Three Epochs in the Religious Education of Man
GA 307
12 August 1923, Ilkley
Translator Unknown
If we survey history as one great whole, we see it—in spite of the many valleys and lowlands breaking the heights of the ascending development of man—as a continuous education of the human race, as a process whereby a religious, a divine consciousness penetrates ever and again into mankind.
In every epoch of human evolution there has existed some kind of Initiation Science, analogous, in its own way, to the Initiation Science outlined in my book Knowledge of the Higher Worlds and its Attainment. What I have there described is the Initiation Science of the present age, and it leads us from a mere knowledge of Nature to a knowledge of Spirit.
To this Initiation Science the course of human evolution is revealed in a threefold light. We can look back to a very ancient epoch which came to a close about the year 800 B.C. Then we see an epoch radiant in the light of the Mystery of Golgotha, when through Christ Jesus an everlasting impulse entered into human evolution; and so too, there can arise in our vision a third epoch, an epoch in which we stand to-day and which, by a new Initiation Science, we have to bring to a deeper reality.
Now over and above what is imparted to man by his natural development, intelligence, reason, will, feeling and by his earthly education, each of these three epochs has striven for something else. In each of these epochs man has sensed the existence of a mighty riddle, deeply interwoven with his destiny. And always this riddle has assumed a different form because the human race has passed through different conditions of soul in the several epochs. It is only in the modern age of abstractions, since the inception of the theory—invalid though it be—that the soul of man has evolved from the animal state, that the human soul could be thought of as having remained unchanged through the ages.
Those whom a deeper science has enabled to gaze with unbiased vision into the reality of life, realise that the constitution of the human soul in the first epoch of evolution was not by any means the same as in the epoch crowned by the Mystery of Golgotha. Again there is a difference in our own times, when we must learn to understand this Mystery of Golgotha if it is not to be lost as a fact of knowledge.
In this sense, then, let us consider the nature of the human soul in the ancient East, in an age which produced the wisdom contained in the Vedas and the Vedanta philosophy. Everywhere to-day men are turning back, and often with great misunderstanding, to the Vedas and the Vedanta. If we look at the souls of men in this ancient East, even at souls living in the old Chaldean-Assyrian-Babylonian civilisation and on into the earliest Greek period, we find that they were of quite a different nature from the souls of men living to-day. The souls of men in those ancient times passed through a much more dreamlike, spiritual existence than the souls of modern men, who in their waking life are wholly given up to sense impressions, to all that the intellect can derive from these sense impressions and the substance flowing into the human memory from them. What really constitutes the substance of the soul of man to-day, did not bear the same form in the souls of the ancients. These men possessed a much more instinctive wisdom of the inner life of soul and Spirit. What we to-day would speak of as the faculty of clear and conscious discernment, did not as yet exist. Man experienced a weaving, moving inner life, the shadowy echoes of which remain in our present dream-life. It was an inner life, in which man not only knew with certainty that a soul was weaving and moving through his body, forming part of his true manhood, but in which he also knew: A soul, born from a divine-spiritual existence before a body clothed me in my earthly existence, is living within me.
In those ancient times man experienced his own being in a kind of waking dream. He knew himself as soul and in this inner, living experience felt the body as a kind of sheath, merely an instrument for the purposes of earthly existence. Even in his waking hours man lived in this consciousness of soul—dreamlike though it was. And he knew with clear conviction that before a physical body clothed him on Earth, he had lived as soul in a divine-spiritual world. Direct inner perception revealed to him this life of soul and Spirit, and, as a consequence, his consciousness of death was quite different from that of modern man. To-day man feels that he is deeply linked with his body. His inner consciousness of soul is not detached from his bodily life as was the case in earlier times. He looks upon birth as a beginning, death as an end.
So living and intimate was the experience of the permanent, eternal nature of the soul in the ancients, that they felt themselves raised above birth and death in their contemplation of this life of soul. Birth and death were states of growth, metamorphoses of life. They knew the reality of a pre-earthly existence and hence with equal certainty that they would live on beyond the gate of death. Birth and death were transitory occurrences in an unceasing life.
It has, however, always been necessary for man's immediate experience to be widened and deepened by knowledge that penetrates to the spiritual world, by an Initiation Science that tells him more than can arise within his inner being or is imparted to him in ordinary life by earthly education. It fell to the old Initiates, the teachers of that ancient humanity, to give the answer to a definite riddle that arose in the souls of men. As I have said, these men knew of the soul' and Spirit in immediate experience. But there was a great riddle and it arose in the soul in this form: Through conception and birth I pass into physical life and move upon Earth; I am clothed in my physical body and this body contains the very same substances as those of dead, outer Nature. I am clothed in something that is foreign to my being. Between birth and death I live in a body—a body of Nature. I am born in a physical sense but this physical birth is foreign to my inner sense of being.
The mighty riddle before the man of very ancient times, as he gazed into his innermost being, was not a riddle connected with the soul or Spirit, but with Nature. And it arose before him as he sensed the full inner reality of soul and Spirit and then felt the need to understand why he was clothed in a physical body so foreign to his real being. It was the task of Initiation Science to teach man how he could direct the same forces which enabled him to gaze into the life of soul and Spirit, to outer Nature as well—to Nature whose manifestations are otherwise dumb and inarticulate. And if after adequate training—so it was taught by that ancient Initiation Science—man directs to stone, plant, animal, to clouds, stars, to the courses of Sun and Moon, the forces which otherwise lead only to inner knowledge, he can know and understand outer Nature as well. Then he beholds the Spiritual not only in his inner being but also in bubbling spring, flowing river and mountain, in the gathering clouds, in lightning, thunder, in stone, plant and animal.
Thus did an ancient Initiation Science speak to man: “Gazing into thine own being, thou hast living experience of soul and Spirit, thou hast found the Divine within thee. But Initiation Science trains the power which otherwise beholds the Divine in man alone, also to behold the Divine in the whole life of Nature. Thou art clothed in an outer physical body. Know that this body too is from God. Physical birth hath brought thee into an earthly existence which is itself of a Divine origin.”
And so the task of ancient Initiation Science was to give man this sublime teaching: “Know that thou art born of God not only when thine eyes gaze inwards. In the body that comes into the world through physical birth—there also thou art born of God.” And all that the old Father Initiation placed before the soul of man was expressed, in after times, in three penetrating words:
Ex Deo Nascimur.This was the first way in which Initiation Wisdom worked upon man and awakened a religious consciousness within him.
The old heathen cults assumed the form of Nature-religions because man felt the need for a justification of his physical birth in Nature. The riddle of Nature—this was what confronted his soul; and in this Ex Deo Nascimur the riddle of Nature was solved and he could feel his earthly existence hallowed, although in his waking life he still felt himself a being of Spirit and soul, transcending the Physical.
As the course of evolution continued, man's early, dreamlike experience of soul and Spirit—which was indeed a kind of innate knowledge of his true inner being—faded gradually into the background. He began more and more to use the instruments afforded by his physical body. Let me express it as follows: The dreams of a life of soul and Spirit that characterised a primal instinct in the human race, faded away into darkness, and for the first time indeed in the last few thousands of years before the Mystery of Golgotha, men learnt to make use of their outer senses and of the intellect bound up with these outer senses. What we to-day call “Nature” appeared before men as an actual experience. It was the task of the old wise Initiates to unfold the spirituality of Nature to the human soul. The purely physical quality of outer Nature was now there as a question before the soul. To the old riddle of man's earthly existence there was added the second great riddle in the history of evolution—that of man's earthly death.
It was only in the last few thousands of years before the Mystery of Golgotha that man really came to feel death in earthly existence with any intensity. Whereas in earlier times he had little sense of his body and a strong sense of soul and Spirit, he now felt and experienced his being in the physical body. And death, the enigmatic event that is bound up with the physical body, was experienced by him as the greatest riddle of existence in this second epoch. This riddle of death emerges with great intensity among the ancient Egyptians, for instance. They embalmed their corpses because they; experienced the terror of death, because they were aware of the kinship of the physical body (in which they sensed their own existence) with death. “How do I live in my earthly body?” This had been the first riddle. “How do I pass through earthly death?”—this was the second.
In the days when man had gazed upwards to the soul and Spirit, when the soul and Spirit were immediate experience to his instinctive clairvoyance, he knew: When the chains that bind me to this earthly existence fall away, I shall belong to the Earth no more. My earthly being will be changed and lo! I shall once again live in the super-earthly kingdom, I shall be united with the stars.—For the soul knew the stars spiritually in the living, instinctive existence of days of yore. Man read his destiny in the stars. He felt himself united with Sun and Moon; he knew the stars. “From the Spirit in the stars, from a pre-earthly existence I have come forth. To the stars to the Spirit in the stars—I shall return, when I pass through the gate of death.”
But now all this became a riddle. Man confronted death, beholding in death the body's end. He felt his soul inwardly bound to the body and with a deep awareness of this riddle he asked himself: “What becomes of me after death? How do I pass through the portal of death?” And to begin with, there was nothing on the Earth which could help him to solve this riddle.
The old Initiates knew how to explain to man the riddle of Nature. Ex Deo Nascimur—this was how they answered, if we translate their words into a later tongue. But now, all consciousness of the pre-earthly existence whither man would return after he had passed the gate of death, all that was so clearly revealed to the ancients, was obliterated from the human soul. The instinctive knowledge, arising in man as his life of soul and Spirit flowed upwards to the stars, was no longer there. And then a mighty event occurred.—The Spirit of the world of stars—He Whom a later age called “Christ” and an earlier Greek age, the “Logos”—descended upon Earth, descended in His Substance as a Spiritual Being and took flesh upon Himself in the human body of Jesus of Nazareth. It was given to mankind to experience the greatest event of earthly existence. He Whose life had been divined by the ancients as they gazed upwards to the stars, the Godhead of Whom the Divine-Earthly is also part, passed through earthly life and through death. For the death and resurrection of Christ were, in the first place, the most essential features for those who truly understood Christianity.
