| 270. Esoteric Lessons for the First Class II: Sixteetnth Hour
28 Jun 1924, Dornach Translated by Frank Thomas Smith |
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| But membership in the School implies even more, that the member recognize the serious conditions for membership—namely the basic condition that anyone who wishes to belong to the School should present himself in life in such a way that he is in every respect a representative of anthroposophy before the world. To be a representative of anthroposophy before the world necessarily means that whatever he or she does in connection to anthroposophy, be it ever so remotely connected, also be with the approval of the leadership of the School, that is, with the esoteric Executive Committee at the Goetheanum. |
| 270. Esoteric Lessons for the First Class II: Sixteetnth Hour
28 Jun 1924, Dornach Translated by Frank Thomas Smith |
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My dear friends, We will again start by letting the words resound from the cosmos near and far, which can be heard by everyone who correctly understands the world. But before doing so, because again many new members of the esoteric school are present, I must say at least a few words about the meaning of this school. I will put it briefly. This School must be recognized as one which brings down its information from the spiritual world to human souls. Therefore, what lives here in the School and what is brought to human souls are to be perceived as communications from the spiritual world itself. From this you will understand that membership in the School must be regarded as serious in the highest degree. This seriousness has only become possible because of the Constitution which the Anthroposophical Society received during the Christmas Conference. Since then the Anthroposophical Society as such is an openly public institution, but at the same time one through which an esoteric breath flows, which has been better received than the former exoteric one. So nothing more is expected from the members of the Anthroposophical Society than that they feel themselves to be receivers of anthroposophical wisdom. And, of course, what is generally expected of decent people in life. But membership in the School implies even more, that the member recognize the serious conditions for membership—namely the basic condition that anyone who wishes to belong to the School should present himself in life in such a way that he is in every respect a representative of anthroposophy before the world. To be a representative of anthroposophy before the world necessarily means that whatever he or she does in connection to anthroposophy, be it ever so remotely connected, also be with the approval of the leadership of the School, that is, with the esoteric Executive Committee at the Goetheanum. Thus through the School a real stream can enter the anthroposophical movement, which today is represented by the Anthroposophical Society. Therefore, it is necessary that membership in the School be understood in such a way that the member feels in his whole being that he is a part of what is being done and revealed from here in the Goetheanum. Such a condition should not be taken as a restriction on human freedom, my dear friends, for membership in the school rests on reciprocity. The leadership of the School must be free to give what it has to give to whom it considers right to do so. And the fact that no one is obliged to be a member of the School, but that it depends on his free will to be a member, means that the leadership may also place conditions on membership without anyone claiming that his free will is in any way infringed upon. It is a free agreement between the leadership of the School and those who wish to be members. Furthermore, in order that the School really be taken seriously, it cannot be otherwise than that the leadership exercise its right to revoke a membership whenever it considers necessary because of certain events. And, my dear friends, that the leadership of the School takes this seriously is shown by the fact that since the relatively short time the School has existed, sixteen members already had to be suspended for shorter or longer lengths of time. And I must again emphasize that this measure will have to be strictly adhered to in the future, regardless of the personalities involved, because we will be entering ever more deeply into esoteric matters. * * * And now the words will be spoken which are always spoken at the beginning of our deliberations, reminding us of the admonitions which resound from all the events and beings of the world to all those who have the heart to understand them: the admonition to self-knowledge, which is the true foundation of world knowledge. O man, know thyself! My dear friends, we have advanced, in respect to what has been sent to us from the spiritual world in the form of mantras, to the mantric verses which correspond to the esoteric situation in which we feel ourselves: first of all, in meditation we imagine the being standing at the abyss of existence speaking to us. Let us imagine it once more, for we cannot recall it to our souls too often. We see before us everything belonging to the kingdoms of nature. We observe the glorious heavenly bodies; we see the floating clouds; we see the wind and the waves, the thunder and lightning. We see everything from the humblest worm to the sublimest revelations in the glittering stars. Only a false asceticism, unrelated to true esotericism, could in any way despise this world that speaks to the senses. The person who wishes to be truly human can do nothing other than intimately relate to the sense-perceptible life, from the humblest creature to the majestic, divinely glittering stars. We must never despise the grandeur and awesome beauty of all that surrounds us, which we must acknowledge; we must go forward step by step in the world and be able to appreciate what our eyes see, what our ears hear, what the other senses perceive, what we can grasp with our reason. However, a moment comes as you look around at the expanse of space, at the interweaving of time, that despite all the grandeur and awesome beauty in your surroundings, you cannot find there what the inner nature of your being is. So you must say to yourself: the inner source of my being is to be sought elsewhere. The very power of such a thought affects us. What follows for the soul can only be expressed in imaginative thoughts. At first these imaginative thoughts lead us to a wide field in which everything earthly and sense-perceptible is spread out before us. We find it to be radiant with the sun, we find it to be shining light. But as we look all around us we find our own self nowhere. Then we gaze before us and see that this sunny field, which is grandiose and beautiful and sublime to the senses, is blocked by a dark, night-bedecked wall. We see ourselves entering deeply into the darkness. We intuit that perhaps there in the darkness is our self's true origin; but we cannot see into it. And as we follow the path forward, the abyss of existence, the threshold to the spiritual world, appears before us. We must cross over this abyss. The Guardian stands there warning us that we must be mature in order to cross over the abyss, for with our thinking, feeling and willing habits which correspond to the physical sense-perceptible world, we cannot cross over the abyss of existence into the spiritual world in which our real self originated. The Guardian of the Threshold is the first spiritual being we encounter. Every night we are in this spiritual world when we sleep. But it is like darkness around our I and our astral body, because we can only enter this spiritual world when sufficiently mature. The Guardian of the Threshold protects us from entering immaturely. But now as we encounter him he sends us his grand admonishments. And the admonishments are contained in the mantric verses which until now have formed the content of these esoteric lessons. Those of you who do not yet have these mantric verses can obtain them from other members of the School. But the following procedure must be observed: not the person who is to receive the verses asks for permission, but the one who gives them. These verses have not only shown us how our hearts are to react if we wish to cross over the abyss of existence, they have also shown us what our souls will feel once we have overflown the abyss and gradually sense—not yet see, but sense—how the darkness, which was at first night-bedecked, gradually becomes lighter. At first we feel becoming lighter, and we feel that the elements—earth, water, air, fire—are different on the other side, that we are living in another world. And the world in which we recognize our own being, and therewith the true form of the elements, is indeed another world. During the last lesson we considered the meditation with which we were to imagine how the Guardian stands before the abyss of existence; now we are already beyond it, first we feel—not yet see—how the darkness becomes lighter. The Guardian speaks to us, after he had previously made clear to us how we should comport ourselves in relation to the four elements. He tells us how these four elements change for us. He then asks questions. Who answers? The hierarchies themselves answer these questions. From one side the third hierarchy—Angeloi, Archangeloi, Archai—from the other side the second hierarchy, from a third side the third hierarchy. The third hierarchy—Angeloi, Archangeloi, Archai—answers when the Guardian of the Threshold asks what becomes of the earth's solidity. The second hierarchy—Exusiai, Dynamis, Kyriotetes—answers when the Guardian of the Threshold asks us what becomes of the water's formative force, which acts in us and gives us our inner configuration. And the first hierarchy—Thrones, Cherubim, Seraphim—answer when the Guardian asks us what becomes of our breathing, of the air's stimulating power, which awakens us from dull plant-like existence to sentient-feeling existence. Such mantras are to penetrate our souls, our hearts, to the extent that we feel ourselves to be within the situation. The Guardian of the Threshold poses the testing, admonishing questions. The hierarchies answer. The Guardian: Angeloi: Archangeloi: Archai: The Guardian: Exusiai: Dynamis: Kyriotetes: The Guardian: Thrones: Cherubim: Seraphim: These, my dear sisters and brothers, are the admonishing words coming from the communion of the Guardian of the Threshold together with the hierarchies, which bring our souls ever forward if we experience them more and more in the right way. In this way, we are doing what is appropriate for human beings of today and the future, what in the ancient holy mysteries meant that the student was being guided to the essence of the elements: earth, water, air. But warmth, which is also an element, pervades everything: in the solid earth element, which supports us, is warmth; in the element of water, which forms us as humans, which gives form to our organs, causing them to develop and grow, warmth is also present; and in the element of air, by which the Jehovah-spirits once breathed into humanity its soul, through which man is even today awakened from his dull, plant-like existence, warmth is present. Warmth is everywhere. We must recognize it as the all-pervading element. We must immerse ourselves in it as the all-pervading element: Yes, we feel so close to it. We feel far from the solid earth element, though we still feel the earth's support. We even feel far from the water element. The air element maintains a more intimate relation to us. When the air element does not fill us with regularity, when we have too much breath in us, or too little, our inner life indicates how the air-element is connected to us. Too much breath awakens fear in the soul. Too little causes fainting. Our soul is embraced by the air element. We feel ourselves most intimately united with the warmth element. We ourselves are what is warm or cold in us. In order to live we must generate a certain amount of warmth. We are intimately close to the warmth element. If we want to be closer to it, then not only one hierarchy can speak, then the reminding words must resound together from various hierarchies. Therefore, when the Guardian of the Threshold asks questions of us concerning the warmth element, the answers from the cosmos are different. The Guardian asks the question: What becomes of fire's purification, which enkindled your I? We already know this question; it is the question about our entrance into the element of warmth, or fire. But now the answer does not come from one hierarchy or from a rank of one of the hierarchies, but the answer comes in choir from the Angeloi, the Exusiai, the Thrones; secondly the Archangeloi, Dynamis, Cherubim answer the Guardian's question; and thirdly Archai, Kyriotetes, Seraphim answer. Thus the three answers about the general nature of warmth resound from the choir-like words of the three hierarchies. Therefore, we are to imagine that when we hear the Guardian of the Threshold's warning reminders, the answers, which resound from our I, but which are stimulated by the hierarchies—come from all sides: first Angeloi, Exusiai, Thrones; secondly speak the Archangeloi, Dynamis, Cherubim; and thirdly speak Archai, Kyriotetes, Seraphim. All three hierarchies always speak: a rank from each of the three hierarchies always speaks. Thus the answers comes to us from the cosmos. The Guardian speaks: Angeloi, Exusiai, Thrones: From all three hierarchies we are reminded that everything which happened to us during earthly life is recorded in the cosmic ether and we see it recorded there when we have passed through the gate of death. Once we have passed through the gate of death, looking back at our earthly life, but also gazing out at the etheric vastness, what we have done and accomplished in thoughts, feelings and deeds during earthly life is recorded. It is your life's flaming script. Archangeloi, Dynamis, Cherubim—answer in us: We are admonished during the second stage we go through after passing through the gate of death, where we experience in reverse, in mirror images—that is, in its just atonement—what we have done here on earth. If we have harmed another human being in any way, we experience in the reverse stream of time what the other felt because of us. As I have said, the Archangeloi, Dynamis and Cherubim admonish us in this second stage, which we pass through between death and a new birth. What our karma works through during the third stage—what happens when as souls we cooperate with other human souls and with the beings of the higher hierarchies —the Archai (primal powers), Kyriotetes and Seraphim admonish us: We must feel ourselves completely within this situation: the speaking Guardian of the Threshold—his earnest gesture toward us, his admonishment. And from the cosmic vastness, resounding, grasping our heart—what connects us with the riddle of life. [The fourth part of the mantra is written on the blackboard.] The Guardian speaks: Angeloi, Exusiai, Thrones: Archangeloi, Dynamis, Cherubim—they answer in us: Archai, Kyriotetes, Seraphim: What previously stood before us like a black, night enclosed darkness, is not yet illuminated by light for the soul's eye. But we have the feeling that while we are standing within this black, night enclosed darkness, wherever we reach out we begin to feel a glimmering light. And we find ourselves in the situation where we know that we ourselves are within this glimmering light. We feel ourselves moving toward the Guardian of the Threshold. We had only seen him as long as we were in the field of the senses. Then we stepped into the darkness and heard his questioning, admonishing words. But these admonishing, questioning words had led us to where we now feel something like a mild weaving, moving light. In this weaving, moving light we make our way to the Guardian of the Threshold seeking help. It is a unique experience: not yet light, but the light is making itself felt; in this felt light the Guardian of the Threshold, manifesting himself, as though he were becoming more intimate with us, as though he were leaning more to us now, as though we were also stepping closer to him. And what he now says seems as though in [earthly] life a person is whispering something confidential in our ear. And what were at first admonishing, earnest words, trumpet-like, powerful, majestic, from all sides of the cosmos coming to our hearts, continues now as an intimate conversation with the Guardian of the Threshold in weaving, moving light. For now it is as though he no longer just speaks to us, it is as though he whispers to us: Has your spirit understood? Our inner self becomes warm when the Guardian of the Threshold says in confidence: “Has your spirit understood?” Our inner self becomes warm. It experiences itself in the warmth. And this inner self feels obliged to answer with devotion, quietly and humbly. Thus we imagine it in meditation: The cosmic spirit in me [Der Weltengeist in mir Our I does not answer the question “Has your spirit understood?” with pride and arrogance: “I have understood”, but the I feels: divine being streams through the innermost essence of the human being; it is divine breath in man which quietly lingers and prepares us for understanding. [The first part of the new mantra is written on the blackboard.] The Guardian: The I: The cosmic spirit in me Secondly, the Guardian in confidence asks: The I answers: Again it is not proudly that the I is tempted to answer when the Guardian asks: Has your soul apprehended? Rather is the soul becoming aware that in it speaks the cosmic souls of the beings of the higher hierarchies, and that in what they say not an individual entity is present, but an entire council, a consultative meeting, as if the planets of a planetary system were circling and contributing their respective illuminating forces. Thus do the cosmic souls send their concise suggestions. Our soul hears and hopes that from the harmonies the I will be so formed that the I in the human being is an echo of the cosmic harmonies which arise when cosmic souls take council among each other—like the planets in the solar system—and their advice and harmonies resound in the human soul. [The second part of the mantra is written on the blackboard.] The Guardian: The I: And the third confidential question which the Guardian directs to the person in this situation is this: Has your body experienced? The soul feels that in this body the cosmic forces—which are everywhere—are concentrated in one point in space. But these cosmic forces do not appear now as physical forces. The soul has long since become aware of how these forces, which from outside appear as active physical forces, as gravitational, electrical, magnetic forces, as warmth forces, as light forces, when they are active in the human body are moral forces, are transformed into will-forces. The soul feels the cosmic forces as those which constitute eternal universal justice throughout the succession of earth lives. The soul feels them to be like forces of judgment which weave in the verdicts of karma and therewith the I itself. When the Guardian asks in confidence: The human being feels obliged to answer with devotion to universal justice: The cosmic forces in me [The third part of the mantra is written on the blackboard.] The Guardian: I: The cosmic forces in me Thus after having experienced the metamorphoses of the cosmic elements together with the Guardian of the Threshold and the hierarchies, the soul answers the Guardian's three questions with inner devotion; interwoven with what has been poured into it, the soul has advanced somewhat in answering the riddle of the words: “O man, know thyself!” And today we will compare the opening words after having been filled with the element of warmth in devotion to the spiritual content of the cosmos, feeling how we have advanced further in following the great admonishment: “O man, know thyself!” We will see how we, as human beings, stand between the resounding of the demand for self-knowledge from all the cosmic events and beings, and the mantric verse, which has been contemplated in today's lesson: O man, know thyself! What becomes of fire's purification, which enkindled your I? Has your spirit understood? The cosmic spirit in me Has your soul apprehended? The cosmic souls in me Has your body experienced? The cosmic forces in me |
| 130. The Festivals and Their Meaning II: Easter: The Death of a God and its Fruits in Humanity
05 May 1912, Düsseldorf Translated by Dorothy S. Osmond, Alan P. Shepherd, Charles Davy |
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| But the time will come when their own religion will lead more and more Buddhists to Anthroposophy, and Christianity itself will lead more and more Christians to Anthroposophy. And then complete understanding will reign between them. |
| And to this soul, which must reign all over the globe as the science of the Spirit belonging to all men in all earthly civilisations, Anthroposophy should lead the way. From the 13th and 14th centuries onwards, such knowledge was cultivated in the Rosicrucian Schools. |
| 130. The Festivals and Their Meaning II: Easter: The Death of a God and its Fruits in Humanity
05 May 1912, Düsseldorf Translated by Dorothy S. Osmond, Alan P. Shepherd, Charles Davy |
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I shall Speak to-day of certain matters in a way that could not be used in public lectures but is possible when I am speaking to those who have been studying spiritual science for some considerable time. The importance of the subject of which we shall speak first, will be evident to all serious students of spiritual science. Reference has frequently been made to this subject but one cannot speak too often of spiritual-scientific concepts, for they must become actual forces, actual impulses in men of the present and immediate future. I shall lay emphasis to-day upon one aspect of what spiritual science must signify in the world, namely, the need to impart soul to our “world-body,” as we may call it. A comparatively short time ago in the evolution of humanity it would not have been possible to speak, as we can speak to-day, of a “world-body.” Looking back only a little into the historical development of mankind, we shall find that in the comparatively recent past, the idea of a world-body peopled by a humanity forming one whole had not yet come into the consciousness of men. We find self-contained civilisations, enclosed within strict boundaries. Guided by the several Folk-Spirits, the Old Indian civilisation, the Old Persian civilisation, and so on, embraced peoples living a self-contained existence, separated from one another by mountains, seas or rivers. Needless to say, such civilisations still exist. We speak, and rightly so, of Italian, Russian, French, Spanish, German culture, but as well as this, when we look over the earth to-day we perceive a certain unity extending over the globe—something by which peoples separated by vast distances are formed as it were into a single whole. We need think only of industry, of railways, of telegraphs, of recent inventions.1 Railways are built, telegraph systems installed, cheques made out and cashed, all over the globe, and the same will hold good for discoveries and inventions yet to be made. Now let us ask: What is the peculiarity of this element that extends over the globe and is the same in Tokyo, Rome, Berlin, London, and everywhere else? It is all a means of providing humanity with food and clothing, as well as with ever-increasing luxury goods. During the last few centuries a material civilisation has spread over the earth, without distinction between nation and nation, race and race. Greek culture flourished in a tiny region of the earth and little was known of it outside that region. But nowadays, news flashes around the whole globe in a few hours—and nobody would doubt the justification of calling this material culture an earthly culture! Moreover it will become increasingly material and our earth-body more and more deeply entangled in it. But those who realise the need for spiritual science will understand with greater clarity that no body can subsist without a soul. Just as material culture encompasses the whole body of the earth, so must knowledge of the spirit be the soul that extends over the whole earth, without distinction of nation, colour, race or people. And just as identical methods are employed wherever railways and telegraph systems are constructed, so will mutual understanding over the whole earth be necessary in regard to questions concerning the human soul. The longings and questionings that will arise increasingly in the souls of men, demand answers. Hence the need for a movement dedicated to the cultivation of spiritual knowledge. Something comparable with cultural relations between individual peoples will then take effect on a wide scale, weaving threads between soul and soul over the whole earth. And what will weave from soul to soul may be called a deep and intimate understanding in regard to something that is sacred to individual souls everywhere, namely, how they are related to the spiritual world. In a future not far distant, intimate understanding will take the place of what led in past times to bitterest conflict and disharmony as long as humanity was divided into regional civilisations which knew nothing of each other. But what will operate on a universal scale over the globe as a spiritual movement embracing all earthly humanity, must operate also between soul and soul. What a distance still separates the Buddhists and the Christians, how little do they understand and how insistently do they turn away from each other on the circumscribed ground of their particular creeds! But the time will come when their own religion will lead more and more Buddhists to Anthroposophy, and Christianity itself will lead more and more Christians to Anthroposophy. And then complete understanding will reign between them. That humanity is coming a little nearer to this intimate understanding can be discerned to-day in the fact that the science of comparative religion is also finding its place in the domain of scholarship. The value of this science of comparative religion should not be underrated, for it has splendid achievements to its credit. But what is really brought to light when the different teachings of the religions are set forth? Although it is not acknowledged, the basis of this science of comparative religion amounts to no more than the most elementary beliefs, long since outgrown by those who have grasped the essence of the religions. The science of comparative religion confines itself to these elementary beliefs. But what is the aim of spiritual science in regard to the various religions? It seeks for something that lies beyond the reach of the scientific investigators, namely for the essential truths contained in the religions. From what does spiritual science take its start? From the fact that mankind has originated from a common Godhead and that a primeval wisdom belonging to mankind as one whole and springing from one Divine source has only for a time been partitioned, as it were, in a number of rays among the different peoples and groups of human beings on the earth. The aim and ideal of spiritual science is to rediscover this primeval truth, this primeval wisdom, uncoloured by this or that particular creed, and to give it again to humanity. Spiritual science is able to penetrate to the essence of the various religions because its attention is focussed, not upon external rites and ceremonies, but upon the kernel of primeval wisdom contained in each one of them. Spiritual science regards the religions as so many channels for the rays of what once streamed without differentiation over the whole of mankind. When a professed Christian, knowing nothing beyond the external tenets of belief that have been instilled into the hearts of men through the centuries, says to a Buddhist: ‘If you would reach the truth you must believe what I believe’ ... and the Buddhist rejoins by declaring what he holds sacred, then no understanding is possible between them. But spiritual science approaches these questions in an entirely different way. Those who can penetrate to the essence of Buddhism as well as to that of Christianity through the methods leading to the development of the new clairvoyance, come to know of sublime Beings who have risen from the realm of man and are called Bodhisattvas. Herein lies the central nerve of Buddhism. And the Christian, too, hears of a Bodhisattva who arises from mankind and works within humanity. He hears that one of these Bodhisattvas—born 600 years before our era as Siddartha, the son of King Suddhodana—attained the rank of Buddha in the twenty-ninth year of his life. A Christian who is an anthroposophist also knows that a Being who has risen from the rank of Bodhisattva to that of Buddha need not appear again on earth in a body of flesh. True, such teachings are also communicated to us by the scientific investigators of religions, but they can make nothing of a Being such as a Bodhisattva or a Buddha; the nature of such a Being is beyond their comprehension; neither can they realise how such a Being continues to guide humanity from the spiritual worlds without living in a body of flesh. But as anthroposophical Christians, our attitude to the Bodhisattva can be as full of reverence as that of a Buddhist, In spiritual science we say exactly the same about Buddha as a Buddhist says. The Christian who is an anthroposophist says to the Buddhist: I understand and believe what you understand and believe. No one who has come to spiritual science from the ground of Christianity would ever dream, as a Christian, of saying that the Buddha returns in the flesh. He knows that this would wound the deepest, most intimate feelings of the Buddhist and that such a statement would be utterly at variance with the true character of those Beings who have risen from the rank of Bodhisattva to that of Buddha. Christianity itself has brought him knowledge and understanding of these Beings. And what will be the attitude of the Buddhist who has become an anthroposophist? He will understand the particular basis of Christianity. He will realise that as in the case of the other religions, Christianity has a Founder—Jesus of Nazareth—but that another Being united with him. A great deal could be said about all that has been associated with the personality of Jesus of Nazareth through the centuries. But the Christian's view of the personality of Jesus of Nazareth differs from the Buddhist's view of the Founder of his religion. In the East it would be said: “One who is a great Founder of religion has achieved the complete harmonisation of all passions and desires, of all human, personal attributes. Is such complete harmonisation manifest in Jesus of Nazareth? We read that he was seized with anger, that he overthrew the tables of the money-changers, drove them out of the temple, that he uttered words of impassioned wrath. This is evidence to us that he does not possess the qualities to be expected of a Founder of religion.” Such is the attitude of the East. We ourselves, of course, could point to many other aspects of this question, but that is not what concerns us at the moment. The really significant fact is that Christianity differs from all other religions inasmuch as they all point to a Founder who was a great Teacher. But to believe that the same is true of Christianity would denote a fundamental misunderstanding. The essence of Christianity is not that it looks back to Jesus of Nazareth as a great Teacher. Christianity originates in a Deed, takes its start from a super-personal Deed—from the Mystery of Golgotha. How could this be? It was because for three years there dwelt in Jesus of Nazareth a Being, Whom—if we are to give Him a name—we call Christ. But a name cannot encompass the Divine Spirit we recognise in Christ. No human name, no human word, can define a Divinity. In Christ we have to do with a Divine Impulse spreading through the world: the Christ Impulse which at the Baptism in the Jordan entered in Him, into Jesus of Nazareth. The very essence of Christianity lies in the Christ Impulse which came to the earth through a physical personality, the physical personality of Jesus of Nazareth into whose sheaths it entered. The Christ took these sheaths upon Himself because the course of world-evolution is, first, a descent, and then again an ascent. At the deepest point of descent the Mystery of Golgotha takes place, because from it alone could spring the power to lead humanity upwards. After the Atlantean catastrophe came the ancient Indian epoch of civilisation. The spirituality of that epoch will not again be reached until the end of the seventh epoch. The ancient Indian epoch was followed by that of ancient Persia, that again by the Egypto-Chaldean epoch. When we survey evolution, even in its external aspect, the decline of spirituality is evident. Then we come to Greco-Latin civilisation with its firm footing in the earthly realm. The works of art created by the Greeks are the most wonderful expression of the marriage of spirit with form. And in Roman culture, in Roman civic life, man becomes master on the physical plane. But the spirituality in Greek culture is characterised by the saying: ‘Better it is to be a beggar in the upper world than a king in the realm of the Shades.’ Dread of the world lying behind the physical plane, dread of the world into which man will pass after death is expressed in this saying. Spirituality has here descended to the deepest point. From then onwards, mankind needed an impulse for the return to the spiritual worlds, and this impulse was given in the Fourth Post-Atlantean epoch through an Event at a level far transcending the physical plane. The Mystery of Golgotha was enacted in a remote corner of the earth, for the sake of no particular race or denomination. It took place in seclusion, in concealment. Neither outer civilisation nor the Romans who governed the little territory of Palestine, knew anything of the Event. The Romans were no followers of Christ—the Jews still less! Who were present when the Mystery of Golgotha took place? Whom had he gathered around him who in his thirtieth year had received the Christ into himself? Had pupils gathered around this Being as they had gathered around Confucius, Laotse or Buddha? If we look closely we see that this is not so. For were those who until the Event of Golgotha had been His disciples, already His apostles? No! They had scattered, they had gone away when the One Whom they had followed hitherto entered upon the path of His Passion. Only when having passed through death, He gave them the certain knowledge of the power that had conquered death—only then did they become true Apostles and carried His impulse to the peoples of the earth. Before then they had not even understood Him. Even Paul, the one who after the Mystery of Golgotha achieved most of all for the spread of Christianity, understood Him only when He had appeared to him in the spirit! So we see that, unlike the other religions, Christianity was not, in essence, founded by a great Teacher whose pupils then promulgate his teachings. The essential, basic truth of Christianity is that a Divine Impulse came down to the earth, passed through death and became the source of the impulse which leads humanity upwards. When the individual personal element had passed through death, had departed from the earth—then and only then did the power which came upon the earth through Christ, begin to work. It is not a merely personal teaching that works on, but the actual Event that Christ was within Jesus and passed through the Mystery of Golgotha, and that from the Mystery of Golgotha a power streamed forth over the whole subsequent evolution of mankind. That is the difference between what Christianity sees as the starting-point of its development and what the other religions see as theirs. When, therefore, we turn our attention to the beginning of Christianity, it is a matter of realising what actually came to pass through the Mystery of Golgotha. Paul says, in effect: The descending line of evolution was caused through Adam, even before the Fall, before he was man, before he was a personality in the real sense. The impulse for the ascent was given by Christ. To feel this as a reality, we must go deeply into the occult truths available to mankind. To grasp this stupendous fact, man's understanding must be quickened by the deepest, most intimate occult truths. It will then be comprehensible to him that, to begin with, even in Christendom itself, the loftiest thoughts and deepest truths could not immediately be understood. To grasp the full meaning of this Divine Death and the Impulse proceeding from it, to realise that such an Event cannot be repeated, that it occurred at the deepest point of the evolutionary process and radiates the power which enables mankind henceforward to tread the path of ascent—to conceive this was possible only to a few. And so in the centuries that followed, men clung to Jesus of Nazareth—for understanding of the Christ was as yet beyond their reach. Moreover it was through Jesus that the Christ Impulse also made its way into works of art. Men yearned for Jesus, not for Christ. We ourselves are still living at the dawn of true Christianity; Christianity is only beginning to come into its own. And when men plead to-day: ‘Do not take from us the individual, personal Jesus who comforts and uplifts our hearts, on whom we lean; do not give us, instead of him, a super-personal event’ ... they must realise that this is nothing but an expression of egoism. Not until they transcend this personal egoism and realise that they have no right to call themselves Christians until they recognise as the source of their Christianity the Event that was fulfilled in majestic isolation on Golgotha, will they be able to draw near to Christ. But this realisation belongs to future time. There may be some who say: Surely the Crucifixion should have been avoided! But this is simply a human opinion—no more than that. These people do not know the difference between an utter impossibility and what is merely a mistaken idea. For what came into the evolution of humanity through the Mystery of Golgotha could proceed only from the impulse of a god Who had endured all the sufferings and agonies of mankind, all the sorrows, the mockery and scorn, the contempt and the shame that were the lot of Christ. And these sufferings were infinitely harder for a god than for an ordinary human being. That the Mystery of Golgotha actually took place cannot be authenticated in the same way as other historical events. There is no authentic, documentary evidence even of the Crucifixion. But there is good reason why no proof exists, for this is an Event which lies outside the sphere of the general evolution of mankind. The Mystery of Golgotha—and this is its very essence—is an Event transcending that which has merely to do with the evolution of humanity. The Mystery of Golgotha was concerned with the descending path which men have taken and with what must lead them upwards again—with the Luciferic influence upon mankind! Lucifer, together with everything belonging to him, is verily not a human being. Lucifer and his hosts are superhuman beings. Nor did Lucifer desire that through his deeds men should be set upon a downward path; his purpose was to rebel against the upper gods. He wanted to vanquish his opponents, not to set men upon a downward path. The progressive gods, the upper gods, and Lucifer with his hosts of the lower gods of hindrance, waged war against each other, and from the very beginning of earthly evolution, man was dragged into this warfare among gods. It was an issue that the gods in the higher worlds had to settle among themselves, but as a result of the conflict, men were drawn more deeply into the material world than was originally intended. And now the gods had to create the balance; humanity had to be lifted upwards again, the deed of Lucifer made of no avail. And this could not be achieved through a man but only through a Divine Deed, the deed of a god. This deed of a god must be understood in all its truth and reality. If we ponder deeply about earthly existence, we find as its greatest riddle: birth and death.The fact that beings can die is the fundamental problem confronting humanity. Death is something that occurs only on the earth. In the higher worlds there is transformation, metamorphosis—no death. Death is the consequence of what came into human beings through Lucifer, and if something had not taken place from the side of the gods, the whole of mankind would have been more and more entangled in the forces which lead to death. And so a sacrifice had to be made from the side of the gods: it was necessary that One from among them should descend and suffer the death that can be undergone only by the children of earth. This was a deed which created the balance for the deed of Lucifer. And from this death of a god streams the power which also radiates into the souls of men and can raise them again out of the darkness in which Lucifer's deed has ensnared them. A god had to die on the physical plane. This is not a direct concern of men ... they were here spectators of an affair of the gods. No wonder that physical means are incapable of portraying an Event which is an affair of the higher worlds, for it falls outside the sphere of the physical world. But the fruits of this deed of a god which had perforce to be wrought on the earth, became the heritage of humanity, and the Christian Initiation gives men the power to understand it. And just as mankind could come forth only once from the bosom of the Godhead, so could the overcoming of what was then instilled into the human soul be achieved only once. If the Christian who has become an anthroposophist were to speak of the nature of Christ to a Buddhist who has become an anthroposophist, the Buddhist would say: ‘I should therefore misunderstand you were I to believe that the Being Whom you call Christ is subject to reincarnation. He is not subject to reincarnation—any more than you would say that the Buddha can return to earthly existence!’ Yet there is one fundamental difference. The Buddhist points to the great Teacher who was the originator of his religion; but the true Christian points to a deed of the spiritual worlds, enacted in seclusion on the earth, he points to something entirely non-personal, having nothing to do with any specific creed or denomination. No single human being, to begin with, recognised this deed; it had nothing to do with any particular locality on the earth. In majestic seclusion the Divine Power poured from this deed into the whole subsequent evolution of mankind. The task of the spiritual-scientific conception of the world is to seek for the truths contained in the different religions, and to seek for the kernel of truth in them all is the augury of peace. When an adherent of some creed truly understands his religion in the light of spiritual science, he will never force its particular ray of truth upon adherents of another religion. As little as the anthroposophical Christian will speak of the return of the Buddha—for then he would not have understood him—as little will the anthroposophical Buddhist speak of the return of Christ—for that too would be a misunderstanding. Provided personal bias is laid aside, the truth concerning Buddha and the truth concerning Christ never makes for discord and sectarianism, but for harmony and peace. This is a natural consequence of truth, for truth is the augury of peace in the world. At the highest level of truth, all nations and all religions on the earth can belong to Buddha the great Teacher; and at the same highest level of truth, all nations and all religions can belong to Christ, the Divine Power. Mutual understanding augurs peace in the world. This peace is the soul of the new world. And to this soul, which must reign all over the globe as the science of the Spirit belonging to all men in all earthly civilisations, Anthroposophy should lead the way. From the 13th and 14th centuries onwards, such knowledge was cultivated in the Rosicrucian Schools. It was known there that together with such knowledge, peace draws into the souls of men. And in these Rosicrucian Schools it was known, too, that many a one who on earth cannot experience this peace, will experience it after death as the fulfilment of his most treasured ideals—when he looks down to the earth and beholds peace reigning among the peoples and nations to the extent to which men open their hearts to receive such knowledge. As I have spoken here to-day, so did the Rosicrucians speak in their small, enclosed circles. To-day these things can be communicated to larger gatherings of men. Those to whom it has been entrusted to carry into effect through spiritual science what streams into humanity from the Mystery of Golgotha, know that every year at Eastertide, Jesus, who bore the Christ within him, seeks out the places where the Mystery of Golgotha was fulfilled. Whether actually in incarnation or not, every year he visits these places, and there his pupils who have made themselves ready, can be united with him. A poet—Anastasius Grün—felt the reality of this. He describes five such meetings of the Master with his pupils. The first, after the destruction of Jerusalem; the second, after the capture of Jerusalem by the Crusaders; the third—Ahasver, the Wandering Jew, lingering on Golgotha; the fourth—a praying monk, yearning and pleading for deliverance from his conqueror. For while sects of different kinds scattered over the earth are at strife among themselves, he through whom the greatest of all tidings of peace was brought to the earth, looks again at the places that were the scene of his earthly deeds. These four pictures are given of past visits of Jesus to the scene of his work on Golgotha. Then, in the poem printed under the title of “Five Easters,” Anastasius Grün pictures another return to Golgotha, in the far future. In this far future of which he gives us a glimpse, the power of peace will then have prevailed on the earth, a peace based, not on denominational Christianity, but on Christianity as it is understood in Rosicrucianism. He sees children who, while they are at play, dig up an object of iron and do not know what it is. They alone who still possess some remote information of the strife waged among men in what is for them the distant past—they alone know that this object is a sword. In that age of peace the purpose of a sword is no longer known—it has been replaced by the ploughshare. Then a farmer digging in the earth finds an object made of stone ... Again it is not recognised. “For a time this was banished from the earth,” say those who still have some knowledge, “for men no longer understood it! Once upon a time they used it as a symbol of strife.” It is a cross of stone,—but now, when the impulse given by Christ Jesus for all future time gathers men together, now it has become something different! How does this poet, writing in the year 1835, describe this symbol of the mission of the Christ Impulse, when rightly understood? He describes it as follows:
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| 236. Karmic Relationships II: Wonder in Everyday Life, Nero, Crown Prince Rudolf
27 Apr 1924, Dornach Translated by George Adams, Mabel Cotterell, Charles Davy, Dorothy S. Osmond |
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| A call that has so often gone out from this platform is that anthroposophists shall have enthusiasm in their seeking, enthusiasm for what is implicit in Anthroposophy. And this enthusiasm must take its start from a realisation of the wonders confronting us in everyday life. |
| —Remember that this was in the eighties of last century when there was as yet no talk of Anthroposophy. It was Schröer, not I, who was examined by the phrenologist who said: “There's the theosophist in you.” |
| Among its other aspects the Goetheanum Building, together with the way in which Anthroposophy would have been cultivated in it, was in itself an education for the vision of karma. And that is what must be introduced into modern civilisation: education for the vision of karma. |
| 236. Karmic Relationships II: Wonder in Everyday Life, Nero, Crown Prince Rudolf
27 Apr 1924, Dornach Translated by George Adams, Mabel Cotterell, Charles Davy, Dorothy S. Osmond |
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We have now studied a number of examples showing how destiny unfolds, examples which can explain and illumine the life and history of mankind. The purpose of these studies has been to show that individuals themselves carry into later epochs of earthly existence what they have experienced and assimilated in earlier times. Connections have come to light which enable us to understand how certain decisive actions of men have their roots in moral causes created by themselves in the course of the ages. It is not this kind of causal connection only that the study of karma can disclose to us. Many other things, too, become intelligible, which to external observation seem at first obscure and incomprehensible. But if we are to participate in the great change in thinking and perception that is essential in the near future if civilisation is to progress and not fall into decline, it is incumbent upon us to develop, in the first place, a sense for what in ordinary circumstances is beyond our grasp and the understanding of which requires insight into the deeper relationships of existence. A man who finds everything comprehensible may, of course, see no need to know anything of more deeply lying causes. But to find everything in the world comprehensible is a sign of illusion and merely indicates superficiality. In point of fact the vast majority of things in the world are incomprehensible to the ordinary consciousness. To be able to stand in wonder before so much that is incomprehensible in everyday life—that is really the beginning of a true striving for knowledge. A call that has so often gone out from this platform is that anthroposophists shall have enthusiasm in their seeking, enthusiasm for what is implicit in Anthroposophy. And this enthusiasm must take its start from a realisation of the wonders confronting us in everyday life. Only then shall we be led to reach out to the causes, to the deeper forces underlying existence around us. This attitude of wonder towards the surrounding world can spring both from contemplation of history and from observation of what is immediately present. How often our attention is arrested by events in history which seem to indicate that human life here and there has lost all rhyme and reason. And human life does indeed lose meaning if we focus our attention upon a single event in history and omit to ask: How do certain types of character emerge from this event? What form will they take in a later incarnation? ... If such questions remain unasked, certain events in history seem to be entirely meaningless, irrelevant, pointless. They lose meaning if they cannot become impulses of soul in a subsequent life on earth, find their balance and then work on into the future. Now there is certainly something that really does not make sense in the phenomenon of a personality such as the Roman Emperor Nero. No reference has yet been made to Nero in lectures in the Anthroposophical Movement. Think of all that history recounts of Nero. In face of such a personality it seems as if life could be mocked and scorned with impunity, as if the utterly flippant disregard for life displayed by one in a position of great power and authority, brought no consequences. Anyone hearing of Nero's deeds must be dull-witted if he is not driven to ask: What becomes of a soul such as this, who scorns the whole world, who regards the life of other men, nay even the existence of a whole city, as something he can play with? “What an artist is lost in me!” is a saying attributed to Nero, and it seems to be in line with his whole attitude and tenor of mind. Utmost flippancy, an intense desire and urge for destruction, acknowledged even by himself—and the soul actually taking pleasure in it all! One can only be repelled by the story, for here is a personality who literally radiates destruction. And the question forces itself upon us: What becomes of such a soul? Now we must be quite clear on this point: Whatever is discharged, as it were, upon the world, is reflected in the life between death and a new birth, and discharged in turn upon the soul who has been responsible for the destruction. A few centuries later, that is to say, a comparatively short time afterwards, Nero appeared again in the world in an unimportant form of existence. During this incarnation a certain balance was brought about in respect of the mania for destruction, the enthusiasm for destruction in which he had indulged as a ruler, simply out of an inner urge. In that next life on earth something of this was balanced out, for the same individuality was now in a position where he was obliged to destroy; he was in a subordinate position, acting under orders. The soul had now to realise what it is like when such acts are not committed out of free will while in a position of supreme power. Matters of this kind must be studied quite objectively and all emotion avoided—that is absolutely essential. In a certain respect, such a destiny calls for pity—for to be as cruel as Nero, to have a mania for destruction as great as his, is, after all, a destiny. There is no need for hatred or censure; moreover such an attitude would prevent one from experiencing all that is required in order to understand the further developments. Insight into the things that have been spoken of here is possible only when they are looked at objectively, when no hostile judgment is passed but when human destiny is really understood. Things disclose themselves quite clearly, provided one has the faculty for understanding them ... That this Nero-destiny came vividly before me on one occasion was attributable to what seemed to be chance—but it was only seemingly chance. One day, when a terrible event had occurred, an event of which I shall speak in a moment and which had a shattering effect throughout the region concerned, I happened to be visiting a person frequently mentioned in my autobiography: Karl Julius Schröer. When I arrived I found him profoundly shocked, as numbers were, by what had happened. And the word “Nero” fell from his lips—apparently without reason—as though it burst from dark depths of the spirit. To all appearances the word came entirely out of the blue. But later on it became quite clear that in reality the Akashic Record was here being voiced through human lips. The event referred to was the following.— The Austrian Crown Prince had always been acclaimed as a brilliant personality, and great hopes were entertained for the time when he would ascend the Throne. Although all kinds of things were known about the behaviour of the Crown Prince Rudolf, they were accepted as almost inevitable in the case of one of such high rank; nobody dreamt for a moment that the things told about him might lead to any serious, tragic conflicts. It was therefore an overwhelming shock when it became known in Vienna that the Crown Prince Rudolf had met his death in mysterious circumstances near the Convent of the Holy Cross, outside Baden, near Vienna. Details gradually came to light and at first there was talk of a “fatal accident”—indeed this was officially announced. Then, after the official announcement, it became known that the Crown Prince had gone to his hunting lodge accompanied by the Baroness Vetsera and that there they had both met their death. The details are so well-known that there is no need to recount them here. All that followed made it impossible for anyone acquainted with the circumstances to doubt that this was a case of suicide. For what happened first of all was that after the issue of the official announcement of the fatal accident, the Prime Minister of Hungary, Koloman Tisza, took exception to this version, and obtained from the then Emperor of Austria the promise that this incorrect statement should not be allowed to stand. The Hungarian Prime Minister refused to be responsible for making this announcement to his people, and he was very emphatic in his refusal. Besides this, there was a man on the medical staff who was one of the most courageous doctors in Vienna at the time and who was to assist at the post-mortem examination; and this man said that he would sign nothing that was not corroborated by the objective facts. Well, the objective facts were a clear indication of suicide; this was officially admitted and the earlier announcement corrected. And if there were no other circumstances than the admission of suicide by a family as fervently Catholic as that of the Austrian Emperor, that alone would have precluded the slightest shadow of doubt. Nobody who can judge the facts objectively will think of doubting it, but there is one very obvious question: How was it possible that anyone with such a brilliant future should turn to suicide when faced with circumstances which, in his position, could easily have remained concealed? Obviously, there was no objective reason why a Crown Prince should commit suicide on account of a love affair—I mean that there was no objective reason attributable to external circumstances. There was no objective reason for such an action, but the fact was that this heir to a Throne found life utterly worthless—a state of mind which had, of course, a psychopathological basis. This itself needs to be understood, for a pathological condition of the soul is also connected with destiny. And the fundamental fact here is that one to whom a brilliant future was beckoning, found life utterly worthless. This, my dear friends, is one of those phenomena in life which seem to be wholly inexplicable. And in spite of all that has been written or said about the whole affair, a true judgment can be formed only by one who says to himself: This single human life, this life of Crown Prince Rudolf of Austria, gives no clue to the suicide or to the causes of the preceding pathological state of mind; something else must be at the bottom of it all. And now, if you picture to yourself the Nero soul, having subsequently experienced what I described and passing at length into that heir to a Throne who does away with himself, who forces the consequences by means of suicide ... then the whole setting is altered. Within the soul there is a tendency which originates in preceding earthly lives; in the time between death and rebirth the soul perceives in direct vision that nothing but forces of destruction have issued from it—and now the ‘grand reversal’, as I will call it, has to be experienced. And how is it experienced?—A life abounding in things of external value reflects itself inwardly in such a way that its bearer considers it utterly worthless, and commits suicide. The soul becomes sick, half demented, seeking an external entanglement in the love affair, and so forth. But these things are merely the consequences of the soul's endeavour as it were to direct against itself all the arrows which in the past had been directed to the world. And then, when we have insight into these relationships, we perceive the unfolding of an overwhelming tragedy, but for all that a righteous, just tragedy. The two pictures are co-ordinated. As I have said so often, it is the underlying details that make real investigation possible in such domains. Many factors in life must work together here. I told you that when this shattering event had just occurred, I was on my way to Schröer. The event itself was not the reason for my visit—I happened to be on the way to him and he was the first person to whom I spoke about the matter. He said: “Nero! ...”—quite out of the blue, and I could not help asking myself: Why does he think of Nero just at this moment? He actually introduced the conversation with the mention of Nero. This amazed me at the time. But the shattering effect was all the greater in view of the particular circumstances in which the word “Nero” was uttered. Two days previously—all this was public knowledge—a Soirée had been held at the house of Prince Reuss, then German Ambassador in Vienna. The Austrian Crown Prince was present, and Schröer too, and the latter saw how the Crown Prince was behaving on that occasion—two days before the catastrophe. The strange behaviour at the Soirée, the suicide two days later, all of it described so dramatically by Schröer—this, in connection with the utterance of the name “Nero”, made one realise that there was good reason for further investigation. Now why did I often follow up things that happened to fall from Schröer's lips? It was not that I simply took anything he said as a pointer, for he, of course, knew nothing of such matters. But many things he said, especially those which seemed to shoot out of the blue, were significant for me because of something that once came to light in a curious way. A conversation I had with Schröer on one occasion led to the subject of phrenology. Not humorously, but with the seriousness with which he was wont to speak—of such things, employing a certain solemnity of language even in everyday matters, Schröer said to me: “I too was once examined by a phrenologist. He felt my head all over and discovered up there the bump of which he said: ‘There's the theosophist in you’.”—Remember that this was in the eighties of last century when there was as yet no talk of Anthroposophy. It was Schröer, not I, who was examined by the phrenologist who said: “There's the theosophist in you.” Now Schröer, outwardly, was far from being a theosophist—my autobiography makes that abundantly clear. But it was just when he spoke of things without apparent motive that his utterances were sometimes profoundly significant. And so there seemed to be a certain connection between the utterance of the word ‘Nero’ and the outer confirmation of his theosophical trend. This was what made him a personality to whose spontaneous utterances one paid heed. And so investigation into the Nero destiny shed light on the subsequent Meyerling destiny and it was found that in the personality of the Austrian Crown Prince Rudolf one actually had to do with the Nero soul. This investigation—which has taken a long time, for in matters of this kind one must be extremely cautious—presented special difficulties to me because I was continually being diverted by the fact that all kinds of people—you may believe it or not—were claiming with fanatical insistence that they themselves had been Nero! So it was a matter, first of all, of combating the subjective force emanating from these alleged reborn Neroes. One had to get through a kind of thicket. But what I am telling you now, my dear friends, is much more important because it has to do with an historical phenomenon, namely, Nero himself. And to understand the further development is much more important than to understand, let us say, the actual catastrophe at Meyerling. For now we see how things which, to begin with, arouse horror and indignation—as does the life of Nero—live themselves out according to a perfect world-justice; we see how this world-justice is fulfilled and how the wrong returns, but in such a way that the individuality is himself involved in creating the balance.