The Rudolf Steiner Archive

If we survey history as one great whole, we see it—in spite of the many valleys and lowlands breaking the heights of the ascending development of man—as a continuous education of the human race, as a process whereby a religious, a divine consciousness penetrates ever and again into mankind.

In every epoch of human evolution there has existed some kind of Initiation Science, analogous, in its own way, to the Initiation Science outlined in my book Knowledge of the Higher Worlds and its Attainment. What I have there described is the Initiation Science of the present age, and it leads us from a mere knowledge of Nature to a knowledge of Spirit.

To this Initiation Science the course of human evolution is revealed in a threefold light. We can look back to a very ancient epoch which came to a close about the year 800 B.C. Then we see an epoch radiant in the light of the Mystery of Golgotha, when through Christ Jesus an everlasting impulse entered into human evolution; and so too, there can arise in our vision a third epoch, an epoch in which we stand to-day and which, by a new Initiation Science, we have to bring to a deeper reality.

Now over and above what is imparted to man by his natural development, intelligence, reason, will, feeling and by his earthly education, each of these three epochs has striven for something else. In each of these epochs man has sensed the existence of a mighty riddle, deeply interwoven with his destiny. And always this riddle has assumed a different form because the human race has passed through different conditions of soul in the several epochs. It is only in the modern age of abstractions, since the inception of the theory—invalid though it be—that the soul of man has evolved from the animal state, that the human soul could be thought of as having remained unchanged through the ages.

Those whom a deeper science has enabled to gaze with unbiased vision into the reality of life, realise that the constitution of the human soul in the first epoch of evolution was not by any means the same as in the epoch crowned by the Mystery of Golgotha. Again there is a difference in our own times, when we must learn to understand this Mystery of Golgotha if it is not to be lost as a fact of knowledge.

In this sense, then, let us consider the nature of the human soul in the ancient East, in an age which produced the wisdom contained in the Vedas and the Vedanta philosophy. Everywhere to-day men are turning back, and often with great misunderstanding, to the Vedas and the Vedanta. If we look at the souls of men in this ancient East, even at souls living in the old Chaldean-Assyrian-Babylonian civilisation and on into the earliest Greek period, we find that they were of quite a different nature from the souls of men living to-day. The souls of men in those ancient times passed through a much more dreamlike, spiritual existence than the souls of modern men, who in their waking life are wholly given up to sense impressions, to all that the intellect can derive from these sense impressions and the substance flowing into the human memory from them. What really constitutes the substance of the soul of man to-day, did not bear the same form in the souls of the ancients. These men possessed a much more instinctive wisdom of the inner life of soul and Spirit. What we to-day would speak of as the faculty of clear and conscious discernment, did not as yet exist. Man experienced a weaving, moving inner life, the shadowy echoes of which remain in our present dream-life. It was an inner life, in which man not only knew with certainty that a soul was weaving and moving through his body, forming part of his true manhood, but in which he also knew: A soul, born from a divine-spiritual existence before a body clothed me in my earthly existence, is living within me.

In those ancient times man experienced his own being in a kind of waking dream. He knew himself as soul and in this inner, living experience felt the body as a kind of sheath, merely an instrument for the purposes of earthly existence. Even in his waking hours man lived in this consciousness of soul—dreamlike though it was. And he knew with clear conviction that before a physical body clothed him on Earth, he had lived as soul in a divine-spiritual world. Direct inner perception revealed to him this life of soul and Spirit, and, as a consequence, his consciousness of death was quite different from that of modern man. To-day man feels that he is deeply linked with his body. His inner consciousness of soul is not detached from his bodily life as was the case in earlier times. He looks upon birth as a beginning, death as an end.

So living and intimate was the experience of the permanent, eternal nature of the soul in the ancients, that they felt themselves raised above birth and death in their contemplation of this life of soul. Birth and death were states of growth, metamorphoses of life. They knew the reality of a pre-earthly existence and hence with equal certainty that they would live on beyond the gate of death. Birth and death were transitory occurrences in an unceasing life.

It has, however, always been necessary for man's immediate experience to be widened and deepened by knowledge that penetrates to the spiritual world, by an Initiation Science that tells him more than can arise within his inner being or is imparted to him in ordinary life by earthly education. It fell to the old Initiates, the teachers of that ancient humanity, to give the answer to a definite riddle that arose in the souls of men. As I have said, these men knew of the soul' and Spirit in immediate experience. But there was a great riddle and it arose in the soul in this form: Through conception and birth I pass into physical life and move upon Earth; I am clothed in my physical body and this body contains the very same substances as those of dead, outer Nature. I am clothed in something that is foreign to my being. Between birth and death I live in a body—a body of Nature. I am born in a physical sense but this physical birth is foreign to my inner sense of being.

The mighty riddle before the man of very ancient times, as he gazed into his innermost being, was not a riddle connected with the soul or Spirit, but with Nature. And it arose before him as he sensed the full inner reality of soul and Spirit and then felt the need to understand why he was clothed in a physical body so foreign to his real being. It was the task of Initiation Science to teach man how he could direct the same forces which enabled him to gaze into the life of soul and Spirit, to outer Nature as well—to Nature whose manifestations are otherwise dumb and inarticulate. And if after adequate training—so it was taught by that ancient Initiation Science—man directs to stone, plant, animal, to clouds, stars, to the courses of Sun and Moon, the forces which otherwise lead only to inner knowledge, he can know and understand outer Nature as well. Then he beholds the Spiritual not only in his inner being but also in bubbling spring, flowing river and mountain, in the gathering clouds, in lightning, thunder, in stone, plant and animal.

Thus did an ancient Initiation Science speak to man: “Gazing into thine own being, thou hast living experience of soul and Spirit, thou hast found the Divine within thee. But Initiation Science trains the power which otherwise beholds the Divine in man alone, also to behold the Divine in the whole life of Nature. Thou art clothed in an outer physical body. Know that this body too is from God. Physical birth hath brought thee into an earthly existence which is itself of a Divine origin.”

And so the task of ancient Initiation Science was to give man this sublime teaching: “Know that thou art born of God not only when thine eyes gaze inwards. In the body that comes into the world through physical birth—there also thou art born of God.” And all that the old Father Initiation placed before the soul of man was expressed, in after times, in three penetrating words:

This was the first way in which Initiation Wisdom worked upon man and awakened a religious consciousness within him.

The old heathen cults assumed the form of Nature-religions because man felt the need for a justification of his physical birth in Nature. The riddle of Nature—this was what confronted his soul; and in this Ex Deo Nascimur the riddle of Nature was solved and he could feel his earthly existence hallowed, although in his waking life he still felt himself a being of Spirit and soul, transcending the Physical.

As the course of evolution continued, man's early, dreamlike experience of soul and Spirit—which was indeed a kind of innate knowledge of his true inner being—faded gradually into the background. He began more and more to use the instruments afforded by his physical body. Let me express it as follows: The dreams of a life of soul and Spirit that characterised a primal instinct in the human race, faded away into darkness, and for the first time indeed in the last few thousands of years before the Mystery of Golgotha, men learnt to make use of their outer senses and of the intellect bound up with these outer senses. What we to-day call “Nature” appeared before men as an actual experience. It was the task of the old wise Initiates to unfold the spirituality of Nature to the human soul. The purely physical quality of outer Nature was now there as a question before the soul. To the old riddle of man's earthly existence there was added the second great riddle in the history of evolution—that of man's earthly death.

It was only in the last few thousands of years before the Mystery of Golgotha that man really came to feel death in earthly existence with any intensity. Whereas in earlier times he had little sense of his body and a strong sense of soul and Spirit, he now felt and experienced his being in the physical body. And death, the enigmatic event that is bound up with the physical body, was experienced by him as the greatest riddle of existence in this second epoch. This riddle of death emerges with great intensity among the ancient Egyptians, for instance. They embalmed their corpses because they; experienced the terror of death, because they were aware of the kinship of the physical body (in which they sensed their own existence) with death. “How do I live in my earthly body?” This had been the first riddle. “How do I pass through earthly death?”—this was the second.

In the days when man had gazed upwards to the soul and Spirit, when the soul and Spirit were immediate experience to his instinctive clairvoyance, he knew: When the chains that bind me to this earthly existence fall away, I shall belong to the Earth no more. My earthly being will be changed and lo! I shall once again live in the super-earthly kingdom, I shall be united with the stars.—For the soul knew the stars spiritually in the living, instinctive existence of days of yore. Man read his destiny in the stars. He felt himself united with Sun and Moon; he knew the stars. “From the Spirit in the stars, from a pre-earthly existence I have come forth. To the stars to the Spirit in the stars—I shall return, when I pass through the gate of death.”

But now all this became a riddle. Man confronted death, beholding in death the body's end. He felt his soul inwardly bound to the body and with a deep awareness of this riddle he asked himself: “What becomes of me after death? How do I pass through the portal of death?” And to begin with, there was nothing on the Earth which could help him to solve this riddle.

The old Initiates knew how to explain to man the riddle of Nature. Ex Deo Nascimur—this was how they answered, if we translate their words into a later tongue. But now, all consciousness of the pre-earthly existence whither man would return after he had passed the gate of death, all that was so clearly revealed to the ancients, was obliterated from the human soul. The instinctive knowledge, arising in man as his life of soul and Spirit flowed upwards to the stars, was no longer there. And then a mighty event occurred.—The Spirit of the world of stars—He Whom a later age called “Christ” and an earlier Greek age, the “Logos”—descended upon Earth, descended in His Substance as a Spiritual Being and took flesh upon Himself in the human body of Jesus of Nazareth. It was given to mankind to experience the greatest event of earthly existence. He Whose life had been divined by the ancients as they gazed upwards to the stars, the Godhead of Whom the Divine-Earthly is also part, passed through earthly life and through death. For the death and resurrection of Christ were, in the first place, the most essential features for those who truly understood Christianity.

And so, this passing of the God Who in earlier times only revealed Himself from the stars—this passing of the Godhead through a human body—contained the solution of the second riddle of existence, the riddle of death, inasmuch as the mystery was revealed in the so-called Gnosis by the Initiates of the age of the Mystery of Golgotha. The Initiates could now teach men: The Being Who erstwhile dwelt in Eternity, in the stars, has descended into a human body and has vanquished death in a human body. The Christ has now become an “extract” of the Spirit, of the Logos, of the Universe. The old Initiates had pointed to Nature, saying: “Out of God is this Nature born.” Now the Initiates could teach man how he can be united with the Divine Being Who descended into Jesus of Nazareth, Who in the man Jesus of Nazareth passed, as all men pass, through the gate of death, but Who had conquered death. And once again it was possible for man to solve this second riddle of death, even as he had formerly solved the riddle of Nature.

In Buddhism we are told that the Buddha found the four great Truths, one of which awoke within him at the sight of a corpse, when he was seized by the despair of the human body in death. About six hundred years before the Mystery of Golgotha, as a last remnant of ancient thought, the Buddha had the vision of death. Six hundred years after the Mystery of Golgotha, men began to gaze at the dead human form on the Cross. And just as Buddha believed that in the corpse he had discovered the truth of suffering as a last fragment of ancient thought, so now a humanity permeated with the Christ impulse gazed at the dead figure on the Cross, at the crucifix, and felt in this figure the heavenly guarantee of a life beyond death—for death had been conquered by Christ in the body of Jesus.

Because of their fear of death, the Egyptians embalmed their corpses, to preserve, as it were, the Nature-forces in man from death. This was in the age of Ex Deo Nascimur. The early Christians, in whom the impulse of esoteric Christianity was still living, buried their dead but held divine service over the grave in the sure conviction that death is conquered by the soul that is united with Christ; the tomb became an altar. From the Mystery of Golgotha flowed the certainty that if man is united with Christ, Who as the spiritual essence of the stars descended upon Earth and passed through life, death and resurrection in a human form, he himself as man, will conquer death.

Thus God the Father was the answer to the riddle of Nature. Christ was the answer to the riddle of death. Death had lost its sting. Henceforth death became a powerful argument (which formerly had not been necessary) for the metamorphosis of life.

The Gnosis—which was later exterminated, and of which fragments only have been preserved—proves that as the Christian Initiates contemplated the Mystery of Golgotha, in the certainty that Christ had descended to Earth and had awakened to new life the death-bringing forces in the Earth, they were able to instil into humanity the truth of the union of mortal man on Earth with Christ. Through Christ, man redeems the forces of death within him and awakens them to life. And so the Initiates were now able to impart a new consciousness of immortality to men, saying: “Your souls can be united with Him Who passed through the Mystery of Golgotha; you can live in the life, death and resurrection of Christ. If your earthly life is more than a mere natural existence, if it is such that. Christ's Kingdom is awakened in your dealings with all your fellow-men, you live in communion with Christ Himself. Christ, the Divine Being, becomes your brother; in death and in life you die in Christ.” The truth of life in God the Son, in Christ, could now be added to the primeval truth of birth from God the Father, and to Ex Deo Nascimur was added:

In Christo Morimur

“In Christ we die”—that is to say—“As soul, we live!”

Such was the wisdom of man in the epoch that began about a thousand years before the Mystery of Golgotha and came to its close in the fifteenth century A.D. We are now living in a third epoch which we must learn to understand aright. So in the education of the human race directed by the great Divine Teachers of the world, there was added to the truth “Out of God the Father we are born”—this truth—“In Christ the Son we die, in order that we may live.”

The great riddles of the first and second epochs stand clearly before us when we look back over history. The riddle of the third epoch in which we have been living for some centuries is as yet little known or felt, albeit it exists subconsciously in the feeling life of man and he yearns for its solution as deeply as he once yearned for the solution of the riddle of his earthly nature and then of his earthly death.

Since the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries man has acquired a knowledge that penetrates deeply into Nature. Think only of the starry heavens which were once revealed to the dream-consciousness of the ancients and from which they read their destiny. External calculations, geometry and mechanics have taught man more and more about the stars since the approach of our present age. The science of the stars, of animals and plants has spread abroad in the form of a pure science of Nature. It was very different in the first epoch of human evolution and different again in the second, when in the depths of their souls men knew the truth of that which the old clairvoyant powers of the soul read in the stars, and which had descended in Christ into the body of Jesus of Nazareth. Thus Christ lived among men, and men of the second epoch looked to the Christ, felt Him in their hearts and in this deep communion with Him they experienced what the Spirit of the Cosmos had once revealed to an old dreamlike clairvoyant consciousness as the justification of earthly existence. In the second epoch, man lived in cosmic spheres, as it were, inasmuch as he lived in communion with the Christ Who had descended from these cosmic spheres to Earth.

Then came the third epoch, when the world of stars was understood merely through calculation, when men looked through the telescope and spectroscope and discovered in the stars the same dead elements and substances as exist on the Earth. In this epoch men can no longer see Christ as the Being Who descended from the stars, because they do not know that the stars are the expression of the Spiritual Essence weaving through the Cosmos. And so the Cosmos is void of God, bereft of Christ, for mankind to-day.