And so, this passing of the God Who in earlier times only revealed Himself from the stars—this passing of the Godhead through a human body—contained the solution of the second riddle of existence, the riddle of death, inasmuch as the mystery was revealed in the so-called Gnosis by the Initiates of the age of the Mystery of Golgotha. The Initiates could now teach men: The Being Who erstwhile dwelt in Eternity, in the stars, has descended into a human body and has vanquished death in a human body. The Christ has now become an “extract” of the Spirit, of the Logos, of the Universe. The old Initiates had pointed to Nature, saying: “Out of God is this Nature born.” Now the Initiates could teach man how he can be united with the Divine Being Who descended into Jesus of Nazareth, Who in the man Jesus of Nazareth passed, as all men pass, through the gate of death, but Who had conquered death. And once again it was possible for man to solve this second riddle of death, even as he had formerly solved the riddle of Nature.
In Buddhism we are told that the Buddha found the four great Truths, one of which awoke within him at the sight of a corpse, when he was seized by the despair of the human body in death. About six hundred years before the Mystery of Golgotha, as a last remnant of ancient thought, the Buddha had the vision of death. Six hundred years after the Mystery of Golgotha, men began to gaze at the dead human form on the Cross. And just as Buddha believed that in the corpse he had discovered the truth of suffering as a last fragment of ancient thought, so now a humanity permeated with the Christ impulse gazed at the dead figure on the Cross, at the crucifix, and felt in this figure the heavenly guarantee of a life beyond death—for death had been conquered by Christ in the body of Jesus.
Because of their fear of death, the Egyptians embalmed their corpses, to preserve, as it were, the Nature-forces in man from death. This was in the age of Ex Deo Nascimur. The early Christians, in whom the impulse of esoteric Christianity was still living, buried their dead but held divine service over the grave in the sure conviction that death is conquered by the soul that is united with Christ; the tomb became an altar. From the Mystery of Golgotha flowed the certainty that if man is united with Christ, Who as the spiritual essence of the stars descended upon Earth and passed through life, death and resurrection in a human form, he himself as man, will conquer death.
Thus God the Father was the answer to the riddle of Nature. Christ was the answer to the riddle of death. Death had lost its sting. Henceforth death became a powerful argument (which formerly had not been necessary) for the metamorphosis of life.
The Gnosis—which was later exterminated, and of which fragments only have been preserved—proves that as the Christian Initiates contemplated the Mystery of Golgotha, in the certainty that Christ had descended to Earth and had awakened to new life the death-bringing forces in the Earth, they were able to instil into humanity the truth of the union of mortal man on Earth with Christ. Through Christ, man redeems the forces of death within him and awakens them to life. And so the Initiates were now able to impart a new consciousness of immortality to men, saying: “Your souls can be united with Him Who passed through the Mystery of Golgotha; you can live in the life, death and resurrection of Christ. If your earthly life is more than a mere natural existence, if it is such that. Christ's Kingdom is awakened in your dealings with all your fellow-men, you live in communion with Christ Himself. Christ, the Divine Being, becomes your brother; in death and in life you die in Christ.” The truth of life in God the Son, in Christ, could now be added to the primeval truth of birth from God the Father, and to Ex Deo Nascimur was added:
In Christo Morimur
“In Christ we die”—that is to say—“As soul, we live!”
Such was the wisdom of man in the epoch that began about a thousand years before the Mystery of Golgotha and came to its close in the fifteenth century A.D. We are now living in a third epoch which we must learn to understand aright. So in the education of the human race directed by the great Divine Teachers of the world, there was added to the truth “Out of God the Father we are born”—this truth—“In Christ the Son we die, in order that we may live.”
The great riddles of the first and second epochs stand clearly before us when we look back over history. The riddle of the third epoch in which we have been living for some centuries is as yet little known or felt, albeit it exists subconsciously in the feeling life of man and he yearns for its solution as deeply as he once yearned for the solution of the riddle of his earthly nature and then of his earthly death.
Since the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries man has acquired a knowledge that penetrates deeply into Nature. Think only of the starry heavens which were once revealed to the dream-consciousness of the ancients and from which they read their destiny. External calculations, geometry and mechanics have taught man more and more about the stars since the approach of our present age. The science of the stars, of animals and plants has spread abroad in the form of a pure science of Nature. It was very different in the first epoch of human evolution and different again in the second, when in the depths of their souls men knew the truth of that which the old clairvoyant powers of the soul read in the stars, and which had descended in Christ into the body of Jesus of Nazareth. Thus Christ lived among men, and men of the second epoch looked to the Christ, felt Him in their hearts and in this deep communion with Him they experienced what the Spirit of the Cosmos had once revealed to an old dreamlike clairvoyant consciousness as the justification of earthly existence. In the second epoch, man lived in cosmic spheres, as it were, inasmuch as he lived in communion with the Christ Who had descended from these cosmic spheres to Earth.
Then came the third epoch, when the world of stars was understood merely through calculation, when men looked through the telescope and spectroscope and discovered in the stars the same dead elements and substances as exist on the Earth. In this epoch men can no longer see Christ as the Being Who descended from the stars, because they do not know that the stars are the expression of the Spiritual Essence weaving through the Cosmos. And so the Cosmos is void of God, bereft of Christ, for mankind to-day.
Therefore it is that the inner consciousness of man is now menaced by the danger of losing Christ. The first signs are already visible. The ideas of Divine Wisdom, of Theology, which for centuries contained full knowledge of the Christ revelation, are now in many respects powerless to find the Christ, the God in the man Jesus of Nazareth. Many who contemplate the age of the Mystery of Golgotha no longer find Christ as a Cosmic Being, they find only the man—Jesus of Nazareth. The starry heavens are bereft of God, they are a part of Nature and men can no longer recognise in Him Who passed through the Mystery of Golgotha, the Being Whose “physical kingdom” is the whole cosmos, but Who dwelt in, the man Jesus of Nazareth in the age of the Mystery of Golgotha.
Inasmuch as these things can be deeply experienced in the inner being, there is a difference between one who treads the path of Initiation Wisdom and one who merely stands within external Natural Science. This Natural Science has lost the Spirit of the Cosmos and the danger approaches that humanity will also lose sight of the Christ in Jesus of Nazareth.
Therefore it is that those who in our age penetrate more deeply into the knowledge of Nature that has blossomed forth in the third period of evolution since the fourteenth or fifteenth centuries, feel the third great riddle of man's earthly development. They look back in history to the first great riddle—that of man's earthly nature; to the second riddle of his earthly death. And the third riddle arises within them, whispering something that as yet they do not like to face, although they feel it subconsciously and with a certain emphasis in their hearts. The Initiates of our age say to themselves: “We are living in the world which once spoke to man from out of the cosmos—spoke as the Spirit. In days of yore man lived a life of full wakefulness in the cosmos. Gradually this waking life in the cosmos, this feeling of oneness with the Christ Who descended to Earth as the Being Who preserves this awareness of the spiritual cosmos in man, faded away, and we are now living in a cosmos that is revealed to us merely in its outer aspect. Cosmic ideas are experienced by us only in dreams. The cosmos is weighed in the scales of a balance, observed by the telescope. Such is our dream! And instead of uniting us with the Spirit of the cosmos, this dream separates us from Him.”
And so the third great riddle of the sleep of knowledge, the sleep into which mankind has fallen, stands before those who live in the third epoch of evolution, the third epoch, not only of “uninitiated” but of Initiation Science.
Deeper spirits of the human race have felt this. Descartes felt it, for he finally began to doubt the validity of all knowledge yielded by outer Nature. But, to begin with, it was felt only dimly. More and more deeply there must enter into men the consciousness that the whole domain of knowledge of which they have been so proud for some five centuries, represents a sleep of existence. This third great riddle must stand more and more clearly before them. Why do we dwell in an earthly, physical body? Why do we pass through earthly death? And in the third epoch this question arises in the hearts of men: Why this sleep of a knowledge directed merely to outer Nature? How can we awaken from the dream that this “calculated” universe represents, how can we pass from this cosmos whose external aspect is revealed through Astro-Physics and Astro-Chemistry, and stand face to face with the cosmos that in the depths of our innermost being unites us once again with its deepest Essence? How can we wake from the dream into which knowledge has fallen in recent times?
Ex Deo Nascimur—this was the answer given by the Initiates in the earliest times to man's question, “Why do I live in an earthly body?” In the age of the Mystery of Golgotha the Initiates sought to solve the riddle of death by linking man with Christ Jesus Who had passed through the Mystery of Golgotha, answering in the words of a later tongue, In Christo Morimur. And it is the task of modern Initiation Science in this our age and in the following centuries, gradually to lead mankind to a divine consciousness, to a religious life, and make it possible for him to awaken in his innermost being a spiritual knowledge of the cosmos. The Initiation Science that must arise through Anthroposophy does not wish merely to be an extension of our present sleeping knowledge—although men are proud of this knowledge and its outer successes have been so splendid. Anthroposophical Initiation Science would awaken this sleeping knowledge, would awaken man, who is fettered in the “dreams” of reason and intellectuality.