—That is what is so stupendous about karma. Still more can become clear when such wrong is balanced out in the course of particular earthly lives. In this case the balance will be almost complete, for you will realise how closely the fulfilment is bound up with the compensatory deed. Just think of it ... a life which considers itself worthless, so worthless that a whole Empire (Austria was then a great Empire) and the rulership of it are abandoned! The suicide in such circumstances bears the consequence that after death it all has to be lived through in direct spiritual vision. This is the fulfilment, albeit the terrible fulfilment, of what may be called the righteous justice of destiny, the balancing out of the wrong. But on the other hand, leaving all this aside, there was a tremendous force in Nero—a force which must not be lost for humanity. This force must of course be purified and we have spoken of the purification. If this has been accomplished, such a soul will carry its forces into later epochs of the earth's existence with salutary effects. When we apprehend karma as righteous compensation, we shall never fail to see how it tests the human being, puts him to the test even when he takes his place in life in a way that horrifies us. The just compensation is brought about, but the human forces are not lost. What has been committed in one life may, under certain circumstances, and provided the righteous justice has taken effect, even be transformed into a power for good. That is why a destiny such as the one described to-day is so profoundly moving. This brings us to the consideration of good and evil, viewed in the light of karma: good and evil, fortune and misfortune, happiness and sorrow—as man experiences them breaking into, shining into, his individual life. In regard to perception of a man's moral situation there was far greater sensitivity in earlier epochs of history than is to be found in modern humanity. Men of the present age are not really sensitive at all to the problem of destiny. Now and again, of course, one comes across someone who has an inkling of the onset of destiny; but real understanding of its problems is shrouded in darkness and bewilderment in our modern civilisation, which regards the single earthly life as something complete in itself. Things happen—and that is that. A disaster that befalls a man is commented on but not really pursued in thought. This is pre-eminently the case when through something that seems to be pure chance, a man who to all appearances is thoroughly good and who has committed no wrong, either perishes, or perhaps does not actually perish but has to endure terrible suffering on account of some injury, or other cause. No thought is given to why such a fate should cut in this way into a so-called innocent life. Humanity was not always so obtuse and insensitive with regard to the problem of destiny. We need not go very far back in time to find that blows of destiny were felt to strike in from other worlds—even the destiny a man has brought upon himself. What is the explanation of this? The explanation is that in earlier times men were not only endowed with instinctive clairvoyance but even when this had faded, its fruits were still preserved in traditions; moreover external conditions and customs did not conduce to such a superficial, commonplace view of the world as prevails to-day, in the age of materialism. There is much talk nowadays of the harmfulness of purely materialistic-naturalistic thinking which has become so universal and has even crept into the various creeds—for the religions too have become materialistic. In no single domain is outer civilisation sincerely desirous of knowing anything about the spiritual world and although men talk in theory of the need to fight this trend, a theoretical battle against materialistic ideas achieves very little. The point of salient importance is that by reason of the conception of the world which has led men to freedom, which will do so still more, and which constitutes a transitional period in the history of human evolution—by reason of this conception of the world, a certain means of healing that was available in earlier epochs for outer sense-observation has been lost. In the early centuries of Greek civilisation—in fact it was so for a considerable time—men saw in nature around them the outer, phenomenal world. The Greek, as well as modern man, looked out at nature. True, the Greek saw nature in a rather different aspect, for the senses themselves have evolved—but that is not the point here. The Greek had a remedy wherewith to counteract the organic harm that is caused in man when he merely gazes out into nature. We do not only become physiologically long-sighted with age as the result of having gazed constantly at nature, but this gives our soul a certain configuration. As it gazes at nature, the soul realises inwardly that not all the demands of vision are being satisfied. Unsatisfied demands of vision remain. And this holds good for the process of perception in general—hearing, feeling, and so forth. Certain elements in the perceptive process remain unsatisfied when we gaze out into nature. It is more or less the same as if a man in physical existence wished to spend his whole life without taking adequate food. Such a man deteriorates physically. But when he merely gazes at nature, the perceptive faculty in his life of soul deteriorates. He gets a kind of ‘consumption’ of soul in his sense-world. This was known in the old Mystery-wisdom. But it was also known how this ‘consumption’ in the life of soul can be counteracted. It was known that the Temple Architecture, where men beheld the equipose between downbearing weight and upbearing support, or when, as in the East, they beheld forms that were really plastic representations of moral forces, when they looked at the architectural forms confronting the eye and the whole of the perceptive process, or experienced the musical element in these forms—it was known that here was the remedy against the consumption which befalls the senses when they merely gaze out into nature. And when the Greek was led into his temple where he beheld the pillars, above them the architrave, the inner composition and dynamic of it all, then his gaze was bounded and completed. When a man looks at nature his gaze is really no more than a stare, going on into infinity, never reaching an end. In natural science too, every problem leads on and on, in this way, without coming to finality. But the gaze is bounded and completed when one faces a work of great architecture created with the aim of intercepting the vision, rescuing it from the pull of nature. There you have one feature of life in olden times: this capturing of the outward gaze. And again, when a man turns his gaze inwards to-day, it does not penetrate to the innermost core of his being. If he practises self-knowledge, what he perceives is a surging medley of all kinds of emotions and outer impressions, without clarity or definition. He cannot lay hold of himself inwardly; he lacks the strength to grasp this inner reality in imaginations, in pictures—as he must do before he can make any real approach to the inmost kernel of his being. It is here that cult and ritual enacted reverently before men take effect. Everything of the nature of cult and ritual, not the external rites only but comprehension of the world expressed in imagery and pictures, leads man towards his innermost being. As long as he strives for self-knowledge with abstract ideas and concepts, nothing is achieved. But when he penetrates into his inmost being with pictures that give concrete definition to experiences of soul, then he achieves his aim. The inmost kernel of his being comes within his grasp. How often have I not said that man must meditate in pictures, in images. This has been dealt with at ample length, even in public lectures. And so, looking at man in the past, we find on the one side that his gaze and perception, when directed outwards, are as it were bounded, intercepted, by architectonic forms; on the other side, his inward-turned gaze is bounded and held firm by picturing his soul-life; and this can also be presented to him through the imagery of cult and ritual. [IMAGE REMOVED FROM PREVIEW] On the one side, therefore, there is the descent into the inmost being; on the other, the outward gaze lights upon the forms displayed in sacred architecture. A certain union is thereby achieved. Between what comes alive within and that upon which the gaze falls, there is an intermediate domain, imperceptible to man in his everyday consciousness because his outward gaze is not captured by forms of architecture born of deep, inner knowledge, nor is his inward gaze given definition by pictures and imaginations. But there is this intermediate domain ... if you let that work in your life, if you go about with inner self-knowledge deepened through imagination, and with sense-perceptions made whole and complete through forms created and inspired by a real understanding of man's nature ... then your feeling in regard to strokes of destiny will be the same as it was in olden times. By cultivating the domain that lies between the experience of true architectonic form and the experience of true, symbolic imagery along the path inwards, a man becomes sensitive to the strokes of destiny. He feels that what befalls him comes from earlier lives on earth. This again is an introduction to the studies which we shall be pursuing and which will include consideration of the good and the evil in connection with karma. But what is of salient importance is that within the Anthroposophical Movement there shall be right thinking. The architecture that would have fulfilled the needs of modern man, that would have been able to capture his gaze in the right way and to have led naturalistic perception, which veils and obscures the vision of karma, gradually into real vision—this architecture did once exist, in a certain form. And the fact that anthroposophical thoughts were uttered in the setting of those forms, kindled the inner vision. Among its other aspects the Goetheanum Building, together with the way in which Anthroposophy would have been cultivated in it, was in itself an education for the vision of karma. And that is what must be introduced into modern civilisation: education for the vision of karma. But needless to say, it was in the interests of those who are opposed to what ought now to enter civilisation, that such a Building should fall a prey to the flames ... There, too, it is possible to look into the deeper connections. But let us hope that, before very long, forms that awaken a vision of karma will again stand before us, at the same place. This is what I wanted to say in conclusion to-day, when so many friends from abroad are still with us after our Easter Meeting. |
| 176. The Karma of Materialism: Lecture VI
04 Sep 1917, Berlin Translated by Rita Stebbing |
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| I recently described the incredible superficiality with which a professor of Berlin University attacked Anthroposophy. I told you of the misrepresentations and slanders delivered by Max Dessoir.21 That such an individual should be a member of a learned body is part and parcel of the complexities of life today. |
| For the moment I refer to it in my forth coming booklet concerned with attacks on Anthroposophy. As I said Max Dessoir wrote a history of psychology and then withdrew it from circulation. |
| People are bound to say that here, at last, the old fashioned idea of speaking about the spiritual world is done away with. Anyone knowing something of Anthroposophy will recognize that in the case of this scholar there is a condition of dimmed consciousness. |
| 176. The Karma of Materialism: Lecture VI
04 Sep 1917, Berlin Translated by Rita Stebbing |
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It is especially important in our time that the reality of spiritual life is not confused with the way people interpret this reality. We live in an age when human understanding and human conduct are strongly influenced by materialism. However, it would be wrong to think that because our age is materialistic, spiritual influences are not at hand, that the spirit is not present and active. Strange as it may seem it is possible, particularly in our time, to observe an abundance of effects in human life which are purely spiritual. They are everywhere in evidence and, the way they manifest, one could certainly not say that they are either invisible or inactive. The situation is rather that people, because of their materialistic outlook, are incapable of seeing what is manifestly there. All they see is what is so to speak "on the agenda." When one looks at people's attitude to the spirit, at the way they react when spiritual matters are spoken of, it reminds one of an incident which took place several decades ago in a Central European city. There was an important meeting of an important body of people and the degeneration of moral standards came under discussion. Immoral practices had begun to have adverse influence on certain financial transactions. Naturally a large part of this distinguished body of people wanted financial matters to be discussed purely from the point of view of finance. But a minority—it usually is a minority on such occasions—wanted to discuss the issue of moral corruption. However a minister got up and simply tossed aside such an irrelevant issue by saying: “But gentlemen, morality is not on the agenda.”—It could be said that the attitude of a great many people today in regard to spiritual matters is also one that says: But gentlemen, the spirit is not on the agenda. It is manifestly not on the agenda when things of importance are debated. But perhaps such debates do not always deal with the reality, perhaps the spirit is present, only it is not put on the agenda when human affairs are under discussion. When one considers these things, and has opportunity to talk more intimately with people, a situation emerges which is very different from what is imagined by those who feel embarrassed by talking about things of a spiritual nature. When one comes to discuss how people got the impulse to do what they are doing one finds again and again that they decided on a project because of some prophetic vision or because of some inner impulse. As I said, if one looks at these things and is able to assess the situation, more often than not things are done because of some spiritual influence, perhaps in the form of a dream or some other kind of vision. Much more than is imagined takes place under the influence of spiritual powers and impulses which flow into the physical world from the spiritual world. People's theoretical rejection of spirituality, based on present-day outlook, does not alter the fact that significant spiritual impulses do penetrate everywhere into our world. However, they do not escape being influenced by the prevailing materialism. There has always been an influx of spiritual impulses throughout mankind's evolution and one ought not to think that this has ceased in our time. But people responded differently when there was more awareness of the existence of a spiritual world than they do in a materialistic age like ours. Let us look at a particular example. It is extraordinarily difficult to convey to the world certain facts concerning spiritual matters, the reason being that people in general are not sufficiently prepared; they cannot formulate the appropriate concepts for receiving rightly such communications from the spiritual world. Such communications are all too easily distorted into the very opposite. Therefore it often happens, especially at present, that those who are initiated into spiritual matters must remain silent in regard to what is most essential. They must because it cannot be foreseen what might happen if certain things were imparted to someone unripe for the information. Nevertheless certain situations do often arise. On occasions, in accordance with higher laws, discussions take place about spiritual matters. When it is difficult, as it usually is at present, to discuss such things with the living it can often be all the more fruitful to discuss them with those who have died. Seldom perhaps was there a time when conscious interaction between the physical plane and the spiritual world, in which the dead are living, was so vigorous as it can be at present. Let us assume that a discussion takes place of a kind possible only between someone with knowledge on the physical plane and someone who has died. In this situation something very curious can happen, something that could be termed a "transcendental indiscretion" can take place. The fact is that there are those who listen at keyholes, so to speak, not only on the physical plane, but also among certain beings in the spiritual world. There are spirits of an inferior kind who are forever attempting to obtain knowledge of all kinds of spiritual facts by such means. They listen to what is being said between beings on the physical plane and those in the spiritual world. Their opportunity to listen to such a conversation can arise through someone who, being especially passionate, in the grip of his passion is, as one might say, “beside himself.” This kind of situation often arises through passion, through being drunk—really physically drunk—or through faintness. It gives the lower spirit opportunity to enter into the person with the result that the person either then or later has visions of some kind and can hear things he is not supposed to hear. It is well known to those able to observe such happenings that countless things, obtained through indiscretion in spiritual communication, appear in distorted form in all kinds of literature, particularly those of a more dubious kind. Nothing is more effective than when some lower elemental spirit (Kobold) takes possession of the writer of a detective novel, especially if drunk and, entering into his human frailties, instills in him a particular sentence or phrase which he then introduces into his story. Later the novel reaches people through all kinds of direct or indirect channels; the particular sentence has an especially strong effect because, given the way people take these things in, it speaks, not to the reader's consciousness, but to his subconscious. Another method which is very effective is when, in a spiritualistic seance, such a spirit may have the opportunity to insinuate, into what is related through the medium, the spiritual indiscretion he wishes put to effect. This is not to say anything against mediumship as such, only the way it is used. Many things occur in the course of human karma which, in order to come to light, need mediumistic communications. We are not dealing with this aspect today, however. The point I want to make at the moment is to emphasize that there are at the present time spiritual channels between the spiritual world and the physical plane. These channels are very numerous and far more effective than is supposed.—Having said this you will understand better when I now say something which may seem paradoxical but is nevertheless a reality. The years between 1914 and 1917 will no doubt be written about in the future in the usual way of historians. They will scrutinize documents, found in archives everywhere, in order to establish what caused the terrible World War. On this basis they will attempt to write a plausible account of say the year 1914 in relation to events in Europe. However, one thing is certain: no documentary research, no report drawn up in the way this is usually done will suffice to explain the causes of this monstrous event. The reason is simply that according to their very nature the most significant causes are not inscribed by pen or printer's ink into external documents. Furthermore their very existence is denied because they are not, so to speak, “on the agenda.” Just in these last days you will have read reports of the legal inquiries going on in Russia. The Russian minister of war Suchomlinoff,20 the Chief of the Russian General Staff and other personalities have made important statements which have caused a great deal of indignation. Many feel moral indignation on learning that Suchomlinoff lied to the Czar; or that the Chief of the Russian General Staff, with the mobilization order in his pocket, gave the German Military Attache his solemn promise that this order had not yet been issued. He said this because he intended to pass it on to the proper quarters a few minutes later. Such things are certainly cause for indignation and moralizing but so much lying goes on nowadays that no one should be surprised that really fat ones are told in important places. But these incidents and what people say about them are truly not the real issue. That is something quite different. When one reads the full report carefully one comes across remarkable words which are clear indicators of what really took place. Suchomlinoff himself says that while these events were taking place he, for a time, lost his reason. He says in so many words: “I lost my reason over it.” The continuous vacillation of events caused this state of affairs. He was not alone, quite a few others in key positions were in similar states. Imagine a person occupying a position such as that of Suchomlinoff: The loss of his power of reasoning gives splendid opportunity for ahrimanic beings to take possession of him and instill into his soul all kinds of suggestions. Ahriman uses such methods to bring his influence to bear, especially when no importance is attached to remaining fully conscious—apart from sleep. When we are fully conscious such spiritual beings have no real access to our soul. But when our spirit; i.e., our consciousness is suppressed then ahrimanic beings have immediate access. Dimmed consciousness is for ahrimanic and luciferic beings the window or door through which they can enter the world and carry out their intention. They attack people when they are in a state of dimmed consciousness and take possession of them. Ahriman and Lucifer do not act in inexplicable terrifying ways but through human beings whose state of consciousness gives them access. Those who in the future want to write a history of this war must discover where such dimmed states of consciousness occurred, where doors and windows were thrown open for the entry of ahrimanic and luciferic powers. In earlier times such things did not happen to the same extent in events of a similar kind. In order to describe the causes of events during earlier times what professors and historians find in archives will suffice, whereas in the case of present events something will remain unexplained over and above what is found in documents however well researched. This something is the penetration of certain spiritual powers into the human world through states of dimmed consciousness. I spoke in an earlier lecture about how, in a certain region of the earth, conditions were prepared for decades so that at the right moment the appropriate ahrimanic forces could penetrate and influence mankind. Something of this nature took place in July and August of 1914 when an enormous flood, a veritable whirlpool, of spiritual impulses surged through Europe. That has to be rightly understood and taken into account. One simply does not understand reality if one is not prepared to approach it with concrete concepts derived from spiritual insight. To understand what is real, as opposed to what is unreal, at the present time spiritual science is an absolute necessity. Nothing can effectively be done in the political or any other sphere unless wide-awake consciousness is developed concerning events which must be approached with concepts and ideas gained from spiritual knowledge. Not that everything can be judged in stereotyped fashion according to spiritual science. But spiritual knowledge can stir us to alert participation in present issues, whereas a materialistic view of events allows us to sleep through things of greatest importance. A materialistic outlook prevents us from arriving at proper judgement of what the present asks of us. A recognition of what here is at stake is what I so much want to be present as an undercurrent in our spiritual-scientific lectures and discussions, so that spiritual knowledge may become a vital force enabling souls to deal appropriately with outer life. It is essential to recognize not only the issues of spiritual science itself but also those of external life as they truly are. One must be able to arrive at judgements based on the symptoms to be seen everywhere. I recently described the incredible superficiality with which a professor of Berlin University attacked Anthroposophy. I told you of the misrepresentations and slanders delivered by Max Dessoir.21 That such an individual should be a member of a learned body is part and parcel of the complexities of life today. Max Dessoir once wrote a history of psychology and mentions in the preface that he wrote it because the Berlin Academy of Science had offered a prize for a work on the subject. The history of psychology written by Max Dessoir is such a slovenly piece of work, containing fundamental errors that he withdrew it and prohibited further publication. Consequently not many copies are in circulation, though I have a reviewers copy and could say many things about it. For the moment I refer to it in my forth coming booklet concerned with attacks on Anthroposophy. As I said Max Dessoir wrote a history of psychology and then withdrew it from circulation. But the fact remains that the Berlin Academy of Science did award it the prize. Such things should not be overlooked; they are symptomatic of what takes place nowadays. One must ask: who are the people who award such prizes? They are the very people who educate the younger generation; i.e., they educate those who will become leading figures in society. They also educated the generation which brought about the present situation in the world. It is necessary to see things in their true context and to recognize that all the symptoms reveal the need for that which alone can make our time comprehensible. This again indicates what I wish so very much could flow as an undercurrent through our movement so that spiritual science would shake souls awake and make them alert observers of what really takes place in their surroundings. The occasion for sleep is in our time considerable and naturally ahrimanic and luciferic powers make use of every opportunity to divert the alert consciousness aroused by spiritual knowledge away from the real issues. The opportunities for dulling man's consciousness are plentiful. Someone who studies exclusively a special subject will certainly become ever more knowledgeable and clever in his particular field; yet the clarity of his consciousness may suffer as a result.—In speaking about these things one is skating on very thin ice. While it is true that there are many things of which an initiate cannot speak at present because it could have terrible results, it is also true that there are things of which one can and indeed must speak. To give an example, there is a professor at a German university of whom much good could be said and I have no intention to say anything against the man. I want to give an objective characterization. He is a distinguished scholar of theology, has studied widely and his research in the domain of theology has made him very learned. Yet it has not made him awake and alert to what constitutes true reality. As professor of theology his task is to speak about religion, scripture and also about veneration and supersensible powers. This, for a modern professor of theology, is a rather uncomfortable task. Such learned men much prefer to speak about experiencing religion as such, about how it feels merely to approach the spiritual. This professor, as others like him, has a certain fear of the spiritual world, fear of defining or describing it in actual words and concepts. I have often spoken about this fear which is purely ahrimanic in origin. This professor has an inkling that he will meet Ahriman once he penetrates the material world and enters the spiritual world. He would then have to overcome Ahriman. Here we see someone who as a theologian looks upon the beauty and the greatness of nature as a manifestation of the divine. But this aspect of nature he will not investigate for it is the beings of the Higher Hierarchies who reveal themselves through nature and to speak of them is not “scientific.” Nevertheless he does want to investigate the soul's religious experiences. However, in attempting investigation of this kind, without any wish to enter the spiritual world itself, one very easily succumbs instead to the very soul condition one is apt to experience when confronting Ahriman: the condition of fear. The religious experience of this theologian consists therefore partly of fear, of timidity in face of the unknown. The last thing he wants is to make the unknown into the known. He presumes that timidity and fear of the unknown—which stems from ahrimanic beings—is part and parcel of religious experience. It is because he wants to describe the soul's religious experience but refuses to enter the realm of the Hierarchies who live behind the sense world that Ahriman darkens his comprehension of the spiritual world. Through the ahrimanic temptation the spiritual world appears as “the great unknown,” as “the irrational” and religious experience is confused with the “mystery of fear.”—Nor is that all, for just as Ahriman is waiting without when one seeks the spiritual world through external nature so does Lucifer wait within. The modern theologian of whom we are speaking also refuses to seek the Hierarchies within. Here again Lucifer makes the realm of the Hierarchies appear as "the great unknown" which the theologian refuses to make into the known. Yet he wants to know the soul's experience, so here he meets the opposite of the mystery of fear, namely the “mystery of fascination.” This is a realm in which we experience attraction, we become fascinated. The theologian now has on the one hand the mystery of fear and on the other the mystery of fascination; for him these two components constitute religious life. Naturally there are critics today who feel that it is a great step forward when theology has, at last, got away from speaking about spiritual beings; no longer speaks of what is rational but about what is irrational; i.e., the mystery of fear and the mystery of fascination, the two ways to avoid entering the unknown. The book: Über das Heilige (About the Sacred) by professor Otto22 of Breslau University is certain to attain fame. This book sets out to derationalize everything to do with religious experience. It sets out to make everything vague, to make all feelings indefinite partly through fear of the unknown and also through fascination for the unknown. This view of religious life is certain to attract attention. People are bound to say that here, at last, the old fashioned idea of speaking about the spiritual world is done away with. Anyone knowing something of Anthroposophy will recognize that in the case of this scholar there is a condition of dimmed consciousness. Such conditions frequently occur; philologists and researchers often fall into states of dimmed consciousness, especially when their investigations are within a limited field. In such conditions Ahriman and Lucifer have access to them. And why should Ahriman not prevent such a researcher from beholding the spiritual world by deluding him through the mystery of fear? And why should Lucifer not delude him through the mystery of fascination? There is no other remedy than clear awareness of the roles played by Ahriman and Lucifer, otherwise one is merely wallowing in nebulous feelings. Certainly feeling is a powerful element of the soul's life which should not be artificially suppressed by the intellect, but that is something different altogether from allowing a surge of indefinite feeling to obscure every concrete insight into the spiritual world. One is reminded in this connection of something said by Hegel,24 though it was cynical and purely speculative. Hegel was referring to Schleiermacher's23 famous definition of religious feeling which, according to him, consisted of utter and complete dependence. This definition is not false but that is not the point. Hegel, who above all wanted to lead man to clear concepts and concrete views and certainly not to feelings of dependence, declared that if utter dependence was a criterion for being religious then a dog would be the best Christian. Similarly if fear is the criterion for religious feelings then one need only suffer an attack of hydrophobia in order to experience intensely the mystery of fear. What I am bringing up in these lectures must be considered, not so much according to its theoretical content but rather as an indication of the kind of inner attitude which is indispensable if one wants to observe the conditions in the world as they truly are. And it is so very important to do so. No matter where or how one is placed in life one can either observe appropriately or be inappropriately asleep. What surges and pulsates through life comes to expression in small issues as well as in big ones and can be observed everywhere. We are at the beginning of a time when it will be of particular importance that things I have indicated in these last lectures are kept very much in mind. Many people do arrive at awareness of a universal Godhead or a universal spirituality. Yet, as I demonstrated when I spoke about his article “Reason and Knowledge,” even someone of the stature of Hermann Bahr does not arrive at any real awareness of Christ. He allies himself with the most prominent Christian institution of the day, that of Rome. But despite all he says there is no sign in his “Reason and Knowledge” of any conscious search for the Christ Impulse. Yet the most pressing need in our time is to gain an ever clearer understanding of the Christ impulse. In the course of the 19th Century there was a great upsurge of natural-scientific thinking and all its attendant results. One of the first results was theoretical materialism accompanied by atheism. It can be said that the materialists of the 19th Century positively revelled in atheism. But such tendencies are apt to reverse and the same kind of thinking which made human beings atheists—due to certain luciferic-ahrimanic impulses at work during the first upsurge of natural science—will make them pious once the first glow has faded. The teachings of Darwin can make people God-fearing as easily as it can make them atheists, it all depends which side of the coin turns up. What no one can become through Darwinism is a Christian; nor is that possible through natural science if one remains within its limits. To become a Christian something quite different is required; namely, an understanding of a certain fundamental attitude of soul. What exactly is meant? Kant said that the world is our mental picture, for the mental pictures we make of the world are formed according to the way we are organized. I may mention, not for personal but for factual reasons, that this Kantianism is completely refuted in my books Truth and Knowledge and The Philosophy of Freedom. These works set out to show that when we form concepts about the world, and elaborate them mentally, we are not alienating ourselves from reality. We are born into a physical body to enable us to see objects through our eyes and hear them through our ears and so on. What is disclosed to us through our senses is not full reality, it is only half reality. This I also stressed in my book Riddles of Philosophy. It is just because we are organized the way we are that the world, seen through our senses, is in a certain sense what Orientals call Maya. In the activity of forming mental pictures of the world we add, by means of thoughts, that which we suppressed through the body. This is the relation between true reality and knowledge. The task of real knowledge and therefore real science is to turn half reality; i.e., semblance, into the complete reality. The world, as it first appears through our senses, is for us incomplete. This incompleteness is not due to the world but to us, and we, through our mental activity, restore it to full reality. These thoughts I venture to call Pauline thoughts in the realm of epistemology. For it is truly nothing else than carrying into the realm of philosophic epistemology, the Pauline epistemology that man, when he came into the world through the first Adam, beheld an inferior aspect of the world; its true form he would experience only in what he will become through Christ. The introduction of theological formulae into epistemology is not the point; what matters is the kind of thinking employed. I venture to say that, though my Truth and Knowledge and The Philosophy of Freedom are philosophic works, the Pauline spirit lives in them. A bridge can be built from this philosophy to the Christ Spirit; just as a bridge can be built from natural science to the Father Spirit. By means of natural-scientific thinking the Christ Spirit cannot be attained. Consequently as long as Kantianism prevails in philosophy, representing as it does a viewpoint that belongs to pre-Christian times, philosophy will continue to cloud the issue of Christianity. So you see that everything that happens, everything that is done in the world must be observed and understood on a deeper level. It is necessary, when assessing literary works today, to keep in view not only their verbal content but also the whole direction of the ideas employed. One must be able to evaluate what is fruitful in such works and what must be superceded. Then one will also find entry into those spheres which alone enables one to stay awake in the true sense. The terrible events taking place in our time must be seen as external symptoms, the real change of direction must start from within. Let me mention in conclusion that before 1914 I pointed out how confused were the statements made by Woodrow Wilson.25 At that time I was completely alone in that view. What I said can be found in a course of lectures I gave at Helsingfors in May and June 1913. At that time Woodrow Wilson had the literary world at his feet. Only certain writings of his had been translated into other languages and much was said about his “great, noble and unbiased” mind. Those who were of that opinion speak differently now; but whether insight or something different brought about the change of view is open to question. What is important now is to recognize that because spiritual science is directly related to true reality it enables one to form appropriate judgements. This is an urgent need in view of the empty abstraction on which most judgements are based at present. An example of the latter is Der Geistgehalt dieses Krieges (The Spiritual Import of this War) by George Simmel. It is an ingenious presentation and a prime example of ideas from which all content has been extracted. To read it is comparable to eating an orange from which all juice has been squeezed out. Yet the book was written by a distinguished philosopher and innovator of modern views. At the Berlin university he had a large following; the fact that he never had a thought worthy of the name did nothing to diminish his fame.
