True and False Paths in Spiritual Investigation
GA 243
20 August 1924, Torquay
9. Abnormal Paths into the Spiritual World and their Transformation
We began these lectures with an enquiry into our normal dream life and from here we moved on to a consideration of further states of consciousness which enable us to enter into worlds other than the one we inhabit between birth and death. Finally we discussed mediumistic consciousness, the consciousness which man experiences in a somnambulistic condition, for the mediumistic state is always of this nature.
Now both kinds of experience, those of the dream and of somnambulism, are conditions of the soul which are also found in their true form in normal life. It is only when they are intensified that they lead into true or false channels.
Today we will examine our dream life once again. We have seen that when man in normal consciousness passes over from the waking state into sleep, he is subject to dreams and that his astral body registers during the latter state an after-vibration of his experiences in the etheric and physical bodies. Then follow the chaotic, indeed extraordinary dream-experiences which only an Initiate can rightly interpret, because the man who does not penetrate more deeply into the nature of the spiritual world is simply bewildered by these normally chaotic experiences.
But we have also seen how, through exercises in meditation and concentration, the weft of dream life can be interwoven with the woof of higher consciousness. We therefore envisage man transplanted into the chaotic and wondrous world of dream; but he remains fully conscious in this dream life which is as real to him as ordinary life. Then he gains insight into another world where he can accompany the dead in their after-death existence. He feels that a world of much greater reality than our present world envelops him. The question now is: what is the real nature of the world he now contacts? I have already spoken about this, but today I would like to touch upon this question from a different angle.
I described how there once lived on Earth illustrious teachers who did not inhabit physical bodies, but only subtle etheric bodies, and were able therefore to incarnate in the ether surrounding the Earth. They instructed men through Inspiration and laid the foundations of the primordial culture on Earth. When we look back into these ancient times with the appropriate condition of consciousness, we find these primeval spiritual teachers sharing the life of mankind. Then they withdrew to the Moon sphere and today are only to be found in this sphere where they have subjected to their purposes all manner of beings who have never lived on Earth. They live amongst these elementary beings and work upon human beings who have passed through the gates of death, instructing them how to acquit themselves in relation to their karma. These are the Beings with whom we are concerned when we first enter the spiritual world. Just as we cannot ignore society and social relationships in our life on Earth, so we must cooperate with these other Beings in order to attain higher knowledge. And it is with the help of these Moon Beings who were once the primeval teachers of humanity on Earth and the beings whom they have taken into their service, that we investigate the spiritual world immediately adjacent to our own. It is there that we find the key to earlier Earth epochs and to the earlier incarnations of human beings. We can then discover personalities who once lived on Earth and with whom we either had, or had not, karmic connections. In order to illustrate this, I pointed out how, by further developing this level of consciousness, we gradually contact earthly beings such as Brunetto Latini, Dante, Alanus ab Insulis and others who are no longer incarnated on Earth today.
This state of consciousness is therefore an illumination, a translucence of the dream state. In ordinary life the dream state represents, so to speak, only the rudimentary beginnings of this state. Now it is very easy to show the difference between the Initiate and the man living at the ordinary level of consciousness.
Under normal conditions of sleep man's physical and etheric bodies are left behind, whilst his astral body and Ego are outside his body. In the dream state experience is solely the province of the Ego. The occurrences experienced in the dream belong, it is true, to the astral body which is still outside the physical and etheric bodies, but in terms of ordinary consciousness only the Ego can experience the dream.
The Initiate, however, experiences with his Ego and especially with his astral body. The difference, therefore, between the Initiate and the ordinary dreamer is that the latter only experiences with his Ego when he is outside his physical and etheric bodies, whilst the Initiate experiences with his astral body as well.
Now this mode of perception was developed to a high degree, especially in the ancient Mysteries, for the purpose of investigating the super-sensible worlds. It was further developed in a decadent form throughout the Middle Ages and later epochs. In modern times it has virtually disappeared. Isolated individuals, either by spiritual means or through tradition, have always received instruction from the ancient teachers in the Mysteries how to remain fully conscious in ordinary dream life. Individuals have at all times been able to penetrate into these worlds, but the attempt is fraught with danger. When the Initiate with Imaginative Knowledge is immersed in the normal dream world, he immediately has the feeling that he is losing touch with the physical world, that he is losing consciousness and sinking into a void. He feels as if solid ground were slipping from under his feet, as if he were no longer subject to the force of gravity. He experiences a feeling of inner release, a feeling that he is being swept away into a cosmic ocean, that he might easily lose control over himself because he is no longer firmly anchored.
The purpose of the spiritual exercises described in my book, >Knowledge of the Higher Worlds, is to obviate this danger. Whoever undertakes these meditations in the right way will find that he develops “wings” of the soul and that, having overcome gravity, he can now take wing. When the Initiate loses the physical and etheric ground beneath his feet and has not yet developed the “wings” of the astral body and Ego, a dangerous situation arises. Though I express myself figuratively you will understand my meaning. The dangers are real enough. If we prepare ourselves assiduously for the world we enter as a result of these exercises, all possibility of danger is excluded. We can gradually participate in these worlds just as we participate in the physical world through our physical and etheric bodies.
This was more or less the condition of man in earliest times. Today we have to achieve this condition through the practice of spiritual exercises. The make-up of primordial man was such that, in contrast to our waking consciousness, he enjoyed a natural condition of spiritual vision such as I have described amongst the Chaldeans and a condition that could not be equated with our dream state, but was a form of Imaginative perception. When confronted by another human being a man perceived not only his physical contours, but had a dreamlike impression of the aura around him. It was the true aura, not merely a subjective illusion. In addition to this gift for perceiving the aura of the physical body, he also possessed another faculty—for both are related to each other—which enabled him to perceive the aura of a spiritual being who is not incarnated in a physical body. And then he dreamed the form of the spiritual being.
Note the difference: if, in ancient times, a man looked at his physical counterpart, he imagined in a true dream the aura around him. If he met with a spiritual being, an Angel or an elementary being, he had, from the first, a spiritual perception of the aura and ‘dreamed’ the form belonging to it.
This is how the earliest painters worked, but we are unaware of it today. These painters saw the spiritual beings and ‘dreamed’ the corresponding forms. They depicted the Beings of the hierarchy of the Angels almost in the likeness of human beings, the Archangels with unsubstantial bodies, but with clearly defined wings and head; and the Archai solely with a winged head because this was the form they ‘dreamed.’ These insights were as natural to men of ancient times as it is natural to us today to see another's physical features. Since man has gradually lost his clairvoyance, he must reacquire it through spiritual training. But as clairvoyance was natural to primitive man, and relatively easy to regain through spiritual training, it has been the subject of extensive investigation over the years. There has always been an active interest in the world ruled by the Moon Beings and the Initiates of the ancient Mysteries, who were the true investigators, have much to say of this world, of their encounter with the dead, of the investigation into the Moon sphere and how the world appears from the perspective of the Moon sphere.
Copernicus established his heliocentric system from the point of view of the terrestrial consciousness only. The old Ptolemaic system is not erroneous; seen from the perspective of the consciousness of the Moon sphere its findings are correct. Now it is a characteristic of these investigators, i.e. the Initiates of the Moon sphere, that their activities are restricted to that sphere.
It is common knowledge to all of you that the present Anthroposophical Society was formerly a part of the Theosophical Society. The Theosophical Society which is similar to many societies of a kindred nature that have been founded in the course of recent years, has accumulated an abundant literature. If you refer to this literature you will find—whether rightly or wrongly is immaterial for the moment—that it describes the world of which I am now speaking, the Moon sphere, the world that we investigate in conjunction with the Moon Beings. When it was proposed that I should work in the Theosophical Society it had important implications for me—although I was faced with certain difficulties at first, for in the Theosophical Society I found investigations and a literature which were limited solely to this Moon sphere. Undoubtedly this material contains much that is incorrect, but much that is highly important and unique, especially in the writings of H. P. Blavatsky. But everything to be found in the writings of H. P. Blavatsky is determined by her association with the Moon sphere and her relationship with Initiates who elected to stay behind in this Moon sphere as an act of sacrifice.
I can assure you that I have come to know many of these Initiates and how such spirits penetrate into the Moon sphere but are indifferent to man's desire to develop further.
When I wrote my book, Occult Science—an Outline, in the years between 1906 and 1909, I described the Earth in its earlier incarnations of Moon, Sun and Saturn. [See Chapter IV: Man and the Evolution of the World.] My description did not end with the Moon incarnation; I traced the Earth incarnation as far back as the Saturn incarnation, whereas all the Initiates who spoke of these matters concluded their account between Moon and Sun; in reality, they traced the Earth incarnation only as far back as to the Moon sphere. Any suggestion that they should look back to still earlier incarnations of the Earth was met with indifference, sometimes even with a sense of disquiet. They declared this to be impossible, for the path was blocked by an insuperable barrier. It was of course, most important and not without interest to understand the reason for this. It soon became apparent on closer acquaintance that these Initiates had an aversion, an antipathy to the modern scientific outlook. When these Initiates were introduced to the ideas of Darwin, Haeckel and their followers they became most indignant and regarded them as childish and stupid and refused to have any truck with them. They were less antipathetic to the ideas of Goethe at first, but ultimately they found that he too spoke the language of the modern scientist and then they dismissed the whole affair.
In short, one could not appeal to the Initiates with such ideas. And it was in the years 1906 to 1909 when I first steeped myself in modern scientific ideas in order to impregnate them with Imaginations that I found it possible to penetrate to the Sun and Saturn spheres. I did not use these scientific concepts as a method of cognition after the fashion of Haeckel or Huxley, but as an inner motivation in order to overcome the limitations to which the Initiates were subject at a time when the modern scientific outlook did not yet exist and when therefore one could achieve higher consciousness only by impregnating the dream-world with Imaginations. In writing my Occult Science I attempted to imbue with inner meaning the fully conscious scientific outlook of Huxley and others which normally is only associated with the external world, and to impregnate the Imaginative world with it. Then it was possible to understand this whole sequence of Saturn, Sun and Moon and to investigate on Earth the old Initiate-knowledge.
I am describing this path to knowledge in order that you may understand how these things arise. You may perhaps say that this is a personal interpretation. But in this case the personal element is, in fact, wholly objective. The criticism directed against my book Occult Science is that it is written like a mathematical text-book, that I sought to avoid subjective interpretation and that I described with mathematical detachment the whole path of development I have been discussing. None the less this path is precisely as I have described it. Its origin lay in the circumstance that the modality of thought which has existed since the time of Copernicus and Galileo and which was enriched by Goethe was combined with the same disposition of soul that is normally present in Imagination. Thus it was possible to trace back this sphere that had always been accessible to the Initiates, to its origin in Saturn.
From this example you will appreciate perhaps how important it is to approach these matters not in a vague, haphazard fashion, but with clear and conscious deliberation, to introduce a note of caution where thoughtlessness so easily takes over. Under normal conditions the dream life is in contact with the Ego only, but here we have an example where it contacts the astral body also.
To the question: what is the difference between modern natural science and the information I have given in Occult Science? I would reply: the modern scientist can only appeal to the Ego and begins to dream the moment he surrenders his Ego, whilst I was able to take over into the dream life the concepts of natural science, to direct the astral body into the worlds I had to describe.
This is a path which can be described to you exactly and will serve as an example to indicate perhaps more precisely how the true paths differ from the false.
The condition diametrically opposed to the dream state is that of somnambulism and mediumism. The dreamer lives wholly in his Ego and astral body. Even though he has no conscious perceptions in the astral body, he nevertheless lives within it. He lives wholly in his Ego and astral body outside his physical and etheric bodies. He is thrust down into, immersed in his own being, and his own being is then affiliated to other worlds. Thus the dreamer is submerged, so to speak, in his own being and hence is immersed in the Cosmos and, to a certain extent also in his physical organism.
The precise opposite is the case with the medium and somnambulist. Man is only in a mediumistic or somnambulistic condition when his Ego and astral body are outside his physical and etheric bodies; but in this case, as I have pointed out, his Ego and astral body are possessed by an alien being.
Thus we have the medium or somnambulist with his physical being, but the Ego and astral body are outside the physical and etheric bodies. The Ego and astral body are suppressed, for another being takes them over. Consequently the medium cannot influence the physical and etheric bodies in the right way. Even when we are in dreamless sleep, for instance, we exert an effect upon the physical and etheric bodies. In waking life we permeate our physical and etheric bodies from within; in sleep we protect them from incursions from without.
