Universe, Earth and Man
GA 105
Introduction
by Marie Steiner
The cycle of lectures now appearing in book form was given by Rudolf Steiner in 1908, and the following words of his might well serve as its motto: “The mission of our age is to bring forth not an ancient wisdom, but a new wisdom, one that points not only to the past but that works prophetically into the future.”
The previous year at the memorable congress of the General Theosophical Society at Munich, Doctor Steiner clearly indicated the direction that the revival of the Theosophical movement should take, for the movement was threatening at that time to degenerate into one-sidedness influenced by Oriental ideas which did not accommodate themselves to the mental and soul-life of the people of Europe.
As against the many grievous misunderstandings that had arisen, Rudolf Steiner gave out something positives teaching that was suited to the growth of humanity. He also gave for the first time on that occasion a fitting artistic setting to the spiritual teaching he had to offer. The colours of the walls, and the pictures of the Seals represented the Rosicrucian spiritual aims; the motive of the column-forms portrayed the future, and this was aided by the dramatic reproduction of “The Sacred Drama of Eleusis” by Edouard Schuré, which presented in a living way the Mysteries of ancient Greece. With these Rudolf Steiner connected the Mythology of northern Germany. He had something new to give which hitherto had not been offered to the blind followers of a submissive Anglo-Indian Theosophy.
The courage with which Rudolf Steiner trod new paths stirred up spiritual opposition among the leaders of the Theosophical Society, who sought constantly to hamper and fetter him. This opposition forced him to withdraw from the post he had held in the Society. The conditions under which he had undertaken office were: that he should be free to allow that which threw light on the mystery of Christ to flow into European culture, which since the Event of Christ had become western esotericism. When certain leading theosophical circles recognised the remarkable spiritual capacities and the knowledge that Rudolf Steiner was able to bring to bear on this problem, means were sought to hamper his activity. They considered that the best way to do this was to proclaim the coming of Christ again in the flesh, in the body of a Hindu boy, and the centre from which a few years later Krishnamurti was to appear as a future world teacher was cautiously prepared.
It was whispered that Rudolf Steiner would be compelled—by the appearance of Krishnamurti—to divulge Christian secrets concerning which he would ordinarily have been silent. This interfered with his quiet and steady aim in building up the system and organisation of his teachings. He considered it his task to instruct humanity in the methods of initiation suited to present conditions of consciousness. Beside the reverent pursuit of ancient wisdom, it was necessary to waken an understanding of the changed form in which this wisdom was now to be given, and to show how such forms are subject to a continual up-rising, maturing, and decay, in order that new life may spring ever and again from what is dead. An historical sense had to be aroused in men, not merely a wonder-filled contemplation of ancient manifestations. The mysterious connection of the great cosmic laws uniting one age of civilization with another had to be made known. No one had ever described in so powerful and sublime a fashion the primeval wisdom which streamed down to earth from spiritual heights as Rudolf Steiner had done. No one before him had been able to speak in terms of modern consciousness of the reflection of the great Cosmic Existence in individual man—the microcosm.
All this teaching culminated in the central event of human evolution: the descent of the Sun-Spirit into the body of Jesus of Nazareth. Rudolf Steiner showed how the sun forces were thereby able to penetrate and spiritualize the planet, summoning men to fit themselves for the task that was before them. By the death on Golgotha an incisive mystic fact was consummated; it could endure no repetition, otherwise it would have taken place in vain.
In order that these truths might be brought to humanity, fact by fact had to be introduced in gently balanced stages. The foundations had already been laid before Krishnamurti was presented to Europeans. In this cycle, in the year 1908, the path had already been entered, the logical sequence of events from civilization to civilization had been described, the great central event clearly illuminated. There are occasions when the time in which a truth is to be given out may be hastened; it may be necessary to confront certain challenges with facts which one would rather have allowed to speak for themselves. This does not mean that something was done which otherwise would not have been done; it had to be done because it was rooted in the deepest necessities of present evolution, both cosmic and human; and, with complete self-sacrifice, the responsibility was assumed as the task of a life-time. The Theosophical Society cut itself off from this influx of new wisdom, it rejected what would have infused new life into it, and to the admiring recognition of an ancient honoured wisdom would have given new meaning to historic events.