Hence, the Initiation Science that would be borne by Anthroposophy is not a mere extension of facts and discoveries of knowledge, but an impulse to an awakening, an attempt to answer the question: How can we wake from the sleep of life? And so, just as the earliest Initiates had explained Ex Deo Nascimur, and those who came later In Christo Morimur—the Initiation Wisdom which bears within itself a future life of conscious spiritual knowledge, a life leading to a deepening of religious feeling, a divine consciousness—this Initiation Wisdom would fain lead man once again to know that the Christ Who passed through the Mystery of Golgotha is the Logos, weaving and working through the cosmos. And inasmuch as man will gradually grow to be conscious of his cosmic existence, the Initiation Science that is intended to inaugurate a spiritual Christology in the truest sense (as well as an Art of Education, for instance, in a narrower sphere), will strive to bring a religious mood into the practical life it ever seeks to serve.—“Out of God we are born as physical human beings”—“In Christ we die”—that is to say, “As soul, we live.” To these truths Initiation Science will ever strive to add the third: “When we press forward through the new Initiation to the Spirit, then even in this earthly existence we live in the Spirit.” We experience an awakening of knowledge whereby all our life is bathed in the light of true religion, in the light of a moral goodness proceeding from inward piety. In short, this new Initiation Science endeavours to supplement the answers to the first and second riddles of Initiation as expressed in Ex Deo Nascimur and in, In Christo Morimur—although at the same time it solves them anew and restores them to the soul of man. It endeavours to bring afresh and in full clarity to the human heart, this other truth—a truth that will awaken the Spirit in heart and soul: In the understanding of the living Spirit, we ourselves, in body, soul and Spirit, shall be re-awakened—
Per Spiritum Sanctum Reviviscimus.Achter Vortrag
Die Tage der Woche sind während dieses Kurses einer fachlichen Betrachtung des pädagogischen Wesens gewidmet. Lassen Sie uns heute den Sonntagsvortrag, der herausfallen soll in seinem Wesen und Inhalte aus der Reihe der pädagogischen Vorträge, dazu benützen, um aufzublicken von der irdischen Menschenerziehung, die wir uns als eine Kunst aneignen sollen, zu den großen göttlichen Erziehern der gesamten Menschheit, zu den Weltenerziehern, welche die Menschheit im Laufe der geschichtlichen Entwickelung von Epoche zu Epoche geführt haben, so daß in jeder Epoche Verschiedenes gerade in religiös-sittlicher Beziehung im Zusammenhange mit der Welterkenntnis von der Menschheit angestrebt werden sollte.
Überblickt man die Geschichte als Ganzes, so erscheint sie doch trotz mannigfaltiger Wellentäler, Niederungen, die sich den Wellenbergen der aufsteigenden Entwickelung der Menschheit entgegenstellen, als eine fortlaufende Erziehung des Menschengeschlechtes, als ein immer erneutes Durchdringen mit dem, was man das religiös-sittliche Bewußtsein der Menschheit nennen kann.
Derjenigen Initiationswissenschaft, welche ich in meinem Buche «Wie erlangt man Erkenntnisse der höheren Welten?» zu beschreiben versuchte und welche die heutige Initiationswissenschaft ist, die uns heute von dem bloßen Naturerkennen zu dem Geist-Erkennen führt, entsprach zu allen Zeiten, in allen Epochen der Menschheitsentwickelung eine irgendwie geartete Initiationswissenschaft. Und für diese Initiationswissenschaft erscheint der Gang der Menschheit ein dreigliedriger.
Man kann zurückblicken in eine sehr alte Entwickelungsepoche der Menschheit, die etwa ihren Abschluß gefunden hat im 8. vorchristlichen Jahrhundert. Man kann dann in eine Epoche der Menschheitsentwickelung blicken, welche ihren Glanz und ihre Sonne erhält durch das Mysterium von Golgatha, durch dasjenige, was durch den Christus Jesus als ein ewiger, immer dauernder Impuls in diese Menschheitsentwickelung hereingekommen ist. Und man kann dann eine dritte Epoche ins Auge fassen, eine Epoche, an deren Aufgang wir eigentlich jetzt stehen, und die wir gerade durch eine neuere Initiationswissenschaft zu vertiefen haben werden.
Jede dieser Epochen hat über dasjenige hinaus, was dem Menschen durch seine naturgemäße Entwickelung, durch Sinn und Verstand, Wollen und Fühlen wie von selbst und durch die gewöhnliche irdische Erziehung zukommt, noch nach etwas anderem gestrebt. Jede dieser Epochen hat ein großes, in das Menschenschicksal tief eingreifendes Weltenrätsel empfunden. Und in jeder Epoche hatte dieses Weltenrätsel in einer gewissen Beziehung eine andere Gestalt, weil die Menschheit verschiedene Seelenzustände in den verschiedenen Epochen durchgemacht hat. Nur einer heutigen abstrakten Zeit erscheinen die Menschenseelen, seit sie sich, wie man heute durch eine allerdings ungültige Hypothese annimmt, aus der Tierwelt heraus entwickelt haben, gleichgeartet.
Demjenigen, der durch eine vertieftere Wissenschaft unbefangener in die Wirklichkeit des Menschenlebens hineinschaut, dem erscheint die Menschenseele in der ersten genannten Epoche in einer ganz anderen Weise geartet als in jener Epoche, die sich erfreuen durfte des Eintrittes des Mysteriums von Golgatha, und wiederum anders, als in unserer Epoche, in der wir das Mysterium von Golgatha wiederum suchen müssen, damit wir nicht der Gefahr unterliegen, es für die Erkenntnis zu verlieren.
Wenn wir auf die Art und Weise hinblicken, wie die Menschenseelen im alten Orient geartet waren, aus dem uns herüberleuchtet die Vedenweisheit, die Vedantaphilosophie, und die wir heute wiederum - allerdings durch manches Mißverständnis — in der mannigfaltigsten Weise aufsuchen, wenn wir auf diese Seelen hinsehen, ja selbst wenn wir noch hinsehen auf die alten chaldäisch-assyrisch-babylonischen Seelen, auf die ägyptischen Seelen und selbst noch auf das griechische Wesen in seiner älteren Zeit, wie diese Vorträge über Pädagogik in diesen Tagen gezeigt haben, dann müssen wir die Menschenseelen in jenen Zeiten in einer ganz anderen Art sehen, als sie heute beschaffen sind.
Diese Menschenseelen empfanden viel mehr ein träumerisches, geistiges Leben als die heutige Seele, die in ihrem Wachleben ganz und gar angewiesen ist auf die Sinneseindrücke, auf dasjenige, was der Verstand aus diesen Sinneseindrücken machen kann und was in der Erinnerung von diesen Eindrücken als Seeleninhalt erhalten blieb.
Alles, was so Eigentum der heutigen Seele ist, war nicht in derselben Weise bei den Seelen einer älteren Menschheitsepoche vorhanden. Es war bei diesen Seelen vielmehr eine instinktive Urweisheit vorhanden von dem inneren seelisch-geistigen Menschenleben. Nicht das war vorhanden, was wir heute aus der Gewohnheit unserer Sinneserkenntnis heraus als eine klarbewußte Einsicht ansehen, aber ein innerliches Weben und Leben, wie wir es abgeschwächt und abgeschattet im Traumleben haben, ein innerliches Leben, in dem sich für den Menschen nicht nur die Gewißheit ergab: du hast eine Seele, die den Körper durchwellt und durchwebt, die dein eigentliches Menschtum ausmacht, sondern du hast eine Seele, die hervorgegangen ist, bevor du dich in dem irdischen Dasein mit einem Leibe umkleidet hast, aus göttlich-geistigem Dasein.
Man möchte sagen: wie im wachen Träumen, so erlebte sich der Mensch in diesen älteren Epochen. Und er erlebte sich als Seele. Er erlebte sich als Seele so, daß für diese in elementarer Lebendigkeit innerlich empfundene und erlebte Seele der Körper etwas wie eine Art Umkleidung war, wie nur ein Werkzeug, um das Erdendasein zu vollbringen.
Das Seelenbewußtsein, wenn auch traumhaft, war dasjenige, in dem der Mensch auch während des Wachens lebte. Und aus diesem Seelenerleben ging ihm mit voller Klarheit hervor, daß er, bevor er in einen physischen Leib auf Erden eingekleidet wurde, als Seele in einer geistigen Sphäre, in einer geistigen Welt, in einem göttlichen Reiche gelebt habe.
Und so kannte dieser ältere Mensch das seelisch-geistige Leben durch unmittelbare innere Anschauung. Und er hatte dadurch, daß er dieses seelisch-geistige Leben durch eine unmittelbare Anschauung kannte, ein ganz anderes Bewußtsein von dem Tode, als es die heutige Menschheit hat. Die heutige Menschheit fühlt sich mit dem Körper verwandt. Es löst sich nicht in derselben Weise, wie bei einer älteren Menschheit, das seelische Bewußtsein los vom körperlichen Bewußtsein. Und so sieht der heutige Mensch auf die Geburt wie auf einen Anfang, auf den Tod wie auf ein Ende hin.
Der ältere Mensch hatte ein so lebendiges innerliches Erleben von dem Dauernden, Ewigen der Seele, daß er sich, indem er auf dieses seelische Leben hinblickte, immer als über Geburt und Tod erhaben fühlte. Sie waren ihm Wachstumszustände, Metamorphosen des Lebens. Er war sich klar darüber, daß er war, bevor er auf Erden war. Er konnte dadurch sicher sein, daß er auch dann ist, wenn er durch die Pforte des Todes durchgegangen sein wird. Geburt und Tod erschienen als vorübergehende Ereignisse im Leben.
Aber immer hat der Mensch nötig, daß er durch eine ins Geistige hineinschauende Wissenschaft eine Ergänzung dieses seines unmittelbaren Erlebens erhält, daß ihm durch eine geistige Initiationswissenschaft noch etwas anderes gesagt werde, als ihm durch sein eigenes Innere und durch das, was ihm im gewöhnlichen Leben die Erdenerziehung geben kann, aufgeht.