This no longer applies to the somnambulist. The medium or somnambulist has no control over his physical and etheric bodies; they are, so to speak, deserted territory.
When a man is endowed with the constitution of soul that is normal for our time, it is the forces of the plants and minerals alone that have an influence upon his physical and etheric bodies. If the forces of the minerals, i.e. of the mineral Earth, did not influence our physical body, we should be unable to walk or move around, because we are dependent upon these forces. It is permissible to share the world of the mineral forces; that is the normal condition, but they must not enter into the etheric body.
The same applies to the plants. It is permissible for the forces of the plants still to work to a certain extent upon the etheric body, although not too strongly. But the forces that stimulate sensation in the animal and the forces of another human being should no longer be permitted to influence the physical body of man, and especially his etheric body. Because the physical and etheric bodies of the medium or somnambulist are deserted, the animal and terrestrial human forces work upon the medium or somnambulist. The physical and etheric bodies become influenced by suggestion. Just as thought passes from the dream into the environment, so in this case the will is detached from the human being and merges into the environment. We can suggest to the medium or somnambulist that he should stand up and walk; if we offer him a potato we can suggest that it is a tasty pear and so on. As human beings when we suggestionize the medium or somnambulist we make direct contact with the physical body, and hence with the etheric body. The medium and somnambulist bear within them in their etheric body their physical environment which should be reflected only in the physical body, as is the case with normal man. Normal man therefore surrenders himself in a dreamlike state to his inner spiritual world, the medium to the external world of nature.
Now mediumism or somnambulism is a normal condition in so far as the condition itself is normal. For the ability to move about, to seize hold of objects, to be able to perform any kind of external action is a magico-somnambulistic achievement on the part of everyone. But this activity must be limited to the physical body; it must not find its way into the etheric body, otherwise the normal passes over into the abnormal.
And so the dreamer lives entirely within his own being; the medium or somnambulist is outside his being. The physical and etheric bodies of the medium or somnambulist function somewhat after the fashion of automata and we can work upon them because his own Ego and astral body fail to provide for them. Consequently, just as in the dreamer an inner spiritual world is created, so in the medium or somnambulist there comes into being a union with the external world of nature, with the world of form and its origin, with all that is perceptible and all that is related to space and time.
When we sink down into the world of dream, we are immersed in the formless, in that which is in a state of constant transformation. When we penetrate with our physical and etheric bodies into the world where the somnambulist or medium is exercising his will under the influence of suggestion, everything is sharply defined; all that supervenes as the result of external influence is carried out with extraordinary precision.
This world is the exact antithesis of the normal world of dream; in the somnambulist it is a dream activity, a natural creation externalized. It is dreaming in action, activity in a dreamlike state, in place of dreaming in inner experience only.
From the standpoint of Initiation this antithesis is most interesting and significant. When the Initiate sinks down into the world of dreams in order to permeate it with Imaginations he meets with difficulties. I have already spoken of this. He feels that he is no longer subject to gravity, that he no longer has firm ground beneath his feet. When the Initiate enters into this world he must gain access to it consciously, whilst the somnambulist finds his way into it unconsciously—he feels that he may at any moment lose consciousness. He is always faced with this possibility, and he must take himself firmly in hand so that he maintains full consciousness. If, as Initiates, we penetrate more deeply into this world, we must proceed here as sensibly and intelligently as normal beings in the visible and tangible world. The Initiate must not betray the fact that, whilst he is living a normal life, he is at the same time living with full consciousness in a spiritual world. For were he to imagine for a single moment that he was detached from the physical world, he would begin to give himself airs and his fellow men would think him rather odd. And they would say: what madman is this! This may happen if he does not keep a tight hold on himself in order to preserve full consciousness as he passes through the spiritual world which is omnipresent just as the sensible world is omnipresent.
This opens up a sphere that has not been dealt with by the Theosophical Society, but which the “big guns” among the natural scientists have seized upon, namely, the sphere of psychical research. These researches are carried out by men with a scientific background and of limited potentialities who undertake statistical surveys and who experiment with mediums in order to ascertain the nature of the spiritual world. In all kinds of societies, and from different points of view, attempts are now being made to investigate objectively what processes are involved when a man moves his limbs or reacts, not with his normal consciousness, but with a diminished or totally obliterated consciousness, at a time when other beings have taken possession of his soul. The reactions of those whose consciousness has been damped down in this way are thus recorded.
The suggestion has even been made by enthusiasts for this kind of investigation that I, together with the fruits of my investigations, should put myself at their disposal in their laboratories in order that they may be able to investigate objectively the phenomena of the inner world. This is about as sensible as if someone were to come along and say: I understand nothing about mathematics so I cannot say whether the statements of mathematicians are true or false. The best thing for him to do would be to come to me in my psychical laboratory and I will make experiments with him to show whether he is a great mathematician or not.—That is approximately the situation. I am here speaking of a field of investigation at the present time in which no real attempt is being made to penetrate to the inner being of man, but simply to investigate somnambulism and mediumism from outside by methods that are a caricature of the scientific method. For if people really penetrated to the inner being of man they would realize that in mediumism and somnambulism they are faced by the external vehicle, an automaton consisting of physical and etheric bodies; that they are not investigating the spiritual reality, but that what they wish to investigate has deserted the external vehicle. They simply refuse to look into the more subtle aspects of the spiritual world. They often want to perceive the spiritual, not only through inner experience, but also in visible and tangible form.
This approach sometimes assumes other forms as, for example, in the Theosophical Society, at the very time when I had already described this path. They were looking for the spiritual figure of Christ in a physical body. They wanted to find a direct manifestation of the spiritual in the external world.
We must accept the physical world as it is and seek the spiritual where it really exists—in the physical world of course, but essentially in the spiritual spheres that permeate the physical world.
Here lies yet another region. Man in a healthy state feels impelled to bridge the gap between the region of inner experience and external perception, between the chaotic world of the dreamer and the abnormal world of the medium and somnambulist. Art is born of the union of these two worlds and their mutual fructification. For in art the external form is imbued with spirit and the spiritual content is clothed in external form.
Whilst the Theosophical Society was busy proclaiming an ordinary human being to be a spiritual entity, we in the Anthroposophical Society were impelled to direct the occult stream into art. The Mystery Plays and Eurythmy were born, and the art of Speech Formation was developed. [See list of literature] These and similar developments in the Anthroposophical Society were the fruits of the impulse to bridge the gap between the spiritual and the physical, so that consciousness bridges the chaotic world of dream and the chaotic world of the medium or somnambulist. In art these two worlds are consciously merged.
Some day this will be understood. People will understand the purpose of our endeavours when Speech Formation, as practised by Frau Marie Steiner, shall be restored to the level it once enjoyed when men were still instinctively spiritual. For them rhythm and measure in speech were more important than empty, abstract diction. These must be revived again. And Eurythmy restores to us again man unfolding before us through movement, man as he really is as a being of soul and spirit. This is what we learn from Eurythmy.
In art, therefore, we have had first of all to build a bridge from the world in which the dreamer wanders aimlessly to the world in which the medium or somnambulist blindly stumbles around. In our present materialistic age the dreamer is left to his solitary reflections and knows nothing of configurations and material forms which express and reveal the spiritual. And the somnambulist lives his life caring little whether he enjoys a medium's fame or whether he invents theories of an ideal State like the Bolshevists and, like the medium, projects all kinds of manifestations into the world around. Both dreamer and somnambulist share the life of the contemporary world without the slightest suspicion of the existence of the spiritual.
It is essential to find once again the bridge leading from the spirit into matter and from matter to the spirit. In the sphere of art we must first build this bridge so that we no longer stumble and drift along in a semi-conscious state, but develop a sense for art through spiritual movements which are not of the normal kind. Thus Eurythmy has its true, inner source in an impulse arising out of Initiation and all that we practise in the art of Speech Formation stems from the same source. And when the forthcoming Course on Dramatic Art1Speech and Drama, 19 lectures, Dornach, 5th to 23rd September, 1924. is held at Dornach we shall try to restore once again the spiritual image of dramatic art. For a long time attention has been focussed on how to present the actor on the stage with a maximum of realism. In the nineties discussions on this subject were simply comic. The question was discussed—and naturalism finally won the day—whether Schiller's characters should declaim their heroic lines with their hands in their trouser pockets because that was the contemporary fashion. There is every reason therefore for finding the right way to explore the spiritual world. It is a sound principle to follow the path of art.
It is most important to transcend the ancient Initiation-Science that was steeped in the Moon mysteries and everything pertaining to them and to develop that inner condition of soul that can only be reached when the achievements of natural science—I am referring in this context to the intellectual conquests of natural science—can be used to fructify the occult knowledge of the Initiate. On the other hand, it is equally important to make a special field of research the confused, dilettante experiments which are undertaken in order to ascertain what takes place in the ectoplasmic forms when, in trance condition, the somnambulist or medium is possessed by elementary beings. For these two paths are really one and the same, namely, the emergence from within the dream into conscious dreaming and the conscious apprehension of the external world which natural science knows only in its mineral properties—these, so-called psychical research proposes to explore in its dilettante fashion. Since we live in a scientific age it is important to pursue this path of spiritual investigation and also to explore spiritually that other realm which is the polar opposite of the world of dreams.
The somnambulist or medium produces phenomena to which we are not accustomed in ordinary life. His handwriting, movements, speech and sense of taste are not those of the normal man because his astral body and Ego are outside the physical and etheric bodies and we are dealing with a physical and etheric body which are deserted and are given up to the influence of the Cosmos. We are confronted with physical and etheric manifestations which do not reflect the normal workings of nature, but which proceed from the spiritual world. For after all it is immaterial whether we suggestionize the medium or whether the medium is subject to some stellar, climatic or metallic influence which he assimilates into his etheric body.
We must bear in mind that the vehicles of the medium are at the service of the spiritual for magical ends. We cannot study these manifestations without knowledge of the spiritual as the Society for Psychical Research would like to do by means of external experiments. We must look into their spiritual relationship. We must observe the phenomena produced by the medium or somnambulist and the spiritual basis behind them.
All these phenomena manifested through the medium or somnambulist are associated with other mediumistic phenomena. When in trance condition a medium performs some act under human or cosmic influence, i.e. when a physical and etheric body perform some act, then this is temporarily the same as the process which takes place, though determined by other factors, in the poisonous plants which are the source of disease in man. It is only the external, transient mask of disease that is revealed in the mediumistic, somnambulistic state. From a certain point of view—and we shall have to discuss this in greater detail in the course of the next lectures—we can see in the phenomena of mediumism and somnambulism (there is no necessity to do so, but it is always possible) what is happening in the person who is ill, because his Ego and astral body have withdrawn in some abnormal way from an organ, or from the whole organism, and have been replaced by other spiritual influences.
Since men were aware of this relationship in ancient times the Mysteries were always associated with medicine. And because people were not so inquisitive as today, they never felt the need to be interested in mediums and somnambulists, for they were familiar with their activities just as they were familiar with the conditions of disease. They approached these matters more from the medical point of view. It is a standpoint that we must acquire once again.
And the other path which approaches the spiritual through natural phenomena, through natural science, in dilettante fashion must be pursued in the right way. All phenomena and particularly everything that is expressed through the pathological states of men and animals must be reviewed again in the right perspective. Only then shall we be in a position to investigate the phenomena which the Society for Psychical Research would like to explore.
And this field of investigation has now been opened up by the Anthroposophical Society. We have been able to study pathological phenomena in such a way that through them the door to the spiritual world has been opened. This has become possible because Dr. Ita Wegman and I endeavoured to develop along the right lines this field of investigation that had been ignored by psychical research; and also because Ita Wegman possesses not only the knowledge of a qualified doctor, but also those intuitive therapeutic gifts which lead directly from observation of the clinical picture to spiritual insight and thence to genuine therapy.
Here, then, lies the path that must be followed in order to explore the region that I have indicated. Through our efforts we hope to develop a genuine Initiation-medicine, which itself is an Initiation-natural science. Thus the true path, in contradistinction to the many false paths, will be demonstrated to all. And the first volume of the book written by Dr. Wegman and myself will indicate the steps that must be undertaken. [See list of literature]
In this connection it would be well to point out perhaps that the differences between the true and false paths can best be illustrated by examples.