Therefore it is that the inner consciousness of man is now menaced by the danger of losing Christ. The first signs are already visible. The ideas of Divine Wisdom, of Theology, which for centuries contained full knowledge of the Christ revelation, are now in many respects powerless to find the Christ, the God in the man Jesus of Nazareth. Many who contemplate the age of the Mystery of Golgotha no longer find Christ as a Cosmic Being, they find only the man—Jesus of Nazareth. The starry heavens are bereft of God, they are a part of Nature and men can no longer recognise in Him Who passed through the Mystery of Golgotha, the Being Whose “physical kingdom” is the whole cosmos, but Who dwelt in, the man Jesus of Nazareth in the age of the Mystery of Golgotha.

Inasmuch as these things can be deeply experienced in the inner being, there is a difference between one who treads the path of Initiation Wisdom and one who merely stands within external Natural Science. This Natural Science has lost the Spirit of the Cosmos and the danger approaches that humanity will also lose sight of the Christ in Jesus of Nazareth.

Therefore it is that those who in our age penetrate more deeply into the knowledge of Nature that has blossomed forth in the third period of evolution since the fourteenth or fifteenth centuries, feel the third great riddle of man's earthly development. They look back in history to the first great riddle—that of man's earthly nature; to the second riddle of his earthly death. And the third riddle arises within them, whispering something that as yet they do not like to face, although they feel it subconsciously and with a certain emphasis in their hearts. The Initiates of our age say to themselves: “We are living in the world which once spoke to man from out of the cosmos—spoke as the Spirit. In days of yore man lived a life of full wakefulness in the cosmos. Gradually this waking life in the cosmos, this feeling of oneness with the Christ Who descended to Earth as the Being Who preserves this awareness of the spiritual cosmos in man, faded away, and we are now living in a cosmos that is revealed to us merely in its outer aspect. Cosmic ideas are experienced by us only in dreams. The cosmos is weighed in the scales of a balance, observed by the telescope. Such is our dream! And instead of uniting us with the Spirit of the cosmos, this dream separates us from Him.”

And so the third great riddle of the sleep of knowledge, the sleep into which mankind has fallen, stands before those who live in the third epoch of evolution, the third epoch, not only of “uninitiated” but of Initiation Science.

Deeper spirits of the human race have felt this. Descartes felt it, for he finally began to doubt the validity of all knowledge yielded by outer Nature. But, to begin with, it was felt only dimly. More and more deeply there must enter into men the consciousness that the whole domain of knowledge of which they have been so proud for some five centuries, represents a sleep of existence. This third great riddle must stand more and more clearly before them. Why do we dwell in an earthly, physical body? Why do we pass through earthly death? And in the third epoch this question arises in the hearts of men: Why this sleep of a knowledge directed merely to outer Nature? How can we awaken from the dream that this “calculated” universe represents, how can we pass from this cosmos whose external aspect is revealed through Astro-Physics and Astro-Chemistry, and stand face to face with the cosmos that in the depths of our innermost being unites us once again with its deepest Essence? How can we wake from the dream into which knowledge has fallen in recent times?

Ex Deo Nascimur—this was the answer given by the Initiates in the earliest times to man's question, “Why do I live in an earthly body?” In the age of the Mystery of Golgotha the Initiates sought to solve the riddle of death by linking man with Christ Jesus Who had passed through the Mystery of Golgotha, answering in the words of a later tongue, In Christo Morimur. And it is the task of modern Initiation Science in this our age and in the following centuries, gradually to lead mankind to a divine consciousness, to a religious life, and make it possible for him to awaken in his innermost being a spiritual knowledge of the cosmos. The Initiation Science that must arise through Anthroposophy does not wish merely to be an extension of our present sleeping knowledge—although men are proud of this knowledge and its outer successes have been so splendid. Anthroposophical Initiation Science would awaken this sleeping knowledge, would awaken man, who is fettered in the “dreams” of reason and intellectuality.

Hence, the Initiation Science that would be borne by Anthroposophy is not a mere extension of facts and discoveries of knowledge, but an impulse to an awakening, an attempt to answer the question: How can we wake from the sleep of life? And so, just as the earliest Initiates had explained Ex Deo Nascimur, and those who came later In Christo Morimur—the Initiation Wisdom which bears within itself a future life of conscious spiritual knowledge, a life leading to a deepening of religious feeling, a divine consciousness—this Initiation Wisdom would fain lead man once again to know that the Christ Who passed through the Mystery of Golgotha is the Logos, weaving and working through the cosmos. And inasmuch as man will gradually grow to be conscious of his cosmic existence, the Initiation Science that is intended to inaugurate a spiritual Christology in the truest sense (as well as an Art of Education, for instance, in a narrower sphere), will strive to bring a religious mood into the practical life it ever seeks to serve.—“Out of God we are born as physical human beings”—“In Christ we die”—that is to say, “As soul, we live.” To these truths Initiation Science will ever strive to add the third: “When we press forward through the new Initiation to the Spirit, then even in this earthly existence we live in the Spirit.” We experience an awakening of knowledge whereby all our life is bathed in the light of true religion, in the light of a moral goodness proceeding from inward piety. In short, this new Initiation Science endeavours to supplement the answers to the first and second riddles of Initiation as expressed in Ex Deo Nascimur and in, In Christo Morimur—although at the same time it solves them anew and restores them to the soul of man. It endeavours to bring afresh and in full clarity to the human heart, this other truth—a truth that will awaken the Spirit in heart and soul: In the understanding of the living Spirit, we ourselves, in body, soul and Spirit, shall be re-awakened—

In the last lecture we began to consider aspects of mankind's post-Atlantean evolution which can provide a key to our present problems. Current events do indeed present a riddle to those who attempt to understand them merely by means of the materialistic concepts and ideas of our age. That we are in need of new ideas must be obvious from the many things we have considered. Concepts that sufficed in the past are no longer sufficient to understand present-day life which has become so much more complex. I have for years repeatedly emphasized in various lectures something which I believe to be of utmost importance for the present time.

I have repeatedly said in various places the following: If we survey the field and scope of thoughts and ideas, by means of which attempts are made to understand the world and attain a glimpse behind the scenes of external physical reality, we shall find that the most valuable of those ideas originated in the fourth post-Atlantean epoch. The fifth post-Atlantean epoch which began in 1413 has not produced any ideas that are fundamentally new. Certainly it has produced, in admirable fashion, an enormous amount of new facts and combinations of facts. However, they are understood in the light of the old ideas. Let us take an example: What Darwin and his successors have brought together, in order to demonstrate organic relationships, has been introduced into the concept of evolution; but the concept of evolution is in itself not new; it stems from the fourth post-Atlantean epoch. When concepts and ideas are taken seriously and their true nature and reality is understood, then it will be seen that this way of dealing with issues permeates all spheres of knowledge.

Only when Goethe brought the ideas from the past into movement can it be said that a step forward was made. He saw in the concept as such the possibility of transformation, of metamorphosis and thus introduced something quite new which as yet is not properly appreciated. Concepts of blossom, of fruit and so on he saw as transformations of the basic concept “leaf.”¹ To recognize a living mobility in concepts and mental pictures is something new. It enables one to transform concepts within oneself so that they follow the manifold metamorphoses taking place in the phenomena of nature. I have for many years pointed out that this is Goethe's most important discovery, a discovery whose further development is to be found only in spiritual science. Spiritual science alone brings man new concepts enabling him to penetrate true reality.

It is of special importance that the concept of history should be widened. In our recent considerations we have in fact worked with a much extended concept of history. This enabled us more particularly to recognize how the constitution and whole disposition of man's soul has changed. Just a few centuries ago man's soul was fundamentally different from what, in conformity with human evolution, it is now. I drew attention to the fact that during the first, the ancient Indian epoch, man continued his bodily development right up to the ages between 56 and 48. I tried to illustrate this by saying that whereas today in the child and youth the development of the spirit-soul being takes its course parallel to the development of the physical body, in that ancient cultural epoch this continued right into the fifties of a person's life. Today man no longer notices when his body passes beyond the 30th year. All he is aware of inwardly is that in childhood his muscles become stronger and the nerve functions change. It is during this time when changes take place in muscles, nerves and blood that he notices the soul-spiritual element following a parallel development to that of the physical organism. Then comes the time when the soul and spirit cease to be dependent on the organism. However, in the ancient Indian epoch, the dependence persisted, and this is something we must consider in more detail.

Man was at that time, just as he is now, more or less consciously aware of becoming physically stronger during childhood, aware also that at the same time his life of will, of feeling and also his mental life became different. In other words, he was aware during childhood and youth of his soul's dependence on the growing, thriving, flourishing life of the organism. Then came the time when he reached the middle of life which occurs in his thirties; the 35th year must be regarded as the middle of life. Today man is not aware of going through the middle of life the way he is aware, for example, of going through puberty from 12 to 16. But in that ancient time man was aware of this; he sensed to a certain extent, that before he reached his thirties life had welled up within him, had grown ever stronger till it reached a climax and now had begun to recede. He sensed that growth had stopped, that the formation of nerves had come to an end and that from now on he would remain as he was. Those who were particularly sensitive even felt their life forces become sluggish and recede; they felt ossification taking place and that they were becoming mineralized.

When man at that time reached his forties he felt that a decisive decline began, that the organic life was withdrawing. But he also experienced something which can be experienced no longer, namely his soul's dependence on the declining life of the body. Thus, in that ancient time man experienced going through three stages of development whereas now he experiences at most going through one.

How were the three stages experienced? Let us look quite carefully at the dependence on the thriving, flourishing life forces during the body's growth; let us establish initially that an individual felt himself to be thoroughly healthy—something very few people do today—so that he strongly experienced that the healthy, flourishing, thriving life welling up within him was carried by the spirit. After all, what grows is not the merely physical substances taken in as nourishment; it is the spiritual forces underlying the body that cause growth and development. One can look at one's origin as a human being and say: My body came into being through hereditary substances; the spirit united itself with the body and caused its growth and development. In that ancient time man's spirit-soul being felt itself within the body; its healthy dependence upon the body was felt to be brought about by God, and indeed by God the Father. Man at that time said to himself something like this: I am placed into the world with forces of growth, of thriving, and provided one pays attention and has a feeling for what takes place in the body, then the soul can sense in the growing and thriving the effect of the Father God. Man felt related to nature, that human beings grow and thrive just as plants and animals do. He felt related to natural existence and felt the Father God within himself. Thus you see that something which today can take place only under exceptional circumstances was in that ancient time experienced simply as part of life. Then began the period in the life of the individual when he passed through the middle of life and therefore through the culmination, the climax of the growing, thriving life forces, and then the time of decline began.

As we have seen, the growing, thriving life of the healthy body, upon which the spirit-soul being of man knew itself dependent, called forth the feeling “ex deo nascimur,” “from God I am born.” Man felt he originated from God, who also caused his further growth and development. When he passed beyond the middle of life, he could still detect during ordinary waking consciousness the thriving life forces. This was partly because he still remembered his spirit-soul being's earlier dependence on the bodily nature and because he could observe growth and thriving of a similar kind in external nature. However, during lowered states of consciousness, such as dream or sleep and also during the state of atavistic clairvoyance, the astral body and I withdrew from the declining life forces which remained connected with the physical body. It is during sleep that the declining life forces are particularly important to man. In that ancient time those who reached the age when their life forces were declining perceived them particularly in such states of lowered consciousness. And when the physical body began to withdraw and become sclerotic, the soul began to live within the spirit of the whole cosmic environment. Thus in that ancient epoch, when man had passed the climax of the thriving life forces and the body's decline had set in, he perceived in waking consciousness the spiritual in all natural existence; in states of dream, of sleep, or of atavistic clairvoyance he perceived the spirit that pervades the whole cosmos.

Try to imagine these experiences: Man felt his awareness of the spirit-permeated, God-ensouled nature alternate with awareness of the spirit of the cosmos; one kind he experienced as ascending, the other as descending. Thus he was directly aware of the union of the spirit of the cosmos with the spirit of nature and was conscious that the spirit of nature is on earth and the spirit of the cosmos in the earth's environment. He knew that they are related, that they weave into one another and that during his life man passes from one to the other. When his life forces began to decline after having reached their climax, he experienced becoming permeated with the spirit of the cosmos, later known as the Christ.

At that time, during their forties and beyond, people experienced their spirit-soul being's dependence on their declining life forces, especially during dream, sleep and other states of semi-consciousness. If they lived beyond their forties, they became aware of the spirit itself, the spirit which is not linked to matter, but lives as spirit. From their forties onwards they perceived the Holy Spirit. Thus when we look back to that ancient time we find that people in the course of their life perceived directly the Father-God, the Christ-God—who had not yet descended to earthly existence—and the Holy Spirit. Such direct human experiences are the basis for the ancient religious traditions, to be found everywhere, of a divine Trinity.

We see in this how one truth complements another, which is something that must be recognized more and more as a feature of science of the spirit. If it were recognized, we would not hear remarks, such as those made recently to a member of our movement, to the effect that what is said in our lectures is all very beautiful but lacks all foundation. Such a statement is just about as clever, or should I say stupid, as it would be had someone said, when Copernicus established that the earth circles the sun and consequently cannot be fixed on a base; Oh, but the earth lacks all foundation—planets and stars must be sitting on something! Just as planets and stars are self-supporting physically, so it should be recognized that the science of the spirit is an edifice whose individual aspects are mutually self-supporting.

We now come to the ancient Persian epoch during which, as described, man's natural development continued only in his forties, that is, to the ages between 48 and 42. You will realize that this meant the direct vision of the spirit in its purity faded, though there was still an awareness of it. Those who lived beyond the ages between 48 and 42 could still be aware of the Holy Spirit.

Then came the Chaldean-Egyptian epoch. Mankind's general age dropped to that between 42 and 35. Vision of the spirit in its purity clouded over. Towards the end of this epoch it was really only those initiated in the mysteries who could know about the pure spirit. In the mysteries everywhere one could, of course, learn through direct vision about the secret of the Trinity. But as far as ordinary life was concerned understanding of the spirit receded. However, in this third post-Atlantean epoch man was still strongly conscious that in the cosmos, in the heavens, an ascending and descending spirit lives. Consciousness of the cosmic Christ was general. Man was still strongly conscious of his connection with the world of the Gods.