The Theosophical Society would have been led with ripened wisdom from India by way of Persia, Chaldea, and Egypt deeply into the mystery of the chosen people, and the reason for this choice would have been made intelligible to it; and thence it would have been led to the Mystery places of Asia Minor and southern Europe. Further, the soul-life of the expectant peoples of central and northern Europe would have been touched on, and the whole teaching would have culminated in the Event of Golgotha, by which the hidden mysteries which until now had been veiled stepped forth on to the plane of universal history.
The individual personality evolves within the general evolution of humanity, and must learn to find within itself the central point of its purpose, which is primarily in spiritual experience. The tragedy of the personality lies in its severance from the spiritual world; in its seeking, erring, and striving, through the approaching night of separation from what is spiritual, till finally it perceives in spiritual darkness its tragic fate.
Comprehension of such things is necessary if we are to understand ourselves. Into this night of darkness shines a light, the light of Christian esotericism which was kindled in Palestine and passed thence into Europe. It broke with wonderful clearness over the island of Hibernia, where, notwithstanding the repression of the monastic colonies by a Church, fettered by Roman Imperialism, its radiance endured in secret as a stream of spiritual force.
Through this there arose the spiritual orders of knighthood and the desire for religious communities. German mysticism appeared as a rich blossom of deep religious fervour. In order to keep pace with events, above all with the conquests of science, and in order that faith might stand firm in the darkness of a materialistic age, something further had to emerge. The power of Belief had to yield to the certainty of Science. This new force was the aim of the Rosicrucian schools. They concerned themselves with the newly evolving forces of consciousness in the coming age. Rosicrucian esotericism, with its earnest striving after the new forces of human knowledge, with the tragic fate and spiritual tests laid upon its followers, was yet able here and there, as Rudolf Steiner has shown us, to raise the veil of its mysteries. New forces of spiritual consciousness were born from it that were able to overcome materialism by cognition. In the hard struggle to recover the faculty of spiritual perception, once given to man and now lost, but which must be regained through the power of the ego, through the death and re-birth of the personality, the ego-being of striving humanity grows strong. When man consciously grasps this ego-being he can rise and unite himself once more with the Godhead. That this might come to pass the Divine Ego descended—once—to earth. The unique character of this event must be recognised as the decisive turning point of the earth's destiny. Rosicrucian teaching sums it up in the motto “In Christo Morimur”; in Christ we die to live above, to live upwards to the Spirit. “Per Spiritum Sanctum Reviviscimus”; through striving towards the Christ we gain true life, we become awake in the Spirit out of which we once were born.
The personality had to come into being, it had to comprehend itself, to take itself in hand and recognize itself as a centre, to confront and then overcome itself, to learn to die, that it might realize itself again as a free ego-being whose central point is the Divine Ego.
This is the path of western esotericism; the European cannot avoid it. Formerly his task was to complete the education of the personality, entangled as it was in egoism; his present task is to overcome egoism, to transmute it by liberating the divine-willing, strong ego-nature within him. This he can only do through controlling the forces of his consciousness through knowledge and cognition. He must be willing to recognise the smallest in the greatest. He cannot eliminate whole epochs of time with their tremendous significance for human development. Power will be given to him if today he desires knowledge and cognition of the Universe, Earth, and Man.
This knowledge is now called Anthroposophy. It gives its teaching and declares its creed quite openly; it hides nothing, for it knows the time has come when what was once nurtured in secret must step forth on to the plane of history.
In describing the descent of man from the Divine and his way back again to Divinity, Anthroposophy might have felt secure within genuine Theosophy, they are so far one and the same “Ex Deo Nascimur”—Out of God we are born to the Godhead we return when we have received the Christ unto us.
But men turn names to their own particular ends. Societies arise which no longer express their true nature—they may indeed become the very opposite of what they were at first. If one has such a contradiction before one, as for example the pseudo-Christian statement engineered by the Theosophical Society, one cannot strengthen it by means employed in the advocacy of truth.