I said previously that a path to art must be found that will link once again the sphere of the spiritual with the sphere of natural science. I must now add that it appears to inhere in the conditions of modern civilization that we shall only find the right path to art when we have first explored the right path in relation to the investigation of natural phenomena, the path of spiritual science. For in the sphere of art today mankind is so far removed from building the bridge of which I have spoken that it can only be persuaded of the active permeation of art by the spirit when it can be finally convinced of the activity of the spiritual that can be seen especially in the genesis of the pathological; when there is clear evidence of how the spirit operates and reveals itself in matter. When mankind becomes aware of the activity of the spiritual in the kingdom of nature, then it may perhaps be possible to arouse sufficient wholehearted enthusiasm for the idea that the spiritual can be presented directly to the world in the form of works of art.
I will speak further on these matters tomorrow.

Abnorme Wege in die geistige Welt und deren Umwandlung
Die Benutzung naturwissenschaftlicher Vorstellungen für den Erkenntnisweg
Sie haben gesehen, wie in diesen Betrachtungen von der Erforschung eines Zustandes im gewöhnlichen heutigen Leben, von der Erforschung des Traumlebens ausgegangen worden ist, wie dann vorgedrungen werden konnte von da aus zu der Auseinandersetzung über andere Bewußtseinszustände in der menschlichen Seele, die fähig sind, in andere Welten einzudringen, als die ist, die wir zwischen Geburt und Tod durchleben. Sie haben gesehen, daß wir bei dem medialen Bewußtsein gelandet sind, bei demjenigen Bewußtsein, das den Menschen, ich kann auch sagen, in einen somnambulen Zustand führt, denn der mediale Zustand ist immer ein somnambuler. Nun, beide Erlebnisarten, das Traumerleben und das somnambvule Erleben, sind ja innere Zustände der Seele, die in ihrer richtigen Art auch im normalen Leben durchaus vorhanden sind und die nur, wenn sie verstärkt werden, entweder ins richtige oder ins falsche Fahrwasser führen.
Betrachten wir heute das Traumleben noch einmal. Wir haben gesehen, daß der Mensch des gewöhnlichen Bewußtseins Träume erlebt, wenn er aus dem Wachzustand in den Schlafzustand hinüberrückt, und in seinem astralischen Leibe dasjenige nachzittert, was er durchmacht in seinem Ätherleibe und in seinem physischen Leibe während des Wachzustandes. Da kommen dann die chaotischen, zwar wunderbaren Traumerlebnisse, deren Deutung aber dennoch nur richtig dem Initiaten möglich ist, weil sie in ihrem gewöhnlichen chaotischen Zustande den, der nicht tiefer in das Wesen der geistigen Welt eindringt, konfus machen. Aber wir haben auch gesehen, wie durch meditative und konzentrative Übungen dieses Gespinst des Traumlebens von einem wirklichen höheren Bewußtsein durchwoben wird. Sie müssen sich also vorstellen den Menschen, versetzt in die wunderbare chaotische Welt der Träume, aber dieses Traumleben durchströmt von Bewußtheit, so daß man so besonnen ist darüber und auch so in der Realität darinnen ist, wie man es im gewöhnlichen Leben ist. Dann schaut man in eine andere Welt, eben in die Welt, die ich Ihnen angeführt habe, wo man die Toten noch nach ihrem Tode begleiten kann. Und man fühlt sich wie auseinandergebreitet in einer viel realeren Welt als in derjenigen, in der man gegenwärtig ist. Nun ist die Frage diese: In welche Welt kommt man eigentlich? Auch darüber habe ich schon gesprochen; ich will jetzt nur von einem anderen Gesichtspunkte die Sache noch einmal berühren.
Mit den Menschen der Erde lebten einmal, so sagte ich, große Menschheitslehrer, welche nicht in physischen Körpern, sondern nur in feinen ätherischen Körpern waren, die allerdings in Luft sich verkörpern konnten, welche auf dem Wege der Inspiration die Menschen unterrichteten und die Urkultur auf der Erde begründeten. Mit dem entsprechenden Bewußtseinszustande zurückgeschaut in alte Zeiten, findet man diese großen geistigen Urlehrer der Menschheit unter Menschen wandeln. Diese großen Menschheitslehrer haben sich zurückgezogen nach dem Monde, sind heute nur in der Mondensphäre zu finden, haben sich dort allerlei Wesen, die niemals auf die Erde gekommen sind, dienstbar gemacht, leben unter solchen Elementarwesenheiten, und sie wirken namentlich dann, wenn der Mensch durch die Pforte des Todes gegangen ist, auf den Menschen, ihm begreiflich machend, wie er sich seinem Karma gemäß zu verhalten hat. Mit diesen Wesen hat man es ja auch zu tun, wenn man zunächst in die geistige Welt eindringen will. So wie man das Erdenleben nur mit Menschen, in Gesellschaft, in sozialem Zusammensein mit Menschen vollziehen kann, so kann man ja auch das Leben in höherer Erkenntnis nur mit anderen Wesen zusammen vollziehen. Und mit diesen Wesen, mit diesen Mondenwesen, die, ich möchte sagen aus Erdenwesen, aus diesen Urlehrern der Menschheit geworden sind, und mit denjenigen Wesenheiten zusammen, welche sie sich dienstbar gemacht haben, erforscht man die zunächst an die unsrige Welt anstoßende Geisteswelt.
Man findet dann in dieser Welt auch immer die Anhaltspunkte dafür, frühere Inkarnationen von Menschen kennenzulernen, zurückzugehen in frühere Erdenzeiten, um Persönlichkeiten aufzufinden, die früher gelebt haben, mit denen man entweder karmisch verbunden war oder auch nicht. Ich habe Ihnen als Beispiel dafür angeführt, wie man so allmählich in Zusammenhang kommt mit solchen Erdenwesen, die heute nicht auf der Erde verkörpert sind, Brunetto Latini, Dante, Alanus ab Insulis und anderen Persönlichkeiten, dadurch, daß man in diesem Bewußtseinszustande weiter vorgeht. Dieser Bewußtseinszustand ist also eine Erhellung, eine Durchleuchtung des Traumzustandes. Der Traumzustand ist sozusagen das Rudiment des gewöhnlichen Lebens für diesen Zustand. Was ist nun der Unterschied zwischen dem Menschen in dem gewöhnlichen Bewußtsein und dem Initiaten? Diesen Unterschied können Sie sich sehr leicht klarmachen.
Wenn der Mensch gewöhnlich schläft, so hat er seinen physischen Leib und seinen Ätherleib im Bette; er ist mit seinem astralischen Leib und mit seinem Ich außer dem physischen und dem Ätherleib. Im Traum erlebt nun nur das Ich. Zwar sind die Vorgänge, die im Traum erlebt werden, im astralischen Leibe, der noch außerhalb des physischen und des Ätherleibes ist; aber erleben kann für das gewöhnliche Bewußtsein im Traume nur das Ich. Beim Initiaten erlebt das Ich und vor allen Dingen der astralische Leib. So daß also der Unterschied zwischen dem gewöhnlichen Träumer und dem Initiaten der ist, daß der gewöhnliche Träumer, wenn er außerhalb seines physischen und seines Ätherleibes ist, nur mit seinem Ich erlebt; der Initiat erlebt auch mit dem Astralleib.
Nun, diese Art wahrzunehmen, sie ist vor allen Dingen schon in den alten Mysterien zur Erforschung der übersinnlichen Welten stark ausgebildet worden. Sie ist dann rudimentär, dekadent weitergebildet worden durch das Mittelalter und die neuere Zeit, bis sie sich in der allerneuesten Zeit mehr oder weniger verloren hat. Einzelne Menschen haben immer dadurch, daß sie auf irgendeine Weise, sei es auf geistige Weise, sei es durch Tradition, von den alten Lehrern in den Mysterien Kunde erhalten haben, wie man das gewöhnliche Traumleben durchleuchtet mit Bewußtsein, einzelne Menschen haben immer eine Möglichkeit gehabt, in die Welten einzudringen, in die man eben auf diese Weise eindringen kann. Es ist immer eine Gefahr vorhanden für den Menschen, wenn er in diese Welten eindringen will. Denn in diesen Welten hat der Initiat zum Beispiel sofort das Gefühl, wenn er mit der imaginativen Erkenntnis da untertaucht in das, was sonst durch die Träume ausgefüllt ist, daß er die Welt verliert, daß er mit seinem Bewußtsein sozusagen ins Leere sich verliert. Er hat immer das Gefühl, fester Boden geht im fort, Gewicht, Schwere geht ihm fort. Er fühlt, wie er innerlich leicht wird, wie er ohne seinen Willen hinausgetragen wird in geistige Weltenfernen, wie er leicht die Beherrschung über sich verlieren kann, weil alle Schwere, alles Gewicht verlorengeht.
Damit das nicht der Fall ist, dazu sind eben die Übungen da, die in meinem Buche «Wie erlangt man Erkenntnisse der höheren Welten?» beschrieben sind. Wer sich diesen Übungen in der richtigen Weise hingibt, wird finden, daß er ein seelisch beflügeltes Wesen wird, das sich dann, wenn die Schwere, das Gewicht aufhört, gewissermaßen seelischer Flügel bedienen kann. Das ist aber eben gerade der bedenkliche Zustand, wenn man als Initiat sozusagen seine Füße verliert und noch nicht die Flügel hat, wenn man die physischen Füße und die ätherischen Füße verliert und noch nicht die astralischen und Ich-Flügel hat. Sie verstehen, wenn ich das bildlich ausdrücke, was damit gemeint ist. Aber es ist so. Bei sorgfältigem Hineinwachsen in die Welt, die man da betritt durch die Übungen, ist natürlich jede Gefahr beseitigt, kann keine Gefahr eintreten. Der Mensch kann allmählich in diese Welt hineinwachsen, wie er durch seinen physischen und Ätherleib in die gewöhnliche physische Welt hineinwächst.
Dies ist aber zugleich ein Zustand, in dem die Urmenschheit mehr oder weniger durch natürliche Verhältnisse war. Wir müssen diesen Zustand durch Übungen erreichen. Die Urmenschheit brauchte das nicht. Die Urmenschheit hatte natürliche Anlagen, wodurch immer ein Zustand vorhanden war, der nicht unser Wachen darstellt, sondern ein geistiges Schauen, wie ich es bei den Chaldäern beschrieben habe, und ein Zustand, der auch nicht unser Träumen darstellt, sondern ein Wahrnehmen im Imaginieren ist. Ein Mensch begegnete dem anderen. Er sah ihn nicht bloß in bezug auf seine leiblichen Konturen, sondern er träumte um ihn herum die Aura. Aber das war die wirkliche Aura, nicht eine bloß subjektiv erträumte.
Dann wiederum, wenn er diese Gabe hatte, an einem Erdenmenschen, der im physischen Leibe ist, die Aura zu schauen, dann hatte er auch die andere Fähigkeit - denn beide sind miteinander verbunden -, nun die Aura eines geistigen Wesens zu schauen, das nicht im physiischen Leibe verkörpert ist. Und dann träumte er die Gestalt dieses geistigen Wesens. Merken Sie den Unterschied: Begegnete man in alten Zeiten einem Menschen, einem Erdenmenschen, so sah man den Erdenmenschen und imaginierte um ihn herum in einem realen Traum die Aura. Begegnete man einem Geistwesen, einem Engel- oder Elementarwesen, so sah man von vornherein die Aura geistig und träumte dazu die Gestalt.