As we come to the fourth post-Atlantean epoch all this changes. During this epoch mankind's age corresponded to that of individual man between 35 and 28. At the beginning of this epoch, which began in 747 B.C. and ended in A.D. 1413, it was still the case that when a person reached the same age as that of mankind, 35, he still had imaginative knowledge of the Christ Spirit. However, at the end of the first third of that epoch, when a third of Hellenism had run its course and modern chronology began, mankind's age was about 33. Man's dependence upon the flourishing, up-thrusting life forces no longer lasted beyond the point of their culmination though the dependence was still experienced much more strongly than was the case later in the fifth epoch. Man was still conscious of the Father God, but consciousness of the cosmic Christ gradually faded. Then came the event which replaced what was lost from consciousness. Just as mankind's age dropped to that of 33, the cosmic Christ descended to the earth and entered the body of Jesus of Nazareth. The Christ force spread over the earth and, from another direction, bestowed upon man what formerly he had possessed as an immediate human experience through his spirit-soul being's dependence upon his physical-bodily nature. This is the immense significance of the Mystery of Golgotha. It explains the significance of what is understood by “the promise of the Holy Spirit.” A time had begun in which the Holy Spirit must be attained from within, independent of man's bodily development, through the impulse initiated by Christ. The connection man formerly had with the spiritual world came about purely through the way his soul and bodily natures were interrelated; this now changed. What had filled man's consciousness thanks merely to normal evolution gradually vanished.

Then came the fifth post-Atlantean epoch. Mankind's age dropped to 28 and will drop to 21 during this epoch. As I have mentioned we live at the time when mankind's general age is about 27. Therefore (and this must be continually emphasized) it is now necessary that within the soul, forces are initiated which do not arise because bodily forces shoot into the soul. Now spiritual impulses, engendered independently, must be established in the soul, impulses which further the soul in its independence from the body. A healthy person leading a healthy life can sense the dependence on the Father God up to about his 30th year; that is, as long as the forces of growth are still thriving in his body, even if only those of his muscles. As you will realize, it is essential that, as the fifth epoch progresses, there should develop a healthy sense also for the divine spiritual element that withdraws from the forces of growth. A sense and feeling for this was still vivid in the fourth post-Atlantean epoch right up to the 15th century. In that epoch mankind's general age corresponded to the middle of life spanning the ages between 35 and 28. Already mankind's age is one year less; because of this, the bodily constitution of man makes him inclined toward materialism and atheism. The spread of atheism is due to man's bodily organism. It will spread ever more unless a spiritual counterbalance is created by impulses that originate purely within the soul, developed in complete independence of the body. Man becomes an atheist when he ceases to participate in the forces of growth and thriving, and therefore no longer experiences himself as a healthy, complete human being. That is why I have said that one can only be an atheist when one does not, in a healthy way, sense one's spirit-soul being's connection with the growing and developing bodily nature. Spiritual science recognizes atheism as an illness that will increasingly take hold of man in the course of his normal evolution. This is because man will more and more lack the support provided by the bodily nature which enables him to grasp reality in general.

To deny or fail to recognize Christ must be regarded as a misfortune, a tragic destiny, for Christ—from the external world—comes to meet man full of grace. To fail to recognize the spirit must be regarded as soul blindness. To be an atheist is an illness; what is meant is, of course, illness in the widest sense. It is necessary to make these distinctions.

From what has been explained you can see that if one truly wants to understand the evolution of the human race, a completely new concept of evolution is needed. The Darwinian idea of evolution is dreadfully abstract; once its crudeness has been recognized it will be realized that along that path no progress is possible. Evolution follows, as we have seen, an ascending as well as a descending line. The view of today's superficial materialism is that evolution starts from a certain form of life which then progresses to ever higher stages, thus believing that there is a continuous trend towards ever greater perfection.

During post-Atlantean epochs man's evolution goes in the direction of his soul and spirit becoming ever more independent of the body. During the earlier epochs there burst into his soul and spirit, from his bodily nature, comprehension of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. The first to fade was comprehension of the Holy Spirit, next that of the Son, and we are now at the stage when, in ordinary life, comprehension of the Father is fading. This fading comprehension of the Father has its origin in man's life of feeling, for as I said, man is at present more or less conscious of his soul-spirit's connection with the bodily nature. This is related to something else. Bear in mind that in general man's spirit-soul being receives less and less from the bodily nature, with the consequence that, if man wants to approach the spirit, he must do so along paths where there is no support from the bodily organism. This accounts for the fact, clearly perceptible to those able to observe such things, that man produces ever fewer concepts and ideas. The concepts and ideas at man's disposal in ancient times bubbled forth, so to speak, from his bodily nature, for all matter contains spirit and this the body simply handed over of itself. But now the body provides man with fewer and fewer concepts and mental pictures. So, expressing it somewhat drastically, he must now rack his brain more and more or, if he is too easy-going, not rack it. Either way he no longer finds concepts welling up within him; he must turn to spiritual knowledge if he wants to acquire them. Spiritual science provides mobile concepts which, in contrast to the rigid, lifeless concepts understood by means of the physical body, must be understood by means of the ether body. Thus, in the course of normal evolution, man becomes ever poorer in concepts. The way he is naturally organized prevents him, if he refuses the path of spiritual knowledge, from delving into true reality.

This explains the present situation. It makes comprehensible what must be described, without levelling any criticism, as the cause for man becoming ever more obtuse without spiritual knowledge. These are things that must be faced in deep earnestness. The brain will gradually become more and more mineralized, it will become a blunt insensible instrument with which ideas capable of delving into reality can no longer be formulated. Only people who make no effort and feel no inclination to understand what is actually taking place in the world can pass these things by. Yet it is of utmost urgency that one should try to understand.

Provided one is not asleep, one cannot be unaware of the many curious things that occur. However, most people are asleep for they are aware only of what takes place on the surface, not of the effective impulses beneath. If one pays attention to what goes on there is much that seems inexplicable, for without spiritual insight one is helpless in face of these riddles. An event that illustrates this quite aptly took place recently in Austria. A certain Robert Scheu, a man of great idealism, has tried for decades to bring about what he visualized as a movement of a cultural-political nature.² He is concerned about the kind of issues often discussed in our circles. In his endeavour to discover new approaches to political issues, he gathered around him a group of intellectuals. His aim was that together they should discover policies that would ensure greater spiritual influence in people's lives.

This start to the project would have been commendable if by bringing intellectuals together, spiritual influences in people's destinies could be ensured. But what induced Robert Scheu to start this venture in the 1890s? The impulse arose within him from an indefinite feeling that things could not go on as they were; he felt some essential ingredient was missing in life which must be discovered. Needless to say he has not found what mankind so sorely needs. Like so many others who vaguely feel something is missing, he looks upon spiritual science as fantastic superstition. Such people consider themselves far too clever to be concerned with matters of this kind. However, Robert Scheu does feel very strongly that something is lacking. He says the following: “My fundamental conviction, which I herewith repeat, is: As far as cognition, as far as mental activity is concerned, our time is far ahead of the times.”³

A curious expression—what does he mean? He says nothing about the fact that thoughts have become blunted; he is only aware that today's intellectuals are clever in the sense that they can produce abstract ideas like clockwork, and are so sure of their judgments because of the transparency of their abstract ideas. That is why he says that “as far as cognition, as mental activity is concerned, our time is far ahead of the times.” In other words, people are very capable of producing thoughts, but these thoughts are of the kind I have described, quite unrelated to reality. Thus one could also say: Our time is far behind the times. Scheu goes on to say: “As knowers we have become decadent, our thoughts are too rarefied.” That is certainly true of modern man. We need only look at our literature or observe everyday life. Just think of all the intricate thoughts people spin out, but thoughts that are quite incapable of penetrating reality. Hence Scheu is right when he says: “As knowers we have become decadent, our thoughts are too rarefied, too translucent; we are still dominated by the Middle Ages. The reason is that the furnace in which thoughts ought to be recast does not function.”

Scheu expresses himself with feeling in a strange way, but what he says is based on a true sense for what is lacking in our time. Indeed the “furnace” does not function in which thoughts, lost in nebulous abstraction, could become so inwardly strengthened, that they become able to unite with reality. He recognizes that thoughts have become abstract to the point of decadence and that a great number of people have poured our abstract ideas concerning socialism, social-democracy and liberalism with marvelous logic, especially in marxism. Combinations of such abstractions are also possible such as national liberalism, social liberalism and so on. We also have abstract ideas about conservatism. On the basis of all these abstractions—abstract because the furnace is missing that could transform them—one builds up parliamentary systems, representative systems and the network of ideas on which are based liberalism, social liberalism, social democracy, conservatism, nationalism and so on.

Robert Scheu has done what from his point of view is not a bad thing; he has attempted with the means at his disposal to replace the abstractions with reality. Instead of the abstract ideas he wants inquiries set up, maintaining that those who are knowledgeable about an issue should be the ones to judge what should be done about it. After all, whether one is a liberal or conservative is of no great moment when it is a question of organizing the sale of oil or arranging art galleries. What matters in such instances is insight into oil distribution or knowledge about art. Robert Scheu did in fact arrange inquiries into various issues and saw to it that people who made the inquiries spoke about them. A very ingenious start.

He attempts to decide where what he calls the “furnace” is, or ought to be, located. He asks, “Should it be the parliament, the congress? Or should one look for it in the administration? And do the parties uphold the system of representation?” He further points out that “the system contains programs of fundamentally conflicting interests; the parties do not grasp the real issues of life to which they have a purely deductive approach. They are only interested in what constitutes means for enhancing the power of the party.”

Here is someone who for once realizes that the rarefaction, the abstractness of thought—one could also call it dullness, obtuseness, for the thoughts have no contact with reality—have a direct effect on life. He links this problem with the problems of development in social conditions, whether under the system of representation or any other form of government. He is fully aware that no, solution is possible by treating the problems in the old manner. He ponders the possibility of discovering from life itself what could bring order into the structure of-social life; he has in fact done much in this direction. What is interesting is that he now looks back at his efforts and asks himself, “What did I actually attempt to achieve?” What he tried to do was to penetrate to the reality of the issues. However, he expresses this in today's abstract terminology by saying, “I replaced deduction with induction.” These kinds of expressions one meets with everywhere. But Robert Scheu is not altogether satisfied with the result of this endeavour; that is why at the end of the article in which he presents the whole story he says, “I have come to the conclusion that my inductive approach to cultural and political life needs to be completed by a deductive approach. I realize the problem is like a tunnel that must be excavated from both ends if a breakthrough is to be achieved. The mental work necessary must be a joint effort of all Europeans of good will.”

So you see that Robert Scheu comes to recognize that the problem must be approached from two sides. What he does not recognize is the source from which concepts and ideas, allied with reality, must be drawn. He comes to a standstill and does not really believe in his so-called inductive approach via all kinds of inquiries. In any case, to make inquiries is to approach reality from one side only. The approach to the other, the spiritual side, would be the search for the spiritual aspect by means of spiritual knowledge.

Everyday practical life demands spiritual science. This is not suggesting anything out of the way or difficult; rather, it is a thought that essentially belongs to this very moment in mankind's evolution. Just imagine how fruitful spiritual science could be if people would overcome the prejudices which blind them to its reality. Without spiritual knowledge one only arrives at absurdities which deteriorate into all kinds of ridiculous situations. This becomes very obvious when one lives within the mobile concepts of spiritual science. Robert Scheu, for example, wants inquiries set up into the various branches of social life; he wants people who are knowledgeable to speak on the issues. One such issue he wants altered through an inquiry is the system of registration of domicile; just imagine what that would mean at the present time.

However, he does represent a striking example of the fact that people are beginning to feel that something is lacking, but cannot make the decision to turn to what is necessary. Yet I have always tried from the beginning to prevent spiritual science from becoming abstruse and sectarian. I have tried to let it flow into life in response to human requirements. Whenever my advice was sought I tried to give it in accordance with each person's individual need. It must be said, though, that the present materialistic way of life creates huge difficulties in applying such advice. It is understandable that a manufacturer would find it strange if told that science of the spirit could help him run his business better. Yet one could hope that it would work at some point.

A man came to me some years ago who said he wanted his scientific work to be enhanced by spiritual science. We spoke about his scientific work. He was wonderfully erudite; he had really mastered Babylonian and Egyptian archeology to a remarkable degree. I tried to work out with him where the threads could be attached to today's knowledge which would allow spiritual science to flow into his endeavors, so that at least a part of his science could be fructified by spiritual science. He had what modern science can say about the subject; from us he found what spiritual science can reveal about it. He had both—but he could not bring forth the will to penetrate and illumine the one with the other.

If one does not develop this will, one will never understand what is actually intended with spiritual science. One will rather be inclined to make the science of the spirit into merely one more doubtful mysticism so beloved by those who belittle earthly life. There are those who have the view that this life is worth nothing; one must rise to a higher life. One must rise from this world of the senses into a reverie—then a higher life will arise. Why bring up one's children properly here when one can rather think about one's prior incarnations? That brings one into the higher regions and so forth. That is not what is at stake here. What is essential is that, in the area where one stands, one can make science of the spirit fruitful. It can be made fruitful everywhere. Life demands it.

One would wish to have something more than words today to make that comprehensible. Who feels today what lies in words? Who really feels into words? Feeling with words—that is something that humanity has almost lost, at least in that portion of humanity to which we belong. Let me use an example. [^* ] When someone says, “You did your job pretty well” (ziemlich gut), who feels much more today at these words than “You almost did your job well” (fast gut)? “Pretty” (ziemlich) is “almost” (fast). We say one instead of the other. Place your hand on your heart and say you don't feel “almost” when someone says “pretty” (ziemlich) in that way! But “pretty” (ziemlich) is a word which has referred to activities and products which were done properly or decently (geziemend). Who feels anymore the “proper” (geziemend) in the “pretty” (ziemlich) in this case?

Or, who feels in the word “Zweifel” (doubt) the fact that it carries the “Zwei” (two), that one stands before something which divides into two? Who feels indeed the “zw, z-w”?^** But wherever the “zw” appears, you have the same sensation as in doubting (Zweifel), which divides the things in two. “Zwischen” (between)—there you have the same! “Zweck” (goal), “Zweifel” (doubt), “zwar” (indeed)—try to feel it! Feeling can lie in all speech relations. But our words have today become an exceedingly worthless currency. Therefore one would really like to have something other than language to give a penetrating impression of what is necessary for today and what spiritual science could give. The way speech is used today deadens thinking even more than is happening anyway as an effect of natural evolution. The result is a chaos of obtuse thoughts written and printed everywhere.

One could sweat blood, as almost happened to me this morning when I picked up a book by Dr. Johann Plenge, professor of political science at the University of Munster in Westphalia.⁴ This man claims to have unraveled a great contradiction which developed between the ideas of 1789 and 1914. He regards himself as an extremely important fellow, but let that pass. On page 61 of his book one comes across an astonishing sentence. I shall now be somewhat pedantic, but the pedantry refers to something subtle, and those who can feel it, will do so. The sentence on page 61 slugged me—excuse the expression. It says: “Imagine you were a future historian who one day hears about the world catastrophe of 1914.” What is one to make of a sentence like that? He imagines a future historian who suddenly hears about the world war of 1914. So during his whole youth he has never heard of it, but only does so quite by chance when he is a writer of history! One really can no longer be living within living images to be able to produce something like that. He tried to characterize the nature and significance of ideas. He points to ideas that run through mankind's history, saying that ideas can emerge and again withdraw. In this way he attempts to discover the essence of ideas. He tries to show how ideas unconsciously emerge in primitive races and gradually become more conscious. During his attempts he comes up with the following: “A civilized nation in the making lives according to the example of an imagined ennobled humanity. The position of Homer in antiquity is the best example of such a formation of an idea-complex.”