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| 211. The Mysteries of the Sun and Death and Resurrection: The Human Being and its Expression in Greek Art
31 Mar 1922, Dornach |
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| Goethe longed to discover, to experience the human being. And basically, the whole of anthroposophy is nothing more than a world view that arises from the longing to find the human being in his or her entirety, to answer the question: what exactly is this human being? |
| And if you compare what Lessing said about Laocoön and the beautiful comments on it by Goethe, you will not find in Goethe's remarks what leads to a real understanding, because Goethe did not yet have anthroposophy, but you will find significant progress compared to Lessing's discussions. You will discover indications everywhere in Goethe of what I have just explained. |
| And that is why it can be said that, in the right continuation, Goetheanism necessarily leads to anthroposophy, right down to the last detail. |
| 211. The Mysteries of the Sun and Death and Resurrection: The Human Being and its Expression in Greek Art
31 Mar 1922, Dornach |
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Let us visualize the forces that hold the human being together during life on earth, so that we can gain some insight into cosmology during these days. We know, of course, that the human being is structured when we look at the next thing that characterizes him in earthly life: the physical body, the body of formative forces (which can also be called the etheric body), the astral body, and the I. Let us imagine how we might characterize these four aspects of the human being. The physical body is, after all, what comes to a person through the fact that the forces of the earth work for him, so to speak. In the time that a person goes through between death and a new birth, he does not deal with this physical body. From the remarks I made in the immediately preceding lectures, we have seen that the human being, when it descends from the spiritual and soul realms to a physical embodiment, is, so to speak, spiritually dead and must regain its strength in inwardness by immersing itself in the physical body. But this physical body itself is, as it were, born out of the forces of the earth and connects with that which descends from the spiritual-soul world. But a short time before the human being reaches physical embodiment on earth, he does not yet have the formative forces or etheric body either. This is also only connected to the human being for earthly existence in the same way as the physical body. Only this formative forces or etheric body has a different relationship to the cosmos than the physical body. If we examine the physical body of man in relation to its forces, we find in it precisely the forces of the earth planet itself. But if we approach the etheric or formative body of man, we find in it more the forces of the cosmos, the forces of the entire universe. On the other hand, the human astral body and the human I contain such forces that are not actually found in the outer space of the universe, which, if we may use the expression, are not of the world to which the earth belongs. It is actually the case that the earth is constantly striving to take possession of the physical body of the human being and incorporate it into its own being. In contrast, the universe constantly tends to disperse the human being's formative forces or etheric body throughout the world. When a person is in the state between falling asleep and waking up, the forces at work in what remains in bed, in the physical and formative forces, actually work in such a way that the physical body continually, if I may express it this way, wants to connect with the earth. It wants to become similar to the earth, it wants to become completely earthly. The formative forces or etheric body wants to disperse into the universe. And when we rediscover our physical body and our etheric body when we wake up in the morning, it is actually the case that, when we enter our physical body, it tells us: the earth has taken hold of me throughout the night, the earth wanted to shape me into dust. Only because you held me together through your ego and your astral body yesterday and the preceding days on earth have I remained a physical body; the forces of cohesion continued to work in me. Likewise, the formative forces or etheric body says: I have only kept the human form because I have adopted the habit of being like you. Actually, during the night, while you were sleeping, while you were away from me, the forces of the universe wanted to scatter me to the four winds. Every time we wake up, we basically have to make an effort to properly take possession of our physical body again. It actually wants to lose us from falling asleep to waking up. We do this through the ego. The ego, when trained to do so, can really feel as if it wants to take possession of the physical body anew every morning. The astral body can feel when waking up that it must make the etheric body similar to itself. The etheric body already wanted to take on an inhuman form. The astral body must in turn push it back into the human form. One would like to say: During sleep, the physical body loses its tendency to be possessed by the ego, and the etheric body loses its tendency to have a human-like form. It flutters out. So that in fact the shape that our physical body has is only a result of the I-effect in our human being. In the present state of mind, people do not have much feeling for something that can be expressed in words: when I return to my physical body in the waking state, I first have to take possession of it again. It wanted to get lost, and the etheric body wanted to flutter apart. But let us assume that there was once a time when people still had a clear sense of this struggle that takes place every time we wake up between the self and the astral body on the one hand, and the physical body and the etheric body on the other. Then, precisely because they would have had this clear perception, they would also have sensed that it would have to be something very special if a person were to suddenly have to leave his physical body and etheric body through some sudden event. Under normal earthly conditions, when a person leaves his physical body and his etheric body, it is because the physical body, whether through illness or old age, has become very similar to the earth, so that it wants to unite with the earth. Or, through some kind of injury, the physical body has been brought to such a state that the ego can no longer possess it, and so on. But let us assume that the I and the astral body suddenly had to leave the fully healthy and uninjured physical and etheric bodies, so that they still have the tendency to be possessed by the I and to be similar to the astral body in the highest sense. What would have to happen then? The thought might have dawned on the old person: Yes, then this physical body could not simply disintegrate. It can only disintegrate when it already has the tendencies to disintegrate within itself, as a result of illness or aging or the like. But when the astral body and the I suddenly have to emerge from the fully healthy human organism, in which the body of formative forces is present, then the human-like form would have to remain, because the tendency to be possessed by the I and the astral body is still fully present. The human form would have to remain fully intact. The human being would become like a statue. The physical body could not disintegrate, the etheric body could not become dissimilar because the separation would have been too rapid. The human being would become a statue. There seems to have been a case of this kind of sensation in reality. You all know the Greek legend of Niobe, who had seven healthy sons and seven healthy daughters and who, out of a sense of abundance, once mocked the mother of Apollo and Artemis because, despite being a goddess, she only had two children: Apollo and Artemis. She refused to sacrifice, and the revenge of the god or the gods came upon her. She had to experience that her seven daughters and seven sons suddenly died, were killed, by the arrows of Apollo and Artemis. She saw the whole field of corpses of her fourteen offspring before her, and her ego and her astral body united in the pain of what she saw around her. You know the figures on the pediment of the statue of Niobe, who becomes a statue herself, surrounded by her seven sons and seven daughters as they meet their deaths. She herself becomes a statue. The physical body and the etheric body must separate from the ego and the astral body. But this physical body and the etheric body, because they were so full of life that Niobe herself could mock the goddess with her two offspring, could not lose their connection to the ego, and the etheric body could not become dissimilar to the astral body. Niobe became a statue. Such a work of art is certainly the outcome of a deep feeling arising from a world view, of something that was felt to be a truth from the world view of the time. The feeling was simply this: if Niobe had not been so full of life that she could come to mock the goddess Latona, then she could have died with her physical body disintegrating. But she was so full of life that she rebelled against the gods, that she lived so fully in her physical body. And so we see that the Greek genius felt: because of the rapid departure of the ego and the astral body from the physical and etheric bodies, Niobe becomes a statue. If we look back at the development of humanity, we see that art always follows the feelings associated with the world view of the time in question. But we can see this in many other ways as well. Let us turn our gaze once more to how the human being, upon waking, must take possession of his physical body again, because this physical body wants to become similar to the earth. If Niobe had been able to sleep even for one night after experiencing her pain, she could no longer have become a statue, for the physical body would then already have absorbed the forces to become similar to the earth, that is to disintegrate. Therefore, every morning the human being must again take possession of the physical body, and every morning the astral body must form the etheric body in a similar way, giving it a plastic form again, so that it takes on a human-like shape. During the Greek development there was a time when it was felt quite vividly that every morning man must develop strength in order to take firm possession of his physical body. The Greeks derived a certain satisfaction from their physical body, and since they knew that they had to take possession of their physical body anew every morning, they felt the need to strengthen the forces that could take possession of the physical body, and also those that could make the astral body strong, in order to make the etheric body similar to it again every morning. If man, while waking, would consciously follow the whole process that takes place when waking up, he would say to himself every morning: I must not lose my physical body, I must really get back into this physical body! Man would be afraid of not being able to get properly into the physical body. The ancient Greeks knew much about this fear, and they also knew that every night the etheric body has a tendency to split into four different forms: an angelic, a lion-like, an eagle-like, and an ox-like form. Every morning, starting from the astral body, one must endeavor to synthesize these four members of the etheric body, if I may use the expression, in such a way that a real human being is formed again. But the Greeks liked to have life in the physical and etheric bodies. I have often quoted the saying that comes to us from Greece: “Better a beggar on earth than a king in the realm of shadows,” in the underworld. The Greeks loved this physical existence. He also wanted to be strengthened in the possession of his physical body, in the becoming similar of the etheric body to man. And you see, tragedy arose out of this tendency. And Aristotle still gives a definition of tragedy that clearly indicates that basically the Greeks did not think of tragedy as modern man thinks of it. I don't know if anyone else has had different experiences, but I have mostly found that people today believe that tragedies exist because, after spending the whole day dealing with what the day brings, they like to sit down for a few hours in the evening to experience something more or less exciting, which is not a real experience but only an image. This was not how the Greeks thought at the time when Greek culture was actually gradually emerging. For the Greeks, life was one, and everything they put into it was something that should truly belong to the totality of that life. And tragedy was the means by which man could properly possess his physical body and form his etheric body. And tragedy was so developed that by looking at it man should feel fear and pity. Why should man experience fear in tragedy? He should experience fear because by experiencing this fear his power is strengthened to take possession of the physical body in the right way every morning. And he should feel compassion, because through it his astral body is strengthened each morning to form the etheric body in the right way. “Put me before tragedy, said the Greek, then I am able to properly take possession of my physical body, to properly build up my etheric body, then I am able in the fullest sense of the word to be a right person.” The Greeks wanted to be true human beings in their earthly existence. In addition to the other means of immersing themselves in their culture, tragedy was also intended to help them achieve this. Of course, this presupposes that in those older times people knew how the soul and spirit, the I and the astral body of the human being, are connected with the physical and etheric aspects of the human being. Aristotle gives a definition of tragedy. He says: “Tragedy is the imitation of an action through which fear and compassion are aroused, so that by arousing fear and compassion, man experiences the catharsis, the crisis of fear and compassion. Crisis, catharsis, is an expression borrowed from the older Greek medicine, the art of healing, and even when Aristotle was already developing Greek culture into pedantry, he still felt that tragedy, in particular, should have something healing, something strengthening for man. Let us try to understand this term “catharsis”, which also comes from the mysteries – and we have often explained what it means in the mysteries – in our ordinary lives. When a person becomes ill inside, what actually happens? Suffering and pain arise in the person that are not otherwise present. He begins to feel his organism, to sense it in some way, to sense it in a way that he does not sense it in normal, so-called healthy life. In healthy life, one believes, nothing hurts at first. When one becomes ill, something starts to hurt. But this means nothing other than that the I and the astral body are not properly — forgive the somewhat crude expression — integrated into the physical body and the etheric body. If the person is then led to healing and recovery, the I and the astral body are given the strength to integrate properly again. In the healing process, the I and the astral body gain greater power over the physical body than they had before the healing. Let us assume that a person falls prey to a lung disease. His I and his astral body are not properly connected to the etheric part of the lungs and to the physical part of the lungs. What happens during the healing process is, again, the correct connection. And the crisis consists precisely in the fact that outside of the correct engagement, the I and the astral body are given the strength to engage themselves correctly again afterwards. What happens in an external way in the illness is what the Greek saw continually happening in an internal way in the human being. The Greek felt this way: If a person does nothing for himself, then his I and his astral body become more and more alien to the physical and etheric bodies. They can take possession of the physical body less and less and shape the etheric body after themselves less and less. They have to be brought out so that they can then be properly brought back in again. The astral body has to be permeated by visualized suffering, by compassion. And the ego has to be permeated by fear. When the ego experiences fear, it strengthens itself. And the ego survives this fear because it is only presented through the image. So the ego does not perish under fear, it endures the fear, it undergoes the crisis, the catharsis, and as a result has a strengthened power to take possession of the physical body again every morning. Likewise, through compassion, through looking at suffering, the astral body is strengthened, making the etheric body more and more similar. This shows how in Greece, art was seen as being fully connected to the human being, as the figure of Niobe shows, or as something that should have an effect on the process of becoming and educating a human being. The Greeks always looked at the concrete human being, and one can say that since the time of the Greeks, the essence of the human being has actually been lost by the human being himself. This is particularly evident when we turn our gaze to young Goethe. Even in his youth, Goethe really does get to know a great deal about the world around him, the way people think and feel. And he even became familiar with the way extraordinarily significant, ingenious people try to imagine the world. But for Goethe — as I have already discussed here — it is a struggle to grow into his cultural environment. Because we know, of course, that over the last four to five centuries, the cultural world has become intellectualistic, and Goethe felt this intellectualism, which has poured over everything. He expressed this in Faust: philosophy has become intellectualized, jurisprudence has become intellectualized, medicine has become intellectualized, and even theology has become intellectualized. Faust has studied all of these. But the mere thought that lives in all of this is something that is alien to reality. He wants to relate the spiritual foundations of existence to himself. That is basically Goethe's feeling. Of course, Goethe had to admit that modern man was becoming increasingly intellectual, because that was the way the times were developing. The development of humanity had just reached this point. But for him it was a struggle, because thought does not fully embrace the human being. He felt alienated from the world by seeing the world around him develop as a mental one. One of those people who, at the time when Goethe was young, strove energetically and with a certain matter-of-factness towards intellectualism, was Lessing. Goethe could have met Lessing in Leipzig. He avoided it because Lessing was too intellectual for him. Herder, later in Strasbourg, was not. Despite his intellectualism, Herder had arrived at a comprehensive worldview full of feeling and emotion. Goethe could relate to that. Lessing, on the other hand, seemed to him to be a little eerily intelligent. He avoided him. In this context, it is easy to understand how, at a certain age, Goethe could no longer help but break out of this world in which one wants to think about everything. At a certain point in Weimar, Goethe would have liked to get out of his entire skin, even though he was doing extremely well; even though he was idolized at the Weimar court, he could not stand it. He could not stand the whole situation. He also could not bear this: Herder was studying Spinoza. Spinoza, however, is basically a whole thought machinery, a wonderful one, but one does get away from the world when one spins oneself into this thought machinery. And so he had to go to Italy, because he wanted to discover man. He wanted to discover man in the feeling of Greek art, of ancient art, which had become alien to modern man. Goethe longed to discover, to experience the human being. And basically, the whole of anthroposophy is nothing more than a world view that arises from the longing to find the human being in his or her entirety, to answer the question: what exactly is this human being? How does he or she relate to life? But as a result, more and more things gradually become vividly clear that have been placed in the development of civilization out of a full feeling for the human being, such as tragedy or a work of art like the Niobe Group. Take this Niobe Group. Niobe, in her soul, that is, in her ego, in her astral body, lives completely outside herself; they radiate completely out into the sphere from which her pain comes. The soul is torn out by the pain. The body is still permeated by the forces of the ego and the astral. The form remains, the form holds firmly together. She becomes a statue, Niobe. Take the opposite case: there is no reason at all for the ego and the astral body to leave the physical and etheric bodies, and yet they are driven out because the physical and etheric bodies are destroyed from the outside, because they are taken from the ego and the astral body. So the ego and the astral body have to leave. But in that the physical body and ether body are destroyed from the outside, they take on a form which, on the one hand, follows the destructive force and, on the other hand, makes it literally visible how the ego and the astral body are pushed out. With Niobe, this does not have to be the case; there it is suddenly there. But suppose that Niobe, instead of gazing at the field of corpses of her offspring, did not rush out of her physical and etheric bodies, but that something happened to her physical and etheric bodies that forced the soul out. Then one would not see in the physical and etheric bodies how they become statues, how they freeze, as it were, in matter, in formed matter, but one would see how the I still works in there, how the astral body still endeavors to form the etheric body. You also formed that in Greece: this is Laocoon. You can understand Laocoon when you are imbued with the realization that it is the opposite of Niobe, that the physical body and the etheric body are being destroyed from the outside and how the whole thing fights with the I and with the astral body, which are being pushed out. So that in every form, in the shaping of the mouth, in the shaping of the face, in the holding of the arms, in the forms that the fingers take, you can see from Laocoon that the situation I am talking about is being depicted. We must come to such realizations again, because otherwise the intellectualism that has been so deeply justified for the more recent period will remove man from a true view, from a true knowledge of nature, from reality. Just think how Lessing tried to explain the Laocoön Group. He basically explained it only in purely external terms. Of course, I say this with all due respect for the great Lessing. But if you take his explanation, it says: When a poet talks about Laocoon, Laocoon is allowed to scream, because you don't see how he opens his mouth when he screams. But when the sculptor forms him, you see how he opens his mouth. You're not allowed to open your mouth. That is purely external: the poet should do it one way, the sculptor another! Of course, Lessing's achievement is something extraordinarily significant. One can say: with all due respect, one must treat these things, but one must be clear about the fact that in Lessing's treatment of the Laocoön Group there is nothing of what now explains the whole figure of Laocoön from the situation. For this it is necessary, as I said in the introduction to these considerations, to survey in the appropriate way the forces that hold man together in his four limbs. This overview has been completely lost in the age of intellectualism. This age of intellectualism basically no longer knew what to do with what it means to be human. And so, in the age of intellectualism, all sense of proportion was lost. This is what Goethe felt so strongly and what led him to actually loathe it when intellectualism itself extended into art. The young Goethe could not stand the whole style of Corneille-Racine art because there intellectualism forms the dramatic in an intellectualistic way. In contrast to this, Goethe turns to Shakespeare, who creates out of all the contradictions of nature. Therefore, Goethe finds that Shakespeare is something like the interpreter of the world spirit itself. Goethe feels this very deeply because he feels this incursion of intellectualism. I have often pointed out that Hamlet can be seen as a student of Faust. That Hamlet – Shakespeare's Hamlet, of course, not Saxo Grammaticus' – could have sat at the feet of Faust in Wittenberg during the ten years when Faust led his students around by the nose, that was immediately clear to Goethe. Of course, he did not spell out the details; but anyone who would now say, “Thank God I studied philosophy, law, medicine, and, for my own good, theology,” would naturally not be able to feel an intimate pleasure when he finds, say, the Dane Prince artistically shaped in front of him, speaking the monologue “To Be or Not to Be” and speaking of that land from which no traveler has returned from, despite the fact that the ghost of old Hamlet himself spoke shortly before, who must therefore have an awfully short memory if he cannot remember at the moment he speaks the monologue that he just spoke to his father, who returned from that unknown land! An intellectual would not do that, of course. And I have met intellectuals like that. They said: Yes, “Hamlet” was not written by a single poet either, the monologue was written by someone else and then it was all mixed up. That's how it was done with Homer too! It can be easily proved that a whole series of people could have written “Hamlet” because of the contradictions that are everywhere, for such contradictions do in fact exist. And Goethe felt that the reality was richer than the impoverished intellectualism. And so he is perfectly understandable. If you want to have a good laugh at everything that is terrible in “Hamlet” and what just testifies that Shakespeare can be caught on a contradiction every moment, then you just need to read Professor Rümelin, the famous Heidelberg Rümelin, who pointed out all these things in detail in his essay on Shakespeare. But there is a difference between what Goethe felt about art, to the extent that he called the speaking artist the interpreter of the world spirit, and what is handed down as science, even in Heidelberg. And if you compare what Lessing said about Laocoön and the beautiful comments on it by Goethe, you will not find in Goethe's remarks what leads to a real understanding, because Goethe did not yet have anthroposophy, but you will find significant progress compared to Lessing's discussions. You will discover indications everywhere in Goethe of what I have just explained. So that you can say, for example, “Everything I have said about the Laocoon Group is evident from Goethe's comments on it.” And that is why it can be said that, in the right continuation, Goetheanism necessarily leads to anthroposophy, right down to the last detail. |
| 326. The Origins of Natural Science: Lecture III
26 Dec 1922, Dornach Translated by Maria St. Goar, Norman MacBeth |
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| Now, you will perhaps recall how, in my book The Case for Anthroposophy,28 I tried to explain the human organization in a way corresponding to modern thinking. |
| 28. Rudolf Steiner, The Case for Anthroposophy (London: Rudolf Steiner Press, 1970).29. In a reply to two lectures, which Walter Johannes Stein and Eugen Kolisko gave to defend two articles on “Anthroposophy as Science” in the Goettingen newspaper, Hugo Fuchs, Professor of Anatomy, spoke sarcastically of a human being with head, breast, and belly system. |
| 326. The Origins of Natural Science: Lecture III
26 Dec 1922, Dornach Translated by Maria St. Goar, Norman MacBeth |