So haben die Urmaler auch gemalt. Nur weiß man das noch nicht. Die Urmaler sahen die geistigen Wesenheiten, träumten dazu die Gestalten, malten ziemlich menschenähnlich noch die Wesen aus der Hierarchie der Angeloi, malten mit verschwimmendem Leibe, aber mit deutlichen Flügeln und noch mit Haupt die Archangeloi, und nur das Haupt, das geflügelte Haupt malten sie, weil sie es träumten, bei den Archai. Alle diese Dinge waren sozusagen dem alten Menschen, dem Urmenschen ganz natürlich, wie es uns heute natürlich ist, daß wir beim anderen die Nase und die Augen sehen. Heute müssen sie, weil sie allmählich in der Menschheit verlorengegangen sind, durch Übungen wiederum errungen werden. Aber es hat daher, weil das der Urmenschheit eigen war, und weil es verhältnismäßig leicht durch Übungen immer wieder zu erringen war, dieses Gebiet viel Forschung im Laufe der Zeit gefunden. Man hat die Welt, welche sozusagen von den Mondenwesenheiten regiert wird, immer mit einem großen Eifer durchforscht, und die Initiaten der alten Mysterien, die auf diesem Gebiete die richtigen Forscher waren, sprechen viel gerade von dieser Welt, von ihren Begegnungen mit Toten nach dem Tode, von ihrer Erforschung der Mondensphäre. Und dann geben sie Perspektiven, wie von der Mondensphäre aus die Welt sich ausnimmt.
Kopernikus hat ja eben nur von der Erdensphäre aus sein kopernikanisches System begründet. Das alte ptolemäische System ist nicht falsch, sondern es ist nur von der Mondensphäre aus gesehen, und da ist es richtig. Nun ist ein Eigentümliches bei diesen Forschern, was man immer findet. Das ist, daß sie nicht weitergehen als bis zu dieser Mondensphäre.
Sehen Sie, es ist ja Ihnen wohl allen bekannt, daß dasjenige, was man Anthroposophische Gesellschaft nennt, zuerst drinnengestanden hat in der Theosophischen Gesellschaft. Die Theosophische Gesellschaft, die eine ähnliche Gesellschaft ist, wie es im Laufe der Zeiten viele gegeben hat von der Art, sie hat eine reiche Literatur. Wenn Sie diese Literatur nachlesen, meine verehrten Anwesenden, dann werden Sie finden, daß — richtig oder unrichtig, darauf kommt es jetzt nicht an die Welt beschrieben ist, von der ich eben spreche, die Welt, die man mit den Mondenwesenheiten durchforscht, die Welt der Mondensphäre. Und es hatte da für mich etwas Bedeutsames, möchte ich sagen, etwas, womit zunächst Störungen verbunden waren, als ich den Antrag bekam, in der Theosophischen Gesellschaft zu wirken. Es bestand darinnen, daß ich bei all denen, die in der Theosophischen Gesellschaft standen, eigentlich nur Forschungen und eine Literatur vorfand, die sich auf diese Mondensphäre bezog. Da ist gewiß vieles Unrichtige, aber es ist auch vieles außerordentlich Bedeutsame, Großartige, Gewaltige, namentlich in den Schriften der Blavatsky. Aber alles, was in den Schriften der Blavatsky sich vorfindet, ist so, wie es ist, aus dem Grunde, weil sie eben in der Sphäre drinnen stand, die ich soeben beschrieben habe, und weil sie ihren Zusammenhang hatte mit Initiaten, die sich bescheiden in dieser Mondensphäre hielten. Nun, ich kann ja sagen, ich habe manchen solchen Initiaten kennengelernt, kennengelernt, wie solche Geister vordringen in die Mondensphäre, und wie sie uninteressiert werden, wenn man weiterkommen will.
Wenn ich also - es ist das ja in den Jahren 1906 bis 1909 geschehen in meinem Buche «Geheimwissenschaft im Umriß» beschrieben habe die Erde in ihrer früheren Inkorporation Mond, in ihrer früheren Inkorporation Sonne, in ihrer früheren Inkorporation Saturn, so finden Sie, daß ich da nicht bei der Mondeninkorporation Halt gemacht habe, sondern weitergegangen bin, zurück bis zum Saturn; wogegen alle die Initiaten, die von diesen Dingen sprachen, Halt machten zwischen Mond und Sonne, eigentlich nur zurückgingen bis zur Mondensphäre. Sie wurden uninteressiert, sogar zuweilen unruhig, wenn man an sie die Zumutung stellte, da weiter zurückzudringen. Das kann man nicht, sagten sie, da kommt man an eine Grenze, wo ein Schleier ist, über den man nicht hinauskommt.
Es war natürlich außerordentlich wichtig und auch interessant, zu sehen, woran das liegt. Sehen Sie, das liegt daran, daß solche Initiaten — wenn man sie gut kennenlernte, bemerkte man das bald — einen Widerwillen hatten, eine Antipathie hatten gegen das Kennenlernen derjenigen Vorstellungsformen, welche sich auf die neuere Naturwissenschaft beziehen. Man konnte sogar die Erfahrung machen, wenn man Vorstellungen, wie sie im Darwinismus, Haeckelismus und so weiter leben, an diese Initiaten heranbrachte, daß sie ganz unwillig wurden, das als kindisch, als tölpelhaft von dem modernen Menschen betrachteten, und sich nicht damit befassen wollten. Brachte man Goethesche Vorstellungen an sie heran, dann waren sie anfangs nicht so unwillig, aber sie fanden doch, der drückt sich auch so aus, wie sich ein Naturforscher der neueren Zeit ausdrückt. Und dann schmissen sie die Sache auch weg.
Kurz, man kam mit diesen Vorstellungen an diese Initiaten gar nicht heran. Und erst als ich in diesen Jahren 1906 bis 1909 einfach die modernen naturwissenschaftlichen Vorstellungen der Seele imprägnierte, um sie in die Region zu bringen, wo sonst die Imaginationen sitzen, war es mir möglich, vorzudringen bis Sonne und Saturn. Ich benutzte also diese naturwissenschaftlichen Vorstellungen nicht, um mit ihnen so zu erkennen, wie Haeckel oder Huxley erkannten, sondern ich benutzte sie als innerliche Aktivität, um über diese Begrenzung hinauszukommen, der die Initiaten in der Zeit unterlagen, als eine neuere naturwissenschaftliche Denkungsart noch nicht vorhanden war, und man daher nur innerlich durch Imprägnieren der Traumwelt mit Imaginationen in das höhere Bewußtsein hineinkam. Es ist also hier zur Abfassung meiner «Geheimwissenschaft» der Versuch gemacht worden, die ganz bewußte Vorstellungswelt, die sich sonst nur auf äußerliche Naturgegenstände bezieht, innerlich zu nehmen und damit die imaginative Welt zu imprägnieren. Da ergab sich dann die Möglichkeit, in diese ganze Kette: Saturn, Sonne, Mond einzudringen. Da kam man dann darauf, dasjenige auf Erden zu erforschen, was auch die alten Initiaten hatten.
Ich erzähle diesen Erkenntnisweg aus dem Grunde, damit Sie sehen, wie solche Dinge verlaufen. Sie können sagen: Das ist etwas Persönliches. — Aber in diesem Falle ist das Persönliche ja wirklich ganz objektiv. Und wenn man etwas getadelt hat an meiner «Geheimwissenschaft», so ist es das, daß sie wie ein mathematisches Lehrbuch geschrieben ist, daß ich nichts Subjektives versuchte hineinzubringen, sondern diesen ganzen Gang, wie ich ihn jetzt erzählte, mit einer mathematischen Kühle geschrieben habe. Aber er ist so. Er ist dadurch zustande gekommen, daß man die Denkungsweise, die seit Kopernikus, Galilei und so weiter da ist, die von Goethe so sehr vertieft worden ist, in dieselbe Seelenverfassung hineingetragen hat, die man sonst bei der Imagination hat. Dadurch konnte man dieses Gebiet, das immer den Initiaten zugänglich war, eben nach vorne hin, in der Zeit nach vorne hin bis zum Saturn hineintragen. So sehen Sie vielleicht an diesem Beispiel, wie es darauf ankommt, in diesen Dingen nicht nebulos, sondern ganz klar und besonnen vorzugehen, eben gerade Besonnenheit hineinzutragen da, wo sonst leicht die Besinnungslosigkeit beginnt. So haben wir also hier das Beispiel, wo das Traumleben, das sonst nur das Ich ergreift, den astralischen Leib ergreift.
Und ich möchte auf die Frage: Worin besteht denn nun der Unterschied zwischen der modernen Naturwissenschaft und dem, was ich in meinem Buche «Geheimwissenschaft» gegeben habe antworten: Der Unterschied besteht darinnen, daß der moderne Naturdenker nur an das Ich sich wenden kann, sofort ins Träumen kommt, wenn er aus dem Ich herauskommt, und ich konnte dem Astralleib sagen, was die Naturforscher für Vorstellungen haben; dadurch konnte der Astralleib hineindringen in die Welten, die ich zu beschreiben hatte. Das ist ein Weg, der Ihnen ganz exakt beschrieben werden kann und der Ihnen, als Beispiel, als Exempel vielleicht viel genauer zeigen wird, wie die richtigen Wege sind gegenüber den falschen, als irgend etwas anderes.
Die Überwindung der Karikatur naturwissenschaftlicher Methoden zur Erforschung des Mediumismus und Somnambulismus
Nun, der polarisch entgegengesetzte Zustand gegenüber dem Traumzustand ist der Zustand des Somnambulismus oder Mediumismus. Der Träumer lebt ganz in seinem Ich und astralischen Leib; wenn er auch im astralischen Leib keine bewußten Wahrnehmungen hat, so lebt er doch darinnen. Der Träumer lebt ganz in seinem Ich und in seinem Astralleib, außerhalb seines physischen und Ätherleibes. Er ist also versenkt, vertieft in seine eigene Wesenheit, und, da die eigene Wesenheit zusammenhängt mit Welten, von der eigenen Wesenheit aus in Welten [und damit in gewissem Grade auch in den physischen Organismus]. Also der Träumer taucht sozusagen unter in seine eigene Wesenheit und dadurch in die Welt. Das genau Entgegengesetzte ist beim Medium und beim Somnambulen der Fall. Man ist auch nur in einem somnambulen und in einem mediumistischen Zustand, wenn man mit seinem Ich und astralischen Leibe heraus ist außer dem physischen und Ätherleib; aber dann ist, wie ich Ihnen gestern ausgeführt habe, Ich und astralischer Leib durchdrungen von einer fremden Wesenheit.
So haben wir das Medium oder die Somnambule da mit ihrer physischen Wesenheit; aber außerhalb des physischen und des Ätherleibes ist das Ich und der astralische Leib. Da ist das Ich unterdrückt, geknechtet, und der Astralleib auch, denn ein anderes Wesen, wie ich gestern beschrieben habe, sitzt darinnen. Dadurch kann aber auch das Medium nicht in der richtigen Weise zurückwirken auf den physischen und Ätherleib. Denn auch wenn wir zum Beispiel im Schlafe sind, im traumlosen Schlafe, wirken wir zurück auf den physischen Leib und Ätherleib. Wir durchdringen gewissermaßen im Wachzustand physischen Leib und Ätherleib von innen, im Schlafzustand schützen wir sie von außen. Das hört auf beim Somnambulen. Das Medium, die Somnambule, sie können sich nicht kümmern um ihren physischen und Ätherleib. Die sind sozusagen verlassenes Gebiet. Das ist das Eigentümliche des Mediums, des Somnambulen, daß physischer und Ätherleib verlassenes Gebiet sind.
Wenn wir den Menschen, der seine für unsere heutige menschliche Gegenwart normale Seelenverfassung hat, betrachten, so haben auf seinen physischen und Ätherleib nur die Kräfte der Mineralien und der Pflanzen Einfluß; nichts anderes, nur die Kräfte der Mineralien und der Pflanzen. Wenn nicht die Kräfte der Mineralien, also auch der mineralischen Erde, auf unseren physischen Leib wirkten, könnten wir nicht gehen, uns nicht bewegen, denn das sind die physischen Kräfte, deren wir uns bedienen. In die dürfen wir hineinkommen; das ist normaler Zustand. Aber die dürfen nicht in den Ätherleib hereinkommen.
Ebenso ist es bei den Pflanzen. Sie dürfen in gewissem Sinne noch auf den Ätherleib wirken, aber nicht allzu stark. Aber nicht die Kräfte, die in den Tieren die Empfindung bewirken, und auch nicht die Kräfte des anderen Menschen dürfen auf den physischen Leib des Menschen und namentlich auf den Ätherleib einwirken. Weil physischer Leib und Ätherleib beim Medium, beim Somnambulen verlassen sind, wirken die tierischen und irdisch-menschlichen Kräfte auf den Somnambulen, auf das Medium. Sie werden suggestiv beeinflußt.