From his sense of responsibility to truth Rudolf Steiner declared it impossible, in the lectures which under pressure from the members he was forced to print, to employ the term “Us Theosophists” any more. The Theosophical Society is fast stuck in Oriental dogma, and rejects the intellectual permeation of Christian truths to which a rightly guided Theosophical movement should necessarily have come. That which the Theosophical Society did not accept is now represented by those calling themselves Anthroposophists.
It has been necessary therefore in the publication of any cycles of lectures to employ the word Anthroposophy, or Spiritual Science, instead of Theosophy. The ancient holy name Theosophy has been caricatured and falsified, and especially to the outer world must we make clear the difference, especially in all this confusion between Societies bearing great and honourable names.
It is undoubtedly our duty in memory of Rudolf Steiner to throw light upon the conditions of that conflict which aimed at crippling his world-embracing activity in Christian esotericism. It is our duty to show how necessary his action was in separating from a Society which saw in Thibetism, Hinduism, and Buddhism the sum of all wisdom, but in the Mystery of Golgotha only the karmic fate of a noble personality not yet matured to ultimate perfection. The leaders of the Theosophical Society were determined to get control of the Society and run it in their own way.
With their pseudo-Christ, to whom in various circumstances they ascribed varying names as it appeared to suit, they hope to win adherents of other forms of belief and satisfy the longings of western hearts, and in this way gradually and gently to turn the tide of European thought back into the stream of pre-Christian spirituality.
Let us close these observations with words of Rudolf, Steiner which are directly connected with the above.
“We see a primeval wisdom preserved in the Mysteries of past epochs; but our wisdom must be an apocalyptic wisdom, of which we must plant the seeds. We have need once again of a principle of Initiation wherein the original connection with the Spiritual world can be reestablished.”
This is the task of the Anthroposophical world movement.
Aus dem Vorwort von Marie Steiner zur ersten Buchausgabe (1930)
Es war im Jahre 1908, als Rudolf Steiner in Stuttgart diesen nun nach einer Nachschrift in Buchform erscheinenden Vortragszyklus hielt, dem als Motto die Worte vorangehen sollen:
«Unsere Zeit muß nicht eine uralte Weisheit gebären, sondern eine neue Weisheit, die nicht nur in die Vergangenheit hineinweisen kann, sondern die prophetisch, apokalyptisch wirken muß in die Zukunft.»
Ein Jahr vorher, am denkwürdigen Kongreß der Allgemeinen Theosophischen Gesellschaft in München, hatte er deutliche Betonung gegeben der von ihm eingeschlagenen Richtung zur Hebung und Belebung der theosophischen Bewegung, die da drohte in Einseitigkeit zu verfallen, und die, in orientalisierenden Vorstellungen sich bewegend, nicht Rechnung trug der Seelenartung und der Konstitution der europäischen Menschheit. Manche schwere Mißstände waren schon die Folge davon. Rudolf Steiner stellte dem gegenüber ein Positives hin: seine umfassende, dem geschichtlichen Werdegang der Menschheit Rechnung tragende Lehre. Bei dem erwähnten Kongreß in München gab er auch zum erstenmal den dargebrachten geistigen Inhalten einen entsprechenden künstlerischen Ausdruck. Durch die Farbe der Wandbekleidung, durch die aus ihr hervortretenden Siegel-Gemälde wurde rosenkreuzerisches Geiststreben versinnbildlicht; die Motive der Säulenformen erfaßten schon die Zukunft. Antikes Griechentum wurde lebendig in der dramatischen Wiedergabe des wiederkonstruierten Mysteriums von Edouard Schur€ «Das heilige Drama von Eleusis. ...