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In the last two lectures I tried to indicate the point in time when the scientific outlook and manner of thinking, such as we know it today, arose in the course of time. It was pointed out yesterday that the whole character of this scientific thinking, emerging at the beginning most clearly in Copernicus’ conception of astronomy, depends on the way in which mathematical thinking was gradually related to the reality of the external world. The development of science in modern times has been greatly affected by a change—one might almost say a revolutionary change—in human perception in regard to mathematical thinking itself. We are much inclined nowadays to ascribe permanent and absolute validity to our own manner of thinking. Nobody notices how much matters have changed. We take a certain position today in regard to mathematics and to the relationship of mathematics to reality. We assume that this is the way it has to be and that this is the correct relationship. There are debates about it from time to time, but within certain limits this is regarded as the true relationship. We forget that in a none too distant past mankind felt differently concerning mathematics. We need only recall what happened soon after the point in time that I characterized as the most important in modern spiritual life, the point when Nicholas Cusanus presented his dissertation to the world. Shortly after this, not only did Copernicus try to explain the movements of the solar system with mathematically oriented thinking of the kind to which we are accustomed today, but philosophers such as Descartes and Spinoza24 began to apply this mathematical thought to the whole physical and spiritual universe. Even in such a book as his Ethics, the philosopher Spinoza placed great value on presenting his philosophical principles and postulates, if not in mathematical formulae—for actual calculations play no special part—yet in such a manner that the whole form of drawing conclusions, of deducing the later rules from earlier ones, is based on the mathematical pattern. By and by it appeared self-evident to the men of that time that in mathematics they had the right model for the attainment of inward certainty. Hence they felt that if they could express the world in thoughts arranged in the same clear-cut architectural order as in a mathematical or geometrical system, they would thereby achieve something that would have to correspond to reality. If the character of scientific thinking is to be correctly understood, it must be through the special way in which man relates to mathematics and mathematics relates to reality. Mathematics had gradually become what I would term a self-sufficient inward capacity for thinking. What do I mean by that? The mathematics existing in the age of Descartes25 and Copernicus can certainly be described more or less in the same terms as apply today. Take a modern mathematician, for example, who teaches geometry, and who uses his analytical formulas and geometrical concepts in order to comprehend some physical process. As a geometrician, this mathematician starts from the concepts of Euclidean geometry, the three-dimensional space (or merely dimensional space, if he thinks of non-Euclidean geometry.)26 In three-dimensional space he distinguishes three mutually perpendicular directions that are otherwise identical. Space, I would say, is a self-sufficient form that is simply placed before one's consciousness in the manner described above without questions being raised such as: Where does this form come from? Or, Where do we get our whole geometrical system? In view of the increasing superficiality of psychological thinking, it was only natural that man could no longer penetrate to those inner depths of soul where geometrical thought has its base. Man takes his ordinary consciousness for granted and fills this consciousness with mathematics that has been thought-out but not experienced. As an example of what is thought-out but not experienced, let us consider the three perpendicular dimensions of Euclidean space. Man would have never thought of these if he had not experienced a threefold orientation within himself. One orientation that man experiences in himself is from front to back. We need only recall how, from the external modern anatomical and physiological point of view, the intake and excretion of food, as well as other processes in the human organism, take place from front to back. The orientation of these specific processes differs from the one that prevails when, for example, I do something with my right arm and make a corresponding move with my left arm. Here, the processes are oriented left and right. Finally, in regard to the last orientation, man grows into it during earthly life. In the beginning he crawls on all fours and only gradually, stands upright, so that this last orientation flows within him from above downward and up from below. As matters stand today, these three orientations in man are regarded very superficially. These processes—front to back, right to left or left to right, and above to below—are not inwardly experienced so much as viewed from outside. If it were possible to go back into earlier ages with true psychological insight, one would perceive that these three orientations were inward experiences for the men of that time. Today our thoughts and feelings are still halfway acknowledged as inward experiences, but he man of a bygone age had a real inner experience, for example, of the front-to-back orientation. He had not yet lost awareness of the decrease in intensity of taste sensations from front to back in the oral cavity. The qualitative experience that taste was strong on the tip of the tongue, then grew fainter and fainter as it receded from front to back, until it disappeared entirely, was once a real and concrete experience. The orientation from front to back was felt in such qualitative experiences. Our inner life is no longer as intense as it once was. Therefore, today, we no longer have experiences such as this. Likewise man today no longer has a vivid feeling for the alignment of his axis of vision in order to focus on a given point by shifting the right axis over the left. Nor does he have a full concrete awareness of what happens when, in the orientation of right-left, he relates his right arm and hand to the left arm and hand. Even less does he have a feeling that would enable him to say: The thought illuminates my head and, moving in the direction from above to below, it strikes into my heart. Such a feeling, such an experience, has been lost to man along with the loss of all inwardness of world experience. But it did once exist. Man did once experience the three perpendicular orientation of space within himself. And these three spatial orientations—right-left, front-back, and above-below—are the basis of the three-dimensional framework of space, which is only the abstraction of the immediate inner experience described above. So what can we say when we look back at the geometry of earlier times? We can put it like this: It was obvious to a man in those ages that merely because of his being human the geometrical elements revealed themselves in his own life. By extending his own above-below, right-left, and front-back orientations, he grasped the world out of his own being. Try to sense the tremendous difference between this mathematical feeling bound to human experience, and the bare, bleak mathematical space layout of analytical geometry, which establishes a point somewhere in abstract space, draws three coordinating axes at right angles to each other and thus isolates this thought-out space scheme from all living experience. But man has in fact torn this thought-out spatial diagram out of his own inner life. So, if we are to understand the origin of the later mathematical way of thinking that was taken over by science, if we are to correctly comprehend its self-sufficient presentation of structures, we must trace it back to the self-experienced mathematics of a bygone age. Mathematics in former times was something completely different. What was once present in a sort of dream-like experience of three-dimensionality and then became abstracted, exists today completely in the unconscious. As a matter of fact, man even now produced mathematics from his own three-dimensionality. But the way in which he derives this outline of space from his experiences of inward orientation is completely unconscious. None of this rises into consciousness except the finished spatial diagram. The same is true of all completed mathematical structures. They have all been severed from their roots. I chose the example of the space scheme, but I could just as well mention any other mathematical category taken from algebra or arithmetic. They are nothing but schemata drawn from immediate human experience and raised into abstraction. Going back a few centuries, perhaps to the fourteenth century, and observing how people conceived of things mathematical, we find that in regard to numbers they still had an echo of inward feelings. In an age in which numbers had already become an abstract ads they are today, people would have been unable to find the names for numbers. The words designating numbers are often wonderfully characteristic. Just think of the word “two.” (zwei) It clearly expresses a real process, as when we say entzweien, “to cleave in twain.” Even more, it is related to zweifeln, “to doubt.” It is not mere imitation of an external process when the number two, zwei, is described by the word Entzweien, which indicates the disuniting, the splitting, of something formerly a whole. It is in fact something that is inwardly experienced and only then made into a scheme. It is brought up from within, just as the abstract three-dimensional space-scheme is drawn up from inside the mind. We arrive back at an age of rich spiritual vitality that still existed in the first centuries of Christianity, as can be demonstrated by the fact that mathematics, mathesis, and mysticism were considered to be almost one and the same. Mysticism, mathesis, and mathematics are one, though only in a certain connection. For a mystic of the first Christian centuries, mysticism was something that one experienced more inwardly in the soul. Mathematics was the mysticism that one experienced more outwardly with the body; for example, geometry with the body's orientations to front-and-back, right-and-left, and up-and-down. One could say that actual mysticism was soul mysticism and that mathematics, mathesis, was mysticism of the corporeality. Hence, proper mysticism was inwardly experienced in what is generally understood by this term; whereas mathesis, the other mysticism, as experienced by means of an inner experience of the body, as yet not lost. As a matter of fact, in regard to mathematics and the mathematical method Descartes and Spinoza still had completely different feelings from what we have today. Immerse yourself in these thinkers, not superficially as in the practice today when one always wants to discover in the thinkers of old the modern concepts that have been drilled into our heads, but unselfishly, putting yourself mentally in their place. You will find that even Spinoza still retained something of a mystical attitude toward the mathematical method. The philosophy of Spinoza differs from mysticism only in one respect. A mystic like Meister Eckhart or Johannes Tauler27 attempts to experience the cosmic secrets more in the depths of feeling. Equally inwardly, Spinoza constructs the mysteries of the universe along mathematical, methodical lines, not specifically geometrical lines, but lines experienced mentally by mathematical methods. In regard to soul configuration and mood, there is no basic difference between the experience of Meister Eckhart's mystical method and Spinoza's mathematical one. Anyone how makes such a distinction does not really understand how Spinoza experienced his Ethics, for example, in a truly mathematical-mystical way. His philosophy still reflects the time when mathematics, mathesis, and mysticism were felt as one and the same experience in the soul. Now, you will perhaps recall how, in my book The Case for Anthroposophy,28 I tried to explain the human organization in a way corresponding to modern thinking. I divided the human organization—meaning the physical one—into the nerve-sense system, the rhythmic system, and the metabolic-limb system. I need not point out to you that I did not divide man into separate members placed side by side in space, although certain academic persons have accused29 me of such a caricature. I made it clear that these three systems interpenetrate each other. The nerve-sense system is called the “head system” because it is centered mainly in the head, but it spreads out into the whole body. The breathing and blood rhythms of the chest system naturally extend into the head organization, and so on. The division is functional, not local. An inward grasp of this threefold membering will give you true insight into the human being. Let us now focus on this division for a certain purpose. To begin with, let us look at the third member of the human organization, that of digestion (metabolism) and the limbs. Concentrating on the most striking aspect of this member, we see that man accomplishes the activities of external life by connecting his limbs with his inner experiences. I have characterized some of these, particularly the inward orientation experience of the three directions of space. In his external movements, in finding his orientation in the world, man's limb system achieves inward orientation in the three directions. In walking, we place ourselves in a certain manner into the experience of above-below. In much that we do with our hands or arms, we bring ourselves into the orientation of right-and-left. To the extent that speech is a movement of the aeriform in man, we even fit ourselves into direction of front-and-back, back-and-front, when we speak. Hence, in moving about in the world, we place our inward orientation into the outer world. Let us look at the true process, rather than the merely illusionary one, in a specific mathematical case. It is an illusionary process, taking place purely in abstract schemes of thought, when I find somewhere in the universe a process in space, and I approach it as an analytical mathematician in such a way that I draw or imagine the three coordinate axes of the usual spatial system and arrange this external process into Descartes’ purely artificial space scheme. [IMAGE REMOVED FROM PREVIEW] This is what occurs above, in the realm of thought schemes, through the nerve-sense system. One would not achieve a relationship to such a process in space if it were not for what one does with one's limbs, with one's whole body, if it were not for inserting oneself into the whole world in accordance with the inward orientation of above-below, right-left, and front-back. When I walk forward, I know that on one hand I place myself in the vertical direction in order to remain upright. I am also aware that in walking I adjust my direction to the back-to-front orientation, and when I swim and use my arms, I orient myself in right and left. I do not understand all this if I apply Descartes’ space scheme, the abstract scheme of the coordinate axes. What gives me the impression of reality in dealing with matters of space is found only when I say to myself: Up in the head, in the nerve system, an illusory image arises of something that occurs deep down in the subconscious. Here, where man cannot reach with his ordinary consciousness, something takes place between his limb system and the universe. The whole of mathematics, of geometry, is brought up out of our limb system of movement. We would not have geometry if we did not place ourselves into the world according to inward orientation. In truth, we geometrize when we lift what occurs in the subconscious into the illusory of the thought scheme. This is the reason why it appears so abstractly independent to us. But his is something that this only come about in recent times. In the age in which mathesis, mathematics, was still felt to be something close to mysticism, the mathematical relationship to all things was also viewed as something human. Where is the human factor if I imagine an abstract point somewhere in space crossed by three perpendicular directions and then apply this scheme to a process perceived in actual space? It is completely divorced from man, something quite inhuman. This non-human element, which has appeared in recent times in mathematical thinking, was once human. But when was it human? The actual date has already been indicated, but the inner aspect is still to be described. When was it human? It was human when man did not only experience in his movements and his inward orientation in space that he stepped forward from behind and moved in such a way that he was aware of his vertical as well as the horizontal direction, but when he also felt the blood's inward activity in all such moving about, in all such inner geometry. There is always blood activity when I move forward. Think of the blood activity present when, as an infant, I lifted myself up from the horizontal to an upright position! Behind man's movements, behind his experience of the world by virtue of movements, (which can also be, and at one time was, an inward experience) there stands the experience of the blood. Every movement, small or large, that I experience as I perform it contains its corresponding blood experience. Today blood is to us the red fluid that seeps out when we prick our skin. We can also convince ourselves intellectually of its existence. But in the age when mathematics, mathesis, was still connected with mysticism, when in a dreamy way the experience of movement was inwardly connected with that of blood, man was inwardly aware of the blood. It was one thing to follow the flow of blood through the lungs and quite another to follow it through the head. Man followed the flow of the blood in lifting his knee or his foot, and he inwardly felt and experienced himself through and through in his blood. The blood has one tinge when I raise my foot, another when I place it firmly on the ground. When I lounge around and doze lazily, the blood's nuance differs from the one it has when I let thoughts shoot through my head. The whole person can take on a different form when, in addition to the experience of movement, he has that of the blood. Try to picture vividly what I mean. Imagine that you are walking slowly, one step at a time; you begin to walk faster; you start to run, to turn yourself, to dance around. Suppose that you were doing all this, not with today's abstract consciousness, but with inward awareness: You would have a different blood experience at each stage, with the slow walking, then the increase in speed, the running, the turning, the dancing. A different nuance would be noted in each case. If you tried to draw this inner experience of movement, you would perhaps have to sketch it like this (white line.) But for each position in which you found yourself during this experience of movement, you would draw a corresponding inward blood experience (red, blue, yellow—see Figure 2) [IMAGE REMOVED FROM PREVIEW] Of the first experience, that of movement, you would say that you have it in common with external space, because you are constantly changing your position. The second experience, which I have marked by means of the different colors, is a time experience, a sequence of inner intense experiences. In fact, if you run in a triangle, you can have one inner experience of the blood. You will have a different one if you run in a square. [IMAGE REMOVED FROM PREVIEW] What is outwardly quantitative and geometric, is inwardly intensely qualitative in the experience of the blood. [IMAGE REMOVED FROM PREVIEW] It is surprising, very surprising, to discover that ancient mathematics spoke quite differently about the triangle and the square. Modern nebulous mystics describe great mysteries, but there is no great mystery here. It is only what a person would have experienced inwardly in the blood when he walked the outline of a triangle or a square, not to mention the blood experience corresponding to the pentagram. In the blood the whole of geometry becomes qualitative inward experience. We arrive back at a time when one could truly say, as Mephistopheles does in Goethe's Faust, “Blood is a very special fluid.”30 This is because, inwardly experienced, the blood absorbs all geometrical forms and makes of them intense inner experiences. Thereby man learns to know himself as well. He learns to know what it means to experience a triangle, a square, a pentagram; he becomes acquainted with the projection of geometry on the blood and its experiences. This was once mysticism. Not only was mathematics, mathesis, closely related to mysticism, it was in fact the external side of movement, of the limbs, while the inward side was the blood experience. For the mystic of bygone times all of mathematics transformed itself out of a sum of spatial formations into what is experienced in the blood, into an intensely mystical rhythmic inner experience. We can say that once upon a time man possessed a knowledge that he experienced, that he was an integral part of; and that at the point in time that I have mentioned, he lost this oneness of self with the world, this participation in the cosmic mysteries. He tore mathematics loose from his inner being. No longer did he have the experience of movement; instead, he mathematically constructed the relationships of movement outside. He no longer had the blood experience; the blood and its rhythm became something quite foreign to him. Imagine what this implies: Man tears mathematics free from his body and it becomes something abstract. He loses his understanding of the blood experience. Mathematics no longer goes inward. Picture this as a soul mood that arose at a specific time. Earlier, the soul had a different mood than later. Formerly, it sought the connection between blood experience and experience of movement; later, it completely separated them. It no longer related the mathematical and geometrical experience to its own movement. It lost the blood experience. Think of this as real history, as something that occurs in the changing moods of evolution. Verily, a man who lived in the earlier age, when mathesis was still mysticism, put his whole soul into the universe. He measured the cosmos against himself. He lived in astronomy. Modern man inserts his system of coordinates into the universe and keeps himself out of it. Earlier, man sensed a blood experience with each geometrical figure. Modern man feels no blood experience; he loses the relationship to his own heart, where the blood experiences are centered. Is it imaginable that in the seventh or eighth century, when the soul still felt movement as a mathematical experience and blood as a mystical experience, anybody would have founded a Copernican astronomy with a system of coordinates simply inserted into the universe and totally divorced from man? No, this became possible only when a specific soul constitution arose in evolution. And after that something else became possible as well. The inward blood awareness was lost. Now the time had come to discover the movements of the blood externally through physiology and anatomy. Hence you have this change in evolution: On one hand Copernican astronomy, on the other the discovery of the circulation of the blood by Harvey,31 a contemporary of Bacon and Hobbes. A world view gained by abstract mathematics cannot produce anything like the ancient Ptolemaic theory, which was essentially bound up with man and the living mathematics he experienced within himself. Now, one experiences an abstract system of coordinates starting with an arbitrary zero point. No longer do we have the inward blood experience; instead, we discover the physical circulation of the blood with the heart in the center. The birth of science thus placed itself into the whole context of evolution in both its conscious and unconscious processes. Only in this way, out of the truly human element, can one understand what actually happened, what had to happen in recent times for science—so self-evident today—to come into being in the first place. Only thus could it even occur to anybody to conduct such investigations as led, for example, to Harvey's discovery of the circulation of the blood. We shall continue with this tomorrow.
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| 327. The Agriculture Course (1938): Lecture I
07 Jun 1924, Koberwitz Translated by Günther Wachsmuth |
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| But this necessity will lead us to detours which are inevitable, because everything which is said will have Anthroposophy itself as a basis. I would in particular ask you to forgive me if in the introductory lecture to-day there is much that seems so divergent from our subject that many of you will not immediately see what bearing it has upon specifically agricultural problems. |
| I cannot say whether what I am going to say out of Anthroposophy will be satisfactory to us in every respect, but I shall try to bring before you what Anthroposophy can contribute to Agriculture. |
| 327. The Agriculture Course (1938): Lecture I
07 Jun 1924, Koberwitz Translated by Günther Wachsmuth |
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I am quite convinced that everyone here will be perfectly satisfied with the hospitality that has been provided. Whether you will be equally satisfied with the course of lectures itself is a question which is perhaps open to dispute, although we shall do our best, during the discussions which will take place later, to reach accord on what has been said. For you must remember, that though in many quarters there has been an ardent desire for such a course of lectures, it is the first time that I have undertaken such a task from within the heart of Anthroposophical striving. A course of this kind naturally makes many demands, for it will show us to what an extent the interests of Agriculture are bound up with those of the widest circles of human existence and that there is scarcely a single sphere of life which has not some relation to Agriculture. Prom some viewpoint or another all the various interests of life are contained in Agriculture. Here we shall naturally only touch upon the central portion of the subject itself. But this necessity will lead us to detours which are inevitable, because everything which is said will have Anthroposophy itself as a basis. I would in particular ask you to forgive me if in the introductory lecture to-day there is much that seems so divergent from our subject that many of you will not immediately see what bearing it has upon specifically agricultural problems. But what we shall say to-day of things which may seem remote will nevertheless be the basis of our work. The cultural life of modern times has had particular and serious effects upon Agriculture. It has had economic consequences, the destructive character of which few people to-day have the slightest idea. And it was in order to defeat these tendencies that certain economic enterprises were attempted from within the Anthroposophical Movement. This work was undertaken by industrialists and business men, but they did not achieve all the aims they had set themselves, simply because at the present time there are too many opposing forces to allow of this attempt being really understood. The individual is helpless in the midst of these existing hostile powers, and the inner kernel and essential aims of these economic strivings which originated in the Anthroposophical Movement have therefore never really come under discussion. What were the practical questions at issue? I will explain them, taking Agriculture as an example in order to deal with the matter in concrete rather than in abstract and general terms. There are to-day a great many books and lectures on so-called Economics. These contain chapters on Agriculture; the authors try to deal with this subject on the basis or economics. Sow in connection with Agriculture this whole business, books and lectures oh economics is manifest nonsense. This nonsense is, however, very widespread to-day. Everyone should be able to see that Agriculture and its place in the social order can only be discussed when one starts from a knowledge of what is entailed in the growing of turnips, potatoes and corn. Without this it is useless to discuss the principles of Economics involved. These things must be unravelled on the basis of the actual facts, they cannot be established on vague theoretical assumptions. If you say this to those who have listened to a number of their university colleagues talking about Economics in relation to Agriculture, it will strike them as completely absurd, because they regard the subject as already established. But this is not the case. Judgment in agricultural matters must come from practical knowledge of field and forest and of the breeding of animals. There can be no fruitful vision in Agriculture or in anything else so long as people do not realise that this hovering over the subject from the point of view of Economics is mere talk and nothing more; one must go back to the practical foundations in every department of life. You can say of a turnip that it has such and such a colour and consists of such and such constituents. But that is not to understand the turnip—not by a long way, nor, above all does it take into account the living relation of the turnip to the soil, to the season at which it ripens, and many other important matters. Let me make this clear by an illustration taken from another sphere. If you observe the needle of a compass you discover that one end always approximately points to the North, the other to the South. But you seek the cause for this not in the magnetic needle itself but in the earth as a whole, at one end of which is what is called the Magnetic North, at the other end is the Magnetic South Pole. To try and discover from the magnetic needle itself why it should so obstinately turn in one direction would be absurd. For its constant maintenance of direction can only be understood in relation to the whole earth. Yet what in the case of the magnetic needle is clearly absurd, is regarded by many people as sense when it comes to other things. The turnip is regarded as growing only within the narrow confines of its immediate earthly surroundings, but this becomes impossible if one comes to the point that its growth may be dependent upon innumerable factors which are not present on earth at all but in its cosmic surroundings. And thus in practical life many things are explained and ordered to-day as though we had to do only with the narrow isolated phenomenon, and not with activities and influences coming from the whole Universe. The various departments of modern life have suffered very gravely through this, and would have suffered still more had not people continued to rely upon a certain instinct in these matters in spite of all the advances of modern science. To turn to a completely different sphere, it has always been a source of satisfaction to me that people who, following their doctor's orders, weigh every morsel of the food they eat—so many ounces of meat, so many ounces of cabbage (some people even have scales on the table beside their plates)—it is always a source of satisfaction to me, when the unfortunate individual still feels hungry, so long as he has not had enough, and thus proves that instinct is still present in him. In the same way, instinct was at the root of all the work of man in this realm before there was a science of the subject, and its indications were often very sure ones. The old calendars with their versified rules of practice that one still finds among peasants are often surprisingly wise and expressive. And it is quite possible for a man with sure instincts to avoid superstition in these matters. For along with very profound sayings concerning the sowing and reaping of grain we get occasional sayings directed against extravagances, for example “If the cock crows on the dunghill it will either rain or stay as it is” (Kräht der Hahn auf dem Mist, so regnet es, oder bleibt wie es ist) Instinctive wisdom is always sufficiently armed with a sense of humour to be on its guard against superstition. Speaking from the Anthroposophical point of view, what we have to do is not so much to return to the old instincts as, through a deeper spiritual insight, to discover things which can be supplied ever less and less by the instincts as they have become uncertain. This task demands that in studying the life of plants, of animals and of the earth itself, we should extend our views to the whole cosmos. For while it is quite right to reject a trivial connection between rain and the phases of the Moon, yet on the other hand the following has happened, I have told the story already on other occasions. In Leipsic, there were two professors, one of them. Gustav Theodor Fechner, a man gifted with keen insight in spiritual matters, claimed that from external observations which he had made, the existence of a connection between periods of rain and the course of the Moon around the earth was not a mere superstitious belief. He had come to this view through statistical evidence. But his colleague, the famous Professor Schleiden, denied the contention on theoretical grounds. These two University professors were both married, and Fechner, who had a certain sense of humour, said; “Let our wives decide which of us is right.” Now it so happened that in those days at Leipsic, water was scarce and had to be fetched from a distance. So, it was the custom in order to have sufficient for washing day, to collect rain which ran from the houses in pitchers and barrels. Frau Professor Schleiden did this, and so did her neighbour, Frau Professor Fechner. But there was not room for them both to set out their pitchers and barrels in the courtyard at the same time. So, Professor Fechner said: “If my honoured colleague is right and the time of the month does not matter, then Frau Professor Schleiden can put out her pitchers at the time when according to my reading of the lunar phase there will be less rain, and my wife will put out hers during the period when my calculations tell me there will be more rain. If my theory is all nonsense, Frau Professor Schleiden will no doubt gladly fall in with this arrangement.” But lo and behold! Frau Professor Schleiden would do nothing of the sort and preferred to go by Professor Fechner's statement rather than by that of her husband. And so it often happens. Science may be right, but practice cannot be ruled by the “Tightness” of science. But to speak more seriously. This example has only been introduced in order to show that we must look a little further than we are accustomed to look nowadays when we are considering that which alone makes it possible for man to live on this planet—I mean Agriculture. I cannot say whether what I am going to say out of Anthroposophy will be satisfactory to us in every respect, but I shall try to bring before you what Anthroposophy can contribute to Agriculture. I will now begin to draw your attention to some facts within our earthly existence which have an important bearing upon Agriculture. We are accustomed nowadays to lay the chief stress upon the physico-chemical constituents of any substance. Now I propose to start from an examination not of the physico-chemical constituents, but of something which lies behind them and is of very special importance to the life of the plant on the one hand, and of the animal on the other. Human life, and to a certain extent the life of animals as well has become emancipated to a large extent from world-workings outside them. The nearer we come to man, the more strongly marked is this emancipation. In both human and animal life, we find manifestations which seem to be entirely independent of extra-terrestrial influences or even of the atmospheric influences surrounding the earth. Hot only does this seem so, but it actually is the case in regard to many things in life. True, we know that certain atmospheric changes will accentuate the pain attending certain illnesses. What is less well known is that certain illnesses, and certain other life phenomena imitate in their rhythms the course of certain processes in Nature, but do not coincide with those of these natural processes their beginnings and endings. We need only recall one of the most important phenomena, female menstruation, which in its rhythmic character is an imitation of the monthly changes of the Moon, yet the beginnings and endings of the two phenomena do not coincide. There are many more intimate manifestations—both in the male and the female organisms, which imitate the rhythms of Nature. For example, a closer study of the periodicity of sun-spots would bring us to a better understanding of much that happens in the social life. But these things are not noticed, because the social phenomenon which corresponds to the periodic change of the spots on the sun, does not begin and end when they do, but has become emancipated