Ebenso wie sich der Gedanke aus dem Traume hineinsenkt, so senkt sich jetzt der Wille aus dem Menschen heraus in die Umgebung hinein. Und wir können dem Somnambulen, dem Medium suggerieren, es soll gehen. Wir können ihm suggerieren, wenn wir ihm eine Kartoffel geben, es sei eine schmackhafte Birne und so weiter. Wir gelangen unmittelbar als Menschen suggestiv an Medien und an Somnambule in bezug auf den physischen und dadurch auf den Ätherleib heran. Und die Somnambule und das Medium tragen in ihrem Ätherleib ihre physische Umgebung in sich, die sie nur in ihrem physischen Leib in sich tragen sollen, wie es beim normalen Menschen der Fall ist. So ist der normale Mensch traumhaft hingegeben an die innere Geisteswelt. Und so ist die Somnambule, das Medium, hingegeben an die äußere Naturwelt.
Wiederum ist das, also medial zu sein, somnambul zu sein, ein normaler Zustand, wenn er eben normal ist; denn daß wir gehen, daß wir greifen, daß wir überhaupt im Raume etwas tun können, das ist ja eine magisch-somnambule Verrichtung bei jedem Menschen. Es darf nur nicht heraufkommen in den Ätherleib, es muß nur im physischen Leib verbleiben. Das Normale geht durchaus über in das Abnorme. Sehen Sie, so ist eigentlich der Träumende ganz in sich darinnen, das Medium und die Somnambule ganz aus sich heraus, und wir haben gewissermaßen wie Automaten den physischen Leib und den Ätherleib des Menschen vor uns im Medium und in der Somnambulen, können auf diese wirken, weil sie nicht versorgt werden vom eigenen Ich und vom eigenen Astralleib. Und dadurch wird, ebenso wie beim Träumenden eine Verbindung mit der inneren Geistwelt erzeugt wird, bei der Somnambulen und bei dem Medium eine Verbindung mit der äußeren Naturwelt erzeugt, mit der Welt der Gestaltung, mit der Welt der Bildentstehung, mit alldem, was anschaulich ist, was räumlich ist, was zeitlich ist.
Wenn man in die Traumeswelt hinuntertaucht, taucht man in das Gestaltenlose, in das ewig Sich-Verwandelnde ein. Wenn man in die Welt, in der die Somnambule unter suggestivem Einfluß den Willen ausübt, eindringt, wenn also der physische Leib und der Ätherleib in diese Welt eindringen, so ist alles bestimmt, konturiert; mit ungeheurer Exaktheit wird eigentlich alles ausgeführt, was durch äußeren Einfluß geschieht. Das ist die dem Träumenden ganz entgegengesetzte Welt, das ist gewissermaßen ein realisiertes, ein äußerliches, naturhaft hergestelltes Träumen, wo im Tun geträumt wird, statt daß sonst nur im inneren Erleben geträumt wird. Dieser Gegensatz, der ist nun auch bedeutsam und von höchstem Interesse, wenn man ihn betrachtet vom Initiatenstandpunkte aus. Der Initiat hat, wie ich Ihnen sagte, seine Schwierigkeiten, wenn er da untertaucht in die Traumwelt, um sie imaginativ zu durchströmen; seine Schwierigkeiten hat er, weil er ja das Gefühl hat, die Schwere geht verloren, das Gewicht geht verloren, alle die Dinge der Außenwelt, die festen Boden geben, die gehen verloren.
Wenn der Initiat sich einlebt - und er muß sich nun bewußt einleben, er muß ein Bewußtsein dafür entwickeln, so herauszugehen, wie unbewußt die Somnambule herausgeht in die Welt -, dann hat er das Gefühl, daß er in jedem Moment bewußtlos werden kann, das Bewußtsein verlieren kann. Das ist ja der Fall, dieses fortwährende in der Möglichkeit stehen, das Bewußtsein zu verlieren. Man hat immer die Notwendigkeit, sich stramm, straff innerlich zu halten, damit das Bewußtsein ja nicht verlorengeht.
Ich möchte sagen, geht man in dieser Welt vor, so muß man sich als Initiat so vernünftig bewegen in dieser Welt, wie sich sonst leidlich vernünftige, anständige Menschen in unserer Welt bewegen. Ich möchte sagen, man darf es dem Initiaten nicht ansehen, daß, während er zwischen Menschen und Tieren und Steinen durchgeht, er zugleich in einer geistigen Welt ist, wo er mit vollem Bewußtsein drinnensteht. Denn würde er einen Augenblick nur meinen, er habe jetzt keine Füße, sondern er fliege da durch diese Welt, so würde er sehr, sehr leicht in allerlei Allüren hineinkommen, wodurch ihn die Mitmenschen bedenklich finden würden. Sie würden sagen: Was ist denn das für ein Verrückter! - Das kann geschehen, wenn er nicht innerlich straff und stramm sich hält, um das volle Bewußtsein zu behalten beim Durchgehen durch die geistige Welt, die überall da ist, wie die physisch-sinnliche da ist.
Sehen Sie, hier eröffnet sich ein Gebiet, das nun nicht die Domäne der Theosophischen Gesellschaft geworden ist, sondern ein Gebiet, über das sich solche «höher geartete» Naturforscher hergemacht haben, das man nennt das Gebiet für psychische Forschung, Psychical research und so weiter. Es ist das ein Gebiet, wo diejenigen Menschen, die naturwissenschaftlich sonst vorgebildet sind, aber in der Naturwissenschaft weniger leisten können, statische Aufnahmen machen über solche Dinge, mit Medien Versuche machen, um dahinterzukommen, wie es in der geistigen Welt ist. Da wird in allerlei Gesellschaften und von allerlei Gesichtspunkten aus eben ein Gebiet geschaffen, wo man nun von außen erforschen will, wie das vor sich geht, wenn der Mensch nicht mit seinem gewöhnlichen Bewußtsein seine Glieder bewegt oder sich verhält, sondern mit herabgedämpftem oder ganz ausgelöschtem Bewußtsein, wo andere Wesen sich seiner Seele bemächtigt haben. Da wird dann registriert, was andere Menschen tun, in denen das Bewußtsein so heruntergedämpft ist.
Wir haben es sogar erlebt, daß für diese Art von Forschung begeisterte Leute die Anforderung gestellt haben, ich selber soll mich mit alledem, was ich der Welt zu sagen habe, in ihren Laboratorien zur Verfügung stellen, damit sie nun auch von außen erforschen können, was da vor sich geht, was da als innere Welt vor sich geht. Es ist ungefähr so gescheit, wie wenn einer kommt und sagt: Von Mathematik verstehe ich nichts, ich kann also nicht sagen, ob das, was der Mathematiker behauptet, richtig oder falsch ist; aber er soll zu mir in mein psychisches Laboratorium gehen, da werde ich Versuche mit ihm machen und ausprobieren, ob er ein großer Mathematiker ist.
Ungefähr so ist es. Ich weise damit also hin auf eine Domäne in der Gegenwart, wo man auch die Welt des Somnambulen, des Mediumistischen von außen durch die Karikatur der naturwissenschaftlichen Methode erforschen will, nicht eigentlich auf das Innere eingehen will. Denn ginge man auf das Innere ein, würde man sehen, daß man da im Medium und der Somnambulen ein Äußeres vor sich hat, einen Automaten des physischen und Ätherleibes, daß man also gar nicht eigentlich das Geistige erforscht, sondern daß dasjenige, was man erforschen will, verlassen hat, das, was man vor sich hat. Aber in diese feineren Eigentümlichkeiten der geistigen Welt wollen eben die Menschen nicht hineinsehen. Sie wollen sehr häufig nicht nur durch innere Erlebnisse, sondern in äußerlicher Anschauung das Geistige vor sich haben. Im äußeren sichtbaren, sinnlichen Wirken wollen sie das Geistige vor sich haben.
Das tritt manchmal noch in anderer Weise hervor. Das tritt hervor, indem solche Dinge auftreten, wie sie ja auch dann später gerade in der Zeit, als ich diesen Weg da durchgemacht habe, respektive dargestellt habe, in der Theosophischen Gesellschaft aufgetreten sind, wo man die geistige Gestalt des Christus in einer physischen Persönlichkeit gesucht hat. Man wollte in der äußeren physischen Welt ein unmittelbares Geistiges haben.
Die Kunst als Brücke von der Materie zum Geist
Man muß die physische Welt physische Welt sein lassen und das Geistige da suchen, wo es ist, allerdings auch da, wo die physische Welt ist, aber eben in den Sphären, die die physische Welt durchdringen und die geistig sind. Aber hier liegt noch ein anderes Gebiet. Und der Mensch in seinem gesunden Zustande fühlt sich schon berufen, die Brücke zu schlagen zwischen dem einen und dem anderen Gebiete, zwischen dem Gebiete innerlichen Erlebens und äußerlichen Anschauens, zwischen der Welt, in der abnorm der Träumende ist, und der Welt, in der abnorm das Medium oder die Soemnambule ist. Bringt man beide Welten zusammen, befruchtet sie gegenseitig, dann entsteht die Kunst. Denn in der Kunst wird dasjenige, was äußerlich sinnlich wahrnehmbar ist, durchgeistigt, mit den Impulsen der geistigen Welt durchsetzt; dasjenige, was innerlich seelisch wahrnehmbar ist, wird in einer äußerlichen Verkörperung dargestellt.
Während daher die Theosophische Gesellschaft sich damit befaßte, eine äußerliche physische Wesenheit als Geistwesenheit hinzustellen, waren wir in der Anthroposophischen Gesellschaft dazu gedrängt, die okkulte Strömung in die Kunst einlaufen zu lassen. Die Mysterien entstanden. Die Eurythmie entstand. Die Sprachgestaltung wurde ausgebildet. All dasjenige, was in der anthroposophischen Bewegung da entstanden ist, ist aus diesem Impuls heraus entstanden, die Brücke zu schlagen herüber vom Geistigen ins Physische, so daß das Bewußtsein herüberspielt von der Welt, die der Träumende chaotisch betritt, zu der Welt, die die Soemnambule oder das Medium chaotisch betritt. In der Kunst wird beides bewußt ineinandergefügt.
Und das wird man einmal einsehen. Man wird einsehen, was gemeint ist, daß zum Beispiel durch diese besonderen Bestrebungen die Sprachgestaltung, wie sie durch Marie Steiner geübt wird, wiederum zurückgebracht werden soll auf diejenige Stufe, die sie einmal gehabt hat, als die Menschen noch instinktiv geistig waren. Da galt Rhythmus, Takt im Sprechen mehr als der äußerliche abstrakte Wortausdruck. Das muß wieder zurückerobert werden. Und in der Eurythmie wird wieder zurückerobert der bewegte Mensch, der sich vor uns evolviert, wie der Mensch ist als geistig-seelische Wesenheit. Das ist dasjenige, was Sie in der Eurythmie sehen.
Und so haben wir in der Kunst zunächst diese Brücke zu schlagen gehabt von der Welt, an die der Träumende heranstreift, zu der Welt, in der die Somnambule, das Medium herumhopsen und herumstolpern, ungeschickt sich herumbewegen. In unserer gegenwärtigen materialistischen Zeit steht der Träumende einsam sinnend da und weiß nichts von Gestaltungen, von stofflichen Formen, die Geistiges ausdrücken und offenbaren. Und die Somnambulen gehen herum gleichgültig, ob sie als Medien verehrt werden, oder ob sie im Bolschewismus reine Staatstheorien machen und gleich wie die Medien in der Welt allerlei Dinge realisieren -, sie gehen in der gegenwärtigen Welt herum und ahnen nichts vom Geistigen. Das ist das Wesentliche, daß wiedergefunden werde die Brücke vom Geist in die Materie, von der Materie zum Geiste hinüber. Im Künstlerischen handelt es sich zunächst darum, diese Brücke zu schlagen, nicht mehr bloß in der äußeren Welt herumzustolpern und herumzuhopsen, sondern durch geistige Bewegungen, die nicht die gewöhnlichen sind, Sinn dafür zu bekommen.