So, the position of Homer in antiquity is an example of the formation of ideas! One might just as well say that the role of a court advisor is an example of how an idea-complex is formed. It is impossible to think along with something like that if one wants to connect living images with one's concepts. When one is used to doing so from youth, sentences containing such affectations in words are experienced like a slap in the face. They remind me vividly of a professor who began a course of lectures by raising 25 questions. He is a professor of literature who has become very famous indeed. I shall not name him, for you would not believe me. Having put his 25 questions he said: “Gentlemen, I have placed before you a forest of question marks!”—So one had to imagine a wood composed of rows of question marks. Ask yourselves what sort of thinking it is when thoughts remain unrelated to reality, when a person does not live in his thoughts, and they result in nothing but verbiage.

This is a situation that is not uncommon; one comes across the strangest assertions. Plenge, for example, says, “Like the astronomer, so the true historian is able to forecast events.” And then the good fellow proceeds to show how things developed in the period leading up to the catastrophe of the present war. Since he regards himself as a truly great historian, he should be well able to forecast such a catastrophe, but though he has written several books on external affairs, he has not done so. This troubles him; he therefore explains how he has done it after all. And how has he done it? He says, “Well, I have shown that because of the way things were developing one had to strive for peace with all one's strength and power; then I have shown that, as things were, only the war could come.” No one can deny that to be an accurate prophecy! It is comparable to my having two coats and saying, Provided I will not wear this one tomorrow, I shall be wearing the other one. And he continues in the same vein, for when he speaks about how he faltered between forecasting peace or war he says—or rather he quotes himself (quotations are a peculiar feature throughout the book), “To make such a forecast one must let one's fantasy play with the idea of war.” What a sentiment! To suggest that one should indulge in fantasy of war in the years leading up to the present catastrophe reveals an attitude of incredible irresponsibility.

As I said, quotations are a peculiar feature of this book by Plenge. The book is associated throughout with an article that appeared in a daily newspaper. The article is quite inoffensive, written by an unknown journalist who rebels against Plenge's “discovery” of the way ideas had changed by 1914. What makes the composition of Plenge's book peculiar is that on the first page one finds the newspaper article reproduced, or as much of it as Plenge found suitable for his purpose. He speaks about the article, quoting it again on page 21. So the article has now been read twice. He then continues and quotes part of it for a third time. Towards the end of the book, having quoted the article three times, he does so once again, So you have a book with a newspaper article quoted four times.

I chose such concrete examples in order to make clear how things really are and to show also what is necessary. I want to demonstrate that science of the spirit is what is needed, what must intervene in present affairs. The things I have spoken about may seem like trifles; nonetheless they are closely connected with the great issues with which we started our considerations. This I ask you to bear in mind during these lectures.

• 1. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 1749–1832; Naturwissenschaftliche Schriften, edited by Rudolf Steiner (Rudolf Steiner Verlag, Dornach, Switzerland) 1982. Original edition by Joseph Kiirschner, 1883–1897.
• 2. Robert Scheu, 1873–1964, Kulturpolitik, Vienna, 1901.
• 3. Ibid.
• *. This portion of Steiner's lecture used characteristics of German words unique within that language for those examples. An analogous substitution of the word “pretty” for “ziemlich” has been used in the following rendering for the English reader. The analogy is not direct, since “pretty” and “ziemlich” have diverging semantic roles and heritages; it is nevertheless imperfectly useful in grasping the speaker's train of thought.
• **. Pronounced as one would pronounce the letters “ts-v” in English. This sound has not carried over into English, although a similar combination of letters, today unpronounced, remains in the word “two” (German dialect “zwo” = “zwei” = “two”).
• 4. Dr. Johann Plenge, 1874–1963, 1789 and 1914. Die symbolischen Jahre in der Geschichte des politischen Geistes, Berlin 1916.

[Record of Participants: The community of founders gave its leadership the following structure on this day: They appointed Friedrich Rittelmeyer, Emil Bock and Johannes Werner Klein as the senior leaders, Gertrud Spörri as titular senior leader; and Friedrich Doldinger, Johannes Perthel and Alfred Heidenreich as leaders.

Rudolf Steiner brought two pictures of Christ to the meeting that morning: a painting by an unknown master from the Brera Gallery in Milan, and a painting of the Crucified by Matthias Grünewald (Karlsruhe). The pictures were hung one above the other on the blackboard, and on the lectern in front of it, with the help of a board and cloths, an altar table was improvised, on which a candleholder with seven candles was placed.

The stenographer only recorded the following words of Rudolf Steiner:]

First of all, the picture will be present as a symbol of the power that comes into effect with this ceremony, and we will replace the consecration that would otherwise be given to such a picture by consecrating this picture in spirit for a moment for a ceremony by speaking the words:

The power, the word and the light of Christ may work, create and shine in that which His followers do here today.

May God the Father be in us
the Son-God creates in us,
The Holy Spirit enlightens us.

[The following swearing-in of the priests was not recorded by the stenographer.

The swearing-in continued in the afternoon. Afterwards, Rudolf Steiner gave the following short address:]

My dear friends! You have taken the oath before God and Christ and invoked the Spirit of God in order to be His servant of the word. If you work with the same attitude that was in the words that were spoken out of your head, your heart and your whole being to Christ, if you work with the whole spirit of these words, you will be able to carry out your duties in a worthy and proper way. You must keep in your heart, in your head, in your whole being, what has been the spirit of these words, in every hour of your future earthly existence, by working and wanting to work for the salvation of human souls. This is what must be said at this moment, invoking

Christ's strength and Christ's word and Christ's light,
that it may permeate us,
that it may fill us,
that it may enlighten us.

And out of this spirit, I shall advise you on all that you wish to inaugurate here and now point out to you the meaning that should, so to speak, substantially permeate the whole of your work, so that you feel: you may work out of a different light from the one that your outer eyes see; you may work out of a light that strengthens the inner man. And you will also feel more and more how the word comes to life and takes wing, which must be spoken to man when the Christ dwelling in the heart of man throbs through this word, when he is the soul and the spirit of this word. And you shall feel this when you go before the community. When you go before the community, you shall feel:

Christ's power, Christ's word, Christ's light
work in me, so that what comes from me may
live in the seer, even if I myself am blind.

We must carry this humility of our consciousness within us, so that all that is naturally and inevitably weak in the earthly human being may be strengthened by the power of the indwelling Christ-being. In this way our work will proceed in the spirit of the Mystery of Golgotha. And in this way you will be servants of the Word, servants of the Word of Christ, and servants of Christ Himself.

This is what you should bear in mind when you take your oath. This is what I, if I am to be a true advisor to you in all your deeds, should once again firmly inscribe in your memory today in this hour.

To each one of them, first to the three senior leaders, then to the titular senior leader and the three leaders, then to the others.

Remember this
And even if you were blind
blind, Let the light of Christ shine in your heart.

To all:

We have carefully considered all of this, felt it deeply, and will do our best to fulfill it.

The three top links

Yes, so be it (three times).

The titular top link and the links:

Yes, so be it (twice).

The others:

Yes, so be it (once).

Rudolf Steiner:

Yes, so be it
Yes, so be it
Yes, so shall it always be.

[Record of participants: In the presence of Rudolf Steiner, Friedrich Rittelmeyer celebrates the complete human consecration ritual for the first time. Marta Heimeran ministers. During this consecration, Rittelmeyer simultaneously completes the consecration of the first twelve priests. Thus the first 13 original priests are ordained.]

Rudolf Steiner: The first Act of Consecration of Man has been performed here. From this first Holy Act of Consecration of Man may there truly proceed all the power of the word, all the power of the deed and all the power of healing that is to come, my dear friends, through the community that you are founding as a whole, through the communities that you will found as individuals. You must realize the full significance and importance of this fact. You must bear in mind that the Catholic Church, which regards itself as the only legitimate church, traces its authority to properly perform such a human consecration ceremony back to only one historical tradition, namely, that those who perform it have always been consecrated by others who in turn have been consecrated by others, and so on up through all the centuries to the event of Golgotha. And the first consecrator was the Christ Himself, who performed the Act of Consecration of Man with His Apostles. The Catholic Church traces the authority to perform the Act of Consecration of Man back to this apostolic succession.

The Protestant Church has abandoned the performance of this Act of Consecration of Man, and in so doing has laid the seeds of atomization and worldliness and confined itself to the teaching of an unreal act of consecration. Therefore, everything that cannot take place without a real act of consecration cannot take place through the Protestant Church either. The Catholic Church, however, has externalized the living power that is in the Act of Consecration of Man by objectifying the church, and the priest, within the celebration, actually merely presents himself as a bearer of what magically takes place within the Act of Consecration of Man. Thus, everything that takes place in the Protestant Church is actually taken away from what Christ Jesus instituted. Christ Jesus is made the only world teacher, the only teacher of humanity who has descended from divine heights, but He is not revered as the One who inaugurated an act in the Mystery of Golgotha that continues to be effective through all subsequent earthly circles. For this continuation of the deed inaugurated with the Mystery of Golgotha is, after all, the essential thing that underlies the externalized thing, which the Catholic Church has as apostolic succession. So one can say that the Protestant Church has indeed worked with good forces for a long time. But from the signs that have entered into this present time and that have led you, my dear friends, to seek a revival of religious life from within this church, it is clear that the Protestant Church, if it does not seek a renewal of Christian life by taking up what is alive in the Act of Consecration of Man, proceeding from the Mystery of Calvary and being fulfilled in all further earthly circles, the Protestant Church is in danger of completely running into the Luciferic event.

On the other hand, the Catholic Church has long since exposed itself to this danger [of becoming Ahrimanized] by externalizing the cult, which is not supported by the real flow of the power emanating from the Mystery of Golgotha. By rejecting the knowledge of the real spiritual solar power descending from the spiritual cosmos, by rejecting that which even the Catholic Church has before it in the Symbolum, the Catholic Church has long since exposed itself to the Ahrimanization of everything in its cult. The Catholic Church included the monstrance, the Blessed Sacrament, in its symbols. You see, when you look at the monstrance, the Blessed Sacrament, quite clearly the reproduction of the sun. You see in that which is left out in the middle of the radiant sun and what receives the core of the sun, the consecrated body of Christ. You see the moon at the foot of this consecrated body of Christ. You see Sol and Luna in the Sanctissimum, which, after all, is supposed to fulfill the beginning and the end of the Mass with a blessing during particularly solemn masses. But you see at the same time that this connection of Christ with the cosmos, which is even presented to Christianity in the Symbolum at the Missa solemnis, is no longer felt and experienced in its liveliness. That is the Verahrimanization.

All this, my dear friends, passed through my soul when, according to your will, I had to pluck up the courage to bring to you once more, directly from the spiritual worlds, what has actually been lost, as a ritual act, as a human consecration ritual.

Accept it as requested, longed for and brought down from the spiritual realms, and continue to perform it in the spirit of your own consecration by filling yourselves with the consciousness that was to be generated in your souls, to be strengthened in your hearts, to enter into your will in a healing way. Accept it and fulfill it by virtue of your own act of consecration. Every human consecration ceremony that you perform in the future shall be a repetition of this first human consecration ceremony, which itself, through the power of Christ invoked into that which we have celebrated today, should be an aftereffect of the institution of the human consecration ceremony through the word, the power, the will of Christ.

May God the Father be in us
The Son-God create in us
The Spirit God enlightens us.

The altar server: Yes, let it be so.

Dear friends,

Pastoral medicine as we think of it here will only be recognized as something from spiritual research that has meaning when humankind once more possesses a common consciousness of a spiritual realm containing positive, active forces. For naturally in an age that has developed materialism, it is inconceivable to the ordinary human being that anyone could have seen something worthy of notice in the spiritual world. But this really happened in the old mysteries. Individuals saw into spiritual realms and found knowledge there that led to valuable cures. And what we still have to say today to round off our studies may perhaps provide a connection to that old mystery wisdom for the medical stream that should now emanate from the Goetheanum.

Indeed this impulse is understood most correctly in its historical connection if what is intended here is thought of as having developed out of the research methods (although, of course, quite different in form) and the artistic healing practices of the old mysteries. Obviously you will have to regard what has been offered in this short course as just a stimulus, as in a certain sense just the first chapter, the beginning of a pastoral medicine that will develop further through the work that is still to be done here by Dr. Wegman and me.

So first I would like to point out how the initiates in the old mysteries described their path of initiation, particularly that path that was pursued at the place where the mysteries were most involved in the secrets of healing. Actually all the mysteries were connected with secrets of healing, but some more than others. They were all connected with them because healing was regarded as related to the entire evolution of human civilization. There were deep reasons for this. People of those ancient times said: When the human being comes down out of spiritual worlds into the physical-earth world through conception and birth, the soul-spiritual entity undergoes a transformation by which it is able to form a physical human body. We have described how this achievement takes place for the first time through the activity of the individual during the first seven years of life. The first body had been given through heredity, the body that in the course of the first seven or eight years is entirely stripped off.

Thus it was conceived very exactly in the ancient mysteries how one came out of spiritual worlds into the world of the physical senses. But there was a universal recognition that a person does not in the first place unite with the physical body in the way that was originally intended by the spiritual powers who direct humanity. It was always believed that through some anomaly of the general evolution the forces that a human being inherits overpower in a certain sense the forces that are brought through the individuality from former earth-lives. This seemed to show a lack of harmony. It was said: If there were complete harmony between soul-and-spirit and physical body in earthly humans, death would not have the form it now has; nor would illness come in the way it now comes. Illness and death were regarded as the symptoms that show that human beings indeed have more to do with the physical-earth world than they were originally meant to. Although today this can no longer be completely understood, still it is an extremely profound idea in which there is very much truth. For the moment one reaches a higher level of consciousness even to a slight degree, one sees at once that death is quite different in character. It appears as a metamorphosis rather than the end of a phase of life.

Therefore for the entire ancient consciousness the education of the human being was related to healing. The entire educational process in very ancient times of human evolution was thought of primarily from a medical point of view. Connected with this was the recognition that the mysteries united the professions of physician and priest, both of whom should be concerned with the healing of human beings on earth. Usually in olden times physician and priest were united in one person. This could only happen out of the old instinctive consciousness; today it would not be possible, at least not as an accepted custom. This recognition of the importance of healing, which was strong even in normally healthy persons, was related for every human being to their knowledge that after the metamorphosis they would undergo through death, they would be guided through their life between death and rebirth on their path to the sun by souls who on earth had been physicians or priests. The first need of every human being after death was to find the sun path—because there they would work out part of what they had to experience between death and rebirth. And these first steps had to be shown to them by a physician or a priest. So it was thought in ancient times. This was included in the deepest mystery wisdom. For us today this wisdom must be regarded differently because the old methods are no longer suitable for us. However, at this present time they can be renewed. Indeed that renewal is to be attempted right here.

