Moral Worthiness for Higher Knowledge
"Only when our medical training becomes something entirely different again, when all of humanity is led back to a higher moral, spiritual, and intellectual level, and when the individual has proven themselves worthy—only when the examination is conducted in this sense—can we speak of a fruitful development in this field. Therefore, there is nothing to hope for from today’s academic treatment of hypnotism and suggestion. They are understood in a completely wrong way. They must first be viewed in the correct manner again. When that happens, one will see that these phenomena are, in fact, more widespread than is generally believed. We will then understand many things in our surroundings. We will also realize that beyond a certain point, these phenomena cannot be popularized at all, because beyond that point, they belong to human inner development.
The highest power is not attained through the vivisection of the spirit, but through the cultivation of forces lying deep within us. Moral, intellectual, and spiritual higher development—that is what will make us worthy once again to speak a clear and distinct word in these areas. Then we will once again understand our ancestors, who did not want to reveal these things in their deepest meaning to the profane world. This is precisely what was meant when speaking of the veiled image of Isis—that no one should lift the veil if they are unworthy. The intention was to imply that human beings can only perceive the highest truths once they have first made themselves worthy of them.
This will cast a new meaning and a new light on the saying: Knowledge is power. —Indeed, knowledge is power. And the higher the knowledge, the greater the power. The course of world history rests upon such power. It is a caricature of this that science seeks to present to us today. But such knowledge, which awakens the heart, such power, which may intervene in the hearts and freedom of others—these may only be acquired through an insight that is at the same time a blessing for the human being, before which he stands in awe. That our knowledge may take hold of our whole being, that we may stand before the highest truths and recognize that the truth experienced within us is divine revelation, which we regard as something sacred—this must be our ideal. Then we will experience knowledge once again as power, when knowledge is once again a communion with the Divine. He who unites with the Divine through knowledge is called to realize the saying: Knowledge is power."
Read more: Rudolf Steiner, Spiritual Teachings Concerning the Soul, Lecture 14, The History of Hypnotism and Somnambulism, GA 52, 6 June 1904, Berlin.