Die alten Initiierten, die Weisheitslehrer jener älteren Menschheit, die etwas hatten wie ein instinktives Hellsehen, die mußten den Menschen auf eine ganz bestimmte Frage eine Antwort geben. Im GeistigSeelischen wußte sozusagen die ältere Menschheit Bescheid. Man wußte, wie es sich mit dem Geistig-Seelischen verhält; denn das erlebte man, wie ich es eben angedeutet habe. Was aber ein Rätsel war, das war dies: Du ziehst, indem du die Erde betrittst, durch Empfängnis und Geburt in das physische Leben ein; du wirst mit deinem physischen Körper umkleidet, der dieselben Kräfte, ja dieselben Stoffe in sich trägt wie die äußere tote Natur. Du wirst mit etwas Fremdem umkleidet. Du steckst zwischen der Geburt und dem Tode in einem Körper, der ein Naturkörper ist. Du wirst geboren auf physische Weise. Diese Geburt auf physische Weise ist deinem innerlich erlebten Dasein fremd.
Die große Frage, welche dem sein Inneres erblickenden Menschen der alten Zeit vor der Seele stand, war nicht eine Seelenfrage, war nicht eine Geistesfrage, war gerade die Naturfrage, jene Frage, welche den Menschen überkam, wenn er sich mit seinem vollen geistig-seelischen Werte fühlte, und wenn er dann einsehen wollte, warum er mit einem ihm fremden physischen Körper umkleidet ist.
Und da handelte es sich dann für die Initiationswissenschaft darum, dem Menschen zu lehren, daß man dieselben Kräfte, durch die man das geistig-seelische Leben innerlich erblickt, auch auf die äußere Natur richten kann, die sonst stumm nur die äußeren Erscheinungen zeigt. Und wenn man, so lehrte jene Initiationswissenschaft, mit entsprechender Schulung die Kräfte, die sonst nur zur Innenerkenntnis, zur Seelenerkenntnis führen, auf die Steine, Pflanzen, Tiere, auf die Wolken, auf die Sterne, auf den Gang von Sonne und Mond richtet, dann kann man auch das Äußere erkennen. Und dann schaut man geistige Wesen, nicht nur im eigenen Menscheninneren, sondern schaut geistige Wesen in der sprudelnden Quelle, in dem fließenden Strom, in dem sich auftürmenden Berg, in der ziehenden Wolke, in Blitz und Donner, in Stein, Pflanze und Tier.
Und so sagte eine alte Initiationswissenschaft dem Menschen: Du bist gewöhnt, indem du in dich schaust und lebendig dein GeistigSeelisches empfindest, das Göttliche in dir zu finden. Die Initiationswissenschaft aber schult die Kräfte, die sonst nur das Göttliche im Menschen erblicken, auch für das Göttliche in allem Naturdasein. Dadurch kannst du beruhigt sein darüber, daß, indem du mit einem äußeren physischen Körper umkleidet wirst, der auch aus einem Göttlichen ist, daß deine physische Geburt dich nicht aus einem Äußergöttlichen, sondern aus einem Göttlichen in das Erdendasein hereinträgt.
Und so war es für eine ältere Initiationswissenschaft die Aufgabe, den Menschen die große Wahrheit zu lehren: Du bist nicht nur, indem du in dein Inneres blickst, ein Gottgeborener, du bist auch, indem du in deinem Körper bist, der durch physische Geburt in der Welt erscheint, ein Gottgeborener.
Dasjenige, was dann eine spätere Zeit zusammengefaßt hat in drei aufklärende, eindringliche Worte, das war es, was die alte Vaterinitiation dem Menschen vor die Seele hingestellt hat: Aus dem Gotte sind wir geboren.
Ex deo nascimur.
Das war die erste Stufe, wie Initiationsweisheit auf die Menschen gewirkt hat, wie Initiationsweisheit religiöses Bewußtsein in dem Menschen erzeugt hat.
Die alten heidnischen Religionen sind Naturreligionen geworden aus dem Grunde, weil der Mensch seine physische Geburt innerhalb der Natur religiös gerechtfertigt haben wollte. Das Naturrätsel stand vor seiner Seele. Und in dem «Ex deo nascimur» wurde ihm das Naturrätsel gelöst, so daß er beruhigt sein Erdendasein führen durfte in einem religiösen Element, trotzdem er sich vom Aufwachen bis zum Einschlafen als ein über das Physische erhabenes Geistig-Seelisches fühlte.
Der Fortgang in der Menschheitsentwickelung bestand dann darin, daß jenes alte traumhafte Erleben des Seelisch-Geistigen, das der Mensch gewissermaßen als die ihm eingeborene Erkenntnis des eigenen Wesens in sich trug, immer mehr und mehr in den Hintergrund trat, und der Mensch sich immer mehr und mehr der Werkzeuge seines physischen Leibes zu bedienen lernte. Ich möchte sagen: die Träume von Seelisch-Geistigem, die einem Urinstinkte des Menschengeschlechtes eigen waren, dämmerten hinunter in unbestimmtes Dunkel, und die Menschheit lernte, und zwar erst im letzten Jahrtausend vor dem Mysterium von Golgatha, sich der äußeren Sinne zu bedienen und desjenigen Verstandes, der an die äußeren Sinne gebunden ist. Und das, was wir heute Natur nennen, trat immer mehr und mehr den Menschen als unmittelbares Erlebnis vor Augen. Hatten noch die alten Initiierten durch Weisheit das Geistige in der Natur vor die menschliche Seele hinrücken müssen, so stand jetzt das rein Physische der äußeren Natur fragend vor der Menschenseele, und zu dem alten Rätsel von der Erdennatur des Menschen kam das zweite große Rätsel in der historischen Menschheitsentwickelung: das Rätsel vom Erdentode des Menschen.
Der Mensch lernte eigentlich erst im letzten Jahrtausend vor dem Mysterium von Golgatha den Tod im Erdendasein in intensiver Weise fühlen. Hatte er früher wenig Empfindung von seinem Körper, um so mehr Empfindung von seinem Geistig-Seelischen, so fühlte und erlebte er sich jetzt in seinem physischen Körper. Und er erlebte dasjenige Ereignis, das mit dem physischen Körper rätselhaft verbunden ist, als das große Daseinsrätsel in dieser zweiten Epoche der Menschheitsentwickelung: er erlebte dieses Todesrätsel. Wir sehen dieses Todesrätsel in intensiver Gestalt auftreten, zum Beispiel bei den alten Ägyptern, die die Leichname einbalsamierten, weil sie gewissermaßen wie historisch die Todesfurcht des Menschen erlebten, die Verwandtschaft desjenigen, in dem der Mensch jetzt sich als in seinem physischen Leibe fühlte, mit dem Tode. Und während das erste Rätsel für den Menschen dieses war: Wie lebe ich in meinem physisch-irdischen Körper? — entstand jetzt das zweite große Rätsel: Wie durchlebe ich den Erdentod?
In jener Zeit, in welcher der Mensch hinaufgeschaut hat zu dem Geistig-Seelischen dadurch, daß er dieses Geistig-Seelische unmittelbar wie durch ein instinktives Hellsehen erlebte, da wußte er: Wenn ich nicht mehr mit diesem Erdendasein verbunden sein werde, dann gehöre ich auch der Erde nicht mehr an, dann geht mein Erdendasein durch eine Metamorphose hindurch, und ich bin wieder mit dem Außerirdischen, mit den Sternen verbunden. Denn von den Sternen wußte die Seele, als sie sich instinktiv lebendig fühlte im alten Dasein, auf geistige Art. Aus den Sternen las der Mensch sein Schicksal. Mit der Sonne und mit dem Monde fühlte er sich verbunden, von den Sternen wußte er. Aber von dem Geist in den Sternen kam er aus einem vorirdischen Dasein; zu den Sternen, aber zu’ dem Geiste in den Sternen kehrt er zurück, wenn er durch die Pforte des Todes geht.
Jetzt wurde ihm dies alles rätselhaft. Er sah hin auf den Tod; er sah im Tode das Ende des Menschenkörpers. Er fühlte die Seele innig verbunden mit diesem Menschenkörper. Er fragte sich, indem er dieses Rätsel tief empfand: Wie wird es mit mir nach dem Tode? Wie gehe ich durch die Pforte des Todes hindurch? — Aus diesem Rätsel heraus hätte den Menschen zunächst nichts auf der Erde führen können.
Die alten Initiierten wußten dem Menschen Bescheid zu geben in bezug auf das Naturrätsel. Da antworteten sie ihm, wenn wir es in eine spätere Sprache übersetzen: Ex deo nascimur.
Dasjenige aber, woraus der Mensch wußte, von woher er im vorirdischen Dasein gekommen ist, wohin er gehen sollte, wenn er durch die Pforte des Todes geschritten ist, das, was den alten Menschen klar vor der Seele stand, es war jetzt aus der Seele der Menschen erloschen. Das Wissen, das der Mensch instinktiv empfand, indem er sein eigenes seelisch-geistiges Erleben auf die Sternenwelt ausdehnte, das war nicht mehr da. Da ereignete sich das Große, daß die Sternenwelt, der Geist der Sternenwelt, den eine spätere Zeit den Christus genannt hat, den eine frühere griechische Zeit den Logos nannte, selber herunterkam substantiell als Wesenheit auf die Erde und sich verkörperte in dem Menschenleib des Jesus von Nazareth. Und so konnte die Menschheit das Große im Erdendasein erleben, daß dasjenige, was vorher eine alte Menschheit ahnte, indem sie hinaufsah zu den Sternen, das Göttliche, zu dem auch das Göttliche der Erde gehörte, selber durch ein Erdendasein, durch den Tod hindurchschritt. Denn der Tod Christi, die Auferstehung Christi, war zunächst für die Christen, die das Christentum verstanden, die Hauptsache.
Und dieses Durchgehen des Gottes, der früher nur aus den Sternen sich offenbarte, durch einen Menschenleib, durch den Tod eines Menschenleibes, das gab nun, indem es von den Initiierten zur Zeit des Mysteriums von Golgatha in der sogenannten Gnosis den Menschen erörtert wurde, den Menschen die Lösung des zweiten Lebensrätsels, des Todesrätsels.