When ancient initiates described their initiation they would say that after they had crossed the threshold they were first made acquainted with the activity of the elements. In olden times, “elements” was the name given to what today would be called physical conditions. That is, the solid, which was called “earth”; all fluids, which were called “water”; everything gaseous, which was called “air”; and everything to do with “warmth,” which was ascribed to the warmth ether and which was called an element. Modern physicists deny all this. For them these four elements do not exist. For them there are from sixty to eighty elements, which have qualities. Under certain conditions one is fluid, another solid or gaseous. The condition of warmth belongs to all. What was described as an element in olden times does not exist today. There are now only qualities of things; the qualities have no existence of their own. What today are called elements are actually only “real” in the coarse, tangible physical world. And what in olden times were called elements were understood not as reaching down into tangible matter itself, but only to the intangible, living activity of matter.

It was of no particular importance to an ancient physician whether something was this or that substance with this or that name. Naturally this is important, but it only becomes so after one has first obtained full view of something else, of the living, weaving activity of the substance. Thus one can study a substance in a place where it is exposed to weather conditions. The ancient physicians laid great value on studying a substance while it was being exposed to the weather, to the whole earth process. Also they took care that they did not simply take some substance out of the mineral kingdom if it could be obtained from the plant kingdom. In other words, they looked at the position the substance had in the world process by virtue of its living activity. But to understand that, one needs to accept the concept of the four elements. For then it is of prime importance in what temperature a substance becomes earth, for instance; in what temperature it becomes solid, or fluid, or air. That was the important thing in olden times, to observe what world process must happen so that some substance or other would take on a particular form. That was the first requirement. After that, the substance was examined without restriction. Today one starts out from the substance; formerly one started out from the process. And in fact any substance is only a process suspended at a certain stage. Formerly people were above all concerned with the whole weaving life within the material substance. And so initiates described how they were led to a vision of the weaving life of matter and of how it appeared to them as a fabric woven of the four elements. That was the first experience.

The second description everyone gave, which presented the second step for them, was this: they were led to a place where they could learn to know the “upper and lower gods.” What does that mean? We have already described that, but in a modern way. I told you that if the soul-spiritual entity enters too deeply into the physical and etheric bodies, these bodies overpower the soul-spiritual entity, creating a pathological condition—an aberration of the soul-spiritual entity in the physical-etheric organism. There is, then, this pathological situation, that such people have descended more deeply into the physical organism than they should in ordinary waking life, and down below encounter nonhuman, subnatural activity. For only when we have a normal relation between our soul and spirit and our physical-etheric organism do we live in the natural world. The moment we descend too deeply, too intensely into physical corporeality, we come into relation with the subnatural. We fall to a level at which elemental beings, beings of higher hierarchies at various stages of their development, are all active. We come into relation with those gods who are unfolding their activity below the level of nature.

How would ancient initiates have spoken if they had wanted to use a more neutral expression, veiling the facts so that no one would understand them except other initiates? How could they have implied that they had been led to the lower gods? An ancient initiate would have said: I have learned to know the nature of human illnesses. For that leads to the lower gods.

Now look in the other direction, at the life of the saint: this also, as I have shown you, can be at the borderline between normal and pathological. It can happen that the soul-spiritual entity goes out farther than it should, enhancing the sleep condition. The ancient initiates described their introduction to this state as meeting with the upper gods. Put schematically (see drawing), this corresponds to the facts: nature, subnature, supernature. Visionary life, through the clairvoyant faculty that leads an individual into the spiritual world: the initiate called this “meeting with the upper gods.”

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Now when we speak of upper and lower gods someone can very easily entertain the false idea that it concerns rank. You must think of it in this way: if I simply say nature, subnature, supernature, illness, visionary life, then I am tempted to think of the lower gods as being of a lower order. But that is not true. In reality it is like the drawing below.

Imagine we have nature; then above, it leads to a circle; below, it leads to a circle; and what is above joins what is below. If we draw the circle larger and larger, and continue to draw it larger, we finally get a straight line. A piece of circle that continues on, after it has gone into infinity, comes back from the other side. This shows that the terms “upper” and “lower” are not to be understood as signs of rank, but simply as different ways that the gods come to human beings. They have been thought of as working in equal rank with one another, of striving to unite at a point in infinity. Therefore everything in olden times that was either illness or clairvoyance was thought to show that those who gained an understanding of those two human conditions, would then see into the spiritual world. One way to know about the spiritual world was to become well acquainted with illness and with clairvoyance.

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When we understand this, we are able to bring into our own modern age what was present in human consciousness in olden times. If we ask what can be identified in modern consciousness with the realm of the lower gods, the answer must be—the Being whom we call the Father when we think of the divine Trinity. The Father belongs in the most eminent sense to subnature. How are we to think about the Father God with truly spiritual comprehension?

Let us consider human beings, first in day-waking consciousness, then in night-sleeping consciousness, and let us compare the two states. We know that in full waking consciousness individuals are living as they have been placed to live within the order of this physical world. Just as the earth has had earlier stages of evolution—Saturn, Sun, Moon—and will undergo further evolution, so must humans themselves be recognized as the result of those earlier evolutionary periods. In this sense they belong in their waking state to the earth; by their nature they stand within the sphere of the earth. In waking condition they stand on a level with nature.

It is not the same when human beings sleep. When we are asleep our physical and etheric bodies lie on the bed, and our astral body and ego are outside them. Let us look at the physical and etheric bodies. Of what do we consist, lying there in our physical and etheric bodies? We have—of course, at a more advanced stage—what we received in the old Saturn evolution and the old Sun evolution. That is now further evolved; we have the further development of our Saturn and Sun existence now during sleep. We do not have our Moon existence in what lies there on the bed. Nature has progressed from Moon existence to Earth existence. And the fact that the sleep condition is essential to us means that nature preserves in the sleeping human being a nature that is now below, a nature that only existed during the Saturn and Sun periods. That is subnature. That lies at the foundation of all beings through the fact that there is a human race. Humans fall during sleep into subnature, and from this fall illnesses appear. That is the realm of the Father God. When we sleep we enter the realm of the Father God, we enter subnature, the realm of the Father.

Human clairvoyance helps illuminate the members of the human being that during sleep are outside the physical and etheric bodies: that is, the ego and astral body. When we become conscious in them, we are in the opposite condition, the opposite pole to illness and have entered the realm of the Spirit with the astral body and ego.

So we can see that the human being is organized on earth in such a way that one is able to go out from nature in two directions, in the direction of subnature to the Father, and in the direction of supernature to the Spirit. Since the Mystery of Golgotha, Christ has been the mediator for both worlds. He is the one who permeates the world of nature, the one who permeates normal human existence. He has always to create harmony between subnature and supernature. Subnature is always kept in balance by the normal course of sleeping and waking. Supernature is kept in balance by those seers who are able to return to their ordinary human life at will. If someone is unable upon waking from sleep to balance what is experienced in subnature, then there is illness in the physical and etheric bodies. If someone is unable to bring back into the full waking state, into the natural course of earth-life, what is experienced clairvoyantly in the realm of the spirit, then there are soul illnesses or spiritual illnesses. This is the other pole.

Let us now consider physical illness. What happens when the healing process starts? The human being is led from the experience of subnature to the experience of nature, from the Father to Christ. For Christ is the spiritual life in nature. That is in reality what the physician does. It is the physician's task to know how a person fallen to subnature is brought back to Christ, after the Father has given the leadership over to Christ the Son. That puts into modern speech what mystery wisdom would express. After initiates have attained a Christ-consciousness here on earth, they are led on the one side to the Father, on the other side to the Spirit. If then they are aware how their path leads from the Father to Christ, they will find all the healing processes on this path.

Here the modern mystery begins, the mystery that creates a great test for real medical science. It is this to which I must point at the conclusion of this pastoral medicine course, so that there shall flow from it what should first of all bestow healing upon physicians. We can assume that they will gradually learn the separate healing measures that we have shown in this course by learning which are the defective organs and then what in outer nature corresponds to them and will work with spiritual power. Thus we introduce spirit as the healing agent into the human body. The physicians will learn how it is done in a given case. This will all build up for them into a complete knowledge. This living knowledge that they attain will be different from the current conventional knowledge. If today you open your pathology text or a medical textbook and study it thoroughly, at the end you are no further along than you were at the beginning. Granted, you have digested the entire contents, but even while you worked at it chapter after chapter, still you were making no progress in your general human attitude. It is the nature of real knowledge that it impels one to grow in one's entire human attitude.

If you take up medicine in this sense and as it was meant in this pastoral medicine course, you will advance step by step. And the result will be nothing less than that you can say to yourselves: Now that I have my medical training behind me, I understand all that transpired at the Mystery of Golgotha, up to the moment when Christ went through the gate of death. You will understand the passage of Christ from the Father to the death on Golgotha. That is the mystery. One may not believe at first that medicine is related to this mystery, but it is. It is so truly related that through your understanding of the processes of healing, you will grasp what happened in the cosmos when the Father sent the Son to undergo the death on Golgotha. You will see in the death on Golgotha not death but the working together of all that happened at the death. That was not a death but the overcoming of death and the healing of all mankind. That is the path of the physician, from Father to Son until the Son dies on Golgotha. All separate pieces of medical knowledge bring one a step further toward the final comprehension of this Mystery.

Pastoral medicine is not only what the pastor and the physician are to practice together, it is what is to be brought together so that first through the physician one part of the Mystery of Golgotha can be really understood. That is the high point, the ultimate achievement of medicine: to comprehend all human illness in such a way that one sees the Mystery of Golgotha up to the death as a tremendous healing process. The pathology of evolving humanity and the therapy, the dying on the cross—these will be seen in their true connection when we have real medicine.

The priest has to follow all that is experienced by human beings when they leave their body and enter the other world, the world of the spirit. Thereby priests become more and more aware of the relation of a human being to the Spirit, to the spiritus sanctus, the Holy Spirit. And their path is that of mediation between the Spirit and the Son, the Christ, of developing theology so it will find the way from Christ to the Spirit, from the Spirit to Christ. A great sum of knowledge and life experience can be acquired on this path along which one has to lead one's fellow humans from the Spirit to Christ, from Christ to the Spirit. Its highest service must be that the successive stages of theology are able to clarify the meaning of Christ's path after the death on Golgotha. For his going through the death on Golgotha was the great healing event. Then the question arises: what faculty does this healing event create in human beings that will help them to enter the spiritual world? Theology must have for its crowning endeavor the comprehension of what is happening to the Christ individuality since He went through the death on Golgotha.

Christ's path to Golgotha: the peak of the physician's path.
Christ's path after Golgotha: the peak of the priest's path.

For many contemporary theologians, the two paths seem to have no connection whatever. There are theologians today who do not want to know anything about the risen Spirit and the further activity of the Christ. But if we speak in the sense of a renewal of the mysteries, then the event of Golgotha, the Mystery of Golgotha belongs to it. And then we can say that the path by which the ancient initiate came to initiation could be described in this way: I was led through the elements to the lower and higher gods. The modern initiate would describe it as follows: I have been led through what dissolves the elements into their active processes—the elements are now the chemical elements, eighty of them, that dissolve when they enter into any process—and I am led further, to the Father below and the Spirit above. I perceive the activity of Christ on both paths.

If you would like to take a summary of this course with you for your esoteric study, then take these words:

I will follow the path
That dissolves the elements into activity,
And leads me down to the Father
Who sends illness to work out karma,
And leads me up to the Spirit
Who guides the erring soul toward freedom.
The Christ leads downward and upward,
Creating Spirit-Man in earth humanity
In harmonious union.

Ich werde gehen den Weg,
Der die Elemente in Geschehen löst
Und mich führt nach unten zum Vater
Der die Krankheit schickt zum Ausgleich des Karma
Und mich führt nach oben zum Geiste
Der die Seele in Irrtum zum Erwerb der Freiheit leitet
Christus führt nach unten und nach oben
Harmonisch Geistesmensch in Erdenmenschen zeugend.

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When you have become completely permeated by the content of this brief meditation, you will have taken livingly into your spirit what I wanted to give in this Pastoral Medicine course.

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Dear fellow sufferers!

After the kind words of the pastor, I have to be the interpreter for those hearts that have been lovingly received by the dear one who has passed away from us. First, I would like to address my dear, dear partner, dear father and dear children, and then all of you who are gathered here to accompany the earthly shell of our beloved friend to her final resting place.

It has been a short time since we walked the same path and promised the dear companion of the deceased to share her pain, to share the pain that we did not want to comfort her about, but rather promised her that we would share it.

And today we are in a position to have to try to keep the promise of sharing the increased, the magnified pain with our dear friend and with the others with whom the dear departed was so close. Over time, he has become ever closer and closer to us, drawing on the most profound human strengths, the strengths that we can come closest to with another human being, the best strengths of our spiritual striving.

This time, too, I would like to express nothing more with these words than I did when we stood at the grave of our dear child: that we want to bear, faithfully bear the pain that so justifiably follows the cover to the grave, that will last, but that must be borne bravely and courageously in the knowledge that from the spiritual worlds, where the human soul is received after death, space and time separate us, but that nothing separates us from the spiritual worlds when souls want to be connected to these spiritual worlds through the powers they carry within themselves and through which they can, in faithful connection with these worlds, triumph over space and time. We knew our friend Albert Faiss in such striving. Years ago he came into our midst, tested, severely tested by the outer life. It is fair to say that his lot was work, hard work and laborious striving. But when you got to know his soul, how it lived, how it looked out of those kind, faithful eyes so confidently, you saw that this soul had found support and security in itself, was able to bear heavy, laborious work and worries of life because it knew itself to be firmly on the secure ground of spiritual life.

The one we loved had to travel far away, and even in the far distance he did not find his goal and rest, but in his own heart, in his own soul, he found it. He found it, and we appreciated the strong cohesion of the striving that he developed in his soul, with our own striving. We appreciated what must be so infinitely valuable to us, my dear mourners.

If someone finds the connection with us that our friend Faiss found, it is because this connection is already prefigured in the eternal grounds, because he sought with us only what he always sought in his own soul. This also gave our friend that wonderfully beautiful, unified nature that those who came close to him could observe in him again and again.