from them. The periodicity and rhythm are the same but there is no coincidence in time. It is easy enough to dismiss as nonsense the statement that human life is a microcosm which imitates the macrocosm. If for instance one refers to certain illnesses having a period of fever which lasts seven days, it could be objected that whenever the corresponding external phenomena occurred in Nature, the fever ought to appear and run a parallel course; but the fever does not do this! Nevertheless, it is true that the fever retains the inner rhythm even if its beginning and end do not coincide with those of the external event. This emancipation from cosmic events is almost complete in the case of man: it is less complete in the animal; while plant-life is to a high degree immersed in the general Cosmic life of Nature and also in its earthly surrounding. For this reason, we shall never acquire any real understanding of plant-life unless we realise that everything on earth is only a reflection of what takes place in the cosmos. This reflection is hidden in the case of man because he has emancipated himself. He carries within him only the inner rhythm. But the connection is still there in the highest degree in plants, and it is to this that I wish to direct your attention in this introductory talk. In the immediate vicinity of the earth, we have the Moon and the other planets. The old instinctive science which reckoned the Sun, as one of the planets had one of the following sequence: Moon, Mercury, Venus, Sun, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn. Now, without going any further into the astronomical aspect of the subject, I wish to point to the relation which exists between planetary life and life on the earth. If we consider life on the earth in general the first thing we have to take into account is the very important part played by the what I might call the life of the siliceous substance in the world. You will find this siliceous substance in the very beautiful mineral quartz enclosed in prismatic and pyramidal forms. Quartz is siliceous substance combined with oxygen; remove the oxygen mentally, and you have the so-called silicon. This silicon is regarded by modern chemistry as one of the elements (oxygen, etc.) and when united with oxygen may be regarded as a chemical substance. But we must not forget that this silicon which lives in the mineral quartz makes up from 27% to 28% of the crust of the earth, i.e. a higher percentage than that of any other substance on earth, except for oxygen, which amounts to 47% to 48%. Now silicon, in the form in which it appears in such stony substances as quartz, does not at first seem to possess very much importance if we consider only the material of the soil of the earth with its plant growth. Quartz is not soluble in water—the water trickles through it. It thus seems to have no connection with the ordinary commonplace view of “conditions of life.” But if you take the Equisetum (horsetail) you will find that it consists of 90% of silicon (the same substance of which quartz consists) in very fine distribution through its form. This shows the enormous importance which this substance, silicon, must have. It forms nearly one half of everything on the earth. And vet so completely has its importance been overlooked that its use has been neglected even where it can have the most beneficent results. Silicon forms an essential constituent of many remedies used in Anthroposophical therapy. A whole series of diseases is treated either internally or by baths, with this substance, the reason being that what appears in the form of abnormal conditions of the sense organs, (it only appears there, it does not really lie there) the internal sense organs, as cause of pain, is strangely accessible to the influence of silicon. And in general silicon plays the greatest conceivable part in what has been called by the old-fashioned name of the “household of Nature,” for it is present not only in quartz and other stones, but in a highly-refined state in the atmosphere. Indeed, it is present everywhere. One half of the earth at our disposal consists of silicon. What then is the function of this substance? To answer this question let us assume that our earth contained only half of the quantity of silicon which it actually does possess. We should then have plants in more or less pyramidal form: the blooms would be atrophied, and indeed all plants would assume generally the shape of the cacti which strikes us as so abnormal. The cereals would look grotesque; their stems would grow thick and fleshy towards the base, but the ears would be emaciated and without grain. So much for silicon. On the other hand, in every part of the earth, although not in such abundance as is silicon, we find lime and their allied substances, (limestone, potash and sodium). If these were present in smaller proportions we should have plants whose stems were only narrow and twisted, we should have only creepers. There would be blooms of course, but they would be useless and yield nothing of any food value. It is only through the balance of these two formative forces—as embodied in these two substances, silicon and limestone—that plant life can flourish in the form in which we know it to-day. Now everything siliceous contains forces that come, not from the earth, but from the so-called distant planets Mars, Jupiter and Saturn—the planets beyond the Sun. These planets work indirectly upon plant-life through silicon and allied substances. But the planets near the Earth namely, Moon, Mercury and Venus, send out forces into the plant-life and animal life on earth through the medium of the limestone and kindred substances. Thus, of any cultivated field it may be said that the forces of both silicon and limestone are at work in it. The silicon mediates the influences of Mars, Jupiter and Saturn, the limestone those of Moon, Venus and Mercury. Now let us turn to the plants themselves. There are two things to notice about all plants. The first is that the plant world as a whole and every single species have the power to perpetuate their kind and develop the force of reproduction, etc. The second is that the plant as a member of a relatively low order of Nature serves as nourishment for members of higher orders. These two fundamental tendencies seem at first to have little to do with one another. For if we only look at the passing on of the step from parent plant to offspring and so on, it is a matter of indifference to the formative forces of Nature whether or not the plant is used for food. The two interests (i.e. of Nature and Man) are completely different, and yet the forces of Nature act in such a way that the inherent powers of reproduction and growth and of producing generation after generation of plants, are active m the cosmic influences exercised upon the earth by the Moon, Venus and Mercury through the mediation of limestone. If we consider plants which are not used for food, which do nothing but reproduce themselves, we focus our interest in the cosmic forces of Venus, Mercury and Moon, related to reproduction. But in the case of plants which are eminently suitable for food because their substances have become perfected to the point of forming food-stuffs, for human and animal consumption, it is the planets Mars, Jupiter and Saturn that are working through the medium of silicon. Silicon opens up the being of the plant to the expanses of the Universe, it awakens the plant's senses, so that it absorbs the formative forces bestowed by the distant planets, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. From the sphere of Moon, Venus and Mercury on the other hand, the plant absorbs only that which makes it capable of reproducing itself. Now this seems at first to be just an interesting theory. But every insight taken from a wider horizon leads us quite naturally from theory to practice. If then certain forces coming from the Moon, Venus and Mercury enter the Earth and become effective in plant-life, the question arises: What will promote and what will restrain the activity of these forces? For instance, in what way can the activities of Moon or Saturn be modified in their influence on plants? If we observe the course of the year, we shall find that on some days there is rain and on others none. All that the modern physicist observes is the fact that on rainy days more water falls on the Earth than on dry days! Water moreover is to him something abstract consisting of oxygen, hydrogen, and nothing more. If water is decomposed by electrolysis it is split into two substances, each of which acts in its own way. But this tells us nothing about water. There is much more hidden in water than appears in the chemical properties of hydrogen and oxygen. Water by its very nature is eminently fitted to bear along with it the forces coming from the Moon on to the Earth. So, it comes about that it is water which distributes the lunar forces throughout the earthly realm. There is a certain kind of relation between the Moon and the water on the Earth. Let us suppose that after a rainy spell there is a full Moon. Now the forces coming from the Moon when it is full causes something tremendous to happen on Earth. They shoot right into the whole growing forces of the vegetable kingdom. They cannot do so if there has not been a rainy spell beforehand. We must always realise the importance of sowing seed after rainy days followed by the full Moon, and we should never work at random (true, something will always come up). The question: How to connect our seed-sowing with rain and full Moon has definite practical importance, because the forces that come from the full Moon work powerfully and abundantly on certain plants after rain, but only weakly and sparingly after a spell of sunny weather. The old adages of husbandry contained such knowledge. People recalled the adage that told them what to do. These adages or saws are looked upon nowadays as superstition and scientists are not yet sufficiently interested to work out a real science of the matter. Furthermore, around the Earth we find the atmosphere. In addition to consisting of air, the atmosphere has the property of being sometimes warm and sometimes cold. At times, there is certain accumulation of heat which, if the tension becomes too great, may discharge itself in a thunderstorm. Now what can we say about warmth? Spiritual observation shows that while water has no relation to silicon, warmth is so powerfully related to it that it enhances the activity of the forces working through silicon, namely, the forces coming from Saturn, Jupiter and Mars. These forces coming from Saturn, Jupiter and Mars have to be valued on quite a different scale from that adopted in the case of Moon. Venus and Mercury, for it must be remembered that Saturn takes thirty years to go around the Sun, while the Moon takes only about thirty or twenty-eight days to pass through all its phases. Thus, Saturn is only visible for fifteen years, and consequently stands in quite another relation to the growth of plants compared with the Moon. As a matter of fact, Saturn is not only active when it is shining down on the Earth, it is also active when its rays have to pass from below, as it were, through the Earth. [IMAGE REMOVED FROM PREVIEW] Now as Saturn takes thirty years to revolve around the Sun we find that at certain times it shines directly on one spot on the Earth, and that it can work upon this spot by going right through the Earth. (See Drawing No. 1). The strength with which the Saturn forces influence plant-life on Earth always depends upon the warmth-condition of the air. If the air is cold they cannot reach the plants, if the air is warm they can. How then can we see their influence at work in the plant? We see it not in the annuals but in the perennials; not in those plants which grow up and die in the course of one year leaving only their seed behind them, but in those which are perennial. It is the latter whose growth Saturn promotes with the help of the warmth forces of the Earth. The effect of these forces working through the mediation of warmth, is to be seen, for instance, m the bark or cortex of trees and in everything that makes the plant a perennial. When the lives of plants are limited to the short span of a single year, it is because of the relation in which, those plants stand to the planets with short periods of revolution. On the other hand, that which emancipates itself from the fleeting process and is made permanent in the formation of bark around the growing trees is connected with the planetary forces working through the mediation of warmth and cold, and the periods of revolution in these cases are long. Thirty years in the case of Saturn, twelve in the case of Jupiter. Again, it is well for anyone who wants to plant an oak tree to know something of the periodicity or Mars, for an oak tree planted during the appropriate period of Mars will thrive much better than one planted unthinkingly, at any moment that happens to be convenient. Or, if you have a plantation of conifers, where the Saturn forces play so great a part, it will make all the difference if the trees are planted when Saturn is in the so-called ascending period rather than at another time. Anyone who has insight into these matters can tell quite accurately in the case of plants that are doing well or badly whether or not they have been tended with a right understanding of their relation to planetary forces. For what is not always obvious to the external eye is revealed to more intimate observation. To take an example: If we burn wood taken from a tree which has been planted without an understanding of the cosmic rhythms we do not get such a healthy heat as from wood taken from a tree which has been planted with right understanding. It is precisely on the little matters of everyday life that these things play so great a part and that the importance of such differences are revealed. But people live their lives almost unthinkingly. They do not take the trouble to consider such details and everything goes on like a machine. If you pull the right trigger, the machine works, and the materialistically-minded imagine that the whole of Nature works on the same principle. And yet regarding Nature so and working upon her in this way brings us face to face with certain stupendous results in practice. Why, for instance, is it impossible to-day to obtain such fine potatoes as I remember eating in my youth? It is impossible to find such potatoes even in the districts in which they used to be grown. (It is really so! I have tested them everywhere!) The nutritive forces of certain foods have actually declined over a passage of time. The last decade shows this quite distinctly. The reason is that we no longer understand the intimate forces at work in the whole cosmos. These must be sought for once again, and sought for along such lines as I have indicated to-day by way of introduction. I have merely touched upon certain questions which extend far beyond the horizon of contemporary vision. We shall not only continue this consideration, but shall search more deeply for a means of applying it to practical life. |
| 327. The Agriculture Course (1938): Lecture VII
15 Jun 1924, Koberwitz Translated by Günther Wachsmuth |
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| In the days when they were not intellectual, they were not so clever, but they were far wiser and learned through their feelings how to go about things; and we must learn to act with wisdom once again through Anthroposophy, but this time the wisdom will be conscious. For Anthroposophy is by no means something clever and intellectual—it strives for wisdom. |
| What is contained in this saying garnered from Anthroposophy was once common property in times of instinctive clairvoyance into Nature. Even m later days, much of this knowledge has remained among' those gifted with a peculiar sensitiveness in these matters, and in the works of Goethe you will sometimes come across the phrase: “In Nature everything lives through giving and taking.” |
| 327. The Agriculture Course (1938): Lecture VII
15 Jun 1924, Koberwitz Translated by Günther Wachsmuth |
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I propose to devote the time that remains at our disposal to the consideration of the rearing of live-stock and the cultivation of fruit and vegetables. Naturally there will not be time to treat the subject at very great length, but in order to obtain a fruitful starting point, we must gain insight into all the factors which come into consideration. We shall do this to-day, and tomorrow we shall pass on to the more practical aspect of the subject. I shall ask you to-day to join me in the consideration of rather more recondite matters, to follow me into what is nowadays an almost unknown territory, although the instinctive husbandry of the past was thoroughly conversant with it. The beings in Nature—minerals, plants, animals—we will disregard man for the moment—are often regarded as though, they existed in completely separate realms. It is the custom to-day to look at a plant as though it existed by and for itself, and similarly one species of plant is also regarded as being isolated from other plant species. So these things are neatly sorted and fitted into genera and species, as though they were being put into boxes. But things are not like this in Nature. In Nature—nay, in the world—being as a whole, all things are in mutual interaction. One thing is always being affected by another. In these materialistic days, only the more palpable effects of this interaction are noted, such as when one thing is eaten or digested by another, or when the dung of animals is used for the soil. In addition to these, however, finer interactions amongst more delicate forces and substances are continually taking place: through warmth, through the chemical-etheric element which is continually at work in the atmosphere, and through the life-ether. Unless we take account of these more delicate interactions, we shall make no progress, at any rate in certain departments of Agriculture. In particular we must look to those more intimate interactions which take place in Nature when we have to deal with the life together of plant and animal on the farm. We must look with understanding not only upon those animals which undoubtedly stand close to us, such as cattle, horses, sheep, etc., but also, for example, upon the manifold insect world, which during a certain period of the year hovers around the plants. Indeed, we must learn to look with understanding at bird-life too. Humanity to-day is very far from realising how much farming and forestry are affected by the expulsion from certain districts of certain kinds of birds as a result of modern conditions. Here again light can be thrown on the subject by conceptions given by Spiritual Science. Let us therefore extend some of these ideas which have been working upon us and come by their help to a yet wider vision. A fruit tree—apple, pear or plum—is something completely different in kind from a herbaceous or cereal plant as any kind of tree outwardly is indeed. But, putting aside any preconceived notions, we must find out wherein the peculiarity of the tree lies. Otherwise we shall never understand the function fulfilled by fruits in the economy of Nature. I am speaking, of course, of the fruit that grows on trees. If we look at a tree with understanding we shall find that the only parts of it which can really be reckoned as plant are the tender twigs, the green leaves and their stalks, the blossoms, the fruits. These grow out of the tree just as herbaceous plants grow out of the soil, the tree being in fact “earth” in relation to the parts that grow out of it. It is as though the soil were heaped up—but a somewhat more quickened soil than the ordinary soil in which our herbaceous and cereal plants grow. If, therefore, we want to understand the nature of a tree, we must observe that it consists of the thick trunk, to which are attached the branches and boughs. On this ground the specifically plant-like parts grow, viz. leaves and blossoms, which are as much rooted in the trunk and branches as cereal and herbaceous plants are rooted in the earth. The question therefore arises: is this plant this plant-like part—which may be regarded as more or less parasitical, really rooted in the tree? We cannot discover an actual root on the trees. We conclude, therefore, that this plant, which develops its leaves and blossoms and twigs up aloft, must have lost its roots in growing on the tree. But no plant is complete without its root. It must have a root. Where, then, does the actual root of this plant reside? [IMAGE REMOVED FROM PREVIEW] [IMAGE REMOVED FROM PREVIEW] Now, the root is only invisible for our limited outer vision. In this case one does not see it, but has to understand where it is. What do we mean by this? The following concrete comparison may help. Suppose I planted a large number of herbaceous plants so closely together that their roots were intertwined and grew into each other, forming a completely matted mass or pap of roots. You can well imagine that this pap does not remain chaotic, but that it organises itself into a unity so that the sap-bearing vessels unite with each other. In this organised root-pap, it would not be possible to distinguish where one root finished. and the other began, and a common root-organ would arise (See Diag. No. 12). A thing like that does not, of course, exist in the soil, but such a root-formation is actually present in the The plants that grow on the tree have lost their root, have become relatively separated from it and are only, as it were, etherically connected with it. What I have drawn hypothetic ally is really the layer of cambium (a layer of living cells lying between the last-formed wood and the outer bark) in the tree and we cannot regard the roots of these plants otherwise than as having been replaced by the cambium. From this tissue, which is always forming new cells, these plants unfold themselves just as from the root below an herbaceous plant unfolds above the soil. We can now begin to understand what the tree really is. The tree with its cambium—which is the only cell-producing layer in the tree, is actually heaped-up earth, which has grown upwards into the air element and therefore requires a more interiorised form of life than is present in the ordinary soil which contains the root. Thus, we must regard the tree as a very curious entity, whose function it is to separate the “plants” growing on it (twigs, blossoms, fruit; from their roots; an entity which places between them and their roots a distance which is bridged only by spirit—or more strictly by the Etheric. It is in this way we need to look, with a macro-cosmic understanding, into the facts of growth. But the matter goes much farther. What results arise from the existence of a tree? That which is around the tree in the air and outer warmth is of a different plant-nature from that which grows up from the soil in the air and warmth and forms the herbaceous plant. It is a plant-world of a different order, possessing a far more intimate relation with the surrounding astral element. Lower down that element is eliminated from the air and warmth in order to make them mineral-like, so that they can be used by man and beast. [See Lecture II. They become “dead” air and warmth.] It is true, as I have said, that the plant we see rowing upon the ground is surrounded, as with a cloud. v the astral element. But around the tree, the astral element is far denser. So much so, that we may say: Our trees are definitely collectors of astral substance. Here one might say it is quite easy to reach a higher development and become “esoteric”—I do not mean clairvoyant but clair-sentient as to the sense of smell. One has only to acquire the capacity for distinguishing between the scent of plants growing in the ground, the peculiar smell of orchards, especially in the spring when they are in flower, and the aroma of forests. Then one is able to tell the difference between a plant atmosphere poor in astral elements, such as that of herbaceous plants growing in the soil and an atmosphere such as we sniff with such pleasure when the scent of trees is wafted in our direction. And if you train your sense of smell to distinguish between the scent of soil-grown (herbaceous) plants and the scent of trees, you will have developed “clear-smelling” for the thinner and for the denser forms of the astral element. The countryman, as you see, can very easily acquire this “clear-smelling” though this faculty, common in the old days of instinctive clairvoyance, has been much neglected in recent times. If, now, we realise the consequences to which this may lead the question will arise: What is happening in that part of the tree which may be regarded as the opposite pole from the “parasitical” plants on the tree which collect this astral element. What is happening through the cambium? Now. the tree makes the atmosphere far and wide around it richer in astral element. What happens while the “parasite” growth goes on above in the tree? The tree here has a certain inner vitality, a powerful etheric life in it. The cambium tones down this vitality, making it more mineral in nature. “While about the upper part of the tree an enrichment of the astral substance is going on, the cambium causes an impoverishment of the etheric life in the tree. The tree within is deprived of etheric life as compared with the herbaceous plant. In consequence, this produces a change in the root. The root of the tree becomes more mineral, far more mineral than the roots of the herbaceous plants. But by becoming more mineral, the tree-root withdraws some of the etheric life from the soil; it makes the soil around the tree slightly more dead than it would be around a herbaceous plant. This must be fully borne in mind, for these natural processes always have a great significance in the economy of Nature. We must therefore seek to understand the significance of the astral wealth in the atmosphere around the tree and of the etheric poverty in the region of the roots. If we look around us, we can find the further connection. It is the fully developed insect which lives on and weaves in this enriched astral element which wafts through the trees; whereas the impoverished etheric element beneath, spreading in the soil and throughout the whole tree (for, as I pointed out yesterday in connection with human Karma, a spiritual element always works throughout the whole being) is that which harbours the' larvae or grubs. Thus, if there were no trees on the earth there would be no insects. The insects that flutter around the upper parts of the trees and through the forests depend for their life upon the presence of the trees; and exactly the same thing is true of the grubs. Here we have yet another indication of the inner connection between all roots and animal life beneath the soil. This is especially evident in the case of the trees. But this same principle which is so striking in the case of the trees is present in a modified form throughout the whole of the vegetable world, for in every plant there lives something that tends to become a tree. In every plant the root and what is around it tends to throw off the etheric life whereas the upper growth strives to attract the astral element more closely to itself. For this reason, there arises in every plant that kinship with the insect world which I have specially characterised in the case of the tree. This relation, however, to the insect world in fact extends so as to comprise the whole of the animal world. In former times insect grubs, which can only live upon the earth because of the presence of tree roots, transformed themselves into other kinds of animals, similar to larvae and remaining at the larva stage throughout their lives. These animals then emancipated themselves to a certain extent from the tree-root nature and adopted a life which extends also to the root region of herbaceous plants. And now we find the curious fact that certain of these sub-terrestrial animals, though far removed from being larvae, yet have the ability to regulate the amount of etheric life in the soil if this amount becomes excessive. When the soil becomes, as it were, too much alive and the sprouting etheric life too strong, these animals of the soil see to it that this excess is reduced. They are thus wonderful vents which regulate the vitality in the soil. These lovely creatures, for they are of the greatest value to the earth are no other than the common earthworms. One ought to study the life of earth-worms in relation to the soil, for these wonderful animals allow just that amount of etheric life to remain in the soil as is needed for the growth of plants. Thus, in the soil we have these creatures, earth-worms and their like, distantly resembling larvae. One ought in fact to see to it that certain soils which require it, are supplied with a healthful stock of worms. We should soon see how beneficent such a control over this animal-world in. the soil can be, not only for vegetation but also thereby for the rest of the animal kingdom, as we shall show later. Now there are certain animals which bear a distant resemblance to the insect world, to that part of it which is fully developed and winged, I mean the birds. It is well known that in the course of the development of the earth something very wonderful took place between the birds and the insects. It is as though, to put it figuratively, the insects had one day said: “We do not feel strong enough to ‘work-up’ the astrality sparkling around the trees, we shall therefore use the ‘desire-to-be-a-tree’ of other plants. We shall flutter around these, and leave largely to you birds the astral life that surrounds the trees.” Thus, there arose in Nature a proper “division of labour” between the birds and the butterflies; and this co-operation in the winged world brought about in a wonderful manner the right distribution of astral life wherever it was required on the surface of the earth. If these winged creatures are removed, the astral life will fail to accomplish its proper function, and this will be noticeable in the stunted condition of the vegetation. The two things are connected; the world of winged animals and all that grows out of the soil into the air. The one is unthinkable without the other. In farming, therefore, we must see to it that birds and insects fly about as they were meant to do; and the farmer should know something about the breeding and rearing of birds and insects. For in Nature—I must repeat this again and again—everything, everything is connected. These considerations are of the utmost importance for a right understanding of the questions before us and we must therefore hold them very clearly in our minds. The winged world of insects brings about the proper distribution of astrality in the air. The astrality in the air has a mutual relationship with the forest which directs it in the proper way, much as in the human body the blood is directed by certain forces. And this activity of the forest, which is effective over a very wide area, will have to be undertaken by something quite different in a district where there is no forest. Indeed, in districts where woods alternate with arable land and meadows that which grows in the soil comes under quite different laws from those which rule in completely unwooded districts. There are certain parts of the earth which were obviously wooded areas long before man took a hand. In certain matters, Nature is cleverer than we are. and it may safely be assumed that if a forest grows naturally in a certain district it will have its uses for the neighbouring fields and for the herbaceous and cereal vegetation round about. In such districts one ought therefore to have the intelligence not to uproot the woods but to cultivate them. Ana as the earth is gradually changing through climatic and cosmic influences of all kinds, one should have the courage, when the vegetation becomes poor, not merely to indulge in all sorts of experiments in the fields and for the fields, but to increase the area of woods in the neighbourhood. And when plants run to leaf, lacking the power to produce seed, one should take bites out of the neighbouring woods. The regulation of woods in districts which Nature intended to De wooded is an integral part of agriculture, and must be examined with all its consequences from a spiritual point of view. Again, the world of grubs and worms may be said to stand in a mutual relationship to the lime, i.e. to the mineral part of the earth; while the world of birds and insects, of all that flies and