Rudolf Steiner sah seine Aufgabe darin, der Menschheit jenen Einweihungsweg zu weisen, der ihrem heutigen Bewußtseinszustande entspricht. Um diesen Weg der Erkenntnis zu beschreiten, war es notwendig, neben der ehrfürchtig bewundernden Betrachtung uralter Weisheit, ein Verständnis dafür zu wecken, wie die Formen, in denen diese Weisheit gegeben wurde, sich wandelten, entsprechend den neu sich entwickelnden Seelenfähigkeiten der Menschen, wie diese Formen unterworfen sind dem Gesetz des Aufblühens, der Reife und des Vergehens, damit immer wieder neues Leben aus deren Sterben entstehe. So ist Metamorphose, ist stufenweis sich hebende, senkende, wieder sich hebende Entwickelung auch hier die Basis des fortschreitenden Lebens. Geschichtlicher Sinn mußte geweckt werden, nicht nur bewunderndes Anschauen alter Offenbarung. Die geheimnisvollen Beziehungen der großen Weltgesetze von einer Kultur zur andern mußten aufgedeckt werden. Keiner hat in so gewaltiger und erhabener Weise gesprochen über das, was einst als uralte Weisheit aus geistigen Höhen zu den Menschen heruntergeflossen ist, wie Rudolf Steiner; keiner hat vor ihm in dieser Weise in den heutigen Bewußtseinsformen reden können von der Spiegelung des großen Weltendaseins im einzelnen Menschen, im Mikrokosmos. Und alles dies gipfelte in dem Zentralereignis der Menschheitsentwickelung: dem Niederstieg des Sonnengeistes in den Leib des Jesus von Nazareth; zeigte, wie dadurch erst die Sonnenkräfte den Planeten ganz durchdringen und durchgeistigen konnten, den Menschen zu dieser Aufgabe mit aufrufend und befähigend. Im Todesakt auf Golgatha vollzog sich die entscheidend eingreifende mystische Tatsache; sie bedarf keiner Wiederholung. Sie wäre ja sonst umsonst geschehen.
Um diese Wahrheiten an die Menschheit heranzubringen, mußte Stein an Stein herangeholt werden in ruhig abgewogenem Schritte. ...
Hier in diesem Zyklus vom Jahre 1908 ist der Weg schon voll beschritten; der logische Faden zieht sich von Kultur zu Kultur; das Mittelpunktsereignis leuchtet hell hervor. Gewiß kann durch manche Geschehnisse der Zeitpunkt beschleunigt werden, in dem eine Wahrheit ausgesprochen wird; es kann notwendig sein, gewissen Herausforderungen die Kraft der Tatsachen entgegenzustellen, die man lieber allein aus sich heraus, frei von jenem Hintergrunde, hätte sprechen lassen. Aber das bedeutet ja nicht, daß man etwas getan hat, was man sonst nicht getan hätte; was getan werden mußte, weil es in den tiefsten Notwendigkeiten der gegenwärtigen Welt- und Menschheitsentwickelung wurzelt, was die in Verantwortung und mit voller Opferkraft übernommene Lebensaufgabe war.
Die Theosophische Gesellschaft hat sich diesem Zustrom neuer Weisheit verschlossen; sie wies von sich, was ihr Erneuerung gebracht hätte, was dem bewundernden Anerkennen einer ehrwürdig uralten Weisheit hätte hinzufügen können den Sinn für das historische Geschehen; was sie geführt hätte im reifenden Erkennen aus Indien über Persien hinaus nach Chaldäa und Ägypten, tief hineinleuchtend in das Mysterium des auserwählten Volkes, den Sinn dieser Auserwählung dem Verständnis nahebringend; dann zu den kleinasiatischen und südeuropäischen Mysterienstätten, das wartende Volk der Mitte und des Nordens Europas in seinem Seelenleben streifend; alles kulminierend in dem Geschehnis von Golgatha, durch welches die verborgenen Mysterien heraustreten auf den Plan der Weltgeschichte.