So sehen Sie den wahren, den inneren Anfang des Eurythmischen als Initiatenimpuls, und alles dasjenige, was bei uns als Kunst in der Sprachgestaltung geübt wird, ist auch aus diesem Impulse heraus. Und wenn demnächst der Kursus in Dornach über dramatische Kunst gehalten wird, wird versucht werden, auch die Schauspielkunst wieder zurückzuführen darauf, daß auf der Bühne Geistiges sein wird. Lange Zeit hat man nur nachgedacht darüber, wie man möglichst so wie im gewöhnlichen Leben den Schauspieler auf die Bühne stellen soll. Nur komisch waren die Diskussionen in den neunziger Jahren, wo man darüber diskutierte, und sich schließlich für das Naturalistische entschied, ob die Schillerschen Gestalten mit den Händen in der Hosentasche, weil ja das einmal Mode geworden ist, ob die auch auf der Bühne in dieser Weise ihre heroenhaften Sentenzen, sagen wir, aussprechen sollen!
Sie sehen, es gibt viel Anlaß, den Weg zu finden hinein in ein richtiges Erforschen der geistigen Welt. Und derjenige, der auf dem Gebiete der Kunst sich eröffnet, der ist ein wahrhaft nicht ganz unrichtiger Weg.
War es so von einer ganz besonderen Bedeutung, von der alten Initiatenwissenschaft, die sich versenkt hatte in die Mysterien des Mondes mit alledem, was dazugehört, vorzudringen zu demjenigen, was nur durchdrungen werden kann, wenn die Errungenschaften, aber ich meine jetzt die seelischen Errungenschaften der Naturwissenschaft, hineinimprägniert werden in den Seelenzustand, der okkult erkennen kann, war das von einer ungeheuren Bedeutung, so ist es auf der anderen Seite von nicht minder großer Bedeutung, daß die unklaren, dilettantischen Versuche, die gemacht werden, um dem beizukommen, was nach Entgeistigung, wie es bei der Somnambulen und dem Medialen der Fall ist, sich dennoch unter geistigem Einflusse in den Formen des Geistigen bewegt -, es war nicht minder wichtig, dies zum besonderen Gebiete des Forschens zu machen. Denn diese beiden Wege müssen ja eigentlich als einer angesehen werden: das Durchstoßen von innen aus durch die besonnen gewordene Traumeswelt, und das bewußte Erfassen der Außenwelt, die die Naturwissenschaft nur durch ihre mineralischen Eigenschaften erfaßt, die auf eine dilettantische Weise erforscht werden sollen durch die sogenannte psychische Forschung, Psychical research. Es ist ein Wichtiges, gerade weil wir im naturwissenschaftlichen Zeitalter leben, auch diesen Weg der geistigen Forschung zu gehen, auch das andere Gebiet, das polarisch den Träumen entgegengesetzte Gebiet, geistig zu durchforschen.
Wenn wir eine Somnambule, ein Medium vor uns haben, dann geschieht ja durch die Somnambule und das Medium nicht etwas, was wir gewöhnt sind aus dem gewöhnlichen Leben. Die Somnambule schreibt nicht, wie ein gewöhnlicher Mensch schreibt, bewegt sich nicht, wie ein gewöhnlicher Mensch sich bewegt, spricht nicht, wie ein gewöhnlicher Mensch spricht, schmeckt nicht, wie ein gewöhnlicher Mensch schmeckt, weil astralischer Leib und Ich heraus sind aus dem physischen und Ätherleib und wir es zu tun haben mit einem physischen und Atherleib, die verlassen sind, und die nun unter dem Einfluß des Kosmos stehen, dem Einfluß des Kosmos hingegeben sind. Wir haben es also da mit Offenbarungen des Physischen und des Ätherischen zu tun, die nicht die gewöhnlichen Naturwirkungen sind, die aus dem Geistigen, aus der geistigen Welt herrühren. Denn es ist schließlich ja im Prinzip einerlei, ob ich vor einem Medium stehe und ihm etwas suggeriere, oder ob das Medium irgendeinem Sterneneinfluß hingegeben ist und den aufnimmt in den Ätherleib oder einen klimatischen Einfluß oder den Einfluß eines Metalles und so weiter.
Wir haben eine Organisation vor uns in dem Medium, die in magischer Weise Geistigem hingegeben ist. Das müssen wir ins Auge fassen. Da kann man dann nicht diese Wirkungen, ohne daß man das Geistige schon hat, studieren, wie es die Gesellschaften für äußere psychische Forschungen machen möchten, die in äußerlicher Weise damit experimentieren wollen. Da muß man hineinschauen in den geistigen Zusammenhang. Da muß man das, was dadurch das Medium oder die Somnambule oder sonst durch den Menschen vorgeht, als Vordergrund haben und im Hintergrund dasjenige sehen, was als Geistiges vorhanden ist.
Aber alle diese Wirkungen, die im Medium auftreten, in der Somnambulen auftreten, sind verwandt mit anderen medialen Erscheinungen. Wenn Sie hier ein Medium sitzen haben und das in einem bestimmten Zustande unter Menscheneinfluß oder unter kosmischem Einfluß dies oder jenes vollführt, das heißt eigentlich, wenn hier ein physischer und ein Ätherleib dies oder jenes vollführen, dann ist das vorübergehend, temporär ganz dasselbe, was, durch etwas anderes bedingt, bewirkt wird in den giftigen Pflanzen, durch die der Mensch in gewisser Weise erkrankt. Es ist nur, ich möchte sagen, die äußere vorübergehende Maske der Krankheit, die in dem somnambulen, in dem mediumistischen Zustande auftritt. Und von einem gewissen Gesichtspunkte aus — das wird dann noch weiter auszuführen sein in den nächsten Vorträgen — kann man an den Erscheinungen des Mediumismus, an den Erscheinungen des Somnambulismus — man braucht es nicht, aber man kann es — wieder dasjenige sehen, was am kranken Menschen eigentlich dadurch vorliegt, daß in unnormaler Weise sein Ich und sein astralischer Leib irgendwie von einem Organ oder vom ganzen Organismus sich herausgezogen hat, und der Mensch so unter besondere geistige Einflüsse kommt.
Sehen Sie, weil man in alten Zeiten eingesehen hat, daß dieser Zusammenhang besteht, waren immer die Mysterien verknüpft mit Medizinischem, und weil man damals nicht so neugierig war wie heute, hat man es nicht für nötig gehalten, sich viel mit Medien und Somnambulen zu befassen, deren Wirken man begriffen hat, wie man Krankheitszustände begriff. Man befaßte sich eben mehr von diesem Standpunkte aus, der im Medizinischen gegeben ist, mit diesen Dingen. Und das war ein Standpunkt, der wieder errungen werden muß.
Und was in dilettantischer Weise als der andere Weg gerade durch die Naturerscheinungen hineinkommt ins Geistige, der andere Weg, der in dilettantischer Weise da begangen wird, der muß in richtiger Weise verfolgt werden. Es muß dasjenige, was in der Welt ist und was sich insbesondere durch die pathologischen Zustände des Menschen und der Tiere äußert, in richtiger Art wiederum verfolgt werden. Dadurch wird man erst dazu kommen, dasjenige erforschen zu können, was die Gesellschaft für psychische Forschung erforschen möchte.
Und auch dieser Weg ist nun betreten worden auf dem Boden der anthroposophischen Bewegung. Er ist möglich geworden dadurch, daß die pathologischen Erscheinungen in der Art verfolgt werden können, daß sich aus ihnen heraus der Zugang zur geistigen Welt eröffnet. Das ist dadurch möglich geworden, daß im Zusammenarbeiten von mir und Dr. Ita Wegman dieser Weg, der verfehlt wird von den physischen Forschungen, in der richtigen Weise versucht wird zu gehen. Es ist das möglich dadurch, daß dieses Zusammenarbeiten sich ergeben hat dadurch, daß in Ita Wegman wirklich nicht bloß jene Erkenntnisse vorhanden sind, die der heutige Arzt erwirbt, sondern diejenigen intuitiv-therapeutischen Impulse, welche unmittelbar aus dem Krankheitsbilde heraus in die geistige Welt hineingehen und von da zur Therapie kommen.
Da aber liegt der Weg, das Gebiet zu durchforschen, auf das ich hier hindeute. Und so wird hier versucht, durch dieses Arbeiten die wirkliche initiierte Medizin auszubilden, die von selbst initiierte Naturwissenschaft ist. Auf diese Weise wird auch der andere, richtige Weg gegenüber den falschen Wegen vor die Welt hingestellt werden. Und man wird schon sehen an dem ersten Bande des Buches, das von Frau Dr. Wegman und mir zusammen geschrieben wird, das demnächst erscheinen wird und jetzt im Drucke ist, wie dieser Weg gegangen werden muß.
Sie sehen, daß sich an Beispielen am allerleichtesten zeigen läßt, wie die richtigen Wege sich von den falschen, von den irrtümlichen Wegen unterscheiden. Und auch darauf darf vielleicht hier im Zusammenhange hingewiesen werden. Wenn ich vorher gesagt habe, es muß ein Weg in die Kunst hinein eröffnet werden, der nun wiederum das Gebiet des Geistigen und das Gebiet des stofflich Geformten einander nahebringt, so muß ich sagen: Es scheint nach den Bedingungen der heutigen Zivilisation unmittelbar sogar das vorzuliegen, daß man erst den rechten Weg auch dazu finden wird, wenn der letztere Weg mit Bezug auf die Naturerscheinungen gegangen sein wird. — Denn es ist heute auf dem künstlerischen Gebiet die Menschheit so weit entfernt von jenem Brückenschlagen, von dem ich gesprochen habe, daß sie vielleicht erst dann überzeugt werden kann von dem Weben und Leben des Geistigen auch in der Kunst, wenn sie auf jene intensive Weise überzeugt werden kann von dem Wirken des Geistigen, das man besonders schauen kann in der Genesis des Pathologischen; wenn erst anschaulich geworden ist durch ein solches Wirken, wie das in dem Zusammenarbeiten von Ita Wegman und mir vorliegen wird, wenn erst ersichtlich sein wird, wie der Geist webt und lebt in der Materie, wie er sich in der Materie offenbart. Wenn man das auf dem Gebiete der Natur schauen wird, dann wird vielleicht auch der Enthusiasmus, der volle Enthusiasmus erwachen können dafür, daß das unmittelbar in der Kunst vor die Welt hingestellt werden soll.
Ich werde dann morgen von diesen Dingen weiter sprechen.

Abnormal paths into the spiritual world and their transformation
The use of scientific mental images for the path of knowledge
You have seen how in these considerations we have started from the exploration of a state in ordinary present-day life, from the exploration of dream life, and how from there we were able to advance to the discussion of other states of consciousness in the human soul that are capable of penetrating into worlds other than the one we experience between birth and death. You have seen that we have ended up with the medial consciousness, with that consciousness which leads the human being, I can also say, into a somnambulistic state, because the medial state is always a somnambulistic one. Now, both types of experience, the dream experience and the somnambulistic experience, are inner states of the soul, which are also present in their correct form in normal life and which only, if they are intensified, lead either into the right or the wrong direction.
Let us consider the dream life again today. We have seen that the man of ordinary consciousness experiences dreams when he moves from the waking state into the sleeping state, and trembles in his astral body after that which he undergoes in his etheric body and in his physical body during the waking state. Then come the chaotic, indeed wonderful dream experiences, whose interpretation is nevertheless only possible for the initiate, because in their usual chaotic state they confuse those who do not penetrate deeper into the essence of the spiritual world. But we have also seen how, through meditative and concentrative exercises, this web of dream life is interwoven with a real higher consciousness. So you have to imagine a person transported into the wonderful chaotic world of dreams, but this dream life is permeated by consciousness, so that one is as contemplative about it and as present in reality as one is in ordinary life. Then one looks into another world, into the world I have mentioned to you, where one can still accompany the dead after their death. And you feel as if you are spread out in a much more real world than the one in which you are present. Now the question is this: Which world do you actually enter? I have already spoken about this too; I just want to touch on the matter again from a different point of view.
Once upon a time, I said, there lived with the people of earth great teachers of humanity who were not in physical bodies but only in subtle etheric bodies, who could, however, embody themselves in air, who taught people by way of inspiration and founded the primal culture on earth. Looking back into ancient times with the appropriate state of consciousness, one finds these great spiritual primal teachers of humanity walking among men. These great teachers of humanity have withdrawn to the moon, are to be found today only in the lunar sphere, have made themselves subservient there to all kinds of beings who have never come to earth, live among such elemental beings, and they work on man especially when he has passed through the gate of death, making him understand how he has to behave according to his karma. One also has to deal with these beings when one first wants to penetrate the spiritual world. Just as life on earth can only be lived with people, in company, in social interaction with people, so life in higher knowledge can only be lived together with other beings. And with these beings, with these moon beings, which, I would like to say, have become from earth beings, from these original teachers of mankind, and together with those beings which they have made subservient to themselves, one explores the spiritual world which initially adjoins our world.