He had chosen a profession that brought him into contact with nature. He had managed to make his profession, at least in his mind, into what every profession should be and what can be made of every profession from the security of the intellectual life. He managed to achieve higher aspirations within his profession. When he spoke in this way and wanted to penetrate the forces that the earth develops to produce food in his profession that could best serve humanity, when he inquired which plant was better suited for this or that human need, then one saw how he understood how to develop service to humanity out of his profession. It was a beautiful part of his nature that he never thought of pursuing his profession for personal reasons, but tried to make it into a service to humanity and thus into a form of worship. He tried to imbue human activity with the consciousness of divine activity.

That is our task, and our friend Albert Faiss devoted himself to this task with heartfelt dedication, with all the strength he had at his disposal. That which lived so in his soul, which he knew so lovingly and intimately to penetrate with his whole being, and everything that lived so in him, oh, that brought him the love, the intimate love of those who lived near him. We all know Frau Faiss, we know how she was united with the dear departed in intimate love and common striving, we appreciate the harmonious interaction of these two people, and since we know this, we will also find ways to share with her the pain for which there are hardly any words of comfort.

I can think of no better way to express the wonderful beauty with which the powers expressed in our friend's soul were able to acquire active love than to say a few words about the child who has fallen asleep.

When the father went to war and the mother was alone with the children, the dear departed child – the oldest of them – spoke as she worked faithfully by her mother's side: Now that father is gone, I must work especially hard to be a support to my mother. That is laborious love, such as is acquired by the noble powers of mind that the dear departed possessed. This child will now receive the soul of the departed friend in an appropriate way; they will work together in the spiritual world, and we should unite with them in the spirit that we believe we are grasping.

Strong are the thoughts of the dear ones who send them from the other side to those they have left behind; they expect us to direct our soul's gaze to them. We will often think about how the dead, the so-called dead, can know how the souls here look after them, how the souls here are united with them. So let us cultivate the loving service with the deceased in intimate, loyal friendship with those left behind, knowing that he was united with us in the same striving.

Yes, dear friend, dear soul, you knew how to walk the path of the spirit from your very nature. You did not take a step in your daily life here on earth without knowing that everything your eyesight embraces, your hands grasp, is given by God the Father, the eternal God, in all your earthly work. You knew that you were woven into the eternal of God.

And so was your work, dear friend, dear soul, that it had to seek for the knowledge that was appropriate to it, that it might be imbued with the essence that first gave meaning to the earth, with the essence of Christ. You knew that. And that is what you sought when you took your last earthly steps in this region, when you wanted to unfold your activity in harmony with our spiritual striving near the building through which we want to develop this spiritual striving.

So you sought in your own way to penetrate the eternal in you, already during your life on earth with that power that strives to grasp the meaning of the earth, and you sought to gain that knowledge which strives to gain the meaning of life on earth, which the Christ Jesus has given. In this way you knew that you were connected with your eternal, divine part in Christ Jesus himself, knew that you were interwoven with him. And so you also knew that you would one day die in Christ Jesus, and knew that you would carry the aspiration to live with the spirit, with which we are all united, through the gateway of death.

So you lived with God, lived with Christ, so you died in Christ and so your soul will be united with him and we may look up to you in spirit.

In this consciousness of being united with You, we often direct our thoughts to the realms in which Your soul is now active, for we believe that the dead are alive, alive with us, as they were in earthly life when they were still connected to us in the physical body. And we know that What we now feel for him is also interwoven here on earth with what flows down from the spiritual planes into which the dead have entered. United with Your powers, we know those powers, those soul powers, which are beyond space and time.

We give you this as a promise to stand faithfully by those you have left behind here, with whom we will try to bear their pain, looking up to you, who will receive from the soul of the dear child with whom we are united. In eternal spheres, not only in death, we feel united with you, and we may, full of this consciousness, call out to your soul: farewell, farewell in spirit, and let us, as far as we are able, live with you!

[The stenographer only recorded parts of this meeting.]

Rudolf Steiner: Tomorrow, we will need the candelabrum and the picture of Christ again for the ceremony. As you (turning to Friedrich Rittelmeyer) carry out the ceremony, you will also become immersed in it. Today, what was presented yesterday should be repeated so that you are immersed in it to begin with, and then I will be able to continue the ceremony. It is not to be completed today, but we will see that it can be taken a stage further. Tomorrow we will need: a censer, the two pictures of Christ, then the oil and the two water jugs with a tray and the chalice. We can form bread. We should have that tomorrow.

Today I will try to get everything out of my mind for the time being, and no one needs to think that the ceremony is not complete because some things that are connected to it are still missing. Dr. Rittelmeyer will figure out the rest. I already explained yesterday how the whole ceremony is to be thought. It is not possible – it has been weighing heavily on my mind – to perform the ordination in the simple way [suggested last year]; [we will perform it as] it has now been revealed from the spiritual world. And so I will carry out [the beginning] to a certain extent, and then Dr. Rittelmeyer can continue the ceremony under my assistance tomorrow.

The first thing will be for you to provide the vestments here; the first task is to consecrate the vestments themselves, so that they may appear suitable for the purpose for which they will serve. In this case, I will try to invoke the blessing upon them.

In the name of the Father of God, who is in us,
In the name of the Son of God, who works in us,
In the name of the Holy Ghost, who enlightens us:
The power that should be in all the work of those
who have dedicated themselves to the divine service here,
the power of Christ is symbolized by these robes.

Friedrich Rittelmeyer is now given his robe and alb, and Gerirud Spörri his vestment.

Now the first part of the Act of Consecration of Man is read [in the expanded form for priestly ordination, as had already been indicated the previous day. During this, Friedrich Ritielmeyer is given the stole. After that, he reads the Gospel of John 1:1-14.

Rudolf Steiner: Dear Friends! We have completed the first part of the consecration ritual. Since the consecration ritual will not be completed today, it will be possible to carry out the second part here in spirit without actually performing the ceremony, and this should now follow on from the first part. I am entitled to assume that a fully valid act will now be carried out.

[Rudolf Steiner now reads the offertory (see CW 343, page 416 ff.), combined with the words of the ordination (see the facsimile on page 100), during which Friedrich Rittelmeyer is given the surplice.]

Rudolf Steiner: Having spoken the word that gives strength, I empower you with the symbol of the reading of the Act of Consecration of Man.

[Rudolf Steiner hands the chasuble to Pastor Dr. Rittelmeyer. The following words are spoken three times: “The Father-God...”]

Rudolf Steiner: This completes the second part of the act of consecration. The person to be consecrated has thus received the power to read with full justification the part of the mass that has just been read up to this point. And tomorrow the consecration of the next of you will have to be done by the one who has just been consecrated, and the one who has just been consecrated will receive the completion of the consecration at the end of the sacrifice of the mass tomorrow. Then tomorrow he will perform the act of consecration, and the consecration of the shepherds of souls will gradually be carried out in stages.

The next step is to continue in such a way that transubstantiation is now celebrated, that after transubstantiation the Paternoster is prayed, and after praying the Paternoster, before Communion, the third part of the priestly ordination will be performed tomorrow on the newly ordained. But tomorrow we will first perform the further ordinations, and for each one the ordination will be completed in the same way. So after the one ordained today has received the ordination in full, he will in turn continue the ordination for the others, so that the complete ordination as a pastor of souls will be carried away by each of you from here.

That is what I wanted to do with you today. Now we will conclude the ceremony so that our dear Dr. Rittelmeyer can recover a little. Tomorrow at a quarter to three.

There follows the answering of a few questions by Rudolf Steiner.

— The person performing the consecration must wear the robe.

— The oil that has just been used can be stored in such a way that it remains for this purpose and is not used for anything else or even poured away.

— We can use ordinary bread. - A goblet could be used, a chalice-like glass, simple white glass, which is a bit wide at the bottom.

— Squeezing ripe grapes? An eighth of a liter may suffice. Only a few drops are needed. Ripe grapes are just right.

— It takes only one to be ordained, and he can pass on the ordination. Anyone ordained a priest can pass on the ordination.

— They must have the opportunity to perform the cult at all times.

— The ceremony performed after the prayer for the relay must be for each individual, as must the ceremony with anointing after the offertory.

— The act of consecration itself is inserted as often as there are candidates for ordination. The Mass is celebrated as far as the Gospel reading, then the sequence of actions following the Gospel as the actual act of consecration is performed in such a way that everyone reads the Gospel. The offertory is then completed, followed by the brief act of consecration with the anointing.

On the following pages, the words of the ordination are given in Rudolf Steiner's handwriting (reduced in size).

My dear friends! Today, we want to prepare ourselves for the coming together that we actually have to accomplish in the first days of our being together here, by letting the Act of Consecration of Man — as I would like to call the sacrifice of the Mass — take effect on us, even if today it is only by interpreting and hinting, because some things simply have to be explained.

It is indeed the case that this Act of Consecration of Man contains everything that should result from the soul shepherd's mood and the soul shepherd's connection with the spiritual world. In the Act of Consecration of Man, the Christian current also lives in perpetual and direct presence, and this current of Christian substance moves through this Act of Consecration of Man, so that this Act of Consecration of Man must actually stand at the center of Christian worship. So for now, we will let it take effect on us as such. From it, much will arise that may need to be added in a few words as a kind of commentary. But in the next few days, we will work to be able to perform a demonstration that is fully adequate for the Mass. So I will hint at what I cannot explain here.

Accompanied by his acolytes, the priest comes out from somewhere, where he has prepared himself in an appropriate manner, carrying the chalice, which he carries covered. The acolyte on the right carries the missal; the acolyte on the left carries a bell, with which he indicates by three rings that the Act of Consecration of Man will begin. The chalice is first placed on the altar, left covered. The priest descends the steps of the altar and says before the altar: “Let us worthily perform the Act of Consecration of Man from the Revelation of Christ, in worship of Christ, in devotion to the deed of Christ.

May the Father-God be in us
The Son-God create in us
The Spirit God enlightens us.

And turning around:

Christ in you.

The altar boy says:

And fill your spirit.

The priest:

May God the Father be in us
The Son of God create in us
The Spirit God enlightens us.

In the consciousness of our humanity, we feel the divine Father. He is in all that we are. Our substance is His substance. Our being is His being. He goes through everything in us through our existence.

In the experience of the Christ in our humanity, we feel the divine Son. He reigns as the Spirit-Word through the world. He creates in all that we create. Our being is His creating. Our life is His creating life. He creates through us in all soul-making.

In the grasping of the spirit by our humanity, we feel the healing God. May He shine as the Spirit-light through the world. May He shine in everything we behold. May our beholding be imbued with His Spirit-light. May our cognition be accepted by Him into His spiritually radiant life. May He spiritualize all the activity of our human soul. [Rudolf Steiner now reads the text of the gospel story (see GA 343, pages 414 f.) and the beginning of the gospel of John:]

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
This was in the beginning with God.
All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being that has come into being.
In this was life, and the life was the light of men.
And the light shone in the darkness, but the darkness did not comprehend it.
There came a man sent from God, whose name was John.
He came for a witness, to bear witness about the Light, so that through him all might believe.
He was not the light, but a witness to the light. For the true light that enlightens all men was coming into the world.
It was in the world, and the world was made through it, but the world did not recognize it.
But it came to individual people (it came to people with a sense of self), and these individual people (people with a sense of self) did not receive it.
But those who received it were able to reveal themselves as children of God through it.
Those who trusted in his name came into being not from blood, not from the will of the flesh, and not from human will, but from God.
And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only Son of the Father,) full of grace and truth.
John bears witness about him and clearly proclaims: This was he of whom I said, 'After me will come the one who has a higher rank than I, for he was before me. For we have all received out of his fullness, and grace upon grace has been bestowed upon us.
For the law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Christ.
God has never seen anyone with his eyes. The only begotten Son, who was in the bosom of the Father of the world, has become the guide in this beholding.

[Rudolf Steiner now reads the creed (see CW 343, p. 510) and then the text of the offertory, the consecration and the communion (see CW 343, pages 416, 464 and 471) and concludes:)

At the end, the opening epistle is repeated on the right side of the altar. Then:

The Act of Consecration of Man, that was it.

In the next few days, we will demonstrate and perform this act, which I have only hinted at, again in its entirety, as best we can. But it seems to me that from what has just been said, the spirit of this consecration can flow into your hearts, and that by living the spirit of this consecration in our hearts, we can accomplish in a worthy manner what we will have to accomplish in the coming days.

I note that in an original consecration service, a sermon was inserted at the point after the reading of the Gospel, before proceeding to the Creed. Today, the Catholic Church often separates this sermon from the sacrifice of the Mass and regards it as a separate entity. This is understandable, since in modern times preaching has taken on a more intellectual character, whereas in the original services of consecration, precisely at the point where the Christian gospel word, perceived as the word of God, was read, what was then preaching could be spoken in direct connection with this word. It was something that continually needed symbolic, pictorial clothing, something that was not merely shaped out of the subjective will and conviction of the preacher, but something that was felt to be released in the heart by the divine word of the Gospel and that could be given to the faithful as a kind of gift of the continuation of the Gospel word. One must only imagine how this human consecration ritual has emerged from ancient and most ancient cults and has found its way to the corresponding ritual for the flow of Christianity through the evolution of the earth. The further we go back in pre-Christian times, the more we find that the very place where cults of consecration took place was regarded as something that was set apart from the rest of the world, that was consecrated and hallowed in itself. Thus, when one was in this place, one felt as if it were a second world; even in the outer world, this still often resounds in those who have an inkling of such things. Goethe often speaks of the great and the small world. He does not mean a church by the “small world,” but since he had become a Freemason, he meant by the small world the Masonic lodge, and the great world is the universe for him. For it was clear to him that where a ritual act is performed, there is a world, and he calls it the “small world” because it is spatially small compared to the “big world”. Schiller meant something deeper when he made the statement:

Friends, you seek the sublime.
But the sublime does not dwell in space.

By this he meant that in the smaller space, in the “small world”, the sublime should be sought, independently of all external greatness, in the smaller world the greater world.

And so we can say: Since space was already considered sacred and hallowed, it was the case that the performance of the consecration cult was associated with the celebrants - who also placed the teaching brother, the preacher, before the faithful — felt themselves to be representatives here on earth, through whom the continuation of the word of God spoken in the Gospel could flow, in that they refrained from subjective formulation and endeavored to use such a formulation that expressed itself in symbols and images.

For our time, however, it will be entirely in harmony with the spiritual world if you hold a sermon proper alongside the Act of Consecration of Man and if this is inserted between the Gospel reading and the saying of the Creed, and if perhaps something more clothed in symbolic forms, according to the seasons, is spoken to the hearts and souls of the members of the community. This could be brief and calculated not so much to teach as to edify, as a continuation of the gospel word in the symbol.