Innerhalb dieses Menschheitswerdens entwickelt sich die einzelne Persönlichkeit. Ihren Mittelpunktsinn, den sie zunächst im geistigen Erleben hatte, muß sie lernen in sich zu finden. Die allmähliche Abschnürung von der geistigen Welt ist ihre Dramatik; ihr Suchen, Irren und Streben in der hereinbrechenden Nacht geistiger Abtrennung, dann in materialistischer Finsternis - ihre tiefe Schicksalstragik. Verständnis solcher Zusammenhänge ist notwendig, wenn wir uns selbst verstehen sollen. In diese Nacht hinein strahlt ein Licht: das Licht christlicher Esoterik, das sich in Palästina entzündet, nach Europa hinüberflutet. In wunderbarer Helle hat es auf der irischen Insel gestrahlt, und trotz der Unterdrückung irischer Mönchskolonien durch die im römischen Imperialismus befangene Kirche lebten Ausstrahlungen dieses Lichtes als geistige Kraftströmungen im Verborgenen weiter. Geistiges Rittertum entwickelte sich daraus und spirituelles Gemeinschaftsstreben frommer Gemeinden. Als reichste Blüte einer tiefen Innerlichkeit tritt daraus hervor die deutsche Mystik. Doch um Schritt zu halten mit den unaufhaltsam sich nähernden Ereignissen, vor allem der Eroberung der Sinnenwelt durch die Wissenschaft, und um der völligen materialistischen Verfinsterung standzuhalten, mußte sich noch eines herausbilden, das an die Stelle der Glaubenskraft Wissenssicherheit hinstellen konnte. Dies war die Aufgabe der rosenkreuzerischen Schulen. Sie rechneten mit den im neuen Zeitalter sich neu entwickelnden Bewußtseinskräften. Rosenkreuzerische Esoterik — mit all ihrem tiefen Ringen aus neuen menschlichen Erkenntniskräften heraus, mit der ihren Bekennern auferlegten Schicksalsschwere und Geistesprüfung, lüftet hier und da auf den Wegen, die uns Rudolf Steiner weist, ihren geheimnisvollen Schleier. Aus ihr heraus werden die neuen Geistbewußtseinskräfte herausgeboren, die den Materialismus besiegen können durch Erkenntnis. Im schweren Ringen um die Wiedererlangung einer einst der Menschheit gegebenen, dann verlorenen Geistwahrnehmungsfähigkeit, die nun aus der Ich-Kraft heraus wiedererobert werden muß, über das Stirb und Werde der Persönlichkeit hinweg, erstarkt das Ich-Wesen des strebenden Menschen. Das Ich-Wesen des Menschen, durch welches, wenn er es wach ergreift, er wieder zur Gottheit aufsteigen und sich mit ihr vereinen kann. Damit dies einst geschehen könne, mußte das göttliche Ich - ein Mal - auf die Erde hinuntersteigen. Dies Ereignis als entscheidender Wendepunkt des Erdenschicksals muß in seiner Einzigartigkeit verstanden werden.
Das Rosenkreuzertum hat es erfaßt: «In Christo morimur.» In Christo sterben wir hinauf zum Leben, leben wir empor zum Geiste. «Per spiritum sanctum reviviscimus»: Durch das Sterben zum Christus hin ergreifen wir das wahre Leben, werden wir wach im Geiste, aus welchem heraus wir einst geboren wurden.
Die Persönlichkeit mußte werden, sich erfassen, sich ergreifen, sich als Mittelpunkt empfinden, sich vor sich selbst entsetzen, sich überwinden, sterben lernen, um sich als freies Ich-Wesen wieder zu ergreifen, das seinen Mittelpunkt im Gottes-Ich erfühlt.
Es sind dies die Wege der abendländischen Esoterik. Der Europäer kann sie nicht umgehen. Es war ja seine Aufgabe, die im Egoismus befangene Persönlichkeit durchzubilden. Es ist seine Aufgabe, den Egoismus zu überwinden, umzuwandeln, zu höherer Metamorphose zu bringen: zur freien, zur triebfreien, das Göttliche wollenden, starken Ichheit.