Jetzt konnten die Initiierten den Menschen darauf hinweisen, wie das, was in der alten Weise die Ewigkeit verbürgte, was in den Sternen wohnt, in einen Menschenleib eingezogen ist und in einem Menschenleib den Tod überwunden hat. Jetzt wurde der Christus wieder Extrakt des ganzen Geistes, des Logos, der Welt. Hatten früher die alten Initiierten auf die Natur hingewiesen und die Menschen gelehrt: aus dem Gotte ist deine Natur geboren -, so konnten jetzt die Initiierten den Menschen darauf hinweisen, wie er verbunden sein kann mit dem göttlichen Wesen, das durch den Menschen Jesus von Nazareth gegangen ist, das im Menschen Jesus von Nazareth mit der übrigen Menschheit gemeinsam durch den Tod gegangen ist, aber den Tod besiegt hat. Und wiederum konnte man aus jener Initiationswissenschaft, jetzt aus der durchchristeten Initiationswissenschaft, so wie früher das Naturrätsel, jetzt das Todesrätsel lösen.
Und während es noch im Buddhismus so war, daß uns erzählt werden kann, wie der Buddha die vier großen Wahrheiten entdeckt und eine von diesen Wahrheiten ihm aufgeht beim Anblick eines Leichnams, wo er von der Trostlosigkeit des toten menschlichen Körpers so ergriffen wird, daß uns angedeutet wird, wie der Buddha, etwa sechs Jahrhunderte vor dem Mysterium von Golgatha, in dem Anblick des Toten sozusagen zu dem letzten Ausläufer der alten Weltanschauung hinkommt, so sehen wir, wie sich — etwa wiederum sechs Jahrhunderte nach dem Mysterium von Golgatha — die Anschauung ausbildet, die hinaufschaut zu dem Toten am Kreuze, zu der toten Menschengestalt. Und so wie der Buddha in der toten Menschengestalt das Leiden des Lebens als letzten Ausläufer der alten Weltanschauung entdeckt zu haben glaubte, so sah jetzt die durchchristete Menschheit zu der toten Menschengestalt am Kreuze, zu dem Kruzifixus hin und empfand an der toten Menschengestalt die völlige himmlische Garantie für das Leben durch den Tod, den der Christus im Jesus besiegt hat.
Und so wie aus der historischen Todesfurcht heraus die Ägypter ihre Leichname einbalsamiert hatten, um gewissermaßen noch das Naturhafte im Menschen vor dem Tode zu bewahren in der Zeit, als man noch sagte: Ex deo nascimur —, so sehen wir die ersten Christen, die noch den Impuls des initiierten Christentums hatten, ihre Toten begraben, aber über den Toten - in der Gewißheit, daß die mit Christus vereinigte Seele den Tod besiegt — den Gottesdienst halten. Und das Grab wird zum Altar. Aus dem Mysterium von Golgatha zieht der Mensch die Gewißheit: wenn er verbunden ist mit dem Christus, der als der Sterneninhalt heruntergestiegen ist auf die Erde, in einer Menschengestalt Leben und Tod und Auferstehung durchgemacht hat, so wird er durch diese Verbindung mit dem Christus selber als Mensch den Tod besiegen.
So antwortete der Inhalt des Vatergottes auf das Naturrätsel des Lebens. So antwortete der Inhalt des Christus auf das Todesrätsel des Lebens. Und dem Tode wurde sein Stachel genommen. Der Tod wurde fortan durch ein stärkeres Argument, als früher nötig war, zu einer Metamorphose des Lebens gemacht. In dem Hinschauen auf das Mysterium von Golgatha, in der Gewißheit: der Christus ist zur Erde heruntergestiegen und hat dasjenige, was todbringend in der Erde ist, zu neuem Leben erweckt, durchdrangen jetzt — das beweist die später ausgerottete, nur in wenigen Resten erhaltene Gnosis — die Initiierten des Christentums die Menschheit mit jener Wahrheit, welche die Menschenwahrheit enthält von der Verbindung des sterblichen Menschen auf Erden mit dem Christus, durch den der Mensch sein Todgeweihtes in sich erlöst, sein Todgeweihtes zum Leben erweckt. Es durchdrangen jetzt die Initiierten die Menschheit mit einem neuen Unsterblichkeitsbewußtsein.
Die Initiierten konnten den Menschen sagen: Eure Seele kann verbunden sein mit Ihm, der durch das Mysterium von Golgatha gegangen ist; eure Seele kann leben mit Leben, Tod und Auferstehung des Christus. Indem ihr das Erdenleben nicht nur naturhaft durchlebt, indem ihr das Erdenleben so durchlebt, daß euch in allen Erdenleben, besonders in eurem Umgange mit allen Menschen, das Christus-Reich auferweckt wird, so lebt ihr in Gemeinschaft mit dem Christus selber, so machet ihr das göttliche Wesen Christus zu eurem Bruder. Sterbet ihr im Tode, so sterbet ihr im Leben, indem ihr in dem Christus sterbet.
Und hinzugefügt werden konnte zu der Urwahrheit des Geborenseins aus dem Vatergotte das Leben mit dem Sohnesgotte, mit Christus, was später in einem weiteren dreiwortigen Spruche als Ergänzung zu dem «Ex deo nascimur» hinzugekommen ist als:
In Christo morimur,
in dem Christus sterben wir, das heißt, als Seele leben wir.
Und so war hinzugefügt für die Menschheit in jener Epoche, die ein Jahrtausend vor dem Mysterium von Golgatha begonnen hat, und die geschlossen hat etwa im 15. nachchristlichen Jahrhundert — wir stehen in einer dritten Epoche drinnen, die wir erst richtig verstehen müssen —, so war hinzugefügt in der großen, durch die göttlichen Weltenlenker selbst geleiteten Erziehung des Menschengeschlechts zu dem «Aus dem Vatergotte sind wir geboren»: «In dem Christus-Gotte sterben wir, auf daß wir leben.»
Die großen Rätsel der ersten und der zweiten Epoche stehen den Menschen im geschichtlichen Rückblick deutlich vor Augen. Das Rätsel der dritten Epoche, in der die Menschheit seit einigen Jahrhunderten drinnen lebt, wird heute sogar noch wenig genannt, wenig empfunden, trotzdem gefühlsmäßig unterbewußt in der Gegenwart dieses Rätsel schon ebenso lösungsbedürftig in der Menschenseele lebt wie einstmals das Rätsel von der Erdennatur des Menschen, dann das Rätsel vom Erdentode des Menschen.
Die Menschheit hat seit dem 14., 15. Jahrhundert der nachchristlichen Zeit sich ein in die physische Natur tief eindringendes Wissen erworben. Wir brauchen nur daran zu denken, wie jener Sternenhimmel gewonnen worden ist, der einstmals mit Erkenntnisträumen geschaut worden ist von einer alten Menschheit, aus dem heraus in ihren Erkenntnisträumen eine alte Menschheit ihr Schicksal gelesen hat, wie dieser Sternenhimmel durch äußeres Rechnen, durch Geometrie, Mechanik immer mehr und mehr sich bis in unsere Gegenwart herein geoffenbart hat. Wir brauchen nur daran zu denken, wie die Wissenschaft von den Steinen, den Tieren, den Pflanzen sich ausgebreitet hat als eine rein natürliche Wissenschaft.
So war es nicht in der ersten Epoche der Menschheitsentwickelung; so war es auch noch nicht in der zweiten Epoche der Menschheitsentwickelung, in jener zweiten Epoche, wo vor allen Dingen die Menschheit im tiefsten Inneren ihrer Seele geahnt hat: Was einstmals ein instinktives Hellsehen der Menschenseele von den Sternen abgelesen hat, das ist in Substanz selber eingezogen in den Jesus von Nazareth als Christus, das lebt als Christus bei uns. Diese Menschheit der zweiten Epoche sah auf den Christus hin, fühlte den Christus im Herzen, und in diesem herzlichen Zusammensein mit dem Christus fühlte sie dasselbe, was einstmals aus dem Geiste des Kosmos heraus in einem traumhaft alten Hellseherbewußtsein die Menschheit zur Rechtfertigung des Erdendaseins gewußt hat. Sozusagen in den kosmischen Weiten lebte die Menschheit der zweiten Epoche, indem sie mit dem, der aus den kosmischen Weiten zur Erde heruntergestiegen ist, mit dem Christus zusammenlebte.
Da kam die dritte Epoche der Menschheit, jene Epoche, die nur noch mit der Rechnung, mit der Mechanik, mit dem Teleskop, mit dem Spektroskop in die Sternenwelten hinaufschauend dasselbe, was sie als ein Totes, höchstens ätherisch Belebtes auf Erden findet, auch in den Sternen findet; jene Epoche, in der die Menschheit nicht mehr den Christus sehen kann als den von den Sternen Heruntergekommenen, weil sie in den Sternen nicht mehr das den Kosmos durchsetzende Geistige erblickt. Und so ist der Kosmos gottesfremd und damit auch christusfremd für die Menschheit geworden.
Die Menschheit der Gegenwart steht daher in bezug auf ihr inneres Bewußtsein in der großen Gefahr, den Christus zu verlieren. Und wir sehen schon die ersten Schritte in dem Verlieren des Christus. Die Gottesweisheit, die Theologie, die durch Jahrhunderte hindurch in voller Harmonie lebte in ihren Ideen mit Bezug auf die ChristusOffenbarung, weiß heute vielfach nicht mehr den Christus zu finden, den Gott in dem Jesusmenschen von Nazareth. Und viele wissen, indem sie in die Zeit des Mysteriums von Golgatha blicken, nicht mehr den Christus, den geistigen Extrakt, die geistige Wesenheit des Kosmos zu finden, sondern viele finden nur noch den Menschen Jesus von Nazareth. Weil sie in dem Sternenhimmel nur noch die entgötterte Natur schauen, können sie nicht mehr in dem, der durch das Mysterium von Golgatha gegangen ist, das Wesen finden, dessen physisches Reich der ganze Kosmos ist, das aber in dem Menschen Jesus von Nazareth während des Mysteriums von Golgatha Wohnung genommen hat.