flutters about, has a similar relationship to the astral element. The relation between the worm and grub world and lime brings about the drawing off of the etheric element, as I explained a few days ago, from a different point of view. This is the function of lime, but it performs this function in cooperation with the world of worms and grubs. If these ideas are carried out in more detail, they will lead to other things which—and that is why I have expounded them with such confidence—were applied, in the days of instinctive clairvoyance, in the right way. But this instinct has been lost, rooted out by the intelligence, as have been all such instincts. Materialism is to blame for men's having become so clever and intellectual. In the days when they were not intellectual, they were not so clever, but they were far wiser and learned through their feelings how to go about things; and we must learn to act with wisdom once again through Anthroposophy, but this time the wisdom will be conscious. For Anthroposophy is by no means something clever and intellectual—it strives for wisdom. And we must try to draw near to wisdom in all things and not be content merely to learn by rote an abstract jingle of words, such as “Man consists of a physical body, etc.” The main point is that we should introduce this knowledge into everything; then one finds the way to discriminate—especially if one really becomes clairvoyant in the sense that I have explained to you—and to see things in Nature as they really are. We shall discover, for example, that birds can become harmful if they are not in the neighbourhood of a wood of conifers which can turn what they do into something useful. Our vision is then further sharpened and we begin to discern the presence of yet another relationship. It is a very delicate relationship, similar to those I have been dealing with, but which can appear in a more tangible form. All growing things that are neither trees nor small plants, i.e. all shrubs such as the hazel bush have, an intimate relationship with mammals. If, therefore, we wish to improve the mammals on our farm, we shall do well to plant such bush-like growths. The mere presence of the bushes has a beneficent influence, for in Nature all things stand in constant reciprocal relationship. But let us go a step further. Animals are not so foolish as human beings. They very soon notice the presence of this relationship. They find that they like these shrubs; this liking is inborn in them, and they enjoy eating them. They begin to eat what they need of the shrubs, and this has a wonderfully regulating effect upon the rest of their diet. But this insight into the intimate relations in Nature will also throw light upon the nature of harmful influences. Just as conifer woods stand in intimate relationship to birds and shrubs to mammals? so do all kinds of fungi stand in a relation similarly intimate to the lower animals, to bacteria and the like, viz. to parasites. Harmful parasites are closely connected with fungi. They develop where fungus-life is dispersed. In this way, there arise plant diseases and other greater ills in plants. If, however, we can contrive to nave not only woods, but also well-watered meadows suitably situated in the neighbourhood of cultivated lands, these will be useful in forming a good breeding ground for fungi. One should see to it that the moist meadows are well-planted with such growths. We then make the following remarkable discovery, that if a meadow, not necessarily very large, but rich in fungi (e.g. mushrooms) is situated near cultivated land then the fungi, because of their kinship with bacteria and other parasites, will keep these creatures away from the farming-land. For mushrooms “hang together” with these little creatures more than do other plants. Thus, in addition to the other methods I have advocated for combating plant pests there is also the possibility of keeping these tiny creatures, these vermin away from cultivated land by converting land in its vicinity into meadows. It is so important for success in agriculture that the right amount of acreage should be assigned respectively to woods, orchards, shrubberies and meadows with a natural growth of fungi, that one often gets better results-even if one reduces the extent of tilled land accordingly. Generally speaking, to cultivate the whole of the acreage at one's disposal, leaving no room for the other factors of which I have spoken, and to count in consequence upon larger crops is certainly no real economy. The extension of the tilled area is counterbalanced by a lowering in the quality of the produce because the increase in the cultivated area is made at the cost of the other factors. One cannot be engaged in a thing like farming where Nature is the “manager,” without realising the inter-connections and inter—actions which exist between all her processes. Now let us look at something which will make clear to us the relation of plant to animal and, conversely, of animal to plant. What is an animal in reality, and what is the plant-world? (In the case of plants it is better to speak of the whole of the plant-world). We must look for the relationship between the two because only by this means can we come to understand the feeding of animals. For feeding is only properly done if it is done in accord with the true relationship between plant and animal. What are animals? We examine them, we even dissect them, study their muscles and nerves and admire the forms of their skeleton. But this does not tell us what an animal is in the whole economy of Nature. We shall only get at this if we grasp what it is with which the animal is most intimately connected in its environment. Now with its system of nerves and senses and with part of its breathing system, the animal “works-up” all that which comes through the air and warmth. The animal does this to the extent that it is a separate being. (See Diag. No. 14). We may make a schematic drawing to indicate this. With regard to everything lying in its periphery, the animal lives with its nerves and sense system and part of its breathing system immediately in air and warmth. The animal has an immediate connection with air and warmth, its bony system being actually formed from the warmth which in particular mediates the influences of the sun and the moon. Its muscular system is formed from the air, which again works as a mediator of the forces of sun and moon. But as regards its relation to earth and water, the animal is not able directly to assimilate. It must first absorb them into its digestive tract and then work on them with what it has itself become through air and warmth; it works upon earth and water with its metabolic system and with a part of its breathing system, which passes over into the metabolic system. The animal must therefore have already come into existence by virtue of air and warmth if it is to be able to “work up” earth and water. This, therefore, is the animal's way of living in the sphere of earth and water. The process of transformation which I have described takes place, of course, by means of forces (dynamically) rather than by means of substances (materially). Let us now try to answer the question: What is a plant? The plant stands in an immediate relation to earth and water just as the animal does to air and warmth. The plant, therefore? through a kind of breathing and through something very distantly resembling a sense system absorbs earth and water in the same direct manner as the animal absorbs air and warmth. Thus, the plant and earth and water live directly together. And now? of course, you will say: If the plant lives in immediate contact with earth and water as the animal does with air and warmth, then no doubt the plant “works up” air and warmth inside itself just as the animal “works up” earth and water? But this is not the case. We cannot reach spiritual truths merely by analogy. The fact is that whereas the animal absorbs earth and water into itself, the plant actually gives off the air and warmth which it experiences dimly through its connection with the soil. Thus, air and warmth do not go into the plant, or at any rate do not enter deeply into it; instead of being devoured by the plant, air and warmth are given off by it. And this process of elimination is the important thing. Organically the plant stands in inverse relation to the animal. That which in the animal is important as a process of nutrition becomes in the plant an elimination of air and warmth, and as in that sense we can say that the animal lives by absorbing food, in the same sense does the plant live by giving off air and warmth. And in virtue of that quality it may be said that the plant is virginal. Its character is not to absorb greedily but actually to give out that which the animal takes from the world in order to live. Thus, the plant lives by giving. In this giving and taking, we can recognise something which played a very important part in the old instinctive knowledge of these matters. “In Nature's economy, the plant gives and the animal takes.” What is contained in this saying garnered from Anthroposophy was once common property in times of instinctive clairvoyance into Nature. Even m later days, much of this knowledge has remained among' those gifted with a peculiar sensitiveness in these matters, and in the works of Goethe you will sometimes come across the phrase: “In Nature everything lives through giving and taking.” Goethe did not fully understand the phrase, but he adopted it from ancient customs and traditions and he felt that it pointed to something in Nature which was true. Those who came after him understood nothing of this, and so did not understand what he meant when he spoke of taking and giving. Goethe also speaks of taking and giving in connection with breathing, in so far as breathing inter-acts with metabolism. He uses the words “taking and giving” in a fashion, semi-clear. To sum up, I have shown you that in a certain sense the woods, orchards and shrubberies on the earth act as regulators in producing the right kind of plant-growth, and that under the soil grubs and other worm-like creatures act similarly in conjunction with lime. This is how we should envisage the relationship between the cultivation of fields, of fruit and of cattle, and then proceed to put our knowledge into practice. We shall endeavour to do this in the last hour that remains at our disposal, so that our Experimental Circle may work out these things more fully in the future. |
| 346. Lectures to Priests The Apocalypse: Lecture IX
13 Sep 1924, Dornach Translator Unknown |
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| In order to get into the content one needs a cosmology and a view of humanity which can only be given by a new Anthroposophy and by a real perception of' the spiritual world. One comes to Anthroposophy through the Apocalypse because one is using the means to understand the Apocalypse and because one notices: John received the Apocalypse from regions where Anthroposophy was before it came to human beings. |
| 346. Lectures to Priests The Apocalypse: Lecture IX
13 Sep 1924, Dornach Translator Unknown |
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Now that we have gathered together a number of elements in order to get at the essence of the Apocalypse, we will have to look more at the Apocalypse itself, and we will have to arrange things in such a way that we begin with several questions which are connected with the goal or end of what the Apocalypticer sees and what he wants to communicate to mankind; later on we will see why this particular choice of study materials is appropriate. If we look at what he gives, one could say that it is a communication to human beings, a revelation to human beings, but a revelation which differs considerably from what arises when other communications which don't proceed from clairvoyance are brought to men. The Apocalypticer points out that it was a special event, a mighty enlightenment which enabled him to make his statement to humanity. However, thereby the Apocalypse appears as something which arises as a fact and an event which belongs to the continuation of Christian evolution. We can say that of course the Mystery of Golgotha is the great starting point of Christian evolution upon earth which towers over everything else and which could only be anticipated and hoped for before; but then come the individual facts which must occur in order that Christian evolution continues from the Mystery of Golgotha through all the cycles of time to come. And the revelation which occurred through the Apocalypse is such an event. The author of the Apocalypse is fully aware that he's thereby not only putting what he experienced and is communicating to people into present-day evolution, but that what lies in the reception and further elaboration of the Apocalypse is a reality. You see, the important, difference between Christianity and other religious confessions is that one has teachings in the ancient religious confessions, whereas the deed of Golgotha is the important thing in Christian evolution, and more deeds must be added to this important one. Therefore, the important thing for Christianity to do is to look for a real connection with the Mystery of Golgotha, and it's not of primary and fundamental importance to have the gospels interpreted for one. In recent times Christianity has taken on intellectualistic forms through the influence of intellectualism. One could, say that this is why that famous statement could be made: Jesus doesn't belong in the gospels. In other words, one can take the content of the gospels as teachings, but one doesn't have to: take the teacher who stands, behind them into account; he's not important. This means that, only the Father belongs in the gospels. It's as if the main thing about the Mystery of Golgotha was that Christ Jesus has appeared and has given a teaching from the Father. That is not the important thing. The important thing is that a deed was done on Golgotha—that Christ Jesus lived on earth and did the deed on Golgotha. The teaching is an incidental, accessory thing. Christianity must struggle through to, a recognition of this again, but it must also do it. And so the Apocalypticer is aware that he receives this revelation and that this fact has taken place and that he works on through this fact; this is the important thing for him. For what is continually happening as a result of this? You know that from a formal viewpoint present-day man is living in such a way that he wears his three garments, physical body, etheric body and astral body which is connected with a certain normality. When he is in a sleeping condition the astral body and ego are outside the physical and etheric body and are in the earthly environment, in the spiritual region of the earthly environment, which is behind sensory, physical phenomena. They are not equipped for perceptibility in people today, they only become equipped through initiation. Man lives a dull existence during sleep, and only retains a general feeling about this on awaking, or he sees things in dreams, which emerge from sleep in the way which has often been described. Now if we don't think anything else than this; we have man's astral body and ego in the spiritual world, and they stand in that world in such a way that they can receive no direct impressions of Christ and his real nature. Thus if we would think nothing else than what I just mentioned, the ego and astral body would enter the spiritual world every night and would have no direct connection with the Christ, would come back again to this earthly, physical garment, and since the Mystery of Golgotha has taken place in the course of earth evolution, they would have an impression of Christ, for the Christ is in the earth's aura, but this impression would remain dull. Just as other nocturnal impressions remain dull for day consciousness, so this impression that the Christ dwells in the physical and etheric bodies which lie there during sleep would only be perceived in the way that the sleeping condition is perceived by someone when he is waking up, and no distinct, clear experience could be there. Let's suppose that right after the Mystery of Golgotha was accomplished, human beings were there who experienced what happened and who could communicate their direct impressions of the Mystery of Golgotha to others. And in fact Christ gave his apostles an esoteric training and a number of important teachings after his resurrection. All of this was handed on and it continued in the first decades after the Mystery of Golgotha had been accomplished. At a certain point this had to come to an end. And we can see how it gradually died down in certain circles. It's correct to say that there were tremendous esoteric teachings about Christianity in the writings which were denounced for being gnostic and in other writings of old church teachers who were apostolic students or pupils of apostolic students, which were then eradicated by the church, because the church wanted to get rid of the cosmic elements which were always connected with these teachings. The church destroyed very important things. They were destroyed; a reading of the akashic records will restore them to the last dot on the “i” when the time has come to restore them again. Nevertheless, the great impressions which were there would have faded for outer historical evolution. The Apocalypse appeared the moment these things were in danger of dying out. And if the Apocalypse is taken in properly—and various people have made this attempt in the second epoch after the Mystery of Golgotha—if the Apocalypse is taken in, if this grand picture, this prophetic picture of evolution penetrates man's astral body and ego, then the ego and astral body bear a revelation which comes directly from the spiritual world—as I told you in the first lecture—which is really a kind of a letter, a direct verbal revelation from the spiritual world which is connected with visions. If this is taken into the astral body, and namely into the ego-organization and carried out into the sphere of the earth's aura during sleep, it means that all those who had taken in this Apocalypse; with inner understanding were gradually inscribing its content into the ether of the earth's aura. So that one can say: the presence of Christ gives the fundamental tone in the earth's aura, and he continues to work in it. This Christ impulse has a strong influence upon man's etheric body every night when the astral body and ego are outside of the physical and etheric body, except that the average person is usually not able to find the Christ impulse which is contained in the etheric body when he returns to the physical body in the morning with his ego and astral body. But when John's pupils in the wider sense of the word take in the content of the Apocalypse, it becomes inscribed in the ether of the earth's aura. What is inscribed there then works upon the human etheric body between the times of going to sleep and waking up. It was inscribed there already through the great, significant impressions which the author of the Apocalypse, or better said, the receiver of it, got from divine, spiritual beings, so that people who have an inclination to relate themselves to the Mystery of Golgotha can expose their etheric body to the content of the Apocalypse during their sleeping condition. This is a real thing. Through the necessary Christ sentiments one can bring about such a condition of sleep that what is as it were brought about in the earth's ether by the content of the Apocalypse and what lies in the direction of Christ-evolution is inscribed in man's etheric body. This is the way it really happens. This is what was present as the deed of the Apocalypse revelation which continued to have an effect. And in one's work as a priest one can quietly say to those souls who are entrusted to one's care: the Christ has entered earth evolution through the Mystery of Golgotha. He inspired the writing of the gospels to serve as a preparation, so that their content can pass over into men's astral body and ego—one has to use suitable terminology here—and so that they are prepared to receive the Christ impulse in their etheric body when they wake up. Through the fact that the Apocalypticer is focusing on Christian evolution and is describing it through the various epochs of evolution and into the future, what is present in this evolution is incorporated into man's etheric body in a concrete way. You see, therewith we have something in earth evolution which is quite new with respect to the ancient mystery teachings. For what did the ancient mysteries really convey to initiates? They gave them what one can see if one surveys the real spiritual nature of what was laid down an eternally long time ago, as it were, and if one finds the divine being who has been working along certain lines all the way back to eternity in outer physical activities. So that the initiates in the ancient mysteries didn't expect to get anything else into their etheric body than what gets into one's etheric body through the results of initiation. A Christian initiate gets past this point. He wants to take what has come into earth evolution in the course of time, namely, everything which is connected with the Mystery of Golgotha and with Christ, into his etheric body. So that in fact the revelation of the Apocalypse is the beginning of a kind of an initiation for the whole Christian world, and not for individuals; but individuals can prepare themselves to participate in it. One could say that it's only this which opens up a path to get beyond the Father-nature principle. According to its form, all ancient initiation is basically a Father initiation. One sought nature and the spirit in nature and one could be satisfied with that. For man stood in the world. Now the Christ has been there in the earth. Now he remains there; he did his deed and he remains there now. One cannot take in what has taken place through the Mystery of Golgotha through an ancient initiation. One has to raise oneself into a world of the, spirit which is not the one that streams through the ancient mysteries. What streams through the old mysteries only hoped that the Mystery of Golgotha would stream through the new mysteries at some point. However, man now connects himself with the spirit directly through the spirit and not through nature. In ancient times initiates always chose the detour, through nature. New initiates, that is, many half or partly initiated people in the later centuries after the Mystery of: Golgotha—not in the first ones—thought that they connected themselves with the spiritual nature of the world through what has flowed into it through Christ and through what has been built upon Christ. This is the way such an initiate looked upon the Apocalypse; this is the way it was looked, upon at that time. Thus he looked upon it as something, which he spoke about as follows: Nature is one way to get into the spiritual world, and the marvelous knowledge which is revealed through the Apocalypses is the other way. It is a perplexing, felicific thing when the spiritual investigator encounters people in the second to sixth centuries—but not before—who. Say: “Nature is great,”—they meant what one knew about nature in antiquity—“but what is disclosed in a supersensible way by, the Apocalypticer or other apocalypticers is just as great or greater.” For nature leads to the Father, and what is opened up by the Apocalypticer leads through the Son to the Spirit. One was looking for a path to pure, unmediated spiritual things through something like the Apocalypse. At the: same time this pointed to a real change which must and will come about when men make themselves worthy of it. In ancient times one had the strong feeling that man comes out of the spiritual world but that he has a development which connects itself strongly with what comes to meet him in the physical, sensory world. One felt this connection with the physical sense world ' very strongly and one was of the opinion that man has become a sinful, iniquitous being because he connects himself with the matter which is present in the earth. By contrast with this another time was to be prepared, and it was foreseen by the Apocalypticer and announced in advance. He looked for an image or the right Imagination in order to place what is behind these secrets before the soul in imaginative pictures. And so he renewed and summarized an idea which was commonplace in esoteric Hebraic teachings. But only there. One pointed out the following there. Souls come out of the spiritual world. These souls which come out of the spiritual world clothe themselves in what comes out of the earth, and when they build houses for the most external work of the spirit, cities arise. But when they ensheathe the inner activity of the human soul, the human body arises out of the earth's building blocks. Thereby the concept of the construction of outer dwelling places merged with the concept of the building of one's own body. That was a beautiful and wonderful image, because it has such a factual foundation, namely, that one looked upon a house as a sheathe for the more extensive and extended part of one's deeds, soul processes and soul functions that—one saw the sheathe for this in the outer house. However, one had the beautiful and wonderful idea: If I do an outer deed in a house which is built for me out of earthly matter, and I use the house walls and the whole house as a sheathe, this is just the hardened, scleroticized extension of what is there when I do the inner deeds of the soul. Whereas man's body is the first house which man builds for the innermost deeds of the soul. Then when he has his body and he extends what he has, he builds himself a second house; this second house is built out of the earth's ingredients. That was a very common idea, that one really looked upon one's body as a house, and that one looked upon a house as the outermost garment which man puts on here in the physical earth world. Therefore, one looked upon man's housebuilding activity as something which proceeds from the soul's creative activity. In past times man was very much grown together with his house and the like, namely when he could think: O.K., he certainly has this body and this skin (See drawing). And now if he would get another skin in the course of his life for the more extensive activity of his soul, it would be a tent; except that this doesn't grow, he has to make it himself. [IMAGE REMOVED FROM PREVIEW] Now one feature of the Hebraic esoteric doctrine was that one looked upon the absorption of earthly ingredients for human development and the flowing together and control of earthly things in a quite particular way. You see, with respect to the physical, one will always admit: The earth is arranged in such a way that it has a north pole where cold accumulates, as it were. And one will describe this north pole from the nature of the earth in a physical, geographic way, and one will consider it to be an important part of the earth. Hebraic esoteric doctrine also did this with the soul activities which are contained in the earth's forces and in a way which was the opposite of the situation with the north pole on the earth it looked upon Jerusalem, the very concrete Jerusalem, as the place where cultures run together and the most perfect houses are collected. This was a pole for the concentration of outer culture around the human soul, and its culmination was Solomon's temple. Now one felt that this was exhausted in the evolution of the earth, and the people who knew something about the Hebraic esoteric teaching looked upon the destruction of Jerusalem after the Mystery of Golgotha as something which was not an outer event that was brought about by the Romans; they thought that the Romans were the puppets of spiritual powers and that they only carried out the plan of the spiritual powers. For they thought that this method of looking for ingredients from the earth in order to build human bodies and houses was no longer usable. When Jerusalem became great all the substances and materials from the earth which were to be used in order to build human bodies and houses had become exhausted. If one translates this Hebraic esoteric teaching into the Christian one, it means that: If the Mystery of Golgotha had not taken place, Jerusalem would have been destroyed anyway. But what can be a new construction by men who create with the aid of the earth would not have been inserted into this destruction. A kind of a seed of a completely new structure was laid into what was destined to be destroyed in Jerusalem. Mother earth dies in Jerusalem. Daughter earth is expectant or lives in the expectation of another seed. Bodies and houses are not built from the earth here through the gathering together of ingredients as in the old Jerusalem which stands there as the culmination of what occurs on the earth, but the earth rises as a spiritual pole of the old Jerusalem. One will no longer be able to or it will be increasingly difficult to make something like the old Jerusalem from the earth's ingredients. Another time arises instead which was laid down as a seed by the Mystery of Golgotha. Men receive something from above which envelopes them, more on the outside, or more on the inside. The new city sinks down from above and pours over the earth—the new Jerusalem. The old Jerusalem was made out of the earth and its substances: the new Jerusalem is made out of spiritual ingredients from heaven. You will think that such an idea is rather strange by comparison with everything which is thought in our time and compared with what you could learn from what is thought in our time. How does one picture man's development from an anatomical, physiological viewpoint today? Man eats, stuffs food into his stomach, digests it, throws off certain substances and replaces what has to be replaced by the substances he assimilates. However, this is not what happens, for man is a three-membered being who consists of a nerve-senses man, a rhythmic man and a metabolic limb man. None of the substances in food go into the actual metabolic limb man—they all go into the nerve-senses man. The nerve-senses man absorbs the salts and other substances which are needed and which are always finely distributed in air and light, and it guides them into the metabolic-limb man. The latter is fed entirely from above. It's not true that it gets its substances from physical foods. Diseases arise if substances from the earth, enter the metabolic limb man. All of the food which is taken in and digested only supplies the organs of the nerve-senses man. The head is formed by substances, from the earth. The organs of the metabolic-limb man are formed by things from the heavens. What is in the rhythmic man is only a coarser indication which goes in two directions. Man doesn't eat the oxygen in the air—he inhales it. This is coarser than the way that man assimilates things for the metabolic-limb man. Man takes in what he needs for the metabolic-limb man through a very much finer breathing. Respiration is something which is coarser. And what man does with oxygen to produce carbonic acid is something which is finer than what happens so that the food stuffs which go through the stomach can supply the head. This is the transition in the rhythmic man. This is the real story about man's building and its processes. The truth of the matter is that what is created by the materialistic view and is taught by anatomy and physiology is nonsense. The moment one knows this one knows that what builds up the human body doesn't only come from below upwards from the earth's plant, mineral and animal kingdoms, and one knows that what supplies the organs which are often considered to be the coarsest ones comes from above. Then one will be able to see that there was a kind of a surplus in nourishment from below until Jerusalem was destroyed. A surplus of what comes from above gradually begins to be important after the Mystery of Golgotha. Even though we saw that people have twisted the facts around, things are developing in such a way today that nourishment from above is becoming more important than the one from below. Thereby man is being transformed. Our head is no longer like the heads people had in ancient times. They used to have foreheads which receded more. (see drawing) Present-day foreheads protrude more; the outer brain has: become more important. This is the thing which has changed. What is becoming more important in the brain is more like digestive organs than what is at the center. The peripheral brain is more like man's digestive organs than the delicate tissues in the whiter brain, that is, in the continuation of the sensory nerves into the center of the head. And metabolic organs are nourished from above. [IMAGE REMOVED FROM PREVIEW] One can understand these things right down to the smallest details if one has the will to speak about certain things in the way that the Apocalypticer does when he says: Here is wisdom. Except that what is in the ordinary knowledge which is living and weaving among people today is not wisdom, but darkness. What one calls “scientific results” today is definitely the result of Kali Yuga; it is a total eclipse of the human mind. One should look upon this as a secret and not blare it out in the streets. Something is esoteric if it remains in a certain circle. You see, the growing of the new Jerusalem has already begun, has begun since the Mystery of Golgotha. When man's earth period will be completely fulfilled he will not only be able to work heavenly substances into his body through his senses but he will also extend this heavenly substance to what will then be an outer city through what one calls spiritual knowledge and art—an extension of the body in the way that I explained. The old Jerusalem was built from below upwards, the new Jerusalem will really be built from above downwards. This is the tremendous perspective which arose from a vision, a super-colossal vision of the Apocalypticer. He became aware of this mighty thing: Everything arises here which men could build out of the earth upwards, as it were, and becomes concentrated in the old Jerusalem. This came to an end. He saw this rising up and this melting away in the old Jerusalem and he saw the approach of the human-being city, the new Jerusalem from above, from the spiritual worlds. This is the goal, the last tendency of the revelation in the Apocalypse. In this respect it really contains Christian paths of humanity and Christian goals of humanity. If we try to understand them, we arrive at a certain peculiarity concerning the Apocalypse which some people have an inkling of although they can't quite understand it. Anyone who makes a serious effort to understand the Apocalypse cannot help asking himself: How do I do this? How do I get into this, how do I get into the idea about the old and new Jerusalem, what do I have to do in order to understand it? Anyone who seriously wants to understand the Apocalypse cannot help telling himself: I have to get into its content and I can't just continue to talk about images which have no content for me. In order to get into the content one needs a cosmology and a view of humanity which can only be given by a new Anthroposophy and by a real perception of' the spiritual world. One comes to Anthroposophy through the Apocalypse because one is using the means to understand the Apocalypse and because one notices: John received the Apocalypse from regions where Anthroposophy was before it came to human beings. This is why one needs the transition; one has to understand the Apocalypse in an Anthroposophical way if one wants to understand it in an honest and serious way. You notice this most of all in something like the final goal, the new Jerusalem. However, you have to know the secrets about the building up of man from above and below better than science knows them. Then you can extend these ideas to the overall activity of men on earth, which is also from below upwards and which changes into one from above downwards. The building of the old Jerusalem will change into the spiritual building of the new Jerusalem from above downwards. People should grow into what is being built in a spiritual way not just in the exegetes' symbolical, theoretical, pictorial way but in such a way that the spirit becomes just as real for us as the material and physical was for thousands of years. To the extent that you are worthy of it you will look upon the new Jerusalem as something which hangs down from above in just as real a way as the old Jerusalem stood on its foundations from below upwards, and you won't just take this in a pictorial way or in the way that the exegetes present it. This is something which one has to remember the Apocalypse contains no symbols, but references to quite concrete facts and to what happens, and not to something which just wants to indicate the events through symbols. That is the important thing. This is the way we have to feel and find our way into the Apocalypse. We will take this up again tomorrow. [IMAGE REMOVED FROM PREVIEW] |