In this world you will then always find the clues to get to know earlier incarnations of people, to go back to earlier times on earth in order to find personalities who lived earlier, with whom you were either karmically connected or not. I have given you an example of how one gradually comes into contact with such earthly beings who are not embodied on earth today, Brunetto Latini, Dante, Alanus ab Insulis and other personalities, by continuing to proceed in this state of consciousness. This state of consciousness is therefore an illumination, an illumination of the dream state. The dream state is, so to speak, the rudiment of ordinary life for this state. Now what is the difference between the human being in ordinary consciousness and the initiate? You can make this difference very easily clear to yourself.
When a person usually sleeps, he has his physical body and his etheric body in bed; he is with his astral body and with his ego apart from the physical and the etheric body. In dreams only the ego experiences. It is true that the processes experienced in dreams are in the astral body, which is still outside the physical and etheric bodies; but for the ordinary consciousness only the ego can experience in dreams. In the case of the initiate, it is the ego and above all the astral body that experiences. So that the difference between the ordinary dreamer and the initiate is that the ordinary dreamer, when he is outside his physical and etheric body, experiences only with his ego; the initiate also experiences with the astral body.
Now, this way of perceiving has been strongly developed above all in the ancient mysteries for the exploration of the supersensible worlds. It was then further developed in a rudimentary, decadent way through the Middle Ages and more recent times, until it was more or less lost in the most recent times. Individuals have always had the opportunity to penetrate into the worlds that can be penetrated in this way by receiving information from the ancient teachers in the Mysteries in some way, be it in a spiritual way or through tradition. There is always a danger for man if he wants to penetrate into these worlds. For in these worlds, for example, the initiate immediately has the feeling, when he immerses himself with imaginative cognition in what is otherwise filled by dreams, that he is losing the world, that he is losing himself with his consciousness, so to speak, into the void. He always has the feeling that solid ground is slipping away, weight, heaviness is slipping away. He feels how he becomes inwardly light, how he is carried out into spiritual worlds without his will, how he can easily lose control over himself because all heaviness, all weight is lost.
To ensure that this is not the case, the exercises described in my book “How to Attain Knowledge of the Higher Worlds” are there for this very purpose. Whoever devotes himself to these exercises in the right way will find that he becomes a spiritually winged being who, when the heaviness, the weight, ceases, can, so to speak, make use of spiritual wings. But this is precisely the precarious state when, as an initiate, you lose your feet, so to speak, and do not yet have wings, when you lose your physical feet and etheric feet and do not yet have astral and ego wings. You understand what I mean when I express this figuratively. But it is like this. If you grow carefully into the world that you enter through the exercises, all danger is naturally eliminated, no danger can arise. Man can gradually grow into this world, just as he grows into the ordinary physical world through his physical and etheric body.
At the same time, however, this is a state in which primitive mankind was more or less through natural conditions. We must reach this state through exercise. Prehistoric man did not need this. Prehistoric mankind had natural dispositions, as a result of which there was always a state that did not represent our waking, but a spiritual seeing, as I have described it with the Chaldeans, and a state that also does not represent our dreaming, but is a perception in imagining. One person encountered another. He did not see him merely in relation to his bodily contours, but dreamed the aura around him. But that was the real aura, not a merely subjectively dreamed one.
Then again, when he had this gift to see the aura of an earthly man, who is in the physical body, then he also had the other ability - because both are connected - to now see the aura of a spiritual being, which is not embodied in the physical body. And then he dreamed the form of this spiritual being. Notice the difference: In ancient times, when you met a human being, an earthling, you saw the earthling and imagined the aura around him in a real dream. If you encountered a spiritual being, an angel or elemental being, you saw the aura spiritually from the outset and dreamed the form.
The primitive painters painted in the same way. But we don't know that yet. The primitive painters saw the spiritual beings, dreamed the forms, painted the beings from the hierarchy of the Angeloi quite human-like, painted the Archangeloi with a blurred body but with clear wings and still with a head, and only the head, the winged head, they painted, because they dreamed it, with the Archai. All these things were, so to speak, quite natural to the old man, the primeval man, just as it is natural to us today to see the nose and eyes of others. Today, because they have gradually been lost in mankind, they have to be acquired again through practice. But because this was characteristic of primitive mankind, and because it was relatively easy to attain again and again through practice, this field has been the subject of much research in the course of time. The world, which is governed, so to speak, by the lunar beings, has always been explored with great zeal, and the initiates of the ancient Mysteries, who were the real researchers in this field, speak a great deal about this world, about their encounters with the dead after death, about their exploration of the lunar sphere. And then they give perspectives on how the world looks from the lunar sphere.
Copernicus only founded his Copernican system from the sphere of the Earth. The old Ptolemaic system is not wrong, it is only seen from the lunar sphere, and there it is correct. Now there is one peculiar thing that one always finds with these researchers. That is that they go no further than this lunar sphere.
You see, you are all well aware that what is called the Anthroposophical Society was first part of the Theosophical Society. The Theosophical Society, which is a similar society to the many that have existed in the course of time, has a rich literature. If you read this literature, ladies and gentlemen, you will find that it describes - correctly or incorrectly, it doesn't matter now - the world of which I have just spoken, the world that is explored with the lunar beings, the world of the lunar sphere. And there was something significant for me, I would like to say, something with which disturbances were initially connected when I received the application to work in the Theosophical Society. It consisted in the fact that with all those who were in the Theosophical Society I actually only found research and literature that referred to this sphere of the moon. There is certainly much that is incorrect, but there is also much that is extraordinarily significant, great and powerful, especially in the writings of Blavatsky. But everything that is to be found in Blavatsky's writings is as it is for the reason that she stood within the sphere I have just described, and because she had her connection with initiates who modestly held themselves within this lunar sphere. Well, I can say that I got to know many such initiates, got to know how such spirits penetrate into the lunar sphere and how they become uninterested if you want to make progress.
When I described the earth in its earlier incorporation of the moon, in its earlier incorporation of the sun, in its earlier incorporation of Saturn in my book “Secret Science in Outline” - this happened in the years 1906 to 1909 - you will find that I did not stop at the lunar incorporation, but went further, back to Saturn; whereas all the initiates who spoke of these things stopped between moon and sun, actually only went back to the lunar sphere. They became uninterested, even restless at times, when they were asked to go back further. You can't do that, they said, you reach a limit where there is a veil that you can't go beyond.
Of course, it was extremely important and interesting to see why. You see, it's because such initiates - if you got to know them well, you soon realized it - had an aversion, an antipathy to getting to know those forms of conception that relate to the newer natural sciences. One could even make the experience, if one brought mental images, as they live in Darwinism, Haeckelism and so on, to these initiates, that they became quite unwilling, regarded it as childish, as foolish of modern man, and did not want to deal with it. When Goethe's mental images were brought to them, they were not so unwilling at first, but they found that he expressed himself in the same way as a modern naturalist. And then they threw the thing away.
In short, you couldn't approach these initiators with these mental images. And it was only when I simply impregnated the modern scientific mental images of the soul in the years 1906 to 1909 in order to bring them into the region where the imaginations are usually located that I was able to penetrate as far as the sun and Saturn. So I did not use these scientific mental images in order to recognize with them as Haeckel or Huxley recognized, but I used them as an inner activity in order to get beyond this limitation to which the initiates were subject in the time when a newer scientific way of thinking did not yet exist, and one therefore only entered the higher consciousness inwardly by impregnating the dream world with imaginations. Thus, in writing my “Secret Science”, the attempt was made to take the completely conscious world of imagination, which otherwise only refers to external natural objects, inwardly and to impregnate the imaginative world with it. This gave rise to the possibility of penetrating this whole chain: Saturn, Sun, Moon. This led to the idea of exploring that on earth which the ancient initiates also had.
I am recounting this path of knowledge so that you can see how such things work. You can say: This is something personal. - But in this case, the personal is really quite objective. And if there is one thing that has been criticized about my “Secret Science”, it is that it is written like a mathematical textbook, that I have not tried to bring anything subjective into it, but have written this whole course, as I have now told it, with a mathematical coolness. But it is like that. It came about because the way of thinking that has been around since Copernicus, Galileo and so on, which was deepened so much by Goethe, was brought into the same state of mind that one otherwise has in the imagination. In this way it was possible to carry this area, which was always accessible to the initiates, forward in time to Saturn. So perhaps you can see from this example how important it is not to be nebulous in these things, but to proceed very clearly and prudently, to bring prudence to a place where otherwise insensibility can easily set in. So here we have the example where the dream life, which otherwise only takes hold of the ego, takes hold of the astral body.
And I would like to answer the question: What is the difference between modern natural science and what I have given in my book “Secret Science”: The difference consists in the fact that the modern natural thinker can only turn to the ego, immediately comes into a dream when he comes out of the ego, and I could tell the astral body what mental images the natural scientists have; thus the astral body could penetrate into the worlds that I had to describe. This is a path that can be described to you quite precisely and which, as an example, as an exemplar, will perhaps show you much more precisely how the right paths are compared to the wrong ones than anything else.
Overcoming the caricature of scientific methods to explore mediumism and somnambulism
Now, the polar opposite state to the dream state is the state of somnambulism or mediumism. The dreamer lives entirely in his ego and astral body; even if he has no conscious perceptions in the astral body, he still lives in it. The dreamer lives entirely in his ego and in his astral body, outside his physical and etheric body. He is thus immersed, absorbed in his own being, and, since his own being is connected with worlds, from his own being into worlds [and thus to a certain degree also into the physical organism]. So the dreamer immerses himself, so to speak, in his own entity and thus in the world. The exact opposite is the case with the medium and the somnambulist. One is also only in a somnambulistic and in a mediumistic state when one's ego and astral body are outside the physical and etheric body; but then, as I explained to you yesterday, the ego and astral body are permeated by a foreign entity.
So we have the medium or the somnambulist there with her physical entity; but outside the physical and etheric body is the ego and the astral body. There the ego is suppressed, enslaved, and so is the astral body, for another being, as I described yesterday, sits within it. As a result, the medium cannot work back on the physical and etheric body in the right way. For even when we are asleep, for example, in dreamless sleep, we work back on the physical body and etheric body. In the waking state we penetrate the physical body and etheric body from the inside, so to speak, and in the sleeping state we protect them from the outside. This ends with the somnambulist. The medium, the somnambulists, cannot take care of their physical and etheric bodies. They are, so to speak, abandoned territory. That is the peculiarity of the medium, the somnambulist, that the physical and etheric body are abandoned territory.
If we consider the human being who has his normal soul constitution for our present human presence, then only the forces of the minerals and the plants have influence on his physical and etheric body; nothing else, only the forces of the minerals and the plants. If it were not for the forces of the minerals, including the mineral earth, acting on our physical body, we could not walk or move, for these are the physical forces we make use of. We are allowed to enter them; that is the normal state. But they are not allowed to enter the etheric body.
It is the same with plants. They may still have an effect on the etheric body in a certain sense, but not too strongly. But not the forces that cause sensation in animals, nor the forces of the other human being, may have an effect on the physical body of the human being and especially on the etheric body. Because the physical body and etheric body are abandoned in the medium, in the somnambulist, the animal and earthly-human forces have an effect on the somnambulist, on the medium. They are influenced suggestively.
Just as the thought sinks in from the dream, so now the will sinks out of the human being into the environment. And we can suggest to the somnambulist, the medium, that he should leave. We can suggest to him, if we give him a potato, that it is a tasty pear and so on. As human beings, we can directly suggest mediums and somnambulists in relation to the physical body and thus to the etheric body. And the somnambulists and the mediums carry their physical environment in their etheric body, which they should only carry in their physical body, as is the case with normal people. Thus the normal human being is dreamlike devoted to the inner spiritual world. And so the somnambulist, the medium, is devoted to the outer world of nature.