Indem das alles tief durchlebt werden kann, unterscheidet sich heute derjenige, der durch die Initiationsweisheit geht, von dem, der nur durch die äußere uninitiierte Naturwissenschaft geht. Diese äußere uninitiierte Naturwissenschaft hat den Geist des Kosmos verloren, steht vor der Gefahr, daß die Menschheit auch den Christus in dem Jesus von Nazareth verliert.
Deshalb fühlen diejenigen, die gerade in unserer Gegenwart tiefer hineindringen in unser Naturwissen, wie heraufgeblüht ist in der Entwickelungsgeschichte der Menschheit während der dritten Epoche, seit dem 14. oder 15. Jahrhundert, etwas wie das dritte große Rätsel der Erdenentwickelung der Menschheit. Sie schauen hin historisch auf das erste große Rätsel, auf das Rätsel von der Erdennatur; auf das zweite große Rätsel, auf das Rätsel von dem Erdentode des Menschen; und ihnen geht auf das dritte große Rätsel, indem sie sich etwas sagen, was die Menschheit sich heute noch nicht gerne sagt, was aber des Menschen Herz dennoch schon unterbewußt mit einer gewissen Deutlichkeit fühlt. Die Initiierten der gegenwärtigen Zeit sagen sich: Wir leben in der Welt, die einstmals als Geist vom Kosmos aus zu den Menschen gesprochen hat, so daß der Mensch in dieser Welt wie ein im Kosmos Wachender war. So leben wir, daß der Mensch begann, dieses Wachen des Kosmos in sich erlöschen zu fühlen, dieses Verbundensein mit dem Christus, der als das Wesen dieses den Menschen wachhaltenden Geistkosmos auf die Erde heruntergestiegen ist, wir nur mehr in einem Kosmos leben, der uns seine Außennatur zeigt. Wir leben den Ideentraum des Kosmos, wir leben einen errechneten, einen mit der Waage gewogenen, einen durch das Spektroskop geschauten Kosmos. Das ist unser Traum. Dadurch trennen wir uns mehr von dem wirklichen Geiste des Kosmos, als daß wir als Menschen mit ihm verbunden sind.
Daher steht derjenige, der teilhaftig ist in der neueren, in der dritten Epoche der Menschheitsentwickelung nicht nur der uninitiierten Wissenschaft, sondern der Initiationswissenschaft, vor dem dritten großen Rätsel: vor dem Rätsel des Erkenntnisschlafes, des großen Lebensschlafes der Menschheit.
Gefühlt haben es die tieferen Geister. Cartesius fühlte es, indem er dann an der Wahrheit alles dessen zu zweifeln begann, was die äußere Naturerkenntnis sagen kann. Aber es war erst anfänglich gefühlt. Es muß immer tiefer und tiefer zur Bewußtheit der Menschheit kommen, daß die ganze Erkenntnis, auf welche die neuere Menschheit seit drei, vier, fünf Jahrhunderten so stolz ist, einen Lebensschlaf darstellt, daß das dritte große Rätsel immer mehr und mehr über die Menschen kommen muß. Die Menschen mußten sich einmal fragen: Warum wohnen wir in einem physischen Erdenkörper? -, mußten sich dann fragen: Warum gehen wir durch den physischen Erdentod hindurch? — Und als drittes muß vor das Menschenherz die Frage treten: Warum schlafen wir den Erdenschlaf trotz einer bloß auf die Natur gerichteten Erkenntnis? Wie können wir uns dem Traume des errechneten Kosmos, des durch Astrophysik und Astrochemie bloß äußerlich geschauten, des äußerlich geträumten Kosmos, hintreten vor denjenigen Kosmos, der uns wiederum im tiefsten Inneren verbindet mit dem tiefsten Inneren seines Selbst? Wie können wir aus unserem Erkenntnistraum der neuesten Zeit aufwachen?
Und haben die alten ersten Initiierten dem Menschen die Frage: Warum lebe ich in einem Erdenleibe, in einem physischen Erdenleibe? — zu beantworten gehabt mit der Explikation des «Ex deo nascimur»; haben die Initiierten in dem Zeitalter des Mysteriums von Golgatha das Todesrätsel zu lösen versucht durch die Verbindung des Menschen mit dem Christus Jesus, der durch das Mysterium von Golgatha gegangen ist, in dem, was dann eine spätere Menschheit das «In Christo morimur» genannt hat, so hat eine neuere Initiationswissenschaft den Menschen durch die Gegenwart und namentlich in den nächsten Jahrhunderten allmählich hinzuführen zum Gottesbewußtsein, zum religiösen Leben, zu der Art, wie er sein Inneres für eine Geist-Erkenntnis des Kosmos auferweckt. Diejenige Initiationswissenschaft, die durch die Anthroposophie kommen soll, die auch der hier vorgetragenen Pädagogik zugrunde liegt, will nicht bloß das heutige schlafende äußere Wissen vermehren, auf das trotzdem die Menschheit so stolz ist, und trotzdem dieses äußere Wissen in bezug auf äußere Erfolge so glorios ist: sie will als anchroposophische Initiationswissenschaft dieses schlafende Wissen zum Erwachen bringen, sie will den in Verstandes-, in intellektualistischen Träumen befangenen Menschen auferwecken.
Daher ist diese Initiationswissenschaft, die durch Anthroposophie getragen werden will, nicht bloß eine Vermehrung von Kenntnissen und Erkenntnissen, sondern ein Impuls des Aufwachens, ein Versuch, die Frage zu beantworten: Wie erwachen wir aus dem Lebensschlafe?
Und so wie die ältesten Initiierten der Menschheit expliziert haben das Wort «Ex deo nascimur», so wie die späteren Initiierten expliziert haben das Wort «In Christo morimur», so wird diejenige Initiationsweisheit, welche trägt ein wirklich im Geiste erwachendes Erkenntnisleben der Zukunft, welche trägt ein wiederum zur religiösen Vertiefung führendes Leben, welche trägt ein wirkliches Gottesbewußtsein, nun dazu führen, daß man den Christus, den man erlebt im Hinblick auf das Mysterium von Golgatha, wiederum fühlt als den Logos, der durch den Kosmos weht und webt. Und indem der Mensch sich in seinem kosmischen Dasein wiederum fühlen wird, wird diese neue Initiationswissenschaft, die eine wirkliche spirituelle Christologie bringen soll, wie sie im Kleinen wirkend zum Beispiel eine Pädagogik bringen soll — es wird diese Initiationswissenschaft im Großen und im Kleinen in religiöser Hingebung in dem Dienste des Lebens, den sie der Praxis leisten will, sich immerdar bemühen, hinzuzufügen zu dem «Aus dem Gotte sind wir als physische Menschen geboren», zu dem «In dem Christus sterben wir, das heißt leben wir als Seele», das dritte: Indem wir zum Geiste vordringen durch die neuere Initiation, werden wir schon in diesem Erdenleben im Geiste lebendig, wachen wir auf, erleben wir die Erkenntniserweckung, die all unser Leben wiederum durchzieht mit dem Lichte der Religiosität, mit dem Lichte einer aus wirklich innerlicher Religiosität ergriffenen Moralität und Sittlichkeit. Kurz, diese neuere Initiationswissenschaft wird sich bestreben, zu dem alten Initiationsrätsel des «Ex deo nascimur» und dem mittleren Initiationsrätsel des «In Christo morimur», indem sie diese beiden Rätsel der Menschenseele wiederum voll lösend zurückgibt, sie wird sich bemühen, das andere in Lichtesklarheit in das Menschenherz hineinzutragen, das zur Auferweckung des Geistes in Menschenherz und Menschenseele führen soll, zur Religiosität der Erkenntnis: In der Erfassung des wahren, lebendigen Geistes werden wir selber als Leib, Seele und Geist auferweckt:
Per spiritum sanctum reviviscimus.
Eighth Lecture
The days of the week during this course are devoted to a technical examination of the nature of education. Today, let us use the Sunday lecture, which in its nature and content stands apart from the series of educational lectures, to look up from the earthly education of human beings, which we are to acquire as an art, to the great divine educators of all humanity, to the world educators who have guided humanity from epoch to epoch in the course of historical development, so that in each epoch different things should be striven for in relation to religion and morality in connection with humanity's knowledge of the world.
If we look at history as a whole, despite the many troughs and valleys that oppose the peaks of humanity's ascending development, it appears as a continuous education of the human race, as an ever-renewed permeation with what can be called the religious and moral consciousness of humanity.
The science of initiation that I attempted to describe in my book “How to Attain Knowledge of Higher Worlds” and which is the science of initiation today, leading us from mere knowledge of nature to knowledge of the spirit, corresponded at all times, in all epochs of human development, to some kind of science of initiation. And for this initiatory science, the course of humanity appears to be threefold.
We can look back on a very ancient epoch of human development, which came to an end around the 8th century BC. We can then look at an epoch of human development that receives its splendor and its sun from the mystery of Golgotha, from that which entered into human development through Christ Jesus as an eternal, everlasting impulse. And then we can look at a third epoch, an epoch whose dawn we are actually now standing at, and which we will have to deepen through a newer science of initiation.
Each of these epochs has striven for something beyond what comes to human beings naturally through their development, through their senses and intellect, their will and feelings, and through ordinary earthly education. Each of these epochs has sensed a great world mystery that deeply affects human destiny. And in each epoch, this world mystery took on a different form in a certain respect, because humanity has gone through different states of soul in the different epochs. Only in today's abstract time do human souls appear to be of the same kind, since, as is assumed today by an admittedly invalid hypothesis, they have developed out of the animal world.
