nicht zu einer einheitlichen Weltanschauung, wenn er nicht hinaussieht über Geburt und Tod, wenn er nicht hineinblickt in die höheren Welten. Der Mensch braucht, um sein ganzes, volles Wesen zu verstehen, ein Bewußtsein, das durchsetzt ist von der Erkenntnis seines Zusammenhanges mit der geistigen Welt. - Das sind die Dinge, die ich Ihnen heute in einer mehr esoterischen Weise sagen wollte.
Three Stages of the Awakening of the Human Soul
Today I would like to add some esoteric insights to what I spoke about yesterday in my public lecture. What I would like to share with you today is intended to be a kind of esoteric supplement. When human beings first emerge from what I yesterday called the pre-earthly existence and enter physical earthly existence through the germ life, we see how in this physical existence the spiritual-soul element, which is hidden at the beginning, asserts itself out of the physical body, how the child, as it were, stumbles into the physical earthly world. We see that the child's life in relation to its environment is still a kind of dreaming, that it only gradually awakens. But we find three things that represent the stages of this awakening at particularly prominent points. Some of these three things are observed with that deep joy, that devoted love with which one always observes a child if one is a complete human being. But the full meaning of this threefold nature only becomes clear when one is able to observe the spiritual and soul life in physical existence through spiritual science. This threefold nature is learning to walk, learning to speak, and learning to think. You know at what early age human beings go through this threefold process. This is the logical sequence. We will see in a moment why this logical sequence must be so. It could be different, but this sequence is natural.
Learning to walk is something that points in a very one-sided way to a series of things that the child acquires at the same time. The child enters the world in such a way that it is in a completely different state of equilibrium than the one in which it will later move in the world. At the same time, this is linked to the correct use of the arms, as well as the correct positioning of the human organism in relation to the world, which is the one that corresponds to the human being, and the corresponding ability to move in earthly existence. This is what the child must learn first. From what the human being acquires in terms of mobility from its organism flows what classifies it in terms of its equilibrium in relation to solids, liquids, and gases. In all this lies the foundation, the ground for something else. As the human being carries out all these activities, learning to walk, to balance, to use the arms and fingers, the movements that take place throughout his entire system work their way up into the system that underlies human speech. This tenses the muscles, moves the blood, exerts an influence on the etheric body of the human being, is transmitted to those physical, etheric, astral organs of respiration, continues, and exerts a certain plastic activity on the brain. One might say that it is transmitted to those organs which, through imitation of their surroundings, bring forth speech from within the human being. Language is the transformed movement and transformed equilibrium of the human being. Those who can bring reality to knowledge from the perspective of the spiritual-soul realm see how skill continues to work in the melodious element of language—not the finished skill, but the effort that the child must make to acquire the skill that our hand exercises when grasping. The rhythm of language is expressed in the way the feet are placed, in the movements of walking. It is very significant to observe whether a child learning to walk first steps with the heels, the balls of the feet, or the toes. Language gives rise to what springs forth from the human being as childlike thinking. Walking, speaking, thinking: all this develops from that dull, dreamlike state of consciousness. When a human being is born and cannot yet do this, this power is still present in the child in its last after-effects, just as it is present in pre-earthly existence. Spiritual science can show us how this is present in pre-earthly existence. The first sounds of speech are not those that reflect thinking, but arise from physical well-being or discomfort.
How did walking, speaking, and thinking develop in pre-earthly existence? If you look at the expressions of this thinking as they flow out of the child, viewing it in reverse, it disappears into an indefinite darkness. It only reappears in the last period before earthly birth. There one sees the spiritual-soul being of the human being in spiritual communication with that host of beings which I have described in my “Outline of Secret Science” as angeloi. This interaction can be characterized as follows: thoughts are not thought and expressed abstractly, but a living stream of thoughts flows back and forth from being to being; a living interaction with the angeloi arises. From what has flowed into the human soul as power, something develops that is as if dormant in the embryonic life, but which later emerges as the power of thinking and imagining. And we have this in order to enter into proper communication with other human beings. Think what we would be if we were not thinking beings, what we would be as human beings among one another! Everything we are as human beings in our relationships with one another, we are because we are thinking beings. Here on earth, we communicate with each other as human beings through the thinking that we put into language. This way of communicating through thinking is something we have acquired from our pre-earthly communication with the angels. There, however, we can also communicate with other human beings who are in the pre-earthly existence in the same way as with the angels; this takes the form of a direct language of thought. But above this is communication with the hierarchy of angels, for this not only gives satisfaction to the soul, but also strength that reappears in the thinking that the child acquires in the third stage of its earthly life.