On the other hand, to be a medium, to be somnambulistic, is a normal state, if it is normal; for that we walk, that we grasp, that we can do anything at all in space, that is a magical-somnambulistic activity in every human being. It just must not come up into the etheric body, it must only remain in the physical body. The normal certainly passes over into the abnormal. You see, the dreamer is actually completely in himself, the medium and the somnambulist completely out of himself, and we have the physical body and the etheric body of the human being before us in the medium and in the somnambulist like automatons, so to speak, and can work on them because they are not supplied by their own ego and their own astral body. And thus, just as a connection with the inner spiritual world is created in the dreamer, a connection with the outer natural world is created in the somnambulist and in the medium, with the world of creation, with the world of image formation, with everything that is vivid, that is spatial, that is temporal.
When one dives down into the dream world, one dives into the formless, into the eternally changing. When one penetrates into the world in which the somnambulist exercises the will under suggestive influence, that is, when the physical body and the etheric body penetrate into this world, everything is determined, outlined; everything that happens through external influence is actually carried out with tremendous precision. This is the world quite opposite to the dreamer, this is, so to speak, a realized, an external, naturally produced dreaming, where dreaming takes place in action, instead of dreaming otherwise only in inner experience. Now this contrast is also significant and of the greatest interest if we look at it from the initiate's point of view. As I told you, the initiate has his difficulties when he immerses himself in the dream world in order to flow through it imaginatively; he has his difficulties because he has the feeling that the heaviness is lost, the weight is lost, all the things of the outer world that give solid ground are lost.
When the initiate settles in - and he must now settle in consciously, he must develop an awareness of going out in the same way as the somnambulist unconsciously goes out into the world - then he has the feeling that he can become unconscious at any moment, can lose consciousness. That is the case, this constant possibility of losing consciousness. One always has the necessity to keep oneself tightly, tightly inwardly, so that consciousness is not lost.
I would like to say that if one proceeds in this world, then as an initiate one must move as sensibly in this world as otherwise reasonably sensible, decent people move in our world. I would like to say that the initiate must not realize that while he is walking between people and animals and stones, he is at the same time in a spiritual world where he is fully conscious. For if he were to think for a moment that he has no feet now, but is flying through this world, he would very, very easily get into all kinds of airs and graces, which would cause his fellow men to find him questionable. They would say: What kind of madman is he! - That can happen if he does not keep himself inwardly tight and firm in order to maintain full awareness when passing through the spiritual world, which is everywhere, just as the physical-sensual world is there.
You see, here an area opens up that has not become the domain of the Theosophical Society, but an area that has been taken up by such “higher” natural scientists, which is called the area of psychical research and so on. It is an area where people who are otherwise trained in the natural sciences, but who are less capable in the natural sciences, make static recordings of such things, carry out experiments with mediums in order to find out what it is like in the spiritual world. In all kinds of societies and from all kinds of points of view, an area is created where one now wants to investigate from the outside how this happens when man does not move his limbs or behave with his ordinary consciousness, but with a dimmed or completely extinguished consciousness, where other beings have taken possession of his soul. It then registers what other people do, in whom the consciousness is so dampened.
We have even experienced that people who are enthusiastic about this kind of research have asked me to make myself available in their laboratories with everything I have to say to the world, so that they can now also investigate from the outside what is going on there, what is going on as the inner world. It's about as clever as someone coming and saying: I don't know anything about mathematics, so I can't say whether what the mathematician claims is right or wrong; but he should come to me in my psychic laboratory, where I will do experiments with him and see if he is a great mathematician.
Something like that. I am thus pointing to a domain in the present where people also want to explore the world of the somnambulistic, the mediumistic from the outside through the caricature of the scientific method, but do not actually want to go into the inside. For if one were to go into the inner, one would see that in the medium and the somnambulist one has before one an outer, an automaton of the physical and etheric body, that one is not actually investigating the spiritual, but that what one wants to investigate has left what one has before one. But people do not want to look into these finer peculiarities of the spiritual world. They very often want to have the spiritual before them not only through inner experiences, but in external perception. They want to have the spiritual before them in the outward visible, sensual activity.
This sometimes emerges in yet another way. It emerges when such things occur, as they did later in the Theosophical Society, precisely at the time when I went through this path, where the spiritual form of the Christ was sought in a physical personality. They wanted to have a direct spiritual being in the outer physical world.
Art as a bridge from matter to spirit
We must let the physical world be the physical world and seek the spiritual where it is, certainly also where the physical world is, but precisely in the spheres which permeate the physical world and which are spiritual. But there is another area here. And the human being in his healthy state already feels called upon to bridge the gap between the one and the other realm, between the realm of inner experience and outer perception, between the world in which the dreamer is abnormal and the world in which the medium or the soemnambulist is abnormal. If one brings both worlds together, fertilizes them mutually, then art arises. For in art that which is outwardly perceptible to the senses is spiritualized, permeated with the impulses of the spiritual world; that which is inwardly perceptible to the soul is represented in an outward embodiment.
While the Theosophical Society was therefore concerned with presenting an external physical entity as a spiritual being, we in the Anthroposophical Society were urged to allow the occult current to enter art. The Mysteries came into being. Eurythmy came into being. The art of speech was developed. Everything that has emerged in the anthroposophical movement has arisen from this impulse to build a bridge from the spiritual to the physical, so that consciousness plays across from the world that the dreamer enters chaotically to the world that the soul or medium enters chaotically. In art, the two are consciously combined.
And this will be recognized one day. One will understand what is meant, for example, that through these special endeavors the formation of language, as practiced by Marie Steiner, is to be brought back to the level it once had when people were still instinctively spiritual. Rhythm and rhythm in speech were more important than the external abstract expression of words. This must be recaptured. And in eurythmy, the moving human being is recaptured, who evolves before us as the human being is as a spiritual-soul entity. That is what you see in eurythmy.
And so in art we first had to build this bridge from the world that the dreamer approaches to the world in which the somnambulist, the medium, hops around and stumbles about, moving awkwardly. In our present materialistic age, the dreamer stands there alone, pondering, knowing nothing of formations, of material forms that express and reveal the spiritual. And the somnambulists go about regardless of whether they are worshipped as mediums or whether they make pure theories of the state in Bolshevism and realize all kinds of things in the world like the mediums - they go about in the present world and suspect nothing of the spiritual. That is the essential thing, that the bridge from spirit to matter, from matter to spirit, be found again. In art, it is first of all a matter of building this bridge, of no longer merely stumbling and hopping around in the outer world, but of making sense of it through spiritual movements that are not the usual ones.
So you see the true, the inner beginning of eurythmy as an initiatory impulse, and everything that is practiced here as art in speech formation is also based on this impulse. And when the course on dramatic art is soon to be held in Dornach, an attempt will be made to lead the art of acting back to the fact that there will be spirituality on the stage. For a long time people have only thought about how to place the actor on the stage in the same way as in ordinary life. The discussions in the nineties were just funny, where people discussed this and finally decided in favor of the naturalistic, whether Schiller's characters with their hands in their pockets, because that had once become fashionable, whether they should also utter their heroic sentences, shall we say, in this way on stage!
You see, there is much reason to find the way into a proper exploration of the spiritual world. And the one that opens up in the field of art is truly not an entirely incorrect path.
Was it thus of a very special significance to penetrate from the old initiate science, which had immersed itself in the mysteries of the moon with all that belongs to it, to that which can only be penetrated when the achievements, but I mean now the spiritual achievements of natural science, are impregnated into the state of the soul, which can recognize occultly, This was of immense importance, on the other hand it is of no less importance that the unclear, dilettantish attempts which are made to come to terms with that which, after de-spiritualization, as is the case with the somnambulist and the medium, nevertheless moves under spiritual influence in the forms of the spiritual - it was no less important to make this a special field of research. For these two paths must actually be regarded as one: the penetration from within through the dream world, which has become contemplative, and the conscious grasping of the outer world, which natural science grasps only through its mineral properties, which are to be investigated in a dilettantish way through so-called psychical research. It is important, precisely because we live in the age of natural science, to also follow this path of spiritual research, to also spiritually explore the other area, the area that is polar opposite to dreams.
When we have a somnambulist, a medium before us, then something does not happen through the somnambulist and the medium that we are used to from ordinary life. The somnambulist does not write as an ordinary person writes, does not move as an ordinary person moves, does not speak as an ordinary person speaks, does not taste as an ordinary person tastes, because the astral body and ego are out of the physical and etheric body and we are dealing with a physical and etheric body that have been abandoned and are now under the influence of the cosmos, are subject to the influence of the cosmos. So we are dealing with revelations of the physical and the etheric that are not the usual natural effects that come from the spiritual, from the spiritual world. After all, it is basically the same whether I stand in front of a medium and suggest something to him or whether the medium is subject to some star influence and absorbs it into the etheric body or a climatic influence or the influence of a metal and so on.
We have before us an organization in the medium that is magically devoted to the spiritual. We must take this into consideration. We cannot then study these effects without already having the spiritual, as the societies for external psychic research would like to do, who want to experiment with it in an external way. You have to look into the spiritual context. There one must have as foreground that which takes place through the medium or the somnambulist or otherwise through the human being and see in the background that which is present as spiritual.
But all these effects that occur in the medium, that occur in the somnambulist, are related to other mediumistic phenomena. If you have a medium sitting here and in a certain state under human influence or under cosmic influence it performs this or that, that is, actually, if a physical and an etheric body perform this or that, then it is temporarily, temporarily quite the same as what, due to something else, is caused in the poisonous plants through which the human being falls ill in a certain way. It is only, I would say, the outer temporary mask of the illness that appears in the somnambulistic, in the mediumistic state. And from a certain point of view - this will be explained further in the next lectures - one can see in the phenomena of mediumism, in the phenomena of somnambulism - one does not need to, but one can - that which is actually present in the sick person in that in an abnormal way his ego and his astral body have somehow withdrawn from an organ or from the whole organism, and the person thus comes under special spiritual influences.
You see, because people in ancient times realized that this connection existed, the mysteries were always connected with medicine, and because people were not as curious then as they are today, they did not consider it necessary to concern themselves much with mediums and somnambulists, whose workings were understood in the same way as illnesses are understood. These things were dealt with more from the point of view of medicine. And that was a point of view that had to be regained.
And that which comes into the spiritual in a dilettantish way as the other way through the phenomena of nature, that other way which is taken in a dilettantish way, must be pursued in the right way. That which is in the world and which expresses itself in particular through the pathological states of man and animals must be pursued in the right way. Only then will we be able to investigate what the Society for Psychical Research wants to investigate.
And this path has now also been trodden on the ground of the anthroposophical movement. It has been made possible by the fact that the pathological phenomena can be pursued in such a way that access to the spiritual world opens up out of them. This has been made possible by the fact that in the collaboration between myself and Dr. Ita Wegman, this path, which is missed by physical research, is attempted to be followed in the right way. This is possible because this collaboration has resulted from the fact that in Ita Wegman there are really not only those insights which today's doctor acquires, but also those intuitive-therapeutic impulses which go directly from the clinical picture into the spiritual world and from there come to the therapy.
There, however, lies the path to exploring the area to which I am pointing here. And so, through this work, an attempt is made to develop real initiated medicine, which is natural science initiated by itself. In this way, the other, right path will be presented to the world in contrast to the wrong paths. And you will already see from the first volume of the book that Dr. Wegman and I are writing together, which will soon be published and is now in print, how this path must be taken.
You see that examples are the easiest way to show how the right paths differ from the wrong ones, from the erroneous ones. And this may perhaps also be pointed out here in this context. When I said before that a path must be opened up into art, which in turn brings the realm of the spiritual and the realm of the materially formed closer together, I must say that, according to the conditions of today's civilization, it seems that the right path will only be found when the latter path has been taken with reference to natural phenomena. - For today, in the artistic field, humanity is so far removed from that bridge-building of which I have spoken that it can perhaps only be convinced of the weaving and life of the spiritual in art when it can be convinced in that intensive way of the working of the spiritual which can be seen especially in the genesis of the pathological; when it has only become clear through such a working, as will be the case in the collaboration between Ita Wegman and myself, when it will only become clear how the spirit weaves and lives in matter, how it reveals itself in matter. When this can be seen in the field of nature, then perhaps the enthusiasm, the full enthusiasm, will be able to awaken for this to be placed directly before the world in art.
I will speak further about these things tomorrow.