To those who, through deeper science, look more impartially into the reality of human life, the human soul appears in the first epoch mentioned to be of a completely different nature than in the epoch that was privileged to experience the mystery of Golgotha, and again different from our epoch, in which we must seek the mystery of Golgotha once more so that we do not succumb to the danger of losing it to knowledge.
When we look at the nature of human souls in the ancient Orient, from which the wisdom of the Vedas and the philosophy of Vedanta shine down upon us, and which we seek again today in many different ways, albeit with some misunderstanding, when we look at these souls, even when we look at the ancient Chaldean-Assyrian-Babylonian souls, at the Egyptian souls, and even at the Greek nature in its earlier days, as these lectures on education have shown in recent days, then we must see the human souls of those times in a completely different way than they are today.
These human souls experienced a much more dreamlike, spiritual life than today's soul, which in its waking life is completely dependent on sensory impressions, on what the intellect can make of these sensory impressions, and on what has been preserved in the memory of these impressions as soul content.
Everything that is the property of the soul today was not present in the same way in the souls of an earlier epoch of humanity. Rather, these souls possessed an instinctive, primal wisdom of the inner spiritual life of the human being. What existed was not what we today, out of habit of our sensory perception, regard as clear conscious insight, but an inner weaving and life, as we have it in a weakened and shadowed form in our dream life, an inner life in which the human being not only gained the certainty that you have a soul that permeates and interweaves the body, that constitutes your actual humanity, but you also have a soul that emerged from divine-spiritual existence before you clothed yourself in a body in earthly existence.
One might say that in these earlier epochs, human beings experienced themselves as if in waking dreams. And they experienced themselves as souls. They experienced themselves as souls in such a way that for this soul, felt and experienced inwardly with elemental vitality, the body was something like a kind of covering, like a mere tool for accomplishing earthly existence.
Soul consciousness, even if dreamlike, was what humans lived in even while awake. And from this soul experience, it became completely clear to them that before they were clothed in a physical body on earth, they had lived as souls in a spiritual sphere, in a spiritual world, in a divine realm.
And so this older human being knew the soul-spiritual life through direct inner perception. And because he knew this soul-spiritual life through direct perception, he had a completely different consciousness of death than humanity has today. People today feel connected to their bodies. Their soul consciousness does not detach itself from their physical consciousness in the same way as it did for people in earlier times. And so people today view birth as a beginning and death as an end.
Ancient man had such a vivid inner experience of the enduring, eternal nature of the soul that, looking at this soul life, he always felt himself to be above birth and death. For him, they were stages of growth, metamorphoses of life. They were aware that they existed before they came to earth. They could therefore be sure that they would continue to exist after passing through the gate of death. Birth and death appeared as temporary events in life.
But human beings always need to have their immediate experience supplemented by a science that looks into the spiritual realm, so that a spiritual science of initiation can tell them something more than what they can grasp through their own inner being and through what earthly education can give them in ordinary life.
The ancient initiates, the wisdom teachers of that older humanity, who had something like instinctive clairvoyance, had to give people an answer to a very specific question. In the spiritual-soul realm, the older humanity knew, so to speak. They knew how things stood with the spiritual-soul realm, because they experienced it, as I have just indicated. But what was a mystery was this: when you enter the earth, through conception and birth, you enter physical life; you are clothed in your physical body, which carries within it the same forces, indeed the same substances, as the outer, dead nature. You are clothed in something foreign. Between birth and death, you are enclosed in a body that is a natural body. You are born in a physical way. This physical birth is foreign to your inner experience of existence.
The great question that faced the soul of the ancient man who saw his inner self was not a question of the soul, not a question of the spirit, but precisely the question of nature, the question that overwhelmed man when he felt his full spiritual and soul values and then wanted to understand why he was clothed in a physical body that was foreign to him.
And so the task of the science of initiation was to teach people that the same powers through which they could see their spiritual and soul life inwardly could also be directed toward external nature, which otherwise only silently displays its outward appearances. And if, as that initiatory science taught, with appropriate training, one directs the forces that otherwise lead only to inner knowledge, to knowledge of the soul, toward stones, plants, animals, clouds, stars, and the course of the sun and moon, then one can also recognize the external world. And then one sees spiritual beings, not only within one's own inner being, but also in the bubbling spring, in the flowing stream, in the towering mountain, in the passing cloud, in lightning and thunder, in stones, plants, and animals.
And so an ancient science of initiation told human beings: You are accustomed to finding the divine within yourself by looking within and feeling your spiritual soul alive. But the science of initiation trains the powers that otherwise only see the divine in human beings to also see the divine in all natural existence. In this way, you can be reassured that, by being clothed in an outer physical body that is also of divine origin, your physical birth does not bring you into earthly existence from something outside the divine, but from something divine.
And so it was the task of an older initiation science to teach people the great truth: not only are you a child of God when you look within yourself, but you are also a child of God when you are in your body, which appears in the world through physical birth.
What was later summarized in three enlightening, powerful words was what the ancient father initiation presented to the human soul: We are born of God.
Ex deo nascimur.
That was the first stage of how initiation wisdom affected people, how initiation wisdom created religious consciousness in people.
The ancient pagan religions became nature religions because people wanted to have a religious justification for their physical birth within nature. The mystery of nature stood before their souls. And in the “Ex deo nascimur” the mystery of nature was solved for them, so that they could lead their earthly existence in peace in a religious element, even though from waking to sleeping they felt themselves to be spiritual and soulful beings transcending the physical.
The progress in human development then consisted in the fact that the old dreamlike experience of the soul-spiritual, which humans carried within themselves as a kind of innate knowledge of their own being, receded more and more into the background, and humans learned more and more to use the tools of their physical body. I would like to say: the dreams of the soul-spiritual, which were inherent in a primal instinct of the human race, faded into an indefinite darkness, and humanity learned, only in the last millennium before the Mystery of Golgotha, to use the outer senses and the intellect that is bound to the outer senses. And what we now call nature became more and more apparent to human beings as a direct experience. Whereas the ancient initiates had had to use wisdom to bring the spiritual in nature before the human soul, now the purely physical nature of the external world stood before the human soul as a question, and to the ancient mystery of the earthly nature of man was added the second great mystery in the historical development of humanity: the mystery of man's death on earth.
It was only in the last millennium before the mystery of Golgotha that human beings actually learned to feel death in earthly existence in an intense way. Whereas they had previously had little feeling for their bodies, but all the more feeling for their spiritual and soul life, they now felt and experienced themselves in their physical bodies. And they experienced the event that is mysteriously connected with the physical body as the great mystery of existence in this second epoch of human development: they experienced this mystery of death. We see this mystery of death appear in an intense form, for example, in the ancient Egyptians, who embalmed corpses because they experienced, in a sense, the historical fear of death, the kinship of the one in whom man now felt himself to be in his physical body with death. And while the first mystery for man was this: How do I live in my physical, earthly body? — the second great mystery now arose: How do I live through earthly death?
In that time, when human beings looked up to the spiritual-soul realm by experiencing it directly, as if through instinctive clairvoyance, they knew: When I am no longer connected to this earthly existence, then I no longer belong to the earth, then my earthly existence undergoes a metamorphosis, and I am once again connected to the extraterrestrial, to the stars. For the soul knew about the stars when it felt instinctively alive in its ancient existence, in a spiritual way. Man read his destiny from the stars. He felt connected to the sun and the moon, he knew about the stars. But from the spirit in the stars he came from a pre-earthly existence; to the stars, but to the spirit in the stars he returns when he passes through the gate of death.
Now all this became a mystery to him. He looked at death; he saw in death the end of the human body. He felt the soul intimately connected with this human body. Feeling this mystery deeply, he asked himself: What will happen to me after death? How will I pass through the gate of death? — Out of this mystery, nothing on earth could have guided man at first.
The ancient initiates knew how to inform people about the mystery of nature. They answered them, if we translate it into a later language: Ex deo nascimur.
But what humans knew about where they came from in their pre-earthly existence, where they were to go when they passed through the gate of death, what was clear to the souls of ancient humans, had now disappeared from the souls of humans. The knowledge that man instinctively felt by extending his own soul-spiritual experience to the world of the stars was no longer there. Then the great event occurred, when the starry world, the spirit of the starry world, which a later age called Christ, which an earlier Greek age called Logos, came down in substance as a being to the earth and incarnated itself in the human body of Jesus of Nazareth. And so humanity was able to experience the great event in earthly existence, that which an ancient humanity had previously sensed when looking up at the stars, the divine, to which also belonged the divine of the earth, itself passed through earthly existence, through death. For the death of Christ, the resurrection of Christ, was initially the main thing for Christians who understood Christianity.
And this passing through of God, who previously revealed himself only from the stars, through a human body, through the death of a human body, now gave people the solution to the second mystery of life, the mystery of death, as it was discussed by the initiates at the time of the Mystery of Golgotha in what is known as Gnosticism.
Now the initiates could point out to people how that which in the old way guaranteed eternity, that which dwells in the stars, had entered into a human body and overcome death in a human body. Now Christ became once more the essence of the whole spirit, the Logos, the world. Whereas the ancient initiates had pointed to nature and taught people that their nature was born of God, the initiates could now show people how they could be connected to the divine being who had passed through the human being Jesus of Nazareth, who had passed through death together with the rest of humanity in the human being Jesus of Nazareth, but had conquered death. And again, from that science of initiation, now from the Christianized science of initiation, one could solve the riddle of death, just as one had previously solved the riddle of nature.
And while it was still the case in Buddhism that we could be told how the Buddha discovered the four great truths, and how one of these truths dawned on him at the sight of a corpse, where he was so moved by the desolation of the dead human body that we are given to understand how the Buddha, about six centuries before the mystery of Golgotha, in the sight of the dead man, so to speak, comes to the last remnant of the old worldview, we see how — again about six centuries after the mystery of Golgotha — the view develops that looks up to the dead man on the cross, to the dead human form. And just as the Buddha believed he had discovered the suffering of life in the dead human form as the last remnant of the old worldview, so now Christ-conscious humanity looked to the dead human form on the cross, to the crucifix, and felt in the dead human form the complete heavenly guarantee of life through death, which Christ in Jesus had conquered.