Let us now look at the second stage, language. It is not so much bound to the sensory-nervous system as thinking is. Language is bound to the chest system, the rhythmic system of the human being, to that which lives out in breathing and blood circulation. If we trace back what emerges from the child, imitating the outer world in language, back to pre-earthly existence, we find that human beings have these forces from the interaction they were allowed to cultivate in pre-earthly existence with the second hierarchy, the archangels, the ruling beings of the tribes, who have this task precisely because they have the relationship with human beings that has just been described. These forces, which human beings receive in their contact with the archangels, submerged into the night and only reappear in the forces of earthly speech, through which we communicate with other human beings. What would we be as human beings without language, if we could not pour the etheric essence of thought waves into the coarser air waves that convey speech! The forces that cause our rhythmic system to become the carrier of a denser revelation come from the hierarchy of the archangels. And so we can trace this back to pre-earthly existence. We cannot just say in the abstract that human beings live among spiritual beings, but we can say in very specific terms what gift this or that type of being has given us for our life on earth. We thank these spirit beings, that is, we place ourselves in the right relationship to these beings when we say: I thank the Angeloi for my thinking, I thank the Archangeloi for my speech.
Let us now return to the first thing a child learns: walking, learning to maintain balance. There is more to this than one usually thinks. It is connected with the ego bringing forth a very specific physical process that transforms human beings from crawling creatures into walking beings. It is the ego that raises human beings upright, it is the astral body that influences the sense of language in upright beings, and it is the etheric body that permeates everything with thinking power. But they all work into the physical body. If we look at an animal, whose spine is parallel to the surface of the earth, its actions, its movements, its behavior, everything that comes out of the astral body, is something completely different from that of a human being, who acts as a willing being out of his upright, vertical nature. What are states in humans, taking place in the ego, astral body, and etheric body, are a kind of combustion process in the physical body. This is the point where our physical science, if it wants to perfect itself, will be able to find a connection with anthroposophy.
It must be said that the combustion processes in humans are completely different from those in animals. When the flame of the organic being acts horizontally, it destroys what comes from the conscience; what comes from the moral aspect of the conscience cannot have any effect. The fact that it is permeated by the conscience in humans is based on the fact that the flame of the will in humans stands vertically on the earth. The child places itself in this moral, conscientious impact just as it does in the external physical state of equilibrium. With learning to walk, moral human nature, even the religious essence of human nature, bursts into the human being. These are truly sublime forces that come into play when the child transitions from crawling to walking. These forces, when we trace them back through the darkness of the child's consciousness, lead us to an even higher level of human interaction with the beings we call primal forces, or archai. Everything that a person has experienced in their pre-earthly existence continues to have an effect. If we want to add a third to the prayer-like formula: For my thinking I thank the Angeloi, for my speech I thank the Archangeloi, we must say: For my being placed in earthly existence according to physical and moral forces, I thank the Archai, who have received these from even higher beings.
And now we can answer the question: How is it that human beings, who had a consciousness of light before birth, then bring in a dull consciousness? Yes, what we can summarize under the terms “forces of feeling,” “forces of speech,” and “forces of thinking,” which we have received from the higher hierarchies in order to transform them, sinks into this. We therefore see how that which makes us human, that which makes us human beings among human beings, reveals itself to us in connection with the higher divine-spiritual worlds. During our earthly life, we enter these divine-spiritual worlds in a certain sense again and again. We must say to ourselves that for the actual essence of the human being, the state of sleep, from which dreams emerge, is at least as important as the state of wakefulness. When the human being passes from the waking state into the sleeping state, these three abilities, which the human being has acquired in the manner described, begin to fall silent. Imagination, speech, and action fall silent. We see, however, how, when we fall asleep and thinking falls silent, human beings come closer to the angeloi in the same measure as their thoughts disappear from their consciousness, and how, when the ability to speak ceases, they come closer to the archangeloi beings. To the extent that human beings are completely at rest, they come close to the Archai beings, the primal forces, through the cessation of their activity.
But what is important is that we come close to these three hierarchies in a dignified manner precisely in the state of sleep; that we come close to the Angeloi, Archangeloi, and Archai in a dignified manner. This is the point where we need to speak to people of the present day in particular, for much depends on how our thinking is shaped during waking life, on how we come into the presence of the angeloi. It depends on how we use our speech faculties in a dignified manner whether we come into the presence of the archangeloi in a dignified manner. The way in which he uses his ability to move and his moral sense in the right way determines whether he comes into the presence of the Archai in a dignified manner.