Er kann es nur durch die Beherrschung seiner Bewußtseinskräfte, durch Erkenntnis. Er muß das Kleinste im Großen erkennen wollen. Er kann nicht ganze Zeitepochen in ihrer ungeheuren Bedeutsamkeit für die Menschheitsentfaltung ausschalten. Die starken Kräfte werden ihm heute gegeben, wenn er den Willen hat zur Welt-, Erden- und Menschenerkenntnis. Und dies ist wahres Rosenkreuzertum.
Dies nennt sich heute Anthroposophie. In aller Offentlichkeit drückt es sein Bekenntnis aus, gibt es seine Lehre. Es verbirgt nichts; es weiß, daß die Zeit gekommen ist, wo das, was früher in Geheimgesellschaften gepflegt wurde, hinaustreten muß auf den Plan der Weltgeschichte...
Wir schließen diese Betrachtung mit den Worten Rudolf Steiners, die unmittelbar anknüpfen an die oben angeführten Worte:
«Wir sehen eine uralte Weisheit, bewahrt in den Mysterien der vergangenen Kulturepochen; eine apokalyptische Weisheit, zu der wir den Samen legen müssen, muß unsere Weisheit sein. Wir brauchen wieder ein Einweihungsprinzip, damit die ursprüngliche Verbindung mit der geistigen Welt wieder hergestellt werden kann. Das ist die Aufgabe der anthroposophischen Weltbewegung.»
From Marie Steiner's preface to the first edition of the book (1930)
It was in 1908 that Rudolf Steiner gave this series of lectures in Stuttgart, which are now being published in book form with the following words as a motto:
"Our time must not give birth to ancient wisdom, but to a new wisdom that can not only point to the past, but must also have a prophetic, apocalyptic effect on the future.”
A year earlier, at the memorable congress of the General Theosophical Society in Munich, he had clearly emphasized the direction he had taken to elevate and revitalize the theosophical movement, which was in danger of falling into one-sidedness and, moving in Orientalizing ideas, did not take into account the nature and constitution of the European people. This had already resulted in some serious abuses. Rudolf Steiner countered this with something positive: his comprehensive teaching, which took into account the historical development of humanity. At the aforementioned congress in Munich, he also gave the spiritual content he presented an appropriate artistic expression for the first time. The color of the wall coverings and the seal paintings emerging from them symbolized the spiritual striving of the Rosicrucians; the motifs of the column shapes already foreshadowed the future. Ancient Greece came to life in the dramatic reproduction of the reconstructed mystery of Edouard Schur's “The Sacred Drama of Eleusis. ...
Rudolf Steiner saw his task as showing humanity the path of initiation that corresponds to its present state of consciousness. In order to follow this path of knowledge, it was necessary, in addition to reverent and admiring contemplation of ancient wisdom, to awaken an understanding of how the forms in which this wisdom was given changed in accordance with the newly developing soul capacities of human beings, how these forms are subject to the law of blossoming, ripening, and passing away, so that new life can arise again and again from their death. Thus, metamorphosis, the gradual rising, falling, and rising again of development, is also the basis of progressive life here. A sense of history had to be awakened, not just an admiring gaze at ancient revelations. The mysterious relationships between the great world laws from one culture to another had to be revealed. No one has spoken in such a powerful and sublime way about what once flowed down to human beings as ancient wisdom from spiritual heights as Rudolf Steiner; no one before him has been able to speak in this way in today's forms of consciousness about the reflection of the great world existence in the individual human being, in the microcosm. And all this culminated in the central event of human evolution: the descent of the Sun Spirit into the body of Jesus of Nazareth; it showed how only through this could the forces of the Sun completely permeate and spiritualize the planet, calling upon and enabling human beings to fulfill this task. In the act of death on Golgotha, the decisive mystical fact took place; it needs no repetition. Otherwise it would have been in vain.
In order to bring these truths to humanity, it was necessary to proceed step by step, calmly and deliberately. ...
Here in this cycle from 1908, the path has already been fully traversed; the logical thread runs from culture to culture; the central event shines brightly. Certainly, some events can hasten the moment when a truth is spoken; it may be necessary to counter certain challenges with the power of facts that one would rather have let speak for themselves, free from that background. But that does not mean that one has done something that one would not otherwise have done; that one has done what had to be done because it is rooted in the deepest necessities of the present development of the world and of humanity, because it was the task of life that had been taken on with responsibility and with complete self-sacrifice.