And just as the Egyptians had embalmed their corpses out of a historical fear of death, in order to preserve, as it were, the natural in man before death, at a time when people still said: Ex deo nascimur —, we see the first Christians, who still had the impulse of initiated Christianity, burying their dead, but holding worship services over the dead — in the certainty that the soul united with Christ conquers death. And the grave becomes an altar. From the mystery of Golgotha, man draws the certainty that if he is united with Christ, who descended to earth as the star content and went through life, death, and resurrection in human form, he will conquer death as a human being through this union with Christ himself.
Thus the content of the Father God responded to the natural mystery of life. Thus the content of Christ responded to the mystery of death in life. And death was stripped of its sting. From then on, death was transformed into a metamorphosis of life through a stronger argument than had previously been necessary. In looking at the mystery of Golgotha, in the certainty that Christ had descended to earth and awakened to new life that which is deadly in the earth, the initiates of Christianity now penetrated — as evidenced by Gnosticism, which was later eradicated and survives only in a few remnants — the initiates of Christianity now permeated humanity with the truth that contains the human truth of the connection between mortal man on earth and Christ, through whom man redeems what is doomed to death within himself, awakening what is doomed to death to life. The initiates now permeated humanity with a new consciousness of immortality.
The initiates could say to people: Your soul can be connected with Him who went through the mystery of Golgotha; your soul can live with the life, death, and resurrection of Christ. By living your earthly life not only naturally, but in such a way that the kingdom of Christ is awakened in you in all your earthly lives, especially in your dealings with all people, you live in communion with Christ himself, you make the divine being Christ your brother. If you die in death, you die in life by dying in Christ.
And to the primordial truth of being born of the Father God, life with the Son God, with Christ, could be added, which later came to be added in another three-word saying as a supplement to the “Ex deo nascimur” as:
In Christo morimur,
in Christ we die, that is, as souls we live.
And so it was added for humanity in that epoch, which began a millennium before the Mystery of Golgotha and ended around the 15th century AD — we are now in a third epoch, which we must first properly understand — so it was added in the great education of the human race, guided by the divine rulers of the worlds themselves, to the “We are born of the Father God”: “In the Christ God we die, that we may live.”
The great mysteries of the first and second epochs are clearly evident to people in historical retrospect. The mystery of the third epoch, in which humanity has been living for several centuries, is still little mentioned and little felt today, yet emotionally and subconsciously, this mystery lives in the human soul, just as much in need of a solution as once did the mystery of the earthly nature of man, then the mystery of the earthly death of man.
Since the 14th and 15th centuries AD, humanity has acquired knowledge that penetrates deeply into physical nature. We need only think of how the starry sky, once gazed upon with dreams of knowledge by an ancient humanity, from which an ancient humanity read its destiny in its dreams of knowledge, has been revealed more and more to the present day through external calculation, through geometry and mechanics. We need only think of how the science of stones, animals, and plants has spread as a purely natural science.
This was not the case in the first epoch of human development; nor was it the case in the second epoch of human development, in that second epoch when, above all, humanity sensed in the depths of its soul: What was once instinctively seen by the human soul in the stars has now entered into the substance of Jesus of Nazareth as Christ, who lives with us as Christ. The people of the second epoch looked to Christ, felt Christ in their hearts, and in this heartfelt communion with Christ they felt the same thing that humanity once knew from the spirit of the cosmos in a dreamlike ancient clairvoyant consciousness to justify their existence on earth. Humanity in the second epoch lived, so to speak, in the cosmic expanses, living together with Christ, who had descended to Earth from the cosmic expanses.
Then came the third epoch of humanity, the epoch in which, looking up at the starry worlds with only calculation, mechanics, the telescope, and the spectroscope, humanity finds in the stars the same thing it finds on earth as something dead, at most ethereally animated; that epoch in which humanity can no longer see Christ as the one who came down from the stars, because it no longer sees in the stars the spiritual that permeates the cosmos. And so the cosmos has become alien to God and thus also alien to Christ for humanity.
Humanity today is therefore in great danger of losing Christ in terms of its inner consciousness. And we are already seeing the first steps in the loss of Christ. Divine wisdom, theology, which for centuries lived in complete harmony in its ideas with regard to the Christ revelation, today often no longer knows how to find Christ, God in the human being Jesus of Nazareth. And many, looking back to the time of the Mystery of Golgotha, no longer know how to find Christ, the spiritual extract, the spiritual essence of the cosmos, but instead find only the human being Jesus of Nazareth. Because they see only de-divinized nature in the starry sky, they can no longer find in the one who passed through the Mystery of Golgotha the being whose physical realm is the entire cosmos, but who took up residence in the man Jesus of Nazareth during the Mystery of Golgotha.
By deeply experiencing all this, those who go through the wisdom of initiation today differ from those who go only through external, uninitiated natural science. This external, uninitiated natural science has lost the spirit of the cosmos and faces the danger that humanity will also lose the Christ in Jesus of Nazareth.
That is why those who are delving deeper into our knowledge of nature, especially in our present time, feel how something like the third great mystery of the earth's development of humanity has blossomed in the history of human development during the third epoch, since the 14th or 15th century. They look back historically at the first great mystery, the mystery of the nature of the earth; at the second great mystery, the mystery of the death of the human being on earth; and they come to the third great mystery by saying something to themselves that humanity does not yet like to say today, but which the human heart nevertheless already feels subconsciously with a certain clarity. The initiates of the present time say to themselves: We live in the world that once spoke to human beings as spirit from the cosmos, so that human beings in this world were like beings awake in the cosmos. We live in such a way that human beings began to feel this awakening of the cosmos dying out within themselves, this connection with Christ, who descended to earth as the essence of this spirit cosmos that keeps human beings awake. We now live only in a cosmos that shows us its external nature. We live the ideal dream of the cosmos, we live a calculated cosmos, a cosmos weighed on scales, a cosmos viewed through a spectroscope. That is our dream. In this way we separate ourselves more from the real spirit of the cosmos than we are connected to it as human beings.
Therefore, those who are part of the newer, third epoch of human development are faced not only with uninitiated science, but also with initiatory science, with the third great mystery: the mystery of the sleep of knowledge, the great sleep of life of humanity.
The deeper minds have sensed this. Descartes sensed it when he began to doubt the truth of everything that external knowledge of nature can say. But it was only sensed initially. It must become ever deeper and deeper in the consciousness of humanity that all the knowledge of which modern humanity has been so proud for three, four, five centuries represents a sleep of life, that the third great mystery must come more and more upon human beings. Humanity must ask itself: Why do we live in a physical earthly body? Then it must ask: Why do we go through physical death on earth? And thirdly, the question must arise in the human heart: Why do we sleep the sleep of the earth despite a knowledge directed solely at nature? How can we step out of the dream of the calculated cosmos, the cosmos seen only externally through astrophysics and astrochemistry, the cosmos dreamed externally, and step into the cosmos that connects us in our deepest inner being with the deepest inner being of its self? How can we wake up from our dream of knowledge of the most recent times?
And did the ancient first initiates answer the question: Why do I live in an earthly body, in a physical earthly body? — with the explanation of “Ex deo nascimur”; did the initiates in the age of the Mystery of Golgotha attempt to solve the riddle of death by connecting human beings with Christ Jesus, who had passed through the Mystery of Golgotha, in what later humanity called “In Christo morimur,” so a newer science of initiation has gradually led human beings, through the present and especially in the coming centuries, to God-consciousness, to religious life, to the way in which they awaken their inner being to a spiritual knowledge of the cosmos. The science of initiation that is to come through anthroposophy, which also forms the basis of the pedagogy presented here, does not merely seek to increase today's dormant external knowledge, of which humanity is nevertheless so proud, and which is nevertheless so glorious in terms of external achievements: as anthroposophical initiatory science, it wants to awaken this dormant knowledge; it wants to awaken people who are caught up in intellectual, intellectualistic dreams.
Therefore, this science of initiation, which is to be supported by anthroposophy, is not merely an increase in knowledge and insight, but an impulse of awakening, an attempt to answer the question: How do we awaken from the sleep of life?
And just as the oldest initiates of humanity explained the words “Ex deo nascimur,” just as later initiates explained the words “In Christo morimur,” so the wisdom of initiation, which carries a truly spiritually awakened life of knowledge of the future, which carries a life that leads to religious deepening, which carries a true consciousness of God, will now lead to the Christ, whom we experience in relation to the mystery of Golgotha, being felt once again as the Logos that blows and weaves through the cosmos. And as human beings feel themselves once more in their cosmic existence, this new science of initiation, which is to bring about a true spiritual Christology, just as it is to bring about, on a small scale, a pedagogy, for example — this science of initiation will, on a large and small scale, in religious devotion in the service of life, which it seeks to put into practice, always strive to to add to the “From God we are born as physical human beings,” to the “In Christ we die, that is, we live as souls,” the third: As we advance toward the spirit through the newer initiation, we become alive in the spirit already in this earthly life, we awaken, we experience the awakening of knowledge that permeates our whole life again with the light of religiosity, with the light of a morality and ethics seized by truly inner religiosity. In short, this newer science of initiation will strive to return to the ancient initiation riddle of “Ex deo nascimur” and the middle initiation riddle of “In Christo morimur,” fully solving these two riddles of the human soul, it will endeavor to carry the other into the human heart in the clarity of light, which should lead to the awakening of the spirit in the human heart and soul, to the religiosity of knowledge: in the grasping of the true, living spirit, we ourselves are awakened as body, soul, and spirit:
Per spiritum sanctum reviviscimus.