We live in a time when people no longer want to have anything in their thinking that goes beyond the physical world, when they want to be stimulated by the external world. Independent, pure thinking, as I demanded thirty years ago in The Philosophy of Freedom as the basis for moral insight, is unfortunately sought and produced very little in children today. But through such thinking, which Goethe and Schiller would still have called idealistic, human beings break away from the mere waking world of earthly existence and retain something for the state of sleep. We have as much power to approach the Angeloi in sleep as there is idealism in our thinking. And we have as much powerlessness toward the steps we must take toward the angeloi as there is materialism at work in our thinking. This can be observed in the same way as those people who, during sleep, fall prey to Ahrimanic elemental beings, to whom their thinking must then turn because they do not find the forces to come close to the angelic beings through the idealism they develop while awake. It is so beautiful when a child has learned to think so directly in a way that most people can no longer even imagine! The thinking of a child immediately after it has learned to think is full of spirituality. It is wonderful to see how, until the time when they are corroded by materialism, children in their sleep fly toward their angelic beings, how they are connected with angelic beings during sleep. So we can say: in sleep we seek, but only through idealism, through the spiritualization of the world of thoughts, those worlds from which we developed in order to learn thinking here as human beings among human beings.
And if we consider language: the idealism of thoughts has the same meaning for communication with the angeloi as the idealism of attitude has for human communication with the archangeloi during sleep. The person who is able to pour goodwill and kindness into their words when addressing another, which then lives on in the soul of the other, which does not pass by the person but engages with them with the interest one can have for a human being, that attitude which can be described as idealistic benevolence, is what also gives language its euphony. When the astral body and the I have passed into sleep, it gives the astral body and the I, which are also involved in language, the power come close to the archangelic beings, while the antisocial, egoistic attitude is what disperses these forces into the world of the Ahrimanic elemental beings; so that when a person falls asleep and has not used language in an idealistic, correct way, they actually become dehumanized.
The same is true when we use our actions, our deeds, in a way that is humane, but fully conscious that human beings are not only beings who live in the flesh, but that human beings are, in their inner nature, spiritual beings. For out of this consciousness springs respect for other human beings as spiritual beings. From acting out of this understanding, we gain for the state of sleep the power that brings us in the right way into the vicinity of the archai, whereas if we are not able to perform acts that are humane, if we are conscious of ourselves only as physical beings, the corresponding powers are then scattered in the world of the Ahrimanic elemental forces: we alienate ourselves from human nature itself.
Thus, human beings bring three gifts with them from their pre-earthly existence, but they reconnect them in three ways to their original form between falling asleep and waking up when they remain unconscious but repeatedly come into the vicinity of these beings. It is then just as we have to shape our dealings with people here on earth from three sources: the source of thought, the source of speech, and the source of action. Thus, during our sleep life, we stand in a threefold relationship to the spiritual world: to the angels, to the archangels, and to the primal forces.
What we establish here in association with these beings is of decisive importance when we pass through the gate of death. For through spiritual vision we can see how human beings can come closer and closer to the angelic, archangelic, and archai beings. However, it is something that can become very bad for the future of humanity if it surrenders itself completely to the Ahrimanic elemental beings, if the materialism of thinking, speaking, and acting becomes more and more entrenched. But thanks to the spiritual world, human souls today still have, at least for most people, such a legacy of good intentions in their thinking, speaking, and acting that not everything can be corrupted by today's materialism. Very materialistic people do not have much from their present earthly life to bring them closer to the hierarchies, but from their past lives springs forth what will bring them there. But humanity could very easily receive a different reward if it did not gain a spiritual view of life. The idealization of thinking, speaking, and acting gives human beings the opportunity to establish new connections, so to speak, with the three types of divine-spiritual beings, the angeloi, the archangeloi, and the archai, which human beings need for the time between death and a new birth. Otherwise, in a distant future, if he had no connection with the angeloi in this life, he would be born as a being paralyzed in thought; if he had not entered into a connection with the archangeloi, he would be born as a being without language; if he had no connection with the archai, he would be born paralyzed in his limbs and paralyzed in his moral impulses. It is in the hands of humanity on earth to destroy the whole of humanity through the materialism of civilization and culture, or to raise it to a higher level through spiritualization, which I have called the Jupiter existence of the earth being in my “Secret Science.”