The Theosophical Society has closed itself off to this influx of new wisdom; it rejected what would have brought it renewal, what could have added to the admiring recognition of a venerable ancient wisdom a sense of historical events; what would have led it in its maturing recognition from India beyond Persia to Chaldea and Egypt, shining deeply into the mystery of the chosen people, bringing the meaning of this election closer to understanding; then to the mystery centers of Asia Minor and southern Europe, touching the soul life of the waiting people of central and northern Europe; all culminating in the event of Golgotha, through which the hidden mysteries emerge onto the stage of world history.
Within this becoming of humanity, the individual personality develops. It must learn to find within itself the sense of center that it initially had in spiritual experience. Its gradual separation from the spiritual world is its drama; its searching, erring, and striving in the gathering night of spiritual separation, then in materialistic darkness, is its profound tragic destiny. Understanding such connections is necessary if we are to understand ourselves. Into this night shines a light: the light of Christian esotericism, which ignites in Palestine and floods over to Europe. It shone in wonderful brightness on the island of Ireland, and despite the oppression of Irish monastic colonies by the Church, which was caught up in Roman imperialism, the radiance of this light continued to live on in secret as spiritual currents. Spiritual knighthood developed from this, as did the spiritual community aspirations of pious congregations. German mysticism emerged from this as the richest flower of a deep inner life. However, in order to keep pace with the inexorably approaching events, above all the conquest of the sensory world by science, and to withstand the complete materialistic eclipse, something else had to emerge that could replace the power of faith with the certainty of knowledge. This was the task of the Rosicrucian schools. They reckoned with the powers of consciousness that were developing anew in the new age. Rosicrucian esotericism—with all its profound struggles arising from new human powers of knowledge, with the heavy burden of destiny and spiritual testing imposed on its adherents—lifts its mysterious veil here and there on the paths shown to us by Rudolf Steiner. From it are born the new spiritual powers of consciousness that can defeat materialism through knowledge. In the difficult struggle to regain a spiritual faculty of perception once given to humanity and then lost, which must now be recaptured from the power of the I, beyond the death and becoming of the personality, the I-being of the striving human being grows stronger. The ego-being of the human being, through which, when he grasps it awake, he can ascend again to the Godhead and unite with it. In order for this to happen, the divine ego had to descend to earth once. This event, as the decisive turning point in the destiny of the earth, must be understood in its uniqueness.
Rosicrucianism has grasped this: “In Christo morimur.” In Christ we die upward to life, we live upward to the spirit. “Per spiritum sanctum reviviscimus”: through dying to Christ we grasp true life, we become awake in the spirit from which we were once born.
The personality had to become, to grasp itself, to seize itself, to feel itself as the center, to be horrified at itself, to overcome itself, to learn to die in order to seize itself again as a free I-being that feels its center in the God-I.
These are the paths of Western esotericism. Europeans cannot avoid them. It was their task to educate the personality caught up in egoism. It is their task to overcome egoism, to transform it, to bring it to a higher metamorphosis: to a free, impulse-free, strong ego that desires the divine.
He can only do this by mastering his powers of consciousness, through knowledge. He must want to recognize the smallest in the great. He cannot ignore entire epochs in their immense significance for the development of humanity. The powerful forces are given to him today if he has the will to know the world, the earth, and humanity. And this is true Rosicrucianism.
This is called anthroposophy today. It expresses its confession and teaches its doctrine in all public. It hides nothing; it knows that the time has come when what was once cultivated in secret societies must step out onto the stage of world history...
We conclude this reflection with the words of Rudolf Steiner, which follow directly on from the words quoted above:
“We see an ancient wisdom, preserved in the mysteries of past cultural epochs; an apocalyptic wisdom, the seed of which we must sow, must be our wisdom. We need a principle of initiation again so that the original connection with the spiritual world can be restored. That is the task of the anthroposophical world movement.”