Then, as the next step, I would like to say, as a preparatory step, that you imagine this human consecration ritual – which, in a sense, is being used by me in this way for the first time – as having been received directly from the spiritual world , whereas all those who have performed the consecrations so far have sought their authorization in the continuous succession within the Christian [church], so that those who have performed these consecrations have said to themselves: I have been ordained by one who was ordained by another, and so on through the centuries until the last one was ordained by one of the apostles, who himself followed the Christ. Apostolic continuity is, after all, what the celebrants in the churches invoke as justification for the Mass, that is, those who have performed the Mass until now. In the Catholic Church, this apostolic continuity has gradually become something that has taken on an external character. Therefore, in this day and age, it is possible for us to receive this authorization directly from the spiritual world, so that you can celebrate the Sacrifice of the Mass. And the fact that you can do this should be the focus of our efforts over the next few days.

You will have to create a substitute for the place of receiving the apostolic blessing in Christian tradition, so to speak, through the mood and the state of your soul. At the starting point of your new priestly work, you will have to be completely clear that your will and your feelings, and thus your thinking, which depends on your feelings and your will, are such that everything you accomplish as a pastor is to be accomplished in the name of the Christ, the Christ whom you recognize in the particular spirituality and spiritual worlds as they have been presented from the most diverse points of view within the anthroposophical movement. But above all, you must become aware of the Christ in the present, the Christ who, in the immediate present, sends his power into everything you accomplish in detail and who, above all, is present, really present, in the Act of Consecration of Man. If you did not have the awareness of the presence of Christ in the Act of Consecration of Man and of the meaning of this Act of Consecration of Man, and if you did not take the opportunity to bring about the direct presence of Christ, you would not perform this Act of Consecration of Man in the right spirit.

Now it will be a matter of my bringing a formula with me tomorrow that each of you will speak in the sense that by speaking this formula, you will then take it into your heart in such a way that it becomes, as it were, a that by realizing what is contained in the formula, he feels that he is spiritually part of this community, which you have resolved to be part of. This will constitute the first preparation for what for this group should be ordination to the priesthood, which should also be undertaken during this time. But it will be necessary for you first to feel united with the spiritual that must live in you through inwardly speaking such a formula if you are to live together in the right way in the community you have formed.

Then, however, it will be necessary for you to prepare this community in such a way that it has an authority that is taken for granted, so that when communities are formed, the pastor is not chosen by election, but rather that - even if the initiative to appoint a pastor comes from the community, this community turns to this newly founded original community of priests, which you are to be, so that a pastor may be sent to it, the community. Only in this way, that even if the initiative comes from the community, the soul shepherd is requested by the priestly community you have founded, only in this way is the meaning fully fulfilled, that this priestly community of yours carries the spiritual from spiritual worlds down to those who want to be members of the community.

It will then also be necessary that we — having, as it were, praised ourselves for what we want to be through the formula just mentioned — also establish a kind of hierarchy tomorrow among those who have initially dedicated themselves to this community. The serious event of Dr. Geyer's resignation has shaken what I believe was in harmony with the spiritual worlds: that Dr. Geyer, Dr. Rittelmeyer and Licentiate Bock should initially form this triumvirate, which should set the tone in a certain sense, because the fact of the matter is that such a center must be there. Of course, such a center cannot be created today with the same jurisdiction that similar communities in older times had endowed to a central power. But nevertheless, measures will be necessary that make the cohesion of this circle appear as serious as possible, so that once someone has decided to be in it, they do not simply leave again without the act of leaving being felt as a world fact and then also understood accordingly. Communities that aspire to form spiritual leadership and into which one can freely enter and leave as one pleases, carry within themselves the seed of their own destruction. That is a law of the spiritual world. It is a law of the spiritual world that the decision to enter such a community within one earth life should be so strong that one cannot take an equally strong one a second time. This should indicate the intensity of the idea that must underlie the matter. Therefore, arbitrary entry and exit cannot belong to the real development of this community. Although I am thoroughly convinced that each of you has carefully considered in your soul what your attitude to this community should be, I would still like us to reflect on the question of whether you really want to belong to it, and to discuss it with your soul before tomorrow.

Then tomorrow we will also be able to resolve the question of how we organize the central power, since there cannot be two of them after all. That is a spiritual impossibility. There is no true collaboration of wills when there are two. There can be one, as has been established in the Catholic Church by the dogma of infallibility; but then the connection with the spiritual world is very often lost when external impulses of command are joined by that which is supposed to be connected with the spiritual world. The two are too balanced and do not produce any results, even if this is not always consciously perceived. This is based on a spiritual law. So there must be three. And at this moment we are indeed in a position to look for the third one from the circle. But how we will do this will perhaps only become clear to us tomorrow. For the matter of course was a different one before the matter had progressed as far as it has now; at that time this triad had emerged as a matter of course. Now Dr. Geyer's resignation must be regarded as an extraordinarily serious event, and it forces us to clarify the question of the central orientation tomorrow. I will try to bring you suggestions for this matter, which I believe is in line with the leading spiritual powers, whose leadership we must indeed maintain if what you are founding as a community is to flourish. And in accordance with these leading spiritual powers, who want a new Christian community and implore their blessing, we want to arrange all our further steps.

In the last essay, I shared how I became familiar with the German Christmas plays that are performed every year at the Goetheanum in Dornach. These performances depict scenes that were shared by Karl Julius Schröer. Only in one instance this year did I try to act against the principle by making a small addition to bring something orally or in writing into the tradition. Something particularly characteristic of these plays was that the players, before presenting the content of what was being depicted, already stepped before their audience as a kind of choir. This choral element also occurs at many points in the plays, interrupting the progress of the action. In the traditional “Song of the Stars”, which preceded the performance of the “Birth of Christ Play”, an introductory chorus has been preserved in which the players greet everything they would like to relate to before they begin the performance. They greet everything that is close to their hearts at this important moment: from the Holy Trinity, to the individual categories of the audience, to the “little twigs” of their star, which the caroler carries. It is now certain to me that such an introductory chorus originally also preceded the first of the plays, the “Paradise Play,” and that it was very similar in form to the Star Song of the “Birth of Christ Play.” I have now ventured to try to provide such an introductory chorus before the Paradise Play as well, because I believe that, in doing so, I am acting in the spirit of tradition and recreating something that was approximately present, even if the oral and written tradition has lost it. The sentiments of the “Star Song” for the Nativity Play must be found there, somewhat differently.

I love my singing, come here friends,
Today is a day of great joy and celebration;
There sits before me this whole, lonely month,
Which I long to hear my singing with.
So gather round me in a circle;
You shall drive the people away with singing.
My dear ones, my singing, make eyes at me,
So that you may interpret the people well,
And see that singing is good for everyone,
And a heartfelt and strong voice.
But first we want to greet everyone,
Who has found their way into this hall today.
We greet God the Father on his highest throne;
And we greet his only Son;
We greet the Holy Ghost as well,
Who shows us the true way to follow;
And we greet the Holy Trinity:
The Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost in unity.
We greet Adam and Eve in the Garden,
In which we would all like to be today. And we greet all the animals and birds as much as we are in paradise. And we greet very gently the wonderfully large and loud birds; we greet the whole firmament, That the dear Lord has placed at the end of the world.
We greet the officials of the firmament;
We greet the master today as always.
We greet the spiritual Lord,
Without whom we may have to learn.
We greet the Lord, his feast
With all his complaints for the best;
For the Lord has provided
What he so enjoys so much. —
And now, my dear ones, sing along,
In the middle of it all, a tree stands;
From that, a person must not eat,
When he wants to harvest the right thing:
The tree should be greeted,
And all the fruits that hang on it.
Eve, the wicked one, who ate of it,
And Adam, the foolish man.
They were cast out by God;
We want to hear it said.
We don't want to greet the devil,
From whom our dear God protects us;
We want to pull on his tail,
And rip out all his hair. —
My dear ones, you have all heard my singing,
What it once did for them in paradise.
Now we greet our teacher well
And greet the good Muot,
With whom we can sing in our groves
Without many beats. —
So, my dear singers have heard
Where an old friend of ours is celebrating.

My dear venerated guests! As an introduction I have been obliged to refer to a notice in the newspaper which has just been handed to me; a notice in “Christian World,” a publication I don't know and obviously have not thought about. In this notice it says: “From 5 to 12 March an Anthroposophic University Course will take place in Berlin. The day for theologians is Friday the 10th. This event on Friday is now an unequivocal challenge of Steiner and his followers to the theologians ...” and so on.

Now, my dear friends, this event may be anything; what it certainly isn't, even if it was believed to be, it would be misunderstood in the most profound sense, if it is regarded as a challenge to the theologians. I myself would not be involved in any other way than having been asked to cooperate through lectures and introductory observations in this university course which didn't come out of my initiative. I'm least involved in today's event (which is an insertion into this program item of the course) by thinking that what we were dealing with today could be understood as an “unequivocal challenge of today's theologians.”

Thus, you will also allow, my dear friends, that not all sorts of misunderstandings will again be linked to what I have to say in a few introductory words today. I want to limit myself to a theme: The relationship of Anthroposophy to Theology. I want no new misunderstandings to arise; I will renounce some of them in my presentation because otherwise I would have to once again find my intention misjudged.

Dear friends, it has never been my purpose—forgive me if I'm forced by this challenge given to me by shortly mentioning some personal details—it has never actually been my intention to challenge theology and from their starting point Anthroposophy had, insofar as it presents a work sphere in which I participate as well, never attempted to set them apart within the work, with today's theology. This has happened so far, and really from me it has happened as little as possible, but unfortunately it has resulted that many attacks against anthroposophy from the side of theology have taken place, and sometimes people—not me particularly but others—defends themselves. Anthroposophy wants to remain thoroughly neutral in its working sphere, I'd like to say, it wants to work out of present day spiritual science.

Towards the end of the previous century one had a certain scientific direction, certain scientific methods, an attitude and method, out of the foundation of which we have already spoken and which can't be spoken about more extensively, established a method and attitude which people apply to the entire development of recent times and particularly apply to scientific research. Through this natural scientific research the greatest possible triumphs—I don't mean in a trivial but in a deeper sense—have come to human progress and human well-being. During this time natural scientific research stands in a somewhat puzzled manner towards philosophy. Philosophy had to separate itself from those methods which are applied to natural science; the difference of a factual sphere made scientific methods inapplicable in philosophy.

People were not always, one could call it, theoretically and epistemologically clear in what sense the scientific methods or philosophic methods had to apply. Practice lapsed into experimental philosophy in certain areas where it was more or less apparent or more or less really worked, but the uncertainty is basically there as well. By contrast Anthroposophy worked out of the most varied foundations towards its own working methods. On the one hand it wants to take into account what can be achieved in modern thinking and research methods of science, and on the other hand the human needs for the spiritual world and its knowledge. The human being is confronted on the one hand with the fact of fully recognising scientific methods, and in relation to the treatment of the scientific field—I have already mentioned this—I am today as much a student of Haeckel as I was in the 1890's; not in the sense of scientific methodology not to be developed further and not as if, from the side of science Heackel's writings should not be applied, but it comes down to quite a different area being discussed. In the treatment of the purely natural world I'm as much in agreement with Haeckel as at that time. It deals more with the experience of natural scientific observations through which one is educated in scientific precision, in a natural scientific sense which can result in the creation of ideas and concepts, which are needed for working scientifically. This then holds true for all observations in the world—due to our limited time now, I can't give you proof of this. This remains a truth: for all outer sensory observations this sentence is valid: “there is nothing in the mind which wasn't previously in the senses”—certainly on the other hand, Leibniz's statement applies: “Except in the mind itself.”

In the experience of the mind, that means in the weaving of the soul through the mind's categories where ideas are experienced in objects of nature, the examination of facts of nature which need a formulation of natural laws, in which experience of the world of ideas live, there is something which goes beyond the mere sensory experiences, so that when a natural scientific researcher confronts natural science, he must say to himself, if he is sufficiently unprejudiced: everything in the mind must be created out of the senses, only the mind itself can't be created out of the senses.

Once you have understood this in a lively manner then there is no obstacle to now observe what inwardly to some extent can be looked at in the pursuit of the expansion of the mind's categories through an inner soul-spiritual process, through such a process which is inwardly quite similar to the outer growth processes seen in the plant and animal. One remains always true to one's conviction of natural development when one admits that out of the seedling, if you have an inner image of it, you gain a truth which is that the mind itself can't be created out of the sense world. One remains true to that which is learnt from natural existence when you make an attempt to observe the human mind as a seedling which can grow within. When you make this attempt in earnest then the rest is a direct result of what I've suggested here and in other places, of the growth of human intellect in Imagination, Inspiration and Intuition. This is simply a fact for further progress in inner human development. Through this the result is a true observation of the spiritual world. This observation of the spiritual world Anthroposophy tries to clothe, as well as possible, in words of today's language use. Naturally one is often forced that what one is observing—I admit this without further ado—is clothed inadequately in words from the simple basis that speech, as in all modern languages, in the course of the last centuries adapted to the outer material world outlook and today we have the experience, which we have with words, of already being more or less orientated to this world outlook.

As a result, we always struggle with words if we need to dress in words what we have observed through Imagination, Inspiration and Intuition in such a way that it can really be proven again through the ordinary, healthy human mind, because this must also be a goal for Anthroposophical research.

So Anthroposophy was simply a field of work and as such a field of work it has become, in the strictest sense of the word, conceived by me. Those individuals—and they make a very small circle—who have the need to hear about such research methods in the supersensible world, will be told and shown what can be discovered in this way. Nobody in this Movement will be forced in any way to participate in something other than through their own free will. What is said about this, that some or other suggestive means is applied, with one person it is a conscious and with another it is an unconscious defamation of what is really striven for in the Anthroposophic Movement. It is true that whoever thinks it over with a healthy mind, what is researched in Imagination, Inspiration and Intuition, in his higher senses becomes a more free person than any other people living in the present. His contemporaries for instance follow currents in parties and are influenced by all kinds of suggestions. From this inner soul dependency Anthroposophy must free people, because it claims that everyone, who wants to live into it, will not merely become immobilised in simple passive thinking, but that this thinking will make them inwardly mobile and powerful, and this empowered thinking makes a person more free.

For reasons, into which I don't want to enter today, it happened that from the scientifically orientated people on which Anthroposophy actually depend, in the beginning only very few drew closer to Anthroposophy. Today we have really made a start. Those people who first entered into the Anthroposophical Movement—with more or less naive minds with strong soul needs—they were never told anything other than what could be found in a conscientious way within anthroposophic research. I'm always delighted when things are said to me, for example by one of those present here today, a very honourable personality: ‘It is actually remarkable that you even get a large audience, because you avoid actually talking in the way which is considered popular, which we call understandable. You speak in such a way that people actually always have to do work to listen and this people don't want these days, so one must actually wonder how you still manage to find such a large audience.’—These are what the words sound like, which I've heard for years and now a seated person here has also said them, after they had heard a course of my lectures at that time. For popularity I have never striven because I have the validity of Anthroposophy which I want to bring to the world.