Anthroposophy is not a theory. Every word, every thought passes into our entire life of thought, into our entire soul being. We cannot help but think: You are a crippled being if you do not have the right connection with the higher beings. This also gives us a sense of responsibility in our moral existence toward the spiritual world, and from this comes man's proper sense of responsibility toward the physical world. This is the only source of it. If you reflect on what happens to man, how he brings himself closer to the angeloi through idealism in his thoughts, how he brings himself closer to the archai through his words, through what is contained in his speech in terms of idealism, through what is contained in his actions in terms of idealism, how he brings himself closer to the archai through what is contained in his actions in terms of idealism, how he brings himself closer to the archai through what is contained in his actions in terms of idealism, how he brings himself closer to the archai through what is contained in his actions in terms of idealism, how he brings himself closer to the archai through what is contained is contained in his speech, through what is contained in his actions, how he struggles during sleep to ascend to the three hierarchies, then you will also understand what anthroposophical research shows us: that what is man's destiny is woven in this way. We carry all this through the gate of death, and later it becomes conscious. After death, we must shape our thoughts in communication with the Angeloi; with our attitude, we must acquire the ideas for life after death. The way in which we place ourselves in humanity through language gives us the ability, the power, to come together with the Archangeloi. Through the way we use our limbs, we must acquire the possibility of having self-consciousness after death through interaction with the Archai. In this way we live ourselves into it, and in this way that which then forms itself in bright consciousness between death and a new birth is woven.
When we now look at the child in its first years of life, we see the previous earthly life continuing to have an effect. We see not only into the pre-earthly life, but into the previous earthly life, and only then do we acquire the insight into the whole earthly life. We then observe the child as it learns to walk, to use its arms, and we observe whether it walks on the balls of its feet or on its heels. We do not merely observe it as it appears to the physical eye, but we see how certain actions were performed in the past with tenderness, gentleness, and a compassionate heart, how this gives the child firm steps in this life, how an uncertain, dancing step is the result of a brutal, compassionate manner in the previous life. Every step the child takes, the struggle for this or that form of the step, reveals to us how this form is the result of a previous earthly life. We learn to recognize the physical as a reflection of what lives in the child from a previous earthly life as a moral impulse. Learning to walk is the most magnificent thing one can see. The main measure of destiny is expressed in learning to walk. The freedom of the human being, as I said yesterday, is as little impaired by the fact that the human being is born with his destiny as by the fact that he has blond or brown hair.
Something else is expressed in learning to speak. It is also connected with pre-earthly existence, but it is difficult to characterize. Because it is difficult to express, I would like to put it in popular terms. When a person passes through the gate of death, they have shaped their human nature in a certain moral way. They have woven their own being during their sleep, and they begin to see what they have woven. When a person has passed through the gate of death, they come into the right proximity of the Angeloi, Archangeloi, and Archai. But there is something else that humans have from the second group of hierarchies. These pour into humans as a further, more impersonal destiny, which places humans in their future life in a certain language and classifies them in a certain ethnic context. Personal destiny is connected with what humans are in relation to the Archai; we have the ability to speak from the Archangeloi. But the language we speak we have from much higher beings: the exusiai, dynamis, kyriotetes.
When we look at thinking, at imagination, it is connected, as I have shown, with the angeloi. These beings can give humans the gift of thinking. However, they only acquired this ability during the Earth period; they did not have it during the Moon period. In the process, the Angeloi themselves undergo a development; through this they come closer to the Seraphim, Cherubim, and Thrones. Through this they have gained the ability to have direct communication with the Thrones, Cherubim, and Seraphim, and these do not grant an ability that is given only to a human community, but one that is given to all of humanity. Thinking is something that is common to all humanity. Hence, logic is the same throughout the world. We have walking, in which personal destiny is expressed, from the Archai through their own powers. Human beings have their powers of speech from the archangels, but these are directed by the second group of hierarchies. Human beings have their ability to think from the angeloi, but they give it to them under the influence of the highest hierarchies.
This is how things are interwoven in the world order, and one can only understand human beings if one can see them in their interwoven relationship with the world order. In this way, one understands not only the individual human being, but also the essence of a living or dying language tribe, of imperfect or more perfect thinking. Human beings stand on earth in a certain dualism in this respect. They see beings as dependent on certain natural laws. And in contrast, human beings have an awareness of their connection with the deity. Here on earth, there is no connection between the physical and moral world order. But when we look back to pre-birth and post-death life, we enter a world where these two worlds are merged into one. Man cannot properly judge what he himself is if he is not able to see himself correctly as a spiritual being. Human beings cannot arrive at a unified worldview if they do not look beyond birth and death, if they do not look into the higher worlds. In order to understand their whole, complete being, human beings need a consciousness that is permeated by the knowledge of their connection with the spiritual world. These are the things I wanted to tell you today in a more esoteric way.