| 211. The Mysteries of the Sun and Death and Resurrection: On the Transformation of World Views
25 Mar 1922, Dornach |
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| These exercises were not like those we speak of today in anthroposophy, but they were exercises that were more closely tied to the human organism in those older times. |
| Of course, this comparison of Christ with light is mentioned many times in the Bible, but when anthroposophy wants to draw attention to the fact that one is dealing with a reality, today most people rebel who have “divinity” listed as their faculty in the university directories. |
| But they should be taken seriously, because if they were taken seriously, then one would not only see the necessity of today's anthroposophical work, but one would also see the full significance of anthroposophy. And above all, people would be aware of their responsibility towards contemporary humanity with regard to something like anthroposophical knowledge. |
| 211. The Mysteries of the Sun and Death and Resurrection: On the Transformation of World Views
25 Mar 1922, Dornach |
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We have often looked back to the views of earlier times, and we want to do so again today, in a certain sense, with the aim of gaining some insights into the history of humanity and human development. When we go back thousands of years in human development, for example to the times we refer to in our terminology as the ancient Indian cultural period, we find that people's way of looking at things was completely different from the way we look at things today, even if we take a period of time that is very far removed from our own. When we go back to those older times, we know that people simply did not see nature as we see it today. People saw nature in such a way that they still perceived spiritual beings directly in everything, in the individual parts of the earth's surface, in mountains and rivers, but also in everything that initially surrounds the earth, in clouds, in light, and so on. It would have been unthinkable for a person of those older times to speak of nature as we do. For they would have felt as we would feel if we were sitting in front of a collection of corpses — the image is somewhat grotesque, but it corresponds quite well to the facts — and then said that we were among human beings. What presents itself to human beings today as nature would have been perceived by people thousands of years before our era as nothing more than the corpse of nature. For they perceived spiritual and soul elements in everything that surrounded them. We know that when today's humanity hears from poetry or from the messages of myths and legends how it was once believed that spiritual-soul qualities can be found in the source, in the flowing river, in the interior of the mountains, and so on, it believes that the ancients let their imagination run wild and that they were inventing. Well, that is a naive point of view. The ancients did not make things up at all, but they perceived the spiritual and soul just as one perceives colors, as one perceives the movements of tree leaves, and so on. They perceived the spiritual and soul directly, and they would have thought of what we call nature today as merely the corpse of nature. But in a certain sense, some individuals among these ancients strove to gain a different way of looking at things than that which was the general one. You know, today, when people strive to gain a different view from the usual one, and when they are at all capable of doing so, they become 'studied people', they receive concepts that go beyond what they otherwise see only externally. Then they absorb science, as it is called, into themselves. This science did not exist in the times of which we are now speaking. But there were individuals who aspired to go beyond the general observation, beyond what one knew in everyday life. They just did not study as it is done today. They did certain exercises. These exercises were not like those we speak of today in anthroposophy, but they were exercises that were more closely tied to the human organism in those older times. For example, there were exercises through which the breathing process was trained to do something other than what it is by nature. So they did not sit in laboratories and do experiments, but they did, so to speak, experiments on themselves. They regulated their breathing. For example, they inhaled, held back their breath and tried to experience what happened inside the organism when the breath was altered in this way. These breathing exercises should not be copied today. But they were once a means by which people believed they could come to higher knowledge than they could come to if they simply observed nature with their ordinary perceptions, if they saw external natural things as we see them, but also saw the spiritual and soul-like in all natural things. When people devoted themselves to such exercises, the nature of which, although in a weakened form, has been preserved in what is described today as yoga exercises from the Orient, when they thus changed their breathing in relation to ordinary breathing, then the spiritual-soul aspect disappeared from the view of the surroundings, and it was precisely through such breathing that nature became for these people as we ourselves see it today. So, in order to see nature as we see it today, such people first had to do exercises in those ancient times. Otherwise, spiritual-soul entities would have leapt out of all the beings around them for them to see. They drove away these spiritual-soul entities by changing their breathing process. Thus they — if I use the term that is current today for those who aspire so high above the general contemplation — as “learned men” no longer aspired to have nature around them as ensouled and spiritualized, but to have it around them in such a way that they perceived it as a kind of corpse. One could also say that these people felt, as they looked out into nature, as if they were in a surging, billowing, soul-spiritual universe, but they felt within it as a person of the present day would feel when dreaming in vivid images and could hardly wake up from these dreams. That is how they felt. But what did these individuals — let us call them the scholars of that ancient time — achieve when, through such special exercises, they distinguished themselves from this living surging and killed it in contemplation, so that they really felt that they now had a dead, corpse-like thing around them? What did they strive for as a result? They strove for a stronger sense of self. They strove for something through which they experienced themselves, through which they felt themselves. Today's man says every moment: “I am”. “I” is a word that he uses very frequently from morning till night, because it is natural to him, it is self-evident to him. For these ancient people, it was not a matter of course in their ordinary daily experience to pronounce the “I” or even the “I am”. They had to acquire this. To do so, they first had to do such exercises. And by doing these exercises, they came to such an inner experience that they could say with a certain truth: “I am”. Only by doing this did they come to the awareness of their own being. So what we take for granted only became an experience for these people when they made an effort in an inner breathing process. They first had to, so to speak, kill the environment for contemplation, to awaken themselves. This is how they came to the conviction that they themselves are, that they could say “I am” to themselves. But with this “I am” they were given something that we take for granted again today. They were given the inner development of the intellectual. Through this they developed the possibility of having an inner, secluded thinking. If we go back to times when the old oriental views set the tone for civilization, it was the case that people felt a soul nature in their everyday lives, but had a very weak sense of self, almost no sense of self at all, did not at all summarize this sense of self in the conviction “I am,” but that individual people who were trained by the mystery schools were led to experience this “I am.” But then they did not experience this “I am” in the way we take it for granted today, but in the moment when they were brought to it through their breathing process, to be able to say “I am” at all out of inner conviction, out of inner experience, they experienced something that even today's man does not really experience at first. Think back to your childhood: you can only think back to a certain point, then it stops. You were once a baby, but you have no memory of what you experienced as a baby. Your ability to remember ends at some point. You were certainly already there, crawling around on the ground, being caressed by your mother or father. You may have wriggled and moved your hands, but you do not know in your ordinary consciousness what you experienced inwardly at that time. Nevertheless, it was a more active, more intense soul life than later on. For this more intense soul life, for example, has shaped your brain plastically, has permeated your rest of the body and shaped it plastically. There was an intense soul life present, and the old Indian felt transported into this soul life at the same moment that he said to himself, “I am”. Imagine very vividly what that was like. He did not feel in the present moment when he said to himself “I am”; he felt transported back to his babyhood, he felt the way he felt in his babyhood, and from there he spoke to his whole later life. He did not have the feeling that he now But this was only drawn into this inner being after it had previously lived in the spiritual-soul world. That is, by first transporting himself back to his babyhood through his breathing process, this old Indian yogi became aware of the time before his existence on earth. It seemed to him like a memory. Just as if a person today remembers something that he experienced ten years ago, it was like the occurrence of a memory in the moment when the “I am” shot through the soul, when in this ancient Indian time a person strengthened himself inwardly by breathing exercises and killed the outside world around him, but made it alive, which was not his outside world now, but what the outside world was before man descended into the physical world. In those days, if I may use a modern expression, which of course sounds infinitely philistine when I use it for those ancient times, one was really lifted out of one's present earthly existence and into the spiritual-soul existence through the study of yoga. One owed one's elevation into the spiritual-soul worlds to one's studies at that time. One had a somewhat different consciousness than we have today. But precisely when one was a yogi in the former sense, one could think – the other people could not think, the other people could only dream – but one thought into the supersensible world, from which one had descended into earthly existence. This is also a characteristic of the time of the earth's development, which, if we characterize it somewhat roughly, preceded, for example, the Greco-Roman conceptions in the fourth post-Atlantean period. There, the “I am” had already penetrated more into people in their ordinary everyday consciousness. Admittedly, the verb in language at that time still contained the I; it was not yet as separate as it is in our language, but nevertheless there was already a distinct I-experience. This distinct I-experience was now a natural, self-evident fact of the inner life. But in contrast to this, outer nature was already more or less dead. The Greeks, after all, still had the ability to experience the two aspects side by side, and without any special training. They still clearly experienced the spiritual and soul-like in the source, in the river, in the mountain, in the tree, albeit weaker than people of older times. But at the same time, they could also perceive the dead in nature and have a sense of self. This gives the Greeks their special character. The Greek did not yet have the same view of the world as we do. He could develop concepts and ideas about the world like ours, but at the same time he could take those views seriously that were still given in images. He lived differently than we do today. For example, we go to the theater to be entertained. In ancient Greece, people only went to the theater for entertainment in the time of Euripides, if I may put it this way – hardly in the time of Sophocles, and certainly not in the time of Aeschylus or in even older times. In those times, people went to dramatic performances for different reasons. They had a clear sense that spiritual and soulful beings live in everything, in trees and bushes, in springs and rivers. When you experience these spiritual and soulful beings, you have moments in life when you have no strong sense of self. But if you develop this strong sense of self, which the ancients still had to seek through yoga training, and which the Greeks no longer needed to seek through yoga training, then everything around you becomes dead, then you only see, so to speak, the corpse of nature. But in doing so, you consume yourself. They said to themselves: Life consumes the human being. The Greeks felt that merely looking at dead nature was a kind of mental and physical illness. In ancient Greek times, people felt very strongly that the life of the day made them ill, that they needed something to restore their health: and that was tragedy. In order to become healthy, because one felt that one was consuming oneself, that one was making oneself ill in a certain sense, one needed, if one wanted to remain fully human at all, a healing, therefore one went to tragedy. And tragedy was still performed in Askhylos' time in such a way that one perceived the person who created the tragedy, who shaped it, as the physician who, in a certain sense, made the consumed person healthy again. The feelings that were aroused – fear and compassion for the heroes who appeared on stage – had the effect of a medicine. They penetrated the human being, and by overcoming these feelings of fear and compassion, they created a crisis in him, just as a crisis is created in a pneunomia, for example. And by overcoming the crisis, one becomes healthy. So the plays were performed to make people who felt used up as people well again. That was the feeling that was attached to tragedy, to the play, in the older Greek era. And this was because people said to themselves: When you feel your ego, the world is divested of its gods. The play presents the god again, because it was essentially a presentation of the divine world and of fate, which even the gods must endure, thus a presentation of what asserts itself behind the world as spiritual. That was what was presented in the tragedy. Thus, for the Greeks, art was still a kind of healing process. And in that the first Christians lived according to what was given in the embodiment of Christ in Jesus and what can be contemplated and felt in the Gospels – the death of Christ Jesus, to suffering and crucifixion, to resurrection, to ascension – they felt, to a certain extent, an inner tragedy. That is why they also called Christ, and he was increasingly called the physician, the savior, the great physician of the world. In ancient times, the Greeks sensed this healing quality in his tragedy. Humanity should gradually come to experience and feel the historical, the historically healing in the sight, in the emotional experience of the mystery of Golgotha, the great tragedy of Golgotha. In ancient Greece, especially in the time before Aeschylus, when what had previously been celebrated only in the darkness of the mysteries had already become more public, people turned to tragedy. What did people see in this older tragedy? The god Dionysus appeared, it was the god Dionysus who worked his way out of the forces of the earth, out of the spiritual earth. The god Dionysus, because he worked his way out of the spiritual forces and up to the surface of the earth, shared in the suffering of the earth. He felt, as a god, in his soul, not in the way it was in the Mystery of Golgotha, also in his body, what it meant to live among beings that go through death. He did not experience death in himself, but he learned to look at it. One sensed that there is the god Dionysus, suffering deeply among human beings because he had to witness all that human beings suffer. There was only one being on the stage, the god Dionysus, the suffering Dionysus, and around him a chorus that spoke and recited so that people could hear what was going on in the mind of the god Dionysus. For that was the very first form of the drama, of the tragedy, that the only really acting person who appeared was the god Dionysus, and around him the choir, which recited what was going on in Dionysus' soul. Only gradually did several persons develop out of the one person who represented the god Dionysus in the older times, and then the later drama out of the one play. Thus the god Dionysus was experienced in the image. And later, as an historical fact in the evolution of humanity, the suffering and dying God, the Christ, was experienced in reality. Once as an historical fact, this was to take place before humanity so that all people could feel what had otherwise been experienced in Greece in the drama. But as humanity lived towards this great historical drama, the drama, which was so sacred in the old grienzeit that one felt in it the saviour, the miracle-working human medicine, was, more and more, I would say, thrown down from its pedestal and became entertainment, as it is already the case with Euripides. Humanity lived contrary to the times, when it needed something other than having the spiritual world presented to it in images, after nature had been deprived of its soul for viewing. Humanity needed the historical mystery of Golgotha. The ancient yoga student of the Indian period had taken in the breath, held it back in his own body, so to speak, in order to feel in this breathing: The divine impulse of the I lives within you. As yoga students, people experienced God within themselves through the breathing process. Later times came. People no longer experienced the divine impulse within themselves in the breathing process. But they had learned to think, and they said: Through the breath, the soul entered into human beings. The ancient yoga students experienced this. Later humans said: And God breathed the living breath into humans, and they became souls. — The older yoga students experienced this, later humans said it. And by saying this in ancient Hebrew times, people already experienced in a certain abstract sense what they had previously experienced concretely. But people did not look at it in ancient Hebrew times, they looked at it in ancient Greek times. One thing always takes place in one part of the world, another in another part. People no longer experienced God within themselves as the old yoga student did, but instead they experienced the existence of God in human beings in images. And this experience of the existence of God in human beings was very much present in the older Greek drama. But this drama now became a world-historical event. This drama became the mystery of Golgotha. But in return, the image was now discarded. The image became a mere image, just as the process of breathing was now only described in thought. The entire human soul state became different. Man saw the outer world as dead, and for him it was elementary, natural, that he saw the outer world as dead. He saw it de-deified. He saw himself as the outer world, as the physical outer world, de-deified. But he had the consolation that once, in this de-deified world, the real God had come down, Christ, and had lived in a human being, and through the resurrection had passed into the whole of earthly evolution as the Christ impulse. And so human beings were now able to develop a certain view in the following way. They could say to themselves: I see the world, but it is a corpse. Of course, they did not say this to themselves, for it remained in the unconscious; human beings do not know that they see the world as a corpse. But gradually the image of the corpse on the cross, the dead Christ Jesus, formed in their view. And when one looks at the crucifix, at the dead Christ Jesus, then one has nature. One has the image of nature, that nature in which man is crucified. And if one looks at the one who rose from the grave, who was then experienced by the disciples and by Paul as the Christ living in the world, then one has what was seen in ancient times in the whole of nature. Certainly, in a multiplicity, in many spiritual beings, in gnomes and nymphs, in sylphs and salamanders, in all kinds of other beings of the earthly hierarchies, one saw the divine-spiritual; one saw nature spiritualized and animated. Now, however, people felt the urge, through the intellectualism that was already sprouting, to summarize what was scattered in nature. They summarized it in the dead Christ Jesus on the cross. But in Christ Jesus they see everything that they have lost in outer nature. One sees all spirituality by looking at the fact that Christ, the Spirit of God, rose from this body, conquered death, and now every human soul can participate in His essence. One has lost the ability to see the divine-spiritual in the surroundings of nature. One has gained the ability to find this divine-spiritual in Christ again in view of the mystery of Golgotha. Such is evolution. What mankind has lost, it has been given back to it in Christ. In what it has lost, it has gained selfishness, the possibility of feeling itself. If nature had not become dead to human contemplation, man would never have come to the experience of “I am”. He has come to the experience “I am”; he could feel himself, inwardly experience himself, but he needed a spiritual outer world. That became the Christ. But the “I am”, the egoity, is built on the corpse of nature. Paul sensed this. Let us imagine Paul's perception for a moment. All around, the corpse of what people had once seen in ancient times. They saw nature as the body of the divine, the soul-spiritual. Just as we see our fingers, so did these people see mountains. It did not occur to them to think of the mountains as inanimate nature, any more than it occurs to us to think of the finger as an inanimate limb; rather, they said: There is a spiritual-soul element that is the earth; it has limbs, and the mountain is such a limb. — But nature became dead. Man experienced the “I am” within. But he would only stand there as a hermit on the de-spiritualized, de-souled earth if he could not look to the Christ. But this Christ, he must not look at him merely from the outside, so that he remains external; he must now take him up into the I. He must be able to say, by rising above the everyday “I am”: Not I, but the Christ in me. If we were to schematically depict what was there, we could say: Man once sensed nature (green) around him, but this nature everywhere ensouled and spiritualized (red). This was in an older period of human history. [IMAGE OMITTED FROM PREVIEW] In later times, man also felt nature, but he felt the possibility of perceiving his own “I am” (yellow) in the face of nature, which had now become soulless. But for this he needed the image of the God present in man, and he felt this in the God Dionysus, who was presented to him in Greek drama. [IMAGE OMITTED FROM PREVIEW] In even later times, human beings again felt the soulless nature (green) within themselves, the “I am” (yellow). But the drama becomes fact. On Golgotha, the cross rises. But at the same time, what man had originally lost arises within him and radiates (red) from his own inner being: “Not I, but the Christ in me.” [IMAGE OMITTED FROM PREVIEW] What did the man of ancient times say? He could not say it, but he experienced it: Not I, but the Divine-Spiritual around me, in me, everywhere. Man has lost this “Divine-Spiritual everywhere, around me, in me”; he has found it again in himself and in a conscious sense he now says the same thing that he originally experienced unconsciously: Not I, but the Christ in me. The primal fact, unconsciously experienced in the time before man experienced his ego, becomes a conscious fact, an experience of Christ in the human heart, in the human soul. Do you not see, when you draw such a trivial diagram, the form that the reality must take in ideas? Do you not see the whole world filled with the spirit of Christ, which arises from within the human being, and draws from the cosmos into the human being? And when you realize what significance sunlight has for human beings, how human beings cannot live physically without sunlight, how light surrounds us everywhere, then you will also be able to understand when I tell you that in those older times of which I have spoken today, human beings certainly felt themselves to be light in the light. They felt they belonged to the light. He did not say 'I am', he perceived the sunbeams that fell on the earth, and he did not distinguish himself from the sunbeams. Where he perceived the light, he also perceived himself, because that is where he felt himself. When the light arrived, he felt himself on the waves of light, on the waves of the sun, the sun. With Christ, this became effective in his own inner being. It is the sun that enters one's own inner being and becomes effective in one's own inner being. Of course, this comparison of Christ with light is mentioned many times in the Bible, but when anthroposophy wants to draw attention to the fact that one is dealing with a reality, today most people rebel who have “divinity” listed as their faculty in the university directories. They actually reject knowledge of these things. And it is a deeply significant fact that there was once such a theologian in Basel who was also a friend of Nietzsche: Overbeck, who wrote the book on the Christianity of today's theology. With this book, he actually wanted to state as a theologian that one still has Christianity, that at that time, in the 1870s, there was still this Christianity, but that much had already become unchristian, and that in any case, theology was no longer Christian. This is what Professor Overbeck, of the Faculty of Theology at Basel, wanted to prove with his book on the Christianity of today's theology. He was highly successful. And anyone who takes the book seriously will come to the conclusion that there may still be some Christianity today, but modern theology has certainly become unchristian. And there may still be some Christianity today, but when theologians begin to talk about Christ, their words are no longer Christian. These things are just not usually taken seriously enough. But they should be taken seriously, because if they were taken seriously, then one would not only see the necessity of today's anthroposophical work, but one would also see the full significance of anthroposophy. And above all, people would be aware of their responsibility towards contemporary humanity with regard to something like anthroposophical knowledge. For this anthroposophical knowledge should actually underlie all knowledge today. All knowledge, especially social knowledge, should be derived from this anthroposophical knowledge. For by learning that the light of Christ lives in them - Christ in me - by fully experiencing this, they learn to see themselves as something other than what one gets when one sees man only as a corpse of nature. But it is from this view that man belongs to nature that has become a corpse that our antisocial, unsocial present has emerged. And a real view, which in turn can make people brothers and sisters and bring real moral impulses into humanity, can only come about if man penetrates to an understanding of the word: Not I, but the Christ in me — when the Christ is found as an effective force precisely in the dealings from person to person. Without this realization we make no progress. We need this realization, and this realization must be found. If we advance as far as it, then we will also advance beyond it, and our social life will be thoroughly imbued with the Christ. |