Now it is extraordinary that people from all kinds of circles of life and circles of commitment have come. Because Anthroposophy came their way simply through their work in a certain relationship to religious streams of the present, it actually never came into conflict with religious needs of people who came to it: to people, like I said, from all walks of life. For instance, I have often been asked by Catholics who find themselves in our midst whether in connection with religious practice it would be possible to remain Catholics when they also take part in the Anthroposophical Movement.

With Catholics I must say: Obviously it is possible for a good Catholic to take part in what Anthroposophy has to offer because Anthroposophy is there, not to limit the knowledge which speaks about the supersensible world, but it forms a foundation on which supersensible research can be done. This is my preference, that what comes out of the supersensible world is spoken about without entering into any kind of polemic. Someone who honestly says what he sees, knows how polemic comes about and how unfruitful that really is. My original striving was simply to honestly say what is found through Anthroposophy and to exclude any polemic considerations. Things don't always happen this way in life. Still, within the Anthroposophical Movement people of all faiths are found together, and so I would like to say that Catholics may obviously take part in the Anthroposophic Movement, but it will only come into one single point of conflict in the practical religious exercises and that is the audible confession. Not on the basis of it being an audible confession because that could be considered as a matter of conscience. I have found enough protestant clergymen who have gloated over a kind of confession in order to develop an intimate relationship with the congregation. One can have various opinions regarding this. However, here the point is that the Catholic Church denies the altar sacrament to anyone who has not made an audible confession before it. Due to this impediment, taking part practically in the most important Catholic church sacrament is difficult because those beliefs which are gained from the supersensible world need to be combined with this behaviour which is not freely done but which have nevertheless to be adhered to in the Roman Catholic Church constitution. The audible confession, as it is handled, tears the Catholic away from freely following the supersensible world, not because of Anthroposophy but because of the Roman Catholic Church constitution.

This could be avoided if confession could be avoided. One can't avoid it because otherwise one can't participate in the communion service. Still you can find many Catholics who search within the Anthroposophical Movement to satisfy their soul needs.

My dear friends, it is of course natural that people of all beliefs come to Anthroposophy, it is natural that simply in our time a strong need has developed to express what Christianity is about within the Anthroposophical Society. Now I would like to say the following. Just as with all other phenomena of research, in as far as the phenomena of the supersensible and sensible world flow together, just so Anthroposophy regards the content of Christology; it likewise tries to help with research into the supersensible regarding the content of Christology, help which can be acquired through anthroposophical methods. Now it is difficult to say in only a few words what characterises the position of Anthroposophy regarding Christology, but I would like to say the following.

We observe people in earthly life between birth and death where they have their soul and spirit life in their physical being, that they are bound to their physical body in relation to what they observe and process whatever is presented to them in their environment, also in relation to work itself, in relation to their life of will and finally in the way in which they place themselves in the sensory physical world. When a person looks back at when he wakes up, naturally in his surroundings, he firstly finds perceptions possible through the senses of his body, through his mind, and all of these experiences and observations of his environment he experiences as combined.

However, because his mind, intellect and ancient spirituality are carried within his own spirit, so he can—if he only thinks enough about himself, if he only looks away from the environment and looks at himself—not deny that through his own activity he comes to the conclusion culminating in a concept which only has spiritual content and that this spiritual content—if I may express it this way—is the Father-godly imagination. Here anthroposophical research must be of help with its methods. I can only briefly characterise this. It makes the entire human cognitive work process clear—this will also emerge out of the lectures in this course. It also wants to point to what happens through people when they try to turn their gaze away from the outer world, in order to gradually observe their own past actions and ask themselves: What have you actually done? What justifies you at all to make an imagination of the outer world?—By researching this experience far enough a person—when I may use this expression again—comes to a Father-godly experience. Whoever examines this divine godly-Father experience through Anthroposophy, arrives at quite a definite judgement. I ask that this judgement, which is a fact, which I speak about radically, should not be misunderstood.

A person arrives at this verdict, a person who is totally healthy—totally in full health in his physical body—comes to this godly Father experience, this means that whoever doesn't arrive at this godly-Father experience carries some or another degenerative symptom, even if hidden. In other words, through Anthroposophical research you can say: To not come to a Father-godly experience indicates some human illness. That is of course radical to say because illness is ordinarily seen through physical means because—if I might say so—it dwells in the subtleties of the human organisation. In fact, it is clear to those who research through Anthroposophy: Atheism is illness.

What I've said yesterday about the development of opinions, right or wrong, this is particularly important here. If a person follows only this route then he will come to a Father-godly experience. When he then goes further in this way, if he becomes aware what shortcomings live in his soul, if he only comes to this Father-god experience, he becomes aware that basically in the limitation of modern humanity leaning towards intellectualism there also lies a kind of limitation of this godly-Father experience, then he will realise he must go further with this godly-Father experience. Here outer observations can support this easily.

It is an extraordinary fact that in western countries where natural science has grown to its maximum intensity and where this scientific attitude doesn't want to enter into discussing the supersensible but that religion must remain preserved, that just in these religious movements of western countries the spirit of the Old Testament has particularly and successfully intervened even in our modern time. We see how in the west, when Christianity is outwardly accepted and preached that it is done totally in the spirit of the Old Testament; in a certain sense Christianity reshapes the Father-god and doesn't discern a difference between the Father-god and Christ.

In the (European) east by contrast, where people's minds don't see the division between religion and science as sharply as in the west; in the east where this bridge for the human soul more or less exists as an elementary inner soul experience—we find that for example in the presentations of the great philosopher Vladimir Soloviev—how the Christ experience, as an independent experience, exists beside the Father experience.

In this way one can say to oneself: indeed, a completely healthy person can't be an atheist if he combines everything around him in the outer world into the culmination of a God-imagination, which he must give a spiritual content; yet he remains with only a Father-imagination. With this Father-imagination one doesn't arrive at a summary of outer natural phenomena, it fails immediately when applied to one's own human development; one is then, as it were, abandoned. By deepening this inner development from this point at which one has arrived, having taken up the outer world into one's soul—then by following this inner development one will, if by open-mindedly pursuing it, come to a Christ experience, which is initially present as an indefinite inner experience. This experience continues to be recognised by Anthroposophy. A person, simply through honest observation of the human evolution on earth, comes to seeing before his own eyes, the Mystery of Golgotha, the historic Mystery of Golgotha. He arrives here through the inner development of spiritual organs which direct him to Imagination, Inspiration and Intuition. If one with the help of these research means pursues the way human development went from antiquity to the Mystery of Golgotha, then one finds that everywhere in religious imagination—not only in the Old Testament religious imagination—lived a gravitation to the coming of the Christ-Spirit.

Then one can simply through observation, learn to recognise how the Christ-Spirit was not united with the earth in the time before the Mystery of Golgotha. By pursuing all of this which was sought for in the mysteries, was popular in pre-Christian religions, then we see how the images they made of their gods, finally all melt together into what the Christ-Imagination is. We see how the minds of people all over the world are lifted to the supernatural when they turn to their gods in their souls. We see how the point of origin for earthly mankind's development was simply more given through the human organisation than what was perceived through the senses or the mind in what could be observed in his surroundings. It entered into the human soul—most strongly in ancient times, and then less and less—what I would call instinctive perception—not earthly—of the world, to which the human being felt he belonged. In the moment when a person, through the mysteries or through popular religion, is brought to where he can lift his soul into seeing extra-terrestrially, and with which he knows he is united in his deepest being, at this moment a person experiences a rebirth within himself.

Now my dear friends, when we follow human evolution from an Anthroposophic point of view up to the Mystery of Golgotha, it shows that these abilities, which dwelt within human beings, actually diminished gradually and were no longer there the moment the Mystery of Golgotha took place on the earth. Certainly there can be remnants, for evolution doesn't take place in leaps. Individuals preserved, though perhaps inaccurately but still instinctively, an awareness of what had once been seen; this can be pursued in art. Then the Mystery of Golgotha took place on earth. In the Mystery of Golgotha Anthroposophy sees the streaming in of that spirit which previously could only be searched for in the extra-terrestrial: the in streaming of the Christ into the human body of Jesus. How this can individually be imagined, can only be discussed with those who have engaged positively in these fields of research. Here Anthroposophy shows how from that time onwards, from the time of the Mystery of Golgotha, another time has begun on earth, a time about which all the old religious knowledge confessed about. The Christ who went through the Mystery of Golgotha, the Christ who Paul saw on the way to Damascus, the Christ then remained within in the earth with humanity. This is what these words want to say: “I am with you every day until the end of the world.” He lives among us, He can be found again. The Paul experience can, with certain preparation, be renewed time and time again. Then, if Christ is searched for in this way, a person—by looking at his own inner development—just as since the Mystery of Golgotha happened on earth—can see Christ walking; he discovers Christ in his inner life in the same way as when in the outer world—if he is not ill with atheism—he found the Father-god.

Thus, I can only fleetingly, in a sketch, indicate how Anthroposophy through real research of the Christ event, can arrive at an inner objective fact. With all possible detail Anthroposophy tries to present the Christ event as the most important fact of the earthly life of humanity, as something which happened objectively. For this reason, the entire spirit through which the Christ event is presented in Anthroposophy is done in such a way that this event can be absorbed simply as fact. We have within the anthroposophic movement experienced that for example Jewish confessors found themselves in the most genuine, truest and honest sense in recognising the Mystery of Golgotha. With this, my dear friends, the Anthroposophical Movement has already anticipated what after all must enter into human evolution: through directly pointing to what can be seen in the Mystery of Golgotha, how the way to Christianity can be found again.

There is always a question whether there isn't yet a deep meaning in the book by Overbeck, a friend of Friedrich Nietzsche, that modern theology is no longer Christian. If this is legitimate then one could even, perhaps with a certain right, say: Anthroposophy is suitable for directing people in a lively way to the Christ experience. It states that during the time in which the Christ event took place there still existed an instinctive insight among some individuals, so that the spiritual foundation, or I might call it, the spiritual substantiality of the Mystery of Golgotha could be seen and acknowledged in the first Christian centuries. We then see how this diminished gradually; we see it completely fade in the figure of Scotus Erigena, we see medieval theology spreading where the attempt was being made to separate itself from what modern humanity had to develop in the intellect, that which, when it is left to the person who no longer develops inwardly, he becomes incapable of accessing the supersensible worlds. It split what wanted to enter into the human soul into what was recognisable by the intellect, and what people could not attain themselves, except through a revelation.

On this basis one can understand the entire medieval theology, especially Thomistic theology which was considered by Catholicism as the only authority. Today something can be said about this. What Anthroposophy was and is, is nothing other than simply to express what exists and is available through spiritual observation.

As Anthroposophy comes to the proposition that atheism is actually a hidden illness, it arrives at a second proposition: Not finding the Christ, not finding a relationship with the Christ is destiny for humanity, is the fate of misfortune. Atheism is an illness, not finding the Christ is the fate of misfortune because one can find Him in an inward experience. Then He positions Himself there as that Being who has gone through the Mystery of Golgotha. One can only discover Christ through one's inner life; one doesn't need anthroposophical research to be a religious person in the Christian sense. Then again, when one has come to Christ, one becomes a member of the spiritual world and one can really speak about a resurrection of the human being in the spiritual world, because the person who fails to find Christ in regard to his world view, is restricted. Atheism is an illness! Not coming to Christ is a destiny, not reaching the spirit is soul obtuseness!

Now, my dear friends, Anthroposophy relates from such foundations basically only to religion (and not theology) and to religion only in as far as people who have religious needs and who are unable to fulfil them through current declarations, approach Anthroposophy. Anthroposophy will only do what is necessary within the needs of today, and that which others fail to do. What ethos is at this basis—I have to always characterise this again—you can find from the following.

Some years ago, I once held a lecture in a southern German town—at that time it was a German town but it no longer is—a lecture entitled “Bible and Wisdom”. Two Catholic priests were present at the lecture. After the lecture they both approached me and said: “We actually haven't found anything in your lecture which could be challenged from a Catholic point of view.”

I answered: “If only I could always be so lucky!”

To this they both replied: “Yes, but we noticed something, it is not what you say but it is the manner and way how you present it. We must add that you speak to people who are prepared in a certain way. You lecture to a kind of congregation who have a certain education; we, however, speak to all people.”

I said: “Reverend, it doesn't come down to how our subjective experiences decide, but it comes down to us living into our work in evolution, that we don't imagine we speak for all people but that we answer such a question according to what objectively lives in the evolution of humanity. So, I can imagine I speak for all people—and could be very mistaken—you can imagine that. It is very good for enthusiasm to have such an imagination. Still, ask yourselves for once: do all people who have the need to hear something about Christ all come to church?”

Both of them couldn't say yes because naturally they knew that a lot of people who search for a way to Christ, do not come to the church.

So I said: “You see, for those who don't come to you and still search for a way to Christ, it is for those I speak.”

This means finding your task in the evolution of time, and not to imagine you speak for everyone, but to ask: are there minds out there who want to accept this or that in a special way?

Anthroposophy never turns to any other mindset, like to some or other religious confession.

When we, in the Waldorf School, manage to apply teaching in a practical way out of Anthroposophy we still completely avoid making the Waldorf School a school which will splice Anthroposophy into the heads of the children. With regards to religious instruction, we leave the Catholic children to be instructed by a catholic priest and the evangelists by an evangelist priest. Only for the dissident children there is a freer kind of religious instruction, but in the thorough Christian sense. We don't introduce abstract Anthroposophy—also no concrete anthroposophy which is presented to grown-ups—but we try with all our good intensions to bring to the children what is suitable to the stage of their development; all of that must first be searched for and determined according to the content and method. Through those of us who have given free religious instruction, we have managed to bring those children who have no religious instruction as such, towards Christianity and they come in droves to take part in this kind of religious instruction. Never have we preached some or other kind of religious propaganda within the Anthroposophical Movement and even less would Anthroposophy embark on something against single theological systems. With this in mind, anthroposophy can only apply itself to finding differences in separate theological systems in order to understand them and not to oppose them. Thus, I've always regarded it to be my task when I speak to people who have come to Anthroposophy: to make it understandable why Catholicism has become Catholic, Protestants Protestant, Judaism Jewish and Buddhism Buddhistic and how all of them—I believe that is a Christian concept—have within them a Being who through their destiny will let them experience the true Christ.

So it is not possible, if attacks have not originated from the other side, to start a struggle between Anthroposophy and theology, and also today I want to utter these words, while it has been asked for from those who organised today's theologian's day. The only task of Anthroposophy is the pronouncement of anthroposophic research results about the supersensible worlds. This is why I have always been reticent in particular regarding attacks originating from the theological side.

Anthroposophy doesn't want to act as a fighter on the scene but to satisfy the legitimate demands of human soul needs of the time. Everyone who in this sense wants to work together with Anthroposophy and wants to bring to the surface the fulfilment of legitimate, soul foundations of human soul needs, everyone who wants to work with her in this sense, is welcome!